Chapter II. Station Road and River Path

Traveling north by rail up the Hudson Valley you will come, when some two hours from New York, to a little stone depot nestling at the shoulder of a high wooded hill. To reach it the train suddenly leaves the river a mile back, scurries across a level meadow, shrills a long blast on the whistle, and pauses for an instant at Hillton. If your seat chances to be on the left side of the car, and if you look quickly just as the whistle sounds, you will see in the foreground a broad field running away to the river, and in it an oval track, a gayly colored grand stand, and just beyond, at some distance from each other, what appear to the uninitiated to be two gallows. Farther on rises a gentle hill, crowned with massive elms, from among which tower the tops of a number of picturesque red-brick buildings.

Then the train hurries on again, under the shadow of Mount Adam, where in the deep maple woods the squirrels leap all day among the tree tops and where the sunlight strives year after year to find its way through the thick shade, and once more the river is beside you, the train is speeding due north again, and you have, perhaps without knowing it, caught a glimpse of Hillton Academy.

From the little stone station a queer old coach rumbles away down a wide country road. It carries the mail and the village supplies and, less often, a traveler; and the driver, "Old Joe" Pike, has grown gray between the station and the Eagle Tavern. If, instead of going on to the north, you had descended from the train, and had mounted to the seat beside "Old Joe," you would have made the acquaintance of a very worthy member of Hillton society, and, besides, have received a deal of information as the two stout grays trotted along.

"Yes, that's the 'Cademy up there among them trees, That buildin' with the tower's the 'Cademy Buildin', and the squatty one that you can just see is one of the halls--Masters they call it, after the man that founded the school. The big, new buildin' is another of 'em, Warren; and Turner's beyond it; and if you look right sharp you can see Bradley Hall to the left there.

"Here's where we turn. Just keep your foot on that mail-bag, if you please, sir. There's the village, over yonder to the right. Kind of high up, ain't it? Ev'ry time any one builds he goes higher up the hill. That last house is old man Snyder's. Snyder says he can't help lookin' down on the rest of us. He, he!

"That road to the left we're comin' to 's Academy Road. This? Well, they used to call it Elm Street, but it's generally just 'the Station Road' nowadays. Now you can see the school pretty well, sir. That squatty place's the gymnasium; and them two littler houses of brick's the laboratories. Then the house with the wide piazza, that's Professor Wheeler's house; he's the Principal, you know. And the one next it, the yellow wooden house, I mean, that's what they call Hampton House. It's a