started, looking towards the woods, we could see him dimly through the
darkness. As we neared him we could see his bare arms with the handspike
in his hands rolling up the logs. The fire took a new hold of them when
he rolled them together. The flames would shoot up bright, and his
countenance appeared to be a pale red, while thousands of sparks flew
above his head and disappeared in the air. In a minute there was an
awkward boy at his side with a handspike, taking hold and doing the best
he could to help, and there was mother by the light of the fires, who a
short time before in her native home, was an invalid and her life
despaired of, now, with some of her children, picking up chips and sticks
and burning them out of the way.

We were well rewarded for our labor. The buckwheat came up and in a
little time it was all in bloom. It put on its snow white blossoms, and
the wind that caressed it, and caused it to wave, bore away on its wings
to the woods the fragrance of the buckwheat field.

The little industrious bee came there with its comrades and extracted its
load of sweet, then flew back to its native home in the forest. There it
deposited its load, stored it away carefully against the time of need.
Nature taught the bee that a long, cold winter was coming and that it
was best to work and improve the time, and the little fellow has left us
a very bright example to follow.




CHAPTER XIII.

METHEGLIN OR THE DETECTED DRINK.