No wonder he liked it. My own troubles seemed to fade away, as I laid the line lightly across the stream. Ah, those spring days, when the 'March brown' was on the water, how fair they were! A bluff wind came singing up the valley, crisping the clear brown water and crowning each little wave with silver ripples; a soft pearly sky, with now and then a dash of pale spring sunshine that lighted up woods and stream, and showed how the red buds were bursting into leaf, and a tender shining green, was beginning to clothe the alder trees. My eyes, and Jock's, were fastened on to the water. I felt, rather than saw, that spring's soft fingers were at work along the banks; that a tuft of starry primroses had been nestled into the mossy root of an old willow, and a yellow butterfly, the first of the year, hung fluttering over them. Farther on a whole bed of violets, purple and white, glittered, fragrance-breathing, on the bank. The wind swept through the boughs merrily, trying in play to tear off the new leaves; but the stout little things held fast and laughed back, as they were swayed up and down. The whole bright summer was theirs to flutter through, before the wind could claim them as his own; and the birds and the wind and the sunshine spoke with their hundred tongues, and said, 'Ah, poor mortals! you may fret, and dispute, and sorrow as you will; you cannot keep back the summer. It is coming. It is coming.' One day that spring I was bidden to a wedding at the Ferry-house; and I went, rejoicing heartily for both bride and bridegroom's sake. If ever I saw a face that beamed with contentment it was the bridegroom's. Patience--his best helper--had won the day for him, and Elfrida wedded her faithful suitor at last. For David Moore had come home for good, cured of his love of wandering and fighting, and well pleased to settle down for the rest of his days at the ferry. The old people Elfrida had worked for so long wanted her no more. Davy--well, if it be true that clouds have silver linings it is not less so that each rose has its thorn. I thought of that on the wedding day, when the moment came for Elfrida to part with Davy. She was as quiet as usual until then, waiting upon everybody, and looking as if nothing had happened. But when the horse with the pillion on it, stood ready to carry her 'home,' Elfrida's heart gave way. She knelt on the ground, hugging Davy to her, kissing his curls, his frock, his little restless hands. Her husband stood waiting for her, compassionate and a little impatient. Davy himself had one arm round her neck, but his eyes were wandering to the horse, and he was eager to see Elfrida ride away. 'Oh Baby,' she sobbed, going back in her distress to the first name she had loved him by; 'Won't Baby kiss poor Frida?'