Page:Saunders - Beautiful Joe, 1893.djvu/137

128 out of Dash. Windham unfastened the rope, and told him to get home, and if ever I saw a dog run, that one did. Mrs. Windham set great store by him, and her husband didn't want to kill him. But he said Dash had got to give up his sheep-killing, if he wanted to live. That cured him. He's never worried a sheep from that day to this, and if you offer him a bit of sheep's wool now, he tucks his tail between his legs, and runs for home. Now I must stop my talk, for we're in sight of the farm. Yonder's our boundary line, and there's the house. You'll see a difference in the trees since you were here before."

We had come to a turn in the road where the ground sloped gently upward. We turned in at the gate, and drove between rows of trees up to a long, low, red house, with a veranda all round it. There was a wide lawn in front, and away on our right were the farm buildings. They too, were painted red, and there were some trees by them that Mr. Wood called his windbreak, because they kept the snow from drifting in the winter time.

I thought it was a beautiful place. Miss Laura had been here before, but not for some years, so she too was looking about quite eagerly.

"Welcome to Dingley Farm, Joe," said Mrs. Wood, with her jolly laugh, as she watched me jump from the carriage seat to the ground. "Come in, and I'll introduce you to Pussy."

"Aunt Hattie, why is the farm called Dingley Farm?" said Miss Laura, as we went into the house. "It ought to be Wood Farm."

"Dingley is made out of 'dingle,' Laura. You know that pretty hollow back of the pasture? It is what they call a 'dingle.' So this farm was called Dingle Farm till the people around about got saying 'Dingley' instead.