This is the romantic story of Lebanon Fairgale, dark beauty of the Georgia lowlands. The period is that simple and unspoiled era, the early decades of the nineteenth century.
While old Crease Fairgale had taught Lebanon all the rudiments and skills of living in harmony with nature, he had never told her a thing about love. And when Sebastian Ratcliff came down from Baltimore to visit, she was caught off guard. The attraction was mutual, but the solution was not simple. Like all the other Radcliffs he lived up to his promises, in particular a promise to Lucie Birdsong back in Baltimore. His frantic indecision was terminated by a hunting accident which took him back on a journey of pain to Baltimore and the waiting arms of Lucie.
With Sebastian lost to her forever, Lebanon did the practical thing and married kindly,extravagant Fernald d'Aussy. Thus began a life of pioneering for which Lebanon was fitted by nature and which proved difficult for Fernald.
Here is an extraordinary living story with its tragedies, its sounds of birds, its bloom of wild flowers, its thousand and one natural delights. But most important, it is the accurate, many-hued portrait of an impetuous child of nature who, weathered by the storms of life, became a woman of great strength and courage.
