rd busily knocking out the corn of the last
bountiful harvest. Our old friend--a Friend--for though you, dear
reader, do not know him, he was both at the time we speak of--our old
friend, again trudging on, would pause on the brow of a hill, at a
stile, or on some rustic bridge, casting its little obliging arch over a
brooklet, and inhale the fresh autumnal air; and after looking round
him, nod to himself, as if to say, "Ay, all good, all beautiful!" and so
he went on again. But it would not be long before he would be arrested
again by clusters of rich, jetty blackberries, hanging from some old
hawthorn hedge; or by clusters of nuts, hanging by the wayside, through
the copse. In all these natural beauties our old wayfarer seemed to have
the enjoyment of a child. Blackberries went into his mouth, and nuts
into his pockets; and so, with a quiet, inquiring, and thoughtful, yet
thoughtfully cheerful look, the good old man went on.

He seemed bound for a long walk, and yet to be in no hurry. In one place
he stopped to talk to a very old laborer, who was clearing out a ditch;
and if you had been near, you would have heard that their discourse was
of the past days, and the changes in that part of the country, which the
old laborer thought were very much for the worse. And worse they were
for him: for formerly he was young and full of life; and now he was old
and nearly empty of life. Then he was buoyant, sang songs, made love,
went to wakes and merry-makings; now his wooing days, and his marrying
days, and his married days were over. His good old dame, who in those
young, buxom days was a round-faced, rosy, plump, and light-hearted
damsel, was dead, and his children were married, and had enough to do.
In those days, the poor fellow was strong and lusty, had no fear and no
care; in these, he was weak and tottering; had been pulled and harassed
a thousand ways; and was left, as he said, like an old dry kex--_i.e._ a
hemlock or cow-parsnip stalk, hollow and dry, to be knocked down and
trodden into the dust some day.

Yes, sure enough, those past days _were_ much better days than these
days were to him. No comparison. But Mr. John Basford, our old wanderer,
was taking a more cheerful view of things, and telling the nearly
worn-out laborer, that when the night came there followed morning, and
that the next would be a heavenly morning, shining on hills of glory,
on waters of life, on cities of the blest, where no sun rose, and no su