34 CAROLINE.

 

The dog in the boat. Romantic pathway. Rocks and precipices.

 

the right, while it descended on the left, toward the mill-
pond. In fact, the children could often see the surface
of the water in that direction, through the openings of
the trees.

The hill on the right hand appeared to grow steeper and
steeper, as the children went on, until finally it became a
mass of rocks and precipices, shaded and overhung every-
where with dense thickets of evergreen trees. The path
came out too nearer the shore of the pond, so that for
some distance the children, as they walked along, had an
unobstructed. view of the water. They saw the boat
with the boys in it coasting along the rocky shore be-
neath them. The dog was standing in the bow of the
boat, with his feet upon one of the thwarts, and look-
ing eagerly about in every direction, as if enjoying the
scenery.

“T wish we were in that boat,” said Phonny.

“Oh no,” said Maleville, “I should not dare to go
in it.”

The boat, though it was going in the same direction
with the children, soon disappeared behind a point of
land which projected into the pond at a short distance
before them. Caroline and her party accordingly went
on. They found the path more and more picturesque
and romantic as they proceeded. ‘There were great
precipices here and there, with beautiful flowers growing
in the interstices of the rocks, and tall firs and pines over-
hanging them from above. At intervals too there were
deep glens and ravines extending back among the preci-
pices, in each of which a little rill of water came gurgling
down among the moss and the roots at the bottom of the
dell. There were a great many rocks lying here and