Sentence:  ‘And this thicket, so full of a natural art, was in the immediate vicinity, "within a few <WSD>rods</WSD>", of the dwelling of Madame Deluc, whose boys were in the habit of closely examining the shrubberies about them in search of the bark of the sassafras.' 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  (sixteenhalffeet) A unit of length equal to 1 pole, a perch, ¼ chain, 5½ yards, 16½ feet, or exactly 5.0292 meters (these being all equivalent).