Or ploughboys rather; for the younger of them as yet had seen not sixteen years.

His brother must have been several in advance of him.
The farmhouse was placed on a little woody and rocky promontory jutting out into a broad river from the east shore.
Above it, on the higher grounds of the shore, the main body of the farm lay, where a rich tableland sloped back to a mountainous ridge that framed it in, about half a mile from the water.
Cultivation had stretched its hands near to the top of this ridge and driven back the old forest, that yet stood and looked over from the other side.

One or two fields were but newly cleared, as the black stumps witnessed.

Many another told of good farming, and of a substantial reward for the farmer; at what cost obtained they did not tell.
Towards one of these upland fields, half made ready for a crop of spring grain, the boys took their way.

On first leaving the house, the road led gently along round the edge of a little bay, of which the promontory formed the northern horn.