noon
Once Lynde halted at the porch of a hip-roofed , unpainted house with green paper shades at the windows , and asked for a cup of milk , which was brought him by the nut-brown maid , who never took her flattering innocent eyes off the young man 's face while he drank -- sipping him as he sipped the milk ; and young Lynde rode away feeling as if something had really happened . More than once that morning he drew up by the roadside to listen to some lyrical robin on an apple-bough , or to make friends with the black-belted Durham cows and the cream-colored Alderneys , who came solemnly to the pasture wall and stared at him with big , good-natured faces . A row of them , with their lazy eyes and pink tongues and moist india-rubber noses , was as good as a play . At noon that day our adventureless adventurer had reached Bayley 's Four-Corners , where he found provender for himself and Mary at what had formerly been a tavern , in the naive stage-coach epoch . It was the sole house in the neighborhood , and was occupied by the ex-landlord , one Tobias Sewell , who had turned farmer . On finishing his cigar after dinner , Lynde put the saddle on Mary , and started forward again . It is hardly correct to say forward , for Mary took it into her head to back out of Bayley 's Four-Corners , a feat which she performed to the unspeakable amusement of Mr. Sewell and a quaint old gentleman , named Jaffrey , who boarded in the house .