appetizing; the grass betrays all its sweetness and succulency in
parting under her sickle.

The region of which I write abounds in sheep also. Sheep love high,
cool, breezy lands. Their range is generally much above that of
cattle. Their sharp noses will find picking where a cow would fare
poorly indeed. Hence most farmers utilize their high, wild, and
mountain lands by keeping a small flock of sheep. But they are the
outlaws of the farm and are seldom within bounds. They make many
lively expeditions for the farm-boy,--driving them out of mischief,
hunting them up in the mountains, or salting them on the breezy
hills. Then there is the annual sheep-washing, when on a warm day in
May or early June the whole herd is driven a mile or more to a
suitable pool in the creek, and one by one doused and washed and
rinsed in the water. We used to wash below an old grist-mill, and it
was a pleasing spectacle,--the mill, the dam, the overhanging rocks
and trees, the round, deep pool, and the huddled and frightened
sheep.

One of the features of farm life peculiar to this country, and one
of the most picturesque of them all, is sugar-making in the maple
woods in spring. This is the first work of the season, and to the
boys is more play than work. In the Old World, and in more simple
and imaginative times, how such an occupation as this would have got
into literature, and how many legends and associations would have
clustered around it! It is woodsy, and savors of the trees; it is an
encampment among the maples. Before the bud swells, before the grass
springs, before the plow is started, comes the sugar harvest. It is
the sequel of the bitter frost; a sap-run is the sweet good-by of
winter. It denotes a certain equipoise of the season; the heat of