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Updated: June 13, 2025
I have almost forgotten the wood-paths and shady places which I used to know so well last summer; and my views are so much confined to the interior of our mansion, that sometimes, looking out of the window, I am surprised to catch a glimpse of houses, at no great distance, which had quite passed out of my recollection.
The first buildings of the kind were probably erected by people who had bright and constant sunshine, and who desired a shadowy awfulness like that of a forest, with its arched wood-paths into which to retire in their religious moments. In America, on a hot summer's day, how delightful its cool and solemn depths would be!
So they taught, read, sang, wandered along the wood-paths in search of new beauties to charm their Northern eyes; rode together whenever Lucy could be persuaded to mount Nimbus' mule, which, despite its hybrid nature, was an excellent saddle-beast; entertained with unaffected pleasure the officers who came to cheer their loneliness; and under the care of their faithful old "Mammy" and the oversight of a kind-hearted, serious-faced Superintendent, who never missed Red Wing in his monthly rounds, they kept their oddly transformed home bright and cheerful, their hearts light and pure, and their faith clear, daily thanking God that they were permitted to do what they thought to be His will.
Women and house-porters were coming out to wash pavements and entrances: the collective life of the town was waking up to another uneventful day; but they two were hastening off to long hours of sunlight and fresh air, unhampered by the passing of time, or by fallacious ideas of duty; were setting out for a new bit of world, to strange meals taken in strange places, reached by white roads, or sequestered wood-paths.
'It was good, says Hawthorne, 'to meet him in the wood-paths, or sometimes in our avenue, with that pure intellectual gleam diffused about his presence like the garment of a shining one; and he so quiet, so simple, so without pretension, encountering each man alive as if expecting to receive more than he could impart.
The Jungle People who used to fear him for his wits feared him now for his strength, and when he moved quietly on his own affairs the mere whisper of his coming cleared the wood-paths. And yet the look in his eyes was always gentle. Even when he fought, his eyes never blazed as Bagheera's did.
All my life long I had had a kind of passion for being out-of-doors; and, to tell the truth, I had been so often seen wandering by myself in out-of-the-way wood-paths, or sitting idly about on stone walls in lonesome pastures, that some of my Philistine townsmen had most likely come to look upon me as no better than a vagabond. Yet I was not a vagabond, for all that.
"Not till tomorrow, you mean?" she added, recovering herself. Amherst hesitated, glancing vaguely up and down the street. At that noonday hour it was nearly deserted, and Justine's driver dozed on his perch above the hansom. They could speak almost as openly as if they had been in one of the wood-paths at Lynbrook. "Nor tomorrow," Amherst said in a low voice.
It was good nevertheless to meet him in the wood-paths, or sometimes in our avenue, with that pure, intellectual gleam diffused about his presence like the garment of a shining one; and he, so quiet, so simple, so without pretension, encountering each man alive as if expecting to receive more than he could impart."
And if there really were bears once in awhile it would really be better not to be all alone with them. "Very well," she said. She looked hungrily at the thick trees they were speeding through. She supposed she would never have time to lie out under a tree, or go hunting for flowers and new little wood-paths again.
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