CHAPTER XIII.
THE THING AND OTHER THINGS I returned to Mr.Hacket's house late in the afternoon of New Year's day.

The schoolmaster was lying on a big lounge in a corner of their front room with the children about him.

The dusk was falling.
"Welcome, my laddie buck!" he exclaimed as I entered.

"We're telling stories o' the old year an' you're just in time for the last o' them.
Sit down, lad, and God give ye patience! It'll soon be over." Little John led me into the group and the schoolmaster began:--Let us call this bit of a story: _The Guide to Paradise_.
"One day in early June I was lyin' under the big apple tree in the garden--sure I was.

It was all white and sweet with the blossoms like a bride in her veil--an' I heard the hum o' the bee's wing an' odors o' the upper world come down to me.