ere "in the hollow"
of old Harpeth's hand. They were as interesting scientifically from a
philosophical standpoint as were the geological formations which lay
beneath their blue-grass and clover fields. They built altars to what
seemed to him a primitive God, and yet their codes were in many cases
not only ethically but economically and democratically sound. The men
he had found shrewd and as a whole more interested and versed in
statescraft than would seem possible, considering their shut-in
location in regard to the places where the world wheels seem to
revolve. But were there larger wheels revolving, silently, slowly, but
just as relentlessly, out here where the heavens were stretched "_as a
curtain_," and "_as a tent to dwell in_?"

"_'The earth and the fullness thereof,'_" he mused as he raised his
eyes to the sky; "it's theirs, certainly, and they dedicate it to
their God. I wonder--" Suddenly the picture of the woman in the barn
rose to his mind, strong and gracious and wonderful, with the young
"fullness" pressing around her, teeming with--force. What force--and
what source? Suddenly he dropped his pick behind a convenient bush,
shouldered his kit of rocks and sand, climbed the fence and tramped
away down Providence Road to Sweetbriar, Rose Mary and her cold milk
crocks, thither impelled by deep--thirsts.

And under the hospitable eaves of the milk-house he found Rose Mary
and her cooling draft--also Mrs. Caleb Rucker, with small Pete in tow.

"Howdy, Mr. Mark," the visiting neighbor answered in response to his
forcedly cordial greeting. If a man has walked a mile and a half with
a picture of a woman handing him a glass of cool milk with a certain
lift of black lashes from over deep, black blue eyes it
is--disconcerting to have her do it in the presence of another.

"I just come over to get a bucket of buttermilk for Granny
Satterwhite," he found Mrs. Rucker saying as he forced his attention.
"She won't touch mine if there's any of Rose Mary's handy. Looks like
she thinks she's drinking some of Rose Mary's petting with every
gulp."

Everett had just raised the glass Rose Mary had handed him, to his
lips, as Mrs. Rucker spoke, and over its edge he regarded the roses
that suddenly blushed out in her cheeks, but she refused to raise her
lashes the fraction of an inch and went calmly on pressing the milk
from the butter she had just taken from the churn.

"Granny knows that love can be sent just as well in a