sun of the winter noon
In the vast corn-fields stretching everywhere along the river levels there were quails ; and rabbits in the sumac thickets and turnip patches . There were places to swim , to fish , to hunt , to skate ; if there were no hills for coasting , that was not so much loss , for there was very little snow , and it melted in a day or two after it fell . But besides these natural advantages for boys , there were artificial opportunities which the boys treated as if they had been made for them ; grist-mills on the river and canal , cotton-factories and saw-mills on the Hydraulic , iron-founderies by the Commons , breweries on the river-bank , and not too many school-houses . I must not forget the market-house , with its public market twice a week , and its long rows of market-wagons , stretching on either side of High Street in the dim light of the summer dawn or the cold sun of the winter noon . The place had its brief history running back to the beginning of the century . Mad Anthony Wayne encamped on its site when he went north to avenge St. Clair 's defeat on the Indians ; it was at first a fort , and it remained a military post until the tribes about were reduced , and a fort was no longer needed . To this time belonged a tragedy , which my boy knew of vaguely when he was a child .