Many like me are happy in the possession of a dear old homestead; but there are few, I ween, who enjoy the blessing of a double inheritance such as has been my lot--two homes which share my equal devotion, two homes without a choice; the one this beloved heirloom in Hometown, and the other--But you shall see. We shall be there soon, for the little satchel is packed, and the carriage awaits us at the gate. A drive of eighteen miles is before us--a beautiful series of pictures. Down through the village, past the old red mill and smithy, with its ringing anvil, and we are soon winding our way through a sombre glen. Presently we catch glimpses of the great rumbling factory, with its clouds of smoke and steam melting into the wooded mountain above. The old yellow bridge now creaks under our approach, and ere we are aware a sudden turn leads us out of a wilderness on to the shore of the beautiful Housatonic. For a few minutes the rushing water trickles through the wheels as over jolting stones our pony leads us through the ford, and, refreshed by the cool bath, makes a lively sally up the eastern bank. For ten miles the Housatonic guides us around its winding curves through a path of ever-changing beauty, now shut in by the dense, dark evergreens, and again emerging into a bower of silvery beeches, where the roadway is carpeted with mottled shadows, and the dappled trunks flicker with the softened glints of sunlight. Here we come upon a sandy stretch where the road is sunken between two sloping banks thick-set with mulleins and sweet-fern, and overrun with creeping brambles. The stone-wall above is wreathed in trailing woodbine, and along its crest we see the swaying tips of wheat from the edge of the field just beyond; and here we pass a border of whortleberry bushes, laden with their fruit. Now it is a hazel thicket crowding close upon our wheels, and among the leaves we see the brown, tanned husks of the ripening nuts, almost ready for that troop of boys and girls that you may be sure are watching and waiting for them.