“Good!” he cried gayly. “You mean my hat that I _call_ a hat.” He reached for the one behind his head, and spun it lightly upward, where it settled on a projecting branch. “I respect that hat myself,--my _other_ hat, I mean; I'm trying to live up to it. Now, let me guess your State, Miss Newell: is it Massachusetts?” “No,--Connecticut; but at this distance it seems like the same thing.” “Oh, pardon me, there are very decided differences. I'm from Massachusetts myself. Perhaps the points of difference show more in the women,--the ones who stay at home, I mean, and become more local and idiomatic than the men. You are not one of the daughters of the soil, Miss Newell.” She looked pained as she said, “I wish I were; but there is not room for us all, where there is so little soil.” Arnold moved uneasily, extracted a stone from under the small of his back and tossed it out of sight with some vehemence. “You think it goes rather hard with women who are uprooted, then,” he said. “I suppose it is something a roving man can hardly conceive of,--a woman's attachment to places, and objects, and associations; they are like cats.” Miss Newell was silent. Arnold moved restlessly; then began again, with his eyes still on the trickle of water: “Miss Newell, do you remember a poem--I think it is Bryant's--called 'The Hunter of the Prairies'? It's no disgrace not to remember it, and it may not be Bryant's.” “I remember seeing it, but I never read it. I always skipped those Western things.” Arnold gave a short laugh, and said, “Well, you are punished, you see, by going West yourself to hear me repeat it to you. I think I can give you the idea in the Hunter's own words:-- “'Here, with my rifle and my steed, And her who left the world for me'”-- The sound of his own voice in the stillness of the little glen, and a look of surprise in the young girl's quiet eyes, brought a sudden access of color to Arnold's face. “Hm-m-m,” he murmured to himself, “it's queer how rhymes slip away. Well, the last line ends in _free_. You see, it is a man's idea of happiness,--a young man's. Now, how do you suppose _she_ liked it,--the girl, you know, who left the world, and all that? Did you ever happen to see a poem or a story, written by a woman, celebrating the joys of a solitary existence with the man of her heart?” “I suppose that many a woman has tried it,” Miss Newell said evasively, “but I'm sure she”-- “Never lived to tell the tale?” cried Arnold. “She probably had something else to do, while the hunter was riding around with his gun,” Miss Frances continued. “Well, give her the odds of the rifle and the steed; give the man some commonplace employment to take the swagger out of him; let him come home reasonably tired and cross at night,--do you suppose he would find the 'kind' eyes and the 'smile'? I forgot to tell you that the Hunter of the Prairies is always welcomed by a smile at night.” “He must have been an uncommonly fortunate man,” she said.