Publisher's Synopsis
"That's a picturesque old place," said a lady on the back seat of the big wagon in which Hiram Swift was taking his summer boarders to drive. They were passing a low, wide farmhouse, gray from want of paint, with a shabby barn and sheds attached, all overarched by tall elms. The narrow hay-field and the vegetable-patch ended in a rocky hillside, with its steep ledges, overgrown and topped with tall pines and firs, which made a dense green background to the old buildings. "I don't know about its being like a picter," said Hiram, dryly, as he flicked away a fly from the shoulder of his horse, "but it isn't much by way of a farm. That bit of hay-field is about all the land there is that's worth anything; the rest is all rock. I guess the Widow Gale doesn't take much comfort in its bein' picturesque. She'd be glad enough to have the land made flat, if she could." "Oh, is that the Gale farm, where the silver-mine is said to be?" "Yes, marm; at least, it's the farm where the man lived that, 'cordin' to what folks say, said he'd found a silver-mine. I don't take a great deal of stock in the story myself."
