XXXVII. Paradise Regained





CHAPTER I.

THIS OTHER EDEN

"This other Eden, demi-paradise, this fortress built by nature."
--Richard II.

Hidden away in this worn and care-encumbered world, scarred with its
frequent traces of a primeval curse, are spots so quiet and beautiful as
to make the fall of man seem incredible, and awaken in the breast of the
weary traveler who comes suddenly upon them, a vague and dear delusion
that he has stumbled into Paradise.

Such an Eden existed in the extreme western part of Ohio in the spring
of eighteen hundred and forty-nine. It was a valley surrounded by wooded
hills and threaded by a noisy brook which hastily made its way, as if
upon some errand of immense importance, down to the big Miami not many
miles distant. A road cut through a vast and solemn forest led into the
valley, and entering as if by a corridor and through the open portal of
a temple, the traveler saw a white farm-house nestling beneath a mighty
hackberry tree whose wide-reaching arms sheltered it from summer sun
and winter wind. A deep, wide lawn of bluegrass lay in front, and a
garden of flowers, fragrant and brilliant, on its southern side.
Stretching away into the background was the farm newly carved out of the