ns for
the next few days, and after that for the summer. Most of the relatives
from a distance would linger in that neighbourhood for a week or more,
and entertainments of one kind and another would be given by those
residents there. The Oaks, The Laurels, Fairview, Woodburn, Roselands,
and Beechwood would have their turns. After that must come the
inevitable breaking up and scattering of guests to their own homes or
some summer resort, while most of the dwellers in that region would go
northward in search of a cooler climate in which to pass the heated
term. But it was not deemed necessary to settle it all now; only to
arrange on which day each estate would be the scene of entertainment. It
took a good deal of consultation, mingled with merry jests and happy
laughter, to settle all that. Then there was a general leave taking and
scattering to their homes--temporary or settled.

CHAPTER XIV.

The wedding had been on Wednesday. On Thursday all gathered, by
invitation, at the Oaks, where Mr. and Mrs. Dinsmore gave them a royal
entertainment. On Friday the same thing was repeated at The Laurels, on
Saturday at Fairview, and on the following Monday all were to assemble
at Woodburn.

Being a Christian, Sabbath keeping connection, no one thought for a
moment of profaning the Lord's day by frivolity and merry making. Those
who were able attended church in the morning; in the afternoon the Ion
and Woodburn people taught their Sunday-school classes as usual, and
afterward held a Bible class among themselves at Woodburn, that being
the point nearest to the schoolhouse on the Woodburn place, at which
they had just concluded the exercises for the day.

Dr. and Mrs. Landreth and her brother, the Rev. Cyril Keith were, just
at that time, among the guests of Captain and Mrs. Raymond, and, by the
request of the little company, the minister led the exercises.

Turning over the leaves of his Bible, "The thought strikes me," he said,
"that perhaps godliness would be as good a subject for to-day's
consideration as we could find. 'Godliness with contentment is great
gain,' the apostle tells us. It is a duty and the part of wisdom to be
contented with what God our heavenly Father has seen fit to give us of
the good things of this life; for there is no happiness to be found in
discontent, murmuring, and repining; envying those who seem to us to
have a larger share than ours of the riches and pleasures of earth. 'We
brought nothi