thority, for on the
stone mount of the sundial in the lilac-walk there had been chiselled,
in the year 1771, by some disgruntled rival perhaps:

"The Ravenels ryde forth,
Hyde alle ye ladyes gay;
They take a heart,
They break a heart,
Then ryde away!"

The present owner of the plantation, Francis Ravenel, seventh of the
name, stood in the great doorway, dinner dressed, the night after his
return from the East, viewing this inscription with a humorous drawing
together of the brows.

He was handsome, as the Ravenel men had always been, with a bearing
which caused men and women, especially women, to follow him with their
eyes. Certain family characteristics were markedly his: the brown hair
and the wide gray eyes, which seemed to brood over a woman as though she
were the only one to be desired--these had belonged to the Ravenel men
for generations; but the shape of the head, with its broad brow, the
short upper lip and appealing smile, he had from his lady mother, who
had been a D'Hauteville, of New Orleans.

From the time of his majority, some five years before, the South had
been rife with tales of his wit, his love-making, and his lawlessness.
Whatever the cause, women were forever falling in love with him, and the
mention of his name from Newport News to New Orleans would but call
forth the history of another love-affair, in which, according to the old
inscription, he had taken a heart, had broken a heart, and then had
ridden away.

He awaited coffee and cigarettes in the great hail where the candles
had been lighted for the evening, although the sun was still above Loon
Mountain. Looking within he saw their gleams on vanished roses in the
old brocade; on dingy armor of those who had fought with Charlie Stuart;
on stately mahogany, old pewters, and on portraits of the fighting
Ravenels of days long gone. There was Malcom, who died music-mad; Des
Grieux, the one with ruff and falcon, said to be a Romney; and that
Francis, fourth of the name (whom the present Francis most resembled),
who had lost his life, the story ran, for a queen too fair and fond.

Mrs. Ravenel, adoring and tender, in lavender and old lace, the
merriest, gayest, most illogical little mother in all that mother-land
of the South, regarded Frank as he re-entered with a blush of pleasure
on her bright, fond face.

"Who has the Mainwaring place, mother?" he asked.

"A heavenly person," Mrs. Ravenel answered.

"Man, I