eds flocked from out the hollows of West Virginia
and Kentucky to witness the Hatfield baptizing.

That was another autumn day only a few years ago as time goes.

The sun was sinking behind the mountain, casting long shadows on the
waters of Island Creek when the Good Shepherd of the Hills moved slowly
down the bank to the water's edge. Behind him followed his old friend,
no longer the emboldened Devil Anse with fire in his eagle eye, but a
meek, a silent, penitent figure. The autumn breeze stirred his
snow-white hair, his scant gray beard. Upon his breast the old clansman
held respectfully his wide-brimmed felt as he walked with head uplifted
in supplication. Behind him followed his six sons. Jonse came first,
Jonse, who had loved pretty Rosanna McCoy, reckless Jonse, who like his
father had slain he alone knew how many of the other side. Then came
Cap, Elias, Joseph, Troy, Robert.

Slowly and with steady stride Uncle Dyke walked into the water. Up to
the waist he stood holding the frayed Bible in his extended right hand.
"Except ye shall repent and go into the waters of baptism ye shall
perish. But if ye repent and accept salvation, though your sins be as
scarlet they shall be washed whiter than snow," the voice of the Good
Shepherd of the Hills drifted down the valley.

"Amen!" intoned the trembling voice of Devil Anse.

"Amen!" echoed the six sons grouped about their aged sire.

Then Aunt Levicy, wife of the grim clansman, began singing in a
quavering voice:

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me;
I once was lost, but now I'm found,
Was blind, but now I see.

The wives and daughters, mothers, sisters, and sweethearts of McCoys
took up the doleful strain:

'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
And grace my fears relieved;
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed.

"Hit's our sign of peace!" shouted old Aunt Emmie McCoy clapping her
palsied hands high above her head, "the sign of peace 'twixt us and
t'other side!" Whereupon Young Emmie McCoy, still in her teens, who had
loved Little Sid Hatfield since their first day at school on Mate Creek,
threw her arms about his sister and cried, "Can't no one keep me and
Little Sid apart from this day on."

"Amen!" the voice of Devil Anse led the solemn chant. "Amen! God be
praised!"