"Captain! I've got a chestnut!" cried Ruth, holding up a small, familiar nut.
"Sure enough—there's the tree! Let's stop here a minute, and all get some."
Most of the girls succeeded in gathering a handful, before they started on. They proceeded at a leisurely pace, pausing now and then to hunt for nuts or to examine other objects of interest to the student of nature.
"Why, there are some birds, and they're not sparrows, either!" said Daisy Gravers, indicating several slate-colored birds about the size of English sparrows. "I didn't know there were any other winter birds around here!"
"They are Juncos, or Snowbirds," explained the Captain. "They are a winter bird with us, and as soon as the warm weather comes they will fly north. Don't forget to put them down in your notebooks, girls."
They had now reached the outskirts of the woods, through which they had been walking for some time, and Miss Phillips called a halt and suggested that they count their nuts. Ruth, who had been the most diligent searcher, won the game, having found a greater number of varieties than any of the other girls. The Scout Captain told them something about each variety and the tree upon which it grew, before they continued their walk.
"Only a short distance along this road, and we reach the haunted house," said Miss Phillips.
The girls walked closer around her. They had emerged into open country, and were climbing a winding road which extended before them uphill; on their left the land descended gradually to a valley below them, where in the distance, they could see the scattered houses nestled among the fields of fertile farm-land.
"The nearest village is about a mile down the valley," the Captain informed them. "When the haunted house was built it was the farthest away from the village, but since that time a number of others have sprung up all around here."
Mounting to the top of the hill, they found that the road, instead of dipping suddenly down again, was level; and that to the right of it there started a high stone wall which followed the irregularities of the road for a considerable distance. It was covered with lichen and moss, and showed gaps here and there where the mortar had crumbled away and the stones fallen in a heap upon the ground; while in other places, the tangled growth of ivy vines almost entirely obscured the stonework.