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Mrs. Bolton’s countenance was glowing with pleasure.

“I always heard that she was a neighbourly, good woman,” added Mrs. Bolton.

“I don’t think much of her husband,” returned Mr. Bolton, coldly, as he passed from the room after pausing there for only a moment. He could not look at the lumps of golden butter and the pitcher of cream without feeling rebuked, and so he got away as quickly as possible.

“Have you done as I directed?” said Mr. Bolton, with knit brows, on meeting Ben, some time afterwards, returning from the part of the farm where he had left him.

“Yes, sir,” was the answer of Ben.

“What did you do with the gate?”

“I threw it into the field, as you told me.”

“You didn’t break it?”

“No, sir.”

“Very well.”

“There’ll be trouble, Mr. Bolton,” said Ben.

“How do you know?”

“Mr. Halpin’s a very determined man.”

“So am I,” replied Mr. Bolton.

“Mr. Dix says the right of way belongs to Mr. Halpin, and no mistake.”

“When did he say so?”

“Just now. He came down from his house, when he saw me at work, and asked what I was doing; and when I told him, he said you were wrong, and would only get yourself into trouble; that Mr. Halpin’s farm had the right of way through yours.”

“Tell Mr. Dix, when you see him again, not to meddle in my affairs,” replied Mr. Bolton. “I am entirely competent to manage them myself; I want no assistance.”

As Mr. Bolton turned from Ben, on uttering this speech, he saw Mr. Dix, who owned another farm that adjoined his, approaching the place where he stood.

“I want none of his interference,” muttered Bolton to himself. Then forcing a smile into his face, he met his neighbour with a pleasant greeting.

“You will excuse me,” said Mr. Dix, after a few words had passed between them, “for a liberty I am about to take. I saw your man, a little while ago, closing up the gate that opens from your farm into Mr. Halpin’s.”

“Well!” Mr. Bolton’s brows contracted heavily.

“Are you aware that his farm has the right of way through yours?”

“No, sir.”

“Such, however, let me assure you, is the case. Mr. Halpin has no other avenue to the public road.”

“That’s his misfortune; but it gives him no license to trespass on my property.”

“It is not a trespass, Mr. Bolton. He only uses a right purchased when he bought his farm, and one that he can and will sustain in the courts against you.”

“Let him go to court, then. I bought this farm for my own private use, not as a highway; no such qualification is embraced in the deed. The land is mine, and no one shall trespass upon it.”

“But, Mr. Bolton,” calmly replied the other, “in purchasing, you secured an outlet to the public road.”

“Certainly I did; but not through your farm, nor that of any one else.”

“Halpin was not so fortunate,” said Mr. Dix. “In buying his farm, he had to take it with a guarantied right of way across this one. There was no other outlet.”

“It was not a guarantee against my ownership,” doggedly replied Mr. Bolton.

“Pardon me for saying that in this you are in error,” returned the other. “Originally both farms were in one; that was subsequently sold with a right of way across this.”

“There is no such concession in the deed I hold,” said Bolton.

“If you will take the trouble to make an examination in the clerk’s office in the county court, you’ll find it to be as I state.”

“I don’t care any thing about how it was originally,” returned Bolton, with the headiness of passionate men when excited. “I look only to how it is now. This is my farm; I bought it with no such concessions, and will not yield it unless by compulsion. I wouldn’t be the owner of a piece of land that another man had the right to enter.”

“That little strip of ground,” said Mr. Dix, “which is of but trifling value, might be fenced off as a road. This would take away all necessity for entering your ground.”