“Well Kate,” said her bridesmaid, Lucy Cameron, “the clouds look very threatening, and you know it is said to be an unlucky omen for one’s wedding night to be stormy.” “Pshaw, Lucy, would you frighten me with some old grandmother’s tale, as if I were a child? I believe not in omens, and shall forget all unlucky presages, when the wife of Richard Gaston,” answered the lovely and smiling bride. “You treat it lightly, and I trust it may not be ominous of your conjugal life,” resumed Lucy; “but my Aunt Kitty says that’s the reason she never married; because it was raining in torrents the day she was to have been wedded, and she discarded her lover because it was unlucky.” “Ah, Lucy, I do not mean to doubt your good aunt’s word; but there must have been some more serious cause linked with the one you have mentioned. My life on it, _I_ do not lose a husband for so slight a cause. It must be something more than a common occurrence, that shall now break off the match with Dick and myself. But see, the company are beginning to arrive,” said Kate, as she looked from the window of her room, “and I must prepare for the ceremony.” The morning of the day of which we have spoken, had opened in unclouded splendor, and all seemed propitious to the nuptials that were to be solemnised in the evening. The inmates of the cabin in which the preceding conversation had been carried on, had arisen cheerfully with the first notes of the early robin, to prepare for the festival, to which the whole neighborhood, consisting of all within fifteen or twenty miles, (for neighborhoods were then large, and habitations scarce) were indiscriminately invited. Kate Lee was the only child of her parents, and had been born and raised in the humble cottage which her father had assisted to construct with his own hands. Mr. Lee had moved to his present residence, when few ventured thus far into the Indian territory; and by his own labors, and that of his two servants, had erected a double cabin, and cleared about fifty acres of land, upon a rich piece of high ground, a mile and a half from the James River. By his urbanity and kindness, he had gained the confidence of the Indians; and in all their depredations so far, he had gone unscathed. He was of good birth and education, and the most hospitable man in the settlement. The property which he held, and the style in which he lived, together with his superior knowledge, gave him a standing among the settlers superior to all. Ever ready to assist the needy, and always just in his opinions and actions, he was looked to for council, rather than treated as an equal.