If you had asked him why he was there, he would very likely have said,
"To see the world." It was a world worth seeing.  The prospect might be
limited to a dull eye, but not to this lad, who loved to climb this
height, in order to be with himself and indulge the dreams of youth.
Any pretense would suffice for taking this hour of freedom: to hunt for
the spicy checker-berries and the pungent sassafras; to aggravate the
woodchucks, who made their homes in mysterious passages in this gravelly
hillside; to get a nosegay of columbine for the girl who spelled against
him in school and was his gentle comrade morning and evening along the
river road where grew the sweet-flag and the snap-dragon and the barberry
bush; to make friends with the elegant gray squirrel and the lively red
squirrel and the comical chipmunk, who were not much afraid of this
unarmed naturalist.  They may have recognized their kinship to him,
for he could climb like any squirrel, and not one of them could have
clung more securely to this bough where he was swinging, rejoicing in the
strength of his lithe, compact little body.  When he shouted in pure
enjoyment of life, they chattered in reply, and eyed him with a primeval
curiosity that had no fear in it.  This lad in short trousers, torn
shirt, and a frayed straw hat above his mobile and cheerful face, might