Late violets hid shyly under canopies of May-apple; bunches of
blue and of white anemone nodded from under fallen trees, and
water ran like hidden music everywhere. Slowly the valley and the
sound of its life-the lowing of cattle, the clatter at the mines, the
songs of the negroes at work-sank beneath him. The chorus of
birds dwindled until only the cool, flute-like notes of a wood-
thrush rose faintly from below. Up he went, winding around great
oaks, fallen trunks, loose bowlders, and threatening cliffs until
light glimmered whitely between the boles of the trees. From a
gap where he paused to rest, a fire-scald " was visible close to the'
crest of the adjoining mountain. It was filled with the charred,
ghost-like trunks of trees that had been burned standing. Easter's
home must be near that, Clayton thought, and he turned toward it
by a path that ran along the top of the mountain. After a few
hundred yards the path swerved sharply through a dense thicket,
and Clayton stopped in wonder.
Some natural agent had hollowed the mountain, leaving a level
plateau of several acres. The earth had fallen away from a great
sombre cliff of solid rock, and clinging like a swallow's nest in a
cleft of this was the usual rude cabin of a mountaineer. The face of
the rock was dark with vines, and the cabin was protected as by a
fortress.
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