THE DOCTOR




I

THE OLD STONE MILL


There were two ways by which one could get to the Old Stone Mill. One,
from the sideroad by a lane which, edged with grassy, flower-decked
banks, wound between snake fences, along which straggled irregular
clumps of hazel and blue beech, dogwood and thorn bushes, and beyond
which stretched on one side fields of grain just heading out this bright
June morning, and on the other side a long strip of hay fields of mixed
timothy and red clover, generous of colour and perfume, which ran along
the snake fence till it came to a potato patch which, in turn, led to an
orchard where the lane began to drop down to the Mill valley.

At the crest of the hill travellers with even the merest embryonic
aesthetic taste were forced to pause. For there the valley with its
sweet loveliness lay in full view before them. Far away to the right,
out of an angle in the woods, ran the Mill Creek to fill the pond which
brimmed gleaming to the green bank of the dam. Beyond the pond a sloping
grassy sward showed green under an open beech and maple woods. On the