In the meantime the children attended school, played hard, were happy, grew up, courted, married, and kept on farming, and life in Southton flowed onward as peacefully as the current of the river that meandered through it. Near the eastern border, and beside a merry brook that tumbled down from the Blue Hill range, was the home of Loring Camp, his wife, and his only daughter, Liddy. He was not a member of either of the two orthodox churches, but a fearless, independent thinker, believing in a merciful God of love and forgiveness, rather than a Calvinistic one, and who might be classed as a Unitarian in opinion. Broad-chested, broad-minded, outspoken in his ways, he was at once a loving husband, a kind father, a good neighbor, an honest man and respected. Tilling a small farm and mingling with that more or less attention to his trade of a builder, he earned a good livelihood. A reader of the best books and a thinker as well, he was firm in his convictions, terse in his criticism, and yet charitable toward all. His daughter inherited her father's keen intellect and her mother's fair face and complexion, it is needless to say, was the pride of his heart and loved by all. Of Liddy herself, since she is the central figure in this narrative, a more explicit description must be given. To begin with, she was at the age of seventeen, a typical New England girl of ordinary accomplishments, home loving and filial in disposition, with a nature as sweet as the daisies that grew in the green meadows about her home, and a mind as clear as the brook that rippled through them. Fond of pretty things in the house, a daintily set table, tidy rooms, and loving neatness and order, she was a good cook, a capable housekeeper and a charming hostess as well. She loved the flowers that bloomed each summer in the wide dooryard, and had enough romance to enjoy nature's moods at all times. She cared but little for dress and abhorred loud or conspicuous garments of any kind. While fond of music, she never had had an opportunity to cultivate that taste, and her sole accomplishment in that respect was to play upon the cottage organ that stood in her parlor, and sing a few simple ballads or Sabbath-school hymns. She was of medium height, with a charmingly rounded figure, and blessed with a pair of blue eyes that could change from grave to gay, from mirth to tenderness, as easily as clouds cross the sun. With the crowning glory of her sunny hair, a sweet and sympathetic mouth, modest and unassuming ways, tender heart and affectionate manner, she was an unusually attractive girl.