When I was a farm boy of twelve or thirteen years, one
of our neighbors had a breed of chickens with large topknots that
filled my eye completely. My brother and I used to hang around the
Chase henyard for hours, admiring and longing for those chickens.
The impression those fowls made upon me seems as vivid to-day as it
was when first made. The topknot was the extra touch--the touch of
poetry that I have always looked for in things, and that Hiram, in
his way, craved and sought for, too.
There was something, too, in my maternal grandfather that probably
foreshadowed the nature-lover and nature-writer. In him it took
the form of a love of angling, and a love for the Bible. He went
from the Book to the stream, and from the stream to the Book,
with great regularity. I do not remember that he ever read the
newspapers, or any other books than the Bible and the hymn-book.
When he was over eighty years, old he would woo the trout-streams
with great success, and between times would pore over the Book
till his eyes were dim. I do not think he ever joined the church,
or ever made an open profession of religion, as was the wont in
those days; but he had the religious nature which he nursed upon
the Bible. When a mere boy, as I have before told you, he was a
soldier under Washington, and when the War of 1812 broke out, and
one of his sons was drafted, he was accepted and went in his stead.
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