some people, my boy.  Do you remember when I began to call you my boy—­you were very little.  It is long, long ago since I first saw you in your father’s dooryard—­you said you were going to mill on a butterfly’s back.  You looked just as I thought my boy would look.  You gave me a kiss.  What a wonderful gift it was to me then!  I began to love you.  I have no one else to think of now.  I hope you won’t mind my thinking so much of you.

“God bless you,
KATE FULLERTON.”

I understood now why the strong will and singular insight of this woman had so often exercised themselves in my behalf.  I could not remember the far day and the happy circumstance of which she spoke, but I wrote her a letter which must have warmed her heart I am sure.

Silas Wright arrived in Canton and drove up to our home.  He reached our door at eight in the morning with his hound and rifle.  He had aged rapidly since I had seen him last.  His hair was almost white.  There were many new lines in his face.  He seemed more grave and dignified.  He did not lapse into the dialect of his fathers when he spoke of the ancient pastimes of hunting and fishing as he had been wont to do.

“Bart,” he said when the greetings were over, “let’s you and me go and spend a day in the woods.  I’ll leave my man here to help your uncle while you’re gone.”

We went by driving south a few miles and tramping in to the foot of the stillwater on our river—­a trail long familiar to me.  The dog left us soon after we took it and began to range over thick wooded hills.  We sat down among small, spire-like spruces at the river’s edge with a long stretch of water in sight while the music of the hound’s voice came faintly to our ears from the distant forest.

“Oh, I’ve been dreaming of this for a long time,” said the Senator as he leaned back against a tree and filled his lungs and looked out upon the water, green with lily-pads along the edge and flecked with the last of the white blossoms.  “I believe you want to leave this lovely country.”

“I am waiting for the call to go,” I said.

“Well, I’m inclined to think you are the kind of man who ought to go,” he answered almost sadly.  “You are needed.  I have been waiting until we should meet to congratulate you on your behavior at Cobleskill.  I think you have the right spirit—­that is the all-important matter.  You will encounter strange company in the game of politics.  Let me tell you a story.”

He told me many stories of his life in Washington, interrupted by a sound like that of approaching footsteps.  We ceased talking and presently a flock of partridges came near us, pacing along over the mat of leaves in a leisurely fashion.  We sat perfectly still.  A young cock bird with his beautiful ruff standing out, like the hair on the back of a frightened dog, strode toward us with a comic threat in his manner.  It seemed as if he were of half a mind to knock us into the river.  But we sat as still as stumps and he spared us and went on with the others.