"O Hiram, wont you please stop and let us get some?" pleaded Marty. "I'd like so much to take some to mamma." Hiram was obliged to go to Black's Mills on an errand that morning, and Marty and Evaline had been allowed to go with him for the ride. Returning he had driven around by another road, as he said one of the horses had lost a shoe, and this road, though longer, was less stony, and therefore easier for the horse than the other. Besides it would take them by McKay's blacksmith-shop, where he could get the horse shod. It was when going through a valley, which the country folks called "the bottom," that they saw the clematis. It was growing in the greatest profusion in the meadows and the woods on both sides of the road, rambling over bushes, rocks, fences, everything, with its great starry clusters of white blossoms. "I don't think you had better go after any," said Hiram in reply to Marty's request. "Them low places are muddy after the rain yesterday, and your ma might be angry if you was to go home with your shoes all muddied. Besides, there _may_ be snakes under them bushes." "Snakes! Oh, dear!" said Marty with a shudder. "But I should like some of those flowers for mamma." "Well," said Hiram, reining in the horses, "if you promise to sit still in the wagon and not be up to any of your tricks of climbing in and out, I'll get you some." "Oh, thank you ever so much! I'll sit as still as a mouse. But then I shouldn't like the snakes to bite you." "I reckon they wont bite me," said Hiram, as he leaped over the fence, and taking out his knife proceeded to cut great clusters of flowers. "Oh, just see the loads he is getting!" cried Marty. Then as Hiram returned with a huge armful which he carefully laid in the back of the wagon, she said, "Thank you many times, Hiram. You are very kind. How pleased mamma will be! But half these are yours, Evaline." After this they had what was to Marty the pleasure of fording a small stream, where the horses were allowed to stop and drink. Presently they had a distant view of a cascade, called Buttermilk Falls. As the road did not approach very near, only a glimpse could be caught of the creamy foam; but Hiram said that some day, if Mr. Stokes could spare him, he would drive them all down to that point, and they could walk from there to the falls. "I reckon Mrs. Ashford would like to see 'em," he said. "Indeed she would," said Marty. Altogether the drive was what Marty considered "just perfectly lovely." And she was delighted also to be able to go home with such quantities of pretty flowers. She was already planning with Evaline what vases and pitchers they should put them in. "How surprised the folks will be when they see us coming in with our arms full!" she said. When they reached a little wood back of Mr. Stokes' barn, Hiram stopped the horses, saying,