Backward, Turn Backward, O Time, in Your Flight

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Man and wife for fifty years, they are sitting by the fireside together. Old age has crept upon them, but the bond of love cemented in early childhood has never been broken. The softening glow of the firelight reveals a picture of perfect peace and contentment. The arrival of a basket of fruit, containing a number of luscious apples, recalls to mind their childhood meeting, the incident most tenderly cherished in both dear hearts. Memory spanning the space of time, once more brings the orchard into view. The old man laughs as he sees himself the ringleader of a mischievous set of village boys, but boys will be boys. The apples were ripe; the temptation was great. How they shinned up that tree, and what a harvest they gathered, until old Uncle Abner hove into sight. The boys were out of the tree in a jiffy, and then the chase began. And what a chase it was! Across the meadow, through the brook, and up the pasture lot to the hayfield. The smallest boy was far in the rear, and at the turn at the big hay stack he was little ahead of his angry pursuer. Capture would have been certain, but for a quick-witted, bright-eyed little girl, who with quick sympathy covered him up with hay, and sat on him. The farmer, none the wiser, raged after the other culprits. The danger past, the boy was uncovered. As the eyes of boy and girl met in laughter, the sweetest story ever told had its beginning.