The little house in the woods

Contents

. Cepar Hitt Farm

. Tue TREE House

. Tue Picnic

Chapter I HOW DOROTHY’S WISH “CAME TRUE”

CHAPTER I HOW DOROTHY’S WISH “CAME TRUE”

HEN Dorothy Rogers was five

years old she received a great many nice presents on her birthday. The present she liked best of all was a book of fairy tales. Mother read aloud the stories again and again. Dorothy particularly liked the tales in which a fairy appeared to the hero and offered him three wishes. So many times the hero wasted the fairy’s gift, asking for foolish things because he spoke quickly and thoughtlessly, that Dorothy decided to have her mind all made up beforehand about what to ask for, in case a fairy ever appeared to her and told her she might have three wishes.

First, Dorothy thought, she would ask for a baby sister.

Second, she thought, she would ask for a baby brother.

And third, she would ask to live, with her father and mother and brother and sister, in a little house in the woods like Snow White's.

Now, although the fairy did not appear to Dorothy and the baby brother and sister did not come, the third wish came true only a few weeks after Dorothy's fifth birthday. She went to live in a little house in the woods! It wasn't precisely like the little house where Snow White and the dwarfs lived. It was even nicer, Dorothy thought, because #er little house in the woods was close by the waters of the blue, blue sea.

Dorothy and her father and mother lived all summer long in their dear little house, and then they went back to the city. They lived in the big, noisy city all the autumn andall the winter andallthe spring, but when the summer came again and Dorothy was six years old, Dorothy and her father and mother again went to live in their little house in the woods.

This story will tell you about Dorothy’s second summer in the little house under the trees by the shores of the blue, blue waters.

First, there was a long journey to take from the great city. Dorothy had to ride in somany different trolley-cars and trains and boats that she got tired trying to count them all; but at last the long journey was over, and Uncle Ned was swinging Dorothy out of the last boat on to the little pier at the foot of the rocks in front of the little house in the woods. And there on the pier were Aunt Jessie and Baby Billy and

Aunt Elizabeth and Mrs. Sayre; and racing across the beach to welcome Dorothy came Frances and Margaret Fairfield and Margaret Sayre. In a minute there were hugs and kisses and handshakes and every one talking at once, because every one was happy to think of the good times they were all going to have together, all summer long.

Soon Dorothy and the little girls and the aunties were climbing the funny teetery runway from the float to the top of the rocks, while father and Uncle James and Uncle Ned and the boys followed carrying the trunks and the suitcases up to the piazza of the little house.

Dorothy ran eagerly in at the door to see if things looked as she remembered them from last summer. Yes, there was the great fireplace with the chimney made of big “cobblestones” reaching up to the ceiling of the living-room. There were the chairs and the table and the desk and the shelves for books which Father had made from trees that had grown in their very own woods. The room was gay with flowers arranged by the aunties to make the little house seem to say, ‘‘ Glad to see you back again!”

Dorothy next ran into her own pretty room, the little girls crowding in after her. In one corner were three narrow shelves on which Dorothy had kept her collection. She remembered that she had left on these shelves last summer a number of smooth white pebbles shaped like tiny eggs, a great many different kinds of shells, two starfishes, a big sea-urchin, a row of pine cones of all sizes from tiny ones to big ones, and a necklace made of pretty seeds. But now the collection was all in disorder. Some of the things were on the floor. Many of the shells were broken; and of the necklace nothing was left but the thread on which Dorothy had strung the seeds.

As Dorothy gazed in surprise at her ruined treasures, Frances exclaimed :—

“Oh, the field-mice have eaten your necklace. They got into my room too, and messed things up.”

‘‘Or maybe it was a chipmunk,” said Margaret Fairfield. “I saw one scampering across our attic floor the other day.”

‘Never mind,” said Margaret Sayre. “You can find lots of other things just as good. Oh, Dorothy, ask your mother if you can’t go over to your Uncle James’s bungalow. It’s new since last year, you know, and your Aunt Elizabeth has some lovely kittens.”

So Dorothy ran to ask her mother, who said: —

“Wait a minute, dear. Where is that brown suitcase? You must put on your sneakers before you run around on these slippery rocks.”

The brown suitcase was found with the sneakers inside it; and Dorothy took off her city shoes and put on the rubber-soled ones. Nowshe could climb the rocks “like a fly on the side of the house,” as she said, or run along the mossy paths in the woods and up the piney hillsides without fear of slipping.

The little girls ran out of the door, down the piazza steps, and along the narrow path that led to Uncle James’s bungalow. They were so eager to see the new house and the kittens that they did not stop to notice the bright red bunchberries that decked the mossy carpet under the baby birch trees. They did not even wait to pick and eat the blueberries that fooked as blue as the sky and tasted as sweet as sunshine could make them.

In a minute they came to a little bridge which Dorothy had never seen.

“Look, Dorothy,’ said Frances. ‘Uncle James lives on an island —at least, it’s an island at high tide. So he had to build a bridge to the mainland or else they’d have had to swim or come across in a boat. Only at low tide you can wade across.”

The little girls stopped in the middle of the bridge and looked down into the water below for a minute. Then they ran across the bridge on to the island.

Here was the new bungalow, all a lovely mossy green color, roof and sides and every part of it; and around the bungalow was a little grove of trees and around the grove were the blue waters of Penobscot Bay. It was just as Frances said. Uncle James did not need to build a fence or a wall around his land. The water made a sort of wall. But, then, people do not need walls to keep out bad people in this pleasant land where Dorothy and her friends live in summer. The bad people do not seem to care to come to that country.

Uncle James and Aunt Elizabeth and Cousin Lincoln had not yet come back to their little house, but the kittens were there, chasing one another across the broad piazza floor, running up and down the piazza posts and even scrambling up on the screen door. They were beautiful kittens, with long, thick fur and big, fluffy tails, and they were so playful and yet so tame that they loved to be petted almost as much as they liked to play.

Dorothy soon had the gray kitty in her arms, and the little fellow snuggled into her neck and purred loudly as if to say he was glad of another friend to love him.

“Oh, Frances!” said Dorothy. ‘Do

IL you suppose I could have a kitty too? Were there any left where Aunt ’Liz’beth got these ?”’

“T don’t think so,” said Frances. ‘ But Aunt Elizabeth will let you play with these all you like.”

The kitty was so lovely that Dorothy would have been glad to stay on Uncle James’s piazza and play with him all the morning. But the little girls were so eager to show everything to Dorothy as quickly as possible that with one last hug and kiss she put Muffet down, and off they ran once more.

Back across the bridge and up the path they ran, past Dorothy’s bungalow where Father and Mother by this time were unpacking trunks and putting the house in order.

Now the children were going to the bungalow where Frances and Margaret Fairfield lived with Uncle Ned and Aunt

Jessie and Baby Billy and their big brother Arthur.

This time the way was not along a path in the woods. First, the little girls scrambled down steep rocks to a pebbly beach. This was the place where the children bathed or waded when it was not too cold. At low tide the curving beach was very wide, but when the tide came in, the water sometimes covered the peb~ bly floor close up to the roots of the trees that bordered the shore.

It was low tide now, and the little girls’ feet made a rattling sound as they crunched over the pebbles toward Uncle Ned’s bungalow. On days when wind and waves were still, Uncle Ned and Aunt Jessie could always tell when some one was coming to call on them by the “scrunch” of the little stones under the visitor’s feet.

Dorothy particularly loved Uncle Ned’s house. Its dark red roof and walls and white-framed windows, peeping out from among the ‘‘Christmas trees” that grew close about it, always gave her a pleasant feeling of the good times the “ bungaloafers” had within the red house and on its rocks and its beach.

«Shall we take Dorothy first up to our room?” asked Margaret Fairfield.

‘‘Oh, no,” said Frances. ‘‘Let’s show her the Gloucester hammock. She hasn’t seen that, nor our doll’s hammock either.”

So they trooped up the steps of the piazza that ran across the front of the house — such a huge piazza, long enough and broad enough for the big tea-parties that Aunt Jessie was likely to have any afternoon, all summer long.

Across one end of the piazza hung a fine big Gloucester hammock... All four little girls sat in it at once and there was room to spare. They were a little out of breath from so much hurrying, so they sat still awhile, chatting about what they Should do next. -

Near the big hammock hung a tiny one exactly like it in which Margaret’s doll lay sleeping. Beyond the doll’s hammock stood a pretty tea-table made by Uncle Ned, and a lovely rustic seat, too, which he had made. Beautiful fern baskets hung from the piazza posts. In front of the house were the great Maine rocks with fir trees seeming to grow out of them; and beyond the rocks were the wide blue waters dotted with green islands. White sailboats skimmed over the blue water, and far, far above lovely seagulls, the sun gleaming on their white breasts, sailed across the blue, blue sky.

‘‘Now let’s show Dorothy our room,” said Margaret, after they had swung in the hammock for a few minutes. |

“All right,” said Frances.

T5

So they jumped out of the hammock and in at the green front door. Across the big living-room they were going to the stairs when Frances exclaimed : —

‘“‘T smell something good!” And with that she darted into the kitchen, the other little girls following at her heels.

“Oh, Mother, may we have some cookies ?” asked Frances.

* Ves cof scourse, 7 said Arint jessie laughing. ‘You would smell cookies ’way over to Bock’s Harbor, wouldn't you, you always-hungry kiddies ?”

‘“ Your cookies we would, Mrs. Fairfield,’ said Margaret Sayre. “They are the best any one ever made.”

The little girls stood about the big sunny room munching the delicious cookies, while Dorothy’s bright eyes looked eagerly around getting acquainted again with Aunt Jessie’s kitchen.

“See, Dorothy,” said Margaret Fairfield. ‘‘ We have running water this year, just as we do in the city. Mr. Sumner and Mr. Gifford laid pipes from the spring up on the hill down to the bungalows, and now we just turn the faucet and get our water as easy as anything.” Dorothy knew it was much easier for Aunt Jessie in her housekeeping to get water from a faucet, but privately she was a little sorry to have anything in Maine “just like the city.” She had always been much interested in the rain-barrels out on the kitchen porch. On rainy days when the water ran down the steep roof of the bungalow, it was made to flow into a pipe which emptied the water into large barrels standing near the kitchen door. Dorothy had enjoyed watching the water gush from the spout of the pipe, and she had liked to see Frances fill her pitcher with the long-handled tin dipper that hung near the barrels. This rainwater was used for washing faces and washing clothes, not for drinking or cooking. The drinkingwater last summer had been brought in pails from the spring on the hill.

After they had eaten their cookies the little girls started for the stairs.

“Ts Billy upstairs, Aunt Jessie?” asked Dorothy.

‘‘No, dear, he is out with his daddy. I should n’t wonder if they are in the vegetable garden picking string beans for supper.”

Clattering up the bare stairs that smelled so good and woodsy, the little girls flocked into Frances’s and Margaret’s room. It was a big, pretty room, with clean, bare wood walls on which Frances and Margaret had tacked their favorite pictures. In one corner of the room was Frances’s little white ‘bed and in the opposite corner was Margaret’s. The little girls had a dressing-table made of a broad shelf which Uncle Ned had fastened to the wall, and Aunt Jessie had covered with flowered chintz. Uncle Ned had made the washstand, too, another shelf covered with white oilcloth. And the chairs had not come from a city shop either. They came from the woods back of the bungalow and Uncle Ned’s tools had built them.

The little girls spent a very happy halfhour looking at Frances’s and Margaret’s treasures.

Then Uncle Ned’s voice was heard calling up the stairs: —

“Dorothy, your mother asked me to tell you to come home now. It is almost dinner-time, and I suspect all you kiddies need some washing-up.”’

“All right, Uncle Ned, I’m coming,” called Dorothy.

Then Margaret Sayre jumped up, saying:—

“T guess my mother will be wanting me, too.”

So Dorothy and Margaret went down the stairs and out through the kitchen, down the steps of the back porch and across the pebbly beach. They climbed the rocks again near Dorothy’s house, but here Margaret said good-bye and went on up through the woods toward Mrs. Sumner’s.

Dorothy ran in at the door of her little house, and there was Mother waiting to help her small daughter get washed and brushed and into a fresh middy.

Just as the last button was fastened, they heard something that sounded like a horn blowing three long blasts and then three short ones.

‘Ah, there’s the old conch shell!” said Mother. “And I think Mr. Sumner is making it call, ‘Oh, all ye hungry Bungaloafers, dinner is almost ready. So come in from your bathing and in from your boats, and come up to Cedar Hill Farm to try our fresh fish!’”

Dorothy laughed gayly at Mother’s idea.

“But no one is in bathing to-day, Mother,” she said.

“Not to-day,” said Mother. ‘But that is what the conch wsually has to say. You watch and see after this.”

Then Father appeared, fresh from 4zs “washing-up,’ and Dorothy ran and hugged him, exclaiming : —

“Oh, now we don’t look like city people any longer! Daddy has on a flannel shirt and khaki trousers, and Mother and I have middy suits, and we all have on sneakers. And we don’t care a bit how dirty we get, do we, Mother, dear?”

“Not a bit,” laughed Mother, ‘provided we get a swim every morning and clean faces and hands for the table.”

“And when we go on picnics we shan’t even have to get clean for meals!” said Dorothy.

“Oh, what joy!” exclaimed Daddy. “You and I will go as dirty as Indians, shan’t we, Puss? Mother is sure to look clean enough to save the reputation of the family.”

And so, joking and laughing, Father and Mother and Dorothy left the little house, without even locking the door, and started up the road through the woods toward dinner.

Chapter IT

Bs,

Chapter II Cedar Hill Farm

OW they enjoyed the short walk through the woods! The ground under their feet was soft and cool and springy, not a bit like hard, hot city pavements. To be sure the road was uneven and ‘‘hummocky,” and one needed to be careful not to catch one’s feet in roots and low bushes or stumble over rocks here and there. But the loveliness overhead, where bits of blue sky showed between dancing green leaves, and the loveliness all about, of flowers and ferns and sweet smells and soft breezes — ah, it made Dorothy wish never to have to live in the city again. Beyond the woods they passed a sunny field of tall grass that rippled in waves of green as gentle breezes swept over it. “Just see how big and red the clover is!’’ said Mother, noticing the lovely blossoms on the edge of the field.

‘“‘Oh, Mother, may I pick some?” asked Dorothy.

“When we come back you may,” said Mother, ‘We must gather flowers every day to fill our bowls and baskets.”

Now they crossed the main road which ran by Mr. Sumner’s and on up to the village. And beside the road, at the foot of the slope which was Mr. Sumner’s front yard, lay a tiny pond.

‘‘Oh, Mother! Mother!” shrieked Dorothy. ‘“ Justsee the baby ducklings. Oh! Oh! Are n’t they beautiful?”

For there on the pond Dorothy had spied a whole family of little brown, fluffy, yellow-billed creatures that were swimming as fast as they could, away from these giant people, to get close under the care of their mother duck.

“So! There’s your friend Mrs. Jemima

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“JUST SEE THE BABY DUCKLINGS”’

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Puddleduck come to live at Mr. Sumner’s, Dorothy,” said Mother.

“And there’s Mr. Jeremy Fisher to keep her company,” Father added. ‘See the old green bullfrog sitting on the log, swelling out his yellow shirt-front?”’

Dorothy was too delighted to speak. She forgot all about being hungry and wanted to stay and watch the ducklings. But Daddy told her that the pond and its people would stay there all summer, and she would have plenty of time to make their acquaintance.

So Dorothy went on across the narrow plank which made a little bridge over the the brook that flowed into the pond. They climbed the grassy path up the little hill and in a minute more they were on Mr. Sumner’s piazza.

Then such a welcome as Father and Mother and Dorothy received from all the people who lived during the summer with the Sumners of Cedar Hill Farm. Besides Mrs. Sayre and Margaret, whom Dorothy had already seen, there were Mr. and Mrs. Sumner, Mr. Sayre and Mr. Burchard, Miss Hart and Miss Grace Hart, tall Ruth Hopper, fat little David, and Mr. and Mrs. Hopper. Then up the path came Uncle Ned and Uncle James and their families, who, like Dorothy's family, ate dinner every noon at Mrs. Sumner’s. And all the other fathers began to joke Dorothy’s father because his shirt and trousers were so clean and had n't any patches or holes in them, and they pretended they were going to send him back to the city because he looked too stylish. And the mothers said: —

‘Don’t they behave like alot of school-boys just let loose from school?”

Then Arthur and Lincoln said: —

“No, they aren't half so sensible as school-boys !”’

So everybody laughed, and Dorothy thought it was the best fun in the world to be in the midst of sucha jolly big family, because at home she was used to such a tiny family, only herself and her father and mother.

Next everybody went into the dining-room, and while the grown people talked and laughed as they ate, the children attended busily to filling their, ‘‘tummies” that they might the sooner get out to play.

After dessert was eaten the mothers excused the children, who went quietly - out of the dining-room. As soon as they reached the piazza, however, there was no more quiet. All began talking at once.

‘“Let’s take Dorothy up to the spring to see the new reservoir,” said Frances.

“Oh, no! Let’s go down to the barn. That’s new, too, since last summer,” said Margaret Sayre.

“But down in our woods the tree-house that Daddy made us is best of all,” said Margaret Fairfield.

“Now I know Dorothy would rather see our camp than anything else. Would n't you?” said big Arthur, looking down teasingly at little Dorothy.

Dorothy laughed excitedly. It was bewildering to have a choice of so many delightful things to do.

“T’ll tell you,” said Ruth Hopper. ‘Let ’s begin with the nearest thing, then go on with the next nearest, and so on till we ’’ve seen everything.”

This seemed a sensible plan. The nearest thing was the new barn, part-way down Mr. Sumner’s little hill toward the road.

You see, Mr. and Mrs. Sumner lived in Maine all the year, winter and summer. So they did not build their house close by the water, as the summer people do, because winter winds from the ocean are terribly cold. Mr. Sumner, years ago, had chosen a spot on the hillside and had built his warm house close against the sheltering cedar woods which protected the home from the bitter north winds of Old Winter.

From the back of the house one looked directly into the woods, and the little wild creatures of the wood often came close to the kitchen doorstep, not a bit afraid of the house people who never harmed them. From the front piazza there was the loveliest view of the island-dotted blue waters; and one could see the bungalow roofs peeping out from the trees close to the shore.

The little girls ran down to the barn, but Arthur and Lincoln went off by themselves. How sweet the barn smelled with its new boards and its haymows partly filled with new-mown hay. Old Dan, Mr.

Sumner’s horse, looked inquiringly around from his stall as if to say: —

“Who are all these chattering creatures and what do they want here?”

A mother hen had just led her brood of chickens into the barn and she was showing them how to find the nice bits of grain scattered on the floor. The chicken family were having a fine feast.

“Oh, see! There’s a kitty!” exclaimed Dorothy, whose eyes had been eagerly taking in the new sights.

Sure enough, there was a lively brownand-black kitten scampering up one of the posts of the haymow. The little girls tried to coax him down, but pussy did not feel like being petted just then, so he kept beyond reach of outstretched hands.

“You ought to see Mrs. Sumner’s old cat,’ said Ruth. ‘She’s the cleverest cat you ever saw. She is n't this kitten’s mother, though. You know Mrs. Sumner can’t keep lots of kittens, so whenever Blackie has a new family Mrs. Sumner gives away all but one of the babies. Well, old Blackie knows this, so she hides her babies up in the woods until they are big and she thinks they can take care of themselves. Then she brings them down to the house. Mrs. Sumner says she never can find the hiding place. Sometimes when she sees Blackie starting up the road toward her kittens, Mrs. Sumner or some one else follows her at a little distance. Then Blackie sits down in the road as if she had just come out to look at the view. After a while the people forget for a minute to keep their eyes on her, and Blackie always knows just when to disappear into the woods while they aren’t noticing.”

Dorothy liked this story very much and would have been glad to hear more, but Frances exclaimed : —

“You ve seen enough of the barn for to-day, haven't you, Dorothy? Let’s go up to the spring now. That’s the next nearest thing.”

So the five girls left the barn and went back up the steep little path toward the house. This time Dorothy noticed what She had been too excited to see before. Almost half the front of Mrs. Sumner’s house was covered with bushes filled with great clusters of crimson rambler roses. There were enough bouquets of roses on the bushes to have filled dozens of bowls and vases; and oh! how beautiful they looked in the sunshine.

Dorothy was too happy for words as she gazed on the lovely sight, and while she stood drinking it in, Ruth exclaimed in a whisper :—

“Sh-h, girls! There’s a humming-bird, right by the piazza steps. Do you see him ?”

The girls stood like statues watching the tiny humming-bird that, poising his wee body on fluttering wings, thrust a long bill into the heart of a flower and took a deep sip of the honey which the flower was glad to give him. Then the tiny bird flew to another flower and another, his little body flashing like many jewels in the sunlight.

It was a wonderful sight to the city children, and it pleased them that the dainty creature, though he knew they were near, did not take fright and fly away.

After a little the beautiful bird had drunk his fill and in a twinkling his humming wings bore him out of sight. The children drew long breaths of joy at what they had seen.

Next Dorothy spied another interesting thing.

“Oh, see the funny little man on top of the pole!” she cried.

The funny little man was made of wood. He was about the size of Dorothy’s boy doll, Jack Sprat. Mr. Sumner had made him with broad, flapping arms and had fastened him on top of a pole in such a way that when the wind blew, it caught the flapping arms and made them whirl roundand round and also made Mr. Windmill Man whirl round on his pole. When the wind blew gently, Mr. Windmill Man turned around slowly, but when the wind blew hard, it almost made you dizzy to see how fast the little man had to whirl.

Frances now took Dorothy’s hand. “We 'll never see half the things if we keep stopping,” she said.

“ But Dorothy is going to stay all summer,” remarked practical Ruth.

This thought did not seem to make any difference to Frances and the two Margarets. They, had the feeling that, since Dorothy had been later in arriving than the rest of them, she must catch up with all the sights as soon as possible.

So once more the five little girls started toward the spring. They went around back of the house, where they saw Mr. Sumner carrying in an armful of wood from the woodpile.

‘Well, Dorothy, getting homesick for the city yet?” asked Mr. Sumner with a twinkle in his eye.

“Oh, zo,” said Dorothy. “I want to Stay here always and forever.”

Mr. Sumner laughed.

“T?ll tell you. When your father and mother go back in September, you stay here with Mrs. Sumner and me and see what fun a Maine winter is!”

Dorothy laughed gayly.

‘Mother would n’t be able to take care of Daddy without me,” she said. ‘“ But when our ship comes in, Daddy says we ave coming up here in winter.”

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Mr. Sumner went on into the house, smiling, and the little girls soon reached the rail fence that kept the cows from straying from their pasture into the garden and down the road.

Frances and Ruth, who were the tallest of the girls, held open the gate for the younger girls to pass through. Then they swung the gate carefully back into place on its great flat stone.

Now there was a short walk along a mossy path through the woods. The path was wet as well as mossy, because there were many springs on this woodsy hillside, but somehow wet feet in Maine don’t seem to make children catch cold as they do in the city.

Soon Frances said: —

“Now you’d better let me take your hand, Dorothy, because the rocks down to the spring are very slippery.”

So Dorothy, carefully guided by

Frances, stepped down the smooth, wet stones that made a sort of little stairway to the spring.

Oh, what a pretty sight she then saw! There was a lovely pool of water, so clear that every little pebble on its bottom showed plainly. Overhead the tall trees made such a deep shade that the pool was like a’ brown mirror in which the girls could see their faces. The sides of the rocky bowl in which the water lay were bright with vivid green moss. And this little bowl of water, icy cold on the hottest summer day, never was empty, never failed to supply refreshing drink to thirsty man and beast, even though the rain sometimes forgot for a long time to come down to the dry fields.