stop there. The bijou mountains were densely wooded and were infested
by ferocious squirrels and woodpeckers that forever menaced the summer
transients. Like a badly sewn strip of white braid, a macadamized road
ran between the green skirt of the hills and the foamy lace of the
river's edge. A dim path wound from the comfortable road up a rocky
height to the hermit's cave. One mile upstream was the Viewpoint Inn,
to which summer folk from the city came; leaving cool, electric-fanned
apartments that they might be driven about in burning sunshine,
shrieking, in gasoline launches, by spindle-legged Modreds bearing the
blankest of shields.

Train your lorgnette upon the hermit and let your eye receive the
personal touch that shall endear you to the hero.

A man of forty, judging him fairly, with long hair curling at the ends,
dramatic eyes, and a forked brown beard like those that were imposed
upon the West some years ago by self-appointed "divine healers" who
succeeded the grasshopper crop. His outward vesture appeared to be kind
of gunny-sacking, cut and made into a garment that would have made the
fortune of a London tailor. His long, well-shaped fingers, delicate
nose, and poise of manner raised him high above the class of hermits
who fear water and bury money in oyster-cans in their caves in spots
indicated by rude crosses chipped in the stone wall above.

The hermit's home was not altogether a cave. The cave was an addition
to the hermitage, which was a rude hut made of poles daubed with clay
and covered with the best quality of rust-proof zinc roofing.

In the house proper there were stone slabs for seats, a rustic bookcase
made of unplaned poplar planks, and a table formed of a wooden slab laid