human families. Group them together and you can see plainly that they
belong to one another, and yet they differ so widely."

"As widely as Webb and I," put in Burt.

"Thanks for so apt an illustration."

"Burt is what you would call a rampant grower, running more to wood and
foliage than anything else," Leonard remarked.

"I didn't say that," said Amy. "Moreover, I learned from my reading that
many of the strong-growing plants become in maturity the most productive
of flowers or fruit."

"How young I must seem to you!" Burt remarked.

"Well, don't be discouraged. It's a fault that will mend every day," she
replied, with a smile that was so arch and genial that he mentally
assured himself that he never would be disheartened in his growing
purpose to make Amy more than a sister.




CHAPTER XII

A MOUNTAINEER'S HOVEL


One winter noon Leonard returned from his superintendence of the