am subject of no man's kingdom. I trade in New Orleans, and I travel on
the great rivers, and I've friends in Kentucky, and I hunt where the
hunting's good, but when I want to vote I come back to my own county
where I was born, and where I grew up among you all, and where I've yet
a pretty piece of land between here and the mountains. I voted here
before, and I'll vote here again. The Gaudylocks may wander and wander,
but their home is on the Three-Notched Road, and they vote in
Albemarle."

The vote standing, and Adam being followed by a string of hunters,
traders, and boatmen, the Republican candidate was again and finally in
advance. The winds blew for him from the four quarters. In the last
golden light of the afternoon there was a strong and sudden muster of
Republicans. From all directions stragglers appeared, voice after voice
proclaiming for the man who, regarded at first as merely a protégé of
Jefferson, had come in the last two years to be regarded for himself.
The power in him had ceased to be latent, and friend and foe were
beginning to watch Lewis Rand and his doings with intentness.

As the sun set behind the Ragged Mountains, the polls closed, and the
sheriff proclaimed the election of the Republican candidate.

The Court House was quickly emptied, nor was the Court House yard far
behind. The excitement had spent itself. The result, after all, had been
foreknown. It drew on chilly with the April dusk, and men were eager to
be at home, seated at their supper-tables, going over the day with
captured friends and telling the women the news. On wheels, on horseback
or afoot, drunk and sober, north, south, east, and west, they cantered,
rolled, and trudged away from the brick Court House and the trampled
grass, and the empty bowls beneath the locust trees.