(where now exist the elegances of School Court,) was an unappropriated
field; and that spot was considered, by a certain little group of
children, of six or seven years old, the most solitary, gloomy,
mysterious place in their little world. When the colors of sunset had
died out in the west, and the stillness and shadow of twilight were
coming on, they used to "snatch a fearful joy" in seeing one of their
number (whose mother had kindly omitted the first lesson usually
taught to little girls, to be afraid of every thing) perform the feat
of going slowly around the church, alone, stopping behind it to count
a hundred. Her wonderful courage in actually protecting the whole
group from what they called a "flock of cows," and in staking and
patting the "mad dogs" that they were for ever meeting, was nothing to
this _going round the church!_

But to return to the cottage, from which the pretty, rural trait of
its standing in its unfenced green door-yard led me away to notice the
same sort of rustic beauty where the church stood. We did not stop to
knock at the outside door,--for Aunt Molly was very deaf, and if we
had knocked our little knuckles off she would not have heard us,--but
went in, and, passing along the passage, rapped at the door of the
"common room," half sitting-room, half kitchen, and were
admitted. Those who saw her for the first time, whether children or
grown people, were generally afraid of her; for her voice,
unmodulated, of course, by the ear, was naturally harsh, strong, and
high-toned; and the sort of half laugh, half growl, that she uttered
when pleased, might have suggested to an imaginative child the howl of
a wolf. She had very large features, and sharp, penetrating black
eyes, shaded by long, gray lashes, and surmounted by thick, bushy,
gray eyebrows. I think that when she was scolding the school-boys,
with those eyes fiercely "glowering" at them from under the shaggy