CHAPTER XVI
Tom’s Mistress and Her Opinions

“And now, Marie,” said St. Clare, “your golden days are dawning. Here is our practical, business-like New England cousin, who will take the whole budget of cares off your shoulders, and give you time to refresh yourself, and grow young and handsome. The ceremony of delivering the keys had better come off forthwith.”

This remark was made at the breakfast-table, a few mornings after Miss Ophelia had arrived.

“I’m sure she’s welcome,” said Marie, leaning her head languidly on her hand. “I think she’ll find one thing, if she does, and that is, that it’s we mistresses that are the slaves, down here.”

“O, certainly, she will discover that, and a world of wholesome truths besides, no doubt,” said St. Clare.

“Talk about our keeping slaves, as if we did it for our convenience,” said Marie. “I’m sure, if we consulted that, we might let them all go at once.”

Evangeline fixed her large, serious eyes on her mother’s face, with an earnest and perplexed expression, and said, simply, “What do you keep them for, mamma?”

“I don’t know, I’m sure, except for a plague; they are the plague of my life. I believe that more of my ill health is caused by them than by any one thing; and ours, I know, are the very worst that ever anybody was plagued with.”

“O, come, Marie, you’ve got the blues, this morning,” said St. Clare. “You know ’t isn’t so. There’s Mammy, the best creature living,—what could you do without her?”

“Mammy is the best I ever knew,” said Marie; “and yet Mammy, now, is selfish—dreadfully selfish; it’s the fault of the whole race.”

“Selfishness is a dreadful fault,” said St. Clare, gravely.

“Well, now, there’s Mammy,” said Marie, “I think it’s selfish of her to sleep so sound nights; she knows I need little attentions almost every hour, when my worst turns are on, and yet she’s so hard to wake. I absolutely am worse, this very morning, for the efforts I had to make to wake her last night.”

“Hasn’t she sat up with you a good many nights, lately, mamma?” said Eva.

“How should you know that?” said Marie, sharply; “she’s been complaining, I suppose.”

“She didn’t complain; she only told me what bad nights you’d had,—so many in succession.”

“Why don’t you let Jane or Rosa take her place, a night or two,” said St. Clare, “and let her rest?”

“How can you propose it?” said Marie. “St. Clare, you really are inconsiderate. So nervous as I am, the least breath disturbs me; and a strange hand about me would drive me absolutely frantic. If Mammy felt the interest in me she ought to, she’d wake easier,—of course, she would. I’ve heard of people who had such devoted servants, but it never was my luck;” and Marie sighed.

Miss Ophelia had listened to this conversation with an air of shrewd, observant gravity; and she still kept her lips tightly compressed, as if determined fully to ascertain her longitude and position, before she committed herself.

“Now, Mammy has a sort of goodness,” said Marie; “she’s smooth and respectful, but she’s selfish at heart. Now, she never will be done fidgeting and worrying about that husband of hers. You see, when I was married and came to live here, of course, I had to bring her with me, and her husband my father couldn’t spare. He was a blacksmith, and, of course, very necessary; and I thought and said, at the time, that Mammy and he had better give each other up, as it wasn’t likely to be convenient for them ever to live together again. I wish, now, I’d insisted on it, and married Mammy to somebody else; but I was foolish and indulgent, and didn’t want to insist. I told Mammy, at the time, that she mustn’t ever expect to see him more than once or twice in her life again, for the air of father’s place doesn’t agree with my health, and I can’t go there; and I advised her to take up with somebody else; but no—she wouldn’t. Mammy has a kind of obstinacy about her, in spots, that everybody don’t see as I do.”

“Has she children?” said Miss Ophelia.

“Yes; she has two.”

“I suppose she feels the separation from them?”

“Well, of course, I couldn’t bring them. They were little dirty things—I couldn’t have them about; and, besides, they took up too much of her time; but I believe that Mammy has always kept up a sort of sulkiness about this. She won’t marry anybody else; and I do believe, now, though she knows how necessary she is to me, and how feeble my health is, she would go back to her husband tomorrow, if she only could. I do, indeed,” said Marie; “they are just so selfish, now, the best of them.”

“It’s distressing to reflect upon,” said St. Clare, dryly.

Miss Ophelia looked keenly at him, and saw the flush of mortification and repressed vexation, and the sarcastic curl of the lip, as he spoke.

“Now, Mammy has always been a pet with me,” said Marie. “I wish some of your northern servants could look at her closets of dresses,—silks and muslins, and one real linen cambric, she has hanging there. I’ve worked sometimes whole afternoons, trimming her caps, and getting her ready to go to a party. As to abuse, she don’t know what it is. She never was whipped more than once or twice in her whole life. She has her strong coffee or her tea every day, with white sugar in it. It’s abominable, to be sure; but St. Clare will have high life below-stairs, and they every one of them live just as they please. The fact is, our servants are over-indulged. I suppose it is partly our fault that they are selfish, and act like spoiled children; but I’ve talked to St. Clare till I am tired.”

“And I, too,” said St. Clare, taking up the morning paper.

Eva, the beautiful Eva, had stood listening to her mother, with that expression of deep and mystic earnestness which was peculiar to her. She walked softly round to her mother’s chair, and put her arms round her neck.

“Well, Eva, what now?” said Marie.

“Mamma, couldn’t I take care of you one night—just one? I know I shouldn’t make you nervous, and I shouldn’t sleep. I often lie awake nights, thinking—”

“O, nonsense, child—nonsense!” said Marie; “you are such a strange child!”

“But may I, mamma? I think,” she said, timidly, “that Mammy isn’t well. She told me her head ached all the time, lately.”

“O, that’s just one of Mammy’s fidgets! Mammy is just like all the rest of them—makes such a fuss about every little headache or finger-ache; it’ll never do to encourage it—never! I’m principled about this matter,” said she, turning to Miss Ophelia; “you’ll find the necessity of it. If you encourage servants in giving way to every little disagreeable feeling, and complaining of every little ailment, you’ll have your hands full. I never complain myself—nobody knows what I endure. I feel it a duty to bear it quietly, and I do.”

Miss Ophelia’s round eyes expressed an undisguised amazement at this peroration, which struck St. Clare as so supremely ludicrous, that he burst into a loud laugh.

“St. Clare always laughs when I make the least allusion to my ill health,” said Marie, with the voice of a suffering martyr. “I only hope the day won’t come when he’ll remember it!” and Marie put her handkerchief to her eyes.

Of course, there was rather a foolish silence. Finally, St. Clare got up, looked at his watch, and said he had an engagement down street. Eva tripped away after him, and Miss Ophelia and Marie remained at the table alone.

“Now, that’s just like St. Clare!” said the latter, withdrawing her handkerchief with somewhat of a spirited flourish when the criminal to be affected by it was no longer in sight. “He never realizes, never can, never will, what I suffer, and have, for years. If I was one of the complaining sort, or ever made any fuss about my ailments, there would be some reason for it. Men do get tired, naturally, of a complaining wife. But I’ve kept things to myself, and borne, and borne, till St. Clare has got in the way of thinking I can bear anything.”

Miss Ophelia did not exactly know what she was expected to answer to this.

While she was thinking what to say, Marie gradually wiped away her tears, and smoothed her plumage in a general sort of way, as a dove might be supposed to make toilet after a shower, and began a housewifely chat with Miss Ophelia, concerning cupboards, closets, linen-presses, store-rooms, and other matters, of which the latter was, by common understanding, to assume the direction,—giving her so many cautious directions and charges, that a head less systematic and business-like than Miss Ophelia’s would have been utterly dizzied and confounded.

“And now,” said Marie, “I believe I’ve told you everything; so that, when my next sick turn comes on, you’ll be able to go forward entirely, without consulting me;—only about Eva,—she requires watching.”

“She seems to be a good child, very,” said Miss Ophelia; “I never saw a better child.”

“Eva’s peculiar,” said her mother, “very. There are things about her so singular; she isn’t like me, now, a particle;” and Marie sighed, as if this was a truly melancholy consideration.

Miss Ophelia in her own heart said, “I hope she isn’t,” but had prudence enough to keep it down.

“Eva always was disposed to be with servants; and I think that well enough with some children. Now, I always played with father’s little negroes—it never did me any harm. But Eva somehow always seems to put herself on an equality with every creature that comes near her. It’s a strange thing about the child. I never have been able to break her of it. St. Clare, I believe, encourages her in it. The fact is, St. Clare indulges every creature under this roof but his own wife.”

Again Miss Ophelia sat in blank silence.

“Now, there’s no way with servants,” said Marie, “but to put them down, and keep them down. It was always natural to me, from a child. Eva is enough to spoil a whole house-full. What she will do when she comes to keep house herself, I’m sure I don’t know. I hold to being kind to servants—I always am; but you must make ’em know their place. Eva never does; there’s no getting into the child’s head the first beginning of an idea what a servant’s place is! You heard her offering to take care of me nights, to let Mammy sleep! That’s just a specimen of the way the child would be doing all the time, if she was left to herself.”

“Why,” said Miss Ophelia, bluntly, “I suppose you think your servants are human creatures, and ought to have some rest when they are tired.”

“Certainly, of course. I’m very particular in letting them have everything that comes convenient,—anything that doesn’t put one at all out of the way, you know. Mammy can make up her sleep, some time or other; there’s no difficulty about that. She’s the sleepiest concern that ever I saw; sewing, standing, or sitting, that creature will go to sleep, and sleep anywhere and everywhere. No danger but Mammy gets sleep enough. But this treating servants as if they were exotic flowers, or china vases, is really ridiculous,” said Marie, as she plunged languidly into the depths of a voluminous and pillowy lounge, and drew towards her an elegant cut-glass vinaigrette.

“You see,” she continued, in a faint and lady-like voice, like the last dying breath of an Arabian jessamine, or something equally ethereal, “you see, Cousin Ophelia, I don’t often speak of myself. It isn’t my habit; ’t isn’t agreeable to me. In fact, I haven’t strength to do it. But there are points where St. Clare and I differ. St. Clare never understood me, never appreciated me. I think it lies at the root of all my ill health. St. Clare means well, I am bound to believe; but men are constitutionally selfish and inconsiderate to woman. That, at least, is my impression.”

Miss Ophelia, who had not a small share of the genuine New England caution, and a very particular horror of being drawn into family difficulties, now began to foresee something of this kind impending; so, composing her face into a grim neutrality, and drawing out of her pocket about a yard and a quarter of stocking, which she kept as a specific against what Dr. Watts asserts to be a personal habit of Satan when people have idle hands, she proceeded to knit most energetically, shutting her lips together in a way that said, as plain as words could, “You needn’t try to make me speak. I don’t want anything to do with your affairs,”—in fact, she looked about as sympathizing as a stone lion. But Marie didn’t care for that. She had got somebody to talk to, and she felt it her duty to talk, and that was enough; and reinforcing herself by smelling again at her vinaigrette, she went on.

“You see, I brought my own property and servants into the connection, when I married St. Clare, and I am legally entitled to manage them my own way. St. Clare had his fortune and his servants, and I’m well enough content he should manage them his way; but St. Clare will be interfering. He has wild, extravagant notions about things, particularly about the treatment of servants. He really does act as if he set his servants before me, and before himself, too; for he lets them make him all sorts of trouble, and never lifts a finger. Now, about some things, St. Clare is really frightful—he frightens me—good-natured as he looks, in general. Now, he has set down his foot that, come what will, there shall not be a blow struck in this house, except what he or I strike; and he does it in a way that I really dare not cross him. Well, you may see what that leads to; for St. Clare wouldn’t raise his hand, if every one of them walked over him, and I—you see how cruel it would be to require me to make the exertion. Now, you know these servants are nothing but grown-up children.”

“I don’t know anything about it, and I thank the Lord that I don’t!” said Miss Ophelia, shortly.

“Well, but you will have to know something, and know it to your cost, if you stay here. You don’t know what a provoking, stupid, careless, unreasonable, childish, ungrateful set of wretches they are.”

Marie seemed wonderfully supported, always, when she got upon this topic; and she now opened her eyes, and seemed quite to forget her languor.

“You don’t know, and you can’t, the daily, hourly trials that beset a housekeeper from them, everywhere and every way. But it’s no use to complain to St. Clare. He talks the strangest stuff. He says we have made them what they are, and ought to bear with them. He says their faults are all owing to us, and that it would be cruel to make the fault and punish it too. He says we shouldn’t do any better, in their place; just as if one could reason from them to us, you know.”

“Don’t you believe that the Lord made them of one blood with us?” said Miss Ophelia, shortly.

“No, indeed not I! A pretty story, truly! They are a degraded race.”

“Don’t you think they’ve got immortal souls?” said Miss Ophelia, with increasing indignation.

“O, well,” said Marie, yawning, “that, of course—nobody doubts that. But as to putting them on any sort of equality with us, you know, as if we could be compared, why, it’s impossible! Now, St. Clare really has talked to me as if keeping Mammy from her husband was like keeping me from mine. There’s no comparing in this way. Mammy couldn’t have the feelings that I should. It’s a different thing altogether,—of course, it is,—and yet St. Clare pretends not to see it. And just as if Mammy could love her little dirty babies as I love Eva! Yet St. Clare once really and soberly tried to persuade me that it was my duty, with my weak health, and all I suffer, to let Mammy go back, and take somebody else in her place. That was a little too much even for me to bear. I don’t often show my feelings, I make it a principle to endure everything in silence; it’s a wife’s hard lot, and I bear it. But I did break out, that time; so that he has never alluded to the subject since. But I know by his looks, and little things that he says, that he thinks so as much as ever; and it’s so trying, so provoking!”

Miss Ophelia looked very much as if she was afraid she should say something; but she rattled away with her needles in a way that had volumes of meaning in it, if Marie could only have understood it.

“So, you just see,” she continued, “what you’ve got to manage. A household without any rule; where servants have it all their own way, do what they please, and have what they please, except so far as I, with my feeble health, have kept up government. I keep my cowhide about, and sometimes I do lay it on; but the exertion is always too much for me. If St. Clare would only have this thing done as others do—”

“And how’s that?”

“Why, send them to the calaboose, or some of the other places to be flogged. That’s the only way. If I wasn’t such a poor, feeble piece, I believe I should manage with twice the energy that St. Clare does.”

“And how does St. Clare contrive to manage?” said Miss Ophelia. “You say he never strikes a blow.”

“Well, men have a more commanding way, you know; it is easier for them; besides, if you ever looked full in his eye, it’s peculiar,—that eye,—and if he speaks decidedly, there’s a kind of flash. I’m afraid of it, myself; and the servants know they must mind. I couldn’t do as much by a regular storm and scolding as St. Clare can by one turn of his eye, if once he is in earnest. O, there’s no trouble about St. Clare; that’s the reason he’s no more feeling for me. But you’ll find, when you come to manage, that there’s no getting along without severity,—they are so bad, so deceitful, so lazy.”

“The old tune,” said St. Clare, sauntering in. “What an awful account these wicked creatures will have to settle, at last, especially for being lazy! You see, cousin,” said he, as he stretched himself at full length on a lounge opposite to Marie, “it’s wholly inexcusable in them, in the light of the example that Marie and I set them,—this laziness.”

“Come, now, St. Clare, you are too bad!” said Marie.

“Am I, now? Why, I thought I was talking good, quite remarkably for me. I try to enforce your remarks, Marie, always.”

“You know you meant no such thing, St. Clare,” said Marie.

“O, I must have been mistaken, then. Thank you, my dear, for setting me right.”

“You do really try to be provoking,” said Marie.

“O, come, Marie, the day is growing warm, and I have just had a long quarrel with Dolph, which has fatigued me excessively; so, pray be agreeable, now, and let a fellow repose in the light of your smile.”

“What’s the matter about Dolph?” said Marie. “That fellow’s impudence has been growing to a point that is perfectly intolerable to me. I only wish I had the undisputed management of him a while. I’d bring him down!”

“What you say, my dear, is marked with your usual acuteness and good sense,” said St. Clare. “As to Dolph, the case is this: that he has so long been engaged in imitating my graces and perfections, that he has, at last, really mistaken himself for his master; and I have been obliged to give him a little insight into his mistake.”

“How?” said Marie.

“Why, I was obliged to let him understand explicitly that I preferred to keep some of my clothes for my own personal wearing; also, I put his magnificence upon an allowance of cologne-water, and actually was so cruel as to restrict him to one dozen of my cambric handkerchiefs. Dolph was particularly huffy about it, and I had to talk to him like a father, to bring him round.”

“O! St. Clare, when will you learn how to treat your servants? It’s abominable, the way you indulge them!” said Marie.

“Why, after all, what’s the harm of the poor dog’s wanting to be like his master; and if I haven’t brought him up any better than to find his chief good in cologne and cambric handkerchiefs, why shouldn’t I give them to him?”

“And why haven’t you brought him up better?” said Miss Ophelia, with blunt determination.

“Too much trouble,—laziness, cousin, laziness,—which ruins more souls than you can shake a stick at. If it weren’t for laziness, I should have been a perfect angel, myself. I’m inclined to think that laziness is what your old Dr. Botherem, up in Vermont, used to call the ‘essence of moral evil.’ It’s an awful consideration, certainly.”

“I think you slaveholders have an awful responsibility upon you,” said Miss Ophelia. “I wouldn’t have it, for a thousand worlds. You ought to educate your slaves, and treat them like reasonable creatures,—like immortal creatures, that you’ve got to stand before the bar of God with. That’s my mind,” said the good lady, breaking suddenly out with a tide of zeal that had been gaining strength in her mind all the morning.

“O! come, come,” said St. Clare, getting up quickly; “what do you know about us?” And he sat down to the piano, and rattled a lively piece of music. St. Clare had a decided genius for music. His touch was brilliant and firm, and his fingers flew over the keys with a rapid and bird-like motion, airy, and yet decided. He played piece after piece, like a man who is trying to play himself into a good humor. After pushing the music aside, he rose up, and said, gayly, “Well, now, cousin, you’ve given us a good talk and done your duty; on the whole, I think the better of you for it. I make no manner of doubt that you threw a very diamond of truth at me, though you see it hit me so directly in the face that it wasn’t exactly appreciated, at first.”

“For my part, I don’t see any use in such sort of talk,” said Marie. “I’m sure, if anybody does more for servants than we do, I’d like to know who; and it don’t do ’em a bit good,—not a particle,—they get worse and worse. As to talking to them, or anything like that, I’m sure I have talked till I was tired and hoarse, telling them their duty, and all that; and I’m sure they can go to church when they like, though they don’t understand a word of the sermon, more than so many pigs,—so it isn’t of any great use for them to go, as I see; but they do go, and so they have every chance; but, as I said before, they are a degraded race, and always will be, and there isn’t any help for them; you can’t make anything of them, if you try. You see, Cousin Ophelia, I’ve tried, and you haven’t; I was born and bred among them, and I know.”

Miss Ophelia thought she had said enough, and therefore sat silent. St. Clare whistled a tune.

“St. Clare, I wish you wouldn’t whistle,” said Marie; “it makes my head worse.”

“I won’t,” said St. Clare. “Is there anything else you wouldn’t wish me to do?”

“I wish you would have some kind of sympathy for my trials; you never have any feeling for me.”

“My dear accusing angel!” said St. Clare.

“It’s provoking to be talked to in that way.”

“Then, how will you be talked to? I’ll talk to order,—any way you’ll mention,—only to give satisfaction.”

A gay laugh from the court rang through the silken curtains of the verandah. St. Clare stepped out, and lifting up the curtain, laughed too.

“What is it?” said Miss Ophelia, coming to the railing.

There sat Tom, on a little mossy seat in the court, every one of his button-holes stuck full of cape jessamines, and Eva, gayly laughing, was hanging a wreath of roses round his neck; and then she sat down on his knee, like a chip-sparrow, still laughing.

“O, Tom, you look so funny!”

Tom had a sober, benevolent smile, and seemed, in his quiet way, to be enjoying the fun quite as much as his little mistress. He lifted his eyes, when he saw his master, with a half-deprecating, apologetic air.

“How can you let her?” said Miss Ophelia.

“Why not?” said St. Clare.

“Why, I don’t know, it seems so dreadful!”

“You would think no harm in a child’s caressing a large dog, even if he was black; but a creature that can think, and reason, and feel, and is immortal, you shudder at; confess it, cousin. I know the feeling among some of you northerners well enough. Not that there is a particle of virtue in our not having it; but custom with us does what Christianity ought to do,—obliterates the feeling of personal prejudice. I have often noticed, in my travels north, how much stronger this was with you than with us. You loathe them as you would a snake or a toad, yet you are indignant at their wrongs. You would not have them abused; but you don’t want to have anything to do with them yourselves. You would send them to Africa, out of your sight and smell, and then send a missionary or two to do up all the self-denial of elevating them compendiously. Isn’t that it?”

“Well, cousin,” said Miss Ophelia, thoughtfully, “there may be some truth in this.”

“What would the poor and lowly do, without children?” said St. Clare, leaning on the railing, and watching Eva, as she tripped off, leading Tom with her. “Your little child is your only true democrat. Tom, now is a hero to Eva; his stories are wonders in her eyes, his songs and Methodist hymns are better than an opera, and the traps and little bits of trash in his pocket a mine of jewels, and he the most wonderful Tom that ever wore a black skin. This is one of the roses of Eden that the Lord has dropped down expressly for the poor and lowly, who get few enough of any other kind.”

“It’s strange, cousin,” said Miss Ophelia, “one might almost think you were a professor, to hear you talk.”

“A professor?” said St. Clare.

“Yes; a professor of religion.”

“Not at all; not a professor, as your town-folks have it; and, what is worse, I’m afraid, not a practiser, either.”

“What makes you talk so, then?”

“Nothing is easier than talking,” said St. Clare. “I believe Shakespeare makes somebody say, ’I could sooner show twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow my own showing.‘^[1] Nothing like division of labor. My forte lies in talking, and yours, cousin, lies in doing.”

[1] The Merchant of Venice, Act 1, scene 2, lines 17-18.

In Tom’s external situation, at this time, there was, as the world says, nothing to complain of Little Eva’s fancy for him—the instinctive gratitude and loveliness of a noble nature—had led her to petition her father that he might be her especial attendant, whenever she needed the escort of a servant, in her walks or rides; and Tom had general orders to let everything else go, and attend to Miss Eva whenever she wanted him,—orders which our readers may fancy were far from disagreeable to him. He was kept well dressed, for St. Clare was fastidiously particular on this point. His stable services were merely a sinecure, and consisted simply in a daily care and inspection, and directing an under-servant in his duties; for Marie St. Clare declared that she could not have any smell of the horses about him when he came near her, and that he must positively not be put to any service that would make him unpleasant to her, as her nervous system was entirely inadequate to any trial of that nature; one snuff of anything disagreeable being, according to her account, quite sufficient to close the scene, and put an end to all her earthly trials at once. Tom, therefore, in his well-brushed broadcloth suit, smooth beaver, glossy boots, faultless wristbands and collar, with his grave, good-natured black face, looked respectable enough to be a Bishop of Carthage, as men of his color were, in other ages.

Then, too, he was in a beautiful place, a consideration to which his sensitive race was never indifferent; and he did enjoy with a quiet joy the birds, the flowers, the fountains, the perfume, and light and beauty of the court, the silken hangings, and pictures, and lustres, and statuettes, and gilding, that made the parlors within a kind of Aladdin’s palace to him.

If ever Africa shall show an elevated and cultivated race,—and come it must, some time, her turn to figure in the great drama of human improvement.—life will awake there with a gorgeousness and splendor of which our cold western tribes faintly have conceived. In that far-off mystic land of gold, and gems, and spices, and waving palms, and wondrous flowers, and miraculous fertility, will awake new forms of art, new styles of splendor; and the negro race, no longer despised and trodden down, will, perhaps, show forth some of the latest and most magnificent revelations of human life. Certainly they will, in their gentleness, their lowly docility of heart, their aptitude to repose on a superior mind and rest on a higher power, their childlike simplicity of affection, and facility of forgiveness. In all these they will exhibit the highest form of the peculiarly Christian life, and, perhaps, as God chasteneth whom he loveth, he hath chosen poor Africa in the furnace of affliction, to make her the highest and noblest in that kingdom which he will set up, when every other kingdom has been tried, and failed; for the first shall be last, and the last first.

Was this what Marie St. Clare was thinking of, as she stood, gorgeously dressed, on the verandah, on Sunday morning, clasping a diamond bracelet on her slender wrist? Most likely it was. Or, if it wasn’t that, it was something else; for Marie patronized good things, and she was going now, in full force,—diamonds, silk, and lace, and jewels, and all,—to a fashionable church, to be very religious. Marie always made a point to be very pious on Sundays. There she stood, so slender, so elegant, so airy and undulating in all her motions, her lace scarf enveloping her like a mist. She looked a graceful creature, and she felt very good and very elegant indeed. Miss Ophelia stood at her side, a perfect contrast. It was not that she had not as handsome a silk dress and shawl, and as fine a pocket-handkerchief; but stiffness and squareness, and bolt-uprightness, enveloped her with as indefinite yet appreciable a presence as did grace her elegant neighbor; not the grace of God, however,—that is quite another thing!

“Where’s Eva?” said Marie.

“The child stopped on the stairs, to say something to Mammy.”

And what was Eva saying to Mammy on the stairs? Listen, reader, and you will hear, though Marie does not.

“Dear Mammy, I know your head is aching dreadfully.”

“Lord bless you, Miss Eva! my head allers aches lately. You don’t need to worry.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re going out; and here,”—and the little girl threw her arms around her,—“Mammy, you shall take my vinaigrette.”

“What! your beautiful gold thing, thar, with them diamonds! Lor, Miss, ’t wouldn’t be proper, no ways.”

“Why not? You need it, and I don’t. Mamma always uses it for headache, and it’ll make you feel better. No, you shall take it, to please me, now.”

“Do hear the darlin talk!” said Mammy, as Eva thrust it into her bosom, and kissing her, ran down stairs to her mother.

“What were you stopping for?”

“I was just stopping to give Mammy my vinaigrette, to take to church with her.”

“Eva” said Marie, stamping impatiently,—“your gold vinaigrette to Mammy! When will you learn what’s proper? Go right and take it back this moment!”

Eva looked downcast and aggrieved, and turned slowly.

“I say, Marie, let the child alone; she shall do as she pleases,” said St. Clare.

“St. Clare, how will she ever get along in the world?” said Marie.

“The Lord knows,” said St. Clare, “but she’ll get along in heaven better than you or I.”

“O, papa, don’t,” said Eva, softly touching his elbow; “it troubles mother.”

“Well, cousin, are you ready to go to meeting?” said Miss Ophelia, turning square about on St. Clare.

“I’m not going, thank you.”

“I do wish St. Clare ever would go to church,” said Marie; “but he hasn’t a particle of religion about him. It really isn’t respectable.”

“I know it,” said St. Clare. “You ladies go to church to learn how to get along in the world, I suppose, and your piety sheds respectability on us. If I did go at all, I would go where Mammy goes; there’s something to keep a fellow awake there, at least.”

“What! those shouting Methodists? Horrible!” said Marie.

“Anything but the dead sea of your respectable churches, Marie. Positively, it’s too much to ask of a man. Eva, do you like to go? Come, stay at home and play with me.”

“Thank you, papa; but I’d rather go to church.”

“Isn’t it dreadful tiresome?” said St. Clare.

“I think it is tiresome, some,” said Eva, “and I am sleepy, too, but I try to keep awake.”

“What do you go for, then?”

“Why, you know, papa,” she said, in a whisper, “cousin told me that God wants to have us; and he gives us everything, you know; and it isn’t much to do it, if he wants us to. It isn’t so very tiresome after all.”

“You sweet, little obliging soul!” said St. Clare, kissing her; “go along, that’s a good girl, and pray for me.”

“Certainly, I always do,” said the child, as she sprang after her mother into the carriage.

St. Clare stood on the steps and kissed his hand to her, as the carriage drove away; large tears were in his eyes.

“O, Evangeline! rightly named,” he said; “hath not God made thee an evangel to me?”

So he felt a moment; and then he smoked a cigar, and read the Picayune, and forgot his little gospel. Was he much unlike other folks?

“You see, Evangeline,” said her mother, “it’s always right and proper to be kind to servants, but it isn’t proper to treat them just as we would our relations, or people in our own class of life. Now, if Mammy was sick, you wouldn’t want to put her in your own bed.”

“I should feel just like it, mamma,” said Eva, “because then it would be handier to take care of her, and because, you know, my bed is better than hers.”

Marie was in utter despair at the entire want of moral perception evinced in this reply.

“What can I do to make this child understand me?” she said.

“Nothing,” said Miss Ophelia, significantly.

Eva looked sorry and disconcerted for a moment; but children, luckily, do not keep to one impression long, and in a few moments she was merrily laughing at various things which she saw from the coach-windows, as it rattled along.

“Well, ladies,” said St. Clare, as they were comfortably seated at the dinner-table, “and what was the bill of fare at church today?”

“O, Dr. G—— preached a splendid sermon,” said Marie. “It was just such a sermon as you ought to hear; it expressed all my views exactly.”

“It must have been very improving,” said St. Clare. “The subject must have been an extensive one.”

“Well, I mean all my views about society, and such things,” said Marie. “The text was, ‘He hath made everything beautiful in its season;’ and he showed how all the orders and distinctions in society came from God; and that it was so appropriate, you know, and beautiful, that some should be high and some low, and that some were born to rule and some to serve, and all that, you know; and he applied it so well to all this ridiculous fuss that is made about slavery, and he proved distinctly that the Bible was on our side, and supported all our institutions so convincingly. I only wish you’d heard him.”

“O, I didn’t need it,” said St. Clare. “I can learn what does me as much good as that from the Picayune, any time, and smoke a cigar besides; which I can’t do, you know, in a church.”

“Why,” said Miss Ophelia, “don’t you believe in these views?”

“Who,—I? You know I’m such a graceless dog that these religious aspects of such subjects don’t edify me much. If I was to say anything on this slavery matter, I would say out, fair and square, ‘We’re in for it; we’ve got ’em, and mean to keep ’em,—it’s for our convenience and our interest;’ for that’s the long and short of it,—that’s just the whole of what all this sanctified stuff amounts to, after all; and I think that it will be intelligible to everybody, everywhere.”

“I do think, Augustine, you are so irreverent!” said Marie. “I think it’s shocking to hear you talk.”

“Shocking! it’s the truth. This religious talk on such matters,—why don’t they carry it a little further, and show the beauty, in its season, of a fellow’s taking a glass too much, and sitting a little too late over his cards, and various providential arrangements of that sort, which are pretty frequent among us young men;—we’d like to hear that those are right and godly, too.”

“Well,” said Miss Ophelia, “do you think slavery right or wrong?”

“I’m not going to have any of your horrid New England directness, cousin,” said St. Clare, gayly. “If I answer that question, I know you’ll be at me with half a dozen others, each one harder than the last; and I’m not a going to define my position. I am one of the sort that lives by throwing stones at other people’s glass houses, but I never mean to put up one for them to stone.”

“That’s just the way he’s always talking,” said Marie; “you can’t get any satisfaction out of him. I believe it’s just because he don’t like religion, that he’s always running out in this way he’s been doing.”

“Religion!” said St. Clare, in a tone that made both ladies look at him. “Religion! Is what you hear at church, religion? Is that which can bend and turn, and descend and ascend, to fit every crooked phase of selfish, worldly society, religion? Is that religion which is less scrupulous, less generous, less just, less considerate for man, than even my own ungodly, worldly, blinded nature? No! When I look for a religion, I must look for something above me, and not something beneath.”

“Then you don’t believe that the Bible justifies slavery,” said Miss Ophelia.

“The Bible was my mother’s book,” said St. Clare. “By it she lived and died, and I would be very sorry to think it did. I’d as soon desire to have it proved that my mother could drink brandy, chew tobacco, and swear, by way of satisfying me that I did right in doing the same. It wouldn’t make me at all more satisfied with these things in myself, and it would take from me the comfort of respecting her; and it really is a comfort, in this world, to have anything one can respect. In short, you see,” said he, suddenly resuming his gay tone, “all I want is that different things be kept in different boxes. The whole frame-work of society, both in Europe and America, is made up of various things which will not stand the scrutiny of any very ideal standard of morality. It’s pretty generally understood that men don’t aspire after the absolute right, but only to do about as well as the rest of the world. Now, when any one speaks up, like a man, and says slavery is necessary to us, we can’t get along without it, we should be beggared if we give it up, and, of course, we mean to hold on to it,—this is strong, clear, well-defined language; it has the respectability of truth to it; and, if we may judge by their practice, the majority of the world will bear us out in it. But when he begins to put on a long face, and snuffle, and quote Scripture, I incline to think he isn’t much better than he should be.”

“You are very uncharitable,” said Marie.

“Well,” said St. Clare, “suppose that something should bring down the price of cotton once and forever, and make the whole slave property a drug in the market, don’t you think we should soon have another version of the Scripture doctrine? What a flood of light would pour into the church, all at once, and how immediately it would be discovered that everything in the Bible and reason went the other way!”

“Well, at any rate,” said Marie, as she reclined herself on a lounge, “I’m thankful I’m born where slavery exists; and I believe it’s right,—indeed, I feel it must be; and, at any rate, I’m sure I couldn’t get along without it.”

“I say, what do you think, Pussy?” said her father to Eva, who came in at this moment, with a flower in her hand.

“What about, papa?”

“Why, which do you like the best,—to live as they do at your uncle’s, up in Vermont, or to have a house-full of servants, as we do?”

“O, of course, our way is the pleasantest,” said Eva.

“Why so?” said St. Clare, stroking her head.

“Why, it makes so many more round you to love, you know,” said Eva, looking up earnestly.

“Now, that’s just like Eva,” said Marie; “just one of her odd speeches.”

“Is it an odd speech, papa?” said Eva, whisperingly, as she got upon his knee.

“Rather, as this world goes, Pussy,” said St. Clare. “But where has my little Eva been, all dinner-time?”

“O, I’ve been up in Tom’s room, hearing him sing, and Aunt Dinah gave me my dinner.”

“Hearing Tom sing, hey?”

“O, yes! he sings such beautiful things about the New Jerusalem, and bright angels, and the land of Canaan.”

“I dare say; it’s better than the opera, isn’t it?”

“Yes, and he’s going to teach them to me.”

“Singing lessons, hey?—you are coming on.”

“Yes, he sings for me, and I read to him in my Bible; and he explains what it means, you know.”

“On my word,” said Marie, laughing, “that is the latest joke of the season.”

“Tom isn’t a bad hand, now, at explaining Scripture, I’ll dare swear,” said St. Clare. “Tom has a natural genius for religion. I wanted the horses out early, this morning, and I stole up to Tom’s cubiculum there, over the stables, and there I heard him holding a meeting by himself; and, in fact, I haven’t heard anything quite so savory as Tom’s prayer, this some time. He put in for me, with a zeal that was quite apostolic.”

“Perhaps he guessed you were listening. I’ve heard of that trick before.”

“If he did, he wasn’t very polite; for he gave the Lord his opinion of me, pretty freely. Tom seemed to think there was decidedly room for improvement in me, and seemed very earnest that I should be converted.”

“I hope you’ll lay it to heart,” said Miss Ophelia.

“I suppose you are much of the same opinion,” said St. Clare. “Well, we shall see,—shan’t we, Eva?”

CHAPTER XVII
The Freeman’s Defence

There was a gentle bustle at the Quaker house, as the afternoon drew to a close. Rachel Halliday moved quietly to and fro, collecting from her household stores such needments as could be arranged in the smallest compass, for the wanderers who were to go forth that night. The afternoon shadows stretched eastward, and the round red sun stood thoughtfully on the horizon, and his beams shone yellow and calm into the little bed-room where George and his wife were sitting. He was sitting with his child on his knee, and his wife’s hand in his. Both looked thoughtful and serious and traces of tears were on their cheeks.

“Yes, Eliza,” said George, “I know all you say is true. You are a good child,—a great deal better than I am; and I will try to do as you say. I’ll try to act worthy of a free man. I’ll try to feel like a Christian. God Almighty knows that I’ve meant to do well,—tried hard to do well,—when everything has been against me; and now I’ll forget all the past, and put away every hard and bitter feeling, and read my Bible, and learn to be a good man.”

“And when we get to Canada,” said Eliza, “I can help you. I can do dress-making very well; and I understand fine washing and ironing; and between us we can find something to live on.”

“Yes, Eliza, so long as we have each other and our boy. O! Eliza, if these people only knew what a blessing it is for a man to feel that his wife and child belong to him! I’ve often wondered to see men that could call their wives and children their own fretting and worrying about anything else. Why, I feel rich and strong, though we have nothing but our bare hands. I feel as if I could scarcely ask God for any more. Yes, though I’ve worked hard every day, till I am twenty-five years old, and have not a cent of money, nor a roof to cover me, nor a spot of land to call my own, yet, if they will only let me alone now, I will be satisfied,—thankful; I will work, and send back the money for you and my boy. As to my old master, he has been paid five times over for all he ever spent for me. I don’t owe him anything.”

“But yet we are not quite out of danger,” said Eliza; “we are not yet in Canada.”

“True,” said George, “but it seems as if I smelt the free air, and it makes me strong.”

At this moment, voices were heard in the outer apartment, in earnest conversation, and very soon a rap was heard on the door. Eliza started and opened it.

Simeon Halliday was there, and with him a Quaker brother, whom he introduced as Phineas Fletcher. Phineas was tall and lathy, red-haired, with an expression of great acuteness and shrewdness in his face. He had not the placid, quiet, unworldly air of Simeon Halliday; on the contrary, a particularly wide-awake and au fait appearance, like a man who rather prides himself on knowing what he is about, and keeping a bright lookout ahead; peculiarities which sorted rather oddly with his broad brim and formal phraseology.

“Our friend Phineas hath discovered something of importance to the interests of thee and thy party, George,” said Simeon; “it were well for thee to hear it.”

“That I have,” said Phineas, “and it shows the use of a man’s always sleeping with one ear open, in certain places, as I’ve always said. Last night I stopped at a little lone tavern, back on the road. Thee remembers the place, Simeon, where we sold some apples, last year, to that fat woman, with the great ear-rings. Well, I was tired with hard driving; and, after my supper I stretched myself down on a pile of bags in the corner, and pulled a buffalo over me, to wait till my bed was ready; and what does I do, but get fast asleep.”

“With one ear open, Phineas?” said Simeon, quietly.

“No; I slept, ears and all, for an hour or two, for I was pretty well tired; but when I came to myself a little, I found that there were some men in the room, sitting round a table, drinking and talking; and I thought, before I made much muster, I’d just see what they were up to, especially as I heard them say something about the Quakers. ‘So,’ says one, ‘they are up in the Quaker settlement, no doubt,’ says he. Then I listened with both ears, and I found that they were talking about this very party. So I lay and heard them lay off all their plans. This young man, they said, was to be sent back to Kentucky, to his master, who was going to make an example of him, to keep all niggers from running away; and his wife two of them were going to run down to New Orleans to sell, on their own account, and they calculated to get sixteen or eighteen hundred dollars for her; and the child, they said, was going to a trader, who had bought him; and then there was the boy, Jim, and his mother, they were to go back to their masters in Kentucky. They said that there were two constables, in a town a little piece ahead, who would go in with ’em to get ’em taken up, and the young woman was to be taken before a judge; and one of the fellows, who is small and smooth-spoken, was to swear to her for his property, and get her delivered over to him to take south. They’ve got a right notion of the track we are going tonight; and they’ll be down after us, six or eight strong. So now, what’s to be done?”

The group that stood in various attitudes, after this communication, were worthy of a painter. Rachel Halliday, who had taken her hands out of a batch of biscuit, to hear the news, stood with them upraised and floury, and with a face of the deepest concern. Simeon looked profoundly thoughtful; Eliza had thrown her arms around her husband, and was looking up to him. George stood with clenched hands and glowing eyes, and looking as any other man might look, whose wife was to be sold at auction, and son sent to a trader, all under the shelter of a Christian nation’s laws.

“What shall we do, George?” said Eliza faintly.

“I know what I shall do,” said George, as he stepped into the little room, and began examining pistols.

“Ay, ay,” said Phineas, nodding his head to Simeon; “thou seest, Simeon, how it will work.”

“I see,” said Simeon, sighing; “I pray it come not to that.”

“I don’t want to involve any one with or for me,” said George. “If you will lend me your vehicle and direct me, I will drive alone to the next stand. Jim is a giant in strength, and brave as death and despair, and so am I.”

“Ah, well, friend,” said Phineas, “but thee’ll need a driver, for all that. Thee’s quite welcome to do all the fighting, thee knows; but I know a thing or two about the road, that thee doesn’t.”

“But I don’t want to involve you,” said George.

“Involve,” said Phineas, with a curious and keen expression of face, “When thee does involve me, please to let me know.”

“Phineas is a wise and skilful man,” said Simeon. “Thee does well, George, to abide by his judgment; and,” he added, laying his hand kindly on George’s shoulder, and pointing to the pistols, “be not over hasty with these,—young blood is hot.”

“I will attack no man,” said George. “All I ask of this country is to be let alone, and I will go out peaceably; but,”—he paused, and his brow darkened and his face worked,—“I’ve had a sister sold in that New Orleans market. I know what they are sold for; and am I going to stand by and see them take my wife and sell her, when God has given me a pair of strong arms to defend her? No; God help me! I’ll fight to the last breath, before they shall take my wife and son. Can you blame me?”

“Mortal man cannot blame thee, George. Flesh and blood could not do otherwise,” said Simeon. “Woe unto the world because of offences, but woe unto them through whom the offence cometh.”

“Would not even you, sir, do the same, in my place?”

“I pray that I be not tried,” said Simeon; “the flesh is weak.”

“I think my flesh would be pretty tolerable strong, in such a case,” said Phineas, stretching out a pair of arms like the sails of a windmill. “I an’t sure, friend George, that I shouldn’t hold a fellow for thee, if thee had any accounts to settle with him.”

“If man should ever resist evil,” said Simeon, “then George should feel free to do it now: but the leaders of our people taught a more excellent way; for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God; but it goes sorely against the corrupt will of man, and none can receive it save they to whom it is given. Let us pray the Lord that we be not tempted.”

“And so I do,” said Phineas; “but if we are tempted too much—why, let them look out, that’s all.”

“It’s quite plain thee wasn’t born a Friend,” said Simeon, smiling. “The old nature hath its way in thee pretty strong as yet.”

To tell the truth, Phineas had been a hearty, two-fisted backwoodsman, a vigorous hunter, and a dead shot at a buck; but, having wooed a pretty Quakeress, had been moved by the power of her charms to join the society in his neighborhood; and though he was an honest, sober, and efficient member, and nothing particular could be alleged against him, yet the more spiritual among them could not but discern an exceeding lack of savor in his developments.

“Friend Phineas will ever have ways of his own,” said Rachel Halliday, smiling; “but we all think that his heart is in the right place, after all.”

“Well,” said George, “isn’t it best that we hasten our flight?”

“I got up at four o’clock, and came on with all speed, full two or three hours ahead of them, if they start at the time they planned. It isn’t safe to start till dark, at any rate; for there are some evil persons in the villages ahead, that might be disposed to meddle with us, if they saw our wagon, and that would delay us more than the waiting; but in two hours I think we may venture. I will go over to Michael Cross, and engage him to come behind on his swift nag, and keep a bright lookout on the road, and warn us if any company of men come on. Michael keeps a horse that can soon get ahead of most other horses; and he could shoot ahead and let us know, if there were any danger. I am going out now to warn Jim and the old woman to be in readiness, and to see about the horse. We have a pretty fair start, and stand a good chance to get to the stand before they can come up with us. So, have good courage, friend George; this isn’t the first ugly scrape that I’ve been in with thy people,” said Phineas, as he closed the door.

“Phineas is pretty shrewd,” said Simeon. “He will do the best that can be done for thee, George.”

“All I am sorry for,” said George, “is the risk to you.”

“Thee’ll much oblige us, friend George, to say no more about that. What we do we are conscience bound to do; we can do no other way. And now, mother,” said he, turning to Rachel, “hurry thy preparations for these friends, for we must not send them away fasting.”

And while Rachel and her children were busy making corn-cake, and cooking ham and chicken, and hurrying on the et ceteras of the evening meal, George and his wife sat in their little room, with their arms folded about each other, in such talk as husband and wife have when they know that a few hours may part them forever.

“Eliza,” said George, “people that have friends, and houses, and lands, and money, and all those things can’t love as we do, who have nothing but each other. Till I knew you, Eliza, no creature had loved me, but my poor, heart-broken mother and sister. I saw poor Emily that morning the trader carried her off. She came to the corner where I was lying asleep, and said, ’Poor George, your last friend is going. What will become of you, poor boy?’ And I got up and threw my arms round her, and cried and sobbed, and she cried too; and those were the last kind words I got for ten long years; and my heart all withered up, and felt as dry as ashes, till I met you. And your loving me,—why, it was almost like raising one from the dead! I’ve been a new man ever since! And now, Eliza, I’ll give my last drop of blood, but they shall not take you from me. Whoever gets you must walk over my dead body.”

“O, Lord, have mercy!” said Eliza, sobbing. “If he will only let us get out of this country together, that is all we ask.”

“Is God on their side?” said George, speaking less to his wife than pouring out his own bitter thoughts. “Does he see all they do? Why does he let such things happen? And they tell us that the Bible is on their side; certainly all the power is. They are rich, and healthy, and happy; they are members of churches, expecting to go to heaven; and they get along so easy in the world, and have it all their own way; and poor, honest, faithful Christians,—Christians as good or better than they,—are lying in the very dust under their feet. They buy ’em and sell ’em, and make trade of their heart’s blood, and groans and tears,—and God lets them.”

“Friend George,” said Simeon, from the kitchen, “listen to this Psalm; it may do thee good.”

George drew his seat near the door, and Eliza, wiping her tears, came forward also to listen, while Simeon read as follows:

“But as for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had well-nigh slipped. For I was envious of the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. They are not in trouble like other men, neither are they plagued like other men. Therefore, pride compasseth them as a chain; violence covereth them as a garment. Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have more than heart could wish. They are corrupt, and speak wickedly concerning oppression; they speak loftily. Therefore his people return, and the waters of a full cup are wrung out to them, and they say, How doth God know? and is there knowledge in the Most High?”

“Is not that the way thee feels, George?”

“It is so indeed,” said George,—“as well as I could have written it myself.”

“Then, hear,” said Simeon: “When I thought to know this, it was too painful for me until I went unto the sanctuary of God. Then understood I their end. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places, thou castedst them down to destruction. As a dream when one awaketh, so, oh Lord, when thou awakest, thou shalt despise their image. Nevertheless I am continually with thee; thou hast holden me by my right hand. Thou shalt guide me by thy counsel, and afterwards receive me to glory. It is good for me to draw near unto God. I have put my trust in the Lord God.”^[1]

[1] Ps. 73, “The End of the Wicked contrasted with that of the Righteous.”

The words of holy trust, breathed by the friendly old man, stole like sacred music over the harassed and chafed spirit of George; and after he ceased, he sat with a gentle and subdued expression on his fine features.

“If this world were all, George,” said Simeon, “thee might, indeed, ask where is the Lord? But it is often those who have least of all in this life whom he chooseth for the kingdom. Put thy trust in him and, no matter what befalls thee here, he will make all right hereafter.”

If these words had been spoken by some easy, self-indulgent exhorter, from whose mouth they might have come merely as pious and rhetorical flourish, proper to be used to people in distress, perhaps they might not have had much effect; but coming from one who daily and calmly risked fine and imprisonment for the cause of God and man, they had a weight that could not but be felt, and both the poor, desolate fugitives found calmness and strength breathing into them from it.

And now Rachel took Eliza’s hand kindly, and led the way to the supper-table. As they were sitting down, a light tap sounded at the door, and Ruth entered.

“I just ran in,” she said, “with these little stockings for the boy,—three pair, nice, warm woollen ones. It will be so cold, thee knows, in Canada. Does thee keep up good courage, Eliza?” she added, tripping round to Eliza’s side of the table, and shaking her warmly by the hand, and slipping a seed-cake into Harry’s hand. “I brought a little parcel of these for him,” she said, tugging at her pocket to get out the package. “Children, thee knows, will always be eating.”

“O, thank you; you are too kind,” said Eliza.

“Come, Ruth, sit down to supper,” said Rachel.

“I couldn’t, any way. I left John with the baby, and some biscuits in the oven; and I can’t stay a moment, else John will burn up all the biscuits, and give the baby all the sugar in the bowl. That’s the way he does,” said the little Quakeress, laughing. “So, good-by, Eliza; good-by, George; the Lord grant thee a safe journey;” and, with a few tripping steps, Ruth was out of the apartment.

A little while after supper, a large covered-wagon drew up before the door; the night was clear starlight; and Phineas jumped briskly down from his seat to arrange his passengers. George walked out of the door, with his child on one arm and his wife on the other. His step was firm, his face settled and resolute. Rachel and Simeon came out after them.

“You get out, a moment,” said Phineas to those inside, “and let me fix the back of the wagon, there, for the women-folks and the boy.”

“Here are the two buffaloes,” said Rachel. “Make the seats as comfortable as may be; it’s hard riding all night.”

Jim came out first, and carefully assisted out his old mother, who clung to his arm, and looked anxiously about, as if she expected the pursuer every moment.

“Jim, are your pistols all in order?” said George, in a low, firm voice.

“Yes, indeed,” said Jim.

“And you’ve no doubt what you shall do, if they come?”

“I rather think I haven’t,” said Jim, throwing open his broad chest, and taking a deep breath. “Do you think I’ll let them get mother again?”

During this brief colloquy, Eliza had been taking her leave of her kind friend, Rachel, and was handed into the carriage by Simeon, and, creeping into the back part with her boy, sat down among the buffalo-skins. The old woman was next handed in and seated and George and Jim placed on a rough board seat front of them, and Phineas mounted in front.

“Farewell, my friends,” said Simeon, from without.

“God bless you!” answered all from within.

And the wagon drove off, rattling and jolting over the frozen road.

There was no opportunity for conversation, on account of the roughness of the way and the noise of the wheels. The vehicle, therefore, rumbled on, through long, dark stretches of woodland,—over wide dreary plains,—up hills, and down valleys,—and on, on, on they jogged, hour after hour. The child soon fell asleep, and lay heavily in his mother’s lap. The poor, frightened old woman at last forgot her fears; and, even Eliza, as the night waned, found all her anxieties insufficient to keep her eyes from closing. Phineas seemed, on the whole, the briskest of the company, and beguiled his long drive with whistling certain very unquaker-like songs, as he went on.

But about three o’clock George’s ear caught the hasty and decided click of a horse’s hoof coming behind them at some distance and jogged Phineas by the elbow. Phineas pulled up his horses, and listened.

“That must be Michael,” he said; “I think I know the sound of his gallop;” and he rose up and stretched his head anxiously back over the road.

A man riding in hot haste was now dimly descried at the top of a distant hill.

“There he is, I do believe!” said Phineas. George and Jim both sprang out of the wagon before they knew what they were doing. All stood intensely silent, with their faces turned towards the expected messenger. On he came. Now he went down into a valley, where they could not see him; but they heard the sharp, hasty tramp, rising nearer and nearer; at last they saw him emerge on the top of an eminence, within hail.

“Yes, that’s Michael!” said Phineas; and, raising his voice, “Halloa, there, Michael!”

“Phineas! is that thee?”

“Yes; what news—they coming?”

“Right on behind, eight or ten of them, hot with brandy, swearing and foaming like so many wolves.”

And, just as he spoke, a breeze brought the faint sound of galloping horsemen towards them.

“In with you,—quick, boys, in!” said Phineas. “If you must fight, wait till I get you a piece ahead.” And, with the word, both jumped in, and Phineas lashed the horses to a run, the horseman keeping close beside them. The wagon rattled, jumped, almost flew, over the frozen ground; but plainer, and still plainer, came the noise of pursuing horsemen behind. The women heard it, and, looking anxiously out, saw, far in the rear, on the brow of a distant hill, a party of men looming up against the red-streaked sky of early dawn. Another hill, and their pursuers had evidently caught sight of their wagon, whose white cloth-covered top made it conspicuous at some distance, and a loud yell of brutal triumph came forward on the wind. Eliza sickened, and strained her child closer to her bosom; the old woman prayed and groaned, and George and Jim clenched their pistols with the grasp of despair. The pursuers gained on them fast; the carriage made a sudden turn, and brought them near a ledge of a steep overhanging rock, that rose in an isolated ridge or clump in a large lot, which was, all around it, quite clear and smooth. This isolated pile, or range of rocks, rose up black and heavy against the brightening sky, and seemed to promise shelter and concealment. It was a place well known to Phineas, who had been familiar with the spot in his hunting days; and it was to gain this point he had been racing his horses.

“Now for it!” said he, suddenly checking his horses, and springing from his seat to the ground. “Out with you, in a twinkling, every one, and up into these rocks with me. Michael, thee tie thy horse to the wagon, and drive ahead to Amariah’s and get him and his boys to come back and talk to these fellows.”

In a twinkling they were all out of the carriage.

“There,” said Phineas, catching up Harry, “you, each of you, see to the women; and run, now if you ever did run!”

They needed no exhortation. Quicker than we can say it, the whole party were over the fence, making with all speed for the rocks, while Michael, throwing himself from his horse, and fastening the bridle to the wagon, began driving it rapidly away.

“Come ahead,” said Phineas, as they reached the rocks, and saw in the mingled starlight and dawn, the traces of a rude but plainly marked foot-path leading up among them; “this is one of our old hunting-dens. Come up!”

Phineas went before, springing up the rocks like a goat, with the boy in his arms. Jim came second, bearing his trembling old mother over his shoulder, and George and Eliza brought up the rear. The party of horsemen came up to the fence, and, with mingled shouts and oaths, were dismounting, to prepare to follow them. A few moments’ scrambling brought them to the top of the ledge; the path then passed between a narrow defile, where only one could walk at a time, till suddenly they came to a rift or chasm more than a yard in breadth, and beyond which lay a pile of rocks, separate from the rest of the ledge, standing full thirty feet high, with its sides steep and perpendicular as those of a castle. Phineas easily leaped the chasm, and sat down the boy on a smooth, flat platform of crisp white moss, that covered the top of the rock.

“Over with you!” he called; “spring, now, once, for your lives!” said he, as one after another sprang across. Several fragments of loose stone formed a kind of breast-work, which sheltered their position from the observation of those below.

“Well, here we all are,” said Phineas, peeping over the stone breast-work to watch the assailants, who were coming tumultuously up under the rocks. “Let ’em get us, if they can. Whoever comes here has to walk single file between those two rocks, in fair range of your pistols, boys, d’ye see?”

“I do see,” said George! “and now, as this matter is ours, let us take all the risk, and do all the fighting.”

“Thee’s quite welcome to do the fighting, George,” said Phineas, chewing some checkerberry-leaves as he spoke; “but I may have the fun of looking on, I suppose. But see, these fellows are kinder debating down there, and looking up, like hens when they are going to fly up on to the roost. Hadn’t thee better give ’em a word of advice, before they come up, just to tell ’em handsomely they’ll be shot if they do?”

The party beneath, now more apparent in the light of the dawn, consisted of our old acquaintances, Tom Loker and Marks, with two constables, and a posse consisting of such rowdies at the last tavern as could be engaged by a little brandy to go and help the fun of trapping a set of niggers.

“Well, Tom, yer coons are farly treed,” said one.

“Yes, I see ’em go up right here,” said Tom; “and here’s a path. I’m for going right up. They can’t jump down in a hurry, and it won’t take long to ferret ’em out.”

“But, Tom, they might fire at us from behind the rocks,” said Marks. “That would be ugly, you know.”

“Ugh!” said Tom, with a sneer. “Always for saving your skin, Marks! No danger! niggers are too plaguy scared!”

“I don’t know why I shouldn’t save my skin,” said Marks. “It’s the best I’ve got; and niggers do fight like the devil, sometimes.”

At this moment, George appeared on the top of a rock above them, and, speaking in a calm, clear voice, said,

“Gentlemen, who are you, down there, and what do you want?”

“We want a party of runaway niggers,” said Tom Loker. “One George Harris, and Eliza Harris, and their son, and Jim Selden, and an old woman. We’ve got the officers, here, and a warrant to take ’em; and we’re going to have ’em, too. D’ye hear? An’t you George Harris, that belongs to Mr. Harris, of Shelby county, Kentucky?”

“I am George Harris. A Mr. Harris, of Kentucky, did call me his property. But now I’m a free man, standing on God’s free soil; and my wife and my child I claim as mine. Jim and his mother are here. We have arms to defend ourselves, and we mean to do it. You can come up, if you like; but the first one of you that comes within the range of our bullets is a dead man, and the next, and the next; and so on till the last.”

“O, come! come!” said a short, puffy man, stepping forward, and blowing his nose as he did so. “Young man, this an’t no kind of talk at all for you. You see, we’re officers of justice. We’ve got the law on our side, and the power, and so forth; so you’d better give up peaceably, you see; for you’ll certainly have to give up, at last.”

“I know very well that you’ve got the law on your side, and the power,” said George, bitterly. “You mean to take my wife to sell in New Orleans, and put my boy like a calf in a trader’s pen, and send Jim’s old mother to the brute that whipped and abused her before, because he couldn’t abuse her son. You want to send Jim and me back to be whipped and tortured, and ground down under the heels of them that you call masters; and your laws will bear you out in it,—more shame for you and them! But you haven’t got us. We don’t own your laws; we don’t own your country; we stand here as free, under God’s sky, as you are; and, by the great God that made us, we’ll fight for our liberty till we die.”

George stood out in fair sight, on the top of the rock, as he made his declaration of independence; the glow of dawn gave a flush to his swarthy cheek, and bitter indignation and despair gave fire to his dark eye; and, as if appealing from man to the justice of God, he raised his hand to heaven as he spoke.

If it had been only a Hungarian youth, now bravely defending in some mountain fastness the retreat of fugitives escaping from Austria into America, this would have been sublime heroism; but as it was a youth of African descent, defending the retreat of fugitives through America into Canada, of course we are too well instructed and patriotic to see any heroism in it; and if any of our readers do, they must do it on their own private responsibility. When despairing Hungarian fugitives make their way, against all the search-warrants and authorities of their lawful government, to America, press and political cabinet ring with applause and welcome. When despairing African fugitives do the same thing,—it is—what is it?

Be it as it may, it is certain that the attitude, eye, voice, manner, of the speaker for a moment struck the party below to silence. There is something in boldness and determination that for a time hushes even the rudest nature. Marks was the only one who remained wholly untouched. He was deliberately cocking his pistol, and, in the momentary silence that followed George’s speech, he fired at him.

THE FREEMAN’S DEFENCE.

“Ye see ye get jist as much for him dead as alive in Kentucky,” he said coolly, as he wiped his pistol on his coat-sleeve.

George sprang backward,—Eliza uttered a shriek,—the ball had passed close to his hair, had nearly grazed the cheek of his wife, and struck in the tree above.

“It’s nothing, Eliza,” said George, quickly.

“Thee’d better keep out of sight, with thy speechifying,” said Phineas; “they’re mean scamps.”

“Now, Jim,” said George, “look that your pistols are all right, and watch that pass with me. The first man that shows himself I fire at; you take the second, and so on. It won’t do, you know, to waste two shots on one.”

“But what if you don’t hit?”

“I shall hit,” said George, coolly.

“Good! now, there’s stuff in that fellow,” muttered Phineas, between his teeth.

The party below, after Marks had fired, stood, for a moment, rather undecided.

“I think you must have hit some on ’em,” said one of the men. “I heard a squeal!”

“I’m going right up for one,” said Tom. “I never was afraid of niggers, and I an’t going to be now. Who goes after?” he said, springing up the rocks.

George heard the words distinctly. He drew up his pistol, examined it, pointed it towards that point in the defile where the first man would appear.

One of the most courageous of the party followed Tom, and, the way being thus made, the whole party began pushing up the rock,—the hindermost pushing the front ones faster than they would have gone of themselves. On they came, and in a moment the burly form of Tom appeared in sight, almost at the verge of the chasm.

George fired,—the shot entered his side,—but, though wounded, he would not retreat, but, with a yell like that of a mad bull, he was leaping right across the chasm into the party.

“Friend,” said Phineas, suddenly stepping to the front, and meeting him with a push from his long arms, “thee isn’t wanted here.”

Down he fell into the chasm, crackling down among trees, bushes, logs, loose stones, till he lay bruised and groaning thirty feet below. The fall might have killed him, had it not been broken and moderated by his clothes catching in the branches of a large tree; but he came down with some force, however,—more than was at all agreeable or convenient.

“Lord help us, they are perfect devils!” said Marks, heading the retreat down the rocks with much more of a will than he had joined the ascent, while all the party came tumbling precipitately after him,—the fat constable, in particular, blowing and puffing in a very energetic manner.

“I say, fellers,” said Marks, “you jist go round and pick up Tom, there, while I run and get on to my horse to go back for help,—that’s you;” and, without minding the hootings and jeers of his company, Marks was as good as his word, and was soon seen galloping away.

“Was ever such a sneaking varmint?” said one of the men; “to come on his business, and he clear out and leave us this yer way!”

“Well, we must pick up that feller,” said another. “Cuss me if I much care whether he is dead or alive.”

The men, led by the groans of Tom, scrambled and crackled through stumps, logs and bushes, to where that hero lay groaning and swearing with alternate vehemence.

“Ye keep it agoing pretty loud, Tom,” said one. “Ye much hurt?”

“Don’t know. Get me up, can’t ye? Blast that infernal Quaker! If it hadn’t been for him, I’d a pitched some on ’em down here, to see how they liked it.”

With much labor and groaning, the fallen hero was assisted to rise; and, with one holding him up under each shoulder, they got him as far as the horses.

“If you could only get me a mile back to that ar tavern. Give me a handkerchief or something, to stuff into this place, and stop this infernal bleeding.”

George looked over the rocks, and saw them trying to lift the burly form of Tom into the saddle. After two or three ineffectual attempts, he reeled, and fell heavily to the ground.

“O, I hope he isn’t killed!” said Eliza, who, with all the party, stood watching the proceeding.

“Why not?” said Phineas; “serves him right.”

“Because after death comes the judgment,” said Eliza.

“Yes,” said the old woman, who had been groaning and praying, in her Methodist fashion, during all the encounter, “it’s an awful case for the poor crittur’s soul.”

“On my word, they’re leaving him, I do believe,” said Phineas.

It was true; for after some appearance of irresolution and consultation, the whole party got on their horses and rode away. When they were quite out of sight, Phineas began to bestir himself.

“Well, we must go down and walk a piece,” he said. “I told Michael to go forward and bring help, and be along back here with the wagon; but we shall have to walk a piece along the road, I reckon, to meet them. The Lord grant he be along soon! It’s early in the day; there won’t be much travel afoot yet a while; we an’t much more than two miles from our stopping-place. If the road hadn’t been so rough last night, we could have outrun ’em entirely.”

As the party neared the fence, they discovered in the distance, along the road, their own wagon coming back, accompanied by some men on horseback.

“Well, now, there’s Michael, and Stephen and Amariah,” exclaimed Phineas, joyfully. “Now we are made—as safe as if we’d got there.”

“Well, do stop, then,” said Eliza, “and do something for that poor man; he’s groaning dreadfully.”

“It would be no more than Christian,” said George; “let’s take him up and carry him on.”

“And doctor him up among the Quakers!” said Phineas; “pretty well, that! Well, I don’t care if we do. Here, let’s have a look at him;” and Phineas, who in the course of his hunting and backwoods life had acquired some rude experience of surgery, kneeled down by the wounded man, and began a careful examination of his condition.

“Marks,” said Tom, feebly, “is that you, Marks?”

“No; I reckon ’tan’t friend,” said Phineas. “Much Marks cares for thee, if his own skin’s safe. He’s off, long ago.”

“I believe I’m done for,” said Tom. “The cussed sneaking dog, to leave me to die alone! My poor old mother always told me ’t would be so.”

“La sakes! jist hear the poor crittur. He’s got a mammy, now,” said the old negress. “I can’t help kinder pityin’ on him.”

“Softly, softly; don’t thee snap and snarl, friend,” said Phineas, as Tom winced and pushed his hand away. “Thee has no chance, unless I stop the bleeding.” And Phineas busied himself with making some off-hand surgical arrangements with his own pocket-handkerchief, and such as could be mustered in the company.

“You pushed me down there,” said Tom, faintly.

“Well if I hadn’t thee would have pushed us down, thee sees,” said Phineas, as he stooped to apply his bandage. “There, there,—let me fix this bandage. We mean well to thee; we bear no malice. Thee shall be taken to a house where they’ll nurse thee first rate, well as thy own mother could.”

Tom groaned, and shut his eyes. In men of his class, vigor and resolution are entirely a physical matter, and ooze out with the flowing of the blood; and the gigantic fellow really looked piteous in his helplessness.

The other party now came up. The seats were taken out of the wagon. The buffalo-skins, doubled in fours, were spread all along one side, and four men, with great difficulty, lifted the heavy form of Tom into it. Before he was gotten in, he fainted entirely. The old negress, in the abundance of her compassion, sat down on the bottom, and took his head in her lap. Eliza, George and Jim, bestowed themselves, as well as they could, in the remaining space and the whole party set forward.

“What do you think of him?” said George, who sat by Phineas in front.

“Well it’s only a pretty deep flesh-wound; but, then, tumbling and scratching down that place didn’t help him much. It has bled pretty freely,—pretty much drained him out, courage and all,—but he’ll get over it, and may be learn a thing or two by it.”

“I’m glad to hear you say so,” said George. “It would always be a heavy thought to me, if I’d caused his death, even in a just cause.”

“Yes,” said Phineas, “killing is an ugly operation, any way they’ll fix it,—man or beast. I’ve seen a buck that was shot down and a dying, look that way on a feller with his eye, that it reely most made a feller feel wicked for killing on him; and human creatures is a more serious consideration yet, bein’, as thy wife says, that the judgment comes to ’em after death. So I don’t know as our people’s notions on these matters is too strict; and, considerin’ how I was raised, I fell in with them pretty considerably.”

“What shall you do with this poor fellow?” said George.

“O, carry him along to Amariah’s. There’s old Grandmam Stephens there,—Dorcas, they call her,—she’s most an amazin’ nurse. She takes to nursing real natural, and an’t never better suited than when she gets a sick body to tend. We may reckon on turning him over to her for a fortnight or so.”

A ride of about an hour more brought the party to a neat farmhouse, where the weary travellers were received to an abundant breakfast. Tom Loker was soon carefully deposited in a much cleaner and softer bed than he had ever been in the habit of occupying. His wound was carefully dressed and bandaged, and he lay languidly opening and shutting his eyes on the white window-curtains and gently-gliding figures of his sick room, like a weary child. And here, for the present, we shall take our leave of one party.