CHAPTER XII

THE RIGHTEOUS SHOUT

The meeting which Peter Cartwright was to hold had been heralded far and wide, and it was expected that several thousand people would attend. A great arbor had been erected at each of the four corners of which was a high wooden altar covered with earth and sod where pine torches burned to illuminate the darkness. A platform large enough to hold twenty preachers had been built, with an open space in front scattered with straw and lined with mourners' benches. Back from the arbor a circle of tents was placed; back of the tents, wagons, buggies, and carts of every description; and back of this rim of vehicles the horses, and sometimes oxen, were tethered.

The gathering together of so many people from far and near for a period of two or three weeks offered an opportunity for profit-making, and at a previous meeting whiskey as well as cider and tobacco had been sold in the forest beyond the camp-clearing, and wheels of chance had been operated, all of which had had a bad effect on the meeting.

The Clary Grove boys, after a report from Lincoln, had decided to "give Old Pete right of way," and planned neither mischief nor profit-making.

Not so, however, the Wolf Creek and Sand Town gangs; some among these had decided to use the occasion for money-making, and the day before the meeting was to open several barrels of whiskey were discovered in the brush down beyond the camp-arbor.

Cartwright immediately sent out word that no whiskey-selling would be allowed anywhere near the meeting-ground, and to the end of discovering whom he must fight, he disguised himself and was thus able to locate the gang of rowdies whose head-quarters he found a short distance down a little creek running by the camp ground. Close to the arbor was a steep bank, below which the water was quite deep. Into this pool, Peter Cartwright learned, a plan had been made to throw him. The rowdies were then to ride through the arbor on horses and, with screeches and yells like those of Indians break up the meeting.

With this information in hand, Peter Cartwright prepared himself, and, armed with a stout hickory club, he hid at the narrow passage through which the horsemen were to come, a pathway around the high bank just above the deep pool.

The singing service which preceded the sermon, led by the ten exhorters up at the arbor, was swelling into an inspiring volume when Cartwright, hiding in the gloom, heard the sound of horses, and the next moment the leader of the Wolf Creek gang appeared, making his smiling way, with his eye fixed on the arbor.

It was at this time the music of the pious song was pierced by an unearthly screech, ending with the words, "In the name of the Lord, GET BACK!" The horse was the first to heed the exhorter's summary order. Pitching his rider off perilously close to the brink of the creek, he snorted away into the forest.

"In the name of the Lord, get thee behind me, Satan!" Cartwright shouted again, this time into the ear of the Wolf Creek rowdy, and, with the words, he gave him such a resounding whack with his club as to knock him over the bank. The next moment the leader of the gang found himself kicking in the cold waters into which he had planned to throw Cartwright.

Several others of the gang now came up and made an effort to pass, but the yells of Cartwright had summoned the strong ones from the arbor and after a general mixing up between the sheep and the goats, the more valiant members of the Wolf Creek gang found themselves crawling out of the water at the foot of the bank.

When the gang had been dispersed, Peter Cartwright, puffing and blowing, returned to the arbor and sounded the great trumpet call to preaching. The disturbed audience gathered in quickly, the women seating themselves on one side and the men on the other.

Taking a timely text, the exhorter described with great power the conflict he had just been having with the devil, and when he had reached the climax of the great fight, and had described the way the devil went splashing into the pool, he sprang from his pulpit to a long bench across the altar, and, walking back and forth, shouted in a mighty voice:

Then my soul mounted higher In a chariot of fire, And the moon it was under my feet!

From a shout, the words grew into a song, improvised scriptural texts serving for the verses, and the chorus each time being the victorious statement that his soul had mounted up until the moon was under his feet. The audience soon caught the swing of the chorus and sent out great volumes of melody on the night air.

After this song, the old favorite, "Where, O where are the Hebrew children?" was started, and as the questions "Where, O where now is good Elijah?"; "Where, O where now is good old Daniel?"; "Where, O where now is my good mother?" were sung, with their answers, enthusiasm grew until the united answers rolled away in great sound-waves on the stillness of the black forest.

The situation was growing interesting. There was a suppressed feeling that something was going to happen.

Among the hundreds who stood about the sides were Abe Lincoln and Doctor Allen, who had taken the time to ride over in the hopes of seeing for themselves an exhibit of spiritual power known as the jerks. The perceptible and steady rise in excitement gave promise of almost any kind of unusual demonstration. Sinners had been called to the altar and many were falling in the dust, groaning and calling on God to save them from sin and its terrible punishment of hell.

Cartwright by now seemed to be singing, exhorting, preaching and praying all at the same time. The shouters had felt the power, and added to the singing and praying. Shrill cries of "Glory," and other ejaculations of unearthly joy were heard. Bonnets, caps, and combs were beginning to fly. Several of the sisters gave exhibitions of what were called running, jumping and barking exercises, and the men most interested in them were near at hand to catch them when they fell. Some who succumbed to this excess of joy, remained in a trance-like condition, however, and there were at one time many unconscious men and women lying prostrate in the straw at one place. Abe Lincoln and Dr. Allen looked on with much interest.

In the midst of the excitement, there came to the ears of Abe Lincoln, from the woman's side, somewhere across from him, a familiar note. His interest was at once centred in discovering the owner of the voice. After a very short time he saw Ann Rutledge. To-night she wore a dress half wool, half flax, a soft material, dyed with butternut until it was as yellow as her hair. She stood not far from one of the pine-torch fires, and in the reflection of the orange flames she made a picture worthy an artist's canvas.

With his eyes upon her face, shining as if touched by fire from some heavenly altar, Abe Lincoln suddenly became oblivious of the scenes about him, though proving of such unusual interest to Dr. Allen.

The song about the Hebrew children had given way to another and yet more emotional expression; a hand-shaking ditty which seemed little more than a monophonic impromptu to carry the line, "My brother, I wish you well; when my Lord calls, I trust you will be mentioned in the Promised Land." Before the many improvised verses of this chant, alike rousing and pathetic, had been sung twice, the climax joy of the safety of heavenly bliss, and the climax sorrow of the doom of eternal punishment had been reached, and it was evident to Dr. Allen that the strange physical expression was about to break out.

"Look!" he said to Abe Lincoln.

There was no response.

"Look!" he repeated.

Then he glanced at the man by his side. Abe Lincoln was looking, but not as Dr. Allen had indicated, and the expression on his face was one Dr. Allen had never seen there. For a moment his eyes rested on the uncouth and homely youth in surprise; then, as if hesitating to break some pleasant spell, he took him by the arm and said softly, "They're getting the jerks."

Abe Lincoln turned suddenly, and in something of an apologetic tone said, "It's Ann Rutledge singing. Look at her face. Doesn't she seem happy?"

"Ann Rutledge is always happy," Dr. Allen answered, "but look up in front."

"Hope she don't catch it," he said with a last glance at Ann as he turned his attention to a woman who had just shaken her apron off.

"Don't fear," Dr. Allen replied smiling. "Book learning and this sort of thing don't go together."

Dr. Allen and Abe Lincoln pushed nearer the front. According to Cartwright the jerks were useful to call attention to the power of God or the devil, whichever caused the peculiar demonstration. At any rate it affected them powerfully, and soon many about the altar were in different stages of the mysterious visitation of the supernatural. The heads of some jerked from side to side. Others bent back and forth. Sometimes the whole body jerked so violently it soon fell exhausted, and many bodies that fell into the straw lay for days before returning to consciousness.

As Dr. Allen and Abe Lincoln watched, they saw one man, who stood near a support, beat against it until the skin was scraped from his forehead. Dr. Allen felt moved with professional pity, but Abe Lincoln said, "He's getting religion, let him alone."

It was four o'clock in the morning, when those who had breath enough left sang, "Blest be the tie that binds," and repaired to their tents to rest until the trumpet should summon them to early morning prayers.

* * * * *

The next morning, as Abe Lincoln and Dr. Allen were crossing the arbor grounds, they saw Ann Rutledge and John McNeil laughing together as she fried eggs over an open fire. For a moment Lincoln felt the same sensation he experienced when once before he would have destroyed McNeil from the face of the earth.

Dr. Allen noted the momentary expression on his face and involuntarily compared it with what he had seen there the night before. He did not stop now to make any deductions, but he did not forget.

A little later Abe Lincoln met Ann and the Rev. Peter Cartwright. "We were talking about you," Ann said.

"I was wondering if the demonstration of Divine power at last night's meeting had not shaken the scales from your eyes, my sinner friend," was the exhorter's greeting.

"I suppose you call me a sinner because I do not believe in hell," Abe Lincoln said, smiling.

"No man can be religious and not fear hell."

"My sin then is in lack of fear, but I didn't make myself, and God just forgot to put it in. Am I to blame for that?"

"Don't be a scoffer," was Cartwright's advice. "You have a soul worth saving, young man. I shall pray for your never-dying soul. Perhaps others are praying for you, and the effectual fervent prayer of the righteous man availeth much."

"Thanks. I'll do as much for you if you ever get in need." Abe Lincoln answered, and bidding Ann and the preacher good-bye he went on his way.

John McNeil had come up just as Lincoln turned away. "Poor deluded sinner," Cartwright said kindly, looking after the tall, uncouth figure of Abe Lincoln. "How Satan does delude the soul of man, but he's worth praying for."

When John McNeil was alone with Ann Rutledge a few moments later, he said: "What did I tell you, Ann? I like Abe Lincoln all right, but I believe he is one of the worst sinners in this county. Why even those Wolf Creek rowdies that tried to break up the meeting believe in hell."

"Folks don't see things the same way," Ann asserted thoughtfully.

"No--I suppose you'd call Abe Lincoln a saint."

Ann made no answer. She seemed just then to hear a bruised and helpless child saying: "God come, and His name's Abe Lincoln."