r and Miss Dunham. He knew his own
people; the girl had been sent into Pennyroyal by the Freedmen's Bureau,
a product of the Civil War hated by most Southerners; and while
Pennyroyal might not mean to be cruel, her pride and clannishness had no
parallel outside of early Scottish history. And, in spite of Kentucky's
far-famed hospitality, truly there is no other place in the world where
an outsider may be made to feel so outside.

Finally when he had come to the edge of the clearing and could see the
log school-house ahead, Ambrose was weary, and so sat down on the stump
of a tree. He should have preferred to go boldly to Miss Dunham's door
and ask that she talk with him, but while his courage had carried him
thus far, the recollection of his first visit to her halted him at this
spot. Surely the girl would some time come to her door or else be taking
a walk through the woods, for the papaw grove of small slender trees was
thickly shaded, cool and still, many of the birds that earlier
inhabited it having flown farther north, while for those which remained
behind it was a season of home responsibilities.

How long Ambrose waited and watched he did not know, since time is of so
little importance to a lonely man, and, moreover, he possessed a long
and beautiful patience with men and things, even with that Providence
whose ways are past finding out. Only once did anything happen to
encourage him, and then some one did come out of the school-house door
to look toward the setting sun, but she proved to be the coloured woman
who was Miss Dunham's sole guardian and caretaker. Still Ambrose managed
to keep cheerful, when unexpectedly and without warning a dreadful
change came over him. His head sank upon his chest, his delicate nose
quivered, and boyish tears sprang up in his eyes. And this change was
brought about in the oddest fashion. Ambrose had been idly carving his
own initials in the stump of the tree where he sat, when all of a sudden
it was borne in upon him that this was the first time in his life that
he had ever carved his own initials without some girl's to entwine with
them. And this brought such a longing for Sarah that Ambrose straightway
forgot both Miner and Miner's cause, remembering only his own loss and
the single plate and cup and saucer that must be waiting for him on his
supper table at home.

"Lord," Ambrose whispered, "I'm all in." Then leaping up from his seat
he started running, running away from the