“Keep heart!” says Charley, in a tone of consolation. “I have entered into negotiations for a tract of land in Transylvania, where I mean to erect a hunting-lodge, and where any or all of the present company will be welcome.” “Are you in earnest?” asks Eric, skeptically. “I have heard nothing of such negotiations.” “Probably not,” Charley serenely answers, “since they were conducted while you were at Cæsar’s Head. I have found a place that I think will suit me exactly.” “Charley, you’re a trump!” cries Rupert, enthusiastically. “I’ll spend every vacation with you!” “And, unless you object, I’ll go shares in the purchase,” says Eric. “I was thinking of such a place myself.” “What is to become of us, Aunt Markham?” demands Sylvia. “We shall never be able to command an escort for a watering-place again.” “But I thought you had abjured watering-places?” I observe. “She abjured them with the saving clause, ‘until I change my mind,’” Charley remarks. Not far from the gap we turn to the right, ford the river, and follow a road which leads immediately along the foot of the mountains. On one side the latter rise, on the other lies a fertile valley. We skirt the hills, and reach presently a log-cabin, with its door overrun with vines, and its tiny garden full of gaudy flowers. A man so tall that he looks altogether out of proportion with his house comes out and bids us “drive straight ahead” if we want to find the Pools. “But, if we drive farther, can we find any place to turn?” Eric asks—a very important question, since the road is of the narrowest possible description. “Oh, yes, plenty of places,” is the reassuring reply; so, despite a remonstrance from John, who would prefer to halt where he is, we drive on through some bars which Harrison has meanwhile let down. “I wonder whar them places for turning is, Mass Eric?” says John, presently, as we jolt along a rough road with a mountain on one side and a steep declivity on the other. “Not far ahead, I think,” replies Eric. “Here’s the stream—now you can turn.” “Let me out first,” cries Aunt Markham, who has an aversion to narrow turns. We all alight, and follow Eric up a hillside-path by the side of the stream, which is a well-sized creek of crystal clearness. A more charming glen than the one in which we find ourselves it would be impossible to imagine. On each side the mountains rise sheer from the bed of the stream, while between these walls of green the water rushes downward in a succession of cascades, falling finally into three circular pools, the sides of which are worn to the smoothness of the most carefully-polished stone. “That water must surely have a rotary motion,” I say, “to have chiseled out such perfect wells.” “Certainly it has a rotary motion,” answers Eric. “Throw a bough in, and you will see it drawn under, disappear for some time, and finally reappear on the opposite side of the pool, from which it will gradually drift into the current.”