bare, dirty, and seemed to me very forlorn. What a set of
people my mother's hands must be, I thought. Presently I came
upon a ring of girls, a little larger than I was, huddled
together behind one of the cottages. There was no manners
about them. They were giggling and grinning, hopping on one
foot, and going into other awkward antics; not the less that
most of them had their arms filled with little black babies. I
had got enough for that day, and turning about left the dell
with Preston.

At the head of the dell, Preston led off in a new direction,
along a wide avenue that ran through the woods. Perfectly
level and smooth, with the woods closing in on both sides and
making long vistas through their boles and under their boughs.
By and by we took another path that led off from this one,
wide enough for two horses to go abreast. The pine trees were
sweet overhead and on each hand, making the light soft and the
air fragrant. Preston and I wandered on in delightful roaming;
leaving the house and all that it contained at an unremembered
distance. Suddenly we came out upon a cleared field. It was
many acres large; in the distance a number of people were at
work. We turned back again.

"Preston," I said, after a silence of a few minutes, — "there
seemed to be no women in those cottages. I did not see any."

"I suppose not," said Preston; "because there were not any to
see."

"But had all those little babies no mothers?"