And even those pioneers who were moved to come into the wilderness by a great purpose--and they were moved so--to come into the new territory and make it free, nevertheless capered and romped through the drouth of '60 in the cast-off garments of their kinsmen and were happy; for there were buffalo meat and beans for the needy, the aid room had flour, and God gave them youth.
Not drouth, nor famine, nor suffering, nor zeal of a great purpose can burn out the sparkle of youth in the heart.

Only time can do that, and so John Barclay remembered the famous drouth of '60, not by his mother's tears, which came as she bent over his little clothes, before the aid box came from Haverhill, not by the long days of waiting for the rain that never came, not even by the sun that lapped up the swimming hole before fall, and left no river to freeze for their winter's skating, not even by his mother's anguish when she had to go to the aid store for flour and beans, though that must have been a sorry day for a Thatcher; but he remembers the great drouth by Ellen Culpepper's party, where they had a frosted cake and played kissing games, and--well, fifty years is along time for two brown eyes to shine in the heart of a boy and a man.

It is strange that they should glow there, and all memory of the runaway slaves who were sheltered in the cave by the sycamore tree should fade, and be only as a tale that is told.

Yet, so memory served the boy, and he knew only at second hand how his mother gave her widow's mite to the cause for which she had crossed the prairies as of old her "fathers crossed the sea." Before the rain came in the spring of '61 Martin Culpepper came back from the East an orator of established reputation.

The town was proud of him, and he addressed the multitude on various occasions and wept many tears over the sad state of the country.