Project Gutenberg's The Shepherd of the Hills, by Harold Bell Wright
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Title: The Shepherd of the Hills

Author: Harold Bell Wright

Release Date: July 4, 2007 [EBook #4735]
Last updated: January 22, 2009
[This file was first posted as shphl10.txtin etext03 on March 10, 2002]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SHEPHERD OF THE HILLS ***

Produced by Jim Weiler and Robert Rowe

THE SHEPHERD OF THE HILLS

BY HAROLD BELL WRIGHT

TO FRANCES, MY WIFE

IN MEMORY OF THAT BEAUTIFUL SUMMER
IN THE OZARK HILLS, WHEN, SO OFTEN,
WE FOLLOWED THE OLD TRAIL AROUND
THE RISE OF MUTTON HOLLOW--THE TRAIL
THAT IS NOBODY KNOWS HOW OLD--AND FROM
SAMMY'S LOOKOUT WATCHED THE
DAY GO OVER THE WESTERN RIDGES.

"That all with one consent praise new-born gawds,
Tho they are made and moulded of things past,
And give to dust that is a little gilt
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted."

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. ACT 3; SC. 3.

CHAPTER I.

THE STRANGER.

It was corn-planting time, when the stranger followed the Old
Trail into the Mutton Hollow neighborhood.

All day a fine rain had fallen steadily, and the mists hung heavy
over the valley. The lower hills were wrapped as in a winding
sheet; dank and cold. The trees were dripping with moisture. The
stranger looked tired and wet.

By his dress, the man was from the world beyond the ridges, and
his carefully tailored clothing looked strangely out of place in
the mountain wilderness. His form stooped a little in the
shoulders, perhaps with weariness, but he carried himself with the
unconscious air of one long used to a position of conspicuous
power and influence; and, while his well-kept hair and beard were
strongly touched with white, the brown, clear lighted eyes, that
looked from under their shaggy brows, told of an intellect
unclouded by the shadows of many years. It was a face marked
deeply by pride; pride of birth, of intellect, of culture; the
face of a scholar and poet; but it was more--it was the
countenance of one fairly staggering under a burden of
disappointment and grief.

As the stranger w