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THE WOODS.

"This is the forest primeval."

-Longfellow.

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HE greater part of the woods stood, originally, back of the barn. There the trees had reared their massive stems for centuries upon the knolls and along the brooks; useful to the pioneer, in his day, and much more valuable, those that have come down still standing, to later generations. Stumps can occasionally yet be seen where the old trees were; and what little of the vast tract is now remaining is one of the last bits left of the magnificent primeval forest of virgin timber which once covered all these hills.

A MOSSY LOG.

The barn was new then, and its great beams and rafters were hewn by the broadax in the very woods which sheltered it, and from trees cut, in those early times, freely, to make clearings-the straightest and finest trunks being selected for the buildings, and the others rolled and piled together, logs and branches, and burned, to open up the forest for the fields of wheat. So it happens that the houses and barns erected then have in them the most durable of lumber-oak, black walnut, hard maple, hickory-as commonly as now we find the pine, and outlasting, for that reason, the more recent edifices.

The old place—a half section-primarily extended for more than a mile along the turnpike. The woods then was of immense extent, and was overrun with squirrels and 'coons; and many a tale of prowess has been related of shooting 'coons by starlight only, or even in absolute darkness, so keen was the eyesight of our forefathers. Even I can recollect when the old woods was so big that from any point near its center I could not see cleared land anywhere ahead through the trees. It was an easy matter to get lost in it. It seemed then, in my boyhood days, to be an absolutely endless forest, a gigantic stretch of waving, majestic monarchs, nothing but trunks and tree-tops everywhere I gazed, filled with all the enchantment of the snare and still hunt, and hallowed with illimitable beauty and mystery. And it has not lost all of its beauty by the removal of the trees; for, although there is more light under them, some of the trees are there yet, and the old woods still looks quite familiar and much as it used to appear.

There was a certain portion of it, near the highway, where the growth was more open, and where, consequently, gypsy caravans used regularly to encamp. I well recollect how my boyish fancy thrilled at the first sight of them, as their dusky figures moved to and fro beside the crane and the kettles in the weird, dancing firelight, while gypsy dogs barked warningly at us newcomers. Surely here was the long-lost happiness, I thought; or, at least, a little of pure romantic wildness, inclosed among the dim trees, under the stars.

Let us ramble, then, together for a while beneath the leaves on this fair afternoon, and see if perchance

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