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 as Miss Lamb vanished, "but I am not fond of hobbling about in company, so Lilian waits on me."

Not exactly the tone of a protégé I thought, and I said:

"How pleasant it is to hear the cattle go by."

"Yes, indeed," said Miss Willet. "That is about all the music we have here in the winter. In the summer we are very gay, with our hops and Sunday concerts."

"Do you go down to the hops?" I asked.

"Dear me, no! I haven't been down the hill for three years. But the music comes up to me—which is much easier. Mahomet and the mountain you know."

John looked with a benignant smile at the minute speaker, and said: "So you are the mountain?"

"Sometimes the mountain and sometimes the squirrel, just as I please. I often think of Emerson's squirrel when I sit here, face to face with that big Pike's