The south-western part of the township, with much of two adjoining
townships, remained an unbroken forest, belonging to an eccentric
landholder who refused to sell it. This was spoken of as "the
woods," and furnished cover and haunts for wild game and animals,
hunting-ground for the pioneers, and also gave shelter to a few
shiftless squatters, in various parts of its wide expanse. In the
eastern border of the township was Punderson's pond, a beautiful,
irregular-shaped body of limpid water, embosomed by deep wooded
hills, and of considerable extent, well stocked with fish, and much
frequented on that account.

In the afternoon of the second day after his return, Bart went down
a highway leading east to the State road, to the post-office, kept at
Markham's store, and this road took him down by the southern end of
the pond, and thence southerly on the State road. He passed along by
Dr. Lyman's, Jonah Johnson's, and so on, past houses, and clearings,
and woodlands, looking almost wistfully, as if he expected pleasant
greetings; but the few he saw merely nodded to him, or called out:
"Are you back again?" He paused on the hill by the saw-mill, which
overlooked the pond, and gazed long over its beautiful surface,
sleeping in utter solitude amid the green hills, under the slanting
summer sun, and seemed to recognize in it what he had observed, on the
evening of his return, about the old homestead--the change that had
taken place in himself--a change which often accounts for the strange
appearance of the most familiar and cherished places. We find it
reflected in the face of inanimate nature, and wonder at her altered
guise, unconscious of the cause. He sauntered musingly on to the
State road, and over by the old grist-mill, past several houses, up to
Parker's. Here, by a beautiful spring under the shade of old apple