CRESTLANDS (continued 2)

"Who can depict the horrors of that day!" Gilcrest ejaculated. "It has been estimated that at least one-tenth of all the able-bodied men in Kentucky either fell on that battlefield, or were carried captive to meet lingering death by torture. You see," he continued, "we had thought we could have a better chance at the enemy on foot than on horseback, so we had dismounted before forming into line; and then we were so closely pursued that few had time to reach the horses."

"An' thet," said Rogers, taking up the narrative, "give the savages anotheh big edvantidge; fur they jumped on our hosses an' galloped afteh us, while we had to mek to the river on foot."

"Yes," said Gilcrest, "and if it hadn't been for you, Mason, I'd never have reached the river. A fierce Wyandotte brave mounted on one of our horses had picked me out as his special prey, and I, exhausted by my long, hot run, and already slightly wounded, could never have reached the ford but for your timely aid."

"Fo'tunately," Rogers put in, "I, who hadn't been so close pressed, hed hed time to reload my rifle. So we left thet Injun varmint rollin' in the dust with a bullet in his back, an' you an' me jumped on thet hoss an' swum the river. But, pshaw, Hiram! talk 'bout my savin' yer life! Thet wuz nothin' to some o' the brave things you an' others done thet day. Do you re-collect how two uv our men afteh they'd got safe oveh the river, instid o' mekin' fur the bresh, stopped thar on the bank in full range o' the Injuns on t'otheh side, an' rallied the men an' made 'em halt an' fire back at the whoopin' red demons, so's we pore wretches whut wuz still swimmin' fur life could hev some chance to escape? It wuz Ben Netherlands an' one uv the Page brothehs—Marshall Page, I believe 'twuz—who did thet."

"Marshall Page!" ejaculated Abner Dudley.

"Yes, it was Marshall Page, I think," answered Major Gilcrest; "but why your exclamation, Mr. Dudley? Do you know any one of that name?"

"I can't recall that I do," answered young Dudley; "but the name seems familiar, and, in fact, I have a dim impression, absurd though it may seem to you, of having heard or experienced many incidents such as you and Mr. Rogers have been describing. But my impressions may be baseless."

"Your impressions," said Gilcrest, "are doubtless only the faint memory of some tale heard in your early childhood. Such harrowing incidents as Mason and I were recalling were common enough in the pioneer days, and have furnished the theme of many a fireside recital. As for Marshall Page, you very likely have known some one of the name; for I believe there are still many Pages living in Virginia and Maryland; but you can not have known the man I mean—either Marshall Page or his brother, whose Christian name I can not recall just now—for he was killed there on the banks of the Licking while bravely helping his comrades to escape. Which brother was it, Mason?"

"Blest ef I know," Rogers replied; "but one, whicheveh it wuz, wuz killed at the Licking, an' the otheh wuz captured by the savages. Seems to me, though, I heard aftehwa'ds thet he escaped befoh they got to the Injun town way back in Ohio, an' thet he turned up agin at Bryan's thet fall, an' took the little Page boy back across the mountains to his own people. Wuzn't thet the way uv it, Cynthy Ann?"

"Yes," Mrs. Rogers answered, "Mary Jane Hart, who kept the little boy with her at the station afteh his motheh died, tole me about it the nex' summeh when she come oveh to Houston's one day, an' uv how she hated to part with him; fur she hed no childurn uv her own then, an' hed took a mighty fancy to the pore little fellah."

"Speaking of Netherland's and Page's brave deed," here spoke Major Gilcrest, "Mason, do you remember Aaron Reynolds' equally brave and self-sacrificing rescue of young Patterson that day?"

And the two veterans, spurred by each other's promptings into livelier recollection, painted in vivid colors many more of the stirring incidents of that most tragic event in the annals of pioneer Kentucky, the battle of Blue Lick Springs.

Young Dudley and Henry Rogers, their fighting blood aroused by the realistic portrayal, sat by with kindling eyes and quickened pulses, while each in his heart pictured some deed of daring heroism which himself might have achieved had he been in that memorable battle.

Mrs. Rogers' sewing lay unheeded in her lap as she rocked slowly to and fro, her gaze fixed upon the fire. She, too, was painting pictures and seeing visions of the long ago—pictures which included not only the heroic band of Kentucky's defenders in the midst of the bloody horrors of that battlefield, but also that band of devoted women shut up alone with their helpless little ones in that lonely station, not knowing what terrible fate was befalling husbands, brothers, kinsmen out in the wilderness, nor what even greater evils from lurking foes might at any moment beset themselves within their stockade fortress; and her brave lip trembled and the visions in the fire became dimmed and blurred as she thought of that terrible ride under the scorching rays of the August sun, and of the eighteen-months-old babe, her little William, who, already ailing before the departure from Houston's, and unable to bear the merciless heat of the long journey, had died in her arms at Bryan's two days later—hours before her husband returned from that ill-fated march to the Licking.

"No," she thought, as she wiped the tears from her eyes, and resumed her sewing, "our men didn't hev all the strugglin's an' the trials; we women fought our battles, too; an' ours, afteh all, wuz the hardest parts."

CHAPTER VI.

ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO

The household at Oaklands presented a singular admixture of diverse elements working together harmoniously, and blending into a home life that was thrifty, stirring, and, at the same time, genial and refined.

In Hiram Gilcrest, notwithstanding a certain air of Puritanical bigotry, there was a strong leaven of integrity and sound sense which won him much respect from his neighbors. Seeing him in the midst of his family, one thought him like a tall, vigorous New England fir-tree, standing sentinel over a garden of blooming children, and protecting and sheltering the delicate, listless wife who seemed like a frail hothouse flower which, too late in life, had been transplanted from the artificial warmth of a greenhouse into an outdoor garden.

The sons, reared in the new and hardy soil of Kentucky, were like sturdy young shrubs. Betsy, in her youthful bloom and piquancy, was the type of the fragrant, spicy garden pink; and no one could look at Abby Patterson without thinking of a June rose.

During the winter Abner Dudley was often at Oaklands. The undemonstrative yet hearty interest of Hiram Gilcrest, the serene cordiality of Miss Abby, and the boisterous greeting of the children made the young Virginian feel himself a welcome guest. But, whether he discussed affairs of church or school, state or nation with his host, or listened to Mrs. Gilcrest's somewhat languid conversation, or parried the sparkling quips and gay repartees of Betsy, he carried away from these visits very little realizing sense of anything save the presence and personality of Abby Patterson, whose serene gentleness and blooming beauty had power to stir within him "all impulse of soul and of sense."

Another frequent visitor at Oaklands was James Anson Drane, the young lawyer and land agent of Lexington. In him Dudley at first feared a formidable rival; but it soon became apparent that Betsy Gilcrest, not Abby Patterson, was the magnet which drew the young lawyer to Oaklands. Hiram Gilcrest and Drane's father had been close friends. For this reason James was ever a welcome guest; and he ingratiated himself into still greater favor with Major Gilcrest by agreeing with him on all points, whenever religion or politics was the topic of discussion. Abner Dudley distrusted this easy acquiescence, and had a suspicion that the views which Drane expressed so glibly were not his true sentiments—a suspicion which Betsy Gilcrest appeared to share, as testified by the scornful toss of her head, the contemptuous smile that flitted across her lips, and the sarcastic light that flashed in her eyes whenever the bland and brilliant young lawyer fluently argued in favor of federalism and Calvinism.

No distinctions of rank and culture disturbed the homogeneous character of society at Cane Ridge. Friendships were warm and constant; and just as these men and women had toiled and struggled together in the first days of settlement, so now they and their children lived, worked, and enjoyed their simple pleasures in cordial harmony. Although staunch Presbyterians in doctrine, these people did not, as a rule, oppose dancing. Mason Rogers was the fiddler of the neighborhood, and as much esteemed in that capacity as in that of song-leader at church; and even Deacon Gilcrest, notwithstanding the Puritanical stiffness of his mental joints upon questions of creed, relaxed considerably upon matters of social pastimes; nor did he assume superiority over his neighbors on account of his greater wealth and education. On the contrary, he encouraged his niece and daughter to mingle in all the social functions of the community. Hence, the young schoolmaster was likewise a frequenter of these gatherings—drawn thither by the hope of seeing Abby Patterson, who, although she did not participate in any of the more boisterous games, was frequently present as an onlooker; and while the crowd of merry young people were romping through "Rise-up-thimbler," "Shoot-the-buffalo," or "Skip-to-me, -Lou," Abner had the opportunity he coveted, a quiet chat with Abby in some retired corner of the room.

One form of merry-making which was in high favor among the women of that day was the quilting-bee. These quilters of the long ago must have been accomplished needlewomen, as evidenced by the heirlooms in "diamond," "rose," "basket," and other quaint designs which have descended to us from our great-grandmothers.

One Saturday in November there was a quilting-bee and a corn-shucking at farmer Trabue's. Early in the afternoon the matrons and maids of Cane Ridge—each with thimble, needles and scissors in a long reticule dangling from her waist—congregated in Mrs. Trabue's big upper room, where the quilt, already "swung," was awaiting them.

To Polly Hinkson, who was considered highly accomplished in such matters, was accorded the honor of marking the quilt into the pattern previously decided upon, an elaborate and intricate design known as "bird-at-the-window." The marking done, women and girls seated themselves around the quilt, and began to work, taking care to make the stitches short and even, and to keep strictly to the chalk line defining the pattern.

With an accompaniment of laughter, jest, good-natured gossip and innocent rivalry, the work went merrily forward all afternoon until the evening shadows began to gather in the upper room. Then the nearly finished quilt was rolled upon its frames; and the older women repaired to the kitchen to assist the hostess and her dusky handmaidens in supper preparations, while the girls doffed aprons and reticules, smoothed out Sunday merinoes or bombazines, and readjusted combs and fillets, to be ready for the evening gayeties; for by this time the beaux were arriving.

In the kitchen, with its smoke-begrimed walls and its blackened rafters, from which dangled sides of meat, bunches of herbs, and strings of pepper, the supper was spread. Keeping guard at one end of the long table was the roast pig, brown, crisp and juicy, stuffed with sage dressing; around its neck a garland of sausage, in its mouth a turnip. At the other end of the table, facing the pig, was a turkey replete with gravy and rich stuffing, and garnished with parsley. Down each side of the board stretched a long line of edibles—sparerib, potatoes, cabbage, beans and hominy, pitchers of milk and of cider; within this double line, another of pies, white loaf bread, corn pone, flakey biscuit, pickles, honey and apple-butter. In the center of the board rested the masterpiece of culinary art, the tall "stack cake" shaped like a pyramid, and at its apex a wreath of myrtle. Ranged around this pyramid stood glasses of foaming, yellow "float."

Immediately after supper the entire company assembled in the barn for the shucking bout. Several scaffolds had been erected at suitable intervals in the barn, their tops covered with dirt and rocks on which were big billets of blazing hickory to furnish light for the workers. The corn was apportioned as equally as possible, and then at a given signal a lively contest began.

"You don't seem to be trying for the championship," laughingly remarked Abby Patterson to Abner Dudley that evening as they sat side by side in the long line of busy shuckers. "See how William Hinkson, Jed White and John Smith are working; and look how swiftly Thomas Miles is reducing his heap. I do believe he will win the contest."

"He may, for all of me," was Abner's smiling rejoinder; "I'm well content to be among the laggards, so long as you are sitting near me. Besides, the prize is not one I should dare claim."

"Is there a prize?" asked Abby. "I did not know that; this is the first shucking party I ever attended. What is the prize to be?"

"A kiss from any girl the winner may choose from among the shuckers, I believe," Dudley answered demurely.

"Oh!" murmured Abby, blushing warmly. "I now understand."

"The girl of my choice," Abner added with a meaning glance at his companion, and with a decided emphasis upon "my," "is far too refined and womanly to permit my taking such a reward. Hence, I do not aspire to be a champion shucker, nor a fortunate finder of red ears of corn."

"It is rather difficult, is it not, Betty," he continued presently, with a humorous twinkle in his eyes, as Miss Gilcrest came across to where he and her cousin were seated, "to find the logical connection between the championship as the fastest corn-shucker, and the privilege of kissing the girl of one's choice?"

"The custom isn't founded upon logic, but solely upon the consent of the parties," was Betsy's ready rejoinder; "and who but a pair of old sobersides like you and Cousin Abby would sit here discoursing on 'logical connections,' while all this fun is going on? 'Logical connection,' indeed!" she exclaimed merrily, with a saucy toss of her curls.

"At any rate, those hilarious folks over yonder certainly appear to care but little as to whence the custom originated or upon what principle, logical or otherwise, it is perpetuated," Dudley added, nodding towards the center of the barn, where a number of noisy boys and girls were circling around Thomas Miles, who had just won the championship, and was now claiming his reward from the lips of the blushing, screaming, struggling, but by no means displeased, Mary Hitt.

"It is wonderful, isn't it," Abner continued, as Betsy danced away, "how Betty always contrives to evade taking part in those detestable kissing games, and yet maintains her popularity with all those boys and girls? She's a rare combination—self-willed and impetuous, yet big-hearted and lovable—and how pretty she is growing!"

"Pretty!" Abby exclaimed warmly. "She is more than pretty, she is lovely; and there is a certain force and dignity about her, too, that contrasts curiously with her piquant wit and coquettish ways. It would be a bold man indeed who would attempt a familiarity with her."

Returning home after school one February afternoon, schoolmaster and pupils found an unusual stir and commotion agitating the Rogers domain, news having arrived that the neighbors would gather there that night for a dance.

Soon after six o'clock, a loud hail from the stile block proclaimed the first arrivals, a big sledload of merry folks. Others followed quickly, until in half an hour the spacious family room was overflowing with life and laughter and excited chatter. Hoods and wraps were quickly thrown aside, rumpled dresses smoothed out, loosened ribbons readjusted, refractory ringlets reduced to order, and presently the sitting-room was deserted, and the entire company had assembled in the loom-room across the yard, where the dance was to be held.

"Why do you wound me and slander yourself by such language?" Abner Dudley asked, gloomily, in answer to Miss Patterson's request that he leave her quietly in her corner, and choose some fairer, fresher, merrier partner for the first dance. "I shall not dance at all unless you favor me," he stoutly asserted.

"In that case, I suppose I must yield," Abby answered good-naturedly; "I should hate to mar your pleasure of the first Kentucky dance you ever attended," and she rose smilingly and took his arm.

A proud and happy man was Abner as they crossed the room to take their places among the eager groups who were standing about impatiently waiting while Mason Rogers fitted a new string to his fiddle.

"'Fairer than Rachel at the palmy well,"

Fairer than Ruth amid the fields of corn,"

Fair as the angel that said "hail," she seemed!'"

quoted Abner, bending his head to look into the face of the girl beside him—the grandiloquence of the quotation and the blunt directness of the flattery atoned for by the earnest sincerity of his voice and glance.

Abby was indeed a fair and gracious vision as she stood there, straight and lissome as a young palm-tree. The somber plainness of her winter gown of dark merino and the soft, clinging texture of her muslin tucker accentuated the delicate fairness of skin, the dainty perfection of feature, and the exquisite beauty of the white throat. Her quiet, rather pensive face was just now unusually animated, and the faint sea-shell tint of her cheek was deepened into a glowing crimson.

"This homely scene is a contrast to that Assembly ball, isn't it?" Dudley said presently; "and how different my position now from that of the forlorn youth who that night stood afar off, gazing with useless longing at the brilliant scene within the ballroom! Little did I then dream that to-night in far-off Kentucky I should be leading the reel with the peerless belle of that assembly."

"There stands the 'peerless belle' of this assembly," returned Miss Patterson, looking across to Betsy Gilcrest, the center of a group of boys and girls. "Dear little girl!" continued Abby; "she appears in her airiest, sauciest mood to-night, and is clearly bent on enjoying life to its fullest extent. No one holds her head so prettily as Betty; no one laughs and chatters with such innocent gayety. Is she not bewitching?"

A momentary look of vexation flitted across the young man's face. "What is Betsy's witchery to me, and why does Abby always try to divert my attention when I would give our conversation a personal meaning?" he thought gloomily. "Of course," he admitted, glancing at Betsy with reluctant admiration, "she is bright and winning, and extremely attractive, at least to the youths of this community; but she is not the rose, and I——"

"Ah! It is easy to see what is the attraction here for that bepowdered, beruffled, fashionable swain, as well as for the Cane Ridge youths," Miss Patterson interrupted, as James Anson Drane presented himself before Betsy, and bowed over her hand with a courtly grace befitting a far more brilliant scene than this country dance in the old loom-room.

"Do you think she favors him?" asked Dudley, anxiously, a momentary fierce pang of dislike or distrust or envy shivering through him as he looked at the debonair young lawyer.

"At any rate," laughed Abby, "there can be no doubt of his intentions. As for her," she continued, looking earnestly at Abner, "I have in mind a far more suitable lover, who will, I hope, some day win that heart of gold."

"Who is this fortunate one destined to 'win that heart of gold'?" Dudley carelessly inquired, feeling but little interest just then in any topic save that which concerned himself and the girl at his side. "Do I know him?"

"Only slightly, I believe," Miss Patterson replied, looking down with a demure smile; "not nearly so well as I hope you will some day."

Abner flushed warmly, and his pulse leaped high with hope; for he interpreted the words to refer to a closer relationship between Abby and himself. "Of course," he thought jubilantly, "I shall become well acquainted with Betsy's prospective husband, when Abby shall have accepted me."

"Whoever he may be," said Abner, heartily, "since he has your approval, I wish him Godspeed with Betty; for," he added in a lower key, and frowning slightly, as he looked at Mr. Drane, "I can not, for the life of me, cordially like or trust yonder fine gentleman. But what about this other lover for Betty?"

"At present," Abby answered with a meaning which Abner was far from construing correctly, "he thinks his affections are centered in a far less worthy object; and he is blind to his heart's best interests."

"Let us hope that this blind Romeo may soon be restored to sight," laughed Abner; "or else, that dear little Juliet yonder will be carried off by some clearer-visioned wooer. But see, Mr. Rogers has at last restrung that fiddle and tuned it to his notion; so now for our dance!"

No stately minuet or mincing cotillion was the order of the evening. Instead, the "countre dance," the "gauntlet," the "four-handed reel"—old-time, energetic country dancing—shook the rafters overhead, and made the puncheon floor vibrate. Such jigging, such "cutting the pigeon wing," such swinging corners! No languid, lazy gliding, but hearty motion—up and down, round and round, faster and faster, as the twinkling bow sawed across the strings to the tune of "Coon Dog," "Roxy Ann," "Billy Batters," or "Niggah in the Cawnfield."

Rousing music it was—"enough," as Rube and Tom declared, "to mek even a one-legged fellah git up an' hump hisse'f."

Mason Rogers at one end of the room, his eyes beaming, his face shining, made the fiddle hum and sing. Interspersed with his music came energetic promptings, "Balance all!" "Swing yer pardnahs!" "Ladies, chain!" "Gals to the centah, an' boys all around!" Sometimes he admonished some laggard or blunderer, "Hurry, thah, Sammy!" "Bill, to the left!" his feet the while tapping the floor, and his body swaying rhythmically as his right arm swung the bow and the fingers of his left hand twinkled over the strings. A further incentive to merriment was the excited admiration of the negroes gathered outside at doors and windows—not only the darkeys of the Rogers household, but many from neighboring domains as well—heads bobbing, eyes rolling, teeth glistening, as their feet beat time on the frozen ground. Sometimes a dusky swain caught some dusky maid around the waist and swung her merrily; and all promised themselves "jes' sech a dance in the big cabin, nex' Sat'day night, with Marse Bushrod Hinkson's Jake fur fiddler."

CHAPTER VII.

THE "HOUSE-RAISIN'"

Soon after coming to the neighborhood, Abner Dudley, heeding the advice of Mason Rogers, had gone to see the tract of land lying on Hinkson's Creek. He found it to be all that Rogers had said of it—a rich, well-watered, well-timbered body of land. Early in November he had purchased of Simon Lucky his "head right" to four hundred acres, for four hundred and fifty dollars. He had enough money for the first payment, and Mason Rogers became security for the rest of the purchase price. After making a rough survey of the land, and recording the transfer in the land office at the county-seat, Dudley, with his ax, notched the corner trees of his purchase, and thus took formal possession.

"Well, Abner," said Rogers the evening after he and young Dudley had returned from Bourbonton, whither they had gone to record the deed of transfer, "you've got four hundred acres uv ez good land ez thar is in Bourbon County, or in Kaintucky, fur thet matteh, an' now you kin push yer way right on, an' in a few years you'll be inderpendent rich. Ef I wuz you, I'd buy up a lot o' hogs, an' turn 'em loose in the woods, ez soon's you git yer place fenced in. They'll be no expense fer ther keep; they'll fatten on the mast undah the trees, an' be an advantidge ev'ry way. Henry'll holp you Sat'days to cl'ar off breshwood an' cut down trees, so's to let in the sun to dry yer ground in time fer yer spring plowin'. I'll spar' you Rube an' Tom this wintah sometimes, when thar ain't much a-doin' at home, an' you kin hev the ox team, too, to haul off the bresh. You'd bettah begin nex' Sat'day to girdle 'bout a dozen o' them big oaks ovah thar on yer west slope—it'll mek splendid cawn-ground."

Spring in this favored locality was neither coy nor capricious, but came on with a steady step and an assured air, as though confident of her welcome. By the middle of February the icy fetters of winter's binding were loosened from creek and pond. Then came the fierce winds of March to melt the snow and to dry the earth; and presently woods and fields were springing into new beauty under the gentle touch of April shower and sunshine.

The school term ended in March. The same need which called Abner and the larger boys to the fields, provided tasks in garden, poultry-yard, loom-room and springhouse for the girls.

"Books is all very well fer wintah times," said Mrs. Rogers to Susan one afternoon as she sat on the back door-step, marking a basket of eggs to set. "But now thet warm weathah's tekin' holt in arnest, thar's more important things ter think 'bout. Thar's all thet soap grease to mek up soon's I kin git the leach bar'l sot up—'sides hens to set, gairden to plant, the turkey hens to watch so's they don't steal ther nests; an' Brindle an' Crooked Horn an' Spot all comin' in fresh nex' week, an' ther new calves to look aftah, 'sides all thet buttah an' milk an' cheese. The days hain't nigh long 'nough fer all the wuck thet's to be did. Heah, these aiggs is marked. Put 'em undah them five hens whut's been a-cluckin' an' takin' on fer a week or more. Eph made the nests fer you this mawnin'—a whole row o' 'em back o' the loom-room in a fresh place, so's the chiggers won't pester the hens. Hev you boys picked thet basket o' chips?" Mrs. Rogers then asked of Tommy and Buddy, who at this moment came around the corner of the house, prancing and dancing, each astride a stick horse. "Whut! You hain't? Drap them sticks this minit, or I'll w'ar 'em out on yer backs! Cl'ar out to thet woodpile, fast ez yer laigs'll carry you. Ef you don't look sharp, nary a step do you go to the sugah-camp ter-morrow, an' nary a mouthful o' thet maple sugah shell you hev."

It was an unwritten law of the community that whenever a farm was opened up, a house should be immediately built upon it. In fact, a man was not considered to have positive possession of his land until a house of some description was erected thereon. So, although Dudley was to continue to live with the Rogerses at least for the spring and summer, as soon as the first plowing was done and the corn planted, he proceeded to build his house, the logs for which had already been cut; for Mason Rogers, in common with the other old settlers, held to the superstition that if the timber for a house was cut in the full moon of February, the future inmates of the house would never be molested by bedbugs—"An'," Mrs. Rogers had added when her husband was recommending this course to Dudley, "ef you gether pennyrile when it's in blossom, an' dry it, an' keep sprigs o' it b'tween yer bed-ticks, an' 'long the cracks o' the walls, you won't be pestered with fleas, nuther."

It was another unwritten law of these early times that every ablebodied man should assist in a "house-raisin'." Therefore, one clear April morning about forty men and boys assembled with axes, mauls, and other rude tools, near the site of the proposed cabin. This site was a gently sloping, wooded prominence near the center of the farm. A pretty locality it was. Through the trees at the back there was a glimpse of Hinkson Creek, and across the newly plowed fields to the right and left could be seen the shadowy blue of some distant, low-lying hills. In front, several walnut, oak and elm trees had been left standing to preserve the wild beauty of the place.

The first day was spent in preparing materials and laying the foundation logs. The men laughed and jested and shouted merrily as they worked; and by noon the timbers were prepared, and the rock hauled for the two mammoth chimneys. Well it was that the hardest part of the work was already done, for some of the party, not content with the efficacy of hard cider, had brought whisky, and at the noon repast many of the men imbibed so freely that they were incapacitated for active service, and spent the afternoon lounging on log heaps, dozing off the effects of their potations or singing maudlin songs and making still more maudlin jests. However, the whisky of those days was pure, and though it did inebriate, its after effects were not so injurious, nor did it render its votaries so quarrelsome as does our so-called "pure Bourbon" of to-day. By the next morning even the most intoxicated had slept off the effects of their indulgence, and all reassembled at sunrise for the "raisin'." Four "corner men" were chosen, whose business it was to notch and place the logs handed them by the rest of the men, as needed. Meanwhile, boards for window and door frames were placed in readiness, so that by the time the walls were a few rounds high, the sleepers were laid and the chimneys being built.

The cabin was considered unusually commodious and elegant for a young householder. It was built of white oak logs and was forty feet long by eighteen wide. Moreover, it was a "double house;" that is, the two large rooms were separated by a passageway. The puncheon flooring was planed into delightful smoothness, and the mantels were of beautifully grained walnut, prepared by Abner during winter evenings.

The house was to "set with the sun;" and on the second day, by the time the sun's rays shone squarely across the newly laid threshold, walls were raised, rafters laid, and door and window frames adjusted. The noon recess was a merry time. Lunches were eaten with greater relish, and cider and whisky circulated even more freely than on the previous day. Nevertheless, by four o'clock the work was completed, and the last helper had departed homeward.

The cabin was, of course, not yet fit for occupancy; the walls were not chinked, nor the hearthstone laid. Doors were still unhung and windows unglazed; but as Abner stood alone that evening in his doorway, leaning on his ax and looking across his rich lands, his heart swelled with a feeling of proud proprietorship. He pictured how inviting this wilderness home would look when its interior walls should shine with a plentiful coat of whitewash, and when hop vines and morning-glories should cover the rough exterior, and convert doorways and window frames into bowers of beauty.

"In a few years," he mused, "if I am as prosperous as I see reason to hope, this log cabin will be replaced by a mansion as commodious as any in Bourbon County. Flowers will bloom in my trim gardens; and my broad fields will whiten with a wealth of grain. A home that shall be a fit setting for the jewel of my love shall make her forget her former luxurious life in Virginia, as well as the toils and privations of the first days with me; and our children shall take their places with the highest in the land."

From that October day when Abby Patterson had raised her veil in the old church and revealed the features of the beautiful girl who had entranced his boyish fancy at the Assembly ball four years before, a veil seemed lifted from his own vision. Love had dawned, and in its light life was invested with a deeper and more beautiful significance. "What if she is a few years older than I?" he would ask himself. "Is she not above me in everything else as well? So that, if she accepts my love, it will be through no worthiness of mine."

CHAPTER VIII.

LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM

All through the early spring Abner toiled with the might of a hopeful heart—love lightening every task and enduing him with the strength of two. His farm was soon enclosed, and divided into fields and woodland stretches by neat rail fences. Planting-time was over. The young corn was rank and tall, and its luxuriant green foliage almost hid the brown ridges and furrows.

One day in May Abner stood at the threshold of his unfinished cabin, and gazed with unseeing eyes over fields and woods and growing corn. Alas for visions of domestic joy! The day before, he had asked Abby to be his wife. So gentle, so sad, and withal so tender, had been her manner, that at first he had refused to accept her decision. "Believe me, dear friend," she then said, "there is no answer possible save the one I have given. Though I honor you above any one else I have known during my life in Kentucky, I have no love to give you. Besides, I am too old, too grave, too disposed to melancholy, to make you happy. You need a younger, stronger, more joyous nature than mine. At present you can not understand this; some day you will, and then you will see that a far more suitable mate—a girl self-reliant, buoyant, and with a wealth of love in her pure, warm heart—is waiting for you. Ah! you are blind, blind, that you do not see how Happiness is holding out her hand to you."

A dim, shadowy wonder as to whom she could mean flitted an instant across the young man's mind; but he was too eager, too absorbed, to entertain the thought, and renewed his pleading. Then Abby, after looking at him a moment in wistful silence, rose from her chair, and, standing before him, laid her hands upon his shoulders, and, looking earnestly into his face, said: "Abner, I have no love to give you; for long ago all the love of which my heart is capable was given to another. He is dead now; but I am as much his as though he stood here before me to-night. As I loved him at the first, I love him now, and must love him to the end. For some, and I hope it will be so for you, love reblossoms into new beauty and vigor; but not for me. My heart can have no second springtime."

Abner Dudley was of too manly a nature to grow morbid—no healthy-minded, strong-bodied man does that—but for a long, dark season he went about his work with a cherished sadness in his soul. The spring was gone from his step, the light from his eyes, and he was so quiet, so little like his former cheery self, that Mason Rogers, noticing his depression and attributing it to overwork, urged him to take a "rest spaill."

"Tain't wuck whut's ailin' you, Abner," said Mrs. Rogers. "Thet nevah. hurt nobody yit. It's stayin' so much in them damp woods. You're gittin' peaky ez a sick kitten, an' saller ez a punkin; you'll be down with fevers an' agers nex'. You need dosin' on boneset an' life-evehlastin', an' I'll brew you a cupful this very night. Drink it bilin' hot, then soak yer feet in hot watah with a lot o' mustard pounded up in it; then go to bed an' sweat it out, an' you'll be all right by mawnin'. Thar's nothin' lak a good sweat to drive fevers an' agers outen the systum."

Abner thanked his kindly hostess, but could not help laughing secretly at her diagnosis and prescription. "Truly," thought he, "it's but a step from sentiment to bathos. 'Fevers an' agers' instead of disappointed love! Boneset tea and a mustard foot-bath for a broken heart! I really must pull myself together."

This perfect unconsciousness of the simple household was helpful to the young man. Furthermore, his work necessitated his living much out of doors, and this helped him still more; for none but those who have the unseeing eye and the unappreciative heart for the beauty of woods and fields, summer sunshine, glinting stream, and joyous bird notes, can long be wholly without benefit from nature's ministry. Thus Abner had within reach two mighty remedies for sadness—the balm of nature's beauty, and the bracing tonic of hard work.

For some time he kept aloof from Oaklands; not only because of Abby, but because, when in Betsy's presence, certain tones of her voice when speaking to him, and a wistful look in her eyes, troubled him with a vague, half-conscious sense that she, young though she was, comprehended his trouble.

In July, Abby, taking advantage of the proffered companionship of a family who were returning to Virginia, went for a protracted visit. After arriving in Norfolk, she decided to make her home with a cousin there. It was many a day before Abner Dudley saw her again.

CHAPTER IX.

THE GREAT REVIVAL

In the summer of 1801, Cane Ridge became a storm-center of the great religious agitation which at that time was sweeping over the Western States.

In the spring of that year, Barton Stone, leaving his Bourbon County churches for a time, had gone to southern Kentucky to attend a meeting conducted by McGready, McGee, and other noted revivalists, upon the edge of a barren tract in Logan County where multitudes encamped, and where worship was in progress in some parts of the grounds during the entire meeting, which lasted over a week.

This southern Kentucky revival was followed by others of a like nature throughout other portions of the State, and like a wind-driven fire through the dried grass of a prairie was the effect of such meetings. In the prevalence of this excitement, sectarianism, abashed, shrank away, and the people, irrespective of creed, united in the services.

It was decided to hold a camp-meeting at Cane Ridge. The woodland slope surrounding the meeting-house was cleared of its thick undergrowth for a space of several hundred yards, and three-fourths of this space was soon covered with long rows of log seats with broad aisles between the rows. In front, a spacious platform was erected, and over all was a roof of loose boughs supported by posts.

The meeting began Thursday night before the third Sunday in August. Before sunrise on that Thursday, the roads were thronged with carriages, wagons, ox-carts, horseback riders, and persons on foot, all moving toward the woodland rendezvous. Many came from distant parts of Kentucky; many from the neighboring States. A Revolutionary officer, skilled in estimating large encampments, declared that the crowd numbered between twenty-five and thirty thousand people.

Enthusiasm gathered intensity with each succeeding hour. There was no fixed time for intermission. Each family cooked, ate, slept at any time its members chose, and returned to the services, which began at sunrise and continued until long after midnight. Sometimes several preachers were each exhorting a large audience in different parts of the ground at the same time, while singing, shouting, praying and groaning were the constant accompaniment of the fervid, chantlike exhortations.

At night the vast encampment, illuminated by scores of bear-grease lamps, hundreds of rush-lights, and thousands of tallow dips, presented a spectacle of weird sublimity. In the improvised auditorium lights suspended from overhanging boughs fell upon a concourse of earnest worshipers whose voices, rising in the solemn melody of a hymn, mingled with the fervid petitions of the preacher, the shouts of the newly converted, the sobs and shrieks of the newly convicted. Pine knots set in sockets upon the rostrum revealed in unearthly radiance the face of some impassioned speaker, silhouetting his form with startling distinctness against a background of forest. In the shadowy depths beyond the rostrum could faintly be seen, by the light of smoldering campfires, the long, ghostly line of tents and wagons, and here and there the fitful gleam of torches, like giant fireflies in the surrounding gloom. Enclosing all this was a black and seemingly illimitable expanse, from which could be heard the occasional hoot of an owl or the baying of a hound, mingled with the unceasing voice of the trees, now rising almost to a scream, now softly sighing, now wailing as in a dying agony.

In an environment of such great natural solemnity, and under the spell of tense religious fervor, it was not strange that the very atmosphere seemed surcharged with a mystical and awful force, and that many of the campers were soon the victims of those singular "manifestations" called, in the parlance of the times, "the falling exercise," "the jerks," "the trance," and "the ecstasy." The various phases of this strange disorder attacked indiscriminately the credulous and the critical, the fervid and the frivolous, the religious and the reprobate. A strong man, while quietly attending to the exposition of some text; a young girl, while listening with blanching lips and quickening pulses to the impassioned appeal of the exhorter; or a careless onlooker, while laughing and jesting, might suddenly be affected by this terrifying malady. Some scoffer might perhaps at one moment be sneering or denouncing the demonstrations as demoniac, and the next be attacked with great violence. Nor were the campers alone affected. New arrivals, while yet upon the outskirts of the encampment, were sometimes seized with violent and inexplicable sensations. The air seemed charged with an irresistible electrical force.

Many farmers of the neighborhood attended the meeting, taking advantage of the comparatively leisure season between summer harvesting and fall wheat-sowing. Mason Rogers was among this number, his wife declaring that "the hull thing would likely fall through ef Mason warn't thar to holp lead the singin'. Ez fer me," she said cheerfully to her children, "I'll stay to home most o' the time to cook things fer you-all ter eat up thar et the camp. Some day when I kin spar' time, I'll be ovah to heah the preachin', an' ter see whut's goin' on. You kin go, too, Susan, ef you want to, seein' ez you air 'titled to a leetle play-spaill arter wuckin' so spry all summah. You kin find a place to sleep with Betsy in Gilcrest's tent, or with Molly an' Ann Trabue. I reckon yer pap an' Henry an' Abner kin git a shakedown in some uv the wagon-beds, or else on the groun'; 'twon't hurt 'em this dry weathah. No, Tommy, nary step do you go; you an' Buddy's gwintah stay right heah. Camp-meetin's hain't no place fer brats. Maybe, though, ef you're good, I'll tek you ovah with me some day; or I'll let you go 'long with Rache an' Tom some mawnin', when they tek the baskets uv vi'tuls fur the folks to eat."

CHAPTER X.

AFTERNOON IN THE GROVE

One afternoon toward the close of the revival, Betsy and John Calvin Gilcrest and Henry and Susan Rogers took their lunch-baskets to a shady grove near the big spring, with the intention of spending the afternoon in the woods.

"I'm completely worn out," declared Susan, throwing herself down upon a grassy knoll and tossing her bonnet aside. "I've had enough excitement for one while."

"And I, too," assented Betsy, as she uncovered her lunch-basket. "Every nerve in my body is on the war-path. We'll be having the 'jerks,' if this meeting lasts much longer."

"If you do," remarked John Calvin, as he attacked the wing of a fried chicken, "I suppose you'll think it an 'evidence of conversion,' as old Daddy Stratton shouted out this morning when Billy Hinkson fell to the ground foaming at the mouth."

"'Evidence of conversion,' indeed!" rejoined Betty. "I never felt further from it in my life. My head is like a ragbag stuffed to overflowing with all sorts of odds and ends of doctrinal wisdom, and when I want to get at any one sensible idea, out tumble a dozen or more that are of no use whatever."

"My head's all confused, too," acknowledged Susan. "Yesterday Dr. Poague preached on 'Saved by Grace,' and showed that all we have to do is just to sit still and wait for the Lord's call. I felt real comfortable under that discourse. But last night old Brother Steadman's text was, 'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,' and he made me dreadfully uneasy. Now, are there two plans of salvation, or only one?"

"Why, two, of course," said John Calvin, with laughing assurance. "One teaches that if you mean to get to heaven, you must keep your horse everlastingly hittin' the road; the other, that the best way to get there is just to sit still. I like the 'sittin'-still plan' best, myself," he declared, with boyish frivolity.

"This is what puzzles me," said Betsy, ignoring her brother's irreverent summary of the two seemingly conflicting doctrines, "grace" and "works": "if it be true, as so many of our learned brethren teach, that nothing good that one can do merits salvation, then it seems to me that, in accordance with every principle of justice, nothing bad that one can do ought to merit damnation. Therefore, why should not I do the thing that pleaseth me best, whether it be good or bad? If I'm one of the 'elect,' nothing will keep me out of heaven, anyway."

"If you're of the elect, Betsy, you won't ever want to be wicked," Henry said gravely, speaking for the first time.

"Then, I fear I'm not of the elect."

"Oh, yes, I hope you are—only you're not yet converted. When you are, you'll see things differently." Henry was of a devout, reverent temperament, with a vivid imagination in spite of his quiet, self-contained manner. He had been greatly stirred by what he had seen and heard during the last ten days.

"But, Henry," began Betsy, argumentatively, "if I'm among the chosen at all, I'm as much chosen now as I will ever be; for I'm a sheep, not a goat—'Once a sheep, always a sheep,' you know."

"Well, sis," teasingly interrupted John Calvin, "if you're a sheep, you're surely one of the black ones; and it'll take a mighty heap o' scrubbin', I tell you, to get you white."

"And you," rejoined his sister, playfully, "I fear must be a goat—judging by the way you're always butting in, and interrupting serious converse."

"Oh," answered John Calvin, lightly, "I ain't bad enough to be classed with the goats, nor good enough to be a sheep, even a black one. That other parable about the wheatfield fits my case better. I reckon I'm just one of those useless tares."

His sister retorted: "The parable also declares that 'he who sows the tares is the devil,' and I hardly believe you are prepared to call your parents the devil, although they put you into the church by having you baptized in infancy." Then, resuming her conversation with Henry, she said, "If I am of the elect at all, Henry, I am elected already, before conversion, am I not?"

"To be sure," Henry replied. "God chose his people before the foundation of the world."

"Bosh!" exclaimed Susan, impatiently. "You don't know what God was doing before the foundation of the world, and I doubt if any of those wise brethren up at the camp do, either."

"Besides," added the irrepressible John Calvin, "the catechism says we're made of the dust of the earth; and before the foundation of the world, there wasn't any dust. So, the elect must mean some other folks—not us of this world, at all."

"Doubtless the inhabitants of Mars or Jupiter," observed Betty, laughing in spite of herself at John's flippant remark.

"Betsy," presently said Henry very earnestly, "I've watched you and Susan closely all during this revival, and I do believe that you both are really under conviction. The belief in your own wickedness and in the total depravity of the human heart is the first link in the chain—as Brother Weaver says."

"But I do not believe in 'total depravity,'" maintained Betsy, stoutly. "If the human race was utterly depraved to start with, how could one keep growing worse and worse all the time?"

"Ah, Betty," said Henry, "I reasoned just as you do, once; but now I understand these things better. Although I am of myself utterly vile and worthless, the mercy of God has taken hold of me and clothed and hidden me in the righteousness of his dear Son, and now I——"

"Henry," interrupted Betsy, with sudden sweetness, for the time sobered by his earnest face and voice, "you mustn't feel hurt by anything I have said. You know I jest over the most solemn subjects, and see the ludicrous side of everything; but I can be impressed by real earnestness, and I have never doubted that you are sincere in all you say."

"Yes," said Susan, "I'd sooner doubt my own eyesight than your sincerity, Henry. I can understand and believe in that at least; but in other things I must be a bigger simpleton than even the 'wayfaring man'; for the way of salvation is anything but plain, if it includes the doctrines of our churches. I can't understand them at all."

"Understand them!" exclaimed Betsy. "Who can? Why, whenever one of our learned ministers is on the subject of 'reprobation,' 'predestination,' or 'effectual calling,' his reasoning is so subtle and his logic so ingenious that it must puzzle the elect angels themselves to understand his arguments."

"But you surely believe in the beautiful doctrine of grace?" Henry asked earnestly. "You believe that the saints will persevere and get home at last to glory, don't you?"

"We'll tell you more about that when we get there ourselves—if we ever do," replied Susan.

"If the saints do persevere to glory," remarked John Calvin, "some of 'em are makin' a mighty poor start of it here below. Look at Sam Ruddell, drunk half his time, and too lazy and mean to do any honest work at any time; yet he claims to be one of the elect, and the church accepts him as such."

"And, Henry," Betty pursued mischievously, "in spite of your hopeful view about Sue and me, I, for one, am not under conviction, if every truly convicted penitent believes himself a 'sinner above all Galilee'—that's the orthodox phrase, isn't it? I'm not nearly so bad as Sam Ruddell, nor as Zebuel Simmons, who beats his wife."

"Ah, but my dear little girl," said Barton Stone, who, with Dudley, had just come up, and had laid his hand gently upon the girl's shoulder, "you must remember that training and environment are the measure of guilt or innocence."

"You'll think me a reckless girl, I'm afraid, Brother Stone," Betsy answered, laughing and coloring. "I shouldn't have made that speech had I known that you and Mr. Dudley were within hearing. But, nevertheless, I do not believe that I am the chief of sinners; others who have had just as good opportunities are as bad as I am, I'm sure."

"Besides, if everybody who gets up in meeting and says he's the chief of sinners, is really so, there would be more chiefs in this neighborhood than in all the Indian tribes taken together," put in John Calvin, pertly, unabashed by the presence of parson and schoolmaster.

"The trouble with so many ministers," said Dudley, as Betty, Susan and John Calvin strolled away, "is that they seem to think that furnishing people with doctrine is equivalent to awakening them to conviction and supplying them with faith."

"Too true," assented Stone rather sadly. "Dogma and doctrine contain very little of the true essence of faith. But the time is coming when people will begin to search the Scriptures for themselves; and then, just as the walls of Jericho fell before the blasts of the trumpets, so will the whole superstructure of human theology, whose four corner-stones are bigotry, intolerance, superstition and speculative doctrine, crumble into nothingness. Even now the walls are beginning to tremble. When this human-built edifice shall have fallen, and all the debris shall have been cleared away, then shall arise upon the one true foundation, Jesus Christ, a glorious structure, pure, consecrated and untrammeled, the church of the living God."

"Do you really believe," inquired Dudley, "that there will ever be a union of all the sects of Christendom?"

"A union of sects? Never!" replied Stone, emphatically. "Such a thing is impossible from the very nature and meaning of sect. But union, or rather unity, of Christian people there will surely be. Our Saviour's prayer was that all his people might be one. That petition will certainly be answered."

"We seem very far from the realization of that prayer now," said Dudley, thoughtfully.

"Yes!" assented Stone. "That evil spirit of intolerance, the curse of the Corinthian church, besets the churches to-day. We must first overcome that foe before unity is possible. But some day—and I pray that it may be in my day," he continued with flashing eyes—"when the storm and stress of this battle are over, there will ring out, mingling with the shouts of victory from every rank and company of the Lord's hosts, this one clear, dominant note, 'Unity of all of Christ's people!'"

After a moment, he continued: "Clergy nor presbytery nor synod has the right to stand between the people and the Bible, with authoritative creeds and confessions of faith; for the Bible is its own interpreter; and 'Equal rights to all, special privileges to none,' is a doctrine that will some day be adopted in religion as well as in civil and political matters."

"Ah, Stone," Dudley replied, "that is indeed laying the ax to the very root of the tree of denominational intolerance. If you make public such opinions, you will be branded as a heretic."

"I can stand that," Stone answered simply. "'Orthodoxy' and 'heresy,'" he continued after a pause, "are in truth variable terms in religion. The 'orthodoxy' of this generation may perhaps be considered by the next as ignorance and superstition; and what is to-day denounced as 'heresy' in the father, may become 'orthodoxy' in the son."

Henry Rogers, who for some time had remained a deeply interested but silent listener, sitting with his back against a tree, his hat shading his eyes, presently asked Stone what he thought of the singular manifestations at the camp-meeting.

"I hardly know what to reply," said Stone. "Many things connected with this revival are mystifying to me; and, besides," he went on, smilingly, "your question places me in an embarrassing position, as, you know, I was largely instrumental in starting the meeting at this place. If I say I do not believe that these manifestations are conducive to good, you, Henry, I can see by the quickening sparkle in your eye, will immediately impale me upon one horn of my dilemma by asking me why, after seeing a similar excitement at the southern Kentucky revival, I should help to start this one. And if I say I do not believe that these manifestations are the work of God, there sits Abner, ready to confound me with arguments, psychological, philosophical and common-sensical. So what am I to answer?"

"But, Stone," Abner exclaimed, "you surely do not deny the work of the Spirit in conversion, do you?"

"Certainly not," Stone replied. "The Bible plainly teaches that without the unceasing instrumentality of the Holy Spirit there can be no real conversion; but nowhere in the Bible can I find it taught that we should seek in supernatural signs and special revelations, rather than in the clear and unchangeable testimonies and promises of the gospel, for evidence of our acceptance with God. In fact, I can find in the New Testament no account of any miraculous manifestation being sent for the sole purpose of converting any one, although there are instances where a miracle did attend the conversion."

"What about Paul?"

"The voice and the great light were, I think, sent more for the purpose of making him an apostle than for the purpose of converting him."

Abner smiled. "You certainly dispose of Paul's case in a cool, offhand way; but how about the 'Philippian jailer'?"

"You misunderstand me," said Stone; "whether Paul and the Philippian jailer were miraculously converted or not, I am not prepared to say. My statement was, that when a miracle did accompany any case of conversion, it was sent for some other purpose. Incidentally the miracle may have converted the jailer, but I do not think it was sent for that purpose."

"Then, in the name of reason and common sense, what do you think it was sent for?" asked Dudley.

"To free the two apostles. Through their imprisonment the gospel was enchained. For example, suppose some malicious boy hurls a stone to break a neighbor's window, and, in so doing, hits some one inside the house. He did not therefore throw the stone for the purpose of hitting the person, did he?"

"You're a Stone too many for me," laughed Abner. "Your subtle reasonings and hair-splitting distinctions are too much for me to attempt to disprove, on such a broiling hot day as this."

"Brother Stone! Brother Stone!" shouted a voice from the brow of the hill back of them. Looking up, they espied among the trees a man waving and beckoning.

"Coming!" shouted Stone in reply. "I have an appointment at three o'clock with some of the brethren," he explained. "It must be fully that hour now; so I must hurry back. After all this excitement is over, I will talk further with you, Dudley, on the subject we were discussing. Will you return with me now?"

"No," replied Abner, throwing himself down at full length on the grass under the big elm, and drawing his hat over his face. "I'd rather stay here and commune with nature. I want to think over what you've been saying—and see if I can't find arguments to confute you."

CHAPTER XI.

LIGHT DAWNS

After Stone and Henry had disappeared through the woods, Dudley did not long ponder over the late discussion; he found in his environment too much food for other thought. He was on the same spot where, ten months before, he had first been alone with Abby Patterson. Yonder was the fallen log upon which she had sat toying with a spray of goldenrod, her white bonnet beside her, the soft wind playing with her brown hair, the sunlight through the overhanging boughs dancing over her head and hands, and making little patches of brightness on her lavender gown. The pungent odor of mint was in the air now as then when she had gathered some for her uncle's glass of toddy. The water sparkled and danced in the sunshine, trickling down the mossy rocks into the spring, and yonder in the cleft was the old gourd from which he had poured water on her hands.

Somewhere in his reading he had come across the story of the man who always "thanked God for the blessings that passed over his head." Often in the last few weeks he had had a dim consciousness that perhaps it was best for both that Abby had not yielded to his pleadings; but hitherto he had thrust the thought from him, as though it were disloyalty to Abby and to love. But though the recollection of Abby had still a tender, half-sad sweetness, Dudley's nature was too vigorous and buoyant long to give way to melancholy and vain regrets. As he lay there in the forest solitude, a renewed hopefulness filled his soul, and he felt that he, too, could thank God for the blessing that had passed him by. He got up, intending to return to the encampment, but a recollection of something Abby had said in their last interview, about his being blind to the good that fate was ready to bestow upon him, suddenly arrested him. "What could she have meant?" he wondered, as he seated himself on a stump, pulled his hat over his eyes, and, with a stick in his hand, idly traced lines and figures in the dust at his feet.

A slight noise presently made him look up, and there, standing under the big oak on the little prominence above him—just where she had stood that October afternoon, beckoning to him and Abby—was Betsy, again looking down upon him. She did not beckon this time; but as he looked up she turned quickly away, though not before he had caught the wistful, steadfast look in her eyes, and had seen the quick flush that covered her face.

Like lightning came the thought, "Was it Betsy whom Abby meant?" and as quickly the truth was flashed upon him with all the force of an electric shock. In an instant, old things had passed away, and a tumult of feeling stronger than anything he had ever known leaped into life. It was not alone the realization of Betsy's love, coming to him in that flash of intuition, that set his nerves tingling and made the hot blood pulse madly through his veins; but, with a rapture that approximated pain in its intensity, there rushed into his soul an answering love, tender, deep and fixed.

It is supposed by many people that man's love is founded upon uncertainty as to any answering passion in the woman's heart, and that a true woman never gives her love unsought; but there is more proof to warrant the contrary belief—that it is her love, unspoken, carefully hidden from all eyes, yet revealed by the mysterious telepathy of spiritual sympathy, that calls his love into being. A man of noble, generous nature is often thus kindled into responsiveness, and his love thus evoked is often the most reverent and the most lasting.

In a moment Abner had to some extent regained his self-possession, though his pulses still beat riotously. He hastened after Betsy, who turned as he approached, her face still flushed, her eyes glowing with unwonted fire. She greeted him in her usual nonchalant manner, and walked demurely beside him, swinging her bonnet carelessly.

"You seem to have forgotten, sir, that a big camp-meeting is in progress in these woods. You reminded me of Daniel Boone or Simon Kenton, sitting on that stump with your 'monarch-of-all-I-survey' air, as though you were alone in the heart of some vast wilderness of which you were the sole proprietor. What schemes were you hatching? and what were you doing with that stick? Working out some abstruse mathematical problem, or calculating how much money your year's crops will bring? This is no time for such worldly thoughts, while all these hair-lifting wonders are occurring yonder. Your leisure moments should be employed in pious meditation, or in repenting of your sins."

Too much agitated by the revelation which had just come to him to answer her light banter, he walked silently by her side. She, surprised by his silence, glanced into his face. What she saw there arrested her footsteps and brought a startled look into her eyes. For a moment they stood still in the pathway, gazing into each other's faces—soul revealed to soul in the look. Then her eyes fell, a trembling seized her, and a wave of crimson swept over cheeks and brow and throat. In a voice hoarse with feeling, he exclaimed, "Betty! Betty!" and stretched out his arms toward her. Tremblingly she threw out her hands as though to repel his approach; and then, turning from him, ran down the path toward the encampment.

Abner was in no mood for the noise and excitement of the "revival"; so he turned aside into a ravine where many of the campers' horses were tethered. Here he encountered Henry, to whom he said abruptly, saddling his mare as he spoke, "I'm sick of all this; I'm going for a gallop."

"It's a pity to miss to-night's service," Henry answered. "The camp breaks up to-morrow."

"No matter," Dudley replied as he sprang into the saddle. "I'm off now."

"Better take a snack before you go. You must be hungry," called Henry, but Dudley, already beyond the ravine, gave no heed.

In his overwrought mood hunger and slumber were equally impossible, and the quiet of his attic room would have been as intolerable as the glare of the torchlights and the singing, shouting, and wild ravings of the encampment. He rode on and on through the moonlight, over hills and fields and roads, until his mare, flecked with foam, was breathing uneasily. Then he allowed the reins to drop loosely over her neck, and rode slowly back until he reached his own unfinished cabin. But the air of the unused house was oppressive, and the walls seemed to stifle him. Freeing the mare of saddle and bridle, and turning her out to graze, he threw himself down on the sward in front of the house. Even then he could not sleep, but for a long time lay gazing into the clear, star-studded sky; for the sudden broadening of the perspective of his future kept him wide awake. He wondered at his long blindness, and with an agony of uncertainty questioned whether Betsy's sympathetic comprehension of his old feeling for her cousin might not now hinder the fulfillment of his dearest hope. But at last the solemn serenity of the summer night stilled his unquiet spirit, and he fell asleep.

When he awoke, the flaming radiance in the eastern sky indicated another sultry day; but at this early hour there was a dewy freshness in the air, and all nature was astir and joyous. Upon the bark of a hickory-tree a crimson-crested woodpecker was tapping for his breakfast; under the edge of a half-decayed stump a colony of ants had already begun the day's labor. Lark and bee were on the wing; squirrels ran up and down the trunk of a big elm, leaping from branch to branch, where redbird, thrush and linnet were making the woods merry with their morning concert.

CHAPTER XII.

COMMENT AND CRITICISM

On Friday the campers returned to their homes, and Cane Ridge neighborhood settled down to its usual routine.

"It's high time thet fo'ks should come to ther senses," said Mrs. Rogers, as she and her husband and young Dudley sat in the yard after supper that evening. "I don't see how you all stood it stiddy fur two weeks et a stretch up et the 'campment. Ev'ry time I sent the niggahs up thah with the fresh vittuls, they'd come back with ther eyes fa'rly bulgin' out o' ther haids, an' whut little wits they hed knocked sky west an' crooked. They brung me sich 'counts uv the goin's-on thet at last, thinks I, I'll go an' see fur myse'f. I knowed you an' Henry could tek keer uv yo'se'ves; but I wuz consarned 'bout Cissy, an' felt it high time to be lookin' artah her. I soon found her, an' when I seed she still hed her haid on her shouldahs, I wuz easier in my mind; but I'll nevah fergit thet fust visit. The meetin' hed been goin' on six days, an' things hed got in a good weavin' way. Thah wuz no less than five preachahs holdin' forth to oncet in diffrunt parts uv the grounds; so I tells Cissy thet ez thah wuz no tellin' when I'd git thah ag'in we'd meandeh 'roun' permiscous lak an' tek in all we could. Fust, we went to the arboh whah thah wuz a big geth'rin'—hardly even standin'-room in the aisles—but we manidged to squedge in on a seat close up in front. The platform wuz crammed with preachahs, an' ole Brothah Ranson wuz holdin' fo'th et a gran' rate. His subjec' wuz 'Fleein' frum the wrath to come,' an' he wuz pow'rful. The pictures he drawed uv the tormints uv the lost, writhin' in the midst uv the fire an' brimstone in the bottomless pit, wuz 'nough to set a snowbank afire. I felt ez hot ez ef I wuz danglin' ovah thet pit myse'f; an' ef one o' the angels hed happened to peep ovah the battermints o' heaven et thet minit, he'd been scorched hisse'f by the billers o' flame whut riz mountain high frum thet sea o' tormint. But somehow, the fo'ks didn't git ez much rousement on 'em ez I'd looked fur—reckon they'd done hed so much preachment thet they wuz kindah tuckahed out. Oh, yes, thah wuz considahble groanin' an' wailin' an' sich like, an' a whole passel o' sinnahs come furwa'd to be prayed fur; but I could see thet Brothah Ranson wuz disapp'inted et the lack o' 'citement, an' thet he wuz fixin' to mek a big jump uv some sort. Fust, he prayed a ha'r-liftin' pertition; then, soon's thet wuz ovah, he swung hisse'f out to the aidge o' the platfo'm, stomped his foot, waved his arms, an' hollahed out, 'Ev'rybody whut wants to 'scape the wrath to come, an' to meet me in heaven, clap yer hands an' shout "Glory!" altogethah.' Thet fotched us shore 'nough."

"Yes," said Mr. Rogers, "I hearn o' thet meetin', but I wuzn't thah. I wuz list'nin' to Brothah Rice et t'othah eend o' the camp."

"Did you shout with the rest, Mrs. Rogers?" Dudley asked.

"I should say so!" she answered. "Ev'rybody did, an' sich a hullabaloo ez it wuz—'nough to raise the dead. I thought fur a minit thet judgment-day hed come, an' wouldn't been s'prised to heah the toot o' Gabr'el's horn then an' thah. No wondeh fo'ks hed jerks an' fits an' swoondin' spaills et the camp! My ha'r wuz all creepy, thah wuz goose flesh all ovah my arms, an' hot an' cold chills a-chasin' one 'nothah up an' down the spines o' my back."

"How'd Cissy behave in all thet rumpus?" asked Rogers.

"I got Cissy outen thah none too soon," Mrs. Rogers acknowledged with a wise shake of her head. "Her face wuz ashy, an' she wuz all o' a shake an' a quake. I took her ovah to some trees whah a watah barr'l stood, an' made her tek a good swill, an' wet her hankchief an' mop her face. Then I walked her off to a quiet place an' says to her, 'Cissy, the Lawd knows I want to see you become a child o' grace, but I don't intend to hev religion jerked an' shouted an' skeered intah you. 'Tain't fittin', to my notion, to see a modest young gal a-mekin' a show uv herse'f, an' the Lawd nevah intended it, nuthah. Ef you're 'lected to salvation—an' I believe you air, fur he's a marciful an' gracious God, an' you're a nice, innercent, well-behaved gal—you kin be called in a quiet way; an' when he does call, whut you got to do is to heah an' obey. Thet's all thah is to convarsion, anyway. So I reckon you'd bettah come 'long home with me this evenin', outen all this fuss.' But she begged so hard to stay, an' promised so faithful not to git wrought up ag'in, thet I let her stay."

After a short pause, Mrs. Rogers continued: "But I stick to it thet the Lawd nevah intended his people to go stark, starin' crazy ovah religion, no more'n ovah anything else. All them ravin's an' jerkin's an' holy-laughin's an' holy-dancin's air onseemly in any fo'ks, sinnah or saint. The Almighty don't want to be pestered with no sich tekin'-on. When he calls, listen; whut he says do, you jes' git up an' do. Thet's religion, an' nuthin' else."

"You're 'bout right, Cynthy Ann," Rogers assented, as he lay at full length on the grass. "To my mind, the main p'int is to love God, an' do yer duty by yer neighbor an' fambly."

"An' do it quiet, too," added his wife. "You nevah heah uv a woman tekin' spasms an' jerks ovah lovin' her husban' or childurn, or a gal ovah lovin' her sweetheart. Then, why must fo'ks raise sich a cavortment 'bout lovin' God—hollahin' an' whoopin' an' sprawlin' 'roun' on the ground lak Sal Fox did thet las' time I wuz et the camp? She'd been a-jerkin' an' a-rollin' an' a-foamin' et the mouth wussen a mad dog, tell she wuz clean tuckahed out, an' thah she lay in the straw 'roun' the altah, her pink caliker dusty an' tore lak she'd been a-chasin' through a briah patch, straws stickin' out all ovah her haid. Thah stood ole Brothah Stratton prayin' ovah her, her sister Jane an' Poll Tribble snifflin' an' snufflin' an' fannin' her, an' sayin' they feared she'd nevah come outen her trance. Thinks I, 'I'll fotch her out.' I walks up, an', pokin' her with my foot, I says, 'Git up, Sal! Hain't you 'shamed yo'se'f, layin' heah with yer haid lookin' lak a rat's nest, an' yer laigs a-showin'?' Daddy Stratton he prayed loudah, Poll she fanned fastah, an' Jane she sniffled an' snuffled harder'n evah, while Sal she jes' lay thah lak a dead corp. I knowed she heard me, though, fur she kindah flickahed her eyeleds, an' then lay stiffer'n evah. So I says, pokin' her ag'in, 'Ef I hed sich pipestems ez them laigs o' yourn, I'd keep 'em hid—an' heah comes Jed White, too!' With thet she sets up, smoothes down her dress, an' winds up her ha'r, spry ez a ant; fur Jed's her beau."

"Oh, well, Sal nevah 'sperienced religion befoh," said Rogers, "so it went hard with her, 'cause, befoh this, she's allus resisted the Speret. But whut I can't stand is them Methodis' folks whut fall in an' out uv religion so of'en—'speri'ncin' a change o' heart ev'ry day in the week, an' mekin' the Lawd out a reg'lar Injin givah, bestowin' grace at ev'ry revival, an' tekin' it away soon's meetin's ovah. While the rousement lasts, the road to glory stretches out befoh 'em, an' they're ready, ez the hymn says, 'to bid far'well to ev'ry fear an' face a frownin' world.' Then by the nex' week they can't mustah up 'nough strength to hoe a row o' cawn. Oh, yes, they're mighty happy while the meetin' lasts. They're on the way to the land o' promise, singin' ez they journey on, ez how they'll 'b'ar the toil, endure the pain, supported by His grace.' Soon's the revival's ovah, they're ready fur anothah kind o' journey, an' lak ez not, they will jine in a drinkin' spree, an' end up in a free fight an' a gen'ral fisticuff. Now, thahs Jake Simmons, a lazy, no-'count skunk whut won't even tote in a back log to keep his fambly frum freezin'. He's got religion ha'f a dozen times, an' teks on a leetle crazier ev'ry time. When I seed him a-rollin' an' stompin' an' cavortin' an' axin' the brethren to pray fer him, thinks I, 'Whut you need, Jake, wossen the prayers uv the saints, is a big blacksnake whip larruped ovah yer back.' The Lawd does the job up right when he really convarts a man. It's 'onc't in grace, allus in grace,' ez the catechism teaches."

"But," said Dudley, who until now had listened silently to this discussion, "the Bible speaks of wanderers from the fold. No doubt Jake is a wandering sheep."

"Maybe he is," Mrs. Rogers agreed; "but, ef so, he looks an' acts so lak a goat thet the angel Gabr'el hisse'f don't know the diffruns."

"An' ef he is a sheep," added Mason, "he's so hidebound an' so fleece-growed, an' hez been herdin' with the goats in the devil's pastur' so long, thet he hain't wuth fotchin' home to the fold."

As soon as the fall wheat-sowing was finished, Abner Dudley resumed his school, but under such changed conditions that he could not feel the same enthusiastic interest as during the previous term. John Calvin was now the only advanced pupil; Henry had entered Transylvania University, and neither Betsy nor Susan were in school.

"Cissy's goin' on sixteen, an' hez eddication 'nough," said her mother. "It don't do gals no good to be too book-l'arned—jes' meks 'em uppish an' no-'count."

Mr. Rogers submitted to his wife's decree. "I boss the boys," he said, "but I reckon Cynthy Ann knows whut's best fur the gals; though, ez fur ez I'm consarned, I'd like Cissy to be ez eddicated ez any uv them high-flyers 'roun' Lexin'ton."

Susan was ambitious and loved study, and, although she did not openly rebel against her mother's ruling, went about her household tasks in a dejected way which greatly tried bustling Mrs. Rogers.

"Now, Cissy," she said, coming to the girl's room one night and finding her sobbing over disappointed hopes, "don't you s'pose yer own mammy'll do whut's best fur her dautah? You mustn't think 'cause I'm sharp an' stirrin' with you thet I don't love you." She seated herself on the side of the bed and began to stroke Susan's hair. "'Tain't no use fur you to tek on so. You must jes' trust yer mammy, an' by an' by you'll see I'm right. I can't spar' you frum home this wintah, but you kin study o' nights, an' Abner'll holp you with yer books. So cheer up, lak a good gal; an' nex' time the packman comes 'long—an' I'm lookin' fer him 'most any day—I'll buy you some ribbon fur yer hair an' a string uv beads. Soon's we git the heft o' the fall wuck did up, you'n' me will mek you one o' them fine quilted silk petticoats, lak Betsy's, to w'ar under yer red calaminco dress. Thah now!"—and she kissed the girl—"say yer prayers, an' go to sleep." Then she murmured as she left the room, "Pore gal! 'Tis hard on her; but I jes' can't spar' her this wintah. I know she's ez purty an' ez good a gal ez kin be found anywhahs!"

As the weeks went by, Betsy Gilcrest did not sing over her work in her old light-hearted way. Mrs. Gilcrest was not an observant woman; but Aunt Dilsey, the old "black mammy," noticed the change in her idolized young mistress. "The keer ob dis place an' all de man'gin' o' dem noisy boys an' lazy niggahs am too much 'sponsibility fur sich young shouldahs ez hern. Ole Dilsey does whut she kin to spar' de precious chile frum worry an' care; but one ole niggah lak me carn't do ebbrythin'; an' 'tain't no wondah Miss Betsy's gittin' pale an' peeky an' low-spereted."

CHAPTER XIII.

COURT DAY

The old-time county court, held once a month, usually on Monday, was an interesting feature of early statehood.

Judging by the crowds that always assembled at the county-seat upon court day, one would have supposed that if legal business were the main feature of the occasion, a surprising amount of litigation was necessary to the well-being of the commonwealth. But legal business was often the least important feature of these gatherings, which seemed to combine the characteristics of picnic, county fair, muster day and old English hustings.

From an early hour upon court day, all was excitement, noise and confusion in and around the county-seat. The discordant bleating and lowing of sheep and cattle filled the air, and droves of swine, after the manner of their kind, refusing to be driven quietly to the market-place, wandered into byways, or sought refuge in stable lots and house yards. In fence corners and under trees, along every approach to the town, horses were hitched—many of them with heaps of provender on the ground before them, that they might feed at any hour which suited their appetites; and vehicles of every known pattern, from family coach to ox-cart, thronged the highways. It was a gala time for the slave-buyer, stock-trader, horse-jockey, and itinerant packman, as well as for the politician and the militia men. Not only was there much trading and political speech-making, but also horse-racing, cock-fighting, gambling and drunkenness; for society, even in the good old times, contained a large rioting element.

At Fayette County court, however, the chief interest was usually the political; and the most popular rendezvous was the tree-bordered enclosure surrounding the court-house, until the noon hour; then the center of interest was the tavern, which, though but a two-storied log house, having only eleven rooms to serve all purposes of dining-hall, office, kitchen and guest chambers, was a famous resort. The sleeping apartments were large, and each was furnished with four beds. Always as many as two guests to a bed, and frequently as many as three, was the economical rule of the house—an arrangement which, though possibly inconvenient in some respects, was one likely to encourage a spirit of democratic sociability.

Abner Dudley accepted Major Gilcrest's invitation to accompany him in his coach to Lexington upon a certain court day which was an occasion of unusual excitement. Tidings that the trade of the Mississippi River was again endangered had just been received. The treaty of 1795, which secured to Kentucky the right of navigation of the Mississippi and the right of deposit in the New Orleans Bank, had now come to a termination by limitation of treaty; and the Spanish Intendant of the province of Louisiana had issued a proclamation that there should be no renewal, although it had been plainly stipulated in the former treaty that the privileges should be renewed. The indignation which this act of broken faith produced in Kentucky was greatly augmented by tidings which had just reached the State that Louisiana had been ceded by Spain to France by the treaty made secretly in 1800, but not made public until 1802.

The failure of all former efforts to induce Kentucky to sever her allegiance to the Union and to join her fortunes with Spain had not destroyed the hopes of the Spaniards and of self-seeking Kentucky agitators. Thus the revival of the old troubles over the navigation of the Mississippi afforded an opportunity of which treacherous conspirators were not slow to avail themselves.

During the noon repast at the tavern, Dudley and James Drane had been neighbors at table; and when the meal was concluded, the two had linked arms and strolled up and down the wide portico running the length of the tavern, and serving to-day as a reception-room for the tavern and as a political arena for groups of excited men who were hotly denouncing Spain and all her works. Other groups near by were as earnestly, but far less noisily, insinuating that Spain was the best friend Kentucky could have, and that her interests lay in the direction of an alliance with the foreign power.

Somewhat apart from the larger groups three men were talking in low tones. Presently, at a sign which, unperceived by Dudley, passed between his companion and one of the men, Drane, saying that he desired to introduce Abner to three of the most agreeable and gifted men of the age, drew him toward the trio at one end of the porch, and presented him to General Wilkinson, Judge Sebastian and Judge Murray. Immediately after the introduction, Drane excused himself and withdrew. Before any conversation, save the usual exchange of introductory courtesies, had passed between the three distinguished Kentuckians and our young Virginian, Hiram Gilcrest came through the door opening from the hall. Seeing Dudley in what was apparently a confidential conversation with the three older men, Gilcrest stood a moment in the doorway, frowning heavily; then, turning, he strode through the hall to the negro quarters of the hotel. Here he found Uncle Zeke, his coachman, and ordered him to prepare for a speedy return home. When he returned to the porch, he walked up to the group of which Dudley was one, and said to him, after a somewhat curt salutation to the other three, "I am sorry to cut short your day's pleasure, but I find that a matter of grave importance necessitates our leaving immediately."

On the homeward drive Gilcrest explained the reason for this hasty retreat. "You were in the company of three of the slyest and most dangerous intriguers of these unsettled times. They are brilliant, daring men, and I fear many of our adventurous young men are being led away by their specious arguments and schemes for future greatness. You have never been in their company before to-day, have you?" with a keen glance at his companion.

Dudley explained that he had only exchanged a few words of ordinary civility with the three before Gilcrest had interrupted the conversation. He did not, however, mention that Drane had brought about the meeting, and had spoken of the men in glowing terms.

CHAPTER XIV.

BETSY SAYS "WAIT"

Rarely ever since that August afternoon when Abner and Betsy had stood a moment in the pathway, gazing into each other's souls, and she had hurried away from him, could he by any pretext or maneuver succeed in being for one moment alone with her. Always when in her presence, either as one of the quiet home circle at her father's house, or at church, or at a neighbor's, he was conscious of a change in her manner towards himself. Much of her old, light-hearted gayety had vanished, and in its stead were a new quietness and reserve, without any trace of embarrassment, it is true, but with a demure dignity which made her seem to repel even such advances as ordinary gallantry would prompt any young man to make to a pretty girl.

Dudley tried vainly to win her back to her former attitude of cordial ease. Occasionally he noticed a merry chord in her voice and something of the old, sparkling playfulness of manner; but if he sought to answer her quips in the same vein of pleasantry, she would color warmly, answer gravely, and then seem to shrink from him. Never could he get her eyes to meet his. Once or twice, in some rare opportunity when he found himself for a brief moment alone with her, he had tried with the most delicate and insinuating skill to approach the subject of his love for her; but at the first hint she, like a fish that sees the line gleaming in the sunlight, would dart away to another topic, or would find some ready excuse for leaving him. Furthermore, the very power of his love made him likewise often constrained and ill at ease in her presence; and as the months dragged on, it seemed to him that not only was he making no progress toward winning her, but that he was losing even her former frank regard. He frequently questioned the reliability of the revelation which had come to him that afternoon at the spring; for although it had given him unmistakable knowledge of his own feelings, it had, he feared, erred in its interpretation of hers. Nor was the element of jealousy wanting to complete his torment at this period. Betsy was developing into the recognized beauty and belle of the county, and not only did the rustic swains of the neighborhood court her favor, but the fashionable beaux from Lexington and Frankfort found abundant attraction at Oaklands. The one feared most by Abner was James Anson Drane, who, besides being well-to-do and of good family, was handsome and gallant and stood very high in Major Gilcrest's good graces. In fact, it seemed to Dudley in his moments of deepest despondency that Drane had everything in his favor, while he himself had nothing to plead in his own behalf save the might of his love, and that between two such suitors as Drane and himself no girl would hesitate to choose the former.

Under the sway of these feelings, Abner's first instinctive dislike of Drane, which had been lulled to sleep by the young lawyer's courteous bearing, awoke into more than its former vigor. At times the schoolmaster felt ready to believe anything of James Anson Drane—he was a schemer, a traitor, and was doubtless even now plotting against the Government. He would marry Betty, of course, and would wreck her happiness, and bring financial ruin and political disgrace upon the Gilcrests. Nevertheless, although Betsy's reserve, his own lack of opportunity for wooing her, and his jealous distrust of Drane, made Abner alternately chafe and despond, yet through all these moods there ran the fiber of a proud, buoyant spirit which would not allow him to give up; and hope, though for a time baffled, retreated only to advance again with new courage.

While returning from Bourbonton one May afternoon, Abner, lured by the beauty of the day, turned from the public road, and chose instead a sequestered bridle-path which, with many a devious turn and twist, wound through the forest whose giant trees, though centuries old, were now again clothed upon with youthful freshness and beauty. Through this green canopy of arching boughs, where sunshine and shadow intermingled, one caught glimpses of the sky, a dome of azure velvet flecked with fleecy white. A soft wind blew from the south, laden with the faint, elusive fragrance of anemone and violet. From every bush and treetop came the light-hearted carol of linnet and thrush and redbird; and in the open spaces between the trees the sportive sunlight gleamed and smiled so joyously that every blade of soft, green grass seemed to quiver with gladness. The day was so golden, so filled with the tender hope and promise of the Maytime, that Abner, yielding to its charm, for the moment forgot his doubts and perplexities. His path led in the direction of a shallow creek; and as he drew near the stream, he spied upon its bank a girl who had stopped to let her horse drink. It was Betty on old Selim. Abner gently checked his mare and sat watching her. Her white scoop-bonnet was hanging from the pommel of the saddle, the bridle-reins drooped carelessly upon old Selim's neck, and her hands, encased in white linen "half hands," were crossed in her lap. She was looking out across the country with a far-away, dreamy expression. Her lover noticed every detail of her beauty—the regal poise of head, the lovely outline of throat and shoulders, the rosy oval of face, the piquant cleft of the chin, the arch curve of the upper lip, and the ripe fullness of the lower. Presently her horse, more awake to outside influences than was his mistress, caught the sound of a breaking twig, and, raising his nose from the water, pricked up his ears and neighed.

"Old Selim spied me first," said Abner, riding to Betty's side.

She looked up for an instant, then her eyes fell before a scrutiny whose blending of admiration and passionate feeling she could not fail to understand.

"Yes," she answered lightly, laughing and striving to regain self-possession, "Selim is glad to see you, I know; he is getting impatient for his supper, and there's no knowing how long I might have sat here day-dreaming, had you not appeared. Shall we ride on?"

"And is not Selim's mistress glad to see me, too?" asked Abner, as he rode by her side.

"Oh, of course," was the reply; "but it is getting late, and we had better hasten on."

After riding a few moments in silence, he said, laying a detaining hand on her bridle: "Betty, why do you avoid me so persistently, and why are you so reserved with me? Is it because, knowing that you are becoming all the world to me, you would by avoidance and reserve spare me the pain of refusing my love? It is now nearly ten months since I first began to realize what you are to me, and that knowledge has become everything."

"No! no! do not speak! Please, please do not!" she remonstrated, her face flushing and then paling.

"Why will you not let me speak?" he continued gently.

"Oh, not—not now," she murmured stammeringly. "I—I—I could not bear it. I can not listen—yet," she ended, her eyes filling with tears.

Her manner, though it had something of a proud reserve, was not wholly unrelenting. In her voice there was a winning cadence which seemed to bid him hope. He understood her at once. She did not want to silence him entirely, but it was too soon—that was what she meant—too soon after his feeling for her cousin. She owed it to her own womanly dignity that his love should be put to the proof of time. She must not be too easily won. Yes, Abner felt that he understood her. Instantly the look of deprecating humility vanished from the young man's face, and in its stead there flashed into his eyes an eager, courageous light; for renewed hope was sending the warm blood leaping and dancing through his veins; and the humble, dejected suppliant of the moment before was transformed into the hopeful, assured lover.

For a time he said nothing, but, with his hand still upon her bridle, they rode on silently through the twilight of the forest aisle, where all was so still and peaceful that their fast heart-throbs seemed almost audible. Pledges more definite and binding might afterwards be exchanged, yet in the hearts of these two lovers this solemn temple of nature was forever consecrated as the place of plighting.

"I will wait, Betty," he said presently; "but do not keep me too long in suspense. Remember how long I have already waited for you. When may I speak?"

"Oh, I—I don't know—not for a long time yet." Then, regaining her old, saucy air, and flashing into his eyes one glance, half tender, half defiant, she snatched her bridle-rein from his hand, and, with a flick of the switch across her horse's neck, rode on. As she galloped off, she looked back for an instant to say archly, "Spring is very beautiful; but I like autumn better, and November is my favorite month, for Thanksgiving Day comes then. No! no! do not follow me, sir," she added saucily, as he rode quickly towards her. "Your road lies straight on," pointing with her switch to where the roads forked. "Mine leads down this lane to Oaklands."

"Very well," he answered with grave sweetness, "I will leave you now, but I shall remember what you have said, and hope that my own thanksgiving day may, in truth, come next November—though it is a weary while to wait."

CHAPTER XV.

THE WAITING-TIME

The Cane Ridge revival of the August before had been followed by many others of a similar nature throughout the country. Although there was much that was fanatical and grotesque in these meetings, much good was undoubtedly accomplished. With all the fanaticism, there was in them the wholesome leaven of gospel truth which did much to arouse the churches from their deathlike indifference. Better than this, the revivals were a bond of union between the different religious sects; for, in the prevalence of enthusiasm, even such rigid upholders of creed as Gilcrest and Landrum felt more concern about the salvation of their children than about the tenets of their church. In fact, from the beginning of the awakening, Books of Discipline and Confessions of Faith had been gathering dust, and soon would have been completely lost to view, had not the more strenuous churchmen at last in alarm put forth their hands to stay their tottering ark of creed, mistaking it for the ark of God. But though for a time the orthodox element held its peace, apparently well pleased to see members of other denominations joining cordially in the revivals, each sect finally became fearful lest other churches might draw away disciples from its own ranks. The tocsin was sounded, "'To your tents, O Israel!' Our creed is in jeopardy! There must be no more union meetings!" Thus the old denominational war waged with renewed fierceness.