. Down the eastern and up the Black . flung a bridge across for loiterers like from the numerous bits of Chinese napkins that I seeabout me on the ground, some picknickers have used it lately,but this afternoon absolute silence rules. For me the sound ofmerry voices here would be most inharmonious, would seem likeprofanation. The feeling that the place inspires is one of sad-ness. Mournfulness is born of the spot, or else of the reflectionthat this retreat was not originally made for me—God madeit for the Indian, and I stand here— upon his ashes . .Beside a stream h
. Down the eastern and up the Black . flung a bridge across for loiterers like from the numerous bits of Chinese napkins that I seeabout me on the ground, some picknickers have used it lately,but this afternoon absolute silence rules. For me the sound ofmerry voices here would be most inharmonious, would seem likeprofanation. The feeling that the place inspires is one of sad-ness. Mournfulness is born of the spot, or else of the reflectionthat this retreat was not originally made for me—God madeit for the Indian, and I stand here— upon his ashes . .Beside a stream he loved. A half mile further up, near the blacksmith shop of JamesMyers, the North and South Branches of Indian Run meet. Bytaking the South Branch, you will find yourself moving towardBrandywine Manor, and later discover that you are circlingthrough bushes and swamps to Cupola. The North Branch, onthe other hand, will lead you into the heart of a great wood,solitary and lonesome, where there are no Ioads and where the [ 66 o w a w o w O ft. few remains of wagon tracks are covered up with weeds. Sooften have I wandered through this wood, I know each mossy-rock, each bank of ferns, each quiet pool. The giant grape-vines that entwine themselves about the trees and creep far upinto the branches, or twist themselves in curious convolutions onthe ground, even these have lost their serpentine appearanceand become familiar. And yet at times both rocks and vinesseem most unfriendly; the former set their slippery traps forme, and when I leave the stream, the grapevines catch me intheir coils and fling me down upon the stones and rotten leaves. One afternoon late in the summer, as I sat on a fallentree that formed a kind of rustic bridge across the run, andwatched a spider adjusting its net, I heard a weird and mournfulsound and then a piercing cry—like the wail of a lost soul. Amadman or wild cat? Which? At once the wood took on alonelier look, the very foliage appearing thicker,
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