Then Pete would come in and announce that the job was done--and grandfather would bundle-up and go out for a final inspection. Pete removed the pad from his leg (you remember the carpet he wore on his left knee--the one that held the stick in place in the buck when he was sawing) and together they went into the barn--and talked it all over--and Pete said it was harder wood than last year's and more knots in it and ought to be worth two shillings more than contract price--and grandfather finally allowed the excess--and Old Pete came in and got his money (in gold and silver) and a bowl of coffee and some bread--and went his way to the Jonesses or some other folks. And you, young man--you surely hated to see that great Viking go--for he had told you many a wonderful tale at the noon hour as he munched his thick sandwiches--and no one could look at his massive head and huge shoulders and great beard and hair and doubt that his forebears had done all that he credited to them. Somehow, Old Pete seemed more real than most men you knew--except grandfather, of course. There was something unexplainable in the man and his work that rang true--something that was so wholesome and sound. He wasn't like old Hawkins, the grocer--he'd as lief give you a rotten apple as not if he could smuggle it into the bag without you seeing him; and Kline the candy-man sometimes sold you old hard stuff mixed with the fresh. But Old Pete here--he just worked honest and steady--out in the open--at a fixed wage--and he did an honest job and was proud of it even if it was only sawing wood. He worked faithfully until it was done, and then he got a good word and a bowl of coffee and his wages in gold and silver--and went his way rejoicing, leaving behind him the glory of labor well performed blending with the refreshing fragrance of new-cut logs that sifted through the cracks of the old barn. The Rain It is early, and Saturday morning--very, very early. Listen! ... An unmistakable drip, drip, drip ... and the room is dark. A bound out of bed--a quick step to the window--an anxious peering through the wet panes .... and the confirmation is complete. It is raining--and on Saturday, the familiar leaden skies and steady drip that spell permanency and send the robin to the shelter of some thick bush, and leave only an occasional undaunted swallow cleaving the air on swift wing. In all the world there is no sadness like that which in boyhood sends you back to bed on Saturday morning with the mournful drip, drip, drip of a steady rain doling in your ears. Out in the woodshed there is a can of the largest, fattest angle-worms ever dug from a rich garden-plot--all so happily, so feverishly, so exultantly captured last night when Anticipation strengthened the little muscles that wielded the heavy spade. All safe in their black soil they wait, coiled round and round each other into a solid worm-ball in the bottom of the can.