"On thy fair bosom, silver lake, The white swan spreads her snowy sail,"

quoted Delia.

"It is not the first time swans have proved geese," said Mr. Theodore, with a smile. "But for the sake of the picturesque we will let it pass."

"I wonder if the Wye or the Severn would be so enchanting to us if poets had not lived there and immortalised them?"

"When we are an old country, we will, no doubt, sigh for relics. In 1666, this was called 'Neworke or Pesayak towne;' and a little more than a hundred years ago this Gully was made the dividing line between the towns. There are many historic spots in Belleville, and an old copper mine that once made a great addition to her prosperity. But my quest ends here. I don't know as I have a hero exactly, Miss Hanny, yet my friend, Frank Forrester, has had a varied and eventful life. This way."

Mr. Whitney led them up a path mostly over-grown with pale, spindling grass that had no chance for sunshine, so close and tall were the trees.

It was undeniably gloomy, hidden away here. A little old brown, weather-beaten house hung with vines, that even stretched up into the trees; small, narrow windows, with diamond-shaped panes that could not let in much light, it would seem.

"It's a horrid place," cried Dele. "Hanny, we shall surely see a ghost.

The idea of living at the very foot of a burying-ground!"

Hanny held tight to Joe's hand. She was beginning to have what Miss Cynthia called the "creeps."

CHAPTER XIII

OUT-OF-THE-WAY CORNERS

If the outside was gloomy, it had a queer, disorderly, and rather cheerful aspect within, for the sun was pouring a flood of gold in one window where it happened to strike a spot between two trees. And Frank Forrester was by no means melancholy to-day. He shook hands cordially with Mr. Whitney, and welcomed the rest of the party with the utmost affability,--a fine-looking Englishman with a picturesque air, due largely to his rather long hair, which fell about his forehead and neck in a tumbled manner, suggesting a tendency to curls.

"These young people may like to look over my curiosities, while we have our talk," he said. "Take a cigar, and I'll bring a bottle of wine.

Won't you join us, Doctor? Here, young folks, are curiosities from everywhere."

He ushered them into a small room that was library and everything by turns. There were trophies of hunting expeditions, some rare birds stuffed and mounted, looking so alive Hanny would not have been surprised if they had suddenly begun to warble; books in every stage of dilapidation, some of them quite rare copies, Ben found; portfolios of old engravings; curious weapons; foreign wraps; Grecian and Turkish bits of pottery; and the odd things we call bric-a-brac nowadays.

Delia began to make some notes. Ben laughed a little. Interviewing was not such a fine art then; and people were considered greater subjects of interest than their belongings. But Delia was saving up things for stories which she meant to write as she found time.

Doctor Joe had come in here with the young people, leaving the two friends to discuss their business. He, too, found much to interest him; and he was amused at Delia's running comments, some of them very bright indeed. She was quite a spur to Ben, he found; and he was surprised at the varied stock of knowledge Ben had accumulated.

It did not seem as if they had explored half, when Mr. Whitney opened the door.

"Young folks, we must be going, if we expect to reach home that very same night, like the old woman with her pig," he said.

"Are you talked out?" asked Delia, archly; "for we haven't half looked through things."

"I want your brother to stay and have some supper with me. I'm my own housekeeper now; but I think we could manage."

"What fun it would be," said Delia. "As there are no stores, we should have to start at the foundation of things."

"I have a loaf of bread, and some cold mutton, and eggs, I think, and tea and coffee. Come, you had better accept my hospitality."

"I must be home in the early evening," remarked Doctor Joe.

"And Hanny's not to stay out after dark," appended Ben.

"We are going down to Cockloft Hall," explained Mr. Whitney. "I am sorry we cannot accept."

"Then you must bring your happy family again. If they are fond of curiosities, the old house could entertain them all day long."

"And if they are fond of adventures, which they are, they might put you to the test," said Delia, daringly.

Herbert laughed at the vivacious tone.

"Then you'd have to find me in the mood. In that respect, I am variable."

"Do you have a mood for each day? Then your friends could be sure--"

"A good idea, like the ladies' reception-days. Must I put on the card, Serious, Jolly, Adventurous, etc.?"

"And supernatural. I should come on the ghost days. For if ever a ghost walked out of its earthy habitation, I should think it would be here.

Did you ever see a ghost, Mr. Herbert?"

"I have seen some queer things. But these up here," nodding his head, "seem a very well behaved community. I can't say that they have troubled me; and I've come down the road at twelve or so at night. Perhaps my imagination is not vivid enough in that line. Have you ever seen a ghost, Miss Whitney?"

"No, I have not, except the ghosts of my imagination. I can shut my eyes now, and see them come trooping down that lonely road by twos and threes."

Herbert laughed again. "A vivid imagination is worth a good deal at times," he said. "There ought to be a ghost-walk about here; and next time you come over, we'll arrange one so perfectly that he shall defy detection. I'll walk a bit with you, if I am not a ghost."

When he put on his wide-brimmed, rather high-crowned hat, he looked more Spanish than English. They went through another room that opened on a porch, and, from thence, through the garden, or an attempt at one that did not betoken signal success.

The cemetery sloped down from a high hill that was such a thicket of woods it hid all indications of the City of the Dead. The placid river, in which there was only a gentle tide up here, lapped the shores with a little murmur as it came up from the bay. The green, irregular shore opposite showed here and there a house. The wood-robins were beginning their vespers already. Hanny thought them the sweetest singers she had ever heard.

Just here there was a terraced garden-spot and an old house adorned with all kinds of blossoming shrubbery.

"You see we two are guardians of the place, at either end. Miss Whitney, this house could tell some interesting tales of the bygone time; but the glory is departing. In a few years the city will stretch out and invade our solitude."

A wild spot of ground it was below, hilly, gravelly, sloping sharply down to the river. But people were beginning to take advantage of the shore-edge for business. There were shops, and a foundry stretching out smoky, dingy arms in various directions.

They said their good-byes here, as they were in sight of the old Gouverneur mansion. And no one guessed then that a tragedy of love and desperation to madness was soon to follow, and that in the dreary old house "Frank Forrester" was to lie, slain by his own hand, that he waved so jauntily to them as he bade them "Come again."

They scrambled up the small ascent, and sprang over the wall. Here was where the Nine Worthies used to come for their merry-making in their exuberant youth, and, as one of their number said afterward, "enlivened the solitude by their mad-cap pranks and juvenile orgies." The house had not been much modernised up to that period. Its young owner, Mr. Kemble, who was the Patroon of the merry company, still held it. They found the old honeydew cherry-tree standing; but some of its long-armed branches were going to decay. The odd, octagonal summer-house had not then fallen down.

They went up to the old room in the south-western angle, the green moreen chamber, as it had been called, where the Nine Worthies used to congregate, and where Irving concocted some choice bits of fun for the Salamagundi Club. And here was the great drawing-room where they disposed themselves to sociable naps on Sunday afternoons, the vine-covered porch on which they sat and smoked starlit evenings, and the grassy lawn over which they rambled. And now Mr. Washington Irving had been minister to Spain, and the guest of noted people in England and on the continent. He had won fame in more than one line, and hosts of appreciative readers.

Hanny could hardly realise it all, as she thought of the still handsome though rather delicate man, past middle life, gracious and dignified and kindly, sitting on his own porch at Sunnyside. She couldn't help going back to her first love, the old "Knickerbocker History" that seemed so real to her, even now.

The hand of improvement touched Cockloft Hall shortly after. The old summer-house was taken down; the famous cherry-tree, where the robins sang and reared their young for so many generations, succumbed to old age and wintry blasts; but she was glad she had seen it in its romantic halo.

They were not far from the upper railroad station then,--the old Morris and Essex that had stirred up the country people mightily when it first went thundering through quiet vales, and screaming out at little way-stations. They were just in time for a train. The sun had dropped down behind the Orange Mountain, though the whole west was alive with changeful gold and scarlet, melting to fainter tints, changing to indescribable hues and visionary islands floating in seas of amber and chrysoprase.

Hanny was quite tired, and leaned her head on Joe's shoulder. Ben and Delia were in front, and Mr. Whitney in the seat behind. They kept up an animated conversation, and thought it had been a delightful afternoon.