t 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-l