. There were obstacles put in the way of her going to
meeting of a Sunday,--first one thing, then another; and, finally, the
bureau was locked, and the best dress and brightest ribbon inside the
drawers. The new side-saddle she had been promised was refused to her,
unless she in turn would make a promise; and the long day's work was
made to drag on into the night, lest she might find time to visit some
neighbor, and lest that neighbor might be the Widow Walker. But what
device of the enemy ever proved successful when matched against the
simple sincerity of true love? It came about, in spite of all restraint
and prohibition, that Jenny and Hobert met in their own times and ways;
and so a year went by.

One night, late in the summer, when the katydids began to sing, Jenny
waited longer than usual under the vine-covered beech that drooped its
boughs low to the ground all round her,--now listening for the expected
footstep, and now singing, very low, some little song to her heart, such
as many a loving and trusting maiden had sung before her. What could
keep Hobert? She knew it was not his will that kept him; and though her
heart began to be heavy, she harbored therein no thought of reproach. By
the movement of the shadow on the grass, she guessed that an hour beyond
the one of appointment must have passed, when the far-away footfall set
her so lately hushed pulses fluttering with delight. He was coming,--he
was coming! And, no matter what had been wrong, all would be right now.
She was holding wide the curtaining boughs long before he came near; and
when they dropped, and her arms closed, it is not improbable that he was
within them. It was the delight of meeting her that kept him still so
long, Jenny thought; and she prattled lightly and gayly of this and of
that, and, seeing that she won no answer, fell to tenderer tones, and
imparted the little vexing secrets of her daily life, and the sweet
hopes of her nightly dreams.

They were seated on a grassy knoll, the moonlight creeping tenderly
about their feet, and the leaves of the drooping vines touching their
heads like hands of pity, or of blessing. The water running over the
pebbly bottom of the brook just made the silence sweet, and the evening
dews shining on the red globes of the clover made the darkness lovely;
but with all these enchantments of sight and sound about him,--nay,
more, with the hand of Jenny, his own true-love, Jenny, folded in
his,--Hobert was not ha