The trouble began, as trouble often begins instead of ending, with
a romance. In Dalesburg there was a man named Elijah Hemstetter, who
kept a general store. His family consisted of one daughter called
Rosine, a name that atoned much for "Hemstetter." This young woman
was possessed of plentiful attractions, so that the young men of
the community were agitated in their bosoms. Among the more agitated
was Johnny, the son of Judge Atwood, who lived in the big colonial
mansion on the edge of Dalesburg.

It would seem that the desirable Rosine should have been pleased to
return the affection of an Atwood, a name honored all over the state
long before and since the war. It does seem that she should have
gladly consented to have been led into that stately but rather empty
colonial mansion. But not so. There was a cloud on the horizon, a
threatening, cumulus cloud, in the shape of a lively and shrewd young
farmer in the neighborhood who dared to enter the lists as a rival to
the high-born Atwood.

One night Johnny propounded to Rosine a question that is considered
of much importance by the young of the human species. The accessories
were all there--moonlight, oleanders, magnolias, the mockingbird's
song. Whether or no the shadow of Pinkney Dawson, that prosperous
young farmer came between them on that occasion is not known; but
Rosine's answer was unfavorable. Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood bowed
till his hat touched the lawn grass, and went away with his head high,
but with a sore wound in his pedigree and heart. A Hemstetter refuse
an Atwood! Zounds!

Among other accidents of that year was a Democratic president. Judge