Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/342

 foaming beer were tapped, and healths were drunk and glasses clinked merrily. This last was something of an innovation; but Margaret had begged to be allowed to contribute to the feast these innocent beverages, as well as the mammoth pasty, the pair of giant turkeys, and the great wedding-cake, big as a small cart wheel. Robert was introduced to many of the farmers, who had seen Margaret grow up from a wee motherless baby to the winsome young woman she now was. They regarded him with a less covert curiosity than her kinsfolk had shown; and Joseph Halloway, the chief of the selectmen, who had given her apples when she was no higher than his knee, expressed it as his opinion that "Margaret Ruysdale had found a downright smart, handsome-looking husband down South, though he dooes look and talk more like a furriner than an American."

It was a joyous day, long remembered at Woodbridge as the merriest Harvest Home there had been in many years. It was held in Margaret's remembrance, all her life through, as a happy day,—the last of her girlhood days; for on the morrow Robert Feuardent was to claim his bride, and General Ruysdale had pledged his word to deliver over his prisoner to the enemy, even without the return of the hostage heart.