seems to be rather set against me since we settled in Barcreek. We used to be on the best of terms in New Hampshire, for I always lent him money when he was hard pressed. I don't know what has come over him since we came to Kentucky."

"I do," added Deck, looking earnestly into his father's face.

"Well, what is it, I should like to know? I have always done everything I could since I came here for him."

"Sandy told me something about it one day, and seemed to have a good deal of feeling about it. He says you wronged Uncle Titus out of five thousand dollars," said Deck, wondering if his father had ever heard the charge before.

"I know what Sandy meant. Of course Titus must have been in the habit of talking about this matter in his family, or Sandy would not have known anything about it," replied Mr. Lyon, evidently very much annoyed at the revelation of his son.

"I did not know what Sandy meant, and I thought I had better not ask him; for of course I knew there was not a particle of truth in the charge," added Deck, surprised to find that his father knew something about the accusation.

"I don't talk with my children about troublesome family matters, Dexter, and your Uncle Titus ought not to do so. I shall only say that there is not the slightest grain of reason or justice in the charge against me; and Titus knows it as well as I do. If anybody has wronged him, it was your deceased Uncle Duncan. Let the matter drop there, at least for the present. Why does Sandy wish to prevent Artie from attending the Union meeting to-morrow night?"

"He said it was likely to be broken up by the Home Guards."

"Then he probably knows something about a plot to interfere with the gathering. I rode up to the village this morning, and I was quite surprised to find that several whom I knew to be loyal men did not intend to be present. When I urged them to be there, they hinted that there would be trouble at the schoolhouse."

At this moment a bell was rung at the side-door of the mansion, about ten rods from the bridge where the father and son had been discussing the situation. It crossed the creek a quarter of a mile from the river, which has a course of three hundred miles through the State, and is navigable from the Ohio two-thirds of its length during the season of high water. The mansion was the residence of Noah Lyon; and after the green field, ornamented with stately trees, which extended from the house to the river, it had taken the name of "Riverlawn" in the time of the former proprietor. The plantation extended along the creek more than half a mile, including over five hundred acres of the richest land in the State.

Above the bridge was a little village of negro houses, so neat and substantial that they deserved a better name than "huts," generally given to the dwellings of the slaves of a plantation. Each had its little garden, fenced off and well cared for. It was evident that the occupants of these cottages were subjected to few if any of the hardships of their condition. Many of them were just returning from the hemp fields and the horse pastures of the estate; and they seemed to be happy and contented, with no care for the troubles that were then agitating the State.

The bell had been rung at the side-door of the mansion by a black woman, very neatly dressed. Back of the dwelling was the kitchen in a separate building, according to the custom at the South. Mr. Lyon, though he was the present proprietor of this extensive estate, was dressed in very plain clothes, and had none of the air of a Kentucky gentleman. Deck was clothed in the same manner; but both of them looked very neat and very respectable in spite of their plain clothes.

They came from the bridge at the sound of the bell. On the left of the entrance was the dining-room, a large apartment, with the table set for dinner in the middle of it. Two young octoroon girls were standing by the chairs to wait upon the family, which consisted of six persons.

"You have been shopping this forenoon, haven't you, Ruth?" asked Mr. Lyon, addressing his wife, who was seated at one end of the table while he was at the other.

"I did not do much shopping; but I called upon Amelia, and found her very much troubled," replied Mrs. Lyon, alluding to the wife of Titus Lyon.

"I should think she might be troubled," replied Mr. Lyon. "She does not take any part in politics; but one of her brothers is a captain in a New Hampshire regiment, and another is a major, and all her family are loyal to the backbone. She has not said much of anything, but I know she does not approve the attitude of her husband and her two sons. The last time I saw her, she was afraid they would enlist in the Confederate army. Titus won't hear a word of objection from her."

"She told me an astonishing piece of news this forenoon," continued Mrs. Lyon.

"I shall not be much astonished at anything Titus does," added the husband. "But what has he done now? Has he enlisted in the Confederate army?"

"Not yet; but Amelia says he has been offered the command of a company of Home Guards if he will pay for the arms and uniform of it. He agreed to do so, and has already paid over the money, five thousand dollars."

"Is it possible!" exclaimed Mr. Lyon; and the two boys dropped their knives and forks in their astonishment. "I did not think he would go as far as that. He could not be a ranker Secessionist if he had lived all his life in South Carolina, instead of nine or ten years in Kentucky."

"This happened a month ago, and Amelia says the arms are hidden somewhere on the river."

"Does she know where?"

"She did not tell me where if she knew. More than this, she says he is drinking too much whiskey, and that the Secessionists have made a fool of him. She is afraid he will throw away all his property."

"I have noticed several times that he has been drinking too much, though he was not exactly intoxicated."

"Oh! Amelia said he meant to make you pay for the arms and uniforms," said Mrs. Lyon, with some excitement in her manner. "He insists that you owe him five thousand dollars."

"If I did, he gives me a good excuse for not paying it; but I do not owe him a nickel. Home Guards and Confederates here are all the same; and no money of mine shall go for arming either of them."

"Titus's wife says you are denounced as an abolitionist, Noah, and they will drive you out of the county soon," added Mrs. Lyon.

"When they are ready to begin, I shall be there," replied Mr. Lyon with a smile.

The dinner was finished, and the family separated, Deck and his father returning to the bridge, followed by Artie.

CHAPTER II

SOMETHING ABOUT THE LYON FAMILY

The grand mansion and the extensive domain of Riverlawn had been occupied by the Lyon family hardly more than a year when the political excitement in Kentucky began to manifest itself, though not so violently as in some of the more southern States. Abraham Lincoln had been elected President of the United States, and south of Mason and Dixon's line he was regarded as a sectional president whose term of office would be a menace and an absolute peril to the institution of slavery. Senator Crittenden of Kentucky proposed certain amendments to the Constitution to restore the Missouri Compromise, by which slavery should be confined to specified limits, and Congress prevented from interfering with the labor-system of the South.

Before Christmas in 1860, South Carolina had unanimously passed its Ordinance of Secession, the intelligence of which was received with enthusiasm by the Gulf States, all of which soon followed her example. The more conservative States held back, and all but the four on the border seceded in one form or another after some delay.

In Kentucky the wealthy planters and slaveholders, with many prominent exceptions, were inclined to share the lot of the seceding States; but the majority of the people still clung to