They could all picture a turkey-roast at Davis’s: the crisp, brown turkeys rising from their own dripping, squares of pone as yellow as buttercups, and biscuits calculated to melt whitely with honey from glass dishes of sweet-smelling combs. There would be every kind of vegetable grown in the Swamp, and game from the banks of the Feeder and Reservoir, pies and cakes and coffee, and at least eight kinds of preserves. Jane Davis and the preacher would stand up in front of the fireplace, and after the ceremony there would be a constant rattle of jokes from the presiding elder and his assistants. And over the whole house would hang that happy atmosphere which makes one think of corn ripening on a sunny hillside in still September weather. A dozen times the long tables would be replenished and supplied with plates, all the usual features of a turkey-roast at Davis’s being exaggerated by the importance of the occasion; and Aunt Davis would now and then forget to urge a guest, while she hurriedly wiped her eyes and replied to some expression of neighborly sympathy, that they had to lose Jane sometime, and it was a good thing for a girl to get a religious man. Then about dusk the preachers and their congregation would start again to chapel, and Jane, in Millersport clothes, would shine on the front seats as a bride, certain of an ovation when the after-meeting handshaking came. It would be a spite if she sat where tallow candles could drip on her from one of the wooden chandeliers, but she would enjoy hearing her bridegroom exhort, and he would feel like exhorting with all his might. “Well, Doc,” said John Davis, turning from the deserted camp and sinking fire to place himself by the bridle of the young man from Lancaster. “No,” answered Dr. Miller, “I’m obliged to you, John; but I’ll ride back to Millersport to-night.” “You don’t feel put out?” urged John, conscious of a pang because all the good fellows who courted Jane could not become his brothers-in-law. “No; oh, no,” protested Dr. Miller with chagrin. “She’d a right to suit herself. I’ll be around some other day.” “We’d take it hard if you didn’t,” said John. “But just now,” concluded the doctor, “I feel what a body might call--stirred-off.” Dick Hanks was riding up close to Jimmy Thompson, while Jimmy unblanketed his mare and prepared for a deliberate departure. “John, now,” remarked Jimmy,--“he brothered the preacher right up, didn’t he? They’ll be makin’ a class-leader o’ John yet, if they can git him to quit racin’ horses.” “Which way you goin’ home, Jimmy?” inquired Dick Hanks anxiously. “The long way, round by Georger Chapel, where I can look at the tombstones for company. Want to go along? We can talk over the weddin’, and you’re only two mile from home at our woods’ gate.” “I guess I’ll take the short cut through the brush,” said Dick. Jimmy drove through the clearing and fence-gap, where John Davis was waiting to lay up the rails again.