knew why they were so heavy, then, I reckon I shan't call on Mrs. Mudge
next time I go by."

"So you've run off," he continued, after a pause, "I like your
spunk,--just what I should have done myself. But tell me how you managed
to get off without the old chap's finding it out."

Paul related such of his adventures as he had not before told, his
companion listening with marked approval.

"I wish I'd been there," he said. "I'd have given fifty cents, right
out, to see how old Mudge looked, I calc'late he's pretty well tired
with his wild-goose chase by this time."

It was now twelve o'clock, and both the travelers began to feel the
pangs of hunger.

"It's about time to bait, I calc'late," remarked the pedler.

The unsophisticated reader is informed that the word "bait," in New
England phraseology, is applied to taking lunch or dining.

At this point a green lane opened out of the public road, skirted on
either side by a row of trees. Carpeted with green, it made a very
pleasant dining-room. A red-and-white heifer browsing at a little
distance looked up from her meal and surveyed the intruders with mild
attention, but apparently satisfied that they contemplated no invasion
of her rights, resumed her agreeable employment. Over an irregular stone
wall our travelers looked into a thrifty apple-orchard laden with fruit.
They halted beneath a spreading chestnut-tree which towered above its