the "bloomin' gy-ar-ding" when ever they asked him, particularly if
some apple-cheeked little maid would say, "Please, Tom!"
He always laughed then, and, patting the child's hand, said, "Pooty gal,--
got eyes!" The youngsters dance with glee at this meaningless phrase,
just as their mothers had danced years before when it was said to them.

Summer waned. In the moist places the gentian uncurled
its blue fringes; purple asters and gay Joe Pye waved their
colors by the roadside; tall primroses put their yellow
bonnets on, and peeped over the brooks to see themselves;
and the dusty pods of the milkweed were bursting with
their silky fluffs, the spinning of the long summer.
Autumn began to paint the maples red and the elms yellow,
for the early days of September brought a frost.
Some one remarked at the village store that old Blueb'ry Tom
must not be suffered to stay on the plains another winter,
now that he was getting so feeble,--not if the "_se_leckmen" had
to root him out and take him to the poor-farm. He would surely
starve or freeze, and his death would be laid at their door.

Tom was interviewed. Persuasion, logic, sharp words, all failed
to move him one jot or tittle. He stood in his castle door,
with the ladder behind him, smiling, always smiling
(none but the fool smiles always, nor always weeps), and saying
to all visitors, "Tom ain't ter hum; Tom's gone to Bonny Eagle;
Tom don' want to go to the poor-farm."

November came in surly.

The cheerful stir and bustle of the harvest were over, the corn