ce of those
who had shared its benefactions.

I count this one of the great events of my youth. But there was a
greater one, although it seemed not so at the time of it. A traveler on
the road to Ballybeen had dropped his pocketbook containing a large
amount of money--two thousand seven hundred dollars was the sum, if I
remember rightly. He was a man who, being justly suspicious of the
banks, had withdrawn his money. Posters announced the loss and the offer
of a large reward. The village was profoundly stirred by them. Searching
parties went up the road stirring its dust and groping in its grass and
briers for the great prize which was supposed to be lying there. It was
said, however, that the quest had been unsuccessful. So the lost
pocketbook became a treasured mystery of the village and of all the
hills and valleys toward Ballybeen--a topic of old wives and gabbing
husbands at the fireside for unnumbered years.

By and by the fall term of school ended. Uncle Peabody came down to get
me the day before Christmas. I had enjoyed my work and my life at the
Hackets', on the whole, but I was glad to be going home again. My uncle
was in high spirits and there were many packages in the sleigh.

"A merry Christmas to ye both an' may the Lord love ye!" said Mr. Hacket
as he bade us good-by. "Every day our thoughts will be going up the
hills to your house."

As he was tucking the blankets around my feet old Nick Tubbs came
zigzagging up the road from the tavern.

"What stimulation travels with that man!" said the schoolmaster. "He
might be worse, God knows. Reeling minds are worse than reeling bodies.
Some men are born drunk like our friend Colonel Hand and that kind is
beyond reformation."

The bells rang merrily as we hurried through the swamp in the hard snow
paths.

"We're goin' to move," said my uncle presently. "We've agreed to get out
by the middle o' May."

"How does that happen?" I asked.

"I settled with Grimshaw and agreed to go. If it hadn't 'a' been for
Wright and Baldwin we wouldn't 'a' got a cent. They threatened to bid
against him at the sale. So he settled. We're goin' to have a new home.
We've bought a hundred an' fifty acres from Abe Leonard. Goin' to build
a new house in the spring. It will be nearer the village."

He playfully nudged my ribs with his elbow.

"We've had a little good luck, Bart," he went on. "I'll tell ye what it
is if you won't say anything about it."

I promised.

"I dunno