One of them arose and advanced toward him.

"I trust," he remarked, "that you will not think we are trespassing on your premises.

We have been traveling all day; our horses were tired and we were thirsty, and the spring invited us to be refreshed." For a moment Jake stood speechless, and then in almost forgotten terms he made his unexpected visitors feel welcome.
The three men conversed for some time, and in the course of the conversation Jake explained to them the reason for his lonely life and the circumstances that caused him to be thus engaged.

The strangers explained that they were driving across the State, and that, in order to make their journey fifty miles shorter, they had been instructed to take this untraveled road through this expanse of wooded hills.
"I should think," remarked one of the men, "that this would be a splendid place to meditate on the goodness of God.

Loneliness often begets meditation, and God loves to be the companion of the companionless.