Our way lay over October Mountain by a road not much frequented.  In the morning’s ride we did not meet a trap of any kind or a rider,—­something quite unusual in that country of riders and drivers.  The road seemed to cling to the highest hills, and we climbed up and up for hours.  Only once was the grade so steep that we were obliged to dismount.  We passed through no village until we reached the other side, but every now and then we would come to a little clearing with two or three houses, possibly a forlorn store and a silent blacksmith shop; these spots seemed even more lonely and deserted than the woods themselves.  Man is so essentially a gregarious animal that to come upon a lone house in a wilderness is more depressing than the forests.  Nature is never alone; it knows no solitude; it is a mighty whole, each part of which is in constant communication with every other part.  Nature needs no telephone; from time immemorial it has used wireless telegraphy in a condition of perfection unknown to man.  Every morning Mount Blanc sends a message to Pike’s Peak, and it sends it on over the waters to Fujisan.  The bosom of the earth thrills with nervous energy; the air is charged with electric force; the blue ether of the universe throbs with motion.  Nature knows no environment; but man is fettered, a spirit in a cage, a mournful soul that seeks companionship in misery.  Solitude is a word unknown to nature’s vocabulary.  The deepest recesses of the forest teem with life and joyousness until man appears, then they are filled with solitude.  The wind-swept desert is one of nature’s play-grounds until man appears, then it is barren with solitude.  The darkest mountain cavern echoes with nature’s laughter until man appears, then it is hollow with solitude.  The shadow of man is solitude.

Instead of coming out at Becket as we expected, we found ourselves way down near Otis and West Otis, and passed through North Blandford and Blandford to Fairfield, where we struck the main road.

We stopped for dinner at a small village a few miles from Westfield.  There was but one store, but it kept a barrel of stove gasoline in an apple orchard.  The gasoline was good, but the gallon measure into which it was drawn had been used for oil, varnish, turpentine, and every liquid a country store is supposed to keep—­not excepting molasses.  It was crusted with sediment and had a most evil smell.  Needless to say the measure was rejected; but that availed little, since the young clerk poured the gasoline back into the barrel to draw it out again into a cleaner receptacle.

The gasoline for sale at country stores is usually all right, but it is handled in all sorts of receptacles; the only safe way is to ask for a bright and new dipper and let the store-keeper guess at the measure.

At Westfield the spark began to give trouble; the machine was very slow in starting, as if the batteries were weak; but that could not be, for one set was fresh and the other by no means exhausted.  A careful examination of every connection failed to disclose any breaks in the circuit, and yet the spark was of intermittent strength,—­now good, now weak.