, who were
ardent fisher-maidens.

"But, Margaret, it is the sport!" Bell would cry. "It isn't just
killing, it is sport!"

"But, Bell, if the sport does not amuse me!" Margaret would answer. "If
I want to kill something, I would rather kill spiders, though I am
trying not to be so afraid of them--or mosquitoes."

Then the girls would cry out that she was hopeless, and would gather up
their reels and rods and leave her to her own peaceful devices, having
even the generosity not to twit her with inconsistency when she enjoyed
her delicately-fried perch at supper.

These solitary afternoons were sure to be pleasant ones for Margaret.
She loved the merry companionship of the campers, but she loved, too, to
wander through the woods, among the great straight-stemmed pines and
dark feathery hemlocks, or to track the little clear brook through its
windings, from the great bog to its outlet into the lake; or, as now, to
stroll about over the great down, looking down on the blue water below.

It was a perfect afternoon. Little white clouds drifted here and there
over the tops of the wooded hills, but they only made the sky more
deeply and intensely blue. There was just enough breeze to ripple the
water so that it caught every sunbeam, and set it dancing on the
tremulous surface. Below her a fish-hawk poised and dipped, seeking his
dinner; far out, two black specks showed where her friends were at their
"sport." Margaret drew a long breath of content.

"Oh, pleasant place!" she said. "How glad I am that I am not in that
boat. Oh, pleasant place!"

She looked about her with happy eyes. Before her, the earth fell away in
an abrupt descent to the lake, steep enough to be dignified by the name
of precipice; but behind and on either hand it rolled away in billowy
slopes of green, crowned here and there with patches of wood, and
crossed by irregular lines of stone wall.

"Oh, pleasant place!" said Margaret a third time. "How many beautiful
places I know! What a wonderful world of beauty it is!"

Her mind went back to Fernley House, the beloved home where she lived
with her uncle John Montfort: to the rose-garden, where they loved to
work together, the sunny lawns, the shady alleys of box and laurel, the
arbors of honeysuckle and grape-vine. She could almost see the beloved
uncle, pruning-knife in hand, bending over his roses; if only he did not
cut back the Ramblers too far! She could almost see her little cousins,
her child