Page:George Weston--The apple-tree girl.djvu/15



was such an old-fashioned little thing!

"And ever likely to be old-fashioned," said Aunt Hepzibah, "born up here at Marlin Mills and raised, as a body might say, right in the shadow of Micah's apple tree!"

I smiled at Aunt Hepzibah then; but thinking it over now, I begin to see that the wonderful things which happened to Charlotte Marlin might never have taken place if it hadn't been for the history of Marlin Mills and the story of Micah's apple tree.

In its day Marlin Mills had been one of the prettiest and happiest of villages. Even now it has an avenue of elms by 9