Often he would go to his old friend in the Hollow with some thought, and the shepherd, seeing how it was, would smile as he helped the lad on his way.  The scholar looked forward with confidence to the time when young Matt would discover for himself, as Sammy had found for herself, that the only common ground whereon men and women may meet in safety is the ground of their manhood and womanhood.

And so it was, on that spring morning when the young giant felt the red life throbbing strongly in his great limbs, as he followed his team to and fro across the field.  And in his voice, as he shouted to his horses at the end of the furrow, there was something under the words, something of a longing, something also of a challenge.

Sammy was going to spend the day with her friends on Jake Creek.  She had not been to see Mandy since the night of her father’s death.  As she went, she stopped at the lower end of the field to shout a merry word to the man with the plow, and it was sometime later when the big fellow again started his team.  The challenge in his tone had grown bolder.

Sammy returned that afternoon in time for the evening meal, and Aunt Mollie thought, as the girl came up the walk, that the young woman had never looked so beautiful.  “Why, honey,” she said, “you’re just a bubblin’ over with life.  Your cheeks are as rosy; your eyes are as sparklin’, you’re fairly shinin’ all over.  Your ride sure done you good.”

The young woman replied with a hug that made her admirer gasp.  “Law, child; you’re strong as a young panther.  You walk like one too; so kind of strong, easy like.”

The girl laughed.  “I hope I don’t impress everybody that way, Aunt Mollie.  I don’t believe I want to be like a panther.  I’d rather be like—­like—­”

“Like what, child?”

“Like you, just like you; the best, the very best woman in the whole world, because you’ve got the best and biggest heart.”  She looked back over her shoulder laughing, as she ran into the house.

When Young Matt came in from the field, Sammy went out to the barn, while he unharnessed his team.  “Are you very tired to-night?” she asked.

The big fellow smiled, “Tired?  Me tired?  Where do you want to go?  Haven’t you ridden enough to-day?  I should think you’d be tired yourself.”

“Tired?  Me tired?” said the girl.  “I don’t want to ride.  I want to walk.  It’s such a lovely evening, and there’s going to be a moon.  I have been thinking all day that I would like to walk over home after supper, if you cared to go.”

That night the work within the house and the chores about the barn were finished in a remarkably short time.  The young man and woman started down the Old Trail like two school children, while the father and mother sat on the porch and heard their voices die away on the mountain side below.

The girl went first along the little path, moving with that light, sure step that belongs only to perfect health, the health of the woods and hills.  The man followed, walking with the same sure, easy step; strength and power revealed in every movement of his body.  Two splendid creatures they were—­masterpieces of the Creator’s handiwork; made by Him who created man, male and female, and bade them have dominion “over every living thing that moveth upon the earth;” kings by divine right.