CHAPTER I.

THE STRANGER.


It was corn-planting time, when the stranger followed the Old
Trail into the Mutton Hollow neighborhood.

All day a fine rain had fallen steadily, and the mists hung heavy
over the valley. The lower hills were wrapped as in a winding
sheet; dank and cold. The trees were dripping with moisture. The
stranger looked tired and wet.

By his dress, the man was from the world beyond the ridges, and
his carefully tailored clothing looked strangely out of place in
the mountain wilderness. His form stooped a little in the
shoulders, perhaps with weariness, but he carried himself with the
unconscious air of one long used to a position of conspicuous
power and influence; and, while his well-kept hair and beard were
strongly touched with white, the brown, clear lighted eyes, that
looked from under their shaggy brows, told of an intellect
unclouded by the shadows of many years. It was a face marked
deeply by pride; pride of birth, of intellect, of culture; the
face of a scholar and poet; but it was more--it was the
countenance of one fairly staggering under a burden of
disappointment and grief.