On the Church Steps

by Sarah C. Hallowell

ON THE CHURCH STEPS.

By SARAH C. HALLOWELL.

This e-text was compiled from sections of this novel published in the August to October editions of:

LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE

OF

POPULAR LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.

1873

CHAPTER I.

What a picture she was as she sat there, my own Bessie! and what a strange place it was to rest on, those church steps! Behind us lay the Woolsey woods, with their wooing fragrance of pine and soft rushes of scented air; and the lakes were in the distance, lying very calm in the cloud-shadows and seeming to wait for us to come. But to-day Bessie would nothing of lakes or ledges: she would sit on the church steps.

In front of us, straight to the gate, ran a stiff little walk of white pebbles, hard and harsh as some bygone creed.