fanned by the winds of heaven. Here, too, we gathered sweet blue
violets, yellow buttercups, Ladies' traces and London pride, with all
the beautiful variety of simple meadow flowers, and entwined them into
pretty wreaths, or fragrant boquets. But the touch of time has rested
upon this spot, and his finger has left a deep impress upon it. The
sloping hills that surround it remain the same. The trees bear some
traces of decay, but here stand the thorn bushes that used to scatter
their showers of white blossoms around us like descending snow-flakes,
still filled with green leaves and small red apples, surrounded by the
prickly thorns that to all appearances are the same that we grasped
fifty years ago.

The sand-hills where the juvenile part of the neighborhood used to
congregate to celebrate the happy twilight hour in merry sports, have
literally passed away; having been shovelled up and transported to
the various places for many miles around, where the multiplicity of
chimnies mark the increasing population of the village, that passing
years have added to it.

As we pass the antiquated moss-covered bars that admit us into the
dear old orchard, and cross the little brook that bubbles on forever
in the same monotonous sound, requiring but one smooth round stepping
stone for a bridge, we sigh and feel that the change of years is upon
us, for here almost every thing speaks of decay. True the hills, the
ponds, the rocks (and I had almost said the speckled tortoise that has
crawled up to sun itself on their summit), remain the same.

Sit down on this dilapidated trunk, for the burden of years is upon
us; and as I glance upon this frame, I can scarcely realize it is the
same form that used to impress this spot with childish footprints.