A singing heart, a laughing road,
With salutations all the way,--
The gossip dog, the hidden bird,
The pig that grunts a gruff good-day;

The apple-ladder in the trees,
A friendly voice amid the boughs,
The farmer driving home his team,
The ducks, the geese, the uddered cows;

The silver babble of the creek,
The willow-whisper--the day's end,
With murmur of the village street,
A called good-night, an unseen friend_.




CHAPTER XII

ORCHARDS AND A LINE FROM VIRGIL


Orchards! We were walking to New York--through orchards. And we might
have gone by train! A country of orchards and gold-dust sunshine falling
through the quaint tapestry trees, falling dreamily on heaped-up gold,
and the grave backs of little pigs joyously at large in the apple
twilight. A drowsy, murmuring spell was on the land, the spell of fabled
orchards, and of old enchanted gardens--