Poor mother was too glad to say much. I skipped along the path into the house, and Hattie (Charlie's wife) and I made such a fuss that we frightened Emma and Harry into a cry. I carried the milk to the spring-house for mother, and while she strains it away, I tell her all about Uncle John's and the rest of the friends. Come, reader, and sit down with me, and have a slice of my dear mother's bread and butter, and have some cream for your blackberries, and now let's eat. I've been hungry so long for a meal at home. And how good to go to my own little room, and thank God for this home coming at my own bedside, and then lay me down to sleep. Then there were uncles, aunts, and cousins to visit and friends to see and tell all about my trip, and how I liked the West. Then "Colonel" was hitched up, and we children put off for a twenty mile ride to visit Brother Will's. First came Sister Lizzie to greet us, then dear May, shy little Frantie, and squealing, kicking Charlie boy was kissed--but where is Will? "Out at the oats field?" "Come, May, take me to your papa; I can't wait until supper time to see him." Together we climb the hill, then through the woods to the back field. Leaving May to pick huckleberries and fight the "skeeters," I go through the stubble. Stones are plenty, and I throw one at him. Down goes the cradle and up goes his hat, with "Three cheers for sister!" As we trudge down the hill, I said: "Let's go West, Will, where you have no hills to climb, and can do your farming with so much less labor. Why, I didn't see a cradle nor a scythe while I was in Nebraska. Surely, it is the farmer's own state." "Well, I would like to go if father and mother could go too, but I will endure the extra work here for the sake of being near them. If they could go along I would like to try life in the West." Home again, and I must get to my writing, for I want to have my book out by the last of September. I had just got nicely interested, when mother puts her head in at the door, and says, with such a disappointed look: "Oh! are you at your writing? I wanted you to help me pick some huckleberries for supper." Now, who wouldn't go with a dear, good mother? The writing is put aside, and we go down the lane to the dear old woods, and the huckleberries are gathered. Seated again-- "Frank," father says, "I guess you will have to be my chore boy while Norval is away. Come, I'd like you to turn the grindstone for me while I make a corn cutter." Now, who wouldn't turn a grindstone for a dear, good father? There stood father with a broken "sword of Bunker Hill" in his hand that he found on the battle field of Bunker Hill, in Virginia. "Now, father, if you are sure that was a rebel sword, I'll willingly turn until it is all ground up; but if it is a Union sword, why then, "Hang the old sword in its place," and sharpen up your old corn cutters, and don't let's turn swords into plowshares now even though it be a time of peace."