Publisher's Synopsis
This is a story of long ago, of a time after General Jackson had got into the White House and had shown the world what a real democracy was. It is a tale of the village of Coniston just after the Era of the first six Presidents had closed, and when a new Era had begun. No greater contrast was to be had in Coniston than that between Cynthia Ware and Jethro Bass. In the first place, Cynthia was the minister's daughter, and twenty-one. I can summon her now under the great maples of the village street, a virginal figure, gray eyes that kindled the face shaded by the poke bonnet, and up you went above the clouds. Cynthia was not only the minister's daughter, -- distinction enough, -- her reputation for learning was spread widely. Why in the world she should ever have been curious about Jethro Bass is a mystery to many, for the two of them were as far apart as the poles. Cynthia, of all people, took to watching the tanner's son, and listening to the brief colloquies he had with other men at Jonah Winch's store. On one or two of these occasions Cynthia had been startled to find his eyes fixed upon her, and though the feeling she had was closely akin to fear, she found something distinctly pleasurable in it. That was the crux of the tale: Cynthia and Jethro. Everything that came from them became the tale that was Coniston.
