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!'"
"'Fairer than Rachel at the palmy well,"Fairer than Ruth amid the fields of corn,"Fair as the angel that said "hail," she seemed!'"
"'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
"Like ships that sailed for sunny isles,But never came to shore."—Hervey.
"Like ships that sailed for sunny isles,But never came to shore."—Hervey.
"Like ships that sailed for sunny isles,
But never came to shore."—Hervey.
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."