General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1887 Original Publisher: Roberts Brothers Subjects: Fiction / General Fiction / Classics Fiction / Historical Fiction / Literary History / General Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: AT A SHEEP-WASHING. THE wayfarer in the South County of nearly forty years ago might find himself, like Dante at the beginning of his pilgrimage, before the -entrance to a dense wood. With its goodly oaks of a century’s growth it looked a forest primeval. But it was, according to the tradition of the countryside, the plantation of a choleric old squire, who, in his resentment at finding himself cheated in a bargain for cord- wood made with a shrewd neighbor, swore roundly that no heir of his estate should ever suffer a like annoyance; and immediately planted the sandy plain sloping to the river that bounded his patrimonial acres with oaks and maples, and had them cultivated by his negro servants, until they had well begun that growth which now in its maturity overhung with shade the smoothly sloping banks of the stream of the full-syllabled Indian name, the accepted meaning of which was in keeping with the practical tendencies of the aboriginal mind, for it signified
plenty of fish. Thus by the kindly offices of Nature the wrath of man wasturned to praise; and the plantation which perhaps originated in caprice or anger, but was doubtless continued from worthier motives, kept green the memory of the bluff old squire. Following the cart-path which led through the wood to the water, the pilgrim was from time to time met by creatures as strange and nondescript as any that were encountered by the observant Gulliver in his adventurous travels. Long-legged and …
