The ceremony had been postponed on account of the illness of her mother, and was finally performed on the Sunday following the incidents last narrated.  A meeting was to be holden in the primitive forest, near Coe’s cabin, on the margin of a deep, crystal pool, formed naturally by the springs that supplied Coe’s Creek.  Few events happened in that quiet region, and this was an event.  News of it had circulated widely, and hundreds attended.

The occasion was not without a certain touching interest.  The beauty of the day, the wildness of the scenery under the grand old trees, with rude rocks, beautiful slopes, and running, pure water, and the deepening tints of autumn in sky, cloud and foliage,—­the warm shafts of sunshine that here and there lit it all up,—­the sincere gravity that fell as a Sabbath hush on the expectant multitude, who seemed to realize the presence of a solemn mystery,—­carried back an imaginative mind to an earlier day and a more primitive people, when the early Christians, in the absence of schism, administered the same rite.

Uncle Aleck, imbued with the sweetest spirit of his Master, seemed inspired with a sense of the sacredness of the act he was to perform.  Of its divine origin, and sweet and consecrating efficacy, he had not the slightest doubt.  The simple services of his faith he performed in a way that harmonized entirely with the occasion and its surroundings.  A grand hymn under the old trees was sung by the choir with fine effect; a short, fervent prayer, the reading of two or three portions of one of the gospels, and a few words of sweet and simple fervor, expressive of a great love and sacrifice, and the unutterable hope and rest of its grateful acknowledgment in the public act about to be performed, followed; and then the believing, trembling girl was led into the translucent waters, which for a single instant closed over her, and was returned, with a little cry of ecstasy, to her friends.  Another hymn, a simple benediction, and the solemnly impressed crowd broke up into little knots, and left the spot vacant to the silence of approaching night.

Conspicuous in this gathering, as conspicuous everywhere where he appeared, was Major Ridgeley, an elder brother of Bart.  Slightly taller, and absolutely straight in the shoulders, with an uppish turn to his head, the Major was universally pronounced a handsome man.  His large, bright, hazel eye, pure red and white complexion just touched by the sun, with a world of black curling hair swept carelessly back from, an open white brow, with well-formed mouth and chin, and his frank, dashing, manly way, cheery voice, and gay manner, made him a universal favorite; and, farmer and carpenter though he was, he was welcomed as an equal by the best people in the community.  He had little literary cultivation, but mixing freely among men, and received with universal kindness by all women, he had the ready manners of a man of the world, which, with a shrewd vigor of mind, qualified him for worldly success.