Other-Day took part in this deliberation. He arose and addressed the council, warning them against the consequences of the attack they were meditating. They might succeed in killing a few whites, he told them, but extermination or expulsion would be their fate if they did. But his pacific arguments produced no effect. Toward evening, the Yanktons, Sissetons, and a few of the Wahpetons rose from the council, and moved toward the houses of the whites, to prepare for the attack. All the afternoon the Indians had been busy taking their guns to the blacksmith shop to have them repaired, which the unsuspecting smith, being told they were going on a buffalo hunt, had done.

Other-Day now left the council, took his wife and his gun, and went to warn the whites of the impending danger. They had, up to this time, known nothing whatever of the council. At his suggestion, sixty-two persons assembled in one of the Agency buildings, gathered their arms, and prepared to defend themselves. Part of the farmer Indians assisted Other-Day in standing guard round the house that night, part of them guarded the house of Rev. Mr. Riggs, their old missionary, to whom they were very much attached, and another part joined the insurgents.

Small bands of hostile Indians were seen prowling around the house during the night, and by the next morning it was nearly surrounded. At daybreak, several shots were fired near the warehouses, some distance away, and then a triumphant yell was heard from the Indians as they broke into the stores and killed the inmates. At this, the savages who had prowled around the house during the night ran off to the scene of the riot to share in the booty; and even the farmer Indians who had stood guard for the whites, excepting only Other-Day, followed them.

Other-Day now advised the whites to make their escape, and offered to pilot them out of danger. They were at first inclined to doubt his faithfulness; but in their extremity, finally consented to follow him. While the hostile Indians were occupied in the work of plundering the stores and warehouses, the whites managed to collect three two-horse wagons, and two buggies, and placing as many of the women and children as they could in these, the party, sixty-two persons in all, started off in a direction opposite to the usually travelled route. They reached and forded the Minnesota River, eluded pursuit, and after a three days' march of great severity and privation, under the faithful and successful guidance of Other-Day, they arrived at a place of safety. True among the treacherous, he should be gratefully remembered, and liberally rewarded and protected for the remainder of his life, by the people of Minnesota and the Government of the United States. When he reached St. Paul, after the escape, he wrote the following, in answer to the many questions asked him:

"I am a Dakota Indian, born and reared in the midst of evil. I grew up without the knowledge of any good thing. I have been instructed by Americans, and taught to read and write. This I found to be good. I became acquainted with the Sacred Writings, and there learned my vileness. At the present time, I have fallen into great evil and affliction, but have escaped from it; and with fifty-four men, women, and children, without moccasins, without food, and without a blanket, I have arrived in the midst of a great people, and now my heart is glad. I attribute it to the mercy of the Great Spirit.

An-pe-tu-to-ke-ca. (Other-Day.)"



Another party of about forty persons escaped from the vicinity of Yellow Medicine, under the guidance of the missionary, Rev. Mr. Riggs, who was also warned and aided by a few of the farmer Indians.

Having thus successfully attacked and destroyed the Lower Agency, at Redwood, and the Upper Agency, at Yellow Medicine, and having obtained large supplies of arms and ammunition from the stores and warehouses they sacked at these points, part of the Indians divided into small marauding bands, and scoured the country, attacking and murdering isolated settlers, burning houses, and stealing horses and cattle; but the larger portion remained together, and, under the leadership of Little Crow, planned further attacks.

Fifteen miles below the Lower Agency, on the north bank of the Minnesota, is Fort Ridgely; and twenty miles below the fort, on the southern bank of the river, is the town of New Ulm, which, as its name indicates, is mainly populated by German settlers. Early in the afternoon of Tuesday, August 19th, a party of citizens from New Ulm, returning from a neighboring village, where they had gone to aid in recruiting volunteers for the Union army, were fired upon from an ambush by a number of mounted Indians, and several of them killed. Those who escaped had barely time to get back to New Ulm and give the alarm before the Indians advanced upon the town, and began firing at long range upon the distressed and panic-stricken inhabitants, who were huddled together, in helpless confusion, in a few of the more protected houses. Fortunately, a squad of eighteen armed men from one of the lower counties had arrived there an hour or two previous. Only six of the number had good guns; but they immediately organized themselves, and went forward to meet the savages. By dint of determined coolness and bravery, they held the Indians at bay, killing several of them, until, seeing the town reenforced by another small party of mounted whites, the savages retreated. The fight lasted two or three hours, and a number of the Germans were killed.

Beaten back from New Ulm, the Indians retraced their course up the river, and being joined by other bands, a concerted and deliberate attack was next made on Fort Ridgely. Like too many of our frontier forts, it is a fort only in name. Situated on a projecting spur of the river bluff, it is almost completely encircled by deep and wooded ravines, the edges of which are within a stone's throw of the buildings. A long, two story stone building with an ell, standing in the centre, and a number of log and frame houses ranged around it in an irregular circle, with several barns and outhouses beyond them, constitute what is called the fort, but what is really only barracks for a small number of troops.

When on Monday Captain Marsh left the fort to quell the disturbances at the Agency, only about twenty-five soldiers remained to protect it. After his party was cut up in ambush, only twenty-one, wounded and all, returned. Luckily, however, on Tuesday, two detachments of reenforcements, of about fifty men each, reached the garrison in safety. On the other hand, from the beginning of the outbreak, the women and children of the surrounding country who had escaped massacre, sometimes a whole family, sometimes only a single member—now a mother, and then a child—fresh from the scenes of savage violence and blood, had been fleeing to the fort for safety, until the number had been swelled to some three hundred. Six cannon, a few old condemned muskets, and considerable supplies of provisions were fortunately in the fort. Such hurried preparations for defence as could be, were soon made. Small squads of Indians were seen prowling about during Monday and Tuesday, but they were promptly scattered by a shell from the howitzer, accurately planted by the veteran artillery sergeant who was in charge of the guns.

At a quarter past three o'clock on Wednesday afternoon, about three or four hundred Indians, led by Little Crow, advanced under cover of the woods and ravines to the attack of the garrison. It was a complete surprise, the first announcement being a deadly volley through one of the north entrances into the parade ground of the fort. For a moment there was uncontrollable confusion and alarm among the whites, and had a storming assault immediately followed, the fort must have fallen. The garrison, however, quickly rallied, manned the guns, and poured a steady fire on their assailants. The Indians, as usual, took shelter behind every available cover—trees, ravines, outhouses, high grass and logs—the whites directing their return shots as best they could. In this way, a brisk fusilade was kept up until half-past six o'clock in the evening. A number of the outbuildings were fired by the enemy, but the flames did not reach the fort. The houses that remained nearer the fort were destroyed by the garrison after the enemy withdrew. The garrison lost twelve or fifteen men killed and wounded in this engagement.

A night of terrible anxiety and suspense succeeded, but there was no further disturbance. On the next day, Thursday, two more attacks, each lasting about half an hour, were made, one at nine o'clock in the morning, and the other at six in the evening, but they were much feebler than the previous one, and easily repulsed.

The final and most desperate attack occurred on Friday, the twenty-second. The garrison was engaged in strengthening its defences, when, at one o'clock in the afternoon, the sentinel saw at two miles distance great numbers of Indians approaching on horseback. As they neared the fort they dismounted, and advancing from three different points under cover of the ravines, where the shells from the field pieces could do them but little damage, they opened a terrible fire on the garrison. But the previous two days' siege had steadied the nerves of the whites, and they received the onslaught coolly, reserving their fire until they could obtain a fair view of the enemy, and do effective execution. The "big guns," of which Indians stand in so great dread, were also well served. The fight raged all the afternoon, from two until half past six o'clock. Once the savages pressed up so near that the halfbreeds in the fort could distinguish the shout of the chiefs ordering a charge for the purpose of capturing the guns. It was a concerted movement; a feint to draw the fire of the field pieces, and an immediate rush was made to secure them before they could be reloaded. But the old artillery sergeant was not to be trapped; he reserved the fire of his own gun, and when the storming party emerged into open view, he planted a shell among them which sent them howling back to their shelter. At nightfall the savages reluctantly gave up the siege and retired, carrying away a considerable number of killed and wounded. Those in the fort escaped miraculously; only one man being killed, and three or four slightly wounded.

The next morning, Saturday, the Indians were seen again approaching the fort, apparently to renew the attack; but it was soon discovered they were withdrawing, to wreak their thwarted vengeance on the devoted town of New Ulm. In the interim since the first attack, the town had been reenforced by about one hundred volunteers, and had also been put in a partial state of defence. Fire, murder, and pillage marked the way of the savages toward it; the garrison noted their approach by the clouds of smoke which the burning dwellings of the settlers sent up to heaven.

The Indians reached and again attacked New Ulm, on Sunday morning at about eleven o'clock. The commanding officer of the whites had placed pickets, and a considerable part of his force to support them, along the outer edge of the town toward the foe; but so fierce and impetuous was the attack, that the whites were forced back into the town at the first onset of the enemy, giving them possession of several of the outer buildings, from which they pushed their further operations. But the garrison soon rallied, and obstinately held their ground. Finding themselves so unexpectedly held at bay, the Indians, who were to the windward, set fire one after another to the buildings they held, thus literally burning their way into the town. All day long this continued. Toward evening, the whites found they had been forced back, inch by inch, by the fire and smoke and the swift leaden messengers of death, until nearly one half of the town was lost; but they rallied once more, made a vigorous charge on the foe, and drove them out. At this the Indians withdrew, forming themselves into three parties, and camped a short distance off, making the night hideous with fiendish yells and the horrid music of their war dances. During the night the garrison retreated into a still smaller and more defensible part of the town, committing the rest to flames. A brief demonstration was made by the enemy on the following morning, but finding the whites so well posted, they finally abandoned the contest and withdrew. The whites, exhausted and cut up, joyfully welcomed a cessation of hostilities. During the day they evacuated the town, bringing off what remained of the garrison in safety. In this battle they lost ten killed, and about fifty wounded, while the Indians lost about forty. They were seen to haul off four wagon loads of dead.

The events thus far narrated cover a period of nine days, and, though forming the principal ones, were by no means the only events of that brief time. The contagion of murder, arson, and rapine spread over the whole area of country on which the Indians lived and roved, embracing a district one hundred miles in width by two hundred in length. Fort Abercrombie, situated at the upper end of this vast tract, was surrounded and besieged, as Fort Ridgely at the lower end had been. Throughout the intermediate region, scattering parties of the savages appeared in the isolated villages and settlements, spreading death and desolation. Local conditions exaggerated and heightened the horrors of the insurrection. The population of Minnesota, and particularly of these exposed regions, unlike that of the lower Western States, whose settlers, trained in border warfare, were familiar with savage craft and cruelty, and inherited the prowess and spirit of daring adventure which possessed Daniel Boone, was largely made up of foreign emigrants, Germans, French, Norwegians, and Swedes. They were unaccustomed to danger, and unused to arms. They had lived for years in confidence and daily intercourse with the Indians. Engaged in the absorbing labor of building and providing their new homes, they were without guns or other weapons of defence. Still worse, the war for the Union had called into its ranks a large proportion of their young, active, and able-bodied men, and left only the women and children to gather the harvest and guard the hearthstone. Upon their heads this storm burst suddenly, and with a terror which deprived them of all courage and resource to resist it. Emboldened by the feeble opposition they met, and maddened by the carnival of blood in which they rioted, the savages indulged in cruelties and barbarities too horrible to recount in detail. The Governor of Minnesota, in a special message to the Legislature of the State, thus paints them:

'Infants hewn into bloody chips of flesh, or nailed alive to door posts to linger out their little life in mortal agony, or torn untimely from the womb of the murdered mother, and in cruel mockery cast in fragments on her pulseless and bleeding breast; rape joined to murder in one awful tragedy; young girls, even children of tender years, outraged by their brutal ravishers, till death ended their shame and suffering; women held in captivity to undergo the horrors of a living death; whole families burned alive; and as if their devilish fury could not glut itself with outrages on the living, its last efforts exhausted in mutilating the bodies of the dead; such are the spectacles, and a thousand nameless horrors besides, which their first experience of Indian war has burned into the brains and hearts of our frontier people.'....

A wild panic ensued. Those who escaped the tomahawk and scalping knife fled in consternation and dismay, abandoning their little earthly all, leaving their cattle astray on the prairies, and their crops uncut and ungathered in the fields; some fleeing with such precipitation as to leave their food untouched on the table, where but a moment before it had been spread for the daily repast. Women and children wandered for days in the woods, subsisting on nuts and berries. Every road was lined with fugitives, and all the villages were crowded with their surrounding population. The refugees poured by hundreds into the city of St. Paul, situated from eighty to one hundred and fifty miles from the scenes of the outbreak; and many, who were able to do so, embarked on the first departing steamers, and hurried away from the State. It is estimated that ten large and flourishing counties were almost completely depopulated.

It so happened that a portion of the volunteers recruited for the Union army had not yet been ordered out of the State. Though poorly equipped and supplied, they were at once sent into the field against the Indians, and they served as a nucleus around which the irregular organizations could rally. Every old gun, pistol, knife, or other weapon was cleaned up; every pound of powder and lead was bought and distributed; and horses were impressed by military authority, with which to extemporize cavalry companies. The surrounding States promptly sent what aid they could in men, guns, and cartridges. The Governor by proclamation authorized the formation of companies of scouts and rangers in the threatened neighborhoods. Very soon after the outbreak, Colonel H. H. Sibley, an experienced frontiersman, having a thorough knowledge of Indian habits and character, was on the march against them, with about one thousand men. The General Government augmented these forces as rapidly as possible, and sent Major-General Pope to assume command of the Indian Department.

Hearing of Colonel Sibley's approach, Little Crow retreated to Yellow Medicine, taking with him a large baggage train of plunder, and about one hundred white prisoners, chiefly women and children, whom he had captured at different places, and whom, with a few exceptions, they did not specially maltreat, but compelled to labor at camp drudgery.

Colonel Sibley pushed on with his forces, sending in advance a cavalry detachment, which reached and relieved Fort Ridgely on the 27th of August, after it had been besieged for nine days. He himself arrived at that post with the remainder of his troops on the following day. On the 31st, he sent out a detachment of two companies, one mounted, a fatigue party of twenty men, and seventeen teams and teamsters, to reconnoitre the neighboring settlements and to bury the dead. They proceeded to the Minnesota river opposite the Lower Agency, and found and buried sixteen corpses the first day. The next day they continued their search, finding and burying fifty-four. That night they encamped on the open prairie, near the upper timber of the Birch Coolie creek, three miles from the Lower Agency. At about four o'clock of the next morning, September 2, one of their sentinels shouted, "Indians!" and almost immediately, a shower of balls rained upon the camp. From this first fire, and during the confusion attending it, the detachment suffered severely. They soon, however, gained the shelter of their wagons, and from behind them and the piles of dead horses which literally covered the ground, they returned a vigorous fire upon their assailants, meanwhile digging a rifle pit as they fought. It was a fierce morning's battle, and the foe, in largely superior numbers, had nearly surrounded and captured them when reenforcements arrived. So hot was the attack, that one of the tents was found to have one hundred and forty bullet holes through it.

The boldness and severity of this attack, demonstrated to Colonel Sibley the necessity for an increase of force and very cautious movements, and accordingly he fell back to the neighborhood of Fort Ridgely. Anxious also to obtain the release of the white prisoners in Little Crow's camp, and fearing that if he won a decided success in battle they would be murdered, he determined to resort to negotiation. He therefore wrote the following note and left it fastened to a stake, on the ground where the last battle had taken place:

'If Little Crow has any propositions to make to me, let him send a halfbreed to me, and he shall be protected in and out of my camp.

H. H. SIBLEY, Col. Com. Military Expedition.'



A day or two afterward, two halfbreeds came into his camp under a flag of truce, bringing a note signed 'Little Crow, his mark,' excusing and justifying his attack on the whites. Colonel Sibley replied, 'Little Crow, you have murdered many of our people without cause. Return me the prisoners under a flag of truce, and I will talk with you like a man.' After the lapse of a few days, another message came from Little Crow, stating that he had one hundred and fifty-five prisoners, and asking what he could do to make peace. Colonel Sibley replied that his young men had been committing more murders, and that was not the way to make peace.

Having learned from several sources that serious dissensions had broken out in the Indian camp, and having also received the needed reenforcements, Colonel Sibley left Fort Ridgely on the 12th of September, and marched up the Minnesota river to Wood Lake, near Yellow Medicine, arriving there on the 22d following. Little Crow was encamped in the vicinity with his braves. The savages, however, had become demoralized, and he could no longer control them. Little Crow desired to make an attack that night, but his opponents told him in council that if he was a brave Indian he would fight the white man by daylight. Accordingly, next morning he attacked Colonel Sibley's forces with three hundred of his warriors, the others refusing to join in the fight. After a sharp two-hours' battle the Indians were completely routed, losing thirty killed, and a proportionate number of wounded. The whites lost four killed, and forty wounded.

This battle substantially ended the war. The Indians retreated, and the whites pursued them to Lac Qui Parle. Four days afterward, a camp of about one hundred and fifty lodges of Indians and halfbreeds separated from Little Crow's party, met Colonel Sibley in council, surrendered themselves, and formally delivered up to him ninety-one white prisoners, and over one hundred halfbreeds, whom they had obtained. Other parties came in afterward, surrendering themselves unconditionally, until between two and three thousand Indians, of all sexes and ages, were in the hands of the troops as prisoners of war. A military commission was appointed to try the ringleaders and worst offenders, and over three hundred of them were convicted and sentenced to death. Before this paper is printed, some, at least, of these, will have expiated their crimes on the gallows. Little Crow, with a small but desperate band of followers, succeeded in making his escape to Devil's Lake in Dakota Territory.

The future disposition of the Indians of the State of Minnesota is one of the most perplexing minor questions of the day. In their present location, the feud of race engendered by the insurrection will only die with the generation that witnessed its beginning. Humanitarian impulses and humanitarian duties are forgotten in the fierce thirst for private vengeance. With one voice, the people of that State demand the removal or threaten the extermination of their dangerous neighbors. But whither shall they go? The swallowing tides of civilization encompass them on the east, the north, and the south; and the only other avenue, the west, is guarded by the gaunt wolf starvation.

It is proposed by some to colonize them on the island of Isle Royale, in Lake Superior; by others, to purchase some small West India island, and transport them there, where tropical nature will feed them without expense to the Government. Perhaps the more practical measure would be to gather all that remains of the red race within the United States into one Territory, to establish a more thorough guardianship over them, and to subject them to a stricter and more absolute government, which should compel them to assume gradually the duties and customs of civilized life.



'DEAD!'

With chilling breath it comes: Again—and yet again! on every gale, America! from thy great battle field! Our hearts are hushed, and desolate our homes— Our lids are heavy, and our cheeks are pale— While thus we yield Our loved ones up to thee!

Dead! dying at their posts! The young, the noble, and the loving ones! The widow's all! the gray-haired father's hope— All thine, my country! take the treasured hosts: Hold in thy faithful keeping all thy sons! We give them up— To thee and liberty!

Oh, keep our honored dead Within the folds of thy great-pulsing heart! Entwine their memory with thy polished lore: Cherish the sacred dust above their bed Who sprang to shield thee from the traitor's dart! Bless evermore The dead who died for thee!

Silent the teardrops fall Down the pale mother's cheek at close of day; For sorrow sitteth at the widow's gate: Dark are the shadows gathered on the wall, And where the mourner bendeth low to pray— No more to wait The coming of her free!

For thee—'dear native land!' What precious hopes are severed one by one! What hearts lie crushed and sick by 'hope deferred!' How many dear ones, stretched along the sand, Bleed out their lives beneath a blighting sun— With but a word— 'Mother!' for plaint or prayer!

Shall they be vainly shed— The blood and tears that wash our stricken soil? Bringing no healing with their torrent streams? Vain the long requiem for the noble dead— Vain all the agony and all the toil— The soldier's dreams— The patriot's thought and care?

No! float upon the winds! Flag of my country! let thy stars give light To nations of the earth! proclaim afar The end of tyrant rule that madly binds Our millions down beneath a fearful blight! Float—every star! We have not one to spare!



A MERCHANT'S STORY.

'ALL of which I saw, and part of which I was.'

CHAPTER IX.

After dinner, we rode over my friend's plantation. It contained about twelve hundred acres, mainly covered with forest trees, but with here and there an isolated patch of cleared land devoted to corn and cotton. A small tributary of the Trent formed its northern boundary, and bordering the little stream was a tract of three hundred acres of low, swampy ground, heavily timbered with cypress and juniper. Tall old pines, denuded of bark for one third of their height, and their white faces bearded with long, shining flakes of 'scrape turpentine,' crowned the uplands; and scattered among them, about a hundred well-clad, 'well-kept' negro men and women were shouting pleasantly to one another, or singing merrily some simple song of 'Ole Car'lina,' as with the long scrapers they peeled the glistening scales from the scarified trees, or, gathering them in their aprons, 'dumped' them into the rude barrels prepared for their reception. Preston had a kind word for each one that we passed—a pleasant inquiry about an infirm mother or a sick child, or some encouraging comment on their cheerful work; and many were the hearty blessings they showered upon 'good massa,' and many their good-natured exclamations over 'de strange gemman dat sells massa's truck.'

'He'm de kine, 'ou gals,' shouted an old darky, bent nearly double with age, who, leaning against one of the barrels, was 'packing down' the flakes as they were emptied from the aprons of the women: 'He'm de kine, I tell by him eye; de rocks doan't grow fass ter dat gemman's pocket!'

'Well, they don't, uncle,' I replied, tossing him a half-dollar piece, and throwing a handful of smaller coin among the women. A general scramble followed, in which the old fellow nimbly joined, shouting out between his boisterous explosions of merriment:

'Dis am de sort, massa; dis am manna rainin' in de wilderness—de Lord's chil'ren lub dis kine—it'm good ter take, massa, good ter take.'

'Good as black jack, eh, uncle?' I inquired, laughing, for I saw certain lines about his shrunken mouth, and underneath his sunken eyes, which told plainly he was rather too familiar with that delicious compound of strychnine and whiskey.

'Yas, massa, good as black Jack; dat's my name, massa, dat's my name—yah, yah,' and he turned his face, wet with merry tears, and distended in an uncommonly broad grin, up to mine. In a moment, however, his eye caught Preston's. His broad visage collapsed, his distended mouth shrank to a very diminutive opening, and his twinkling eyes assumed a peculiarly stolid expression, as he added, in a deprecatory tone:

'No, massa Robert, not so good as black jack; not so good as dat—'ou knows I doan't keer fur him; you knows I doan't knows him no more, massa Robert.'

'I know you never knew him,' replied Preston, playing on his name. 'He's a hardened old sinner. He has sinned away the day of grace, I'm sure. But you know better than to ask presents of strangers. Give it back to the gentleman at once.'

An indescribable expression stole over the old negro's visage as he thrust his hand through his thin, frosty wool, looked pleadingly up at his master's face, and, seeing no signs of relenting there, slowly and reluctantly opened his palm and offered me the money.

'No, no, Preston, let him keep it; it won't do him any harm,' I said.

'No more'n it woan't, good massa, not a morsel ob harm,' exclaimed the darky, his small eyes twinkling again with pleasurable anticipation, and his broad face widening into its accustomed grin: 'I woan't take nary a drop, massa Robert, nary a drop!'

'Well,' said his master, 'you can keep it if you'll promise not to drink it all to-morrow. So much whiskey would spoil your prayer at the meeting.'

'So it 'ould, massa Robert; so much as dat; but Jack allers prays de stronger fur a little, massa Robert, jess a little—it sort o' 'pears ter warm up a ole man's sperrets, and ter fotch all de 'votion right inter him froat.'

'I suppose it does; all the devotion you ever feel. You're an old sinner, Jack, past praying for, I fear,' replied Preston, good-naturedly, turning his horse to go.

'Not pass prayin' fur 'ou, massa Robert, not pass dat, an' ole Jack neber will be, nudder—not so long as he kin holler loud 'nuff fur de Lord ter yere. 'Ou may 'pend on dat, massa Robert, 'ou may 'pend on dat.'

As we rode away, I asked Preston if the old black led the services at the negro meetings.

'Yes, I am obliged to let him. He was formerly the plantation preacher, and, with all his faults, the blacks are much attached to him. A small rebellion broke out among them, five years ago, when I displaced him, and put Joe into the pulpit. I compromised the difficulty by agreeing that Jack should lead in prayer every Sunday morning. They think he has a gift that way, and you would conclude the day of Pentecost had come, if you should hear him when he is about half-seas-over.'

'Then he does pray better for a little whiskey?'

'Yes, a mug of 'black jack' helps him amazingly—it gives him the real power.'

After a two hours' circuit of the plantation, we halted in the vicinity of the distilleries, which stood huddled together on the bank of the little stream of which I have spoken. There were three of them, each of thirty barrels' capacity—an enormous size—and they were neatly set in brick, and enclosed in a substantial framed structure, which was weatherboarded and coated with paint of a dark brown color. Near the only one then in operation were several large heaps of flake turpentine, three or four hundred barrels of rosin, and a vast quantity of the same material scattered loosely about and mixed with broken staves, worn-out strainers, and the debris of the rosin bins. Pointing to the confused mass, I said to my host:

'I've half a mind to turn missionary. I feel a sort of call to preach to you Southern heathen.'

'I wish you would,' he rejoined, laughing; 'you'd give me a chance to laugh at your sermons, as you have laughed at mine.'

'No, you wouldn't laugh. I'd make you feel way down in your pocket. I'd have but one sermon and one text, and that would be: 'Gather up the fragments, that nothing be lost.' You Southern nabobs do nothing but waste—you waste enough in one day to feed the whole North for a week. It's a sin—the unpardonable sin—for you know better.'

'Well, it is wrong, but how can we help it? We can't make the negroes anything but what they are—shiftless and careless of everything but their own ease.'

'I don't know about that. I think such a man as Joe ought to be able to manage them.'

'Joe! Well, he can't. He's all drive, and negroes are human beings; they should be treated kindly.'

We had approached the front of the still, and were fastening our horses to the trunk of a tree, when we heard loud voices issuing from the other side of the enclosure.

'Her'm what I owes you—now pack off ter onst, and don't neber show your face on dis plantation no more,' said a voice, which I at once recognized as that of 'boss Joe.'

'I shan't pack off till I'm ready, you d—d black nigger, I've been bossed 'bout by ye long 'nuff. Clar out, and 'tend ter yer own 'fairs,' rejoined another voice, which had the tone of a white man's.

'I reckon dis am my 'fair, and I shan't leff you git drunk and burn up no more white rosum yere; so take yerseff off. Ef you don't, I'll make you blacker nor I is.'

'Put your hand on me, and I'll take the law on ye, shore,' returned the white man.

'Pshaw, you drunken fool, do you s'pose dese darkies would tell on me? Ef dey would, dar word ain't 'lowed in de law; so you trabble. I don't keer ter handle you, but I shill ef you don't leab widin five minutes.'

What might have followed will not go down in history, for just then Preston and I, emerging from around the corner of the building, appeared in view of the belligerents. The native—a respectable specimen of the class of poor whites—stood in a defiant attitude before the still-fire, while Joe was seated on a turpentine barrel near, quietly noting the time by a large silver watch which he held in his hand. He kept on counting the minutes, and gave no heed to his master's approach, till Preston said:

'Joe, what's to pay?'

'Nuffin, master Robert, 'cept I'se 'scharged dis man, and he say he won't gwo.'

'Do as Joseph bids you,' said Preston, turning to the white man, 'take your pay and go at once.'

The man stammered out a few words with a cringing air, but the planter cut him short with:

'I want no explanations. If you can't satisfy Joseph, you can't satisfy me.'

The native then leisurely took down a ragged coat that hung from one of the timbers, counted over a small roll of bank notes which Joe gave him, and meekly left the still-house.

Joe and his master devoted the next half hour to piloting me over the distilleries. I commented rather freely on the sad waste of valuable produce which was scattered about, and on the bad economy of keeping three 'stills' to do the work of one.

'It might have done years ago,' I remarked, 'before your trees ran to 'scrape,' and when they yielded enough 'dip' to keep all the stills busy; but now they are eating you up. You have fully four thousand dollars idle here. Sell them, Preston—that amount would help you out of debt.'

'Dat's what I tells master Robert, Mr. Kirke, but he sort o' clings to ole tings, sar,' said Joe, in the free, familiar tone usual with him.

'But you do just as badly, Joe,' I replied. 'You let these darkies waste more than they eat, and you keep four here to do the work of three. You are no better than your master.'

'Only half so good, Mr. Kirke,' rejoined the black, showing a set of teeth which a dentist might have used for a door plate; 'only half so good, 'case I'se only half white. But, if master Robert 'ould leff me handle de whip, I'd show him suffin'! I reckon de int'rest 'ouldn't be ahind den.'

'Why? don't you let Joe whip the negroes?' I asked Preston.

'No, not now; I did, till some years ago, when he almost killed one of them, and came near getting me into serious trouble. He could manage them well enough without whipping, if he'd curb his impetuous temper a little.'

'But I does curb it, master Robert, and it tain't ob no use. Dey knows I can't whip 'em, an' dey don't keer fur de starvin', or de tyin' up, or de talkin' to in de meetin'. Dey don't mind fur nuffin' but de whip, an' a little ex'cise wid dat does a nigger good when he'm right down 'fractory. And you has 'lowed, master Robert, dat I warn't so much ter blame in dat 'fair ob Black Cale.'

'Well, perhaps you weren't. It's a good story, Kirke; did I ever tell it to you?'

'No; I'd be glad to hear it.'

'Come, Joe,' said his master, good-naturedly, 'you can tell it better than I. You know it by heart.'

'Well, master, if you says so,' replied Joe; and as we seated ourselves in a semicircle on some rosin barrels, the black proceeded to give the following illustration of the working of free and slave institutions:

'Well, you see, Mr. Kirke, de darky's name wus Black Cale, an' he wus a raised up 'long wid me by de ole gemman—dat am master Robert's gran'fer. He wus allers a hard-bitted, 'fractory darky, but he wus smart, awful smart, and could do a heap ob work when a minded to; but he wusn't a minded to bery of'en, an' ole master used to hab ter flog him—flog him bery hard. Well, finarly, de ole gemman grow'd tired ob doin' so much ob dat, an' he call Cale ter him one day, an' he say:

''Cale, you'se a likely nigger, an' I don't like ter flog you so much. Now, I'll leff you hire you' time, an' gwo down ter Newbern, an' shirk fur you'seff.'

'Ole master knowed Cale wus habin' a bad 'fect on de oder darkies, an' he 'lowed 'twould be cheap leffin' him gwo ef he didn't get a picayune fur him. Well, Cale, he took ter dat ter onst, an' he 'greed to gib ole master one fifty a year fur his time; an' so he put off ter Newbern. Well, ebery ting gwo on right smart till de ole gemman die. Cale, he work hard, pay master ebery year, and sabe up quite a heap. Well, ole master die widout a will, an' all de property gwo ter de two sons; dat am master James an' master Thomas—he war master Robert's fader. Now master James he neber lib'd on de plantation, so he sold all his half ob de nigs to master Thomas, an' put all de 'vails inter his bisness down dar ter Mobile, whar he am now, doin' a heap in de cotton way. But he didn't sell his half ob Cale, 'case master Thomas wouldn't buy him, nohow. Well, dey owned Cale tugedder fur a spell, an' Cale he work on right smart, till one day master James come home, and he tells master Thomas dat on de way he'd a stopped at Newbern, and sole his half ob Cale ter Cale heseff, fur five hundred dollar, and giben him de free papers. Well, den Cale he want to buy de oder half ob heseff ob master Thomas, an' master Thomas he offer to take de same money; but Cale say de oder half not wuth so much as de fust, an' dat he wouldn't gib only two fifty.'

'Not worth so much—why not?' I asked.

'Why, Cale say 'case he could do what he like wid de free half, and he reckoned he shouldn't be quite so 'sponsible den fur de slave half,' and here Joe broke into a merry fit of laughter, in which Preston joined.

'Well, master Thomas an' Cale couldn't 'gree 'bout de buyin', but Cale promise to gib seventy-five dollar a year fur de use ob master's half, an' he gwo off agin ter Newbern. Den de time gwo by fur a yar or two, but master neber git nary dime out ob Cale fur his half. Cale would say dat only half ob him wus free, an' de oder half wasn't 'sponsible, and couldn't pay its debts, nohow. Finarly, master, seein' he couldn't git nuffin out ob Cale, only offers ob two fifty fur de oder half—and dat he wouldn't take, nohow—sent me down to Newbern to sort o' mediate 'tween Cale an' he. Well, I coaxed Cale to 'gree to wuck one monfh for heseff and de oder monfh fur massa, and I come home; but it warn't ob no use; Cale would wuck, but massa neber seed a fip ob de pay. Finarly, af'er he'd a gone on dat way 'bout ten yar, stowin' 'way what he arned whar nobody could fine it, an' allers off'rin' two fifty fur de oder half ob heseff, master Thomas he die, and master Robert he come ter lib on de plantation. Den master Robert axed me what he should do wid Cale, and I tole him to take de two fifty, and leff him gwo. But he say, 'no,' dat he wouldn't sell him fur dat, nohow.' And here the black looked slyly at his master, and a merry twinkle came into his eyes. 'Well, den, I tole master Robert dat I tought I could fix Cale ef he'd leff me manage him jess as I like. He 'greed to dat, an' I gwoes down to Newbern, an' makes Cale come home, an' den I say to him:

''Now, Cale, you stay yere, an' gwo to wuck. Ebery monfh you wuck fur me, an' ebery oder monfh you wuck fur you'seff, an' when you wuck fur you'seff I pay you so much fur ebery barr'l ob dip, an' so much fur ebery barr'l ob scrape, an' so much fur ebery day when you wuck roun'; an' I makes you pay so much fur what you lib on. Well, Cale, he 'gree to dat. He wuck de fust monfh fur heseff, an' he did wuck—he done twice so much as any hand on de plantation; but de next monfh, when he wuck fur me, he don't do nuffin but lay 'bout, an' git drunk. I stood dat till de monfh wus up—fur I neber did take ter whippin' de nigs, an' master Robert know dat—an' den w'en Cale wus clean sober, I tied him up to gib him a floggin'. Well, w'en he wus a stripped, an' I was jess gwine to lay on de lashes, Cale say to me, says he:

''Look a yere, 'ou Joe, 'ou may whip massa's half ob dis nig jess so long as 'ou likes, but ef 'ou put de lash onter my half, I'll take de law on 'ou. I will, shore.'

'Dat sot me a tinkin'; fur de fac wus, I'd nary right to flog his half; but den it 'curred ter me dat none but darkies wus roun', an' so I tought I had him, shore. Well, I puts on de lashes, an' he keeps a tellin' me he'd hab de law on me, which make me sort o' 'zasparated, till I put 'em on right smart, an' at lass he gib in. Well, w'en I'd a got him a feelin' 'bout right, an' wus only jess puttin' de lass blows on to finish up makin' a decent nigger ob him, master Robert he come up, and when he seed de blood a runnin' down his back, he say Cale had been whipped 'bout 'nough, and I must stop. Cale turned up missin' dat night, an' got off to Newbern; an' shore 'nuff, de next evenin', long 'bout dark, de sherrif he rode up to de house wid a writ fur master Robert fur habin' made 'salt an' batt'ry on one collud man, called Caleb Preston, an' he pulled out a suspeny dat make massa Robert witness agin heseff! ha! ha! You see Cale wus smart; he know'd master Robert b'longed to de Baptist meeting, an' wouldn't lie fur all de niggers in Jones county; so he had him dar, ha! ha!'

Here Joe for some minutes was unable to continue the narrative. His merriment was contagious. I laughed till my sides were sore, and Preston enjoyed the story quite as much as I did.

'Well, what was the end of it?' I asked.

'Only, master Robert hed to be toted off to Newbern dat night, git bail or sleep in de jail, and de next mornin', af'er de nig hed a hed ten yars' use ob heseff fur nuffin, master Robert hed to do what he'd a said, an' his fader afore him hed said, dey neber would do—dat is, take two fifty fur de oder half ob Cale! Ha! ha! De next time I gwoes to Newbern I hunt Cale up, an' I tell him he must study fur de law, shore; an' dat ef he done it, I know'd master Robert would pay de 'spences, out ob lub to de country.'

The negroes who were attending the still had dropped their work to listen to Joe's story, and at its close guffawed in a chorus that made the woods ring. Hearing it, Joe sprang to his feet, shouting out: 'Yere—'bout you' wuck dar; leff me kotch you eavesdroppin' on gemmen agin, an' I'll gib you what I gabe Cale. 'Bout you' wuck, I say.' They turned nimbly to their tasks, and Joe resumed his seat.

'I see the moral of that story, Preston,' I said, when the negro had concluded.

'What is it?'

'That a darky may be as smart as a white man. Cale outwitted you.'

'Well, he did,' he replied, laughing; 'but that isn't the moral: it is that flogging never accomplishes its object.'

'I'm not so sure of that. Joe had brought Cale to terms, 'made a decent nigger on him,' when you, unluckily, interfered.'

'It ain't so much de floggin' on 'em, Mr. Kirke,' said Joe, 'as dar knowin' dat you will do it ef dey desarve it. Dar ain't a darky on de plantation dat don't know master Robert an' de good missus 'ould rader be flogged demselves dan flog dem; an' dat wucks bad, Mr. Kirke, sorry bad;' and the negro shook his head with a grave, thoughtful air.

'Tell me, Preston,' I said, after a slight pause, 'how is it that your neighbor Dawsey, with only seventy-five negroes, sends us more produce than you do with a hundred and fifty?'

'Simply because he treats his hands like brutes, while I treat mine like men.'

'I hope you'll take no offence,' I replied, 'but it appears to me there must be some other reason. He has only half your number.'

'Well, I will tell you how he and I manage, and you can judge for yourself. Dawsey has seventy-five slaves; forty child-bearing women, twenty men, and fifteen children under five years. The sixty adults are all prime hands. They are given daily tasks, which they cannot possibly do in less than fifteen hours, leaving them only nine hours out of the twenty-four for eating, sleeping, feeding their children, and the waking rest necessary to working people. He never whips them on a week day, because it wastes working time, but makes Sunday a general flogging season. He has two women where he has one man, and each woman is expected to bear a child a year. If she doesn't, she is sold. They are made to work in the field till the labor pains are on them; and they are allowed only two weeks' rest after confinement. Three of them have borne children in the woods this season. He keeps only one nurse for the fifteen children, and as soon as each child is five years old—the age at which it can be legally sold away from its mother—it is disposed of to the traders. In addition, three of these women are his own mistresses and they are expected to have children as fast as the others. He serves their children like the rest; that is, rears them to the age of five, and then sells them as he would so many hogs.'

'My God!' I exclaimed, 'he's a monster.'

'There are different opinions about that. Dawsey passes for a jovial good fellow; keeps open house for his friends; spends money freely at the elections, and two years ago 'got religion' at a camp meeting. He merely regards his slaves as chattels, and manages his plantation in perhaps the only way that is profitable in an old section of country like this.'

'And how is it with you? How do you manage?' I asked.

'Leff me tell, master Robert,' said the black, smiling. 'I knows all de 'ticulars 'bout dat.'

'Well, go on,' said Preston, laughing, 'but don't be too hard on me.'

'We hab,' continued the black, 'countin' me in, a hundred an' fifty-one darkies, all in fam'lies—faders, mudders, children, and some on 'em gran'faders and gran'mudders,'most all born on de plantation, an' some on 'em livin' on it fur forty, fifty, sixty, an' seventy yar. Out ob dese, we hab only forty-two full hands, 'case some ob de wimmin dat come in de ages fur full wuck am sickly, puny tings, only fit fur house wuck or nussin'. From de whole I gits equal to fifty-four full hands. 'Cordin' to master Robert's direction, I gib 'em easy ten-hour tasks; but suffin' or anoder turn up 'most ebery day, so dat 'bout half on 'em don't do full wuck, an' I reckon dey don't make, on de whole, more'n 'bout nine hour a day. So you see, Cunnel Dawsey, he hab sixty, an' he wuck em fifteen hour a day; we hab only fifty-four, an' we wuck 'em nine hour a day; an' 'cordin' to my 'rithmetic, dat would make de Cunnel turn out 'bout twice as much truck as we does.'

'And you have twice as many mouths to feed as he,' I remarked; 'and the result is he makes money, while you—'

'Lose nigh onter two thousand a year, Mr. Kirke, an' hab done it ebery yar fur five yar, eber since master Robert come on to de plantation, an' gwo to workin' on human principles, as he calls 'em.'

This was said in so sad and regretful a tone, that, in spite of the serious manner of both the black and his master, I laughed heartily. When my merriment had somewhat subsided, I said:

'Joe, what would you do to mend this state of affairs?'

'It can't be mended if we stay in dis ole country, an' wuck 'cordin' to master Robert's notion.'

'Then you mean to say you can't apply humane principles to slave labor, in an old district of country, and make money?'

'Yes,' said Preston, rising and pacing up and down in the small semi-circle formed by the rosin barrels, 'that is what he means to say, and it is true.'

'Then how do the majority of turpentine planters in this section make money? They do make it, that is certain.'

'By overworking their hands, as Dawsey does. All may not be as severe with them as he is, but all overwork them, more or less,' replied Preston.

'I don't know 'bout dat, master Robert, twelve and eben firteen hour a day neber hurt a prime hand, if he hab good feed.

'Well, it is six o'clock, and supper must be in waiting,' said Preston, drawing out his watch; 'we'll talk more on this subject to-night. Joe, bring the books up to the house this evening. Mr. Kirke has promised to look into our affairs, and I shall need you.'

'Yas, master Robert,' replied the black; and, mounting the horses, Preston and I rode off to the mansion.

CHAPTER X.

Mrs. Preston and master Joe were on the piazza awaiting us, and in the doorway we were met by the younger children. Preston lifted one of them upon his shoulder, and taking another in his arms, led the way to the supper room. However disturbed might be my friend's relations with the outer world, all was peace by his cheerful fireside. No man was ever more blessed in his home. His children were intelligent, loving, and obedient; his wife was one of those rare women—seen nowhere more often than in the South—who, to a cultivated mind and polished manners, add the more homely accomplishments of a good housewife. It is years since she laid aside the weary cares of her plantation home, and entered on the higher duties of another life; but her gentle words are still as fresh in my memory, her kindly image as warm in my heart, as on that autumn day, when she placed her hand in mine for the last time, and spoke the last 'God bless you' which was to fall on my ears from her lips on this side of the grave. She was a perfect woman—a faithful mistress, a loving wife, a devoted mother. Anticipating every want of her husband, cheerfully instructing her children, overseeing every detail of her household, meting out the weekly allowance of the negroes, visiting daily the cabins of the sick and the infirm, and with her own hand dispensing the soothing cordial or the healing medicine,—or, when all medicine failed, bending over the lowly bed of the dying, and pointing him to the 'better home on high,'—she was a ministering angel—a joy and a blessing to all about her. She wore no costly silks, no diamonds on her fingers, or jewels in her hair; but she was arrayed in garments all rich and beautiful with human love. She knew nothing—cared nothing—about the right or the wrong of slavery; but cheerfully and prayerfully, never wearying and never doubting, she went on in the lowly round of duties allotted her, leaning lovingly on the arm of the GOOD ALL-FATHER, and looking steadfastly to HIM for guidance and support. And, truly, she had her reward. 'Her children rose up and called her blessed; her husband, also, and he praised her.'

Supper was soon over, when my hostess rose and conducted me to the library. That apartment was in an L, detached from the mansion, and communicating with it by a covered passage way. It was plainly furnished, but had a cosy, homelike appearance. Its four walls were lined with books, some standing on end, some resting on their sides, and some leaning negligently against each other; and over the massive centre table were scattered open volumes, old newspapers, and unfinished manuscripts, in most delightful confusion. A half dozen old-fashioned chairs straggled about the floor, as if they did not know exactly what to do with themselves, and a score of old worthies—their faces white as chalk, and their long hair and beards powdered with a whole generation of dust, looked complacently down from the top of the bookshelves. Dust was on the table, on the chairs, on the floor, on the ceiling, and on the musty old volumes ranged along the walls, and dust everywhere told unmistakably that no profane hand ever disturbed the dusty repose which reigned in the apartment.

Two or three oaken logs, supported on bright brass andirons—the only bright things in the room—were blazing cheerfully on the broad hearthstone; and drawing our chairs near, we sat down before them.

'May I come in?' said master Joe, thrusting his head in at the half-closed doorway.

'No, my son,' answered his father; 'Mr. Kirke and I are to talk over business matters.'

'Do let him come, Robert,' said Mrs. Preston; 'he is old enough to learn something of such affairs.'

The lad entered, and seating himself on a low stool by the side of his mother, and burying his head in her lap, was soon fast asleep.

'This room, Mr. Kirke,' said the lady, 'is sacred to Robert and the dust. I beg you will not think I have the care of it.'

'Oh no, madam; it is plain that a man has exclusive dominion here; but your husband has been away from it for some time.'

'That does not account for the dust; it hasn't been stirred for a twelve-month;' and after a pause, she added, a thin moisture glistening in her eyes, 'I have not yet thanked you, sir, for saving Phyllis and the children from the clutches of that wretched trader.'

'No thanks are requisite, madam. It was a mere matter of business; we are in the practice of making advances to our consignors.'

'Nevertheless we thank you, sir; Robert and I will ever be grateful for it.'

'Do not speak of it, madam; I would be glad to serve you to a much greater extent.'

The lady made no reply, and a rather embarrassing silence followed for some minutes, when I said:

'Preston, Joe is a remarkable negro; I think I never met one so intelligent and well informed.'

'He is very intelligent,' he replied; 'he has fine natural abilities.'

'It is a pity Nature gave him so dark a skin, and made him a—slave.'

'Not a pity, Mr. Kirke,' rejoined Mrs. Preston; 'Nature, or rather God, always puts us in our right places. Joseph is more useful where he is than he would be anywhere else.'

'I understood him that he was raised on the plantation,' I added.

'Yes,' replied my host; 'my grandfather bought his mother, who is a native African, when she was a girl; she was a favorite house-servant, and Joe was born in a room over where we are sitting. This building was then all there was of the mansion.'

'And how did he pick up so much information?'

'The old gentleman, who gave little heed to either law or gospel, taught them both to read and write.' (Years after the date of this conversation I learned that Joe was the son of that lawless, graceless old gentleman.) 'And Joe, when a boy, read everything he could lay his hands on. Since I brought my library here, he has devoured about half of the books in it. He devotes every night, from eight o'clock to twelve, to reading.'

'I am surprised that with so much reading he uses so entirely the negro dialect.'

'But he does not. In common conversation he expresses himself in it, for it is the dialect in which a black does his ordinary thinking; but let him get upon an elevated subject, as he does frequently in his sermons, and you will hear words as strong, pure, and simple as any found in the Bible, flow from him like a stream.'

'Does he preach every Sunday?'

'Yes; I usually catechize the people in the morning, and he preaches in the evening.'

'But do you learn all your negroes to read?'

'No, the law does not allow it. I teach them to repeat the catechism, texts of Scripture, and passages from good books, and I explain these to them.'

'And Joe is your overseer?'

'Not exactly that. My father made him overseer about thirty years ago, but the law requires a white man in that situation; and when I took charge of the plantation, the neighbors made a clamor about my having a black. The result was, I 'whipped the devil round the stump,' by hiring a white distiller, and calling him 'overseer.' I let Joe, however, 'oversee' him, as you have seen to-day.'

A rap came then at the door, and master Joe, springing up, ushered the subject of our conversation into the room. He held his hat in his hand, and had under his arm a couple of account books.

'This is Joseph the First,' said the lad, taking the black by the coat-tail, and bowing gravely to me.

'And you are Joseph the Second, eh?' I said, laughing.

'Yas, sar, he'm dat 'stinguished gemman,' replied the negro, stroking affectionately the lad's head; 'and he don't dishonor de name, sar. He'm de true blue, dyed in de wool.'

'He was named for Joseph,' said the lady, smiling kindly on the black. 'Bring up a chair, Joseph.'

'Tank you, missus,' and the negro seated himself by the fire, between Preston and me.

'You have brought the documents, I see, Joe; let me look at them,' I said, reaching out my hand for the books.

'Yas, sar, and dey'm all written up till a week back. I reckon you kin pick 'em out, Mr. Kirke, dough master Robert he say he don't understand my way ob keepin' 'em.'

I opened the books, and any man of business will appreciate my surprise to find them kept by 'double entry.' Cotton, corn, and turpentine had each its separate account, and at a glance I could see how much had been made or lost by the production of each staple. The handwriting was plain and bold, and the general appearance of the ledger compared favorably with that of a much larger one I knew of, which was the pride of an experienced bookkeeper.

'Why, Joe, I'm astonished,' I exclaimed with unaffected gratification; 'you write like a schoolmaster.'

A flush, which would have been a blush on a lighter skin, overspread the negro's face, as he replied:

'I don't hab practice 'nuff, Mr. Kirke, to write bery well.'

'Practice!' said Preston, 'he has constant practice; he writes the love letters of all the darkies in the district.'

'It am so, dat's a fac, sar', said Joe, a quiet humor twinkling in his eye. 'One ob Cunnel Dawsey's folk came to me tother day—his wife had been sold down Souf, an' he wanted to say to har, dat dough ribers rose, and mountins run atween 'em, he'd neber hab nuffin to do wid no oder 'ooman—so he come to me, and I wrote de letter; an' when I'd a put in all de ribers, an' de mountins, an' eber so many runs, an' thought I'd done it right smart, I read it ober to him, but he say he sort o' reckoned it warnt quite done up 'pletely, not 'xactly 'cluded; an' he 'sisted dat I muss 'sert a pose scrip, axin' her to ''scuse de bad writin'.''

'And you did it?'

'Yes, sar, I done it.'

'Well, Joe, the important thing just now, is how much you owe. Give me a slip of paper, and let me put these balances together.'

'I'se done dat, Mr. Kirke; here dey am,' and he handed me a correctly drawn-up statement, showing Preston's exact liabilities. I glanced over it, compared it with the footings in the ledger, and said:

'I see by this, Preston, that you owe seventeen hundred dollars, floating debt; twelve hundred dollars, interest on your mortgage, and are overdrawn five hundred dollars on our house.'

'Yes, so Joe makes it, and I reckon he's correct.'

'But dar'm de six hunderd you 'cepted fur master Robert, de oder day, in Newbern—dat ain't counted in,' said Joe.

'Well, all told, it's four thousand, besides the note I have given for Phyllis. What do you calculate on to pay it, Preston?'

'I don't know. How can we pay it, Joe?'

'We moight sell de two stills, and some ob de hosses; I reckon dey'd be 'nuff,' replied the black; 'but de raal trubble, master Robert, am what's cummin'; we'm gwine ahind ebery day, 'case we lose money on ebery crop ob turpentine. Nuffin pay now but de corn and de cotton, and we don't raise 'nuff ob dem to do no good.'

I turned to the ledger, and found that it showed what the black said to be true—corn and cotton had made a handsome profit, but turpentine had 'paid a loss.'

'That is because your trees are old, and now yield scarcely anything but scrape,'[1] I said.

'Yas, sar, and 'case dey am so thin like, sense we cleaned out de pore ones, dat it take a hand long time to git 'round 'mong 'em.'

'Why not drop turpentine, and cut shingles from the swamp? You've a fortune in those cypress trees.'

'My negroes are not accustomed to swamp work—it would kill them,' replied Preston.

'Mr. Kirke,' said Joe,—'you'll take no 'fence, master Robert, if I says dis?'

'No, go on,' said his master.

'De ting am right in a nutshell, an' jess so clar as apple jack: we owes a heap; we'se gittin' inter debt deeper an' deeper ebery yar; we lose money workin' de ole trees; we hain't got no new ones; an', dar's no use to talk,—master Robert won't put de hands inter de swamp. What, den, shill we do?'

Avoiding the darky's question, I said: 'I never before understood why slavery is so clamorous for new fields. I see now—it can draw support only from the virgin soil. It exhausts an old country: like the locusts of Egypt, it blasts the very face of the earth!'

'That is true,' replied Preston; 'but Joe has stated the case correctly, What shall we do?'

'One of two things. Sell your plantation and negroes, or take your hands to a new section, where you can raise virgin turpentine.'[2]

'I cannot sell my negroes—they were all raised with me; and the plantation—it was my ancestors', over a hundred years ago. I would move the hands to a new section, but I have not the means to buy land.'

'Ay, dar's de rub, as Shakspeare say,' said Joe, with a pleasant humor, intended, I thought, to cheer his master, whose face was clouding over with grave thought; 'dat's de ting dat spile de 'gestion ob de king; and in him sleep, such dreams do come ob suffin' better'n dis, some undiscobered country, whar de virgin trees weep tears so white as crystal, and turn to gole de moment dey'm barrled up, dat—'

'Come, Joe, that'll do,' said his master, laughing; 'don't give us any more, or you'll murder us, as well as Shakspeare.'

'You don't 'preciate dat great man, master Robert,' rejoined Joe, also laughing.

'No, I don't—not just now.'

'If you could satisfy your outside creditors that things were likely to go better with you in future, could you put off the payment of the three thousand dollars for a time?' I asked.

'I reckon I could—nearly all of it,' replied Preston.

'Well, then, I'll make you a proposition. Buy ten thousand acres on the line of the Manchester railroad. It is finished to Whitesville, and you can buy land within twenty miles of that station, at seventy-five cents an acre. We'll advance the twenty per cent. you'll have to pay down, and five hundred dollars more to start you there, and hold the deed of the land to secure us. Ship your produce to us, and agree to forfeit the land, if, at the end of three years, you have not paid all the original advance. Move your stills, and your able-bodied men and women there, leaving the old and the young negroes here to raise corn and cotton. Hire fifty more prime hands, and put Joe over the whole, with unlimited power to work them to death if he pleases.'

Preston leaned his head on his hand, as if bewildered. He seemed not to understand me, but Joe's face lighted as if a stream of electricity were playing under his dark skin. Mrs. Preston was the first to speak. Rising and taking my hand, she said: 'Robert will do it, Mr. Kirke; and how can we ever thank you enough for your generous—your noble conduct toward us? You have taken a weary load off our hearts.'

'It is a simple business transaction, madam; I expect to make money by it. I insist on your husband's consigning his produce to us, and I shall require the forfeit of the land and the improvements, if he does not pay our advances within three years.'

'We kin pay 'em in one year, an' you knows it, sar!' exclaimed Joe, springing to his feet, and almost dancing around the room. 'Come, master Robert, look up, an' tell 'im we'll do it, for ole Joe'll make de chips fly as you neber seed 'em fly afore.'

Preston looked up, and a tear rolled down his face, as he said, 'I thank you, my friend. I need not say more.'

'You need not say that; only buy the land, and make Joe autocrat of the new plantation, and your bacon is cured.'

'Joe'll show you how bacon am cured, Mr. Kirke, an' he'll name his fuss boy af'er you—shore!' shouted the black, grinning all over.

'He can safely promise that,' said the lady, laughing through her tears; 'for Aggy is fifty, and never had a child.'

A half-hour's conversation over the details of the proposed arrangement followed; then Joe rose, and taking the account books under his arm, bade us 'good evenin'.' As he was leaving the room, I asked, 'Do you preach to-morrow?'

'Yas, sar, an' I'se gwine home to study ober de sermon. You'll come dar, sar? You won't har no raal preachin', 'less master Robert feel de sperrit move, fur de Lord don't gib de black man de tongue he gib de white.'

'I'm not sure of that; but I'll be there. Good night.'

'Good night, sar, an' de Lord bless you.'

When he had gone, I said to Preston: 'You have admitted me to your confidence, my friend, and asked my advice; therefore, I think you will pardon me, if I make you a few business suggestions.'

'Most certainly, and I shall be guided by what you say.'

'With a hundred hands in those thick woods, Joe will turn out a vast amount of produce. His ambition is excited with the idea of being his own master, and he will coin money for you; but you need to be prudent. You owe a mortgage of twenty thousand dollars—and mortgage debts are the worst in the world. Your plantation and negroes may be worth three times the amount, but they are in jeopardy so long as it exists. If it were called in on you suddenly, you couldn't pay it—your property would be sacrificed—everything might be lost. Now, I would suggest that you sell, at once, your three hundred acres of swamp land, all your surplus live stock and materials, and appropriate the proceeds to paying your floating debt, and reducing the mortgage.'

'And we might reduce our family expenses, Robert,' said his wife; 'we have too many house-servants. We could hire out five or six of them in Newbern. And Joseph's schooling costs us five hundred dollars a year; he might come home—I could teach him.'

'You would take too much on yourself, Lucy,' replied her husband. 'You are not strong, and you can't spare a single servant.'

'How many have you?' I asked.

'Nine,' said Preston.

'For a family of two adults and three children?'

'It strikes you as too many, Mr. Kirke,' said the lady, 'and it is. It is our Southern way; but every additional servant makes additional work for the mistress.'

'I think you are right, madam,' I replied; 'a Northern lady that you know of, takes care of me, Frank, the two young children, and a large house, with only two servants and an errand boy; and she never has anything to do after two o'clock in the day.'

'But you have the Irish; they are better house-servants than our blacks; and you can discharge them if they won't work,' said Preston.

'I would rather have Phyllis than any servant I ever saw at the North. With her, the cook, and one more, I will promise to get on beautifully,' remarked his wife.

Preston gave her a look of indescribable tenderness and affection. What the negro trader had said to me, gave me a key to the thoughts that were passing in his mind. His wife's trust in him was so great, that she was willing to again admit into her family the woman who had made him forget, through long years, the promises he made her in their youth! Truly, the angel of perfect love and forgiveness makes its earthly home in the breast of woman.

Preston's voice quivered as he replied: 'I—I appreciate what you say—Lucy. Do as you think best.'

'But, madam,' I said, 'I think you are really taking too much on yourself—the care of the children will be a great tax on your strength. Would it not be better to employ a governess to instruct them? What is now expended on Joe would pay a competent person.'

'What do you say to that, Joe?' asked his father; 'would you like to come home, and have a woman teacher?'

'I'd like to do what mother wants me to,' said the lad, putting his arms about her neck, and kissing her.

'You're a good boy, Joseph,' said his mother.

'But, you'll let me keep the pony, won't you, father?' said the lad.

'Yes, my son, and if you learn well, you shall go with uncle James when you're fifteen.'

Shortly afterward we separated for the night.

CHAPTER XI.

On a gentle knoll, a few hundred yards from the negro quarters, and in the midst of a grove of pines, whose soft brown tassels covered the ground all around it, stood the negro meetinghouse. It was built of unhewn logs, its crevices chinked with clay, and was large enough to seat about two hundred persons. Though its exterior resembled a backwoods barn, its interior had a neat and tasteful appearance. Evergreen boughs hid its rough beams and bare shingled roof, and long wreaths of pine leaves hung in graceful festoons from its naked walls and narrow windows. On the two sides of a wide aisle, which served to separate the sheep on the right hand from the goats on the left, were long rows of benches, with hard board bottoms, and rough open backs, and beyond them, divided from the rest of the interior by a rustic railing, was the 'family pew,' an enclosure about twelve feet square, neatly carpeted, and furnished with half a dozen arm chairs. Opposite to this was a platform elevated three steps from the floor, and on it stood a rustic settee, a large easy chair, and a modest desk covered with green baize, and decorated with small sprigs of evergreen. On this desk rested a large Bible.

The enormous seashell which served as a bell to this 'house of prayer,' was sending its last blast in long echoes through the old trees, when, with Mrs. Preston and the children, I elbowed an opening through the thick group of grinning Africans that blocked the doorway, and 'worked a passage' down the crowded aisle to the family enclosure. Seating myself in one of its cane-bottomed seats, I glanced around on the assemblage. Such a gathering of woolly heads I had never seen. Every plantation within a circuit of five miles had sent in a representation, till the benches, the aisle, the small area around the pulpit, and the open space near the doorway, were all densely packed. On the left, the men, in gaudy cravats and many-colored waistcoats, were chatting merrily together, and enjoying themselves as heartily as a parcel of Yankees at a clambake; and on the right, the women, in red and yellow turbans, and flaming shawls and neckerchiefs, were bobbing about and flaunting their colors, like so many dolphins sporting in the sunshine. Preston was seated in the lone chair at the back of the pulpit, and Boss Joe and Black Jack occupied the settee near him. The latter shortly rose to open the services, and, in a moment, a deep silence fell on the noisy multitude. The old preacher had carefully combed his thin wool into a pyramid on the top of his head, and he looked, dressed in glossy black pants, longtailed blue coat, ruffled shirt, and high shirt collar, like a stuffed specimen at an exhibition of wax figures. Stepping rather unsteadily to the front of the platform, he flourished his red cotton bandanna, and spreading his huge claws over the large Bible, said:

'Dear bred'rin, leff us begin de worship ob de Lord by singin':

'From all dat dwell below de skies Leff de Creator's praise arise.''

A half dozen darky fiddlers at the left of the pulpit tuned their strings, and then the whole assemblage rose and burst into that grand old hymn. As its last echoes were dying away, Joe got up, and opening the large Bible, read, in a clear, mellow voice, a portion of the one hundred and nineteenth Psalm. When he had concluded, the old darky again came forward.

Gazing complacently around on the audience for a moment, he drawled out: 'My bred'rin, leff us raise our hearts to de Lord.' The whole congregation then kneeled, and Jack, closing his eyes, clenching his hands together, and throwing his head back, until his nose came nearly on a line with the roof of the building, 'lifted up his voice' and prayed.

After the fashion of very many white preachers, he began by telling the Lord all about Himself; all He had ever done, and all He is going to do; how long He had lived, and how long He is going to live; how great He is—'taller dan de mountin's, and bigger dan de seas.' How He made the world in six days, and then, 'gittin' tired, rested on de sevenfh;' How He formed man out of the dust of the ground, and then out of his rib formed woman; how the woman tempted the man, and he fell, and how woman has 'raised Cain' on the earth ever since. How He sent the flood, and how Noah builded the ark; how Noah axed all the wild 'critters' into it, and how they all came in two by two, and how Noah and the wild beasts lay down lovingly together, till the 'wet spell' was over. How He chose the Jews—a meaner race than the 'pore whites'—to be his peculiar people; and how that proves His boundless love and unlimited goodness; 'fur no oder man in all creashun would hab taken dem folks up, no how.' How Moses, when he came down from the Mount, 'stumbled and broke de law; and how 'ebery one of us dat hab come inter de worle sense, hab stumbled and broke de law, 'case he did,' How Noah, though he was a white man, and had a white wife, begat a black son; and how that black son was a great sinner, and how all his descendants have taken after him, and been mighty big sinners ever since.

Then he described the sinners, particularly the black sinners present; and if half of what he said was true, every one of them deserved to be sold 'down Soufh,' and kept on cold hominy and hoecake all the rest of his days.

The prayer was a strange mixture of absurdity, presumption, and profanity, and I felt relieved to hear his long 'amen,' and to see Joe rise and again approach the pulpit.

Requesting some one present to raise a few of the windows (I took occasion, afterward, to thank him for that very considerate thought), Joe opened the Bible, and said: 'My friends, I am gwine to talk ter you from de tex, 'An' dey drew an' lifted up Joseph out ob de pit, an' sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites fur twenty pieces ob silver, an' dey brought Joseph inter Egypt.'

'You all knows,' he continued, 'de story ob Joseph an' his bred'rin; how dey wus raised up by dar fader Jacob in a wile country, whar dar warn't no schools, an' no 'telligence, an' no larnin'; and how his fader lub'd Joseph more dan all ob his bred'rin, an' make fur him a coat ob many colors. But p'raps you don't know dat de Lord lub Joseph a great sight better'n his fader did, an' 'case He lub him so, dat He hardened de hearts ob his bred'rin agin him, till dey sole him to de Ishmaelites—de slavetraders ob dem days, to be taken down inter Egypt. An' p'raps you don't know dat Egypt wus a great country, whar dar wus schools, an' churches, an' great libraries ob books, an' all manner ob sciences; an' dat Joseph wus made de lord ob all dat country, an' dat finarly he got his fader, an' his bred'rin, an' dar wifes, an' all dar little ones, to come down dar, an' stay; whar, dough de tasks war sometimes hard, an' dey hed to 'arn dar bred by de sweat ob dar brow, dey could git knowledge an' larnin'. An' p'raps, too, you don't know dat de chil'ren ob Israel, who war de chil'ren ob Joseph an' his bred'rin, when dey'd staid down dar in Egypt de 'pointed time, war taken by de Lord inter de lan' ob Canaan, which was a lan' 'flowin' wid milk and honey;' and dat dey war gib'n dat lan' far dar possession. Now, my friends,' and he paused and looked around on the congregation, 'de story ob Joseph am de story ob de brack man; he hab been taken out ob de pit; he hab been sole fur twenty pieces ob silver; he hab been brought inter Egypt, an', bless de Lord, he am bound fur de lan' ob Canaan.

'He hab been taken out ob de pit. A pit, my friends, am a dark place, whar de sun neber shine, an' de light neber come; an' Africa, de country whar our faders an' our gran'faders come from—am a pit; fur de darkness cobers dat lan', an' gross darkness de people dareof. Dey hab no cloes—dey lib in cabins made ob clay, an' in holes in de groun'—dey kill an' eat one anoder, an' dey'm allers at war wid one anoder. But de white man he gwoe dar, an' he buy 'em fur twenty pieces ob silver—dat's' zactly de price—twenty silver dollars—dey pay dat fur 'em up ter dis day—dem pore, ign'rant folks won't take nuffin' but silver. Well, de white man buy 'em, and he fotch 'em to dis country, which am like de lan' ob Egypt, full ob schools, ob churches, ob larnin,' an' ob all manner ob good tings. Shore, we hab to wuck hard har; some ob us hab to bear heaby burdens, an' to make bricks w'en dey gib us no straw to make 'em wid; but we am in de lan' ob Egypt, whar we hab knowledge ob de Lord; whar de gospil am preach to us, an' whar we kin fine out de rode to de lan' ob Canaan. (To be shore, we karn't all larn out ob de books; but book larnin' neber make a man, no how.) Yas, my friends, yere we kin fine out de road to de lan' ob Canaan; an' do ye know what dat lan' ob Canaan, dat'm waitin' fur de brack man, am? Do ye 'spose it am a lan' whar de days am hot, an' de nights am cole; whar we'll hoe de cotton, an' gader de turpentine, an' cut de shingles in de swamp? whar we'll wuck till we drop down; whar we'll hunger an' furst? whar de fever will burn in our veins, an' de nager will rattle our bones as de corn am rattled in de hopper? No, my friends, 'tain't no lan' like dat! It am de habitation on high, de city builded ob de Lord, de eberlasting kingdom founded by de Eternal God, who made heaben an' 'arth, de sea, an' all dat in dem is! Oh, tink ob dat, my friends, an' hab courage! Tink ob dat when you'm a faint an' a weary, an' leff you' hearts be glad, an' you' souls rejoice in hope. Fur dat lan' ain't 'spressly fur de white man—it am fur de brack man, too; an' ebery one ob us, eben de brackest, kin git to it ef we'll jess foller der road—ef we'll jess do our duty, bear meekly our burdens, an' lean humbly on de arm ob de Lord. I knows it am so, my friends. I knows it am so, fur de oder night, when de deep sleep fell upon me, I dreamed a dream. I fought dar come to my cabin, an' stood aside ob my bed, a great white angel, wid feet dat touch de 'arth, but wid head dat reach unto de heabens. He wore raiment shinin' like silver, an' on his head wus a girdle ob stars. His face wus dazzlin' as de sun, an' his eyes war like flamin' fire. He look at me, an' he say: 'Joseph, come up hither!' He reach out his hand an' he lift me up—above de 'arth—above de clouds—above de stars—'way up to de high heabens, whar am de sperrits ob just men made perfect, who hab been redeemed from among men, who hab gone fru great tribulation, whose garments hab been washed clean in de blood ob de Lamb! 'Dis,' he say, 'am de city ob de livin' God, de heabenly Jerusalem, whose foundations am saffomires, whose walls am silver, whose streets am gold, whose houses am jewels an' all precious stones! Here de sun neber sets. Here de storm an' de hurricane neber come, an' here, Joseph, am a dwellin' prepared fur you—'here, ef you'm faithful an' 'bedient, you shill come when you' wuck on de 'arth am ober!'

The speaker had been gradually warming with his subject till he uttered this last sentence, when his voice trembled, his face glowed, and his upturned eye seemed gazing on the ineffable glories of the land he was describing. A stillness like that of death fell on the assemblage, and the simple blacks, hanging breathlessly on his words, looked up to where Joe's hand was pointing, as if they too had caught the vision on which his eyes were feasting. In a moment, he continued:

'I looked round, an' I saw dat beautiful city; I breafed its air; I walked its streets; I hard its music—de neber endin' song which its countless people send up to de throne ob de Great Father; an' I say to de angel: 'Do brack folks lib yere? Kin dey come to dis beautiful country?' an' he say: You shill see.' Den he lead me fru dose shinin' streets, out inter de open fiel's whar war pleasant pastures, greener dan any on de 'arth, an' still waters, dat sparkle in de sun, jess like missus' diamonds in de light ob de fire.' (I did not know that Mrs. Preston wore diamonds—she certainly had not worn them in my presence.) 'He lead me out till we come to a great woods, whar fount'ins war playin', an' birds war singin', an' flowers war growin', an' de air wus full of fragrance; an' dar I seed a great crowd ob people gadered togeder, a listenin' to one dat wus a talkin' to 'em. Dar wus Ab'ram, an' Isaac, an' Jacob,—dar wus Moses, an' Joseph, au' Samuel—dar wus David, an' Solomon, an' de prophets—dar wus Paul, an' John, an' Peter,—dar wus 'most all de great an' good men who hab libed in de worle; an' dar too, right aside ob de one dat wus speakin', wus de blessed Saviour, wid de woun' in his side, an' de print ob de nails in his hands. An' who do you tink wus a talkin' dar, to all dem great people? Who do you tink wus fought good 'nuff to stan' by de side ob de blessed Saviour? It wus a brack man! It wus a brack man, who, down yere had been ole, an' lame, an' blind, an' ob no account—so no account he wouldn't sell fur nuffin'. He wus tellin' dem great folks ob de great lub ob de Lord to him, an' dar tears rolled down as dey hard him. He tole 'em how he use to lib in Car'lina—how he wus a slave; how he'd 'most nuffin' to eat; how he wus wucked in de swamp; how, 'fore de sun rose, an' 'way inter de night, he use to stan' in de mud an' de water, till his bones war sore, his heart wus weary, his soul wus faint. How his massa flog him, 'cause he couldn't wuck no more, till de blood run down his back, an' it wus a ridged like de ploughed groun'. How his wife wus whipped to death afore his bery eyes; how his chil'ren—all 'cept one—war sole 'way from him; how dat one 'bused him, an' flogged him, an' tormented him, till he wus jess ready to die. How, when his hair wus white, his body wus bent, his strength wus gone, an' he was ole, an' lame, an' blind, his massa drove him 'way, and make him shirk fur himseff. How he beg in de roads; how he sleep in de woods; in de cole an' de rain, till a good gemman take him in, gib him a bed, tend to his wants, an' pray ober him when he die. He tole 'em all dat; but he say dat fru it all, he hab peace; fru it all, de Lord wus good to him; fru it all, he felt His lub in his heart; fru it all, de blessed Redeemer wus wid him; fru it all, he knowed dat mercy an' salvation am in de heabens! An' DEY AM DAR! Dey took him 'way, 'way from de 'arth; 'way from his suffrin's an' his sorrers down yere, to joy, an' peace, an' rest up dar. Up dar, whar all great an' good men call him brudder—whar de Lord Jehobah call him son, an' whar de blessed Saviour will leff him stan' at his right hand, foreber and eber. An' he, my friends, wus a BRACK MAN! An' who do you 'spose he wus? Who do you 'spose he wus?'

He paused for a moment as he repeated the question, and then, in a slow, impressive manner, continued:

'It wus ole Cale—Cunnel Dawsey's Cale; an' dat good gemman dat take him in and pray ober him when he die—wus my master—yas, bless de Lord, he wus MY master!'

As Joe uttered these last words, Preston bowed his head, his wife sobbed aloud, and the black people gave out a low cry, as sad as the wail which their own mourners breathe over the dead. Fixing his eyes on a tall, stalwart negro in the audience, the preacher continued:

'An' he wus you' fader, Jake! You fader, who, when he wus down yere, you 'bused, an' persecuted, an' treated like a dog, but who up dar am fought worthy to stand at de Saviour's right hand! I knows it wus him, fur I seed him, I talked wid him, an' he gabe me suffin' to tell you. Stand up now, an' yere what he hab to say.'

The black man's face assumed a dogged expression; he moved uneasily on his seat, but showed no inclination to rise. In a firm, imperious tone, Joe again called out to him:

'Stand up, I say! Folks like you' fader am now, don't talk to sech as you when dey'm sittin' down: stand up, or I'll gib you what Cunnel Dawsey neber gabe you in all you' life.'

The negro reluctantly rose. Every eye was fixed upon him as Joe continued:

'He ax me to say to you, Jake, dat he lubs you—lubs you bery much—dat he fully an' freely furgibs you fur all de wrong you eber done him; fur all de tears an' de sorrer you eber cause him. And he say to me: 'Tell Jake dat I'se been down dar an' seed him. I'se seed how he shirk his wuck; how he 'buse his wife an' chil'ren; how he hate his massa, an' mean to kill him—(dough his massa am hard on him, 'tain't no 'scuse fur dat). How he swar, an' lie, an' steal, an' teach all de oder brack folks to do de same. How he'm no fought ob his soul; no fought ob dyin'; no fought ob whar he'm gwine when de Lord's patience am clean worn out wid him. Tell him dat ef he gwo on dis way, he'll neber see his ole fader no more; neber see his ole mudder, an' his little brudders, who am up yere, too, no more; neber come to dis fine country, but be shet out inter outer darkness, whar am weepin' an' wailin' an' knashin' ob teeth. Oh! tell him dis, an 'treat him, by all his fader's keer fur him when he wus a chile; by all his lub fur him now; by all de goodness ob de Lord, who hab borne wid him fru all dese long years, to turn round—to turn round, NOW, an' sot his face towards dis blessed country, whar he kin hab joy foreber! Tell him, too, dat ef he'll do dis, dat his ole fader'll leab his happy home an' come down dar an' holp him; holp him at his wuck; holp him to bar ebery load; gib him strength when he'm weak; hole up his feet when he'm weary; watch ober him day and night, all de time, till he'm ready to come up yere, an' lib wid de Saviour foreber! Tell him—'

Joe paused, for a wild cry echoed through the building, and the negro fell in strong convulsions to the floor.

A scene of indescribable excitement and confusion followed, during which the black was carried out, and, more dead than alive, laid upon the ground. When quiet was somewhat restored, Preston made a short and feeling prayer, and then, after giving out a hymn, he dismissed the congregation with the usual benediction.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: 'Scrape' is the turpentine gathered from the face of the pine. On old trees, the yearly incision is made high above the boxes, and the sap, in flowing down, passes over and adheres to the previously scarified surface. It is thus exposed to the sun, which evaporates the more volatile and valuable portion, and leaves only the hard, which, when manufactured, is mostly rosin. 'Scrape' turpentine is only about half as valuable as 'dip.']

[Footnote 2: "Virgin" Turpentine is twice as valuable as "Dip."]



THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE REBELLION.

II.

The sturdy oak which is not prostrated by the storm that assails it is made thereby to take deeper hold, and to draw the sustenance for a larger growth from the torn and loosened soil into which it has opportunity to thrust new roots and tendrils. Reinvigorated by the resisted violence, its branches shoot upward to the skies and extend themselves laterally with majestic breadth. It gradually gains strength and becomes so firmly rooted in its place that it bids defiance to the repeated tempests vainly striving to overthrow it, and stands for centuries, sublime in its unconquerable might and proud endurance. Our noble Union, fiercely assailed in its early maturity, before its strength has been fully developed, now bends before the hurricane of civil war, swaying to and fro with fearful and threatening movements at every paroxysm of the tremendous blast. We look on with intense agony of suspense, to see whether it will stand the terrible ordeal, and outlive the unexampled convulsion of social elements in which its strength and endurance have been so sorely tested. Instinctively we know that if it survive the present momentous crisis, successfully resisting the attack of the enemy which assails it so furiously, its foundations will be immensely strengthened, and its power of resistance in future dangers will be indefinitely augmented. Prolonged and permanent existence, with assured security and repose, will be the best and most indisputable result of its triumph. Though shaken and torn by the deadly assault, and to a certain extent deprived of its usual resources, in the very effort of resistance it will have put forth new connections, which returning peace will multiply and strengthen. The immense demand on its energy and enterprise will have aroused all its slumbering capacities and stimulated them to the highest point of exertion. Under the necessity of self-preservation, the nation will have been fully awakened to a sense of its gigantic power, which, when employed in the benign pursuits of peace, will be sufficient speedily to restore its prosperity to even more than former splendor. The resources of our broad domain are so unbounded, and the courage and persistence of our people so indomitable, that even the sacrifices and losses of so great a war will make no serious impression on the destined career of this youthful and growing nation. So long as the vigor and elasticity of the popular force is not absolutely overpowered and suppressed, the reaction will only be so much the stronger for all the mighty pressure which has been placed upon it. Returning strength, so invigorated and redoubled by repose, will enable the people to bear the burden patiently, and within a comparatively brief period to throw it off entirely; and then they will bound forward with renewed energy in that race of unexampled progress which has been sadly interrupted, but not by any means wholly arrested.

If peace had continued, and especially if no civil war had occurred to desolate our country, the labors of the population would have been directed chiefly to the increase of wealth, and to the improvement which always accompanies material prosperity. It would be a monstrous error to say that the interruption of these occupations has not been a calamity of the most serious character. Yet is it not altogether unmixed with good. Indeed, it is by no means certain that, in the circumstances which gave rise to the war, there was not an actual necessity, of a moral nature, which made it on the whole advantageous to arouse the nation to this gigantic strife, and thus to exchange its ordinary struggle for wealth into a combat for a momentous principle. Is it questionable whether, in every case, the establishment of such a principle is not the most important of all objects, and whether every other pursuit and occupation ought not to be made secondary to it? In the sacrifices and sufferings which a nation undergoes for the sake of asserting an important moral or political truth, there is always a wholesome virtue that in some measure redeems the brutality and violence which are the inseparable accompaniments of all wars, and which peculiarly characterize the history of civil wars, in every age and country. It is not merely the elevated and unselfish sentiment of patriotism, as known in former ages, and expressed in the noble sentiment, dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, which, engenders lofty impulses and nourishes the rugged virtues of the soldier in the heart; but the still higher sentiment of love for humanity and universal freedom—a sentiment wholly unknown in what are called the heroic ages—sanctifies the labors, the wounds, and the glorious death of the martyrs who struggle and fall in such a contest. Men have often fought and willingly died in the cause of their country, regardless of the merits of the controversy between the opposing parties. There is a certain manliness and devotion to others in this species of patriotism, which commands respect and admiration; and this feeling of approbation rises still higher when the cause of the nation is undeniably just, and the self-sacrificing patriot is giving his life for the purchase of liberty to his country. But the highest and noblest of all exhibitions is that in which the sacrifice is made for the good of the race—for principles in which all men are alike interested, and in which the martyr can claim no peculiar advantage to himself or to his own branch of the human family. The nation which accepts war for such a cause, and wages it with all her means and energies, exhibits a moral grandeur which, in spite of misfortune, has a saving power, capable of overcoming and compensating all calamities, of whatever nature and extent. That nation cannot be overthrown—not unless the laws of the Most High himself can be subverted, and the right be made permanently to succumb to the wrong. Let it be understood, however, that this assertion is made only with reference to wars which are essentially defensive; for no nation has the right to propagate even the best and noblest principles by the power of the sword. In our case, it is true, other motives concur in moving the nation to this tremendous struggle. Not merely the rights and interests of an inferior, degraded, and suffering race appeal to our humanity; but the unity and greatness of our country, its influence abroad, and its success and prosperity at home, are all involved. It is one of many instances in which the best and highest impulses of our nature are reenforced by the dictates of the noblest and most elevated of human interests—the interests of a nation, of a continent, yea, of the world itself; for our gates are still open to the ingress of our brothers from abroad, and our immense and fertile domain, as well as our priceless institutions, are freely offered to their participation.

But, aside from the principles involved in the war, there are results of an interesting character springing from it, which are well worthy the attention of the statesman and the patriot. Two very opposite effects are produced on the minds of the men engaged in such a contest as this, or, indeed, in any contest of arms whatever, when it assumes the proportions of a regular war. The volunteering of our young men of all classes, in numbers so immense, is an extraordinary phenomenon. These soldiers by choice, many of them educated and intelligent, and impelled by deliberate considerations of principle, willingly undergo the hard labor of military training, of marches and campaigns, and the still more trying inactivity of life in camps and fortresses, in new and unfriendly regions and climates. They fearlessly face death in every ghastly form, on the battle field, by exposure in all seasons, by physical exhaustion, and by the most dreadful contagious diseases. They devote themselves unreservedly to the great cause, and in doing so exhibit the noblest spirit of self-sacrifice, and that on the grandest scale presented in history. Fortitude and courage, contempt of the most appalling dangers, disregard of suffering and privation, wounds, mutilation, and lingering death—these are the habits of soul which our citizen soldiers cultivate, and which tend to strengthen and harden the character, and to give it great moral force. The great qualities thus nurtured in the bosom of the multitudes destined soon to return to peaceful life will assuredly make a powerful impression on the whole society, which must be thoroughly pervaded with the manly virtues thence destined to be infused into it. Every man who has been conspicuous for his soldierly conduct and for the faithful performance of duty will be an object of general respect, though he may have passed unscathed through the fiery ordeal; while every maimed and wounded citizen will be regarded as bearing on his person, in his honorable scars and deficient limbs, the decorations which exalt and ennoble him in the eyes of his countrymen. Many a chivalrous deed will be recounted with pride and satisfaction, and handed down to immortality by the pen of history and poetry, and by the pencil and chisel of art. Even the undistinguished services of those who have fought in the war for the Union, and who have passed unchallenged through the fiery ordeal, will be cherished by their children, and transmitted to their remoter posterity with patriotic pride and pardonable self-satisfaction. Thus the glory of noble deeds in this memorable war will everywhere shed its lustre on the national character, and will tend to stimulate the loftiest virtues in the present and succeeding generations.

But, on the other hand, the unavoidable dissipation of military life, the vices of the camp, the brutality and want of moral sensibility engendered by the necessity of slaughter and the horrible ravages of war, will tend largely to counteract the good results already noted. Those who may be nobly disdainful of their own sufferings, will sometimes be even more regardless of the sufferings of others; and perhaps sometimes, with the natural perversion of human passion effected by civil war, will seek to avenge their own misfortunes by ungenerous rigor and cruelty toward all within their power, suspected of favoring the enemy only in thought or sentiment. Even this imperfect discrimination is too often altogether omitted, and innocent loyalty is made to suffer losses and severities which ought never to be visited on non-combatants, even though they be of the enemy. The fearful disregard of human life, and of the accumulations of human labor in the shape of property, which marks the movements of our armies in almost all quarters, and even distinguishes the conduct of some of our high officials, constitutes one of the most serious evils which attend the contest, and which will leave their natural consequences as a permanent injury to the nation. The record of these misdeeds, now disregarded in the hurry and excitement of the conflict, will hereafter confront us with terrible effect. The bad acts themselves will long continue to bear fruit after their kind, and to scatter the seeds of vice over the land. Such drawbacks, however, accompany more or less all great military operations, no matter how sacred the cause in which armies are engaged. Yet, we fear, no such example of generous and unselfish devotion to a holy cause can be found in our present experience as was exhibited by the French people in their violent and bloody revolution of 1789. The mercenary spirit has largely infected the military as well as the civil agencies of our Government. But a people struggling for great principles are compelled to use such instruments as may be at its command; and if the material of armies and their connections in civil life be often of a character to be degraded rather than elevated by the employments and experiences of war, it is nevertheless certain that these bad effects do not always, perhaps not generally, outweigh and overpower the good.