sometimes to the elders, sometimes to the converts at large. Susannah
frequently heard of them first through Emma Smith, whose pious heart was
constantly filled with wonder and thankfulness at the thought of the
great honour vouchsafed to her husband. These revelations, sometimes
illimitable in their sweep, and sometimes having reference only to the
most minute practical details, were at this time all in accordance
either with the dictates of common sense or with the severely literal
meaning of some Scripture text. They were therefore easily justified
either to reason or to the eye of faith, but the results of their
application were often startling, and it was facts, not theories, that
chiefly caused Susannah to stagger.

At length the growing excitement among the congregation seemed to gather
toward some climax. It was then that Joseph Smith was said for the first
time to cast out devils.

Near to John Biery's hotel lived a family of the name of Knight. The
worthy farmer became a convert, and so also, in appearance, did his son.
Susannah first saw them at their baptism, which took place one cold
bleak day in the margin of Seneca Lake. The horses which had brought the
little company to the edge of the water, having been tied among the
trees, made a constant rustling and trampling among the fallen leaves.
The sharp rustle, the thud of the hoofs upon the ground, were sounds
long connected in her mind with the crisis of her doubt, which then
began. The maples stood above them, tall and leafless; the waters of the
lake were leaden in hue and cold. Looking southward on either side of
its long flood, the snores with their many points and headlands lay
cold, almost hueless, near by, and in the distance blue as tarnished
steel.