form stood on a bare spot of
ground, from which the trees all stood back, as if to mark their
disapproval of the railway and all that belonged to it. The sandy soil
made little attempt to produce vegetation, but put out little humps of
rock occasionally, to show what it could do. Behind, a road led off into
the woods, hiding itself behind the low-hanging branches of chestnut and
maple, ash and linden trees. That was all. Now that the train was gone,
the silence was unbroken save by the impatient movements of the old
white mare as she shook the flies off and rattled the jingling harness.

Hilda was too weary to think. She had slept little the night before, and
the suddenness of the recent changes confused her mind and made her feel
as if she were some one else, and not herself at all. She sat patiently,
counting half-unconsciously each quiver of Nancy's ears. But now Dame
Hartley came bustling back with the station-master, and between the two,
Hilda's trunk was hoisted into the cart. Then the good woman climbed in
over the wheel, settled her ample person on the seat and gathered up the
reins, while the station-master stood smoothing the mare's mane, ready
for a parting word of friendly gossip.

"Jacob pooty smart!" he asked, brushing a fly from Nancy's shoulder.

"Only middling," was the reply. "He had a touch o' rheumatiz, that last
spell of wet weather, and it seems to hang on, kind of. Ketches him in
the joints and the small of his back if he rises up suddin."

"I know! I know!" replied the station-master, with eager interest. "Jest
like my spells ketches me; on'y I have it powerful bad acrost my
shoulders, too. I been kerryin' a potato in my pocket f'r over and above
a week now, and I'm in hopes 't'll cure me."

"A potato in your pocket!" exclaimed Dame Hartley. "Reuel Slocum! what
_do_ you mean?"

"Sounds curus, don't it?" returned Mr. Slocum. "But it's a fact that
it's a great cure for rheumatiz. A grea-at cure! Why, there's Barzillay
Smith, over to Peat's Corner, has kerried a potato in his pocket for
five years,--not the same potato, y' know; changes 'em when they begin
to sprout,--and he hesn't hed a touch o' rheumatism all that time. Not a
touch! tol' me so himself."

"Had he ever hed it before?" asked Dame Hartley.

"I d'no as he hed," said Mr. Slocum, "But his father hed; an' his
granf'ther before him. So ye see--"

But here Hilda uttered a long sigh of weariness and impatience; and Dame
Hartley, wi