At last, on a hillside sloping to the south, I saw the farmhouse of my dream. Two tall honey locusts stood like faithful guardians on each side of the porch. An elm drooped over the farther end of the piazza. In the dooryard the foliage of two great silver poplar or aspen trees fluttered perpetually with its light sheen. A maple towered high behind the house, and a brook that ran not far away was shadowed by a weeping willow. Other trees were grouped here and there as if Nature had planted them, and up one a wild grape-vine clambered, its unobtrusive blossoms filling the air with a fragrance more delicious even than that of the old-fashioned roses which abounded everywhere. "Was there ever a sweeter nook?" I thought as I stepped out on the wide horse-block and gave my hand to one who seemed the beautiful culmination of the scene. Miss Adah needed but little assistance to alight, but she took my hand in hers, which she had ungloved as she approached her home. It was her mother's soft, plump hand, but unmarked, as yet, by years of toil. I forgot we were such entire strangers, and under the impulse of my fancy clasped it a trifle warmly, at which she gave me a look of slight surprise, thus suggesting that there was no occasion for the act. "You are mistaken," I mentally responded; "there is more occasion than you imagine; more than I may dare to tell you for a long time to come." A lady who had been sitting on the piazza disappeared within the house, and Adah followed her. "Now, mother," said Mr. Yocomb, "since thee did so little for friend Morton's spiritual man, see what thee can do for the temporal. I'll take the high seat this time, and can tell thee beforehand that there'll be no silent meeting." "Father may seem to thee a little irreverent, but he doesn't mean to be. It's his way," said his wife, with a smile. "If thee'll come with me I'll show thee to a room where thee can rest and prepare for dinner." I followed her through a wide hall to a stairway that changed its mind when half-way up and turned in an opposite direction. "It suggests the freedom and unconventionality of this home," I thought, yielding to my mood to idealize everything. "This is thy room so long as thee'll be pleased to stay with us," she said, with a genial smile, and her ample form vanished from the doorway. I was glad to be alone. The shining tide of events was bearing me almost too swiftly. "Can this be even the beginning of true love, since it runs so smoothly?" I queried. And yet it had all come about so simply and naturally, and for everything there was such adequate cause and rational explanation, that I assured myself that I had reason for self-congratulation rather than wonder.