Being a leisure time of year, and the harvest in, it was hunting, fishing, going to Elm Island,—Ned and Captain Rhines carried the news of Mr. Bell’s arrival to Ben and Sally,—going with Edmund Griffin and Joe up river, and coming down on the raft, breaking colts; and, to fill his cup of happiness to the brim, Ned shot a moose. The boys caught a bear in the trap, and Ned had an opportunity to taste of the meat, and grease his cue with the fat.
There was another older person having a good time, and that was Mr. Bell. His things having been brought to the house, he drew from the recesses of an enormous chest the beautiful work-basket, and some articles of household use, that he had made while in Marseilles, and which had so excited the admiration of Ned. Mary was delighted—she had never seen anything half so beautiful.
“You can’t come up to that, Charlie,” said his father.
“No, father, I can’t. I never saw any of your work so beautiful as this.”
“I never had quite so strong a motive before,” said the old gentleman, smiling.
The next day Charlie was called from home to run out a piece of land, and was absent nearly a week. Finding lumber and tools in the shop, his father made a trough to soak willow, a bench, and having cut some native willows by the brook for the frame, in order to economize the osiers, made a chair for the baby, and when Charlie returned, was busily at work making one high enough for the child to sit at table in.
He was so much occupied with his work as not to notice his son, who stood in the door watching him.
“Father,” said he, “I should think I had got back to Lincolnshire.”
“This is a better place than the fens, Charles. I’ll tell you what I’ve been thinking about while at work here.”