“Ye see, Larks he was our pardner—­him an’ us sold on the same beat—­and he jes’ got run over by a ’lectric, and it went over his back.  So they tuk him to the horspittle, ‘n Larks he up an’ died there yestiddy.  So us fellars we’re goin’ to give Larks a stylish funeril, you bet.  We liked Larks—­an’ it went over his back.  Say, mister, there ain’t nothin’ mean ‘bout us, come to buryin’ of Larks; ’n we’ve voted to settle on one them ‘Gates Ajar’ pieces—­made o’flowers, doncherknow.  So me ’n him an’ the other fellars we’ve saved up all our propurty, for we’re agoin’ ter give Larks a stylish funeril—­an’ here it is, mister.  I told the kids ef there was more’n enough you’s trow in a few greens, anyhow.  Make up de order right away, mister, and give us our money’s worf now, sure—­for Larks.”

The gamin proudly counted out upon the marble slab of that fashionable flower store the sum of seventy-five cents.

The florist—­blessings on him—­is said not to have undeceived the little fellows, but to have duly honored their “order,” and the biggest and most costly “Gates Ajar” piece to be had in the market went to the hospital, and helped to bury Larks.

Of course, as is customary in the case of all authors who have written one popular book, requests for work at once rained in on the new study on Andover Hill.  For it soon became evident that I must have a quiet place to write in.  In the course of time I found it convenient to take for working hours a sunny room in the farm-house of the Seminary estate, a large, old-fashioned building adjoining my father’s house.  In still later years I was allowed to build over, for my own purposes, the summer-house under the big elm in my father’s garden, once used by my mother for her own study, and well remembered by all persons interested in Andover scenery.  This building had been for some years used exclusively as a mud-bakery by the boys; it was piled with those clay turnovers and rolls and pies in whose manufacture the most select circles of Andover youth delighted.

But the bakery was metamorphosed into a decent, dear little room, about nine by eleven, and commanding the sun on the four sides of its quadrangle.  In fact, it was a veritable sun-bath; and how dainty was the tip-drip of the icicles from the big elm-bough, upon the little roof!  To this spot I used to travel down in all weathers; sometimes when it was so slippery on the hill behind the carriage-house (for the garden paths were impassable in winter) that I have had to return to primitive methods of locomotion, and just sit down and coast half the way on the crust.  Later still, when an accident and crutches put this delightful method of travelling out of the question, the summer-house (in a blizzard I delighted in the name) was moved up beside my father’s study.  I have, in fact, always had an out-of-door study, apart from the house I lived in, and have come to look upon it as quite a necessity; so that we have carried on