nned. That in the fields would be plowed under next
spring, presenting the strange anomaly of plowing under one crop to
raise another of the same kind. But it has been done many times in
the fertile Valley of the Tennessee.

There is that in the Saxon race that makes it discontented, even with
success.

There was cotton everywhere; it lay piled up around the gin-houses
and screws and negro-cabins and under the sheds and even under the
trees. All of it, which was exposed to the weather, was in bales,
weighing each a fourth of a ton and with bulging white spots in their
bellies where the coarse cotton baling failed to cover their
nakedness.

It was cotton--cotton--cotton. Seed,--ginned,--lint,--baled,--cotton.

The Gaffs was a fine estate of five thousand acres which had been
handed down for several generations. The old home sat in a grove of
hickory, oak and elm trees, on a gentle slope. Ancient sentinels, and
they were there when the first Travis came from North Carolina to the
Tennessee Valley and built his first double-log cabin under the
shelter of their arms.

From the porch of The Gaffs,--as the old home was called--the
Tennessee River could be seen two miles away, its brave swift channel
glittering like the flash of a silver arrow in the dark green wood
which bordered it.

Back of the house the mountain ridge rolled; not high enough to be
awful and unapproachable, nor so low as to breed contempt from a too
great familiarity. Not grand, but the kind one loves to wander over.

CHAPTER II

RICHARD TRAVIS

Strength was written in the face of Richard Travis--the owner of The
Gaffs--intellectual, physical, passion-strength, strength of purpose
and of doing. Strength, but not moral strength; and hence lacking all
of being all-conquering.

He had that kind of strength which made others think as he thought,
and do as he would have them do. He saw things clearly, strongly,
quickly. His assurance made all things sure. He knew things and was
proud of it. He knew himself and other men. And best of all, as he
thought, he knew women.

Richard Travis was secretary and treasurer of the Acme Cotton Mills.

To-night he was alone in the old-fashioned but elegant dining-room of
the Gaffs. The big log fire of ash and hickory was pleasant, and the
blaze, falling in sombre color on the old mahogany side-board which
sat opposite the fireplace, on the double ash floor, polished and
shining, added a deeper and riche