As we neared the limits of the forest, some new clearings broke in upon the solemn twilight monotony of our path: the aspect of these was almost uniform, presenting an opening of felled trees of about an acre or two; the commencement of a log-house; a patch of ground surrounded by a snake-fence, enclosing the first crop of wheat, and perhaps a little Indian corn; great heaps of timber-trees and brushwood laid together and burning; a couple of oxen, dragging along another enormous trunk to add to the pile. These were the general features of the picture, framed in, as it were, by the dark mysterious woods. Here and there I saw a few cows, but no sheep. I remember particularly one of these clearings, which looked more desolate than the rest; there was an unfinished log-house, only one half of it roofed in and habitable, and this presented some attempt at taste, having a small rustic porch or portico, and the windows on either side framed. No ground was fenced in, and the newly-felled timber lay piled in heaps ready to burn; around lay the forest, its shadows darkening, deepening as the day declined. But what rivetted my attention was the light figure of a female, arrayed in a silk gown and a handsome shawl, who was pacing up and down in front of the house, with a slow and pensive air. She had an infant lying on her arm, and in the other hand she waved a green bough, to keep off the mosquitoes. I wished to stop--to speak, though at the hazard of appearing impertinent; but my driver represented so strongly the danger of being benighted within the verge of the forest, that I reluctantly suffered him to proceed, "And oft look'd back upon that vision fair, And wondering ask'd, whence and how came it there?"