Bed-ridden cripples were borne hither by their loved ones, that the great preacher might lay hands upon their infirmities and implore the merciful God to alleviate their sufferings. The halt and the maimed were come to sue for absolution and to be made whole again. One misshapen hunchback--a veritable Quasimodo--with stubby bowed legs, abnormal arms, and ape-like visage, carried his helpless offspring eighteen miles to this sanctuary; begging prayers to relieve the creature's torture. Every man and boy of them was armed in some fashion, and by high noon the clearing was filled with a multitude of people, sorrow-torn, racked with abject grief. Over in Southpaw the enemy gazed down from the heights upon this spectacle in amazement. As young Sap McGill stood on a crag and watched, his eyes met a sight unlike any which the ranges of Kentucky had ever witnessed. His old arch enemy's strength in death was a force that appalled him. It was only now that he fully realized the peculiar far-reaching power wielded by old Cap Lutts throughout his lifetime. The dead monarch had always ruled his followers through strength and love. Fear had never been a dictator. He repelled his enemies through a will and courage that never flinched, and elicited from them a meed of awesome respect. The church was wofully inadequate and would not hold a twentieth of the mass. A great abundance of live laurel was cut and piled beneath a tree in the church clearing. And hundreds of eager hands hurried into the byways of the vale and returned with arms heaped with blossoms. These tender tributes were carefully placed on the couch of laurel until it rose to a great bier of fragrant petals. Tender hands removed the old man's body from the church and laid him in this laurel-thatched casket of many-hued flowers. Later, a great yellow mule paced out of the west, bearing a tall figure garbed in black, and the voices were hushed to a murmur and the church-bell began its tolling. When the circuit rider reached the clearing the mass of awed humanity parted and opened an aisle leading to the mammoth bier, where smiling death reposed, cradled amidst billows of blossoms. The parson had been a lifelong friend of old Cap Lutts. His towering figure moved on toward the bier and his clean-shaven features were drawn in a terrible sorrow. When his anguished eyes rested upon the still form, a great sob convulsed him; and like an echo the pent-up achings burst in a horde of throats; subdued, piteous weeping ebbed and rolled over the dead hero of the host. Two benches had been carried from the church and placed near the dead man. One was for the parson; on the other sat Lem and Bud and Belle-Ann. Little Bud crouched like a shrunken, lifeless thing. Belle-Ann's beautiful eyes were swollen and her heart wrung dry of tears.