A Summer in Leslie Goldthwaite's Life.

and makes a huge semicircular base for the mountain, and is in itself a precipice-pedestal eighty feet sheer up from the river-bank; close in against the hill front, on this platform of stone, that h

se,-this is the place at which the "little red" drew u

o help Leslie out over the wheel, upon her declaring that she must

e Thoresbys one and all declining. Mrs. Thoresby was politic: she would not fall into the wake of this s

leaded, with playful parody, in his behalf, when the lady had hinted something of her former

he whole perspective of the valley. Jim Holden would readily have driven them round its very edge upon the flat, mossy sward, but for Mrs. Linceford's nerves, and the vague idea of almost an accident having occurred there lately whic

git his leg over the pole; no danger with his cattle." But Mrs. Linceford cried out in utter rem

sing above it; gown, innocent of crinoline, clinging to lank, growing limbs, and bare feet, whose heels were energetically planted at a quite safe distance from each other, to insure a fair base for the centre of gravity,-who, at the moment

enting toward her uncouth pets at the last breath, a sufficiently queer play upon her own word. And with this, the en

me suddenly all else, and she dragged her great toe back and forth in the soft mould, and

ild stood still with finger in mouth, and toe working in the ground, not a bit harde

t a further advance on her own part might put Prissy altogether to flight. Nothing answered in the girl's eyes to her wor

from the doorway. "She ain't that sc

ightness that gradually and regularly, by the persistence of years, had accomplished this peculiar belt of clearing. It completed her expression; it was as a very halo of Yankee saintship crowning the woman who in despite of poverty and every discouragement had always hated, to the very roots of her hair, anything like what she called a "sozzle;" who had always been screwed up and sharp set to hard work. She couldn't help the tumbledown fence; she had no "men-folks" round; and she couldn't have paid for a hundred pickets and a day's carpentering, to have saved her life. She couldn't help Prissy's hair even; for it would kink and curl, and the minute the wind took it "there it was again;" and it was not time yet, thank goodness! to harrow it back and begin in her behalf the remarkable engineering which had laid out for herself that br

e impression of her premises, and turning round to lead the way without waiting for a reply. "Come in, Prissy!" she bawled, illustrating h

issy ran by like a squirrel, and perched h

come to be "Aunt Hoskins" in the whole region round about, so far as she was known at all. "It's the only bird she can hear sing of a morning. It's as good as all outd

y, from Miss Craydocke at the hotel." And Leslie held out the package whic

the like of which she had been made accustomed to before, sprang to her aunt's side within hearing of her exclamation. "If

gnorance of this greatest possible delight-a common one to more outwardly favored children-of a real parc

l big book,-Grimm's Tales; and some little papers fell to the floor. These were

our-o'clocks all to nothin'. It's lucky the old Shank-high did make a clearin' of 'em. Tell Miss Craydocke," she continued, turning a

in the presence of this good deed,

n' I never knew but one or two; an' now she can read 'em off to me, like a minister. She's told her a lot o' stuff about the rocks,-I can't make head nor tail on't; but it'd please you to see her fetchin' 'em in by the apern-full, an' goin' on about 'em, that is, if there was reely any p

d. "Wait a minute," she said, with the effort in her tone

in Aunt Hoskins sharply. "She's as b

eologist,-a mass of quartz rock as large as she could grasp with her two hands, shot through at three different angles with three long, superb, columnar crystals of clear, pale-green beryl. I

ing the heavy specimen out of her own hands into Leslie's. "She's bee

lous and grateful search. "There were only the rocks," as Aunt Hoskins said; in no other way could

ou, I'm afeard,

e girl, and speaking in her clear, glad tone close to her cheek. "I only wish I could find something to take her mys

ome together," said the child, wi

Leslie's last word, and then she and

de. They were full of exclamations about the wo

. "I don't care a bit for the geography of it. That gre

ne, that you've lost. You've no idea, Leslie, what a lovely tableau you h

e blu

prettier, if you

Mrs. Lin

have known it at the time. They say we don't know when we're happiest

rhaps," returned her sister. "If you had

miration were over, she told them the story of the child and her misfortune, and of what Miss Craydocke had done. "That's beautiful, I th

Feather-Cap," put

you show

. And you wouldn't know the best ones when you did. I've seen 'em,-dead, dull-looki

cried Da

if he thought he had got hold of some new-fas

struck the ford. This diverted and absorbed their thought

t's safe?" aske

rned Jim. "I'd drive ac

't!" cri

I could,-an' the hosses

progress, but drifting surely down. They came up out of the depths, however, with a tug, and a swash, and a drip all over, and a scrambling of hoofs on the pebbles, at the very point aimed at in such apparently sidelong fashion

the gradual slope, as far as they would climb before dinner. Otherwise the midday heats would have b

e they spread their picnic, while up above, on the bare, open rock, the young men kindled th

eamy shadows on the far-off steeps, and dropped a gracious veil over the bald forehead and sun-bleak sh

nybody. Pictures? She made them incessantly. She was a living dissolving view. You no sooner got one bright look or graceful attitude than it was straightway shifted into another. She kept Frank Scherman at her side f

new face? But it's partly the petticoat. He's such an artist's eye for color. He was raving about her all the while she stood hangin

tray light through the pines burnishing the bronze of her hair, had innocently made a second picture, it w

had said, coming up to her, as she and her friend Dakie, a lit

ling. "Something I have a very presumptuous wish

urned the young man. "We'll have it

specimens, they did at last "find a-purpose" an irregular oval of dull, dusky stone, which burst with a stroke into two chalices of incrusted crimson crystals,-I ought to be too near the end of a long chapter to tell. But this search and this finding, and the motive of it, were the soul and the crown of Leslie's pleasure for the day. She did not even stop to think how long she had had Frank Scherman's attention all to herself, or the triumph that it wa

o Mrs. Thoresby's room. "I never saw anybody take so among strangers. Madam Routh was delighted with her; and so, I should think, was

laugh. "Girls of that sort are always looking for geodes." After this,

the opportunity. She went straight up to the little woman, in a frank, sweet way. But a bit of embarrassment underneath, the real respect that made her timid,-perhaps a little nervous fatigue a

e said, and instantly knew the

e lady, with an am

ardon," began Leslie

nd rats and the German, that I'm deaf and blind and stupid. But I believe I get as much as they do out of their jokes, after all." The dear old soul took Leslie by bot

re so glad of your parcel,-the little girl and her aunt. And Prissy gave me so

r than ever. "I was sure she'd break her neck, or pull

t, too,-a garnet geode from Feather-Cap?" Leslie thought

ber fifteen, in the west wing,-to-morrow sometim

m she had ever known had said to Leslie Goldthwaite, "I want to see more of you," she