These two figures give the finishing touch to the picture that lies
beyond us as we look from the sheltered corner of the camp, and
strangely enough, though old Opie is not of the direct line and has
never lived in this part of New England before, he goes about with a
sort of half-reminiscent air, as if picking up a clew long lost, while
Dave, the hound, at once assumed proprietary rights and shows an uncanny
wisdom about the well-nigh fenceless boundaries. After his master has
gone to bed, Dave will often come over to visit us, after the calm
fashion of a neighbour who esteems it a duty. At least that was his
attitude at first; but after a while, when I had told him what a fine,
melancholy face he had, that it was a mistake not to have christened him
Hamlet, and that altogether he was a good fellow, following up the
conversation with a comforting plate of meat scraps (Opie being
evidently a vegetarian), Dave began to develop a more youthful
disposition. A week ago Bart's long-promised, red setter pup arrived, a
spirit of mischief on four clumsy legs. Hardly had I taken him from his
box (I wished to be the one to "first foot" him from captivity into the
family, for that is a courtesy a dog never forgets) when we saw that
Dave was sitting just outside the doorless threshold watching solemnly.

The puppy, with a gleeful bark, licked the veteran on the nose, whereat
the expression of his face changed from one of uncertainty to a smile of
indulgent if mature pleasure, and now he takes his young friend on a
daily ramble down the pasture through the bit of marshy ground to the
river, always bringing him back within a reasonable length of time, with
an air of pride. Evidently the hound was lonely.

_The Man from Everywhere_, who prowls about even more than usual, using
Bart's den for his own meanwhile, says that the setter will be ruined,
for the hound will be sure to trail him on fox and rabbit, and that in
consequence he will never after keep true to birds, but somehow we do
not care, this dog-friendship between the stranger and the pup is so
interesting.

By the way, we have financially persuaded Opie to leave his straggling
meadow, that carpets our vista to the river, for a wild garden this
summer, instead of selling it as "standing grass," which the purchasers
had usually mown carelessly and tossed into poor-grade hay, giving a
pittance in exchange that went for taxes.

So many flowers and vines have sprung up under s