"'Why are the mountains shadowed o'er?
Why stand they darkened grimly?
Is it a tempest warring there,
Or rain-storm beating on them?
"'It is no tempest warring there,
No rain-storm beating on them,
But Charon sweeping over them,
And with him the departed.'"
"Look!" she cried, a few moments after. "There is just such a cloud-shadow sweeping over that long hill on the left. Is it true, I wonder? I never see those flying shadows without thinking of 'Charon sweeping over them.' It is such a comfort, Rose, that we like the same things, isn't it?"
"Indeed it is!" said Rose, heartily. "But, oh! Hilda dear, stop a moment! There is some yellow clover. Why, I had no idea it grew so far north as this!"
"Yellow clover!" repeated Hildegarde, looking about her. "Who ever heard of yellow clover? I don't see any."
"No, dear," said Rose; "it does not grow in the sides of buggies, nor even on stone-walls. If you could bend your lofty gaze to the ditch by the roadside, you might possibly see it."
"Oh, there!" said Hildegarde, laughing. "Take the reins, Miss Impudence, and I will get them." She sprang lightly out, and returned with a handful of yellow blossoms.
"Are they really clover?" she asked, examining them curiously. "I had no idea there were more than two kinds, red and white."
"There are eight kinds, child of the city," said Rose, "beside melilot, which is a kind of clover-cousin. This yellow is the hop-clover. Dear me! how it does remind me of my Aunt Caroline."
"And how, let me in a spirit of love inquire, does it resemble your Aunt Caroline? Is she yellow?"
"She was, poor dear!" replied Rose. "She has been dead now—oh! a long time. She was an aunt of Mother's; and once she had the jaundice, and it seems to me she was always yellow after that. But that was not all, Hilda. There was an old handbook of botany among Father's books, and I used to read it a great deal, and puzzle over the long words. I always liked long words, even when I was a little wee girl. Well, one day I was reading, and Aunt Caroline happened to come in. She despised reading, and thought it was an utter waste of time, and that I ought to sew or knit all the time, since I could not help Mother with the housework. She was very practical herself, and a famous housekeeper. So she looked at me, and frowned, and said, 'Well, Pink, mooning away over a book as usual? Useless rubbish! yer ma'd ought to keep ye at work.' I didn't say anything; I never said much to Aunt Caroline, because I knew she didn't like me, and I suppose I was rather spoiled by every one else being too good to me. But I looked down at my old book, which was open at 'Trefolium: Clover.' And there I read—oh, Hilda, it is really too bad to tell!—I read: 'The teeth bristle-form'—and hers did stick out nearly straight!—'corolla mostly withering or persistent; the claws'—and then I began to laugh, for it was exactly like Aunt Caroline herself; she was so withering, and so persistent! And I sat there and giggled, a great girl of thirteen, till I got perfectly hysterical. The more I laughed, the angrier she grew, of course; till at last she went out into the kitchen and slammed the door after her. But I heard her telling Mother that that gal of hers appeared to be losing such wits as she had,—not that 't was any great loss, as fur as she could see. Wasn't that dreadful, Hildegarde? Of course I was wheeled over to her house the next day, and begged her pardon; but she was still withering and persistent, though she said, 'Very excusable!' at last."