Abner thanked his kindly hostess, but could not help laughing secretly at her diagnosis and prescription. "Truly," thought he, "it's but a step from sentiment to bathos. 'Fevers an' agers' instead of disappointed love! Boneset tea and a mustard foot-bath for a broken heart! I really must pull myself together." This perfect unconsciousness of the simple household was helpful to the young man. Furthermore, his work necessitated his living much out of doors, and this helped him still more; for none but those who have the unseeing eye and the unappreciative heart for the beauty of woods and fields, summer sunshine, glinting stream, and joyous bird notes, can long be wholly without benefit from nature's ministry. Thus Abner had within reach two mighty remedies for sadness--the balm of nature's beauty, and the bracing tonic of hard work. For some time he kept aloof from Oaklands; not only because of Abby, but because, when in Betsy's presence, certain tones of her voice when speaking to him, and a wistful look in her eyes, troubled him with a vague, half-conscious sense that she, young though she was, comprehended his trouble. In July, Abby, taking advantage of the proffered companionship of a family who were returning to Virginia, went for a protracted visit. After arriving in Norfolk, she decided to make her home with a cousin there. It was many a day before Abner Dudley saw her again. CHAPTER IX. THE GREAT REVIVAL In the summer of 1801, Cane Ridge became a storm-center of the great religious agitation which at that time was sweeping over the Western States. In the spring of that year, Barton Stone, leaving his Bourbon County churches for a time, had gone to southern Kentucky to attend a meeting conducted by McGready, McGee, and other noted revivalists, upon the edge of a barren tract in Logan County where multitudes encamped, and where worship was in progress in some parts of the grounds during the entire meeting, which lasted over a week. This southern Kentucky revival was followed by others of a like nature throughout other portions of the State, and like a wind-driven fire through the dried grass of a prairie was the effect of such meetings. In the prevalence of this excitement, sectarianism, abashed, shrank away, and the people, irrespective of creed, united in the services. It was decided to hold a camp-meeting at Cane Ridge. The woodland slope surrounding the meeting-house was cleared of its thick undergrowth for a space of several hundred yards, and three-fourths of this space was soon covered with long rows of log seats with broad aisles between the rows. In front, a spacious platform was erected, and over all was a roof of loose boughs supported by posts.