HONOR; 
 
 03, 
 
 THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 BY 
 
 STEPHEN G. BULFINCH. 
 
 "I could not love thee, dear, so much, 
 Loved I not honor more." 
 
 COLONEL RICHARD LOVELACE. 1642. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 i n. :L i .A. in v. SIPEN 
 
 134 WASHINGTON STREET. 
 1864. 
 
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 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1863, by 
 
 STEPHEN G. BULFINCH, 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 
 
 ELECTROTYPES AT THE 
 
 Boston Stereotype Foundry, 
 No. 4 Spring Lane. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 IN introducing this little story to the public, the author 
 would observe that while the tale, as a whole, is fictitious, 
 the sketches of southern scenery, life, and manners, are de- 
 rived from a residence of many years in that section of our 
 country. 
 
 He has wished to do justice to the better side of southern 
 character, while portraying some features of that fatal system, 
 which has been scarce less injurious to the master than to 
 the slave, and has now consummated its work of evil by the 
 crimes and the horrors of the present rebellion, to find 
 therein, let us hope, its own destruction. % 
 
 Some particulars in the narrative, which may seem im- 
 probable, are derived from fact ; such is the incident connected 
 with a popular song; and such the singular legal decisions 
 referred to in the charge of Judge Stanley to the jury. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER -PAGE 
 
 I. { A TRAP TO CATCH A SUNBEAM." .... 7 
 
 II. "WHAT'S IN A NAME?" 15 
 
 III. AN ARRIVAL AND A SCENE. 21 
 
 IV. " HE LEFT HIS COUNTRY FOB HIS COUNTRY'S GOOD." . 30 
 V. COMING TO THE POINT 37 
 
 VI. THE SLAVE-DEALER 47 
 
 VII. TEMPTATION . .55 
 
 VIII. TRAVELLING SOUTH. 66 
 
 IX. LIFE IN XENOPHON 73 
 
 X. A STAGE-COACH AND ITS PASSENGERS. . . .83 
 
 XI. TUSCULUM. . . . . . . . .92 
 
 XII. THE EVIL EVERY WHERE. . . . .103 
 
 XIII. THE GOLD REGION Ill 
 
 XIV. HASTY AND INCAUTIOUS 118 
 
 XV. THE TAVERN AND ITS INMATES 125 
 
 XVI. A STRANGE SCRUPLE. 135 
 
 XVII. THE MOB. 149 
 
 XVIII. COUNTRY LIVING AND RELIGION. . . . .163 
 
 XIX. AN INDIAN CHIEF AND A STRAY POET. . . .176 
 
 XX. INTO THE LION'S MOUTH 191 
 
 XXI. THE TRIAL 204 
 
 XXII. THE DEFENCE 215 
 
 XXIII. THE UNEXPECTED WITNESS 221 
 
 XXIV. THE CONCLUSION. 230 
 
HONOR 
 
 THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 "A TRAP TO CATCH A SUNBEAM." 
 
 town of Irvine, forty or fifty years ago, wore 
 a different aspect from what it does at present : 
 for the cotton factory did not then exist ; there 
 were not half as many houses ; and French roofs and 
 bay windows had not made their appearance. The 
 ground now occupied by the railroad station, from which 
 you look down on the factory buildings around the 
 stream, and on the village rising up the hill beyond, was 
 then part of Captain Bates's farm. But there were the 
 hills around ; there was Mount Josey, with its blue 
 dome terminating the vista up the valley. There, too, 
 was the stream ; and though not as laborious as at 
 present, it did something besides singing, for it turned 
 a mill. The mill-pond spread out where it spreads now, 
 
 (7) 
 
'8 HONOR', OR, 
 
 except that then its border of pond lilies was farther 
 down. The building of the new dam has raised the 
 water, and almost drowned ont the willows there to the 
 left of the old Livingston house, that substantial square 
 mansion, rather low-studded, whose grounds are sepa- 
 rated from the rest of the village by the road that crosses 
 the bridge. 
 
 That Livingston house used to be a pretty place ; 
 some might think, prettier than it is now; for its 
 grounds'have been encroached on in other directions than 
 that of the pond, though what is left of them has been 
 very much improved. The elms in front, now so large, 
 were handsome trees even then ; there was not that 
 arbor-vitae hedge, but there were more lilacs. Mr. Liv- 
 ingston was much interested in his. apples and pears, 
 which were splendid fruit, and still more so in his 
 peach-trees, which ungrateful things ! would yield, 
 for all his care, poor specimens compared with those 
 of New Jersey. 
 
 Mrs. Livingston was quite as much interested in her 
 flower-garden. Besides her fondness for flowers, it gave 
 her something to take care of, and supplied thus in a 
 degree the one want of her life. 
 
 It was a peaceful house, sometimes a little too peace- 
 ful. The Livingstons would have been better pleased if 
 the silence of their home had been broken by infant 
 voices ; but though married for several years, the blessing 
 of children had not been granted to them ; and, except 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 9 
 
 when young nephews and nieces came to visit them, the 
 stillness of the house was more deep than suited the kind- 
 hearted pair. Formed, both of them, to find pleasure 
 in conferring it, they needed an object towards which 
 their hearts could expand themselves, one whom they 
 could care for, provide for, feel for, and pray for, in 
 whom they could treasure up hopes and expectations, 
 which, even if they never should be realized, would at 
 least have conferred a blessing in the prospect. 
 
 Mr. Livingston was a lawyer, who had retired from 
 business with more than enough for his own wants ; and 
 nowhere did the minister, Dr. Solesby, find a more ready 
 attention paid to his representations, where the distresses 
 of the poor were the theme, and any thing could be done 
 for their relief. Such a case once occurred, which formed 
 a memorable epoch in the family history. 
 
 " Mrs. Livingston," said Dr. Solesby, " I have called 
 to ask if you could come with me to see that poor woman 
 at Bailey's tavern." The preparations were soon made, 
 and the lady and her clerical friend were on their way. 
 They passed out of the quiet street of dwelling-houses 
 and gardens, and entered that which was the scene of 
 business in the little town. Passing the various stores, 
 they stopped at the piazza entrance of the hotel. There 
 were but few people about, and those in the bar-room ; 
 so, without stopping to speak to any, Dr. Solesby led the 
 way through the entry and up the stairs to an attic in the 
 back part of the house, where, through his interest in 
 
10 HONOR', OB, 
 
 their behalf, the family in question had been allowed to 
 remain. 
 
 The room was uncarpeted, and the two chairs, bed, and 
 table, were of the simplest kind. A woman was lying 
 on the bed ; and a little girl, about five years old, was 
 seated near her on a stool. 
 
 " How kind of your reverence to come so soon again ! " 
 said the woman, when he had saluted her by the name 
 of Mrs. Witham. "And of this lady, too," she ad'ded, 
 casting a glance around, and uttering a word of excuse 
 for the appearance of her room. 
 
 " Never mind that/* said Mrs. Livingston. "I 
 am sorry to see you so ill, and sorry that I did 
 not know of it before. How long have you been in 
 Irvine?" 
 
 " About five months, ma'am," said the woman. " I 
 came here with my husband, who was in search of work 
 at his trade ; but there seemed little for him to do here ; 
 and after staying a month, he left me, to try and find a 
 place for himself, and promised to let me know, that I 
 might join him." 
 
 " Have you not heard from him since ? " inquired the 
 lady. 
 
 " No, ma'am. He is no great writer, and he wouldn't 
 care to write, unless he had some good news to tell. 
 And there's no knowing how far he's gone. I shouldn't 
 wonder if he had gone to New O'leens ; for he often 
 talked about it." 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. H 
 
 " But how could he find money to take the journey, 
 when he left you in such a situation ? " 
 
 " That's just it, ma'am," said Mrs. Witham. He 
 had money enough when he went away ; for he had sold 
 the shop and our furniture when we left Eastford. That 
 was the place we settled in first, when we came from 
 England ; but he took a dislike to it, because they didn't 
 treat him kindly. They told stories on him, and said 
 that he was a drunken Englishman, and that he stole. 
 But, as I was saying, that's just why I am so poor off, 
 because John said he'd have to take the money, to go 
 round and look out a place where he could work. He 
 left me a dollar, and I meant to find a little place and 
 take in washing ; but I took sick, and should have died 
 before now, if the good minister hadn't looked up friends 
 for me." 
 
 " You tire yourself," said Mrs. Livingston, kindly ; 
 "do not talk any more now. Here," said she to the 
 little girl, " are you mother's nurse, little one?" 
 
 " I take care of mammy a little," said the child, 
 timidly. 
 
 " Don't you wish that father would come back, so as 
 to take care of her better ? " said the clergyman. 
 
 The child cast down her eyes, and murmured a "yes, 
 sir ; " the tone of which seemed to belie its meaning. 
 
 " Betsy don't like her father as she ought to," said 
 the woman. " I suppose it's because he whips her 
 sometimes more than he ought to do ; but that's because 
 
12 HONOR} OR, 
 
 he's in liquor, you know, ma'am ; and he can't help what 
 he does then. But you're a naughty girl, Betsy, not to 
 love your father, and the lady won't like you, if you 
 do so." 
 
 The child turned her tearful eyes up to Mrs. Living- 
 ston, and said, with a mixture of feeling and sullenness, 
 " I don't like anybody but mother." 
 
 " But you won't have no mother much longer," said 
 the woman, " and then you must mind what father says, 
 when he comes back. O, I wish John would come back, 
 if he was ever so sharp with Betsy or with me. But 
 now he's gone to New O'leens, and I shall never see him 
 again ; and what will become of Betsy ? " 
 
 " Trust your child to Him who is the Father of the 
 fatherless," said the minister. 
 
 The woman looked at him uncertainly for a minute, 
 and then said, " I know what you mean, sir, but I ain't 
 good enough to trust like that. As bad as John is some- 
 times to me, he'd see that his child shouldn't starve. O, 
 I wish John was back ! " 
 
 " My friend," said Mrs. Livingston, who found a pur- 
 pose which her husband and herself had indefinitely 
 cherished, brought to active life by the sweet looks and 
 unprotected condition of the child, " you have cause to 
 trust in God, for he has already provided friends for 
 you and yours. If this sickness of yours should be to 
 death, I will take care of your child." 
 
 The woman looked up with a grateful smile ; but at 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 13 
 
 once another expression, an eager and a deprecating one, 
 came upon her face ; and she answered, " But what 
 would John do, if he came home, and found Betsy given 
 away ? He must have her, ma'am, whether or no, if he 
 comes back and wants her ; and I'm sure he will want 
 her if he lives to come back." 
 
 " But how can you speak for him," said Mrs. Living- 
 ston, with more warmth than consideration, " when he 
 has abused you and your child through intemperance, 
 and at last abandoned you ? " 
 
 " O," said the woman, " as for drinking, many's the 
 good man that's not himself when he's taken his drop of 
 comfort ; and as for his leaving me, why, of course it is 
 to find work, so that he may take care of us all. But 
 John's a good husband when he's himself, ma'am ; and 
 he'll be a good father to Betsy, when he comes back 
 some day. And if you'll keep her till then, ma'am, 
 and see that she's clothed and fed, I'm sure God will 
 reward you ; but the child must be John's, when John 
 wants her." 
 
 The illness of Mrs. Witham, notwithstanding the kind 
 care of her new friend, increased, and terminated with 
 her death. The offer made by Mrs. Livingston was 
 willingly confirmed by her husband ; and after the humble 
 funeral was over, Dr. Solesby directed the carriage which 
 alone had followed the hearse, to be driven to Mr. Liv- 
 ingston's, and, descending himself, handed from it Mrs. 
 2 
 
14 HONOR; OH, 
 
 Livingston and the little girl, who was now clothed in 
 deep mourning. As they walked up the pathway, Mr. 
 Livingston advanced from the door, and, taking the little 
 one in his arms, gave a father's kiss and a father's 
 blessing to his adopted child. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER 15 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 "WHAT'S IN A NAME?" 
 
 Livingstons, in adopting little Betsy 
 Witham, had been somewhat disquieted by 
 the earnest reservation which the mother had 
 made in favor of the father's rights, provided he should 
 return. They thought best to make inquiries, however, 
 in the village of Eastford, from which the Withams had 
 come ; and in this Dr. Solesby was able to assist them, 
 by corresponding with a minister in that vicinity, with 
 whom he was acquainted. From this friend he learned 
 that the Withams were, as the woman had intimated, 
 English people that they had lived in Eastford 
 about three years, little Betsy being about two years 
 old at the time of their arrival. The father, it ap- 
 peared, was a carpenter, and an expert workman, when 
 he chose to work ; but he was not only addicted to dis- 
 sipation, but his character lay under the suspicion of 
 darker offences. When sober, he was reserved and 
 sullen ; when excited by drink, noisy and quarrelsome. 
 A number of petty offences against property had been 
 
16 HONOR; OH, 
 
 committed while they lived in Eastford. Hen-roosts 
 and gardens, which had previously, in that quiet town, 
 been as safe as the gold in a bank vault, and possibly 
 safer, were mysteriously plundered ; and people said that 
 the drunken carpenter's family lived well, as far as 
 poultry and fruit went. The man, too, in his cups, had 
 incautiously boasted of his exploits, in " the old country," 
 in the poaching line ; and, when some surprise was 
 expressed, had defended his actions by a logic which 
 would apply as well to Yankee farm-yards as to English 
 preserves. Still, positive proof was wanting, and none 
 liked to be prominent in seeking it, because some were 
 held in awe by the strength and violent character of the 
 man, and others pitied his feeble and suffering wife. At 
 last, however, a house in a town near Eastford was 
 entered in the night ; silver spoons, a watch, and some 
 other articles, and seventy dollars in money, were miss- 
 ing ; and suspicion fell on Witham too strongly for the 
 matter to be kept in silence. He was arrested, but 
 denied the charge made against him, and demanded that 
 his house should be searched. This was done in the 
 most thorough manner ; but none of the stolen property 
 was found, nor did any circumstance come to light 
 which could confirm the suspicion that had been enter- 
 tained. The carpenter complained bitterly of the un- 
 friendliness of the people, and declared his determination 
 to remove from the neighborhood, where, as he said, he 
 had been persecuted. It was not long before the real 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 17 
 
 thief was discovered, and William freed from all suspi- 
 cion of the robbery. He continued in his purpose, how- 
 ever, saying sullenly that he would not stay where he 
 had been so treated. The sale of his goods at auction 
 was well attended, and the family left the village, not 
 much to the. regret of its inhabitants, with the means 
 thus obtained. 
 
 Such was the account which Dr. Solesby received from 
 his friend, the Rev. Mr. Wilson. To this he could add, 
 of his own knowledge, that the family, on arriving at 
 Irvine, had taken a room at the hotel ; that Mrs. 
 Witham's feeble health had lapsed into serious illness, 
 which her husband seemed to regard with much more 
 of vexation than of sympathy ; that at length Witham 
 had left his wife, avowedly to consult an English physician 
 in the county town ; and that from his journey he had 
 never returned. The woman, when the time appointed 
 for his return passed by, seemed less surprised than 
 afflicted ; and when it was found that Witham had gone 
 without paying his bill, and had left no money for that 
 purpose with his wife, the conclusion was clear, that it 
 was on his side an intended flight. The tavern-keeper 
 was disposed to lay blame upon the woman also ; but 
 compassion and Dr. Solesby's intercession prevailed ; and 
 the poor woman was allowed to spend her last days 
 in the humble room where she was found by Mrs. Liv- 
 ingston. 
 
 The account which has just been given was the subject 
 2* 
 
18 HONOR; OR, 
 
 of long and anxious consultation between Mr. and Mrs. 
 Livingston and the worthy minister. Where had Witham 
 gone ? Would he return ? Would he desire to claim his 
 child? Could he take it, without their consent, from 
 those who had assumed the charge of it when deserted 
 by him? Mr. Livingston studied his law-books, and 
 consulted his neighbor and professional brother, Mr. 
 Richards ; but as neither of them could foretell whether 
 the father would return soon or late, able or unable to 
 maintain the child, with a steady character, or a worth- 
 less vagabond, little satisfaction could be obtained. 
 
 One thing was plain the child was to be taken care 
 of ; and this duty and privilege of the present time Mr. 
 and Mrs. Livingston determined to accept, leaving to 
 the future the decision of other questions. So, when 
 the little Betsy was brought to their house, she was 
 received on an uncertain footing in theory, but, as it 
 quickly appeared, a very definite one in practice. They 
 intended to be very cautious, but the child's winning 
 ways got the better of their caution. Their hearts 
 became warmer and warmer towards the little orphan, 
 and before a month was out she was the orphan Betsy 
 no longer, but Elizabeth, or, by contraction, Lizzie, the 
 beloved daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Livingston. How the 
 change came about may be imagined, in its other stages, 
 from what passed in regard to the names by which the 
 little charge should salute her new guardians. - 
 
 " I think," said Mr. Livingston, after some conversa- 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 19 
 
 tion on this point, " that I must give up to you. ' Mr. 
 Livingston' and 'Mrs. Livingston' would be rather 
 formal, I admit. Pity the name is such a long one ! " 
 
 " But ' aunt ' and ' uncle/ " said his wife. 
 
 " Yes, ' aunt ' and ' uncle ' will do. That is affection- 
 ate ; and though I don't like confounding the relations of 
 life, yet this is an excepted case. 'Aunt' and 'uncle' 
 let it be." 
 
 With this decision they met little Lizzie in the break- 
 fast room, where she had gone before them. The child 
 left the kitten, with which she had been playing, and 
 nestling to her protector's breast, began to give an 
 account of pussy's tricks. 
 
 " And, mother," said she, " kitty was trying to catch 
 hold of the table-cloth, and Bridget drove her away, for 
 fear she would pull the teapot over. Do you think, 
 mother, kitty could pull over that big teapot?" 
 
 Mrs. Livingston knew that she ought to tell her to 
 call her ' aunt ' ; but the words would not come. That 
 name 'mother' was so sweet to her ears, that she 
 could not check the child for using it. Mr. Livingston 
 saw his wife's weakness, and determined to show his 
 strength. 
 
 " Come here, Lizzie," said he ; "I have something to 
 say to you." 
 
 " Let me go, mother ; I must go to father," said the 
 little one ; and she ran laughing to him, and seated her- 
 self upon his knee. 
 
20 HONOR i OR, 
 
 " You call me ' father/ dear," began Mr. Livingston, 
 not quite as strong as he had intended to be. 
 
 " O, yes ; I've got a nice, dear father," said the child. 
 " All little girls have fathers and mothers, that they live 
 with." 
 
 " But Mrs. Witham. was your real mother, my dear," 
 said the cautious protector. 
 
 "Yes," said Lizzie, with a shade of sadness for an 
 instant ; and then added, " When I staid over there, she 
 was my mother ; and now you are my mother, and you 
 are my father. All little girls have fathers and mothers." 
 
 "What can she know about it, husband?" said his 
 wife ; "let her call us so ; it will do no harm." 
 
 " But, Lizzie," continued he, not so ready to relinquish 
 his point, " if your real father, Mr. Witham, comes 
 back, you know you must " 
 
 " O, I don't want to go back ! I don't want to go 
 back ! " cried the little girl, in an agony of fear ; " for 
 father scolds and whips me so ; and now he'll do it worse 
 than ever, because mother isn't there to say 'Please 
 don't/ O, I want to stay with you, and have you for 
 father and mother." 
 
 " Call us 4 uncle ' and c aunt/ " said Mr. Livingston. 
 
 " Father and mother," said the child, pleadingly ; "all 
 little girls have fathers and mothers." 
 
 And so the question was practically settled. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 21 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 AN ARRIVAL, AND A SCENE. 
 
 Betsy "Witham was changed into Lizzie 
 /| Livingston. The surname indeed was scarcely 
 \ij/ thought of, till Miss Brown's bill was presented, 
 " for one quarter's tuition of Miss Livingston ; " whereon, 
 after some conversation, it was decided, that though it 
 was a mistake on the part of Miss Brown, it would not 
 he worth while to say any thing to her about it. So 
 successive bills were paid, in which the same error 
 regularly occurred ; all the school associates of Lizzie 
 fell into the same misapprehension. Lizzie herself re- 
 garded Livingston as her name, and even her protectors 
 forgot that there was any mistake in the matter. So 
 passed three years, during which the little girl met and 
 overcame the difficulties of learning, from the a, b, c, to 
 the multiplication table, and proved herself a bright, 
 intelligent, and affectionate child. 
 
 One day, when Lizzie was engaged in her studies at 
 school, a man presented himself at the door, and inquired 
 for Betsy Witham. The name was a strange one to the 
 
22 HONOR', OR, 
 
 scholar who had answered his knock, and with some 
 impatience he asked to see the teacher. Miss Brown 
 accordingly left the class which she was hearing, and 
 with dignified step advanced to the door. The man who 
 stood there was not in appearance such as she was used 
 to converse with ; for hers was a private school, patron- 
 ized by the wealthier people of the village, by some 
 from aristocratic feeling, by others from parental tender- 
 ness or caution, in view of the hardships and exposures 
 which they dreaded for their children in the public 
 schools. The visitor was rather showily than well 
 dressed, with hat jantily disposed on one side, and that 
 arrangement of stock, vest, and watch-chain, which 
 marks the effort at gentility that defeats itself. The 
 man's face might have been handsome, but that it 
 bore the marks of intemperate habits and unregulated 
 passion. 
 
 "Is there a little girl here of the name of Betsy 
 Witham ? " said the man to Miss Brown. 
 
 " No, sir," replied the lady ; "I have no scholar of 
 that name." 
 
 " I think you have, ma'am," said the man, bluntly. 
 " I was told she came to school here, and had for some 
 years. My name is Witham ; I am her father, and I 
 insist upon seeing her." 
 
 Miss Brown's answer had been given in forgetfulness 
 of the story of her pupil, Lizzie Livingston, and the 
 former name of the little girl had never been impressed 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 23 
 
 on her memory. But now that story recurred to her 
 mind. 
 
 " I am not sure, sir," she replied, " that I was right in 
 my first answer. There is a little girl here who goes by 
 a different name, but who may be your daughter. Was 
 she not adopted by Mr. Livingston ? " 
 
 " Goes by a different name ! " said the man. " I 
 wonder what right any one has to give another name to 
 my child. That's the one, ma'am, and I want to see 
 her, about the quickest ; and I'd like to see any body that 
 would take upon him to keep father and child apart." 
 
 The voice of the father was loud enough to be heard 
 through the thin partition which separated the entry from 
 the school-room. Lizzie heard it without a thought that 
 she was concerned in the discussion which appeared to 
 be so angrily carried on by one of the parties. But she 
 raised her eyes, as others did, when the teacher ree'n- 
 tered, received with some surprise her signal to come 
 forward, and was ushered into the entry with no idea 
 why she was sent for. 
 
 "This is the little girl, sir," said Miss Brown. 
 Witham gazed upon her with surprise and pleasure. 
 
 " I should not have known you, little one," said he ; 
 " and of course you don't know me. I am your father, 
 dear, and I've come home, pretty well off in the world, 
 to take you to live with me. So, put on your bonnet, 
 and show me the place where you live ; for I must go 
 and see the folks there, and thank them for taking care 
 
24 HONOR; OX, 
 
 of you. I don't mean to steal you away. I've no need 
 to, for you're my daughter, and nobody has a right to 
 keep you from me." 
 
 Lizzie stood in bewildered astonishment. She had 
 long ceased to think of any earthly father but Mr. Liv- 
 ingston ; and the remembrances of early childhood, as 
 they came to her again, were not such as to make her 
 overjoyed at the sight of her real parent. The teacher, 
 however, thought it her duty to interfere. 
 
 " Mr. Witham," said she, " I think it would be better 
 for you to call on Mr. Livingston without the little girl.- 
 I have nothing to say against your claim to her as her 
 father, but that is not for me to settle. It was Mr. and 
 Mrs. Livingston who left her in my charge, and I am 
 answerable to them." 
 
 " You think, ma'am, I'll steal her away? Why, don't 
 you see I have no occasion. I'm the child's own father, 
 and Mr. Lewiston, or whatever his name is, can't come 
 between me and her. Come, Betsy, put on your things, 
 and let's go and see these friends of yours." 
 
 The child, bewildered as she was, and not much 
 pleased with the paternal claim, caught with some hope 
 at the idea suggested by his use of a name which had 
 now become strange to her. 
 
 " My name isn't Betsy," said she ; " it is Lizzie Living- 
 ston." 
 
 " Livingston," said the man with an oath. " Don't 
 say that to me again, unless you want me to knock you 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER, 25 
 
 down. If you've forgotten your own name and your 
 father's looks, I guess you have not forgotten the feeling 
 of his right hand. Come along this minute, you silly 
 slut," as the frightened child began to cry. 
 
 " Mr. Witham," said the lady, with firmness, " I can- 
 not allow you to take the child at present. I have only 
 your own word for it that you are her father, and, as I 
 said before, I am accountable to Mr. Livingston." 
 
 This name brought forth another profane exclamation. 
 " Come along," said the father, fiercely ; and as the girl 
 hung back, and pressed to her teacher, he seized her, and 
 shaking her violently, gave her a blow upon the face. 
 
 All was now confusion. The children, who had before 
 listened in mute curiosity and fear to Witham' s loud and 
 angry voice, now excited by Lizzie's cries, rushed into 
 the entry ; and while some of the older ones gathered 
 round and tried to soothe her, the younger ones fled, 
 bonnetless, towards their homes. Lizzie was crying as 
 if her heart would break. The teacher, who had stood a 
 moment in silent indignation, now seeing her suffering 
 pupil in friendly hands, turned, with no little severity in 
 her manner, to Witham. 
 
 " You see, sir, what your violence has done. You 
 take but a poor way to make your child love you, or to 
 induce her present protectors to relinquish her. For 
 one, I assure you that not only you shall not take her 
 from my school, but that I will not suffer her to go home, 
 except under sufficient guard." 
 
26 HONOR', OR, 
 
 " We'll see about that," said the man, who, though 
 shamed at first by the excitement caused through his 
 violence, was roused again by Miss Brown's tone of 
 defiance. He pushed aside one of the girls, who was 
 trying to comfort Lizzie, and seizing the child in his 
 arms, began to carry her from the school-house. 
 
 Nearly opposite was the office of lawyer Richards a 
 neat one-story building, within the same enclosure with 
 the lawyer's mansion, and overshadowed by the same 
 elms. The squire was at this time absent ; and perhaps 
 it was in consequence of this that his nephew, Fred 
 Bryant, who sat at a green-covered table near one of 
 the front windows, had suffered his eyes to wander from 
 his Greek Grammar sufficiently to notice the visit of the 
 stranger at Miss Brown's. After the man had entered, 
 Fred returned to the adjective that was before him ; but 
 having partly committed it to memory, he thought it as 
 well not to look at the book, but repeated its declension 
 over to himself, while steadily gazing out of the window. 
 At Lizzie's cry the boy dropped his adjective, and rose 
 from his seat ; and when Witham came out, bearing the 
 child, and followed by the whole terrified school, Fred 
 rushed from the office, and was across the street in a 
 moment. 
 
 "What are you doing, you scoundrel?" he cried. 
 "Put that child down! Help, help! Mr. Williams! 
 Mr. Johnson ! " he cried, as some of the storekeepers 
 appeared at their doors. " Here's a man carrying off a 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 27 
 
 little girl, and she's crying ! Why, it's Lizzie Living- 
 ston," he added, as he caught sight of the child's face. 
 This discovery kindled his blood still more, and with 
 another command to put the child down, the boy of four- 
 teen grappled with the powerful and reckless man. 
 
 Witham, though encumbered with the child, shook off 
 and threw down his young assailant ; but Johnson, 
 Williams, and others, came running up. 
 
 "What is this about?" "What are you doing with 
 that child?" "For shame, for shame !" exclaimed one 
 and another. 
 
 " Don't touch him, my lad," said Mr. Johnson, the 
 storekeeper, as the boy rose, and seemed about to recom- 
 mence the unequal contest. " We'll see justice done. 
 You're a brave boy, but you're no match for a man." 
 
 " What is all this?" said Dr. Solesby, whose house 
 was near, and who, though a man of peace, was yet not 
 the man to hold back when the innocent and feeble were 
 to be protected. 
 
 Others came round, some from their houses, to 
 which their frightened children had carried the tidings, 
 some from passing in the street ; and there were loud 
 and indignant voices at the outrage which had been com- 
 mitted. 
 
 The voices subsided suddenly, however, when Witham 
 declared himself the father of the child. The man saw 
 his advantage, and pressed it, conquering his passion, by 
 a strong effort, sufficiently for his present purpose. 
 
28 HONOR; OJl, 
 
 u I am the child's own father," he said, " and she is 
 the only one I have. I'm a poor man ; and while I've 
 been gone, my wife died, and Squire Somebody has took 
 my child, and dizened her out, and made her forget her 
 own name. But all that don't prevent her from being 
 my child still. If I've got angry and struck her, I've 
 had some reason ; and a father has a right to correct his 
 children. You've none of you any right to stop me, and 
 stop me you shall not. Make way there, and let's see 
 if Yankees will see child and father separated." Lizzie, 
 having ceased her screams and abandoned resistance, 
 lay motionless in his arms. 
 
 " He has the best right, of course, to his own child," 
 said Johnson. 
 
 " It may be a question for the lawyers," said Williams, 
 the shoemaker, " but I won't interfere to take a girl from 
 her own father." 
 
 " But when her own father goes off and leaves her to 
 perish," said young Brooks, the carpenter, "it is hard if 
 he can come back and take her all the same as if he had 
 been the best of parents take her away, too, from those 
 who had provided for her when he had deserted her." 
 
 " But I guess Squire Richards would tell you, Brooks," 
 said Johnson, -" that a father's a father, any how." 
 
 Dr. Solesby now interposed. " Mr. Witham," said 
 he, " I was with your wife at the time she died, and it 
 certainly was her wish that you should have your child. 
 I am sure my friend Mr. Livingston will do what is 
 
*- THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 29 
 
 right in the matter. There is no need of taking her 
 away in this forcible manner. And it is rather hard, 
 when he and his wife have treated her so kindly for years, 
 after you had desert I mean, when you were not here to 
 take care of her yourself that she should be snatched 
 from them as if they had stolen her. Look," he added ; 
 " the poor child is half dead with fright. Bring her into 
 my house, close by here, and let her have a little time to 
 recover. Depend upon it, no harm shall be done to your 
 rights in the matter." 
 
 The father looked at his little girl, and found that she 
 had indeed fainted. He was not altogether sorry for this 
 excuse to accept the temporary compromise offered him 
 by the minister ; for it had by this time occurred to him 
 that the charge of a child, who for the present must be in 
 some sort a prisoner, would be no slight care. To the 
 minister's house, therefore, he bore his insensible bur- 
 den, and left her in the charge of Mrs. Solesby, after 
 receiving her husband's solemn assurance that Lizzie 
 should not leave the house until the following day. 
 3* 
 
30 HONOR', OR, 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 "HE LEFT HIS COUNTRY FOR HIS COUNTRY'S GOOD." 
 
 OHN WITHAM was the son of an English farm- 
 er, the tenant of a small farm on the estate of 
 Lord Cloudesley. In spite of an early reputa- 
 tion for wild daring, or perhaps even assisted by that 
 reputation, the handsome youth found favor in the eyes 
 of Betsy Jennings, the daughter of a neighboring tenant. 
 They married young ; and the child who bore her mother's 
 name was the youngest of three, the two elder having 
 died in those scenes of fatigue and privation to which 
 their father's vices had exposed them. For strong drink, 
 which was used by all around him, was to Witham not 
 merely a temptation to excess in its own use, it excited 
 his imagination and kindled his passions. As he came 
 more and more under its power, and within the circle of 
 companions to which it conducted him, his days were less 
 given to his business as a carpenter, and his nights more 
 to poaching in the preserves of Cloudesley Manor. His 
 offences of this description were for some time suspected ; 
 and, had not the steward, a cousin of Witham's wife, 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 31 
 
 been willingly blind for her sake, the suspicions might 
 have been readily confirmed. At last, however, the 
 young man's reputation became so bad, and his acts so 
 impossible to be overlooked, that a sudden emigration to 
 America was the only alternative to a prison. The 
 carpenter's cottage was found closed one morning, long 
 after the wife was usually astir, and the officers of justice, 
 who had been employed by the steward, arrived only to 
 learn from an idle boy that Witham and his family had 
 been seen, the evening before, going towards the " Cloudes- 
 ley Arms," at a time which indicated that they would 
 take the night coach for Liverpool. The steward, who 
 had accompanied the officers, seemed greatly disappointed 
 and indignant. He urged an immediate pursuit, and 
 only with apparent reluctance suffered himself to be per- 
 suaded that it would be more than the arrest of a poacher 
 was worth, to track him through the wilderness of a 
 great city ; and that if the country was rid of him, it 
 was as well that he should leave it at his own expense, 
 as to be sent to a penal colony at the public cost. None 
 knew better than the steward, however, where the money 
 came from for this sudden flight; for he had himself 
 advanced it from funds of Lord Cloudesley in his hands, 
 on a pledge of repayment from his uncle, the father of 
 Mrs. Witham. 
 
 The absconding carpenter found his way to the New 
 World ; but he brought his Old-World habits with him. 
 His course from the time of his landing till he abandoned 
 
32 HONOR; OR, 
 
 his wife to the compassion of the good people of Irvine, 
 has been already briefly indicated. The fact was, the 
 fancy of the wild and unprincipled man had been fired by 
 the accounts he heard from persons recently returned 
 from the South and South -West. In a new country, not 
 yet subjected to the control of law, he felt certain of that 
 success which he was determined to gain either by the 
 exercise of his trade, or, if that failed, by shorter and 
 darker paths. In the years he spent there, he narrowly 
 escaped, in several instances, being shot in private quar- 
 rel, or hung by Lynch law ; he had tried a variety of 
 callings, nearly corresponding to the nursery summary, 
 "carpenter, sailor, soldier, gentleman, butcher, thief;" 
 and returned, at last, with means enough to establish him 
 in business in an older section of the country, and deter- 
 mined to reclaim the wife and child whom he had 
 deserted. 
 
 He was somewhat shocked to find that the wife who 
 so patiently endured his evil ways, had sunk so soon be- 
 neath the trials which separation from him she loved had 
 made harder to bear. He had not expected this ; but, 
 counting on the sympathy and aid which he found were in 
 this country so freely extended to those in poverty, he had 
 supposed that she would be taken care of, while his own 
 course would not be impeded by the presence of a sick 
 wife and a young child. Towards those who had taken 
 charge of his daughter, his mind wavered between grati- 
 tude for their kindness and jealousy of their influence. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 33 
 
 He determined to see her and to reclaim her. Yet, as 
 in returning he had expected to find his wife and child 
 together, he was unprepared with any plan for the care 
 and education of his daughter. As, after the scene at 
 the school-house, he thought over this matter at the 
 hotel, his reflections took a form more favorable than 
 before to the continuance of the child with her present 
 protectors. 
 
 " I wonder," said he to himself, " what sort of people 
 these Livingstons are. Proud enough, I'll be sworn. 
 But they've dressed up Betsy neat, and taken care of her, 
 when she was nothing to them. They shall not keep her 
 from me, however. And yet, if I take her, what can I do 
 with her? Here I have no place fixed on to live in, and 
 I don't care to settle down any where quite yet. A little 
 girl like her wants some woman to take care of her some 
 decent woman, too ; and who ? Poor Betsy ! Well, 
 that's over ; but I don't feel like marrying just now." 
 
 The result of a night spent in reflections like these, 
 was, that on the following day Witham repaired to Dr. 
 Solesby's with a disposition more conciliatory than he 
 had previously shown. He accompanied the minister to 
 Mr. Livingston's, and met that gentleman and his wife 
 with some words in excuse of his violence the day before, 
 thanked them for the care they had taken of his daughter, 
 and expressed his willingness that she should remain 
 with them for the present. The Livingstons were anx- 
 ious to obtain from him an entire surrender of the child 
 
34 HONOR; OR, 
 
 whom they now habitually regarded as their own. They 
 urged their claim upon Lizzie, founded on her abandon- 
 ment by her father. This excited Witham's resentment, 
 and the conference threatened to have an angry ending ; 
 but Dr. Solesby acting as peacemaker, the matter was 
 settled at last by a compromise, or rather an indefinite 
 postponement. Witham saw his daughter, and endeav- 
 ored by caresses to remove the unpleasant impression of 
 the school-house scene. The Livingstons heard at length, 
 with great satisfaction, that their visitor intended to leave 
 the village on the following day. He gave little account 
 of his plans, further than that he should go to New York, 
 and look about him for a while ; that by and by he in- 
 tended to settle down, and that then he should want 
 Betsy to come and live with him. 
 
 The Livingstons were careful neither to commit them- 
 selves by assenting to this, nor to excite him by contra- 
 dicting it ; and they saw him depart at last with a feeling 
 of relief for the present, but of dread for the future. 
 They had become strongly attached to their little charge, 
 and felt that without her their house would be desolate 
 indeed. But their anxiety to retain her was not on their 
 own account alone. They shrunk from seeing her in the 
 absolute power of one so ill fitted either to guide or 
 govern her, as the father whose parting from her had 
 been in base desertion, and whose return was in abuse 
 and violence. But at least a respite was given. Unable 
 to penetrate the future, they withdrew their minds from 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 35 
 
 painful, and, as it seemed to them, useless anticipation ; 
 and as months again passed on without intelligence of 
 Witham, they ceased to speak of him ; and cherished 
 their adopted darling, with the increasing hope that she 
 would be theirs while their life should last, and render to 
 their old age the offices of filial affection. 
 
 And years passed on, and still Lizzie shared the home 
 of those who loved her as their own child. A few visits, 
 made by her father without previous notice, reminded her 
 of his existence, and awakened more of fear than of love, 
 and more of curiosity than of fear. Her guardians 
 thought it right that as soon as she reached a suitable 
 age, she should have full information of the early circum- 
 stances of her own life ; and this she received in part 
 from Mrs. Livingston, and in part from Dr. Solesby. It 
 was with deep emotion that she heard repeated her 
 mother's earnest charge that she should not be kept from 
 her father, if he ever returned to claim her. As other 
 years passed on, the thought of that possible claim, and 
 of the difficulties and the duties that might result from it, 
 became blended with other thoughts, the effect in part 
 of temperament, and in part of education. Naturally 
 imaginative, she read eagerly those works of fiction, and 
 especially of poetry, which the judgment of her guardians 
 allowed for her perusal ; and she loved in leisure mo- 
 ments to muse upon the incidents there described, and 
 to fancy how she would have acted under the circum- 
 stances in which some favorite heroine was placed. This 
 
36 HOXOR; OR, 
 
 tendency might have led to unhealthy dreaminess, had 
 not Mrs. Livingston instilled, with the utmost care, the 
 sentiments of religious and moral obligation, and accus- 
 tomed her, in every time of doubt, to ask of herself the 
 question, What is right ? Thus romance and poetry took 
 their place, in the development of her mind, in harmony 
 with the more serious teaching she received. Her 
 enthusiastic character fixed its aspirations on the pure 
 and the true ; on virtue, honor, usefulness, self-sacrifice. 
 Her favorite heroines were the Siberian exile, who made 
 her way across the deserts to obtain her father's pardon ; 
 the Scotch girl, who with similar exertion saved the 
 sister whom she would not save by falsehood ; and the 
 daughter of Wallenstein, who taught her lover to prefer 
 honor and duty to herself and her father's cause. Thus, 
 too, for herself she dreamed at times of a self-sacrificing 
 future ; and especially when saddened, as she sometimes 
 was, at the thought that she might be called to leave her 
 pleasant home and her beloved guardians, .she would 
 turn for comfort to the imaginations of duties opening 
 else where. She would fancy a distant but not unpleasant 
 home, to which she might add what would otherwise be 
 wanting of attractiveness, and where her patience might 
 calm her father's passionate feelings, her persuasions 
 check his tendency to any wrong self-indulgence, and her 
 love soothe his declining days. Meantime she busied 
 herself in constant gentle efforts for those around her, in 
 the happy home of the present. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 37 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. 
 
 boy Frederick Bryant meantime was ripen- 
 ing into a young man. With the lively fancies 
 suited to his age, (mingled thoughts of improve- 
 ment r honor, usefulness, \and a gentle presence seemed to 
 float through all his visions, the gay and the grave alike. 
 Often, often in the autumn, after their acquaintance be- 
 gan, had he watched from his uncle's office door till Liz- 
 zie appeared, and followed her with his eyes along the 
 street under the trees, until she turned in at the door of 
 the school-house. At such times he would fancy what 
 deeds he would perform, if that rude man should appear 
 and offer any injury to the little girl ; then, when he had 
 lost sight of her, he would turn to his baize-covered table 
 in the corner of the office, and try his pen in writing, in 
 different hands, the name of Lizzie Livingston, until Mr. 
 Richards's entrance suggested the expediency of a return 
 to his Virgil. 
 
 Since those days he had passed through his college 
 course with honor, and had now commenced the study 
 4 
 
38 HONOR; OR, 
 
 of law, in the office of an eminent counsellor in Boston. 
 He was, therefore, only an occasional visitant at Irvine ; 
 and when he returned there, as the time drew nigh for 
 his admission to the bar, he looked with deeper interest 
 than ever on the child of former years, and observed 
 with delight the change that had taken place in her, 
 more marked than any between his previous visits. 
 Nor was she less pleased with her boy-protector, in his 
 transformation into a tall and gentlemanly young lawyer. 
 The intercourse between them was at first a little con- 
 strained, neither being quite sure of their mutual position. 
 But very quickly the old familiarity returned, and, if 
 they did not play together as noisily as in former days, 
 there was not less enjoyment in their renewed acquaint- 
 ance. Music was a favorite art with them both, and 
 Lizzie's voice and Frederick's suited each other well ; or 
 his fine execution on the flute afforded an admirable ac- 
 companiment to hers on the piano. "Without a thought 
 in the mind of either, that looked beyond the present, 
 their meetings gave life a different aspect to them both. 
 The Livingstons, more keen-sighted, were in no doubt to 
 what the intimacy tended, but saw no reason to discour- 
 age it ; for Frederick Bryant stood high for character 
 and promise ; and, if they felt pained at the thought of 
 Lizzie's leaving their home, even for that of a husband, it 
 still seemed that an early engagement would afford some 
 security against the possible capricious interference of her 
 father. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 39 
 
 It was on an afternoon in the latter part of summer, 
 that Frederick and Lizzie had been with a party of 
 friends to a sail upon the pond, still known by its In- 
 dian name of Sunkesuck, about a mile west of Irvine 
 village. They now strolled homeward, in company with 
 Henry Waldron, James Finch, and Mary Merton. Mary 
 was a year or two older than Lizzie, and very conscious 
 of the difference. Waldron was her devoted, but ap- 
 parently not favored admirer ; while Finch was one of 
 those young men who enjoy the society of all ladies, but 
 seem resolved to be made captive by none. Mary had 
 been conversing with both the gentlemen, taking care 
 not to show a preference to either, until, in passing a 
 brook on stepping-stones, she was obliged, in taking the 
 support of one, to reject that of the other. Waldron 
 advanced first, and, stepping on the first of the stones, 
 oifered his hand to Mary. N 
 
 " O, I am afraid," said she, drawing back. " Let 
 me rest a moment, for I should slip if I went on now. 
 Go on, Mr. Waldron ; do not wait for me : Mr. Finch, 
 don't let me detain you. I'll stay for the others." 
 
 Waldron, discouraged, went on ; Finch followed more 
 slowly, when Bryant and Lizzie, who had been convers- 
 ing a few steps in the rear, came up, and, without noti- 
 cing the purpose of Miss Merton's delay, passed on, Fred- 
 erick supporting Lizzie carefully across the brook. Miss 
 Merton looked vexed, and Finch laughed and returned. 
 
 " That is civility," said she, " to leave me here and go 
 
40 HONOR i OR, 
 
 on with that school girl. How perfectly blind the man is ! 
 He can see nothing but little A, B, C." 
 
 " Cupid is blind," said Finch. " Miss Merton, shall we 
 cross the brook ? " And he assisted her across, meeting 
 half way poor Waldron, who was returning to offer again 
 his rejected aid. 
 
 Waldron turned now disconsolately away. But the 
 coquette had no mind to discourage him too far. " Look 
 at Fred Bryant and that little girl, Mr. Waldron," said 
 she. " What do you suppose he is talking about?" 
 
 " Something tender, I fancy," said Waldron. 
 
 " Tender ! Nonsense ! He's examining her in geog- 
 raphy or spelling. Is not Fred a member of the school 
 committee ? " 
 
 " The poor things are so engaged, they'll lose their 
 way," said Finch. " Waldron, can't you go forward and 
 take care of them?" 
 
 " I might as well be the one too many there as here," 
 said the indignant lover ; and, going forward at a rapid 
 walk, he passed the couple in front, only saying, in a low 
 voice, as he did so, " Don't court too openly, Fred." 
 
 Frederick looked back, and stopped till the two in the 
 rear came up, the coquette covering her disappointment 
 at Waldron's withdrawal by a laugh. She and her re- 
 maining escort turned at length into a road which con- 
 ducted to her father's house. Bryant, to whom Wal- 
 dron's words had furnished the key of his own feelings, 
 had suddenly become silent. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 41 
 
 Lizzie had not heard the remark, but she knew Mary 
 well enough to understand Waldron' s sudden flight. 
 
 " There," said she, " Mary Merton has been tormenting 
 poor Waldron again, and he has gone off in indignation. 
 How can she take pleasure in making him unhappy ! " 
 
 " You would not do so, Lizzie, would you?" 
 
 " I hope not but I can't tell. The temptation has 
 never come to me, and 'tis doubtful whether it will 
 when I am grown up." 
 
 " But, if it did, I am sure, Lizzie, sure, that your 
 heart is too good to trifle with the feelings of one who 
 loves you." 
 
 His tone was very earnest, and Lizzie felt an excite- 
 ment she did not understand ; yet, true to one of her 
 principles, to defend the absent, she replied, 
 
 " Perhaps Mr. Waldron misunderstood her. Indeed, 
 his extreme devotion is so obvious that it furnishes a 
 provocation, almost an excuse, for a little coquetry." 
 
 " ' 0, wad some power the giftie gie us 
 To see oursels as ithers see us ! ' " 
 
 replied Bryant. He was thinking of Waldron's warning 
 to him, and coupling it with this remark upon the giver 
 of the warning. 
 
 Lizzie looked up surprised. " Does my sentiment 
 shock you, Frederick ? " said she. " I would be the last 
 to defend real, intentional coquetry ; but I hope poor 
 Mary is really not guilty of that." 
 4* 
 
42 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " Whether so or not, I am sure, dear girl, you never 
 could be." 
 
 What further passed during that walk which proved 
 longer than the distance home required we do not 
 know ; but Lizzie and Mrs. Livingston had a long talk 
 that night, and Mr. Bryant came to see Mr. Livingston 
 the next day. The young man declared in warm terms 
 his attachment to Lizzie, spoke with modest confidence 
 of his own prospects in business, and asked Mr. Living- 
 ston to permit their engagement. They were both young, 
 he knew, and he would not ask that their marriage 
 should at once take place, but he urged his wishes to be 
 received as an approved suitor. 
 
 Mr. Livingston was surprised, as many a parent has 
 been, to find that his little girl had become in the eyes of 
 others a woman. He had approved the growing inti- 
 macy, but had not expected it to ripen quite so soon. At 
 first, he was disposed to laugh the offer aside, on account 
 of the youth of the parties ; but this would not do. The 
 young friend who sat before him, as full of serious pur- 
 pose as of warm attachment, was unquestionably a man ; 
 and if he still thought of Lizzie as a child, he must admit 
 that her childish years were passing rapidly away ; and 
 when they should be over, who so fit to make her happy 
 as this same youth? 
 
 Bryant's parents, now no more, Mr. Livingston had 
 known and respected highly ; their son appeared to in- 
 herit the character of his father, as well as the resem- 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 43 
 
 blance, which, at that moment, seemed to his father's 
 friend stronger than ever. 
 
 The expenses of an education had indeed nearly ex- 
 hausted the orphan's slender patrimony ; but with the 
 patronage of his uncle Richards, and his own abilities, 
 there seemed no danger but that he could find adequate 
 support ; and to whom should Mr. Livingston's own prop- 
 erty descend, but to his adopted daughter ? 
 
 Such thoughts passed through the good man's mind as 
 he sat thoughtful and silent, scarce hearing the earnest 
 pleading of his visitor ; but the last of them recalled an 
 objection which appeared insurmountable. 
 
 " My dear young friend," he said, " I do not know to 
 whom I should give my consent more readily, if Lizzie 
 is willing to give hers ; but, you remember, I am not really 
 her father." 
 
 " But her father leaves her entirely to you," said the 
 young man. " He has hardly ever come to see her ; and, 
 from what I remember of him, I should suppose his visits 
 could not be much desired. What right would he have, 
 after neglecting her all her life, to interfere with objec- 
 tions to a marriage which you should approve? My 
 blood boils now, when I think of the brutal way he treated 
 her when she was a little child." 
 
 " Why, Fred, you were her champion so long ago as 
 that," said Mr. Livingston, with a smile. " Perhaps Mr. 
 Witham might like it still less, to find her not only en- 
 gaged, but engaged to the boy that undertook to fight him 
 in her behalf." 
 
44 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " He ought not to bear malice, for I got the worst of 
 it," said Frederick. " But really, dear sir, this man's 
 character is a reason in itself for our engagement. Who 
 can protect her so well as a husband ? " 
 
 " But you do not propose an immediate marriage ? " 
 
 " No, I did not ; but, now I think of it, under these 
 circumstances, with this man's claim hanging over her all 
 the time, would it not be better to give me at once the 
 legal title, that would enable me to hold her against all 
 the world?" 
 
 " Too fast, too fast, my earnest young lover. How 
 would it seem on my part, when the poor man came back, 
 and found that I had married off his daughter at sixteen, 
 without giving him notice ? Lizzie would never consent 
 to it, either ; and it would not seem like you to steal a 
 march, and avail yourself of the father's absence in such 
 a way as that." 
 
 Frederick blushed, and excused himself with some 
 confusion. " But," said he, recovering himself, " if we 
 ought not to be married, can we not be engaged ? If her 
 father returns, he can make inquiries about me. I trust," 
 he added, proudly, " he will hear nothing that will give 
 him just grounds to break off the engagement." 
 
 " No, my dear fellow ; an engagement ought not to be 
 formed under such circumstances. It would be wrong 
 towards Witham, and would be laying up trouble for 
 yourself and Lizzie, and all of us." 
 
 " But then, sir, can we not find this man, and induce 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 45 
 
 him to give his consent ? Have you no information where 
 he is, that we could write to him, or that I could go and 
 see him ? " 
 
 " None, whatever. He comes unexpectedly, and leaves 
 no word where he is going. Indeed, I must confess, I 
 have wished to have as little to do with him as possible. 
 I have treated him decently when he came ; and when 
 he left, I have been glad of it, and have let him go with- 
 out wishing to know where. Perhaps I ought not to 
 have yielded to a feeling of aversion ; but I have had 
 some reason besides. If he should commit some desper- 
 ate action, and be in danger from the law, it would be 
 quite as well that I should not know where he was to be 
 found." 
 
 " It is too bad that Lizzie's fate should depend on such 
 a man ! But if he can be found, sir, have I your con- 
 sent that I should try to obtain his ? And, until he is 
 found, may I come and see Lizzie as formerly ? " 
 
 " It cannot be quite as formerly, Frederick. You and 
 Lizzie cannot be much in each other's society, after what 
 has passed, without its going further than I can now in 
 honor permit. I cannot forbid you the house, both as a 
 friend yourself, and as the son of an old friend ; but you 
 ought not to come as Lizzie's lover, and you would not 
 like to come as a stranger." 
 
 " I don't see, then, but that I am in effect forbidden," 
 said the young man, rising. 
 
 " No, my dear boy, do not be angry. I will do the 
 
46 HONOR; OB, 
 
 best I can. Visit us occasionally ; I will try all means I 
 can think of to discover Witham ; and, if he is found, I 
 trust all will be well. At any rate, when Lizzie is of 
 age, her father's consent will no longer be required by 
 law or honor ; and I do not think we need wait for any 
 other consideration." 
 
 Young Bryant thanked his friend, though rather sadly, 
 and returned slowly to his room at his uncle Richards's. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 47 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE SLAVE-DEALEE. 
 
 INGE the conversation recorded in our last 
 chapter, Mr. Bryant had been absent for a 
 
 time ; had been examined and admitted to the 
 bar ; had returned, and placed his sign below that of his 
 uncle on the office in Irvine. The interest taken by the 
 Livingston family in these events had removed whatever 
 feeling of constraint had arisen between them and their 
 young friend ; and their intercourse was again on its old 
 familiar footing, when an event took place which the 
 young man had earnestly desired. This was the return 
 of Mr. Witham. 
 
 He came in showy vest, with brilliant watch-guard and 
 unfailing cigar. He came not alone. In a bold, scrawl- 
 ing hand, he entered on the hotel register the names of 
 "Mr. and Mrs. Witham." The latter person was a 
 woman of feeble and timid aspect, several years younger 
 than her husband, and who had evidently been married 
 long enough to know the strength of her husband's will, 
 and to submit to it entirely. 
 
48 HONOR', OR, 
 
 Witham called upon the Livingstons with his wife, and 
 made the latter acquainted with his daughter. Lizzie 
 and her new mother met each other with looks of mutual 
 fear. Witham observed it, and exclaimed with a laugh, 
 " Why, I don't know which seems the most frightened. 
 Cheer up, Betsy ; there's nothing to be afraid of in Susan 
 your mother, I mean. She's only a sight too easy 
 hasn't got spirit enough to manage a kitten. And, Susan, 
 I'll warrant you'll find Betsy a good girl." The two 
 looked at each other, and the detection by each of a feel- 
 ing like her own, produced a mutual smile, and a mutual 
 disposition to be friends. 
 
 Still, it was with a sort of shudder that Lizzie heard 
 from her father that he had come to claim her at last. 
 He had been successful in the South- West, in what 
 business he did not say, had married there, and had 
 now come back to New England with the purpose of 
 returning in the autumn, and establishing himself as 
 keeper of a hotel. His daughter was to go with him ; 
 he spoke of this not as a subject of consultation, but as 
 something decided upon. He thanked Mr. and Mrs. 
 Livingston for their care of her ; and, as he spoke, a 
 feeling of the real extent of his obligation to them seemed 
 to come upon him, perhaps for the first time ; for it was 
 with much warmth that he repeated his thanks, and 
 declared that he should never forget how they had taken 
 charge of his poor girl when there was no one else to 
 stand by her, and had brought her up to look like a lady. 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 49 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Livingston were not a little embar- 
 rassed. They could not deny the general right of a 
 father to the services of his child under age ; and 
 Witham's circumstances in life, and even his manners, 
 were so far improved, that it was difficult to state the 
 precise grounds why he should be considered- unfit to 
 take charge of his own daughter. The man's appear- 
 ance was not prepossessing, and the prospect of his home 
 at a hotel in Alabama was any thing but agreeable to the 
 northern feelings of Lizzie's friends. They both felt 
 deeply the loss they should sustain, the desolation of their 
 own house when the child who had so long been its light 
 was taken from it ; but even this feeling was overpowered 
 in that of anxiety for her. 
 
 Mrs. Livingston inquired as to the size and character 
 of the town in which Witham. intended to reside. 
 
 " It's a fine place, ma'am, for that country ; its name's 
 Xenophon, the county town of Saunders County. The 
 great things they deals in round there is cotton and 
 niggers ; so there's white and black, the two extremes to 
 choose between." 
 
 " Have you many negroes about you, Mr. Witham?" 
 said Mrs. Livingston. 
 
 " O, plenty rather more than plenty so many 
 they're in each other's way. Betsy won't have a thing 
 to do but sit in the parlor and thrum the piano, except 
 she may have to take her mother's place sometimes, 
 looking after those lazy blackeys. About them, the 
 5 
 
50 HONOR i OR, 
 
 traders stops pretty often with a good sight of 'em, 
 coming from Virginia; but they won't be in Betsy's 
 way." 
 
 " You * have negro - traders stopping at the house, 
 father?" said Lizzie. "It seems to me I should be 
 afraid of the very sight of such a man." 
 
 " It wouldn't be a worse sight than you have seen, 
 Betsy ; and I can tell you, the money that comes from 
 negro-trading is mighty convenient." 
 
 The inference which might have been drawn as to 
 Witham's own history was prevented by the entrance of 
 Frederick Bryant, who was introduced by Mr. Livingston 
 to Lizzie's father and mother. Witham, however, after 
 this interruption, resumed his former subject in a loud 
 tone. 
 
 " You don't think much of nigger-traders round here, I 
 reckon ; but I can tell you, at the South they are as fine 
 gentlemen as any. Some of the great planters and some 
 squeamish city folks do turn up their noses at us, that 
 is, at the traders ; but I don't know any of them but 
 will come and buy a nigger for all that, when they want 
 one ; and I don't know as it's any worse to sell than it is 
 to buy." 
 
 " So our abolitionists say, Mr. "Witham," said Bryant. 
 " They say the system is all one ; if one part is right, 
 all is right, and if one part is wrong, all is wrong. If 
 the slave trade is wrong, it is wrong to hold slaves ; the 
 receiver is as bad as the thief." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 51 
 
 " Thief's rather a hard name for a man that's had his 
 slaves grow up on his own plantation. But I know what 
 you mean, and I think so far the evolutionists is about 
 right, that if one part's bad, all's bad, and if one part's 
 good, all's good. Now, I say, it's right to hold slaves ; it's 
 right to buy 'em, it's right to sell 'em ; it's right to bring 
 'em from Virginia, and it's right to bring 'em from Africa ; 
 and I don't care what any Yankee [we omit the oath] 
 says to the contrary." 
 
 The party looked at each other a moment in silence. 
 Fred, whose indignation was held in check by a strong 
 wish to conciliate Lizzie's father, tried to change the 
 subject by mentioning the news of the day. But the 
 effort was not a successful one, for that news suggested a 
 conversation on the political questions then agitating the 
 country ; and on these the visitor again displayed offen- 
 sively the arrogant dogmatism of ignorance and self- 
 interest. Fred saw that he had made no progress ; and, 
 too honest to conceal his real opinions, he found it his 
 best course to withdraw, leaving his intended suit to Mr. 
 Witham to be urged at a more favorable time. 
 
 The next day Frederick saw Witham in private, and 
 made an offer of his hand to Lizzie, referring her father 
 to Mr. Livingston and Mr. Richards for a further knowl- 
 edge of his character and prospects. But the negro- 
 trader had been so little pleased with the young man the 
 day before, that he received the proposal very coldly. 
 He only answered at first that Betsy was too young, and 
 
52 HONOR; OR, 
 
 that he wanted her to be with him now, as he had not had 
 her with him for so many years. Frederick repressed 
 the impatient answer which sought utterance, that the 
 affection which had waited so long might wait longer, 
 and besought the privilege of an engagement, or at least 
 permission to correspond. But Witham did not choose 
 to have a son-in-law whose deportment and principles 
 were a reproach to his own. " Besides," thought he to 
 himself, " there is no need of throwing her away upon a 
 Yankee lawyer. She's a fine-looking girl, and there are 
 smart young fellows enough in Xenophon, or, if not there, 
 in Montgomery, or, if not tnere, in New Orleans, that 
 will be glad to make her mistress of their land and 
 niggers." So the interview between the suitor and the 
 father ended with a blunt refusal on the part of the latter, 
 and with high wrath indifferently concealed on the part 
 of the former. 
 
 Fred, however, was not to be so baffled. He con- 
 versed with Mrs. Livingston, and found her in deep 
 distress at the anticipated loss of her adopted child a 
 loss embittered by the evidence which every hour's inter- 
 course with Witham increased, of his want of cultiva- 
 tion/ his narrow and sordid mind, and his looseness of 
 principle. From her the young lawyer resorted to his 
 uncle, and inquired of him with earnestness whether the 
 law would sanction the claim of Witham to resume his 
 child, against her own will, and that of the friends who 
 had cherished her as their own, and had borne the entire 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 53 
 
 expense of her education. Mr. Richards assented to the 
 weight of the considerations thus named, but suggested 
 those which balanced them. Witham had never surren- 
 dered his claim over his child ; that claim had been 
 acknowledged by the Livingstons not only by implication 
 but expressly ; and whatever the decision might be, Mr. 
 Richards pointed out to his nephew the painful character, 
 in every respect, of an appeal to law on such a subject ; 
 the agony of the choice to which the young lady would 
 be subjected, obliged to take a part against either her 
 real or her adopting father ; and the misery of having her 
 name and the names of her friends spread before the 
 public, with every detail that impertinent curiosity could 
 collect, in the papers of the day. There was but one 
 claim, Mr. Richards said, which superseded that of a 
 father ; and that was a husband's. 
 
 " O that I had that claim ! " said the young man. 
 "And if Lizzie would consent to let me rescue her 
 from this living death, this banishment to Alabama, 
 this living among slaves and slave-drivers, it might 
 be done." 
 
 " How would you manage about the marriage license ? " 
 said his uncle, smiling. " You would not have a run- 
 away match, and go to New Hampshire ? That would 
 not do for you, a Sunday school teacher at Dr. Solesby's 
 church." 
 
 And so saying, the good lawyer went forth to attend 
 to some business at the Registry of Deeds, little thinking 
 5* 
 
54 HONOR-, OR, 
 
 that he had suggested to his nephew to commit a deed, 
 which, though palliated by circumstances, would be regis- 
 tered against him by the feelings of the community, and 
 by the plain laws of natural and of Christian rectitude. 
 
THE SLAVE -DE ALERTS DAUGHTER. 55 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 TEMPTATION. 
 
 CMCV \ ITHAM and his wife remained in Irvine 
 il it ^ or a ^ me * Their accommodations at the 
 ^IVlx^ hotel were very different from those which 
 had been unwillingly bestowed upon the dying mother. 
 The English carpenter, now appearing as a " gentleman 
 from the South," insisted on the best apartments and the 
 best fare that the house afforded. He was loud and 
 important in the bar-room ; and it was with some diffi- 
 culty that the tavern-keeper contrived to conceal his 
 guest's potations behind the thin veil of decency which 
 increasing excitement on the subject of temperance ren- 
 dered needful. Witham rode out frequently, driving the 
 most spirited horses that could be procured. Sometimes 
 his wife accompanied him ; sometimes he called at the 
 Livingstons', and took his daughter ; and sometimes he 
 had the company of a weak youth named Pickett, who 
 boarded at the hotel, and in whose eyes the stranger was 
 a glorious object, from the show he made, and his taste 
 in brandy and in horses. Once, in a moment of good 
 
56 HONOR; OR, 
 
 nature, he asked Fred to go with him ; but the young 
 man, more honest than prudent, replied to the showy 
 slave-trader with so ill a grace, that Witham swore 
 deeper than ever that he would never let that proud 
 puppy come near Betsy. 
 
 At length he left the town, to attend, as he said, to 
 some business in New York ; and Mrs. Witham remained 
 at the hotel till his return. The Livingstons, who had 
 seen his course with increasing dislike, breathed freer in 
 his absence ; and Lizzie, as she stood at the private door 
 of the hotel, almost blamed herself for not feeling that 
 sinking of the heart which she had experienced there, 
 when expecting to meet her father. 
 
 She found her step-mother in a room, such as hotel par- 
 lors are apt to be, stiffly fine, with much of show, but little 
 of comfort. Two books lay on the centre-table, the one 
 a quarto volume full of coarse portraits of eminent per- 
 sons, alternating with pages full of advertisements ; and 
 the other a Bible, bearing on its substantial covers the 
 inscription, " Presented to the Tenadnuck House, Irvine, 
 by the Washington County Bible Society." Tenadnuck, 
 it may be observed by the way, was the name which a 
 learned professor had declared to be the true Indian 
 designation of the neighboring mountain ; and the en- 
 deavor was strongly made, but as yet with imperfect suc- 
 cess, to bring it into common use, instead of the homely 
 appellation of Mount Josey. 
 
 Mrs. Witham was sitting in a rocking-chair, with her 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 57 
 
 face turned from the window, slowly rocking, and gazing 
 at the empty grate. She looked up with a smile of pleas- 
 ure, yet with something of embarrassment, as her step- 
 daughter entered, and said, 
 
 " Well, Miss Betsy, I'm glad to see you." 
 
 " I thought you might be lonely, ma'am, since Mr. 
 Witham I mean since father is gone," replied Lizzie. 
 
 " Why, yes," said the elder female. " I am lonesome, 
 rather. But it isn't because John is gone, for he often 
 goes away, and leaves me a long time together ; but this 
 house seems so strange and so grand-like, I can't get 
 used to it. I didn't mind it when he was here ; but now 
 I don't like to go about alone, and it's so queer calling on 
 these white people to help one. When I'm to home, I 
 don't mind calling on the niggers when I want any thing ; 
 
 but these white servants . How a white man can 
 
 make a nigger of hisself, and be ordered about, I don't 
 see." 
 
 " I have seen so few black people, I should feel strange 
 in speaking to one." 
 
 "Why, law, I don't feel strange about that at all. 
 They ain't like us, no way, to be spoke to as if we 
 was on our p's and q's with 'em. They mind right easy ; 
 and I tell you they've got to mind, too, when John's 
 about. He'll make 'em stand round, the roughest 
 of 'em." 
 
 " Does father own many slaves ? " said Lizzie, timidly. 
 
 " O, sometimes many, and sometimes none at all," said 
 
58 HONOR; OR, 
 
 the wife. " It's just as happens ; but commonly about 
 November the yard's pretty full ; and then in the winter 
 they go off, except some bad bargains, that stay along till 
 spring." 
 
 The daughter looked at her step-mother with a bewil- 
 dered expression. " The yard ! " she repeated. " Do 
 they stay out in the yard?" 
 
 " O, when I say the yard, I mean the places that's 
 built in it the jail, and the nigger-houses, and all." 
 
 " Jail ! " said Lizzie. " Excuse me, I know it is rude 
 to repeat your words, but I don't understand. What has 
 my father to do with a jail? " 
 
 " O, law ! " said Mrs. Witham, laughing. " That's 
 the place where he shuts up the new niggers, or any 
 that's just going to be sold. Didn't you know, Miss 
 Betsy," she added, " that your father was a slave- 
 dealer?" 
 
 " My father a slave-dealer ! " repeated the girl with a 
 voice of dismay. 
 
 " Yes, he's a slave-trader, and a very good business it 
 is. He's made money at it, hand over hand. He went 
 into it first with my brother, who had been in the busi- 
 ness before ; and that's the way I come to know him." 
 
 " But what a horrid business," said Lizzie, " to buy 
 and sell human beings ! I can't bear to think of my 
 father engaged in such a work ! " 
 
 " Why, miss, you needn't be a looking down on your 
 father for what he does," said his helpmeet, with some 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 59 
 
 anger in her voice. " And it doesn't seem very polite 
 either, for all you're so well eddicated, to talk so about 
 a trade that my husband and my brother is in. But 
 don't cry, Betsy. It must seem strange to you, I sup- 
 pose ; but there's no harm in it. Old father Williamson, 
 the Methodist preacher, often says God made the race 
 of Ham to be slaves, and it's right they should be. And 
 if it's right to buy and sell them, why, then, the men that 
 deal in 'em is just like any other merchants." 
 
 " But does father treat them kindly?" 
 
 " O, yes ; as kindly as any body. They have to be 
 whipped sometimes, you know ; but he takes care not to 
 overwork them, nor nothing. You see they wouldn't 
 sell so well. Sometimes he's rough ; but then," her voice 
 sinking, and a tear in her eye, " sometimes he's pretty 
 rough with me." 
 
 " But the separating of husband and wife " 
 
 " Why, dear, it isn't his fault. If a planter comes 
 and sells him a likely gal, how is he to know she's got a 
 husband? Most likely she hasn't, but only some one 
 that lived with her. And then he does what he can to 
 get her a husband soon. But you ain't going, Miss 
 Betsy, be you ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Lizzie, rising. " Please to excuse me 
 now, and forgive me for my rudeness. It was all so 
 new to me ; but I hope I shall learn to bear it." 
 
 The unhappy girl returned to the pleasant home, which 
 soon was to be hers no longer. With difficulty had she 
 
60 HONOR} OB, 
 
 schooled her mind, not indeed to submit, for that was 
 at once resolved on, but to submit without an expression 
 of the deep repugnance that she felt at going to a distant, 
 unknown section with such a father as hers appeared to 
 be. But then she had supposed him a merchant, engaged 
 in some honorable branch of business. Now she had 
 learned that he was a slave-dealer a man who had en- 
 riched himself by trafficking in the flesh and blood of his 
 fellow-creatures a man whose vocation was despised 
 even by those who employed him, whether to relieve them 
 of troublesome slaves, or to furnish their fields with new 
 laborers. Happily, her ideas of the revolting character 
 of the business were indefinite. The horrors before her 
 were in great part unknown ; and, when she had reached 
 her home, and relieved her feelings in solitary tears, she 
 sought and found strength for duty. As she rose from 
 her knees, she said aloud, " Come what may, I will be a 
 faithful daughter." 
 
 When Lizzie appeared at the evening meal, the friends 
 who had watched her for some weeks with saddened 
 hearts had no suspicion that the day had been one of 
 peculiar mental trial. The dejection which they had 
 detected through her studious effort to conceal it seemed 
 to have gone. Her manner was more natural ; and if 
 they missed the careless gayety of the child, they had in 
 its place something, unknown before, of the dignity of 
 the woman. So completely had the high thought that 
 occupied her triumphed over the sadness of her antici- 
 pated destiny. 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 61 
 
 They were already seated at table, when Fred Bryant 
 came in, with the freedom of an old acquaintance. His 
 cheek was flushed, and his manner betrayed the burden 
 on his mind. Sometimes he would sit silent, and not 
 seem to hear the words addressed to him ; then, starting 
 from his reverie, he would talk with a seemingly careless 
 rattle that he had never before ventured on, at least in 
 that company. 
 
 Tea was over at last, and the good Livingstons, pitying 
 the young man, saw no reason why they should deny him 
 the private interview with Lizzie which he evidently 
 desired. So the husband took up his evening paper, and 
 the wife withdrew on the plea of family cares. A window 
 opening to the floor communicated with a piazza, and 
 Fred, passing through, asked Lizzie some question about 
 the beautiful honeysuckle that overhung it. i As she fol- 
 lowed, and before she could answer, he exclaimed, in a 
 vehement whisper, 
 
 " Shame on the man wlio would tear that lovely vine 
 away from where it has grown for years, and take it to 
 wither and die around a slave-pen at the South ! " 
 
 " O Fred," she answered, sadly, " I know what you 
 mean ; but he is my father. The vine belongs to him ; 
 and, perhaps," she added with a reverent look, " God 
 means the vine to yield some shelter to the poor tenants 
 of the slave-pen." 
 
 " You shelter them ! " he replied. " Dear enthusiast, 
 you will need shelter yourself ; and I can give it to you. 
 6 
 
62 HONOR i OS, 
 
 Will you not take it ? I cannot bear it, either for myself 
 or you, that you should go South with this this man, 
 if he is your father." 
 
 " Alas, Frederick, if it was right for me to wish to 
 stay, I have no choice. He has every right, by the laws 
 of God and man ; and my refusal would only make un- 
 happiness and discord, without accomplishing its object. 
 I should only go as a prisoner, instead of a daughter." 
 
 " Nay, I would keep you as a prisoner," said he, with 
 a fond smile ; " a prisoner such as I am myself, fettered 
 by love." 
 
 " Love's chain reaches far," said she. " If we are 
 parted in person, we may be together in spirit." 
 
 " Ah," he replied, " that gives me some comfort. But 
 what will come to you when so far off ? Your father 
 dislikes me, and I cannot pretend to like him ; and to you 
 new scenes will bring new attractions." 
 
 " Frederick ! " 
 
 " O, forgive me. I cannot distrust you. But I can 
 and must fear for you. You do not know the nature of 
 the scenes to which you are going. Do you know the 
 business your father carries on ? " 
 
 " Yes, Fred, I found out to-day that he not only owns 
 slaves, but deals in them. O Fred, you have given your 
 noble, free, manly heart to the daughter of a slave- 
 trader." 
 
 " No, no7" he answered ; " not his daughter. He 
 gave you up in childhood ; he disgraces you and tyran- 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 63 
 
 nizes over you now. No, you are Lizzie Livingston, not 
 Betsy Witham. And, before to-morrow evening, I will 
 call you, if you will let me, by another name." He 
 stooped and whispered, " Lizzie Bryant." 
 
 She started and trembled. " O Fred, do not speak 
 of that. You know it cannot be." 
 
 " It can be, very well, dearest. Such things are done 
 every day. We are but twenty miles from the borders 
 of another state, whose laws are less strict than ours are ; 
 or at least they are construed so as to allow the marriage 
 of persons from this side the line, without license or cer- 
 tificate. Do but say the word, and we will be on our 
 way there in the morning, with one of the same fast 
 horses that your father is so fond of driving." 
 
 " O Frederick, it cannot be. Besides my father's 
 claims, I should be setting aside those of my kind friends 
 here my true father and mother they often seem 
 to me." 
 
 " They are such indeed, dear Lizzie. And do not doubt 
 that what I propose will have their approval. I must 
 not tell them, for they are bound in honor to oppose it ; 
 but when it is done, they will rejoice to keep you near 
 them, and thank me for cutting the Gordian knot that 
 they could not untie." 
 
 " No, Fred, it must not be. They would be suspected 
 of having betrayed their trust ; they would be involved in 
 a deadly quarrel with my father, and so would you be. 
 And they would feel that I had not rightly returned their 
 
64 HONOR} OR, 
 
 love and confidence. No, dear Fred, my duty is plain ; 
 
 and I feel that God has given me strength to do it. I 
 
 have said in his presence, Come what will, I will be a 
 
 faithful daughter." 
 
 " O, Lizzie, am I nothing to you, then? " 
 
 "You are every thing to me, Fred, that duty will let 
 
 you be. I see I must take Richard Lovelace's words on 
 
 a girl's lips, and say, 
 
 not love thee, dear, so much, J 
 Loved I not honor more.' " 
 
 He paused a moment, and said, " You are right, and I 
 am wrong. It should be the knight that says that, not 
 the lady. I am ashamed that you should have to say it 
 to me. How strange it is I must love you more for your 
 refusing me ! Well, I must wait, and it is some comfort 
 that the road south is as open to me as it is to your 
 father." 
 
 " But, Fred, you would not sacrifice your prospects, 
 your business, your duties here, to follow me to that 
 region. You cannot approach me there openly, with 
 my father's approval, and you surely would not do it 
 secretly." 
 
 ' Dear, I will do nothing that you or Lovelace would 
 be ashamed of. I will try to prove that I am worthy 'of 
 you, and that I have caught something of your spirit. 
 Do not fear from me any further proposal of a runaway 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 65 
 
 "Then you forgive me, Fred?" she asked, as Mrs. 
 Livingston's voice reminded them of the increasing cool- 
 ness. His answer is not recorded ; but hand in hand 
 they reentered the parlor, and peace was in their hearts 
 as they joined with their honored friends in the evening 
 prayer. 
 
 6* 
 
66 HONOR', OR, 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 TRAVELLING SOUTH. 
 
 T was not without extreme pain that Mr. and 
 Mrs. Livingston yielded to the necessity of relin- 
 quishing their adopted daughter. Accustomed 
 for years to consider her as their own, they felt that with 
 her they should lose the very light of their house. For 
 her, too, they felt a deep solicitude, which was not entirely 
 relieved by the patient acquiescence she yielded to what 
 she recognized as duty. Yet this went far towards 
 strengthening them to bear the trial ; and Lizzie nerved 
 herself the more, in order to spare pain to her benefac- 
 tors. Once, indeed, she was found in tears, and, when 
 questioned, made no secret of her feelings. Mrs. Liv- 
 ingston's tears flowed with hers, till Lizzie left grieving 
 for herself, and sought to console her protectress. " We 
 can bear it, dear, if we think that you are happy," said 
 Mrs. Livingston ; " but if you feel so about it, we cannot 
 consent ; something must be done to prevent it." 
 
 Lizzie heard, and took her resolution. Her father's 
 natural claim, her mother's wish, were enough of them- 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 67 
 
 selves to show her what was right. Henceforth she 
 curbed every expression of sadness. No more tears were 
 shed till the moment of parting swept away all restraint, 
 and excused the feeling it indulged. 
 
 Mr. Livingston had attempted more than once to con- 
 verse with Witham ; but his repugnance to the man was 
 such that only a few sentences could be interchanged in 
 peace. Had each felt the other to be his equal, they 
 would have had a violent quarrel ; but the gentleman 
 held his temper in restraint, lest he should disgrace him- 
 self by a contest with a man like Witham ; and the slave- 
 dealer could not quite overcome the consciousness of in- 
 feriority. 
 
 Mrs. Livingston was more successful in her attempts 
 to converse. On the subject of claiming his daughter, 
 Witham was indeed inflexible ; and, as Lizzie was pre- 
 pared to yield, there was, in regard to that, no more to 
 be said. 
 
 But Mrs. Livingston endeavored to explain to the 
 father in what respects his daughter would need forbear- 
 ance and tenderness. She spoke of Lizzie's repugnance 
 to the slave system, avoiding arguments which might ex- 
 asperate, but pleading the difference between southern 
 and northern habits of thought ; and urged strongly that 
 Witham should carry out his expressed intention to 
 enter another mode of life, and have no more to do with 
 the business he had thus far pursued. She tried to inter- 
 est Mrs. Witham to the same purpose, and to secure a 
 
68 HONOR; OR, 
 
 feeling of friendliness towards Lizzie in the heart of one 
 on whom her comfort would so greatly depend. She was 
 encouraged by finding that the step-mother was a woman 
 of kinder feelings, and even of better principles, than she 
 had feared. 
 
 The time of parting had come. Mrs. Livingston had 
 placed in Lizzie's hands the few relics of her own mother 
 that had been preserved, and had expressed, by many a 
 parting gift, her own deep affection for the child she was 
 about to lose. Among these, her own Bible, the one she 
 used in her daily reading, seemed the thing nearest to 
 herself to give to the daughter of her heart ; and, by a 
 mark between the leaves, and in the margin, she pointed 
 out the text, " When my father and my mother forsake 
 me, then the Lord will take me up." The farewell scene 
 was over, and Witham, proud of his daughter, and soft- 
 ened by the success of his wishes, determined to do what 
 he could to make her southern home agreeable to her. 
 
 It was towards sunset, about a week after, that the stage 
 coach which contained the party entered the streets of 
 Richmond. Their fellow-passengers, a Mrs. Compton 
 and her two daughters, returning from Philadelphia to 
 their home in Georgia, directed the driver to take them 
 to the Powhatan House ; but Witham knew that his own 
 standing was not such as to obtain him and his party ad- 
 mission there. He named, therefore, another hotel, and 
 they parted, Mrs. Compton with a distant bow to Mrs. 
 Witham, and the girls with a smile to Lizzie. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 69 
 
 " There, I am glad to have them out," said Witham. 
 " Regular quality, that think themselves up to my lord 
 and my lady, as I used to see in old England. They may 
 have the grand house to tnemselves if they will ; we shall 
 do as well, I guess, with Jim Carpenter at the " Old 
 Dominion." 
 
 And so they swept round the base of the hill, where 
 stands, in its grand position, the Capitol, its noble pro- 
 portions borrowed by the taste of Jefferson from the Ro- 
 man temple at Nismes, but its classic grace somewhat 
 marred by the modern necessity of windows. 
 
 The next morning, as Lizzie, under her father's escort, 
 was visiting the objects of interest in the city, they en- 
 tered this building, and found themselves before the statue 
 of Washington, by Houdon, which adorns its centre. 
 Another party were standing near it, and they recognized 
 their fellow-travellers of the day before. The younger 
 Miss Compton looked at Lizzie with a friendly glance, 
 but the other ladies did not appear to recognize her. 
 
 " It is considered," said a gentleman who accompanied 
 the Comptons, " to be the best likeness there is of Wash- 
 ington." 
 
 " I believe there is one that rivals it," said Mrs. Comp- 
 ton, " one found on a piece of pottery, which proved ad- 
 mirably correct." 
 
 " So," said the gentleman, " it was promoted from its 
 humble place on the side of a pitcher, and framed in 
 gold." 
 
70 HONOR', OJR, 
 
 " Like a village maiden made a queen," said the elder 
 Miss Compton. 
 
 " Would you like to attend the drawing-room of such 
 a queen, Miss Compton?" said "the gentleman. 
 
 *' Hardly in real life, Mr. Bruce. I should be afraid 
 the vulgarity would show itself on the throne." 
 
 " Our English friends are right in that," said Mr. 
 Bruce. " High birth is the security for high culture and 
 high honor." 
 
 " And yet we find interesting characters sometimes," 
 said Miss Compton, thoughtfully, " in strange connection. 
 That sweet girl, you know, Emma, that was with us yes- 
 terday." 
 
 " What," said her mother, " travelling with those " 
 
 " Mamma, mamma," interposed Emma, hastily, " here 
 is the young lady we were speaking of." 
 
 " Bless me ! " said Mrs. Compton, " what was I 
 
 How do you do, my dear? My daughter was just speak- 
 ing of you. Isabella, I believe we shall not have time to 
 stay longer." And the party retreated, the girls looking 
 kindly, but rather shyly at their late fellow-traveller. 
 
 " Why, Betsy," said Witham, " I believe we've driven 
 her ladyship away ! So much for the land of liberty and 
 equality ! " 
 
 " With all that he did for it," said Lizzie, looking at 
 the status, 7 " Pride and exclusiveness among the whites, 
 and oppression over the blacks ! " 
 
 " As to the blacks," said Witham, " they are meant to 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 71 
 
 be oppressed, as you call it ; they ain't fit for nothing else. 
 But I should think these folks thought we was niggers 
 too, by the way they run away from us." 
 
 " What they think of us matters little," said Lizzie, 
 Y if we do our duty wherever we are placed." 
 
 " Well, I hope to be placed out of their way, at any 
 rate," said Witham. " But come, let's go to that church 
 you wanted to see." 
 
 It was the Monumental Church ; and, after an approv- 
 ing glance at the general appearance of the building, they 
 stopped beside the monument in the porch, and Lizzie 
 read to her father the inscription, commemorating the 
 dreadful catastrophe which occasioned its erection when 
 the theatre that stood on that spot took fire, and nearly a 
 hundred persons, including the governor of the state, 
 perished in the flames. As they heard anecdotes told of 
 the mutual devotedness of some among the sufferers, " It 
 was not so hard," thought Lizzie, " to perish, if the loved 
 one was at their side." 
 
 The next moment she heard the sentiment, in almost 
 the same words, from a voice near her, and looking round, 
 saw that it was Isabella Compton who spoke. The sad- 
 ness of her look and of her tone showed that she too was 
 one who had suffered. They understood each other's 
 sympathy in a moment. 
 
 " You feel as I do," said Miss Compton, in a low 
 voice. 
 
 " I had just formed the same thought," said Lizzie. 
 
72 HONOR ; OR, 
 
 " Yet I was afraid it was selfish. Ought we to take com- 
 fort in our own sufferings because a friend suffers too ? " 
 
 " I was thinking I should have liked to share his fate," 
 said the young lady, " not to have drawn him into mine. 
 The friend I had in mind was lost at -sea." 
 
 " O, I can feel for you," said Lizzie. " Your case is 
 harder than mine." 
 
 " You have had sorrow, then? I thought so." 
 
 " I am going away from where I have been brought 
 up, and I leave those behind whom I love very much." 
 
 " How could your parents let you go with such " 
 
 " Don't finish your sentence. He is my father ! " 
 
 She spoke neither angrily nor ashamed, but in deep 
 distress. She began to realize how her father was re- 
 garded ; and she could not, as at the first moment, charge 
 it upon pride and exclusiveness. 
 
 Miss Compton looked surprised. "Your father?" 
 said she ; " I am sorry I did not mean to say any thing 
 rude." 
 
 Her mother, who had been talking with Mr. Bruce, 
 now noticed them, and called Isabella in a tone of some 
 sharpness. The young lady, as she turned away, said, 
 " I hope we shall meet again." 
 
 " Your mother does not," thought Lizzie. " Well, I 
 have not been used to be so shunned ; but, if all turn 
 against my father, the more need for me to stand by 
 him." And she felt a sudden gush of that filial love 
 which she had prayed for, and had blamed herself that 
 she could not more deeply feel. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 73 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 LIFE IN XENOPHON. 
 
 fENOPHON, the chief town of Saunders County, 
 Alabama, was reached at length, and Lizzie en- 
 tered her southern home. She found it in out- 
 ward appearance better than she had anticipated. The 
 house was of that pattern which was then all but univer- 
 sal for houses of the middle class, two parlors with fold- 
 ing doors, and an entry at the side. It was of two stories, 
 and the brick chimneys stood out from the wooden walls, 
 as if the builder had forgotten them at first, and added 
 them after the rest of the house was finished. There 
 was a grass plat before the door, somewhat weedy ; but 
 this might be from the recent absence of the owner. 
 About thirty feet in the rear stood the building for the 
 work and lodging of the house servants ; and on one side 
 was an enclosure, surrounded by a high wall, and con- 
 taining the jail, a building of brick, divided into two 
 rooms for the male and female subjects of Witham's traf- 
 fic. Lizzie shuddered as she looked at it ; but she was 
 upheld by her father's promise to relinquish the business, 
 7 
 
74 HONOR; OR, 
 
 and by the determination to do what was in her power, 
 in the mean time, to diminish the miseries that slavery 
 brought. 
 
 Three of the servants, a mother and her two children, 
 had been left by Witham at the neighboring tavern during 
 his journey to the North, paying for their humble board 
 and lodging by such services as they could render. These 
 were of small account during most of the season, as 
 there were enough without them ; but at the time for 
 picking cotton, the tavern-keeper was glad to have the 
 command of three capable " hands." The woman, Ra- 
 chel, surprised Lizzie at first by the strange jargon which 
 she spoke, and by her extreme ignorance of every thing 
 beyond her lowly employment ; but her young mistress 
 soon found her to be affectionate and faithful. The chil- 
 dren, Nancy and Peter, about fifteen and thirteen years 
 old, seemed as intelligent as white girls and boys of sim- 
 ilar age, and full of merriment, which sometimes was 
 obstreperous. 
 
 Wishing both to make herself of use, and to cultivate 
 a pleasant feeling towards herself on the part of the slaves, 
 Lizzie began by doing, as she had done at Mr. Living- 
 ston's, a part of the household work. But she soon 
 found that this was entirely contrary to Rachel's notions 
 of propriety. 
 
 " No, no, young missis," said the woman, as she found 
 her sweeping her own room ; " what for you hab nigger, 
 me and Nancy, for you to go work yoursef ? No, no ; 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 75 
 
 gib ole Rachel de broom ; you go down dar, play de 
 pianny." She spoke so earnestly, that Lizzie saw that 
 it was not merely the pretence of humility, but that the 
 woman was actually uneasy at seeing a member of the 
 white family working, as at something which was not 
 proper. 
 
 The pity which she felt for their servile condition was 
 diminished for a time by finding how happy they appeared 
 to be. She recalled the remark she had heard from Dr. 
 Solesby, that gayety in degradation is painful to witness, 
 because it shows that the degradation has entered into 
 the soul. Yet she could not but be thankful for even 
 this outward alleviation of the lot of the bondman. 
 
 She observed in them all, and in the young girl Nancy 
 especially, that love of bright colors which is character- 
 istic of the race. One Sunday afternoon, Nancy came 
 up stairs to her, decked in a profusion of hues, and on 
 Lizzie's good-natured notice how brightly she was dressed, 
 replied, " Tank you, missis ; I only corned up to be com- 
 plimized." 
 
 For two or three weeks Nancy was absent, her services 
 being wanted at the hotel. The day after her return to 
 the house, Lizzie heard from the lower regions the loud 
 lament of a child under correction ; and, on her coming 
 down to inquire, the mother told her, that she " had to 
 crack Peter a little." The poor fellow's trouble came 
 from his ambition. During Nancy's absence, he had 
 been allowed to take her place in setting the table ; and 
 
76 HONOR', OR, 
 
 when she returned, and undertook to resume her duties, 
 he resisted the change with so much passion as to occa- 
 sion Rachel's resort to the rod. 
 
 Lizzie's desire to do good led her quickly to entertain 
 the thought of teaching these children to read. She 
 was not at the time aware of the laws against such 
 instruction. She spoke of it first to Nancy, who eagerly 
 embraced the offer. Peter was indifferent at first, but, 
 when he found out that Nancy was going to learn, his 
 ambition to be equal to his sister was excited ; and, that 
 no motive might be wanted, his mother asked Lizzie to 
 tell her if he did not learn well, and she would " crack 
 him." 
 
 The matter was almost settled, when it occurred to 
 Lizzie, that she ought not to undertake such an office in 
 the family without consulting her step-mother. The in- 
 tercourse between them had not been intimate, the re- 
 straint natural to the relation in which they stood being 
 increased by the difference in education and habits of 
 thought. But Lizzie was desirous to do all that might 
 be expected of her, and felt conscious of having done 
 wrong in going as far as she had, without the knowledge 
 of the mistress of the family. Good-natured Mrs. 
 Witham received her apology and request with some sur- 
 prise, but gave her consent with indifference, though she 
 told Lizzie it was " agin the law." " But laws," said 
 she, " isn't nothing in one's own house. I've know'd lots 
 of people have taught their niggers to read folks that 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 77 
 
 hadn't nothing else to do, I reckon, or they wouldn't have 
 wasted their time so. So you do jes' as you please, Miss 
 Betsy ; perhaps you'll kind of like it, for it must be 
 mighty lonesome for you here." 
 
 Armed with this permission, Lizzie began her task. 
 The children were bright and obedient, and soon began 
 to feel an interest in her instructions. 'Their young mis- 
 tress was happy in the feeling of usefulness, and circum- 
 stances around her seemed more favorable than she had 
 dared to anticipate. Her father and his wife, though 
 unpolished, were kind ; his habits of conduct and language 
 had been kept under restraint by her presence ; a few of 
 the young people of the village had offered their acquaint- 
 ance to Lizzie, and she did not yet know that they were 
 not the first either in character or education. She saw 
 differences, indeed, in all around her, from her own dear 
 New England home ; but her expectations had been so 
 moderate, that the difference was less than she had sup- 
 posed. As the season advanced, too, she noticed with 
 delight the proofs of a genial climate in the lengthened 
 beauty of the autumn and the absence of northern snow 
 and sleet. Letters came frequently from the kind friends 
 she had left, and, though they saddened her by some of 
 their allusions, she was able to reply to them in a manner 
 that showed that her submissive mind had found many 
 sources of cheerfulness. But her peaceful sky was soon 
 overcast. 
 
 One morning she was awakened early by a burst of 
 7* 
 
78 HONOR; OR, 
 
 clamorous grief, which filled the house. As she rose in 
 bed, and tried to imagine what the cause could be, Rachel 
 came into the room sobbing and wringing her hands. 
 
 " O Miss Betsy, Miss Betsy, Nancy's gone ! Nan- 
 cy's done gone away ! " 
 
 " Nancy gone away ! Why, Rachel, what do you 
 mean? Wasn't she at home last night?" 
 
 " O, yes, missis, but she's done gone ; she's in de 
 yard." 
 
 " In the yarH, Aunt Rachel ! Why, if she's in the 
 yard, she can't be gone." 
 
 "In de jail yard, missis. De massa hab took her off 
 to sell. O Miss Betsy, could you speak to de massa for 
 de poor nigger gal, for de poor ole aunty, dat hab no oder 
 chile but little Peter, and de four dat's away in Lou'si- 
 ana?" 
 
 " Father's taken her off ? My poor little Nancy ! I'll 
 go this instant, Rachel ! But how do you know she has 
 gone ? " 
 
 " La, missis, de massa call Nancy up in de entry, and 
 he put on de lock-urns on her arms, and tote her right off; 
 and de chile scream, and he tell her hush, and slap her 
 on de face." 
 
 " O, my father, my father ! " said Lizzie, with tears 
 not less bitter than those of the slave. 
 
 Dressing herself hastily, she went in search of Witham. 
 The scene between them was too painful to be described. 
 Lizzie's indignation burst the bounds she had determined 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 79 
 
 to observe as those of filial duty ; and finding entreaties 
 vain to change her father's purpose of selling the girl, she 
 gave free utterance to her feelings with regard to the 
 system of slavery, the trade, and those engaged in it. 
 But she soon found that in the war of words she was no 
 match for the man whose anger she thus provoked. He 
 answered her with a storm of abuse and profanity ; and 
 the unhappy girl fled to her own room, and wept there 
 alone. 
 
 She remained there the greater part of the day. The 
 feeling of terror with which she had heard her father's 
 outburst of passion, gave way, ere long, to a sense of 
 utter desolation. She had failed in her attempt to res- 
 cue Nancy ; she recognized, for the first time fully, the 
 odious character of her father's trade ; she had heard the 
 language he used when excited, in all its brutality and its 
 blasphemy ; and, worst of all, her conscience reproached 
 her that her own ungoverned anger and unfilial words 
 had led to this frightful exhibition on his part, and had 
 made a breach between them, which might probably be 
 fatal to her influence for good, either to him or others. 
 
 To her religious mind, however, this last thought 
 brought the means of comfort. Guilty as her father was, 
 she herself was not without blame. If it added to her 
 sadness to feel that, far from earthly friends, she had 
 broken the law of her heavenly Parent, the way, at least, 
 was open to his throne of mercy. With tears, no longer 
 of passion or of terror, but of penitence, she sought for- 
 
80 HONOR', OR, 
 
 giveness ; but, as she rose from her knees, she felt that 
 her pardon from above would not be complete until she 
 had received that of her earthly father. Wrong as his 
 conduct was, he was her father still. Xhere was the 
 divine command to honor him, and she must do it by 
 confessing her fault. 
 
 But would he not then be strengthened in his wrong 
 course ? Would not all her protest against his conduct 
 go for nothing? It might be so, she thought ; she would 
 try to prevent it ; but, if her influence with him was lost, 
 the fact must be accepted as a part of her punishment. 
 
 She had reached this conclusion, and was thinking how 
 best to make her combined confession and protest, when 
 she heard a knock at her door, followed directly by her 
 step-mother's call, 
 
 " Betsy, Betsy dear, it's three o'clock, and you haven't 
 been to breakfast nor dinner." 
 
 Lizzie opened the door, and the sight of the kind, anx- 
 ious face stirred again the fountain of tears. 
 
 " There, don't cry, Betsy. Father was real angry ; 
 but he's gone away, and I thought I'd see what had come 
 of you." 
 
 " O, mother, I am afraid I have done very wrong." 
 
 " Yes, you have, to stay up in your room so long, a 
 taking on, and not eating a mouthful of victuals. It'll 
 make you sick if you go on a doing so." 
 
 " O, I did not mean that. I meant that I spoke to father 
 in a wrong way." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 81 
 
 " Well, now, Betsy, I'm real glad to hear you say so. 
 A father's a father, after all, and to be so dreadful angry 
 with him, just because he goes and sells his own nig- 
 ger " 
 
 " But I can't think that right," said poor Lizzie, anx- 
 ious to be true to both her duties. " Please, ma'am, tell 
 me, what has become of the poor child?" 
 
 "Well, now, I'll tell you," said her step-mother, with 
 a look and voice that seemed to promise well. " You 
 see, father was a going to sell her to that man that was 
 here yesterday. He's a travelling trader, going to Mas- 
 sissippi. But I didn't like to send her off so fur, and I 
 talked to him some about it, and he was a thinking of 
 selling of her somewhere round here, when you spoke 
 to him. You went at him so strong, he got mad, and 
 swore he would sell her to the Massissippi man, any how. 
 And so he went and done it." 
 
 " And it is my fault then, my passion, my unkindness, 
 that sent the poor child away ! O, poor Nancy, poor 
 Rachel ! " 
 
 " Why, bless your heart, Betsy, don't begin taking on 
 again. John, I mean father, he sold the gal ; but 
 I let Rachel go out, and she asked all around, and she 
 begged, and she prayed ; and at last she got Squire Ad- 
 ams to buy Nancy of the Massissippi man. And, I 
 reckon, father isn't sorry, after all." 
 
 "Squire Adams?" 
 
 " Yes ; the gentleman that has the cotton warehouse 
 
82 HONOR', OR, 
 
 out on Main Street. He said he'd have Nancy to wait 
 on his wife. And so she'll stay in town, and see her 
 mammy every now and then." 
 
 " O, I am so glad ! " said Lizzie. " But," she added 
 after a pause, " I wish it had been father that bought 
 her back again." 
 
 " Well, I don't see what difference that makes ; for the 
 gal's here, and all's ended well. And now, you wash 
 your face, and come and get ready to speak to father 
 when he comes back." 
 
 "With her homely mediation, and Lizzie's humble con- 
 fession of the wrong of her passionate words, Witham 
 was won to say, " Well, well, never mind. But, look 
 here, Betsy, once for all, I won't have none of your inter- 
 fering atween me and my niggers." 
 
 His daughter was too crestfallen to reply ; and so, as 
 has happened in many another instance, the less offender 
 was condescendingly forgiven by the greater. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 83 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 A STAGE COACH AND ITS PASSENGERS. 
 
 years had passed since the conversation 
 recorded in our last chapter, when, along the 
 most direct road from Charleston to New 
 Orleans, a vehicle was seen advancing, of a description 
 which is now seen no more. It was a mail coach, 
 but not such as the well-caped Jehu drives from an 
 English inn, nor such as those that from their birth- 
 place on the Hudson spread far and wide the glories 
 of modern Troy. Straight built, long, heavy, and with- 
 out a door, its anterior portion was occupied, besides 
 the black driver and a white boy, by piles of trunks and 
 mail bags, while behind this barricade sat the passengers, 
 suggesting, to the mind of any one who might catch a 
 glimpse of them, the inquiry how they had ever got in, 
 and how they could possibly ever get out. The one we 
 now speak of was approaching the end, not indeed of 
 its journey for that day, but of its term of service on 
 that road ; for the word had gone forth, a new contract 
 liad been formed with the post-office department, and the 
 
84 HONOR ; OR, 
 
 Troy-built stage tjjiat was to take its place was already 
 on its way, destined to be superseded in its turn by the 
 rattling car and screaming locomotive. 
 
 Slowly and with labor the horses dragged the heavy 
 vehicle, not over, but through the thick clay of the road. 
 At length the clay was varied by a large stone, and after 
 a terrible jolt, the passengers were aware that something 
 in the foundation of their moving prison had given 
 way. 
 
 " Dat axle done broke agin ! " said the negro driver. 
 " Here, Mas' Tom, take de reins ; I must get sumfin' to 
 mend him." 
 
 The needed aid was quickly obtained in the form of a 
 rail from the neighboring fence, and this being placed in 
 position, April for that was the driver's vernal name 
 resumed his place of command. 
 
 " I wonder," said one of the passengers, " how one 
 of their fine new stages would have stood such a jolt as 
 that. It's all nonsense, putting those frippery things on 
 these roads of ours. I've a good mind to keep the old 
 line running as an opposition. Don't you think people 
 have got sense enough to support it ? " 
 
 The man whom he addressed smiled dubiously at the 
 ardor of his conservative friend, and suggested that it 
 would be hard to keep up an opposition, as the new line 
 had got the contract for carrying the mail. 
 
 "Well," said the old contractor, "I s'pose they're 
 bound to make a trial ; but I should like to see how long 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 85 
 
 it will be before they break those gimcrack things all to 
 pieces, and come to me to buy my old solid stages." 
 
 Behind this disinterested lover of the past sat a couple 
 of young men, who exchanged amused glances, and 
 continued their own conversation. TJiey could speak 
 with the more freedom, as the others were absorbed in 
 theirs. 
 
 " So, George," said one of them, " you really like 
 this southern country better than you expected." 
 
 " So well, Fred, that, but for family ties, I would as 
 willingly find my home here as any where. Some of 
 the customs I have been used to, for you know I was 
 partly brought up at the South. I find many kind friends, 
 and there are many opportunities to do good, which, you 
 know, in my profession if in any, ought to be thought of. 
 The greatest objection is the social system prevalent 
 here." 
 
 " You mean slavery," said Fred. " As to that, I 
 confess, it does not strike me as offensively as I expected. 
 I think as I always did, and trust I always shall, about 
 the injustice of it ; but there does not seem to be as 
 much suffering as I had feared. On the contrary, the 
 blacks seem remarkably light-hearted. One would not 
 suppose, to see them, that there was such a thing as 
 slavery." 
 
 " Perhaps you thought as one man did that I heard 
 of that all slaves wore literal iron chains ; so, when 
 he came to Charleston, and saw the negroes going 
 8 
 
86 HONOR', OB, 
 
 about the streets, he thought they were all free blacks, 
 and asked where the slaves were." 
 
 " No ; I own that Charleston gave me an unfavorable 
 impression of the system, not on account of the blacks, 
 but of the whites. There seemed to be a sense of in- 
 security. The military police, a sentinel even posted 
 in every church door on Sunday ; the drum-beat at 
 evening ; the Citadel as a place of defence in case of 
 insurrection, all told a tale as of people living on the 
 verge of a volcano. But the negroes themselves seemed 
 happy enough, and some of them well enough off too. 
 The hotel I stopped at, the most fashionable there, they 
 told me was kept by a black man." 
 
 " And did they tell you that he had to get a pass 
 signed by one of his boarders, in order to go abroad 
 after nine o'clock at night ? No ; Jones is one of the 
 exceptions that prove the rule. Here and there, a free 
 negro may be petted, but he is still kept under." 
 
 " Why, George, I didn't expect to hear a southern 
 minister, like you, talk like an abo ." 
 
 " Hush ! " said George, checking his friend more by 
 his gesture than by his voice. " Don't pronounce that 
 dreaded word in southern hearing. But do not misun- 
 derstand me, either. I am not vain enough to think 
 of revolutionizing society ; and while I live with the 
 southern people, and eat their bread, I should think it 
 base treason to say a word that would really endanger 
 their safety ; but it is another thing to maintain that 
 their system is all right." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAWGHTER. 87 
 
 " But how can you endure to live here, if you don't 
 think it right?" 
 
 " Do you suppose that Paul liked 'the despotism of 
 Nero? Yet he endured to live under it, and without 
 saying a word directly against it ; but he was constantly 
 sowing the seed of that heavenly plant before whose 
 growth despotism and sla all forms of oppression 
 must fade and die." 
 
 " You think the favorable view is superficial. What 
 then lies under the surface ?" 
 
 " More than I can tell with safety here ; more than I 
 could tell you any where. But to touch one of the most 
 obvious points ; last week I married a negro couple. 
 The wedding was very prettily got up ; the kitchen 
 was perfectly neat, and the guests assembled in it all 
 slaves r were neatly dressed ; the women perhaps a lit- 
 tle too showily. Cake and wine were handed round, as 
 if it had been in the parlor. And yet, when I said, 
 'Whom God hath joined together let not man put 
 asunder/ I felt as if I had uttered words of impious 
 mockery." 
 
 4 'But why? People who treated their slaves so well 
 would not set aside the marriage which they themselves 
 had permitted." 
 
 " Probably not ; but suppose a failure in business, or 
 the division of the estate by death. Then the law of 
 man comes in, sets aside the solemn warning of the 
 Saviour, sends John to one master, Jane to another, 
 
e 
 
 88 HONOR', OR, 
 
 three hundred miles off, and perhaps their children 
 to a third." 
 
 " That, indeed; I had not thought of before." 
 " No ; and so it is with unnumbered bearings of the 
 system. The people who live under it cannot help these 
 vils ; they can only mitigate them by personal care and 
 (kindness ; but no one dare assail the system itself, for 
 ll are convinced that in its destruction society itself 
 
 be overthrown." 
 
 
 
 "What will be the end of it all, then?" 
 
 " I cannot tell. I can but preach the gospel, teach 
 the people the great law of love to God and man, and 
 leave that to do the work gradually ; but sometimes I 
 think some tremendous convulsion will sweep the whole 
 away. So I live on and try to do my best. I say little 
 about slavery, but much about justice and charity to 
 all ; but it does move my indignation when a man from 
 the North comes here boiling over with abolitionism, 
 spends a month or two, and goes back declaring that he 
 understands the whole subject, that the slaves are very 
 well treated, and that those who object to the system 
 are only fanatics." 
 
 "What's that about the abolutionist fanatics?" said 
 one of the men in front. 
 
 " I was saying that some people changed their minds 
 about slavery very soon after they come here," said the 
 young preacher. 
 
 "If they don't change their minds, they'd better 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 89 
 
 change their tune, about the quickest," said the man. 
 " What are they after, meddling with other folks' busi- 
 ness ? If I was to meet an abolutionist, I'd beat him as 
 I would a nigger." 
 
 " I would advise you, gentlemen," said the other 
 passenger, in a serious though civil manner, " not to 
 talk much on such subjects while you are travelling; 
 especially if, as I suppose, you are from the North." 
 
 " O," said the clergyman, "I am a Southerner in 
 part, and a minister in a southern parish. As for my 
 friend, I don't know but he is more southern than I am. 
 I thank you for your hint, but I think we shall be safe." 
 
 " Still, sir, you must think also of the safety of others. 
 These things are not to be spoken of in all companies," 
 motioning with his hand towards the negro who drove 
 their conveyance. 
 
 " If you mean April, I reckon he's pretty safe," said 
 the stage proprietor. " I'm not a man to be afraid of 
 my own niggers, but I fancy they're rather afraid of me. 
 So the parson can talk on, and I'd rather like to have 
 him show his hand." 
 
 His more gentlemanly companion turned half round, 
 and gave a quick glance of caution to the young min- 
 ister, then changed the conversation by the abrupt ques- 
 tion, " What's cotton now in Savannah?" 
 
 " Riz," said the other ; " cotton's riz ; and that's good 
 news. There's some trouble about the crop abroad. 
 One man told me he'd heard say that the Grand Packer 
 8* 
 
90 HONOR; OR, 
 
 of Egypt had hung up his pestle, and swore he wouldn't 
 pack another bale." 
 
 The gentleman laughed. " A new meaning to the 
 title," said he. "Bashaw, pacha, packer, Bluebeard 
 metamorphosed into a laborer to fill cotton bales ! By 
 the way, gentlemen, did you ever see a finer sight in the 
 way of culture than a cotton plantation? Look over 
 there, if you can see between April and the boy, at that 
 prospect, spreading far and far away, with no fences to 
 divide it all the property of one man. All that verdure 
 will in a few weeks be dotted with white, from the open- 
 ing bolls ; and that white is the talisman by which the 
 South, if need be, can control the world." 
 
 " The absence of fences," said the young traveller, 
 Fred, " reminds me of the meadows on the Connecticut, 
 near Northampton. But those are not all one man's 
 land ; the wide field is divided into numberless little 
 strips, with their various crops of grass, vegetables, and 
 broom-corn. It is like the poet's imaginary golden age 
 of England, 
 
 ' When every rood of ground maintained its man.' " 
 
 " O, as to that," said the Southerner, " unity of pos- 
 session does not imply a scarcity of population. Come 
 here when the bolls are fully open, and you will see the 
 field swarming with men, women, and children, all 
 gathering the treasure which gives bread to them as 
 well as to their master." 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 91 
 
 The Northerner only replied by repeating thought- 
 fully, " Maintained its man ! " The journey was pursued 
 for a time in silence, and when conversation was re- 
 sumed, it was on indifferent topics. 
 
 At the next town the travellers parted ; the southern 
 gentleman, for whom his own open carriage and well- 
 dressed servant were waiting, turned off towards his 
 plantation, which he courteously invited the young 
 Northerners to visit when they should find it conven- 
 ient ; the stage contractor went to his house hard by ; 
 Fred pursued his journey to New Orleans ; and his 
 friend George went to visit the college at Tusculum, 
 and spend the rest of his summer vacation among the 
 hills in the northern part of the state. 
 
92 HONOR', OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 *r 
 
 TUSCULUM. 
 
 (^n BOUT half a mile from the three large brick 
 /^\ buildings which formed the classic centre of the 
 f 'J^ city of Tusculum, stood a house, before which 
 a sign-board, swinging on a lofty mast, announced its 
 name as the Eagle Hotel. The day after our travellers 
 parted, the few idlers on the broad piazza observed a 
 single passenger emerge from the stage coach. It was 
 George Stevens, the young minister. A colored servant 
 coming forward to take his baggage, he inquired if Mr. 
 Witham was at home, as he had a letter of introduction 
 to him. The man answered that his master was in, but 
 was lying down. Going into the house, however, he re- 
 turned directly, saying that his master would be happy to 
 see the gentleman. 
 
 Mr. Stevens followed his guide, and had not far to go. 
 The front door opened into a hall about twenty-five feet 
 square, on the opposite side of which another door, in a 
 partition of unpainted wood, led into a room of less 
 width but greater length. Part of this was occupied by 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 93 
 
 tables of coarse construction ; but at the farther end, 
 stretched on a cot, lay the burly figure of a man half 
 dressed. His appearance indicated habitual and recent 
 indulgence in liquor. Without rising, he opened the 
 letter addressed to him, welcomed his guest, and intro- 
 duced him to his wife and daughter. The former was 
 younger than her husband, and apparently in very feeble 
 health. The daughter, too, was pale ; but this might be 
 from the effect of a southern climate. There was taste 
 in the choice and arrangement of her cheap and simple 
 dress. There was an expression on her features, not so 
 much of dejection as of seriousness an expression which 
 forsook her the moment she was spoken to, when she 
 answered with a bright smile, or turned quickly to what- 
 ever work had been assigned her. Still, when the remark 
 or the work was over, that expression would return. 
 
 The visitor soon had assigned to him a room adjoining 
 that in which they were. It was, like the others, par- 
 titioned with unpainted boards ; but what female taste 
 could do with scanty means, had been done to render it 
 comfortable. Mr. Stevens soon left it, and inquiring his 
 way around the village, proceeded to distribute his letters 
 of introduction, which in other instances were received 
 under circumstances more promising than those of With- 
 am, for the character of the persons to whom they were 
 directed. He learned incidentally, in conversation, that 
 the tavern-keeper had been in the place about a year and 
 a half. Little seemed to be known of his family, but 
 
94 HONOR; OR, 
 
 there was a feeling of pity for them, of that lukewarm 
 kind which people express in behalf of those whom they 
 cannot help, and with whom they do not desire to have 
 any thing to do. 
 
 His letters were all distributed except the last, and 
 with this he was directed to a house a little distance from 
 the town, and surrounded by shrubbery. Reaching it by 
 a path that wound pleasantly among trees, partly of the 
 natural growth and partly of recent planting, he inquired 
 for Professor Wheeler, and was received by a gentleman 
 of middle age, who warmly welcomed him on the perusal 
 of his letter of introduction. It was nearly the hour of 
 the evening meal, and the guest was not suffered to 
 depart until he had shared it. Another hour passed on, 
 and, delighted with the intercourse of an intelligent 
 family from his own section of the country, Stevens could 
 scarce resist the urgent wish of his entertainer that he 
 would transfer his baggage from the hotel, and make the 
 professor's house his home while he should remain in 
 Tusculum. It was resisted, however ; and the young 
 man returned in the evening to the Eagle. 
 
 He spent the next day in visiting the college, under the 
 guidance of Professor Wheeler ; and, for the two or three 
 that followed, engagements of business or of courtesy 
 occupied his mind and time. At length, however, the 
 changing aspect of things at the hotel gave indication of 
 great events about to occur. Stages arrived, not only 
 of the primitive form which has been described, but 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 95 
 
 exhibiting all the superiority of northern manufacture ; 
 while private conveyances, from the carriage to the 
 saddle-horse, threw clouds of dust upon the road, and 
 gave constant employment to the servants of the Eagle 
 Hotel. Commencement day was approaching, and it 
 was the more regarded, as the rival candidates for the 
 office of representative in Congress had agreed to meet 
 in Tusculum at that time, and give to the scholarly 
 gathering something of the fresh interest of modern life, 
 by a debate upon the principles of their respective 
 parties. 
 
 The hotel, which Stevens had found comparatively 
 deserted, was now thronged to overflowing. Our young 
 clergyman was at first requested by Witham to allow 
 another gentleman to share his bed : when night came he 
 found that the privilege had been granted to a third, 
 without the formality of again asking his consent ; and 
 morning brought into the room two others, who, having 
 slept in some unimagined place, claimed a partnership in 
 Stevens's room for their toilet for the day. Going forth, 
 not very well pleased with this proceeding, he found dining- 
 room and hall thronged with sleeping humanity. Some 
 on cots, and some on the floor, the votaries of Tusculan 
 learning or of Tusculan politics left it scarcely possible 
 for the traveller to emerge into the daylight. 
 
 He lingered on the piazza till many of the sleepers 
 came forth, and it was filled with a throng of men of 
 various classes in society, some with cigars and some 
 
96 HONOR', OR, 
 
 without, amusing themselves with whatever might occur. 
 At one moment the means of entertainment was fur- 
 nished by the editor of a newspaper in a neighboring city, 
 who had mystified a countryman by a proposition which 
 we will let him express in his own words : 
 
 " I maintain," he declared, " that if a man is brought 
 up from childhood on corn-bread, cabbage, and ham, and 
 nothing else, he will be nothing else than corn-bread, 
 cabbage, and ham." 
 
 " No," replied the countryman ; " he will be flesh and 
 blood and bones." 
 
 " But that flesh and blood and bone will be nothing 
 but corn-bread, cabbage, and ham," exclaimed the dispu- 
 tant. " The man has eaten nothing but that, and nothing 
 but that is in him." 
 
 A roar of laughter followed this argument, while the 
 puzzled countryman declared that he could not explain it, 
 but really it seemed to him that the man would not be 
 either corn-bread, or cabbage, or ham. 
 
 Our clerical friend soon had occasion to perceive that 
 his companions were as fond of practical jokes as of 
 facetious arguments. Wishing for the exercise of riding, 
 he had applied to Witham for the hire of a horse ; and 
 now, in obedience to his call, the animal was led out in 
 front of the thronged piazza. It was a shaggy white 
 beast, not much larger than a pony ; and as the intended 
 equestrian looked from it to the amused assembly, and 
 again to the horse, it was evident that some one had been 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 97 
 
 tampering with the sable groom to secure a little sport at 
 the stranger's expense. A closer look assured him that 
 the saddle had been merely placed on the animal's back, 
 and not secured by a girth. In a quiet manner, as if not 
 suspecting any wrong intention, he had the " mistakes " 
 set right, and, properly mounted, took his morning ride. 
 
 Unwilling to encounter, on his return, those whose 
 rudeness had prompted such treatment of an unoffending 
 stranger, Mr. Stevens rode around the house in search 
 of the stables, and dismounted there. He was returning 
 to the main building, when his attention was atracted by 
 the sound of weeping ; and turning to the direction from 
 which it came, he saw, by the grated windows, that he 
 was in the vicinity of a negro jail. 
 
 " O, what shall I do? " were the words he caught, in- 
 terrupted by sobs. "What shall I do? Massa's gone 
 and sold me, and poor Joe don't know nothing about it. 
 O poor Joe ! when he come next time, I no there ! O 
 poor Joe, poor Joe ! " 
 
 Stevens quickened his step to pass the jail, but this 
 only brought him nearer to it, and the voice he next 
 heard kept him where he stood. 
 
 " Don't cry, Aunt Sally ; I'll do all I can for you. 
 Perhaps father can keep you, or sell you here, so you 
 won't have to go away. O, I know how hard it is to go 
 away from home and friends." 
 
 " Lord bless your soul, Miss Betsy ; you too good for 
 dis world ! O, please don't let your pa sell de poor nigger 
 9 
 
98 HONOR; OR, 
 
 woman dat live only jes next door, and knowed you same 
 as you was her own folks ; please don't let him sell her 
 to go away off to Texas. O poor Joe, poor Joe ! " 
 
 The young minister yielded to a strong impulse to 
 speak a word of comfort ; pausing at the window, he 
 said emphatically, " Trust in God ; " then turned away, 
 and went toward the main building. " Ah," said he to 
 himself, " I can tell her to trust ; yet God suffers these 
 things to be, and I know there is but little hope." 
 
 It was with saddened heart that he prepared himself 
 to witness the public exercises of the day. They were 
 to take place in one of the churches of the village, and 
 to this Stevens bent his way. As he advanced, he saw 
 the procession of the faculty, students, and invited guests 
 issuing from the college grounds. A sign from Professor 
 Wheeler invited him to join it, and he fell into the ranks 
 with the gentlemen of his own profession, among whom 
 he found some with whom he was slightly acquainted. 
 
 Stevens had wished to be present at this occasion, to 
 compare the aspect of a southern college with that of 
 the northern institution where he had himself been edu- 
 cated ; but it was some time before he could notice any 
 thing, except in its connection with what he had over- 
 heard in the morning. The prayer, which asked God's 
 blessing on the exercises and those who engaged in them, 
 seemed to him to rise burdened by the weight of the guilt 
 and misery around ; and the references which the young 
 orators made, in glowing language, to the greatness of 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 99 
 
 their country, " the home of freedom, the refuge of the 
 oppressed," seemed to him blind self-deception or bitter 
 mockery. 
 
 As he recovered his self-possession, he could not but 
 give credit to the young men before him for a degree of 
 natural grace and ease as speakers, which compared well 
 with his own college companions. He noticed among 
 their names some which were familiar to him from their 
 connection with the past history of the state or of the 
 nation ; and he saw from the rank which these held, and 
 from their appearance in the exercises, that the reputa- 
 tion of their families for talent was not likely to be 
 impaired in them. 
 
 " At the North," said he to himself, " the first scholar 
 would probably be some youth from an obscure country 
 village one who had his fortune to make. Here it is 
 the descendant of an old historical family. Is it because 
 the advantages of earlier education are more generally 
 extended there, or because the whole spirit of southern 
 institutions is more aristocratic ? " 
 
 The last oration was delivered ; the band pealed forth 
 their music ; the president addressed the graduating 
 class, counselling them to consider the education they 
 had received as only preliminary to the advance they 
 were yet to make, and to consecrate all advancement to 
 duty, their country, and their Grod. In simple form, 
 without square cap or Latin phrase, the degrees were 
 conferred ; and in a concluding prayer the divine bless- 
 
100 HONOR; OB, 
 
 ing was asked on those who now went forth from those 
 quiet shades into the busy world. Mr. Stevens, accepting 
 an invitation from one of the leading men of the state, 
 found himself one of a large company, and apparently the 
 only one who was not a native. A few remarks were 
 made upon the literary exercises of the day ; but this sub- 
 ject soon gave place to that of politics. Among the gentle- 
 men present were two or three whose dress varied from 
 the general uniformity of black. They were clad in 
 brown homespun cloth, which they willingly exhibited to 
 the inspection of those around ; and much admiration was 
 expressed for the fineness of its texture, and the patriotic 
 spirit with which its wearers endeavored to encourage 
 the industry of their own state. Stevens could not fail 
 to perceive what was indeed by no means new to him 
 the existence of a deeply-seated jealousy of northern 
 enterprise, and dread of northern influence. His own 
 treatment, however, was highly courteous. Some curi- 
 osity was apparent to learn the impression which the 
 commencement exercises had made upon his mind, and 
 those who spoke with him were gratified to find that it 
 was decidedly favorable. 
 
 Among others present was the governor of the state. 
 His conversation with the young stranger turned upon 
 the action of the legislature in distributing by lottery a 
 large territory recently obtained from its Indian own- 
 ers. Stevens remarked that in the North such an ex- 
 tensive acquisition would have been kept as a source of 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER? 8 \ 
 
 public wealth, only small portions being disposed of at a 
 time. 
 
 " We have wished to dispose of it," said the governor. 
 " We want to have the state all occupied. So long as 
 there are large portions of unsettled land, our people will 
 be restless, and civilization will not advance ; but when 
 the territory is generally filled up, they will turn their 
 attention more to the arts of quiet life." 
 
 The clergyman ventured, with some of this courteous 
 company, to speak of the Eagle Hotel, and of his dis- 
 covery of the morning. What he said was received with 
 uneasiness, and replied to with earnest assurances that 
 such things were not the genuine marks of a system, but 
 its unavoidable evils. " You are aware," said one, "that 
 the state prohibits the importation of negroes for sale." 
 
 " I know it," replied Stevens, " but where I live the 
 negroes are brought to the opposite shore of the river ; 
 purchasers have but to cross the bridge and make their 
 bargains, and all objection to the importation of the slave 
 ceases." 
 
 " This girl," said their entertainer, " must be a slave 
 of Mr. Johnson. He is ruined by his dissipated habits, 
 and has no doubt been forced to sell her ; and if I am not 
 mistaken, her husband is on a plantation adjoining mine. 
 I will see, Mr. Stevens, what can be done to prevent her 
 being sent away. You northern people must not think 
 that there is no humanity among us." 
 
 From the dinner table our traveller withdrew early. 
 9* 
 
'102 ! U* ffOWQR; OR, 
 
 He had received in the morning from a student a notifi- 
 cation of his election as an honorary member of one of 
 the college societies. For which of his merits this com- 
 pliment had been conferred, he was yet in doubt ; but as 
 a meeting of the body in question was announced for 
 three o'clock, he turned his stepf in the direction indi- 
 cated, and soon Qntered the hall of the society. 
 
 He found it filled, in part with students and in part 
 with visitors, who, he had reason to believe, had received 
 a similar honor to his own. There was much formality 
 about the meeting, and a greater display of officers and 
 regulations than among those who have the business of 
 mature life to transact. When the preliminaries were 
 completed, the president of the society made a speech, 
 which enlightened Mr. Stevens as to the reason of his 
 membership. But when Stevens told about this journey 
 afterwards, he smiled when he came to this point, and 
 said he was not at liberty to disclose the proceedings of a 
 secret society. He would add no more, but that he liked 
 the Logomachian Society very well, and wished them all 
 success in their honorable rivalry with the Philopolyglos- 
 sian Fraternity. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 103 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE EVIL EVERY WHERE. 
 
 young clergyman found the hotel nearly 
 deserted when he returned to it, after a walk 
 lx around the village. A public meeting, at which 
 the rival politicians were to present their views, had 
 drawn to it alike the visitors from abroad and the idlers 
 of the place. Not disposed to join them, he was passing 
 through the dining hall on the way to his room, when he 
 saw there the daughter of his host, engaged in sewing, 
 and stopped to ask if she had been present at the com- 
 mencement exercises. 
 
 " No, sir," she replied ; "I have been too much en- 
 gaged, and if I had had time, should have had little spirit 
 for such a gathering. You know about poor Sally." 
 
 " The negro woman who is to be sold? It was you, 
 then, that I heard speaking with her as I passed ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir ; and you cannot think hew much good your 
 few words did to the poor creature. She was frightened 
 at first, and I was startled to hear a voice so unex- 
 pectedly ; but it seemed to us the more to be a message 
 
104 HONOR; OB, 
 
 from above. l Trust in God ! ' O, it is hard to do so, 
 among so many trials and disappointments." 
 
 " You speak feelingly, Miss Witham. You sympathize 
 deeply with your poor neighbor." 
 
 " I do, indeed, sir. She has lived near us here ; and 
 sometimes when mother has been sick, and I have felt 
 depressed, that poor black woman's kind word has given 
 me new strength to do what I ought." 
 
 " I should think your father, then, would be easily per- 
 suaded to keep her, and not send her away, as she seems 
 to fear so much." 
 
 " Father cannot afford it. He only bought her to sell 
 again, and must do so to pay what he owes for her." 
 
 "But cannot he form some plan to keep her here? 
 Cannot you persuade him?" 
 
 " O, I wish I could," said the girl with tears. " But 
 father is is I beg your pardon, I must not speak 
 about him." 
 
 " Why, he loves you, certainly. He has taken great 
 pains in your education, I should judge." 
 
 A burst of tears was her only reply. Stevens was 
 embarrassed, not less than affected. But believing he 
 understood the cause of her grief, and that it was a cause 
 which she ought to control, he spoke, when she was 
 somewhat recovered, with kind seriousness. 
 
 " I judge from your style of language and thought, 
 that you have been educated at some excellent school, 
 and probably at the North. Now, if so, it must be 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER 105 
 
 hard for you, I know, to come from such company as 
 you there enjoyed, to this hotel, and its daily round of 
 dull cares, and even of low life. But, my dear young 
 lady, these common cares of life are God's appointment 
 to us." 
 
 " I feel them to be such." 
 
 " And I hope you will feel, too, that the friends God 
 has given us are to be cherished and valued according 
 to his appointment. Try not to think of your father's 
 faults ; whatever they are, they proceed from a cause 
 which is, alas ! sadly common throughout the land. 
 How many daughters have fathers who indulge this 
 appetite for drink ! If any thing can wean him away 
 from it, it will be your love. Do not look down on him 
 who gave you life, and who has taken, it is plain, such 
 admirable care of you. It may have been ill-judged for 
 him to educate you above the station he could place you 
 in ; but as for your sake he has spared no expense, and 
 even denied himself your loved society " 
 
 " O, sir," said the weeping girl, " how little you 
 
 know " She controlled her emotion by a strong 
 
 effort, and continued, after a brief pause, 
 
 " It is due to myself, sir, that I should tell you some- 
 thing of my past history. My parents were English 
 people ; my mother died in extreme poverty, in a village 
 in New England, where my father had left her. Neither 
 she nor any one knew where he had gone. I was taken 
 by an excellent family, and brought up as their own. 
 
106 HONOR', O2t> 
 
 My father came back after a year or two, but was satis- 
 fied to leave me with such good friends ; and I saw but 
 little of him till I was sixteen, when he came and 
 claimed me. I thought it my duty to go with him, and 
 I try to love and honor him as I ought ; but, but 
 O, I can't speak of it ; " and her self-control gave way 
 again. 
 
 Here a female voice was heard calling " Betsy." The 
 girl started, and withdrew hastily to an inner room. The 
 minister remained a few moments lost in thought. Then, 
 heaving a deep sigh, he said aloud, " Well, it is idle to 
 grieve over troubles that I cannot mend. What shall I 
 do to change these sad thoughts ? The political meeting ? 
 No, it is almost over, probably ; and if not, what do I 
 care about it ? Another walk ? No ; I am tired. Can't 
 I write a letter ? The huge inkstand at the bar can be 
 borrowed, I suppose." Before many minutes had passed, 
 he was engaged in describing the Tusculan commence- 
 ment. He had not made much progress, however, when 
 he heard the voices and the tread of many persons 
 returning from the political meeting ; and when some of 
 his numerous room-mates entered, he yielded to necessity, 
 and postponed the completion of his letter to a more 
 favorable time. 
 
 The next day Mr.Stevens received a visit from the 
 gentleman at whose house he had dined. They con- 
 versed at first upon the literary and political gatherings 
 which had taken place ; but the visitor appeared grave, 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 107 
 
 and the young minister found that the burden of the 
 conversation rested principally on himself. At length, 
 however, with a sudden effort, Colonel Selwyn relieved 
 his mind of the weight which was upon it. 
 
 " My dear sir," said he, "I never like to limit the 
 freedom of discussion in my own house ; but you must 
 be aware that on one subject we are very sensitive. I 
 regret the existence of slavery. I wish the blacks were 
 all across the Atlantic Ocean, or beneath it, I hardly 
 care which. But here they are, and we must be their 
 masters, or they will be ours." 
 
 *' I am aware," said Stevens, " of the difficulties that 
 embarrass the subject. I know it will not do to discuss 
 it in public, where the blacks might hear." 
 
 " In public ! Certainly not. The next thing would 
 be a negro insurrection, with all its unimaginable hor- 
 rors. The safety of our homes, the lives of our wives 
 and children, depend on our peremptorily putting down 
 all agitation on the subject." 
 
 " And yet, sir, I have been surprised, sometimes, at 
 the freedom with which Southerners themselves would 
 speak upon it, seated at table, and with their slaves 
 standing behind their chairs." 
 
 " Well, we can do as we please, and I suppose we are 
 careless sometimes. Probably every master thinks his 
 own slaves can be trusted. You have no idea, sir, 
 of the attachment of these people. I would far rather 
 sleep with my door unbolted on my plantation, than in 
 the best hotel in any northern city." 
 
108 HONOR; OR, 
 
 Stevens smiled slightly at the contrast of this great 
 security with the fear just before expressed. " I should 
 be sorry," said he, " to have said any thing to offend 
 those by whom I was received so kindly." 
 
 " O, you may be assured there was no offence. Only 
 I would caution you that the same language would not 
 do in all companies. The present, too, is an unfortunate 
 time. Here are our fiery Carolina neighbors ready to 
 leave the Union, if they can but get a few other states to 
 join them. They profess that it is all on account of the 
 tariff; but depend upon it, sir, slavery is at the bottom of 
 it all." 
 
 " But why so, sir? The abolitionists, from all that I 
 hear of them, are a very small, and very unimportant 
 party at the North. Nay, I believe their best men are 
 opposed to their being a party at all, and think they 
 can work better by moral suasion than by political 
 control." 
 
 " As for any thing that they can do, we may well 
 despise it. We are not afraid of northern emissaries 
 among us, though, if we caught them, we should deal 
 with them in a pretty summary manner. But I will tell 
 you where our danger lies. Every year, thousands of our 
 people go to the North, some for business and some for 
 pleasure. Now, though you have few avowed abolition- 
 ists, the whole feeling of your people is against slavery. 
 Our young men meet it in your colleges, our merchants 
 in your cities, and our pleasure-seekers at Newport and 
 
THE SLAVE- DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 109 
 
 Saratoga. If they adopt that feeling, and bring it back, 
 we have the evil of anti-slavery introduced among our- 
 selves. Now, all we can do to prevent this is to break 
 off intercourse ; and that can only be done by dividing 
 the Union. This is the way our Nullifiers reason. For 
 myself, I am a Union man." 
 
 " I suppose," said Stevens, " the subject is beyond 
 any human management ; but at least we can do some- 
 thing at times to alleviate the suffering it brings." 
 
 " You are right, sir ; and that is what I want to do in the 
 case you spoke of. In fact, I have seen Witham already 
 about it. He puts a high price on the girl higher than 
 I can well afford to pay because he thinks he can com- 
 mand more by selling her to Texas. But I think I shall 
 effect it. He is too old and too dissipated to travel him- 
 self with his merchandise, as he used to ; and I fancy that 
 pretty daughter of his has made him a little ashamed of 
 the business. If I can buy Sally, the man she calls her 
 husband lives on the next plantation to mine ; and, so 
 long as they like one another, I shall not interfere." 
 
 " Then you think they are not really married?" 
 
 " O, married, as far as they can be. Some Methodist 
 exhorter joined their hands, I suppose. But that sort of 
 marriage they are continually breaking up, to form new 
 ones. Your northern people think a great deal of our 
 separating families ; but in fact the families would not 
 stay together if we let them." 
 
 " Is not that itself, sir, a consequence of the system? 
 10 
 
110 
 
 HONOR; OR, 
 
 Seeing that their marriages may be broken up at any 
 time by their masters' will, they learn to regard them as 
 of little obligation." 
 
 " May be so may be so ; but as you and I can't help 
 the system, suppose we go and help this poor woman, if 
 we can. She'll do better on my plantation than in With- 
 am's jail ; and, as for her husband, she may have him 
 till they get sick of each other." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. HI 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE GOLD REGION. 
 
 PART OF A LETTER. 
 
 WAS interrupted at the last sentence, and have 
 let a fortnight pass before continuing. Mean- 
 time I have been wandering about among the 
 mountains and gold mines of Upper Georgia ; and you, I 
 trust, have had all success on that mysterious errand 
 which has carried you to the place with the learned name. 
 Whatever the attraction was to Xenophon, may' you, in 
 finding it, have realized your best hopes. I, too, have 
 had my visions of beauty. But no, the matter is too 
 serious for jesting. Let me tell you something of my 
 travels. 
 
 I continued my journey from Tusculum on horseback. 
 Shall I tell you how I purchased a horse, and, with the 
 assistance of a kind friend, escaped being taken in ? No ; 
 for you will not believe the assertion. Shall I tell you 
 of my undertaking to ford a wide river, and unexpectedly 
 
112 HONOR; OR, 
 
 finding that my horse was swimming ? There had been 
 a freshet, which I had not counted on ; so, as the river 
 came in the way of the road, in I went. When my steed 
 got off his legs, I was a little startled ; but he seemed to 
 know what he was about, and I left the matter to him ; 
 so he brought me over in safety. 
 
 This stream was the boundary of the region acquired 
 a few years ago from the Indians, and which has since 
 been rapidly settled on account of its mineral wealth. It 
 was not long after my aquatic experience that I entered 
 the mining town of Orville. I wish it was possible to de- 
 scribe to you its appearance. The street was as thickly 
 set with houses at its sides as with mud in its travelled 
 portion ; but such houses ! Booths would be the more 
 proper name. They were built extempore, some with 
 boards placed vertically, braced together by a few that 
 crossed them, so that they looked like great square hogs- 
 heads, if a hogshead could be square. In others, the 
 boards or slabs were horizontal. Paint was absent, and 
 whitewash was infrequent ; but amid the scene, two 
 regular frame-houses, partly built, looked gigantic and 
 palatial by the contrast, and gave hint of what Orville is 
 to be. As to the state of society here, it may be inferred 
 from such anecdotes as this: A Methodist preacher 
 came along, in the excellent spirit of that sect, Heaven 
 bless them for it, though I don't like all their ways, and 
 preached one Sunday in whatever hovel answers the pur- 
 pose of their grand assembly room. At the conclusion 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 113 
 
 of his services, when he had appointed another meeting 
 for the evening, one of the audience rose, and gave no- 
 tice that there would be a game at shuffle-board, at the 
 same time, in the street in front an announcement which 
 was received with a storm of laughter and applause. 
 
 In this vicinity I spent several days, visiting the dwell- 
 ings of some with whom I had been acquainted, or be- 
 came so ; and, so used was I at length to the rough log- 
 cabins, which these settlers for the most part inhabit, 
 that when I saw at last a log-house, with the interior 
 whitewashed, cleats of wood having been previously 
 nailed over the interstices to keep out the wind, it ap- 
 peared to me absolutely stylish, by its contrast to the rest. 
 
 An object of much interest to me was to visit the gold 
 mines. I went to several, and saw the process of obtain- 
 ing gold, from the simplest form to those more compli- 
 cated. The first who settled in the gold region used 
 nothing more than a pan, in which they washed the 
 gravel by the banks of streams, throwing out the con- 
 tents of the pan by degrees, till at last some grains of 
 the metal would be discovered mingled with sand in the 
 bottom of the pan. These would be then taken into com- 
 bination by quicksilver, forming a little button of the 
 amalgamated metals. The process now generally in use 
 is an advance on this, being that of rocking the gravel in 
 a sort of slanting cradle, through which a stream of 
 water is constantly made to pass. The water washes off 
 the earthy particles, while the gold, sinking by its greater 
 10* 
 
114 HONOR; OR, 
 
 weight, is detained by bars nailed across the bottom of 
 the cradle. 
 
 I visited, however, some places where the work was 
 undertaken on a larger scale. In one, the gold is sought 
 partly by rocking, as I have just described, the gravel 
 being obtained from the borders of a stream. Elsewhere, 
 on the same estate, literal mining had been carried on 
 extensively, but thus far with no profitable result. Here 
 was a hill, that had been perforated from side to side, and 
 the work upon it abandoned ; there lay the wreck of a 
 steam machine that had proved unserviceable. At the 
 time of our visit, the object of labor was to sink a shaft 
 deep enough to strike upon a vein of gold, which, from 
 the dip of the strata, was thought to lie beneath. But 
 the work had been stopped half way by the bursting in of 
 water ; and this was to be drained off by means of ropes 
 and buckets, before the labor on the mine could be re- 
 sumed. We left, foretelling that the owner would use up 
 on his profitless hill mine more than the results of his 
 very profitable surface mine. 
 
 Not much more promising for immediate success was 
 another which we visited, where a large gang of laborers 
 were penetrating a rock, within which, it was supposed, 
 lay a vein of gold. Tons of the broken rocks lay around, 
 and from these, if there were steam power at hand to 
 crush them, we were told that immense sums might have 
 been obtained. At this place we asked the overseer if 
 we could purchase any specimens of the ore. He replied 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 115 
 
 that he had none himself to dispose of, for if any of 
 value were found, the negroes concealed them. " But," 
 said he, "if you ask that fellow when I am out of the 
 way, I dare say he will be able to let you have some." 
 We laughed at his putting us in the way of eluding his 
 own vigilance, and obtained some little specimens, in the 
 manner indicated, without much difficulty. 
 
 This region may be considered as the gradual descent, 
 towards the south of the great Alleghany chain. I can- 
 not say that I think its scenery much improved by the 
 log-cabins of the settlers, and the muddy work which de- 
 files every stream whose gravel is thought to contain 
 gold. But, if one can get a little way off from the set- 
 tlers, he will find sights among these hills that possess a 
 beauty and a grandeur all their own. Such was the 
 scene I witnessed from the summit of the Currahee Moun- 
 tain, a conical hill to the south of the gold region, up 
 which I rode with a party of friends. Far and wide, 
 east, south, and west, stretched below us, apparently to the 
 very horizon, an unbroken forest. The clearings were so 
 slight, in comparison with the vast space uncleared, that 
 they passed unnoticed ; and the minor elevations . were 
 lost, from the superior height of that on which we were. 
 It seemed a perfect level, a green ocean, blending with 
 the sky. Another spot to be remembered was the won- 
 drous ravine of Tallulah Falls, where, stretched on the 
 rock called the Devil's Pulpit, and looking over, we saw 
 an eagle cleaving the air half way beneath us, while the 
 
116 HONOR; OB, 
 
 forest lay far below his flight ; then, raising our eyes, 
 we mused whether mortal foot had ever trod that cavern 
 among the rocks far off upon the other side. But O, 
 Toccoa, pure, beautiful cascade, thou art my favorite ! 
 I was told this fall was hardly worth seeing after Tallu- 
 lah, on account of its small volume of water ; and should 
 not have visited it, but that it lay nearly in my way. So 
 I rode on alone, with my thoughts on far distant scenes, 
 when, suddenly, raising my eyes, I saw, above the tops 
 of the trees, a cliff with a veil of woven rain-drops thrown 
 across its rugged face. I threaded the forest path, and 
 soon stood beside the lakelet into which that veil de- 
 scends ; and there I dismounted, and lingered, I know not 
 how long, looking at the gigantic rock, the lovely stream, 
 and the shrubs that grew so daringly, as it seemed, in 
 the very path of the descending waters. There is a wild 
 Indian legend connected with this place, that a woman 
 betrayed a portion of a hostile tribe to death, by leading 
 them, in single file, through the woods to the precipice 
 above, on which they came so suddenly that they fell over 
 in succession, their screams of terror being lost, to those 
 who followed, in the roar of the cataract. 
 
 But I must close. How much I have yet to tell you ! 
 I had not half finished even about the college, when 
 those politicians came in upon me, with their State Rights 
 and Nullification. But you shall hear all about it, when 
 you come to my bachelor-home on your return ; and I 
 know not but I shall tempt you to follow my steps, when 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. H7 
 
 I have told you the touching story of my landlord Willi- 
 am's daughter. Poor girl, poor girl ! Well, for details 
 you must wait till we meet. Till then, farewell, with 
 every good wish, from 
 
 Your friend and chum, 
 
 GEORGE V. STEVENS. 
 
 To FREDERICK W. BRYANT, Esq., 
 New Orleans, La. 
 
118 HONOR; OB, 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 HASTY AND INCAUTIOUS. 
 
 T so happened that Mr. Bryant, when he received 
 his friend's letter in New Orleans, looked first at 
 the last page, on which, in those days when sep- 
 arate envelopes were not, the direction was written. 
 There he saw, written across the page, some words on 
 the subject upon which, most of all, he desired informa- 
 tion. A part had been covered by the seal ; but enough 
 was legible to show that his friend knew where Witham 
 lived, and to excite the most painful feelings for the un- 
 known trials which his daughter had had to encounter. 
 " Why has not she written ! " said Bryant to himself, as 
 he hastily closed the letter, and made his escape from 
 the hotel reading-room, where he had opened it, lest his 
 agitation should be perceived. " Fool that I was, why 
 did I not let Stevens know of whom I was in search ? But 
 thank God, I am on the track at last." A hasty perusal 
 of the letter showed that this sentence was all that it con- 
 tained upon the subject ; and before evening the young 
 man was on the way to Royalton, where his friend re- 
 sided. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 119 
 
 When, several days afterwards, the commodious stage- 
 coach, which had now taken the place of the lamented 
 " old line," rolled into the broad Main Street of that 
 pretty town, and stopped before a handsome hotel, Bry- 
 ant eagerly inquired for a conveyance to the lodgings of 
 his friend, and was soon on his way to the summer sub- 
 urb, where those citizens of Royalton, who did not visit 
 the North during the summer months, took refuge when 
 they could from the dust and the mosquitoes of the city. 
 Past the double rows of Pride-of-China trees ; past the 
 upper market-house, which looked down the street to 
 front its southern counterpart ; past the dry channel called 
 the Beaver Dam, filled with cypress trees, whose roots 
 bulged forth into those strange excrescences called cypress 
 knees, well known to southern ship-builders ; past the 
 long ascent of the hill, he came at length to a wood laid 
 out in streets, as few as possible of the trees being re- 
 moved, to make way for the neat houses that sheltered 
 themselves beneath the branches of those that remained. 
 A turn of the road brought him in sight of the fair front 
 of the United States Arsenal, which he had visited with 
 his friend, examining curiously the block-house in the 
 centre of its quadrangle, its substantial timbers pierced 
 for musketry, in preparation to meet the threats of Nulli- 
 fication. At length the barouche drew up before a house 
 among the trees, and, bidding his colored driver remain 
 for a time, Bryant rang at the door, and was shown into 
 the study of his friend. 
 
120 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " Why, Fred, how came you here? And how strange 
 you look ! What has happened ? " said the clergyman, 
 his first feeling of pleasure giving way to alarm. 
 
 Fred had seemed to his fellow-passengers from New 
 Orleans the coldest of human beings. He had scarce 
 spoken to them, or noticed when they spoke to him ; and 
 the negro who drove him from the hotel had mentally 
 contrasted the Yankee's reserve with the condescending 
 manners of some of his southern young masters. One 
 thought had engrossed the traveller's mind, one intense 
 anxiety ; and now, when that was either to be relieved, 
 or rendered still more painful, he turned deadly pale, and 
 seemed scarcely able to support himself. Taking a chair, 
 and trying to speak with composure, he said, 
 
 " You wrote about a man named Witham, and the 
 sad story of his daughter. Is she living ? What do you 
 know about them ? " 
 
 " Witham," said the minister ; " what, the tavern- 
 keeper at Tusculum ! The drunken brute ! What can 
 you know, or care, about him ? " 
 
 " That was the place then? But about Lizzie : what 
 did you hear of her, that made you write that her story 
 was so touching?" 
 
 " My dear Fred, don't look so utterly distracted " 
 
 " Do, Stevens, answer my questions." 
 
 " Why, don't get out of temper, man." 
 
 " 0, George, you can't think what this is to me." 
 
 " I can think it well enough, you bear of a lover. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER 121 
 
 Nothing but Cupid could make Fred Bryant lose his 
 good manners. But I'll put you out of your pain, to 
 some extent, at least. The daughter, whose name is not 
 Lizzie, but Betsy, as I can tell from hearing her called 
 by the voice of a she-dragon I wish you joy, Fred, of 
 your father and mother-in-law ! " 
 
 " Never mind, George, only tell me about her. She is 
 living with them yet then, and the fellow is keeping tav- 
 ern in that Tusculum ? " 
 
 " Tavern, with a little sprinkling of jail, besides. He 
 deals in his fellow-creatures, in a small way. For pity's 
 sake, Bryant, if you have done any thing so crazy as to 
 fall in love with such a man's daughter, get over it as 
 soon as you can. Remember your family, your edu- 
 cation, what society expects of you " 
 
 " You do not know, George, that she is the adopted 
 daughter of one of the best and most respectable families 
 in my native town ; and the only reason she is with this 
 brute of a father, is her .heroic sense o dutyT\ But as to 
 marrying her, that is not the question. If she is in suf- 
 fering, or in danger, I must protect her. Tell me, I 
 say again, forgive my excitement, but tell me all you 
 know about her, and those that she is with." 
 
 Thus appealed to, Mr. Stevens gave an account to his 
 friend of what he had seen and heard while at Tusculum, 
 in which Witham's daughter was concerned ; and, when 
 Bryant left him, refusing his hospitable invitations on the 
 ground of want of time, he went, provided with letters of 
 11 
 
122 HONOR; OR, 
 
 cordial recommendation to Professor Wheeler of the col- 
 lege, and to Colonel Selwyn, the gentleman who had bought 
 the slave Sarah, to prevent her from being sold away 
 from her husband. Bryant had already, with great sat- 
 isfaction, learned that Tusculum was the residence of 
 Judge Hendrick, a gentleman who, when visiting the 
 North, had been the guest of his uncle, and had taken an 
 interest in Frederick himself as a schoolboy. 
 
 " Ah, my friend," said he, as he returned to the gate, 
 and found the negro driver dozing on the front seat of 
 the carriage, " I've kept you so long that you had to 
 go to sleep? Well, never mind, since the horses have 
 not run away with you. I should have been sorry to 
 have had your neck broken in my service." 
 
 u Horse no run when I'm on de box, massa," said 
 the man, " I wake up right easy." In his mind, he 
 added, " Someting wake massa up too, I reckon. He 
 done said more now dan de whole ride before. Dese 
 Yankees strange folks." 
 
 " Do the people all move away from here after sum- 
 mer is over ? " said Bryant. 
 
 " Most ob 'em do, but dere's some stay out at de Sand 
 Hills all de year roun'." 
 
 " I should think it the pleasantest way, John. That's 
 your name, isn't it? I think I heard them call you John." 
 
 " No, no, massa ; my name's Toussaint." 
 
 u Toussaint ! Strange they should give such a name 
 as that ! Do you know who Toussaint was ? " 
 
THE SLAVE -DE ALERTS DAUGHTER. 123 
 
 " No, massa, I didn't know it was a man at all. De 
 massas names us niggers after most any ting comes to 
 hand." 
 
 " Well, they named you after the greatest man of your 
 race, and one of its best men too, I fancy ; but he had a 
 sad fate ; " and, talking rather to himself than to the 
 negro, he repeated the first lines of Wordsworth's sonnet ; 
 
 " ' Toussaint, thou most unhappy man of men ! ' " 
 
 " Wha' for dey use him so, massa?" asked the driver. 
 
 " He led the slaves of St. Domingo in an insurrection 
 against the whites ; and the whites afterwards took him 
 prisoner, and carried him to a cold country, where they 
 kept him shut up in a very cold, damp prison, till he died." 
 
 " Did Samingo do dat to him? " 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 " Massa say, Toussaint led de slaves ob Samingo." 
 
 " O, Saint Domingo. That was the name of the 
 island the country I mean where Toussaint lived. The 
 person that shut up Toussaint was Bonaparte Napo- 
 leon Bonaparte. You have heard of him, haven't you ? " 
 
 " Tink so," said the slave, dubiously ; and added, with 
 a furtive look at his passenger, " I reckon massa'd have 
 stood by Toussaint when he done make dat resurrection. 
 Massa wouldn't have seen 'em use him so." 
 
 " No, I hate to see a brave man oppressed." 
 
 " Maybe massa'd stand by de brack men now, if 
 dey'd make a resurrection, jes' like in Samingo." 
 
124 HONOEi OR, 
 
 " What ! " said Bryant, suddenly aware of the danger- 
 ous nature of his conversation. " No ; it would be mad- 
 ness and wickedness both. The whites are so much 
 stronger, it would be impossible to succeed; and it 
 would be only filling the land with murder and rapine to 
 no purpose. My good fellow, I ought not to have told 
 you about Toussaint at all ; but don't speak to any one 
 of what I said to you ; don't think of it yourself. If you 
 tried to do any thing against the white people, they 
 would not treat you as Bonaparte did your namesake, 
 but they'd hang you right off." 
 
 " Reckon massa's 'bout right," said the driver. 
 " Massa, please not tell ole massa at de hotel ; for he no 
 like to have his niggers talk bout sich tings." 
 
 Placed on his guard by this conversation, Bryant was 
 silent the remainder of the way. Toussaint, as he put 
 up his horses, said to the driver of the stage to Tuscu- 
 lum, 
 
 " Queer buckra man dat I druv out to de Sand Hills. 
 He talk 'bout slaves making a resurrection ; tell dis 
 nigger he named after Toussaint, what done make him in 
 Samingo." 
 
 " Hush up, you fool ; you want ole massa gib you de 
 raw-hide? Your mammy name you Two-cent, cause 
 dat all you bring when dey sell you." 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 125 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE TAVEKN AND ITS INMATES. 
 
 T had been Bryant's intention, on arriving at 
 Tusculum, to consult Judge Hendrick and the 
 acquaintances of his friend Stevens, before mak- 
 ing any attempt to approach either Lizzie or her father. 
 For this purpose he would have preferred not to enter the 
 hotel, and looked round among his fellow-passengers to 
 see if there was any whom he could request to have an 
 eye to the safety of his baggage. But the gentleman 
 was too old and grave for him to take that liberty ; the 
 boy was too young ; the two ladies were out of the 
 question ; and the other passenger had drunk at every 
 resting-place, and mixed his conversation with words as 
 strong as his beverage. Frederick thought too that the 
 endeavor to avoid observation, if too carefully made, 
 might rather tend to attract it, and consequently entered 
 the house with the others, hoping that either he might 
 not meet Witham, or that the slave-dealer would not 
 recognize him. 
 
 Witham, however, was within his bar, at the end of 
 11* 
 
126 HONOR', OR, 
 
 the hall ; and as Frederick, after seeing his baggage 
 deposited, turned hastily towards the door, he called to 
 him, 
 
 " Pass the night here, sir? Want a room ? " 
 
 44 Probably," replied Bryant, " but I will not enter my 
 name now. I shall be in again soon. Can you direct 
 me " 
 
 " Won't take very long, just to write your name. 
 Won't charge you any thing for it, if you go to your 
 friends after all." The last was said with a sneering 
 laugh, for the tavern-keeper supposed the haste of his 
 guest to be prompted by meanness, and set down to the 
 same cause his not calling for any thing at the bar. 
 
 Bryant suppressed his irritation, advanced, and silently 
 wrote in the dog's-eared and blotted book, " F. W. Bry- 
 ant, Irvine, Mass." 
 
 The tavern-keeper looked at the name, and then at 
 the writer. 
 
 44 O, I see why you didn't want to write your name. 
 I remember you well enough." 
 
 " We have met before, it is true, Mr. Witham ; and I 
 own I did not want to speak with you till I could do so 
 more in private." 
 
 v " Private ! I think it is pretty private, to come into a 
 man's house, mousing round, and not letting one's name 
 be known." 
 
 44 Mr. Witham, I wish to see you on important busi- 
 ness. I came here for the very purpose. I should be 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 127 
 
 happy to speak with you when you are more at lei- 
 sure. In the mean time, will you please to assign me a 
 room ? " 
 
 The man glared at him, but Bryant's strong effort at 
 self-control had its reward. The tavern-keeper, surly as 
 he was, could not well refuse the common duty of his 
 business. He marked a number against the name, and 
 Bryant followed the negro, who carried his trunk to the 
 room thus indicated. 
 
 " No love lost between you and that young man, With- 
 am," said one of the bystanders. " He spoke soft, but 
 he looked about as cross as you did ; and you're not a 
 lamb, nor a dove either." 
 
 " Where's he from, Witham?" " What do you know 
 about him ? " were the questions of half a dozen others. 
 
 " I don't know much about him, and I don't care to 
 know. I've told you, I went to the North first, when I 
 came from England ; but I could not stay there ; they 
 were too stiff and precise for me. Well, this fellow was 
 one of the stiffest of the whole set, looked down on 
 a poor man as if he wouldn't touch him with a pair of 
 tongs, he'd be dreadfully shocked if a man swore, and 
 go into fits if he saw a glass of whiskey." 
 
 " Wonder what he comes here for, if he's that sort of 
 fellow," said Jones. 
 
 " Wonder if he isn't an abolitionist," said Thompson. 
 
 " Them's just the sort to make abolutionists of," said 
 Jones. " These canting, whining people, that think 
 
128 HONOR', OR y 
 
 themselves better than others, are always dipping into 
 what don't concern them." 
 
 " Here, boy ! " said Smith, beckoning to the negro 
 driver of the stage, who was at the other end of the hall. 
 The man came at once, and was interrogated. 
 
 " Did that man that went up stairs just now, the 
 man that made such a fuss with Mr. Witham about putting 
 his name down, did he have any talk with you as you 
 came up ? " 
 
 " No, massa ; I 'fraid talk with he. I 'fraid." 
 
 " What you afraid of, you numskull? " 
 
 " Massa, I 'fraid he talk bad to me, as he talk wid 
 Toussaint." 
 
 "Talk with who? What was that?" said several 
 voices. 
 
 " Massa, you know Toussaint ; ole Mas' Tom's boy, 
 down to Royalton ? " 
 
 "Mas' Tom? O, a boy of Rogers's that keeps the 
 American House there?" 
 
 " Yes, massa. Well, Toussaint druv this gen'lman 
 out to de Sand Hills ; and he tell me when he come back 
 he was a queer gen'lman. He talk to him 'bout making 
 a rumpus ; a 'surrection of de blacks agin de massas. I 
 tell Toussaint, neber let me hear sich anoder word." 
 
 " Insurrection ! " exclaimed the inquirers, in horror. 
 But Witham, deep as was his dislike of the young lawyer, 
 shrunk from the consequences of the rising excitement. 
 He guessed the object of Bryant's coming ; and while 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 129 
 
 determined to baffle it, was not disposed to use or encour- 
 age violence against his daughter's lover. 
 
 " Nonsense," said he, with an oath. " Don't you 
 know that a nigger's testimony's nothing at all ? I don't 
 like this fellow, and I have reason not to like him ; but 
 he has other fish to fry than meddling with niggers. He 
 says he comes on business with me, and I reckon you 
 know, boys, that I ain't an abolitionist." 
 
 " You you old nigger-trader ! " said Jones, laughing. 
 " But perhaps, fellows, he's come to try and convert old 
 Witham?" 
 
 " I thought that prim parson was going to settle that 
 business," said Smith ; " that one that came so near 
 mounting a saddle without any girths." 
 
 " That trick fell through, though," said Thompson. 
 " And Witham is sore about it ; for Colonel Selwyn gave 
 him an awful talking to, when he heard what had been 
 done." 
 
 " You brought that on me, boys, and I tell you it was 
 too bad to try such a trick on a man that had brought me 
 a letter. I wasn't quite myself that time. But I tell 
 you, I won't have any more tricks, or any more talk, 
 against people that stay at my house. Mr. Jones, what 
 will you have to drink ? " 
 
 That magic word led the thoughts of the bar-room 
 loungers away from the subject, which was becoming too 
 serious ; and after treating all round, Witham suggested 
 a visit to his bowling-alley, though excusing himself from 
 
130 HONOR; OS, 
 
 joining them, on the plea that he could not leave his bar. 
 No sooner were they gone, however, than he left it, and 
 went through the dining-room into a small private parlor, 
 the same which, during the press of commencement week, 
 had been occupied as a bed-room by Stevens and others. 
 He found it now tenanted by his " better half." There 
 could be little question that Mrs. Witham deserved that 
 name. 
 
 " Well, Susan," said he, " here's a pretty kettle of 
 fish ! Here's Betsy's old flame, that boy that I told you 
 about, come spying round here ; and I'll warrant " (we 
 must modify some of his language here and elsewhere) 
 " he's after her again." 
 
 "Well, John, and what if he is?" said his wife. 
 "Why not let him take the gal, and be done with it? 
 She keeps a droopin' and a droopin', and there ain't no 
 use of keepin' on her at this rate." 
 
 " I should think a gal's own father was good enough 
 for her to live with, any how. Some folks would say 
 that you wanted to get rid of her, because you ain't her 
 own mother ; but then you haven't no children of your 
 own, and it seems hard you should go agin the only one 
 I've got." 
 
 " O, John, you know it isn't that. I didn't like Betsy 
 at first ; I thought she was sort of uppish, and looked 
 down on other folks. But she's been so good and so 
 biddable, it goes to my heart to see her pinin' away." 
 
 " I don't see about her being so biddable, when she 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 131 
 
 keeps a talking to me, as if I was to give account to her 
 of what I do to get her a living." 
 
 " But, John, she hasn't said nothin' since you give 
 her that bio win* up, when she took on about your 
 drinking." 
 
 " No, I guess she thought it wan't no use, and it 
 wouldn't be. I didn't come away from Old England 
 and New England, both, to be kept down by a little gal 
 in my own house, and told I mustn't drink, nor I mustn't 
 do this, that, and the other mustn't sell this nigger, 
 and mustn't buy that." 
 
 " Well, John, you and she don't get along well to- 
 gether, no how. Now, wouldn't it be better to have a 
 quiet house, and let her go away to the North, if she 
 wants to, along with this young feller." 
 
 John took a turn about the room, grumbled a little, 
 and brought out an oath or two, but seemed to be con- 
 sidering, favorably on the whole, the suggestion of his 
 wife, when the sound of loud and angry voices, penetrat- 
 ing the thin partitions of the house, drew his attention. 
 He listened a moment, and then hastily left the room. 
 
 The voices which he had heard were those of the men 
 from whom he had parted shortly before, and whom he 
 had supposed safely engaged in the bowling-alley. They 
 seemed in high wrath, and as he entered the bar-room, 
 the first word he heard was " abolitionist," coupled with 
 an adjective more emphatic than courteous. 
 
 Frederick Bryant was standing near the stairs, which 
 
132 HONOR; OR, 
 
 he had just descended from the room assigned him. His 
 tall form was proudly erect, and the expression on his 
 face was less of anger or fear than of surprise and con- 
 tempt. Opposite him were the three bar-room loungers, 
 Smith, Jones, and Thompson, assailing him with their 
 combined abuse. There was something in his aspect 
 that would have daunted them, but they were strong in 
 their numbers, and in Witham's whiskey, to which they 
 had been helping themselves since they returned disap- 
 pointed from the bowling-alley, having found the door 
 locked. 
 
 " So you're not an abolitionist ! " said Smith. " O, 
 no ! you never done nothing agin the rights of the South ! 
 you never set the niggers agin their masters ! you 
 double-faced hypocrite, you ! " 
 
 " I'll tell you, young man, you've come to the wrong 
 place, if you're going to work about in the dark and 
 make mischief between us and the slaves," said Jones. 
 " We have a short way of dealing with such creeping 
 rascals." 
 
 " My friends, let us be orderly on this occasion," said 
 Thompson who, though dismissed from the Methodist 
 ministry for intemperance, retained some of the profes- 
 sional forms of speech. " The business we have to do is 
 very solemn, and I could wish it had been introduced by 
 prayer. Our young brother is to be admonished, and if 
 necessary, disciplined " 
 
 " Disciplined with a cat-o'-nine-tails, and then covered 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 133 
 
 with a coat of tar and feathers ; and I'll see that done, 
 or my name's not Dan Smith." 
 
 " Don't come too near," said Frederick ; " it might 
 not be safe. I have told you already I am not an abo- 
 litionist. If you have any thing to say against me, I am 
 ready to meet your charges before a magistrate." 
 
 " Magistrate, indeed ! In such a case every man's a 
 magistrate," said Smith. " It's the protection of our 
 lives and our families." 
 
 " Our rights as masters, and the safety of our wives 
 and children," added Jones. 
 
 " And the poor colored brethren themselves," said 
 Thompson, " whom Providence has placed in our 
 keeping." 
 
 " And so," said Smith, " look out, you blasted nigger- 
 stealer. You may look as high and mighty as you 
 please, but if you're found here to-night, you'll have a 
 lesson that'll make you stay north, if ever you get back 
 there." 
 
 " Gentlemen," said Witham, as he entered the room, 
 "what's all this about? I can't have my company 
 abused." 
 
 " Your company or not, Jack Witham," said Smith, 
 " he's an abolitionist ; and we won't have no abolitionists 
 here, Yankee abolitionists, no, nor English neither." 
 
 " Brother Witham," said Thompson, " the excitement 
 on this occasion is called for. I am a man of peace, but 
 I reckon this is a case for tar and feathers." 
 12 
 
134 '*' HONOR ; OR, 
 
 " I reckon you're drunk, all of you," said Witham, 
 " and so just clear out of my bar-room." 
 
 " Not unless you clear out the Yankee too," said 
 Smith. " Come along, my tall fellow, and let the folks 
 see you outside." 
 
 He took rude hold of Bryant's arm ; but the latter 
 sternly shook him off, and seized him in turn by the 
 collar. " Out of the door with him," said Witham, 
 grasping Smith on the other side. Together they bore 
 him towards the door, the bully vainly struggling, and 
 uttering threats and curses. Jones and Thompson fol- 
 lowed, increasing the tumult with their clamors, but not 
 venturing to rescue their leader. When all were outside 
 the door, Bryant and Witham let go their hold ; and 
 Smith, losing his balance, fell prostrate on the floor of 
 the piazza. 
 
 " You'll kick up a muss in my bar-room another 
 time ! " said Witham, as he turned away. He reentered 
 the house with Bryant, and locked the door against the 
 vanquished enemy. 
 
 " Mr. Bryant," he said, " I did not give you much of 
 a welcome, but I hope you won't mind it. You've got 
 real pluck, and I'm glad of it. Make yourself at home, 
 and pretty soon I'll hear what you've got to say." 
 
THE SLAVE -DE ALERTS DAUGHTER. 135 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 A STRANGE SCRUPLE. 
 
 scene which had taken place in Witham's 
 /I piazza was not entirely without precedent ; and 
 vj/ there was at first more amusement than pity 
 among those whom the noise drew together, as they 
 saw a drunken brawler borne out of the house which had 
 furnished the means of his intemperance. But when 
 those who had been expelled gave their account of the 
 affair, and declared that Witham was sheltering an agent 
 of the abolitionists, men looked serious. Words were 
 interchanged in low voices ; and though the hotel was 
 soon left in silence, there was something in that silence 
 more ominous than the clamor that preceded. 
 
 The door had been opened ; the usual frequenters of 
 the hotel had assembled, with the exception of the three 
 malecontents, and had gone to dinner at the summons 
 of the bell. The meal had been partaken in silence and 
 haste, but not without many a glance of curiosity or 
 dislike towards Bryant, who filled the seat which Lizzie 
 was accustomed to occupy. Lizzie had been spending 
 
136 HONOR; OR, 
 
 the morning with the Wheelers, who, since they had 
 heard of her through Mr. Stevens, had shown her much 
 kindness. They had kept her to dine with them ; but, 
 excusing herself after the early meal, she was hastening 
 homeward, when she was joined by Bryant. The path 
 was lonely, and no stranger witnessed Lizzie's start of 
 delighted surprise, or intruded on the greeting of the 
 lovers. The first few moments were of unmixed happi- 
 ness ; but those passed, Lizzie exclaimed, "O, Frederick, 
 I ought not to be so glad. I did not mean that you 
 should have come here." 
 
 " No, you did not, you naughty girl ; and so you did 
 not let us know where to look for you. But I have found 
 you, in spite of yourself, thank Heaven. O, Lizzie, how 
 anxious we have been for you ! " 
 
 " I do thank Heaven, indeed, Frederick, to see you 
 once more once more once more," she repeated, 
 almost wildly, " and but once more." 
 
 " Once more, and forever, Lizzie," said the youth. 
 " I must rescue you from this dismal life that I find you 
 in. If it is a time of trial with you, so much the better 
 time for me to put an end to all trials, as far as a lover 
 or a husband can. But, O Lizzie, why did you not write 
 when you left that place in Alabama? You don't know 
 what a search I have had for you, you little runaway." 
 
 " I could not write, Frederick ; I thought it was best 
 not. I saw my path was likely to be dark and sad, and 
 it seemed best that I should bear the burden alone." 
 
 " I thought as much/' said he. " Aunt Richards tried 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 137 
 
 to make me believe you were indifferent ; but I knew 
 your generous heart too well. And you see I have fol- 
 lowed you and found you out. Now, the next thing is 
 to return to the North. If you will trust yourself with 
 the lover as far as Royalton, my friend Stevens, there, 
 will give me a still nearer claim." 
 
 " O, Frederick, you promised " 
 
 " Never to propose a runaway match again. And 
 I am not breaking my promise. We will have your 
 father's consent. He received me coldly at first, but 
 now we are on very good terms. And I have more 
 courage to ask than I had before. Then I was only a 
 young law student, with nothing to depend on but a pro- 
 fession I had not tried. Now I have made a beginning, 
 and and " 
 
 " You have succeeded, as I knew you would." 
 
 " Well, friends have been kind, and nattered me ; but, 
 besides that, the death of my grandfather Williams puts 
 me in possession of more property than I shall know 
 what to do with, unless Lizzie comes and helps me." 
 
 " Dear Frederick ! and all these bright prospects you 
 are willing to darken by marrying a slave-trader's 
 daughter ! No, dear, dear, dearest friend, it cannot be ; 
 it ought not to be ; it must not be." 
 
 " Yes, it must be, though. A slave-trader's daughter, 
 indeed ! You are the daughter of Richard Livingston, 
 Esq., of Irvine, a man whose honor is above suspicion. 
 
 As for this man " 
 
 12* 
 
138 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " Ah, Frederick, he is my father ! " 
 
 " O, I have nothing to say against him. You do not 
 know what good friends we are. We have stood side by 
 side, and I am really under very great obligations to him. 
 Besides, I want nothing of him but you ; if he offered 
 me any thing else I would not take it. His ways and 
 mine are very different, but I do not doubt we shall get 
 along very well together. Only say, that if he consents, 
 you will not refuse me." 
 
 She blushed faltered gave him her hand, and 
 said, " Only mind, I cannot go without his consent." 
 
 They walked together in happy talk towards her 
 home. Their hopes were high, for every thing seemed 
 favorable to their union ; and the loveliness of nature 
 around them, and the luxurious softness of the air on 
 that beautiful afternoon in early autumn, harmonized 
 with every gentle feeling. Witham met them at the 
 door, and expressed neither surprise nor displeasure at 
 seeing them together. They went with him into the 
 private parlor. 
 
 " I told you, Mr. Witham," said Bryant, " that I 
 came on business ; and you have guessed rightly, that 
 my business concerned your daughter. She is too good 
 a daughter to do any thing without your leave, and I 
 do not ask her to. But I do ask your consent. You 
 know something of my character and standing three 
 years ago. Since then I have entered the profession of 
 the law, and have inherited property enough to make 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 139 
 
 me independent, if I choose, of any profession. I ask 
 your consent to my union with Lizzie." 
 
 Witham looked from the speaker to his daugh- 
 ter. She had risen, and with one hand in her lover's, 
 and the other half raised towards himself, looked up in 
 his face with more of affectionate confidence than he had 
 seen in her features since her childhood. The father's 
 heart was touched, and in a softer tone than he had 
 . almost ever used, he asked the question, " Betsy, do 
 you want to leave me ? " 
 
 " Frederick is an old friend," she replied, timidly. 
 
 The answer did not quite suit Witham, and his next 
 words showed it. " Well," said he, " I suppose, then, 
 Betsy must go back to her ' old friends ' off there at the 
 North, whatever becomes of her father. Perhaps it is 
 best ; but I should like to see her sometimes ; and you'll 
 let her come and see me ? Sometimes, too, I shall go 
 North, as I have done for years." 
 
 Bryant looked grave. He had no great wish for inti- 
 macy with his intended father-in-law ; but he answered, 
 " Certainly. My wife will be at perfect liberty to visit 
 and to receive her friends." He almost spoiled the con- 
 cession by adding, " I know that Mr. and Mrs. Livingston 
 are anxious to receive her as a daughter, and as we shall 
 
 live near them " He paused, uncertain how to 
 
 close the sentence. 
 
 " As she will live near the Livingstons, her father may 
 as well keep out of the way," said Witham. " But I 
 
140 HONOR; OR, 
 
 can tell you Mr. Bryant, a father who brings twenty 
 thousand dollars to his daughter is worth seeing, if he is 
 an old, rough slave-dealer." 
 
 " I don't want your money," said Bryant, abruptly. 
 " Excuse me, Mr. Witham, if I seem uncivil. I have 
 abundant means to support my wife, and I ask from you 
 nothing but her. I am willing more than willing 
 to take Lizzie without any dowry." 
 
 " But I am not willing to let my only child go from 
 me like a beggar. Who should my property go to but 
 her, I wonder ? No, Mr. Bryant, you don't like me very 
 well, I know, and I haven't fancied you either ; but as 
 Betsy is willing to marry you, she shall bring you what 
 will be worth your having." 
 
 " No, I am in earnest, Mr. Witham ; I want nothing 
 but Lizzie. And you need not be afraid that she will 
 not be well provided for. Besides what I can do myself, 
 Mr. Livingston, I know " 
 
 " So you are willing to take Mr. Livingston's money, 
 but not mine ! " said Witham. " What is there about 
 my money, that you can't touch it ? " 
 
 Frederick now saw the dangerous ground that he was 
 on ; but he was too conscientious to conceal the nature 
 of his scruple. 
 
 " You know," said he, " our feeling at the North with 
 regard to slavery. I share in those feelings ; and while 
 I do not undertake to dictate to others what they should 
 do, I am resolved never to own a slave, or any property 
 that has any thing to do with slavery." 
 
THE SLAVE- DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 141 
 
 "Very particular, you are, young man," said Witham, 
 with a sarcastic laugh. " A good many of your northern 
 folks have no objection at all to a southern wife, with a 
 good large plantation and half a hundred niggers. But 
 I have no plantation, and not a nigger of mine shall 
 trouble you. All I have, except what's about the house, 
 and a few that a partner of mine is off with to sell in 
 Texas, all except them is in good sound stock of the 
 Xenophon Bank, and Betsy shall have ten thousand of 
 it when she's married, and at least ten thousand more 
 when I give up the ship. Let's see what you say to 
 that, my boy ! " 
 
 " I say as before, sir," said Bryant. " All I ask of 
 you is this dear girl. I cannot accept of any property 
 that has been made by slave-trading." 
 
 " Then, by Heaven, you had better look for some 
 man's daughter that you can ask for without insulting 
 him to his face. Betsy can find enough to be glad to 
 take her and her money too, without crying after a born 
 fool of an abolitionist. No, no, Betsy, don't cling to me, 
 nor kneel, nor cry, nor say a word for him. You've 
 seen the last of him, or my name's not John Witham. 
 And as for you, sir, you'd better be quick and leave the 
 place before the people are after you, for there's a breeze 
 stirring already, or, if there isn't, there soon will be. 
 Clear out from my house, and if ever you enter it again, 
 the chance will be you'll get the welcome of a pistol 
 ball." 
 
142 HONOR; OR, 
 
 Bryant confronted the angry man with aspect not less 
 determined than his own. " Spare your threats, sir," 
 he said. " They will have no power with me. I have 
 refused to defile my hands with your ill-gotten gold, and 
 I would not unsay that refusal, though it would gain me 
 
 
 
 the treasure I seek beyond all else in life. I will not 
 intrude further in your family ; but no threats shall 
 prevent me from watching for Lizzie's good. If she 
 ever wants a friend, she will know on whom to call ; and 
 if she suffers from your heartless tyranny, you too, sir, 
 shall find that she has a defender near." Regardless of 
 Witham's presence, he stooped down and kissed the 
 almost fainting girl ; then turned, and passed from the 
 room with a lofty tread. 
 
 He left the house, and walked rapidly along the path 
 at its side, which he had so recently trodden with Lizzie, 
 full of the high hopes, which were now again crushed to 
 the earth. Having gone some distance, he turned towards 
 the hotel, then, reaching it, turned again, when the 
 thought struck him through the tumult of his feelings, 
 what course he should next pursue. He now remem- 
 bered that he had not yet called on his old friend Judge 
 Hendrick, nor delivered the letters of introduction to 
 others, with which Stevens had furnished him ; and as 
 he considered the circumstances in which he was placed, 
 he saw the importance of securing the interest of those 
 who might assist him in the designs which his mind began 
 to revolve. These were indefinite, or, when they assumed 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 143 
 
 a distinct form, they appeared extravagant and impossi- 
 ble. He was resolved to watch over Lizzie's safety and 
 happiness ; but would it contribute to either for him to 
 linger as an idler in the village where she dwelt, and 
 where, after what had passed, he could not expect to be 
 permitted to visit her ? He had been authorized by Mr. 
 and Mrs. Livingston to urge on Witham that he should 
 send his daughter to them for a visit, if not for per- 
 manent residence ; but in his eagerness for the accom- 
 plishment of his own wishes, he had omitted all mention 
 of this proposal, and neither pride nor prudence sanc- 
 tioned a recurrence to it now. Should he write to Mr. 
 Livingston, and suggest to him to apply to Witham for 
 that purpose? He felt that the scene of the last hour 
 had left little hope for the success of such an application, 
 even if made by Lizzie's former protectors ; and his 
 mind revolted at the thought of requesting his honored 
 friends to make overtures to the slave-trader. Uncertain 
 of his course, he was only firmly resolved not to abandon 
 the protection of the innocent and unhappy, nor to resign 
 the hope of union with one, of whose affection for him- 
 self he was fully assured. Perhaps, if he could not make 
 friends in Tusculum, they could give him advice or aid. 
 With this thought, he left the hotel, where he felt that 
 he was remaining only by the sufferance of the man with 
 whom he had quarrelled, and inquired the way to 
 Judge Hendrick's. 
 
 His cordial reception by the judge encouraged him to 
 
144 ^ HONOR i OR, 
 
 enter, with brief preface, on the story of his -visit to 
 Tusculum, its cause, and its ill success. The judge 
 shook his head at the idea of his gentlemanly visitor's 
 seeking a union with the daughter of the notorious 
 Witham. " My dear sir," said he, " I have no doubt 
 you feel warmly, as young men always do ; but you 
 must let me take the cool view of an older person. 
 Give up this undertaking. The connection is one that 
 would always be an embarrassment to you. Even we, 
 who hold slaves, consider the business this man follows 
 as disreputable ; and how would it appear in your section 
 of the country, where the prejudice is so strong against 
 our whole system? If she would run away with you 
 indeed, those things take place here pretty often, and 
 a man is not thought less of for having married in that 
 way, I should think, with such a father, she would be 
 glad to ; and brought up away from him, too." 
 
 " She will not consent to that, sir ; and I honor her 
 scruples too much to urge her. In fact, I have promised 
 never to propose it again." . 
 
 " That is certainly in her favor ; rather over-scrupu- 
 lous, though ; unless, indeed, there is a view of it which 
 may not be pleasing, but ought to be considered. Some 
 would say, the love cannot be very deep that objects to 
 such a trial under such circumstances." 
 
 " O, I have no doubt on that score. I think, too, that 
 besides her sense of natural and religious duty, she has 
 thought much of a charge given her by her mother, just 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 145 
 
 before she died, to obey her father, and stay with him 
 if he should ever return." 
 
 " Well, whatever the reason, she has made her choice. 
 She will stay with her father, and she will not go with 
 you. What more have you to say ? You cannot marry 
 a lady in spite of her own will." 
 
 " But she consented, if his sanction could be obtained ; 
 and we almost had it, when an unlucky circumstance 
 brought us to high words, and we parted." 
 
 " So you said ; but you did not name the circumstance. 
 Some years hence, perhaps, you may regard it as a 
 fortunate interruption." 
 
 " The subject we got on was that of slavery." 
 
 " Slavery ! I wish those busybodies would let slavery 
 alone. But what had slavery to do with it ? Did Witham 
 want you to live here, and go into the business with 
 him?" 
 
 " Not quite so bad as that, sir ; he only began telling 
 what he could give his daughter ; and I declined touch- 
 ing his property, knowing how it had been gained." 
 
 " You did, indeed ! Then you had no view to the old 
 man's money-bags. Strange ! The first instance that 
 ever I knew of a man quarrelling with his future father- 
 in-law, or with any one else, for giving him too much 
 money. If that is all, it seems to me the difficulty might 
 be got over. It is not generally very hard to persuade 
 people to keep their money." 
 13 
 
146 HONOR ; OS, 
 
 " I am afraid, sir, the breach is irreconcilable. Cer- 
 tainly I would never accept a dollar from him." 
 
 " Your views seem rather romantic. There are many 
 from the North who like our southern beauties all the 
 better for the negroes they own." 
 
 " Perhaps so, sir ; but they remain here, and become 
 southern in their feelings. Or, if not, at least their 
 feelings and mine are different. I am to live at the 
 North. I am in a profession which often leads to public 
 life. This subject of slavery is exciting more and more 
 attention ; and whichever side I take, it must not be said 
 that I am bribed with a slave-trader's money, nor that I 
 am base enough to oppose the system, and yet receive its 
 wages." 
 
 " You're a little of a fanatic, but I don't like you the 
 worse for it. You go according to the rules and feelings 
 of your state, as I go for mine. But as for your affair, 
 if you won't take my advice and give it up, the best 
 thing you can do is to stay here a while, and see if 
 any change takes place in old Witham's feelings. You 
 cannot properly stay at his house, of course ; so you 
 must be my guest. Take tea with us now, and I will 
 send one of my people to the hotel for your baggage." 
 
 The offer was, after some hesitation, gratefully ac- 
 cepted. Judge Hendrick led his guest into another 
 room, and introduced him to his family. The evening 
 meal was served, and Bryant found his depression 
 cheered by the intelligence and refinement of the 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 147 
 
 circle around, when a servant entered the room and 
 handed him a note. He opened it, and read as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 " There is a crowd around the house, threatening x\ 
 vengeance against you as an abolitionist. They will 
 soon learn where you have gone. Escape while you 
 have time. E. W." 
 
 " I must leave here at once, Judge Hendrick, or I 
 may bring trouble upon you," said Bryant, showing the 
 note to his entertainer. 
 
 " It may be the best course, indeed," said the judge 
 " not for my sake, but your own. I will send Henry 
 with you to Professor Wheeler's. It will hardly be 
 suspected that you have gone there ; and if matters 
 look serious, I will send a saddle horse, with which I 
 advise you to make your way out of this neighborhood 
 at once." 
 
 " Thanks for your great kindness," said the young 
 man ; " but there will be, I trust, no occasion for it. I 
 will return to the hotel." 
 
 " You must not think of such a thing, Mr. Bryant," 
 said Mrs. Hendrick. " You would be rushing into a 
 den of wild beasts." 
 
 " I will not own myself guilty by running away," 
 said Bryant, proudly. " I have done nothing, and in- 
 tended nothing, against the peace or the institutions 
 of this section. I will meet those that charge me with 
 
148 % HQNOR; OR, 
 
 it. I have a good deal of confidence in the justice of 
 the people, if properly appealed to ; and if danger comes, 
 I had rather die standing than running. Besides, Mr. 
 Witham's house is endangered on my account, and 
 there is at least one there whose safety I must pro- 
 vide for." 
 
 "I am not sure but Mr. Bryant is right," said the 
 judge. " The attempt to escape might fail, from his 
 want of knowledge of the country ; and I think, if I 
 go with him, I have influence enough to protect him 
 from ill treatment." 
 
 Bryant objected to his host's exposing himself; and 
 Mrs. Hendrick, with trembling voice, tried to dissuade 
 her husband ; but the judge was not to be deterred from 
 fulfilling the duty of hospitality. He laughed at his 
 wife's fears, asking her if she thought he was not pretty 
 well known in Tusculum ; and after he had given some 
 directions to a servant, the two gentlemen left the house 
 arm in arm, and walked rapidly towards the hotel, 
 around which they soon saw the gathered crowd, and 
 heard the cries that bore witness to their excitement. 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 149 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE MOB. 
 
 account which the stage-driver had given 
 to the bar-room loungers, of Bryant's con- 
 / versation with the negro Toussaint, had not 
 fallen on inattentive ears. The men who heard it, 
 having little to do but to drink, and occasionally to 
 gamble or fight, naturally employed the time which 
 their own affairs did not demand in attending to those 
 of their neighbors ; and as soon as they had parted 
 from Witham, they proceeded to discuss, with no little 
 vehemence, the purposes and the abolition propensities 
 of Witham's new guest. It was not strange that they 
 should connect his arrival with Witham's daughter ; and 
 as Smith, the leading spirit among them, had already, 
 in his own mind, aspired to her hand, he was the less 
 disposed to see the prize conferred on a stranger and an 
 abolitionist. When, therefore, he had returned from 
 the bowling-alley to the bar-room, and finding it unoccu- 
 pied, had helped himself and his companions liberally 
 to Witham's liquor, the entrance of Bryant at once 
 13* 
 
150 HONOR; OR, 
 
 prompted his rude attack ; and, when this had led to his 
 own expulsion from the house, he and his associates were 
 neither scrupulous nor idle in spreading the intelligence 
 that there was an abolition agent at the Eagle Hotel, and 
 that the landlord had taken his part against some public- 
 spirited gentlemen who were disposed to call him to ac- 
 count. The better class of citizens, opposed as they were 
 . I *-*" 
 
 ' to abolitionism, paid little regard to statements from such 
 
 "--- 1. ii i n^^, 
 
 I a source ; but there were enough of the idle, the ignorant, 
 t and the violent to spread the excitement, and others 
 \ joined the gathering crowd through mere curiosity. 
 
 Thus it was that in front of the hotel there was now 
 assembled a crowd of men and boys, blending in rude 
 chorus their various cries, " State Rights ! " " Southern 
 Rights ! " " Nullification ! " " Down with the Yankees ! " 
 and " Down with the Abolitionists ! " Smith and his two 
 companions, Jones and Thompson, with some others, 
 were in consultation on the piazza, while at the windows 
 appeared the faces of the servants of the house. Witham 
 advanced from his bar, himself somewhat excited with 
 liquor, and seeing no better way of conciliating the 
 crowd than to invite them to share the same excitement. 
 " Ask Mr. Thompson and Mr. Jones to walk in and 
 take some refreshment, Cato," said he. " There's that 
 fellow Smith again ! his impudence ! Mr. Wilkins, 
 Mr. Jameson, walk in, gentlemen. What will you have 
 to drink, gentlemen? Walk in, and make yourselves at 
 home." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 151 
 
 The leaders of the mob approached, without replying 
 to his invitation ; and Thompson, who thought he had 
 the gift of eloquence, pressing before the rest, endeavored 
 to announce their business. 
 
 " Mr. Witham, we are a committee of the free and 
 and free and patriotic citizens of Tusculum, assembled 
 on this occasion, I repeat, on this occasion " 
 
 " Witham," broke in Smith, " there's a aboli- 
 tionist in the house, and we are going to tar and feather 
 him." 
 
 " Hang him," cried another voice " come here to set 
 the niggers to cutting our throats ! Hanging's too good 
 for him." 
 
 " Tar and cotton him," said a student from the college, 
 more facetiously, perhaps, more mercifully inclined. 
 " Think, fellows, what a pretty bird he will be, with cot- 
 ton for feathers ; so downy." 
 
 " Tar and cotton, tar and cotton ! " cried several voices. 
 
 " With a good whipping to begin with," said Smith. 
 " Witham, where's your raw-hide?" that name being 
 given to a certain long, twisted instrument of correction. 
 
 " Let's have a tar-kettle," cried Jones. " Here, you 
 boys, Zeke and Samson, leave your staring out of that 
 window, and bestir yourselves. Run over to old Moody's, 
 and tell him his tar-kettle's wanted for the public ser- 
 vice." 
 
 " And, Scip, you nigger," said Smith, " off to Peters's 
 warehouse, and get some cotton." 
 
152 HONOR ! OR, 
 
 " Mas' Peters' wa'house done lock up for de night," 
 said Scip. 
 
 " Some of you go, boys, and break the gate open," 
 said Jones. " No bales come in yet, but you'll find waste 
 enough lying about." 
 
 "But where's the feUow himself?" cried Smith. 
 " Witham, what have you done with him? We demand 
 to see the man that's been staying here to-day, and talk- 
 ing abolitionism round among our niggers." Smith had 
 never owned a negro, or any thing else, worth a five dol- 
 lar bill. 
 
 " I've nothing to say to you, Dan Smith. I shall 
 have something to say, by and by, to your sorrow. 
 If any gentleman has any thing to say to me, I'm ready 
 to hear him, and give him a civil answer ; but I tell you, 
 Dan Smith, the less words from you to me the better." 
 
 " Hurrah for Jack Witham ! A nigger-dealer turned 
 
 abolitionist ! But that's all you could expect in a 
 
 Englishman. I say, boys, if Witham don't give him up, 
 let's burn the house down." 
 
 " Hang the Yankee and the Englishman both," cried 
 another voice. 
 
 " Brethren," said Thompson, " gentlemen, I mean, 
 let us act as orderly citizens on this occasion. We repre- 
 sent the dignity of the chivalrous South. Let us obtain 
 an interview with this suspected person, and, having 
 brought home to him a statement of the enormity of the 
 crimes laid to his charge, crimes which, rousing the feel- 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 153 
 
 ing of indignation in the breast of this entire community, 
 alarming all classes for the safety of our peculiar institu- 
 tions, our wives, our children, and our our our sa- 
 ered honor, have brought us together on this occasion, in 
 
 rightful vindication " 
 
 \ . " Let's have him here, and set Thompson to talk at 
 him," said Jones. 
 
 " That would be some punishment in itself," said the 
 facetious and merciful student. 
 
 " There's Judge Hendrick coming, boys ! " cried one, 
 who stood near the end of the piazza. " There's the 
 judge coming, and somebody with him. Wonder what 
 the old judge will think of all this ! " 
 
 " Think ? " said Smith. " If he don't think it right to 
 stand up for the institutions of the South, I reckon he 
 won't get many votes when he's up for the judgeship 
 next time." 
 
 " Who's that with him?" cried several at once. 
 
 " I'll be if it isn't that man himself that we are 
 
 after," said Jones. 
 
 ".Is it ? " said the student. " Abolitionist or not, he has 
 a good deal of pluck." 
 
 The judge and his companion approached, the crowd 
 making way for them, and ascended the steps amid a 
 general silence. The judge himself was the first to 
 break it. 
 
 " Mr. Witham," said he, " what is the meaning of 
 this crowd? Is any thing unusual going on in your 
 
154 HONOR', OR, 
 
 house that calls so many of our fellow-citizens together 
 around it ? " 
 
 " The folks have come together, judge, out of some 
 foolery that Dan Smith has put in their heads. But 
 walk in, walk in, judge. Not you, though, Mr. Bryant, 
 or whatever your name is. I don't want you in my 
 house ; and you may just take your things and find lodg- 
 ings elsewhere, if you can get any." 
 
 " I do not wish to enter your house at present, Mr. 
 Witham. I came back on purpose to talk with these gen- 
 tlemen, who, I understood, were desirous to speak to me. 
 Gentlemen, my name is Frederick Bryant, a stranger, 
 who arrived in Tusculum this morning. I understand 
 you have business with me." 
 
 " Our business, Mr. Bryant," began Thompson, " is 
 is of a serious kind. The circumstances under which 
 we are assembled, on this occasion, are connected with 
 those rights of freedom, and those noble though pecu- 
 liar institutions, in defence of which our revolutionary 
 fathers " 
 
 " We hear, Mr. Bryant," said Smith, " that you are 
 
 a abolitionist ; you've been talking abolitionism to 
 
 our niggers, stirring them up to insurrection ; and you've 
 been talking abolitionism to Witham here ; and we've 
 made up our minds to give you a hundred lashes, and a 
 coat of tar and cotton, and send you out of the state 
 about the quickest. So lose no time talking, but off with 
 your coat." 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER* 8 DAUGHTER. 155 
 
 " Keep your distance, scoundrel," said Bryant. " Gen- 
 tlemen/' he added, raising his voice till its powerful tones 
 rang to the remotest of the crowd, " is it possible you 
 are about to commit an outrage on a stranger without 
 letting him hear the evidence on which he is accused, or 
 have an opportunity to defend himself? I have been in 
 this town little more than six hours. What have I done 
 in that short time to deserve such a punishment as that 
 with which this man threatens me ? I have not spoken 
 to a single negro in the place, unless it was to give some 
 direction about my baggage, or to inquire the way ; and, 
 if you have heard any thing of a conversation elsewhere, 
 it must have been very much misrepresented, to make 
 any harm out of it. Those I have spoken with here 
 have been principally Mr. Witham and Judge Hendrick ; 
 and I ask any man of common sense if I should have 
 been likely to select them as subjects for the infusion of 
 abolition sentiments. Mr. Witham you know. I shall 
 say little of him, for he and I do not agree. Judge Hen- 
 drick is your respected fellow-townsman, a Southerner by 
 birth, and one who would never countenance any thing 
 against the peace of the community in which he resides. 
 I appeal to him to say, if I have, to his knowledge, advo- 
 cated insurrection, or said or done any thing, which I had 
 not, as a free but peaceful citizen, a right to say or do." 
 
 " And I," said the judge, " testify most fully and most 
 willingly in favor of Mr. Bryant. I am well acquainted 
 with his friends, and have known himself from his boy- 
 
156 HONOR; OS, 
 
 hood ; and his purpose in visiting Tusculum I know to 
 be a legal and proper one. His views on some subjects 
 may be different from ours ; but I am fully assured that 
 he has not, since he has been here, said or done any 
 thing against the peace of the community, and convinced 
 that he has no desire to say or do any thing of the kind." 
 
 " Good ! " exclaimed the student. " We shall not see 
 our downy bird this time. And, in truth, I had rather 
 see him in his black broadcloth than in Dan Smith's 
 fancy dress." Many of the crowd seemed of the same 
 opinion ; numbers left it, and took the way to their 
 homes. But the leaders seemed not yet satisfied. 
 
 " Judge Hendrick," said Mr. Thompson, " the inter- 
 ests involved in the gathering of this occasion are too im- 
 portant to be left undefended, or any injury to them un- 
 vindicated and unavenged. Notwithstanding the manner 
 in which your friend if it is not disrespectful to you, 
 sir, to speak of an abolitionist as your friend has spoken 
 on this occasion " 
 
 " I agree fully with all that Mr. Thompson has said," 
 broke in Jones. " If he is an abolitionist, he can't stay 
 here. As Judge Hendrick stands up for him, we may 
 let him off, I suppose, without the flogging and the tar- 
 kettle, provided we are assured that he will leave the 
 state at once." 
 
 " I shall leave the state," said Bryant, " when it suits 
 my own convenience." 
 
 " Bravely, but rather rashly said," remarked the 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 157 
 
 judge. " Mr. Bryant, gentlemen, is a man of courage, 
 and you will not think the worse of him for that. But 
 I agree with you, he had better leave the city. His busi- 
 ness here is, I understand, in great part transacted ; and 
 in what remains of it, he can act through letters. I 
 pledge myself then, gentlemen, that he will leave the city 
 early to-morrow morning. As to his leaving the state, I 
 do not think, gentlemen, that it is our business to enforce 
 that ; but I willingly receive his assurance that he will 
 do so as soon as may be, consistently with his own con- 
 venience." 
 
 " That's putting the thing rather differently," said the 
 student. " Mr. Bryant, I will stand by you, and, if any 
 one here would harm a hair of your head, he will have 
 to do with Ned Elmsley and a few college lads that go 
 with him sometimes. Logomachians, to the rescue ! " he 
 cried ; and the air rang with a sudden response in the 
 same words, while numbers of the students forced their 
 way through the crowd, and gathered at the foot of the 
 piazza steps. 
 
 " Fellow-citizens," said Thompson, " we are assembled 
 on this occasion to do justice on a person accused of in- 
 cendiary conduct. Mr. Elmsley, and you gentlemen of 
 the college, you will not surely protect such a person ! " 
 
 " Drive the college boys home to their mothers," cried 
 Smith. " Down with the abolitionist ! " He rushed for- 
 ward to strike at Bryant, but was intercepted by Elmsley. 
 As the partisans on either side crowded round, leaving 
 14 
 
158 HONOR; OR, 
 
 a space about the door, the judge drew Bryant within it, 
 and shut and locked it. It was done so suddenly, that 
 the young man scarce understood the action ; but in- 
 stantly recovering himself, he exclaimed, " I must not 
 leave my ^defender at the mercy of that crowd," and at- 
 tempted to unfasten the door. 
 
 " Come," said the judge, " don't be crazy. You will 
 do more harm than good by staying. The college boys 
 will take care of their comrade ; and all will be safe, if 
 you are only out of the way." 
 
 Bryant saw the necessity of yielding, and followed the 
 judge as he went quickly through the house. As they 
 passed through the dining-room, the door of the private 
 parlor was open, and they saw Witham standing before a 
 desk, from which he was taking articles of value to se- 
 cure them from the mob. 
 
 Most southern dwellings, whether large or small, con- 
 sist of two separate portions ; one for the white members 
 of the family, and one for the colored. In the most re- 
 cent clearing of the interior settlements, the log-cabins 
 are in pairs, one square room being provided for the ac- 
 commodation of the ruling race, and another for their de- 
 pendants. If these are connected by a roof, covering the 
 space between, that space answers the purposes of piazza, 
 wash-room, and dining-room. The city mansion has no 
 slaves lodged, and no cooking done, within its proper pre- 
 cincts ; but beyond a court in its rear is a building com- 
 prising the kitchen and the servants' rooms. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 159 
 
 In such a building the wife and daughter of Witham 
 had taken refuge, when the shouts and menaces of the 
 crowd were heard in front of the hotel. Lizzie, relieved, 
 in part, of anxiety on Bryant's account, by learning from 
 old Cato that he had gone to Judge Hendrick's, had sent 
 to him thither her few lines of timely warning ; and 
 now endeavored to still the beating of her own heart by 
 doing what she could to cheer her step-mother. 
 
 " O," said Mrs. Witham, " Betsy, what will become 
 of us ? There's father been as mad as a March hare with 
 Dan Smith, and turned him out of the house, and now, 
 here's Smith come back, and all the fellows with him, a 
 tearin' and a ragin' ! And it's all along of that man of 
 yourn. Why couldn't he let you alone, now you was 
 with us, and had done with him and all his folks ? But he 
 must be runnin' after you, and puttin' us all to our wit's 
 end. It's a bad thing, a very bad thing, Betsy, to have 
 a lot of young men a danglin' after you." 
 
 " O, if I was sure that Frederick was safe out of the 
 way ! " said Lizzie. u Let him be once gone, once safe, 
 safe home, and no more young men shall give you trouble 
 on my account." 
 
 " Why, Betsy, child, don't cry. I hope your man will 
 get away safe ; and some time or 'nother all will come 
 right. What on airth was it he and father fell out about? 
 Something of his abolution, I reckon. But abolution or 
 not, he's a fine, handsome feller, and I hope he'll be 
 yourn yet." 
 
160 HONOR) OS, 
 
 " No," said the daughter ; " no : the sooner I dismiss 
 that fancy, the better. I have brought him nothing but 
 trouble ;. and now his coming to me here has brought him 
 danger, and what people call disgrace. I hear his pure 
 name coupled with the charge of being a base incendiary. 
 O, if he quits this place, let him never come near the 
 slave-dealer's daughter again. Heaven will help me to 
 bear my burden alone, and may his course be as happy 
 as it will always be noble." 
 
 " Never happy, unless you share it, dearest," said a 
 voice outside the window against which she leaned. Bry- 
 ant, after passing through the house, had been left by the 
 judge, while he went to see if his servant was ready with 
 the horse which he had directed him to bring, in case a 
 quick retreat should be necessary. 
 
 " Frederick ! You here ? " said Lizzie. " O, why did 
 you come back ? Did you not get my note ? " 
 
 " I had it, and I shall always keep it as a dear me- 
 morial of your care for me ; but I felt that I ought to be 
 here, and face the danger. Now I have faced it, I will 
 be as prudent as my friends desire. Only, are you in 
 safety ? Can I do any thing to protect or serve you ? " 
 
 " No, Frederick, I am where I ought to be ; and, if I 
 have any trials, I am getting used to them. You cannot 
 help any one here; indeed, your presence may be a 
 source of danger to my father. My love to dear fa- 
 ther and mother at Irvine, and Heaven's blessing go 
 with you." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 161 
 
 The shouts which had been heard indistinctly, as their 
 sound came from the front of the house, now burst forth 
 nearer and louder. Some, finding the door locked against 
 them, had entered the house through the windows from 
 the piazza ; others were coming round, outside of the 
 building. 
 
 " One parting kiss, my heart's best love," said Fred- 
 erick. " Life together on earth, if it be Heaven's will ; 
 if not, hereafter." 
 
 " Hereafter, forever," said she, as she stooped towards 
 him. The noise increased. " Now fly," she exclaimed, 
 as she saw her father at the opposite door. 
 
 "Witham, after taking the property and papers he 
 wished to secure, had seized a pistol to protect himself 
 and what he had about him from possible danger on that 
 wild night, and was now hastening to join his wife and 
 child, and escape with them from the building, which 
 some of the rioters had threatened to burn. He witnessed 
 the kiss of parting between his daughter and the man 
 whose coming had brought this trouble on his house, the 
 man who despised his trade, and had scorned his offered 
 gold. Many a deed of blood has been committed because 
 the instrument was at hand, when a moment's thought 
 would have prevented it. Witham uttered a deep curse, 
 raised his pistol, and fired. At that moment, a man 
 rushed into the court from the right, with the cry, " Down 
 with the Yankee incendiary ! " met Witham's bullet, and 
 fell. Bryant reached the gate on the left, ran past the 
 14* 
 
162 HONOR; OR, 
 
 private jail, and found at the stables Judge Hendrick and 
 his servant. 
 
 " Take this horse, and ride for your life," cried the 
 judge. " The south road leads to Palmetto, where you 
 will meet a stage. O, don't spend time in thanking 
 me," as Bryant began, " and as to payment, only 
 write me how you get along." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 163 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 COUNTRY LIVING AND RELIGION. 
 
 REDERICK BRYANT waited no longer, with 
 
 a hasty grasp of the hand of his noble friend, 
 he sprung into the saddle. The horse, excited 
 by the shouts and the flashing lights that began to ap- 
 pear, needed no spur. The rider's mind was too full of 
 other thoughts to take in the direction which had been 
 given for his course ; and it was not until the animal 
 was turning up the avenue to Judge Hendrick's house, 
 that Bryant recalled the necessity of a decision. Quickly 
 checking the creature's hopes of his familiar stable, he 
 pursued the road, indifferent whither it led him, and 
 chafing at the necessity which compelled his flight. It 
 galled his spirit that he should be obliged to fly before 
 such unworthy foes. How, he thought, would his con- 
 duct appear to the young man who had so bravely taken 
 his part ? And what might happen, in the excitement of 
 that hour, to endanger her he loved ? More than once 
 the thought arose of returning, and braving every danger, 
 rather than desert his generous defender and the unfor- 
 
164 HONOR i OB, 
 
 tunate object of his attachment. But reason told him 
 that to both of these his absence would be more likely to 
 bring safety than his presence. He continued on his 
 way, therefore, though with reduced speed. He knew 
 not whither he was going, and he cared not. Love and 
 honor, he bitterly thought, lay behind him ; it was cold 
 duty alone that beckoned him on. If pursued, he would 
 struggle, as well as an unarmed man could, against being 
 captured ; and that struggle might win for him at least 
 a pistol-ball, instead of the disgraceful treatment with 
 which he had been threatened, or the felon's death, which 
 would more probably be his doom, if he now fell into the 
 hands of the infuriated crowd. 
 
 But there was no thought of pursuing him. The feel- 
 ings of the people were now turned towards another 
 object. Death, the solemn messenger from another 
 world, had entered the scene of their excitement, and all 
 stood in awe before him. Judge Hendrick, as he walked 
 towards his home, was surprised at the suddenness with 
 which the shouts of the mob died away. 
 
 Witham had been found, by those who entered the 
 court, standing as if spell-bound, with the pistol in his 
 hand, and looking with an expression of horror upon the 
 man who lay on the ground before him. Turning from 
 the vain attempt to find signs of life in Smith, they fiercely 
 interrogated the tavern-keeper, but could get no answer 
 from him. He suffered the pistol to be taken from his 
 hand ; and it was passed from one to another, each one 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 165 
 
 noticing the marks of its recent use. Screams from the 
 servants' building, at first scarcely heard in the greater 
 interest of the scene before them, now drew the attention 
 of all. Jones tried the door, but found it locked ; and 
 as he shook it to obtain entrance, a voice called to him, 
 " Please to don't, massa. Young missis most dead, and 
 ole missis takin' on ; please go 'way now, please go 
 'way." 
 
 " Shut up about your old missis and young missis," 
 replied Jones. " Here, some of you, come out and take 
 care of poor Smith." 
 
 " He's past taking care of," said Thompson, bending 
 over his former companion with real feeling. " "Well, 
 it's an awful thing to go so suddenly." 
 
 " Why don't you secure the murderer?" said one of 
 the crowd. 
 
 " Send for the coroner," cried another. 
 
 Both suggestions were immediately acted on. Several 
 voices at once told Witham that he must consider him- 
 self a prisoner ; and without a word of remonstrance or 
 acquiescence, he went, with those who had taken his 
 capture upon themselves, into the inner room, and sat 
 down near the desk, from which, not half an hour before, 
 he had taken the fatal pistol. Others went in search of 
 the coroner, and, after some delay, returned with that 
 officer. He, however, decided to postpone his inquest to 
 the following day. Some needful directions were now 
 given, and the hotel was left in charge of a young man 
 
166 HONOR; OS, 
 
 who was William's assistant in his bar. In one room 
 lay the body of the slain man, watched over by those 
 who had been the partners of his dissipation, but whose 
 feelings now, touched by the suddenness of his death, 
 raised them for a time to a better character. The 
 wretched man who had so strangely stained his hands 
 in blood, cowered in another room, under the guard of 
 two who had volunteered to keep watch over him ; and 
 his mourning wife and daughter had been left to the 
 care of the household slaves. 
 
 The college clock had struck twelve, when the senti- 
 nel, who now alone guarded Witham's sleepless and 
 speechless rest, for the other had lain down to sleep, 
 intending to take his turn in watching afterwards, 
 heard a gentle tap upon the door, and, opening it, saw a 
 pale girl with a lamp in her hand. 
 
 " May I speak with my father, Mr. Anderson ? " she 
 inquired. 
 
 " I am sorry to refuse you, Miss Witham," said the 
 guard, " but my orders were to let no one see him. It 
 is late, too, and you have had an exciting time ; you had 
 better go to bed." 
 
 " I only want to see how he is, and speak a word of 
 comfort to him." 
 
 The guard glanced towards his prisoner, and thought 
 it might be well if any thing could rouse him from that 
 hopeless trance, and enable him to give some account 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 167 
 
 of what had happened. He replied, therefore, " Come 
 in, then ; but I must hear what you say together." 
 
 Lizzie looked deprecatingly, but saw it was in vain 
 to object to this condition. She advanced gently into 
 the room, knelt down near her father, and took his hand 
 in hers. Its trembling was the only sign that he was 
 aware of her presence. 
 
 " Father," she began, " dear father, you will be glad 
 to hear that mother is better. She has been quite ill 
 with hysterics, but is now asleep." 
 
 A sigh was the only answer. 
 
 " I have not been well myself, that is, I believe I 
 fainted ; but I am well now, that is, better." 
 
 It was not now a sigh, but a groan. 
 
 " Father," and she hesitated, " do not trouble your- 
 self about what you said to me. I know that it cannot 
 be ; it ought not to be ; I will try to feel right about it. 
 Father, can you forgive me all the trouble I have brought 
 on you ? " 
 
 The strong man groaned again, then threw his arms 
 around her, laid his head on her fair young neck, and 
 burst into tears. 
 
 But had she then forgotten her lover, that she could 
 pass so lightly the remembrance that her father's hand 
 had been raised against his life ? No ; her fainting 
 had prevented an accurate knowledge of what had 
 happened. Witham conjectured at once that she knew 
 
168 HONOR; OE, 
 
 not with what intent he had fired the pistol ; and he 
 resolved that, as far as depended on him, she should 
 never know. 
 
 Meantime, Frederick Bryant had pursued the road 
 which chance had given him, till night had gathered 
 round ; and the moon soon rising, he continued to ad- 
 vance, in hope of reaching some village, whose tavern 
 would afford the needed rest for himself and his horse. 
 But villages in the Southern States are of rare occur- 
 rence, except those of the slaves, which exist on every 
 large plantation ; and though in the upper country the 
 slaves are fewer in proportion than on the seaboard, the 
 cabins of the poorer white inhabitants are not usually 
 found together, but widely scattered. At length, about 
 midnight, fatigue, and the failure to find a better resting- 
 place, induced the young man to stop before a log-cabin, 
 which stood, with its rough plank door and unglazed 
 window, in a recent clearing by the road-side. His knock 
 and call were answered by a man who, though evidently 
 ill pleased at his coming so late, yet did not refuse to 
 receive him, and soon came out to take care of the 
 stranger's horse. The rough building had but one large 
 room, in three corners of which were beds, completely 
 shrouded from view by chintz curtains. In one of 
 these his host found room for Bryant, disturbing for a 
 moment the sound sleep of the two boys that occupied 
 it already. He threw himself on his scanty portion of 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 169 
 
 the hard couch, dressed as he was ; and, before long, 
 fatigue of body and of mind made it as easy to him 
 as ever had been the best accommodations of his distant 
 home. 
 
 He was awakened in the morning by the sound of 
 voices, and of persons in motion, though his young bed- 
 fellows still slept, and, looking forth, discovered that the 
 hive was both populous and busy. The mother of the 
 family and her two girls were astir ; and his host was 
 already abroad at work. Quickly rising, he went out, 
 and found means for a simple toilet in the form of a 
 tin basin near a spring. A little way off, he saw his 
 entertainer, and accosted him with, " A pleasant morn- 
 ing, my friend." 
 
 "Yes, sir," said the man, "though I don't like the 
 looks of that cloud. It's larger than the one that Elijah 
 saw, already, for that was no bigger than a man's hand ; 
 and I shouldn't wonder if this one grew as fast, and came 
 down as heavy." 
 
 " I must take my chance of it, however. I judge, 
 from the looks of your clearing here, that you have not 
 lived here long." 
 
 " No, sir ; I came from the Old North State." 
 
 "What's that? New Hampshire, Vermont, or 
 Maine?" 
 
 " Not quite so far," said the man, with a smile ; " we 
 call North Ca'lina the Old North State; and a good, 
 15 
 
170 HONOR} OR, 
 
 steady old state it is ; not so spry and restless as South 
 Ca'lina, and not troubled with quite so many lazy, worth- 
 less slaves." 
 
 "But though you like it so well, you came away 
 from it." 
 
 " Yes, I thought I'd come and try the gold region, and 
 so I settled there away under Mount Yonah ; but I didn't 
 like the company, and so I came here. I said to them, 
 as Abraham said to Lot, ' If you will go to the east I 
 will go to the west.' " 
 
 " Why, what was the matter with the company?" 
 
 " Too much drinking and gambling for my taste. The 
 first settlers there were a hard set. They would work 
 all day to dig and wash a little gold-dust, and spend the 
 night in gambling it away. And then came another set, 
 that brought in lots of slaves ; and I want to bring up 
 my boys to work, not to be ashamed of it, and leave all 
 work to the niggers." 
 
 " I should think, then, you would have gone farther 
 off, to the free states." 
 
 " No, sir ; I'm a southern man, any how. There's 
 plenty of room round here ; and then there's some dear 
 brethren that I like to be near." 
 
 "Brethren?" 
 
 " Yes, brethren in religion, I mean. I'm what they 
 call a Christian." 
 
 " Christian ! I hope we all are Christians." 
 
V 
 
 THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 171 
 
 " Well, I wish we all were, I'm sure. But there's a 
 set of us people round here, and more off at the West, 
 that don't believe in having any name of a sect, but 
 Christian ; and I'm one of them." 
 
 " Indeed ! Do you preach among them ? " 
 
 " Sometimes I do ; but I'm not a regular preacher. 
 You see, I have my family and my little place here to 
 take care of, and I can't spare time to ride round on a 
 circuit. I'm afraid I shan't be able even to go to the 
 camp-meeting to-day, over at Henderson ; but I expect 
 to be there to-morrow, and take the folks with me. 
 But there's wife blowing the horn for us to come in to 
 breakfast." 
 
 The breakfast, neat, simple, and substantial, was pref- 
 aced by a prayer from the farmer preacher ; and after 
 the refreshment Bryant departed, his host receiving, as a 
 matter of course, the payment which he offered for his 
 entertainment. 
 
 " I think you'd better not travel, with that cloud over 
 you," said he ; " but if you must go, and mean to keep 
 on this road, it will lead you directly to Henderson, where 
 our camp-meeting is ; and if you stop there, and see Colo- 
 nel Freeman, he's one of the deacons, and lives close 
 by the camp-ground, you can tell him that you saw 
 brother Sheridan, and that he sent him his love, and 
 hopes to be there to-morrow, and to receive a bless- 
 ing." 
 
172 HONOR; OR, 
 
 Parting with the worthy settler, Bryant pursued his 
 way. What should be his ultimate course he was yet 
 uncertain ; but for the present, the road that led most 
 directly from Tusculum seemed the safest. He had not 
 travelled far, however, when the warning of his host 
 proved to have been correctly given. Rain began to fall, 
 at first in scattered drops, then in an increasing shower, 
 and finally in a steady, unceasing deluge. Wet to the 
 skin, he rode on, mile after mile, without seeing any place 
 of shelter. At length a building near the road-side, re- 
 minding him in its appearance of a northern country 
 school-house, gave some promise ; and his horse, less from 
 the guiding rein than his own choice, turned with hasty 
 feet toward the adjoining shed. Bryant dismounted, 
 and knocked in vaiaU at the door. He then tried to open 
 it ; but it was locked, and the shutters, which covered the 
 apertures for light, were fastened within. It was, in fact, 
 a country church ; but supposing it to be a dwelling, he 
 concluded that its occupants had gone to the neighboring 
 meeting, and, after allowing his horse a little time to 
 rest, continued his journey through the rain. 
 
 The middle of the day brought him to the camping 
 ground. The road through the woods suddenly expanded, 
 and he saw before him what seemed a village ; for the 
 log-houses differed but little from those which he had seen 
 before as permanent dwellings. In the centre of the wide 
 space which these huts surrounded, were rows of benches, 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 173 
 
 fronting a stand for preaching, but stand and benches 
 were alike unoccupied ; while the worshippers were con- 
 ducting their services under shelter from the still un- 
 abated rain. From one of the huts Bryant caught the 
 chorus of a hymn, sung by numerous voices : 
 
 " Brethren, pray, and holy manna 
 Shall come streaming all around." 
 
 Some, whose duty it was to receive visitors to the re- 
 ligious encampment, came forth at the sound of his horse's 
 feet, and welcomed him with compassion for his dripping 
 condition. His inquiry for Colonel Freeman, and his 
 mention of the name of his entertainer of last night, made 
 his reception still more cordial ; and though he made 
 haste to explain that he was only a passing traveller, and 
 not of their sect, he lost nothing by his sincerity. He 
 was at once ushered to Colonel Freeman's, a large and 
 plain, though well-built house, near the camp-ground, where 
 he was supplied with dry clothing, and soon called to meet 
 the colonel and a large company at an abundant meal. 
 
 It was impossible for him to continue his journey that 
 day, had he been more disposed than he was to refuse 
 the hospitality which urged his remaining. After dinner, 
 therefore, he went out with his entertainer, and visited 
 one of the booths, where, when they arrived, religious 
 services had already been resumed. They were con- 
 ducted in an earnest though simple manner ; and if the 
 language of some uneducated preacher would at times 
 15* 
 
174 HONOR; OR, 
 
 excite a smile, the sentiments expressed were such as 
 every Christian heart could unite in. There were a few 
 slaves present, the servants of Colonel Freeman, and of 
 others in the neighborhood ; but they were present as fel- 
 low-worshippers, and were addressed by one of the speak- 
 ers with kind words, and in a manner which showed that 
 the ^recognition of spiritual fraternity was not in words 
 alone. There seemed to be no regular order of services 
 in the meeting, prayer, singing, and exhortation suc- 
 ceeding each other, at the option of those who were pre- 
 pared to lead in either. Once, when a brother, having 
 exhausted his stock of thoughts, was continuing his 
 address in wearisome repetition, Bryant was surprised 
 and amused at the sudden raising of a psalm tune by 
 another preacher; the audience joined in the singing, 
 and the speaker stopped without any appearance of irri- 
 tation. 
 
 The rain had ceased ; and, after the evening meal, the 
 company from all the booths gathered in the central en- 
 closure. Several preachers, in turn, occupied the stand ; 
 and the religious feeling, strengthened by the sympathy 
 of numbers, displayed itself in fervent addresses, prayers, 
 and singing, and in the tears on many cheeks. Bryant 
 himself was deeply moved. The last night, he had 
 yielded to despondency, so far as to forget that providen- 
 tial care which watches constantly over the course of vir- 
 tue. Now, the affectionate pleadings of these uncultivated 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 175 
 
 speakers, and the deep emotion of their rustic audience, 
 at once reproved his unbelief, and softened his heart to 
 acknowledge and to trust in the Friend who is ever 
 near. 
 
 After the meeting, he sought a private interview with 
 his hospitable entertainer, and told him frankly of his im- 
 prudent conversation with a slave, of the suspicion which 
 had consequently fallen upon him, and of the aid which 
 Judge Hendrick had given him for leaving Tusculum. 
 He inquired if he could find the means of sending back 
 to the judge his horse, and of purchasing another, or oth- 
 erwise continuing his journey. There was something in 
 Bryant's open manliness which always won the hearts of 
 those who, like himself, were true ; and Colonel Freeman 
 readily undertook to aid his stranger guest in what he 
 wished to accomplish. Arrangements were made the 
 next morning for sending the horse to Tusculum ; and 
 Bryant, in his letter of thanks to Judge Hendrick, gave 
 directions for forwarding to New York the baggage he had 
 left at the hotel, and requested intelligence of occurrences 
 since his departure. He enclosed a bank note to cover 
 expenses, requesting his friend to use what might remain 
 of it for some purchase which should preserve the mem- 
 ory of one who owed so much to his generous protection. 
 The colonel furnished Bryant, on moderate terms, with 
 another horse, shook him cordially by the hand, and saw 
 him depart on the road to Knoxville, Tennessee. 
 
176 HONOR; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 AN INDIAN CHIEF AND A STRAY POET. 
 
 course which our traveller was now directed 
 to pursue, lay somewhat west of that which his 
 friend Stevens had taken, when continuing his 
 summer ramble into the region of the gold mines. The 
 road to Knoxville lay through the section of country still 
 mostly inhabited by the Cherokee tribe of Indians, 
 though it had been already surveyed and disposed of 
 by lottery among the white inhabitants of the state. 
 The portions of land actually cultivated by the Indians 
 were, indeed, considered as their property, with whatever 
 buildings they had erected. But as it was not the policy 
 of the state to encourage their remaining, these also had 
 been included in the lottery ; so that each Indian's farm 
 had a claimant ready to take possession of it as soon as 
 the present owner should remove. Some years later, 
 arrangements were made by which the Indians received 
 compensation for their improvements, and consented to 
 emigrate to the region provided for them beyond the 
 Mississippi. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 177 
 
 It was not until the second day after leaving Hender- 
 son, that Bryant forded the Chattahoochee, and entered 
 the Indian country. He soon saw that it had already 
 begun to be occupied by the more powerful race. He 
 overtook a party, consisting of three families, who were , 
 on their way to occupy the portions of land which had 
 fallen to them in the lottery. They were travelling with 
 large covered wagons, which served the purpose of tents 
 for shelter when they rested at night. Only one family 
 had slaves ; and these, a woman and her boy, seemed to 
 be on very familiar terms with their owners. Bryant 
 had already observed a great difference, in this respect, 
 between the slaves of small proprietors and the numer- 
 ous servants on a .large estate. Passing these, he trav- 
 elled for some time in solitude. Then another river was 
 to be forded, and on its opposite bank he found an Indian 
 village. It was composed mostly of simple huts, resem- 
 bling the log-cabins of the border settlers ; but among 
 them were some houses of commodious size and neat 
 appearance ; and the brown faces that appeared at the 
 doors and windows of some among them showed that 
 these also were dwellings of the Cherokees. The men 
 whom Bryant saw were clothed partly like their white 
 neighbors ; but the leggings of deer-skin, and the blanket 
 worn instead of a coat, were marks of a different race. 
 The heads of both males and females were generally 
 uncovered, the blanket serving for a hood, in case such 
 protection was needed. A few men, however, were seen 
 
178 HONOR*, OR, 
 
 dressed entirely in the manner of the whites ; and on the 
 other hand, Bryant met afterwards an Indian adorned 
 with feathers and wampum, in the true aboriginal style. 
 In the centre of the village was a neat building, which 
 answered the purpose of church and court-house, com- 
 bined. Our traveller made no stay in this village, as he 
 had been directed to the home of a friendly chief, some 
 miles farther on. 
 
 It was towards evening that he came upon a group of 
 persons evidently returning from a successful day's hunt- 
 ing. A man and boy, in the common clothing of work- 
 ing people among the whites, were carrying quantities 
 of birds, hares, and squirrels, while two negroes followed, 
 bearing each a rifle over one shoulder, while over the 
 other was the end of a stake, held horizontally between 
 them, and supporting the carcass of a deer. Bryant had 
 heard already that slavery had been adopted by the 
 Indians from their white neighbors. 
 
 The party stopped on seeing the traveller, and he 
 thought the looks of the older Indian betokened little 
 pleasure in meeting a white man in the midst of his 
 hunting-grounds. Bryant saluted him courteously, and 
 inquired if there was any place near, where he could find 
 provision for himself and his horse. 
 
 " None here but Indian," said the man, gruffly. 
 ." When white man come to Indian country, he take care 
 of himself ; he camp out. No expect Indian take care of 
 him." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 179 
 
 " But I do expect the Indians to take care of me to- 
 night," said Bryant, good-naturedly ; " for I have been 
 travelling a long way, and must go a long way farther, 
 before I get out of your country." 
 
 " You go across, den? May be you come to look out 
 your lot?" 
 
 " No ; I am going across to Tennessee. I came from 
 Henderson, and Colonel Freeman told me I could find 
 accommodations with John Coombs, a chief man among 
 your people." 
 
 " Colonel Freeman send you? Colonel Freeman good 
 man. I John Coombs, and if colonel send you, all 
 right. Come along wid me." 
 
 Bryant followed this guide, of a race he had never 
 seen till that day, going back over a portion of the road 
 he had passed. The chief had the copper color, the 
 straight black hair, high but receding forehead, and prom- 
 inent cheek bones, which he had often seen in pictures 
 of Indians. His questions, as they walked, showed that 
 he still regarded Bryant with some suspicion ; but by 
 degrees this cleared away, and but for the slight imper- 
 fection of his English, his visitor might have thought 
 himself still in the company of the cordial and intelligent 
 circle from whom he had recently parted. 
 
 At length they reached a point in the road from which 
 an opening through the trees disclosed a clearing, with a 
 neat house, of two stories, built in southern fashion, its 
 broad piazzas covered by the advancing roof, and its 
 
180 HONOR; OR, 
 
 chimneys projecting at the sides. Bryant wondered that 
 he had not seen this dwelling as he passed before ; but a 
 look in the opposite direction recalled to his memory how 
 his attention had been then engrossed by the lovely 
 scenery that opened to his view, where the woods, par- 
 tially cleared for Coombs's plantation, had allowed the 
 eye to rest on the north-eastern mountains. 
 
 Entering the house, he found it furnished in the same 
 style with the better class of country dwellings in the 
 regions through which he had passed, even to the luxury 
 of a piano, upon which the daughter of his host played 
 the popular songs, for the gratification of her father's 
 guest. When she was gone, Bryant could not but 
 express his pleasure and surprise. 
 
 " Yes," replied the mother, sadly ; " she is too fine 
 a girl to be sent off among the wild Indians out in the 
 West." 
 
 In the evening, his host, learning from Bryant that he 
 was from a different section of the country, entered into 
 the history of the recent events relating to his tribe.. He 
 told of the progress they had made in the arts of life, of 
 their adoption of a regular republican form of govern- 
 ment, and of the increased desire, on the part of their 
 white neighbors, for their removal on that very account, 
 as they did not wish to have within their state limits a 
 permanent population of a different race, and exercising 
 independent authority. He told how near the state had 
 come to actual collision with the United States upon the 
 
TSE SLAVE-DEALER'S. DAUGHTER. 181 
 
 subject, and how, subsequently, the discovery of gold in 
 the Indian country had brought in upon them crowds of 
 adventurers. Bryant had been assured by Judge Hen- 
 drick and Colonel Freeman, that it was, in part, to guard 
 the Indians from these intruders that the legislature of 
 the state had prohibited, for a time, the residence of any 
 white man among them. His host now told, with deep 
 emotion, how the missionaries, whom they regarded as 
 their greatest benefactors, had, in their zeal for the good 
 of their converts, violated the provisions of this law, and 
 were at that very time enduring imprisonment in the 
 state penitentiary ; and he owned that the necessity was 
 becoming more and more apparent for the remnant of 
 their people to emigrate to the West. Bryant recognized 
 in the account a new version of the same tale which the 
 history of the older states discloses that the Indian 
 race recedes before the advancing Saxon with such sad 
 fatality, that even improvement on the humbler side, and 
 the endeavor to do justice on the other, seem almost to 
 hasten the ruin they should delay. 
 
 The evening meal was followed by the evening prayer, 
 for none are more zealous than recent converts in the 
 externals of religion ; and the patience of the Cherokees 
 in after years, when their wilder neighbors, the Creeks, 
 flew to arms, showed that their conversion had not been 
 to external forms alone. In the morning, after a plenti- 
 ful repast, the traveller felt some doubt whether it would 
 be proper to offer to his host a man of distinction 
 16 
 
182 HONOR i OR, 
 
 among his people any payment for the refreshment he 
 had supplied. He made the tender, however, and was 
 glad to find it accepted ; for in a .thinly-settled country 
 the traveller might fare ill if he were not at liberty to 
 ask for food and lodging at any house ; and he can only 
 feel this liberty upon the understanding that compensation 
 will be received. 
 
 After leaving the house of the' friendly Indian, Bryant 
 pursued his way through woods, interrupted at rare inter- 
 vals by clearings. At times he stopped, to buy at some 
 cabin the simple refreshment it might be able to sup- 
 ply. Towards evening, he judged, from the knowledge 
 of distances which he had obtained, that he was near the 
 boundary of Tennessee, if he had not already crossed it ; 
 and he began to hope that he soon should see some cottage 
 where he might pass the night. 
 
 While these thoughts were in his mind, a turn of the 
 road brought him in sight of a group of men equipped as 
 soldiers, except that they were not in uniform. Some 
 were seated or stretched at length on the ground ; others 
 were leaning on their muskets, or slowly walking while 
 they talked with each other. At the sight of Bryant, the 
 attention of all was fixed upon him ; and while some 
 loudly called to him to halt, they handled their arms in a 
 manner which showed they were prepared to enforce 
 their order. Bryant wonderingly obeyed, and, as they 
 approached, inquired of the foremost by what authority 
 they stopped a passenger upon the highway. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 183 
 
 " By the authority of the State of Georgia," said the 
 leader. " I am captain of the Georgia Guard ; and our 
 orders are to keep suspicious persons from entering the 
 Indian country." 
 
 " But I am leaving it, not entering it," replied Bryant ; 
 " so, whether a suspicious person or not, your orders 
 cannot apply to me." 
 
 " I shall judge of that myself," said the officer, conse- 
 quentially. " If a man has been doing mischief in the 
 Indian country, I shall see that he does not leave it very 
 easily. Where are you from, and where are you 
 going?" 
 
 " I am last from the camp-meeting at Henderson, and 
 I am travelling to Knoxville." 
 
 " Are you a preacher?" said the man, with a con- 
 temptuous laugh. " You don't look much like one ; but 
 if you are, we've had enough of preachers in the Indian 
 country, stirring up the red-skins to rebellion. Where 
 did you sleep last night ? " 
 
 " I am not a preacher, and I slept at Mr. Coombs's." 
 
 " Mister Coombs ! John Coombs, the old red-skin, 
 called Mister! Well, friend, go on; you're giving a 
 pretty good account of yourself ! Come all this way 
 from a camp-meeting, but not a preacher ; spent last 
 night at an Indian's, and talk about him as if he was a 
 gentleman ! Let's hear some more, now. Do you live 
 at Knoxville, or at Henderson ? " 
 
 " Where I live is none of your business," replied 
 
184 HONOR; OR, 
 
 Bryant, indignantly. " I am travelling on my own 
 affairs, and simply passing through the country which 
 you are pretending to guard. In half an hour I should 
 be out of it, if I am not in fact through it already." 
 
 " Whether you're through it or not makes no differ- 
 ence. A man can't come it over me about being on the 
 wrong side of a line drawn through the woods, as I told 
 that crazy fellow the other day. I reckon we must take 
 you to keep company with him at the guard-house. Your 
 answers are not satisfactory, young man, and you must 
 just dismount and be searched." 
 
 Bryant saw that it was in vain to resist, and to save 
 the indignity of a search, produced what he had about 
 him. When he saw his pocket-book opened by the 
 officer, he fully expected that it would be lightened of 
 some of its bank notes. His suspicion wronged the man, 
 however, for he was only doing what he supposed to be 
 his duty, though in a pompous and ungracious manner. 
 He looked at the money, evidently with some surprise at 
 its amount, and then examined the miscellaneous papers 
 which the book contained. Some " Notes in the case of 
 Maxwell versus Allen," and some " Verses to a Loved 
 One far away," were but slightly looked at. The receipts 
 attracted more notice ; the officer spoke with one of his 
 men, and pointed to him the date of " Boston." But 
 what confirmed their suspicions fully was a piece of 
 paper, which, having once been wet through with the 
 rain, had been carefully dried, and placed in the inmost 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 185 
 
 fold of the pocket-book. It was Lizzie's note to her 
 lover on the evening of the naob. The officer made out 
 the faded pencil-marks with some difficulty, but on read- 
 ing them, exclaimed, 
 
 " ' Crowd of people surrounding the house/ ' abolition- 
 ist ! ' ' escape ! ' This tells the story. You've just got 
 away from being lynched ; and I reckon you deserved it. 
 I arrest you as a suspicious character, and shall detain 
 you till I receive instructions from his excellency the 
 governor." 
 
 Much to his vexation, our traveller found himself 
 obliged to accompany his new acquaintances to the cabin 
 they occupied as a guard-house. It was of logs, having 
 a chimney built of slabs and plastered inside with clay, 
 and was furnished with an unglazed window in front. 
 Other similar huts were near, for the accommodation of 
 the soldiers. A sentinel was before the door ; and seated 
 on the step was a man of middle age, whose appearance 
 in such a scene struck Bryant with some surprise. His 
 dress, though bearing marks of rough living, was 
 such as indicated the gentleman, fashioned with that 
 attention to comfort more than show that is rather 
 English than American. His face showed boldness, 
 intelligence, and humor. He was talking familiarly 
 with the sentinel ; and if he was a prisoner, one might 
 judge that he was one who could relieve the tediousness 
 of his confinement by a lively temperament and a playful 
 fancy. 
 
 16* 
 
186 HONOR} OR, 
 
 " Here comes our illustrious captain," said he, as the 
 party drew near; "and by all that is valiant, he has 
 taken another prisoner. I welcome you, sir, to my hith- 
 erto solitary cell." 
 
 " Sentinel," said the captain, " do you not know it is 
 against my orders for you to have any talk with your 
 prisoner ? " 
 
 " Beg pardon, cap'n," said the man, trying to smother 
 a laugh ; "but he's so droll." 
 
 " Be not indignant, most valiant captain," said the 
 man upon the door-step. " I must speak to you in 
 Ercles' vein, for that alone suits one so great as you. I 
 consider you the greatest man I ever saw." 
 
 " I cannot allow such remarks," said the officer, hold- 
 ing his head somewhat higher, however, and not ill 
 pleased at the sarcastic flattery. He continued, " You 
 will have a companion in the guard-house, sir. This 
 man, like yourself, has been stopped under suspicious 
 circumstances, and will be detained until we receive 
 further orders." 
 
 "And when will your further orders arrive, most 
 excellent captain?" said the gentleman. "Here have 
 I, for three days already, played the part of a captive 
 Conrad, or a prisoner of Chillon, to quote my old 
 acquaintance, Lord Byron " 
 
 " "We shall hear to-morrow. I have reported to the 
 governor, and I have no doubt he will order you to be 
 sent to him at Milledgeville for examination." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 187 
 
 " And you look to be either earl or duke, for catching 
 me, as Jack Falstaff did for killing Percy ! But no 
 dignity, captain, could possibly increase your greatness." 
 
 The officer made no answer to this compliment, but 
 having posted another sentinel, left the two prisoners to 
 make acquaintance with each other. The first occupant 
 of the gua^d-house courteously shared with Bryant such 
 means of comfort as the place afforded ; and a sol- 
 dier soon appeared, bringing their evening meal. The 
 salt p'ork and bread, and the tin cups of coffee, were not 
 unacceptable ; and after they had supped, Bryant inquired 
 of his new companion how he had fallen into the hands 
 of the guard. ' * v ' 
 
 *' By my own wandering disposition," he answered ; " a 
 disposition that has led me into all sorts of places since I 
 left my father's school-house in Berry Street, Boston. It 
 has carried me to half the capitals of Europe, and now it 
 has made me prisoner to this redoubtable Captain Boba- 
 dil of the Georgia Guard. I have been travelling in the 
 West, from Ohio to Tennessee, collecting subscribers for 
 my new magazine ; and I must needs come into this In- 
 dian country, to see what sort of beings the aborigines 
 made when they were half civilized. I thought I might 
 make a story, or a play, or an article out of it ; and true 
 enough, I have made one, with myself and Captain Bob- 
 adil for the heroes." 
 
 " I agree with you that the pomposity of the captain is 
 rather diverting." 
 
 " The greatest man I ever saw, actually the greatest. 
 
188 HONOR; OR, 
 
 I have seen George the Fourth ; and his brother, the pres- 
 ent king ; and Napoleon the Great ; and old Louis le De- 
 sire ; and ever so many others ; but the majesty of this 
 man goes beyond them all." 
 
 At this moment the sentinel before their open door 
 commenced singing. Bryant was beginning to speak, 
 but his companion signed to him to be silent. He lis- 
 tened with a smile as if of pleasure ; then suddenly tears 
 came into his eyes. Bryant looked on him with sur- 
 prise, for the melody and words, though beautiful, were 
 familiar ; they were sung all over the country ; for it 
 was "Sweet Home." 
 
 " Ah, v thought the young man, "he is thinking of a 
 sweet home of his own, to which this dreary place is a 
 sad contrast." But he did not penetrate the depth of his 
 fellow-prisoner's feeling. 
 
 As the strain ended, the man who had been so moved 
 by it asked the sentinel, " Do you know who wrote those 
 lines?" 
 
 " No," said the man, betrayed, by the suddenness of 
 the question, into forgetfulness of the rule against con- 
 versing with those under guard. 
 
 " I did," rejoined the prisoner. The sentinel looked 
 surprised and respectful ; but he had by this time remem- 
 bered his orders, and in silence resumed his walk. 
 
 " You wrote them ! " said Bryant. "Is it possible? 
 Are you then Mr. John Howard Payne ? " 
 
 " You have heard of me then ? " said the poet. " Hear- 
 ing that man sing, brought back the memory of for- 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 189 
 
 mer days so strongly that it almost unmanned me. I 
 have written about home, and where have I a home 
 now?" 
 
 " The author of Brutus/ the author of those lines, 
 must have a home in every American heart." 
 
 " Thank you for saying so," replied Payne ; " but this 
 does not look like it. But come ; as it is growing cold, let 
 us shut that window and door. There is something to 
 answer for a fireplace here ; and I have a box of the new 
 invented matches, that kindle by rubbing. So we will sit 
 together on these blocks, and talk over our past adven- 
 tures. How is it that you came into the hands of the 
 Philistines ? Have you been stirring up the Indians, or 
 meddling with the blacks ? " 
 
 Bryant gave an outline of his story ; and then, at his 
 request, the poet related some of the incidents in his own 
 life, from those early days when he marshalled the boys 
 of his father's school in mimicry of war, or won their 
 plaudits by his declamation, to his precocious appearance 
 as author and actor ; thence through his experience in 
 connection with the stage, and as consul for the United 
 States in a foreign port. At length the varied tale was 
 ended. They lay down upon the heap of straw which 
 covered the rough floor in one corner of the guard-house. 
 Bryant's dreams led him far away from the wild region 
 and the rude and suspicious men around him. He stood 
 again with Lizzie beneath the honeysuckle at the window 
 of that "sweet home* in Irvine. Again she looked upon 
 him with features kindled by elevated thought, as when 
 
190 HONOR', OR, 
 
 she repeated to him those lines of Lovelace. It was a 
 stanza of the same poet that she whispered now : 
 
 " Stone walls do not a prison make, 
 
 Nor iron bars a cage ; 
 Minds innocent and quiet take 
 
 That for a hermitage. 
 If I have freedom in my love, 
 
 And in my soul am free, 
 Angels alone, that soar above, 
 
 Enjoy such liberty." 
 
 In the course of the next morning a messenger arrived, 
 bearing a letter to the captain of the Guard. It con- 
 tained a severe reprimand for the detention of Mr. Payne, 
 with an order for his immediate release, and that of any 
 other persons detained under similar circumstances. 
 The travellers, taking leave of the crestfallen captain, 
 proceeded to Knoxville, where Payne published an 
 account of his imprisonment, which was read through- 
 out the land, and occasioned no little excitement. ^The 
 executive of Tennessee began to make inquiries whether 
 the outrage had not been committed within the limits of 
 that state ; and from Georgia courteous invitations were 
 sent to the author of " Home, Sweet Home." The Georgia 
 Guard was immediately disbanded. As for Bryant's 
 arrest, it was forgotten in that of his more distinguished 
 companion ; and it would not have been known, but for 
 this veracious record, that John Howard Payne had had 
 any one to share his confinement. *'* 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 191 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 INTO THE LION'S MOUTH. 
 
 OME three months after the occurrences re- 
 corded in our last chapter, a merchant vessel 
 from New York lay outside the bar at Charles- 
 ton harbor. It was near evening, but in the glow of the 
 west the city could be seen beyond the level bay, amid 
 the circuit of land scarce less level the city, twelve 
 miles off, its roofs and less prominent towers clustering 
 round St. Michael's spire, which seemed the gigantic 
 guardian of the whole. Thus had the vessel lain since 
 morning ; and now, while the other passengers awaited 
 its delayed motion with a composure that seemed indif- 
 ference, one gentleman exhibited signs of impatience and 
 vexation. He walked the deck rapidly, stopping, how- 
 ever, frequently, to look towards the city, or to observe 
 the motion of the few clouds, as if to gather from them 
 some augury of possible progress. At length he ap- 
 proached the captain, who, standing by the side of the 
 vessel, was looking also towards the distant city. 
 
 " No hope of getting there to-night, then, captain?" 
 he inquired. 
 
192 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " No, Mr. Bryant, no hope, so long as wind and tide 
 are against us this way. You see we need a high tide 
 to take us across the bar, and when the tide has been 
 high, the wind has been dead ahead. "We may have to 
 lay here four and twenty hours, or more." 
 
 " And the cars for Hamburg leave Charleston at seven 
 to-morrow morning ! Captain, I am on business of life 
 and death life and death ! too truly," said he, inter- 
 rupting himself. " I must leave Charleston for the 
 interior to-morrow at seven. Now, is there any possible 
 way that, for love or money, I can be taken up to the 
 city to-night ? " 
 
 " We might hail a fishing-boat, and see if the man 
 would take you in," said the captain. " There are plenty 
 of these negro fishermen returning to land about this 
 time." 
 
 Bryant eagerly caught at the proposal, and before 
 long a boat was seen and hailed ; the bargain was struck, 
 and Bryant, with his baggage, took his seat in the boat, 
 with its dark oarsman, bade farewell to the captain and 
 his fellow-passengers, and was on his way across the 
 waters, then so peaceful and lonely, since then the 
 scene of such fierce and fatal conflict. 
 
 When the negro had rowed for some distance, crossing 
 the bar which had proved such an obstacle to the en- 
 trance of the larger vessel, Bryant discovered himself to 
 be nearing a bastioned fortress on his right, and learned 
 that it was Fort Moultrie, of revolutionary memory. 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 193 
 
 The low shore on the left was not crowned by any mili- 
 tary work ; and Fort Sumter, in our day so famous, did 
 not then occupy its wave-washed island in the central 
 space. 
 
 The negro sung, as he rowed, a strange, wild strain, to 
 such words as these. They might be entitled 
 
 THE FISH AND THE FISHER-BOY. 
 
 " Take de bait, take de hook ; 
 
 Come along, brudder fish ; 
 Don't you want to see de cook ? 
 
 Don't you want to see de dish ? 
 First-rate cook, Dinah ! 
 
 First-rate dish she got ! 
 O, you'll be happy dere 
 
 Cooked smokin' hot ! 
 
 " Take de hook, take de line ; 
 
 Come along, nigger boy ; 
 Get your massa fish to dine ; 
 
 Dat's a sight to gib you joy ! 
 First-rate man, massa, 
 
 First-rate at a treat ; 
 O, you'll be happy dere 
 
 Seein' massa eat ! " 
 
 Bryant laughed as he heard the sarcasm of the second 
 verse. It was a sudden laugh, that seemed broken off 
 by some thought that forbade it. Remembering how his 
 incautious conversation with Toussaint had resulted, he 
 made no comment to the negro on his song. 
 
 Darkness fell around them, and the stars came out, 
 17 
 
194 HONOR, OR, 
 
 while the city revealed itself across the waters by its 
 lights, streaking the waves with reflected radiance. 
 Bryant was more inclined to converse with himself than 
 with his companion. 
 
 " I- wonder," said he, inwardly, " whether this fort 
 I have just passed will ever give forth war's thunder 
 again. All is peace now ; and it does not seem likely 
 that any nation will care to disturb us, powerful as we 
 are ; and here, on this continent, remote from their 
 centres of power, we can scarcely disturb them. 
 
 "But internal convulsions? Is there not trouble 
 brewing with these Nullifiers? They talk desperately, 
 but it can hardly be carried out. This state will not act 
 alone, and no other state is wild enough to act with her. 
 If they should, I did not vote for Jackson, but he is at 
 least a man. He will not let the Union go without a 
 struggle. 
 
 " These fish ! My oarsman rests his oars to pull one 
 in that has caught at one of the lines he had fastened to 
 the sides of the boat. There, die, poor creature, seized 
 by rapacious man ! When philanthropy has done away 
 with war, will it take up the cause of such victims as you ? 
 
 " What shall we reason ? That philanthropy is 
 wrong ? No ; but we must keep in view common 
 sense, and the evident will of Grod. I will not inter- 
 fere for the fish then; nor will I meddle with the 
 fisherman, and turn his harmless sarcasm into burning 
 anger at the injustice which his race endures. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 195 
 
 "No, c Sunny South'! your great evil is beyond my \ 
 mending. But O, how it pervades with its influence all ^ 
 your life ! Well, I may not interfere with others, but I 
 and mine will be clear of it. Never have I regretted, 
 in all that it has cost me, that I refused to defile myself 
 with Witham's ill-gotten gold. 
 
 " Ah, that recalls my errand my errand, which the 
 only friend who knows of it calls insane. Well, I have 
 counted the cost, and I will not shrink, though it be from 
 death. The father must be saved, wretch as he is, for 
 truth's sake, and for his daughter's. 
 
 " His daughter's ! Can she ever be mine? Not only 
 a slave-dealer's, but a murderer's daughter? For he 
 intended to murder, though not the man he killed ; and 
 if law had its strict course, the intention and the deed, 
 both complete, though applied to different objects, would 
 make him fully guilty of the crime of murder. 
 
 "^Does hojioiL.bid.me give her up for that? She will 
 say so ; I say differently. (True honor Ibids me stand up M/ 
 ^or the innocent and the unfortunate. But down, idle 
 hopes ! My own life is in more danger than his. Well, 
 let me do my part bravely, and if I fall, the victim of 
 another riot, I fall without real dishonor, if I fall without 
 guilt." 
 
 And now, the island of Castle Pinckney passed, the 
 boat reached the wharf in the rear of the Exchange ; 
 and having paid his sable convoy, Bryant called a porter, 
 and found his way to Jones's Hotel. 
 
196 HONOR', OR, 
 
 In the parlor, at Jones's, an elderly gentleman and 
 lady were standing, habited as just returned from some 
 evening engagement. They had -been accompanied back 
 to the hotel by others, who were now taking leave of 
 them with expressions of courtesy. 
 
 " I am sorry/' said a gentleman, " that your stay in 
 Charleston is so short, Mr. Livingston, that we have not 
 time to see more of you, and to show you what is worth 
 seeing in our city." 
 
 " We should be delighted to stay longer among such 
 hospitable friends," he replied, u but the business that 
 brings us south is too pressing for delay, and indeed 
 makes us too anxious to allow much thought for any 
 thing else. But if all turns out well, we shall have a 
 fund of agreeable recollections to dwell upon in future." 
 
 " I shall want to describe to my fifends at the North," 
 said Mrs. Livingston, " those beautiful churches. I 
 hardly know which to admire most. St. Michael's 
 is the finest building, but that venerable St. Philip's, 
 with its walls and pillars so encrusted with marble monu- 
 ments, is different from any thing I have seen elsewhere 
 in our country." 
 
 " Then your accomplished sculptor," said Mr. Living- 
 ston, " Colonel CogdelTs name should be mentioned with 
 Allston's, whom we claim by adoption, to show what 
 South Carolina can do in the arts." 
 
 " While our friends in Orange Street show what she 
 can do in poetry," added his wife. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 197 
 
 " If you could stay over to-morrow, I should like to 
 have you visit our citadel/' said their southern friend ; 
 " the large, square building we passed on our ride this 
 morning." 
 
 " A citadel ! " said Mr. Livingston ; "I heard the 
 word used this morning, and was struck with it as some- 
 thing new in our country. What is it used for ? " 
 
 " O, you know our peculiar population. They need 
 some exhibition of military force to keep them in order. 
 Our police, you may have observed, is military, with 
 guard house and beat of drum ; and the building I spoke 
 of belongs to the state, but is garrisoned by United States 
 troops." 
 
 " They are to leave soon, however," said another 
 gentleman. " The governor has demanded back the 
 citadel, and the requisition is to be complied with. But 
 we must not keep our friends standing, Mr. Henderson." 
 And with mutual good wishes, the Southerners departed. 
 
 " Ah," said Mr. Livingston, when they were gone, 
 " that citadel and that military array tell volumes of the 
 dangers as well as the evils, of the slave system. Strange, 
 that men as intelligent and really noble as these should 
 be the supporters of such a state of things." 
 
 " Did you observe," said his wife, " his anxiety when 
 you were speaking with that poor fellow in the prison ? " 
 
 " What, the one confined on a charge of circulating 
 abolition documents ? Yes ; he seemed to think my 
 simple questions of humanity would involve me as an 
 17* 
 
198 HONOR; OR, 
 
 accomplice. But, Lucy, did you notice the pillory, 
 stored up in the court-house building? Who would 
 have thought to see such a relic of the dark ages ! " 
 
 They paused to listen to the sweet chime of St. 
 Michael's bells. While they were yet ringing, the door 
 opened, and Frederick Bryant was shown into the room. 
 
 " Ah, Frederick ! " said Mr. Livingston, " then you 
 have held firm to your- purppse of coming south once 
 more, though the last time so nearly cost you your life. 
 Did not you think the old folks could be trusted to take 
 care of their stray bird, but you must be coming after 
 them?" 
 
 " No, sir ; but my heart lay this way, and my duty too. 
 But when did you arrive, and by what route, to get here 
 before me ? " 
 
 " We came by the new line of steamers between 
 Charleston and Norfolk. They make a very easy pas- 
 sage, only stopping for wood and water at Cape Fear. I 
 hear they talk of soon having a line direct to New 
 York." 
 
 " O, before long there will be steamers to Liverpool," 
 said Bryant. " You go on to-morrow, I suppose, as the 
 trial is so near ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and we should have gone to-day, but we had 
 friends here who were not to be denied. I have letters, 
 too, since I saw you, that have relieved our anxiety in 
 part." 
 
 " Letters from Lizzie?" 
 
THE SLAVE- DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 199 
 
 " From Lizzie and from Judge Hendrick. He has 
 been all kindness. He and Mrs. Hendrick would have 
 had Lizzie stay at their house, if she had been willing ; 
 but the noble girl would not leave Mrs. Witham, borne 
 cfown with sorrow, and in declining health ; and so, ever 
 since Witham's arrest, they have boarded together at a 
 house near the jail. There was a little left from the 
 wreck of his property, which suffices for the present." 
 
 " The wreck of his property ! " said Bryant. 
 
 " Had you not heard that nearly all he had was lost at 
 a blow, by the failure of the Bank at Xenophon ? The 
 failure was entire. Nothing could be found to explain 
 where the funds had gone ; and no possibility, it seems, 
 of calling any one to account in a legal manner. One 
 of the losers, however, took the law into his own hands, 
 by shooting the president of the bank in open day ; and 
 such was the public feeling, that at last accounts he had 
 not been arrested for it." 
 
 " It has gone then," said Bryant ; " gained by the 
 crimes of its possessor, lost by the crimes of others ! 
 There passed away the obstacle that once was all that 
 stood between Lizzie and me. But O, what obstacles 
 there are now ! " 
 
 " By what I hear from Lizzie," said Mr. Livingston, 
 " her father's comment on the loss was much like 
 what you have just made. He seems to be a changed 
 man. He declares that he did not intend to kill Smith ; 
 but the pistol was found in his hand, hot from its recent 
 
200 HONOR; OR, 
 
 discharge, and Smith dead on the ground before him. 
 It is known that he had a quarrel with Smith, and had 
 turned him out of the house, and that high words had 
 passed between them since ; so no one there believes him 
 but his daughter. I confess, I doubt his story myself, 
 for he gives no explanation why he fired the pistol ; and 
 he seems to feel as one who has the stain of blood on his 
 soul. The Methodist minister who attends him says he 
 should think him a true penitent, if he would but con- 
 fess." 
 
 Bryant made no answer, but stood with contracted 
 brows, as in deep and painful thought. Mr. Livingston 
 continued : 
 
 " Some have fancied that he fired in your defence ; but 
 that does not agree with other facts, for the story is, that 
 you were hustled out of the way among the students just 
 after the people in the house locked the door ; that you 
 ran round to the stable, and took the first horse you 
 found, which happened to belong to Judge Hendrick. 
 They were beginning to call you hard names for it, but 
 Judge Hendrick silenced them, by declaring that you 
 had sent back the horse, and paid handsomely for its use." 
 
 " Which he would not receive, however," said Bryant. 
 " He handed the money I sent to the treasurer of the 
 Orphan Asylum, from whom I received a note of thanks, 
 accordingly. Well, they are ingenious in accounting 
 for my disappearance. Let it pass for true till I tell the 
 story myself." 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 201 
 
 " But are you crazy enough, Frederick, to venture in 
 among those wild beasts again?" Mrs. Livingston spoke 
 with deep concern. " If your testimony on the trial is 
 of importance, can you not as well write your statement, 
 and send it from here ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Livingston; "have your deposition 
 taken before a magistrate." 
 
 " I have thought of that/' said Frederick. "It might 
 possibly answer ; but in such a matter as this, an error 
 might cost life the life of Lizzie's father. If I merely 
 sent my statement, though sworn to, they think so hardly 
 of abolitionists, that, supposing me to be one, they would 
 suspect me of falsehood and perjury. There would be 
 no opportunity for cross-examination, and the counsel 
 opposed would take their revenge for this by dwelling on 
 the improbability of my statement. Besides, it seems to 
 me, the most straightforward, manly way is, to go right 
 there, and tell my own story." 
 
 " And the most straightforward, manly way, you will 
 do to a certainty," said Mr. Livingston. " But have you 
 no news yourself, Fred ? " 
 
 " None as late as yours, sir. My voyage has been a 
 long one. I hoped, when I sailed from New York, to 
 have been in Tusculum a week ago ; but I should not 
 even have been here to-night, but that I hired a negro 
 to bring me up to the city in a boat. The ship is court- 
 ing the obstinate breezes out there, beyond the bar." 
 
 " But you had letters before you left." 
 
202 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " From Judge Hendrick, as I told you, and from 
 young Edward Elmsley, in reply to one of thanks, and 
 excusing my desertion of him in the scuffle, which I 
 never have felt quite easy about. He forgives me, how- 
 ever, and makes light of the bruises he received ; but he 
 writes that he should like to catch a real abolitionist, and 
 help to do him up in soft cotton. Then I have one from 
 Lizzie, sad as sad can be. It was written before the 
 change you speak of had come over her father, or at 
 least before she was fully aware of it. Her religious 
 faith alone seems to sustain her." 
 
 " That change must strengthen her greatly. Yet there 
 is enough of trial in the case," said Mrs. Livingston, " to 
 make us very saa for our poor girl her father in danger 
 of his life on a charge of murder, and, at the best, a 
 ruined man ; her step-mother failing ; and herself com- 
 pelled to hush every sorrow of her own in order to 
 minister to others." 
 
 " That necessity perhaps may be a blessing," said Mr. 
 Livingston. " Her own burden may be less felt in her 
 efforts to help those around her to sustain theirs." 
 
 " But, my dear, she thinks of them too much. That 
 low-bred, quarrelsome man, and that vulgar woman ! 
 If they get out of this trouble safe, what comfort can 
 Lizzie ever have in living with them? O, she must come 
 and stay with us again ; she ought not to refuse, and she 
 must not." 
 
 " Do you think, then," said Bryant, " there is any 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER 203 
 
 hope of her consenting to it? I have been afraid not, 
 she seemed so devoted to what she considers her duty. 
 And I love her all the better for it, too." 
 
 " I don't know ; we must try. What time must we 
 leave to-morrow, Mr. Livingston ? " 
 
 " At seven o'clock, they say. And after all the fatigue 
 you have had to-day, you had better rest now, to be ready 
 for an early start in the morning." 
 
204 HONOR; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THE TKIAL. 
 
 trial of John William for the murder of 
 Daniel Smith was to take place at Johnsonville ; 
 x for Tusculum, though the seat of a college, did 
 not join to that honor the dignity of being the county 
 town. The case had excited no slight amount of atten- 
 tion, as the accused and his victim were both well known 
 in the vicinity, and as popular report connected the oc- 
 currence with the absorbing topic of abolition, and the 
 always interesting theme of love. It was generally agreed 
 that Smith had been a suitor for Witham's daughter ; 
 most people said, an accepted suitor, until the arrival of 
 the young Northerner had induced the intended bride to 
 treat her lover with coldness. This, joined with his patri- 
 otic feelings, had led him to unmask and attempt to pun- 
 ish the abolition agent ; and hence, it was said, had arisen 
 the fatal quarrel. There were some, indeed, who main- 
 tained that the Yankee was the murderer ; and more 
 would have willingly believed this, but that Witham's 
 language implied an admission of the act, though not of 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 205 
 
 the intention, and that the pistol found in his hand gave 
 testimony too clear for them to doubt. Much was the 
 subject disputed among the crowd assembled in the John- 
 sonville tavern ; and many were the bets made respecting 
 the result of the trial, over glasses of mint-julep. 
 
 We will not pause there, but enter the court-house, 
 where persons known to us are already assembled. Judge 
 Hendrick having to appear as a witness, his place of 
 dignity is filled by another. Mrs. Witham is too ill to be 
 near her husband ; but Lizzie is there, though looking 
 pale and worn. Mrs. Livingston is seated next ; and at 
 her side is her husband, with his gray hair and his be- 
 nevolent though energetic countenance. Bryant would 
 have accompanied them ; but such strong representations 
 were made of the danger, not only to himself, but to others, 
 of his being known to be present, that he had yielded, and 
 stood undistinguished among the spectators. His friend, 
 Mr. Stevens, of Royalton, occupied a seat near the Liv- 
 ingstons. 
 
 Lizzie sat with her eyes cast down, conscious of the 
 gaze of the crowd ; but her look was not one of unmingled 
 sorrow or fear. From the expression of her father's fea- 
 tures at the last glance she had ventured to take, she had 
 said to herself, " Ah, if man condemns himself, I believe 
 that he has found forgiveness elsewhere." Never had 
 she loved him so much as now, when she sat by his 
 side to witness his trial for a deadly crime ; and yet, in 
 her thankfulness for his repentance, the agony of sus- 
 pense as to his fate was almost unfelt. 
 
206 HONOR; OR, 
 
 And the old, loved friends of her childhood were near. 
 They had travelled, in their age, the long journey to be 
 with her now. She had wept, last night, on that kind, 
 maternal breast ; she had given a daughter's kiss to her 
 revered protector. That they were there, was joy in 
 itself ; and it was deepened when she thought that now 
 her father was brought near to them by religious faith 
 and hope. More than ever before, her complicated filial 
 duties and feelings seemed to be in harmony. 
 
 There was another : did she look at him ? They had 
 had an interview yesterday, its tenderness rendered solemn 
 by the terrible crisis at which they stood. Now, she 
 knew he was near ; her cautious glance had found him. 
 "Would he be safe, would he be prudent, so near the scene 
 of his former danger ? 
 
 The shock which came to Witham, when he found 
 himself stained with the blood of an unexpected victim, 
 among its other effects upon his character, had made him 
 more tender of his daughter's feelings and reputation. 
 At first, he had been too much overcome by horror 
 at the deed he had committed, to say to those who ques- 
 tioned him, that he had aimed the pistol at Bryant ; 
 and this forbearance, at that time accidental, he had 
 afterwards resolved to continue. He would not have his 
 daughter know that he had sought the life of her lover ; 
 still less would he have her name mingled loosely, in pub- 
 lic speech, with the details of a dreadful crime. As for 
 Lizzie, she had shrunk within the window after her part>> 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 207 
 
 ing with Bryant, and had fainted at the confusion that en- 
 sued. She had been told afterwards that Smith had been 
 shot by her father, and knew that the latter admitted the 
 act, but represented it as unintentional. Engaged in at- 
 tendance now upon her imprisoned father, and now on 
 her sick step-mother, she had shrunk from hearing de- 
 tails of a revolting character, and was, therefore, little 
 acquainted with the circumstances of the fatal deed. 
 
 Silence had been commanded, and the proceedings of 
 the court commenced. There had been some difficulty in 
 impanelling the jury, for few in the neighborhood had failed 
 to express an opinion when their fellow-countryman, 
 Smith, was shot by one who, though he had resided 
 among them long, was still known to be an Englishman. 
 But the difficulty was not increased by the prisoner chal- 
 lenging any without cause ; and at length the jury was 
 complete, the indictment was read, and the prisoner was 
 called to answer, Guilty or Not Guilty. 
 
 "Guilty enough," replied Witham "but not of 
 what I am now charged with. It is true I killed Dan 
 Smith " 
 
 " Enter a plea of Not Guilty, Mr. Clerk," said the 
 judge, hastily. " The prisoner will be heard by his coun- 
 sel, and by himself at the proper time. At present, he 
 must keep silence." 
 
 The state's attorney now rose, and presented a state- 
 ment of the case. He was a young and ambitious law- 
 yer ; and not doubting that he was bringing a murderer 
 
208 HONOR, OR, 
 
 to deserved punishment, he thought rather of what argu- 
 ments would have most effect upon the jury, than of what 
 he could most legitimately employ. There was a motive 
 which, whether the real one or not, he could impute to 
 "Witham with some show of probability, and which, if he 
 could lead the jury to believe it, would prejudice them 
 strongly against the prisoner : this was, a participation in 
 the abolition views and purposes which had been charged 
 on Bryant. He determined, therefore, to represent that 
 Witham killed Smith in defence of the unpopular stran- 
 ger, the incendiary, whom the just anger of the peo- 
 ple sought to punish. 
 
 "Yes, your honor, and gentlemen of the jury," he 
 continued, after having suggested this idea, " we are 
 prepared to prove to you that this man, this agent of a 
 nefarious association at the North, organized for the 
 very purpose of spreading through our fair southern 
 land insurrection, murder, and rapine in all their 
 vilest forms, that this man arrived at the prisoner's 
 house on the morning of the day on which the murder 
 was committed. We will prove, not merely that he had 
 incautiously given hints of his fell designs, but that 
 he had deliberately endeavored to excite a slave to become 
 the leader of an insurrection. We will prove that, on his 
 arrival at the hotel, the abolition agent endeavored at 
 first to put off a meeting with his host until they could 
 discuss their fell designs in private ; that the prisoner, in- 
 advertently, no doubt, defeated this purpose by recogniz- 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER* 8 DAUGHTER. 209 
 
 ing his visitor ; that he immediately endeavored to re- 
 pair his error, and to lull suspicion, by a shallow pre- 
 tence of unfriendliness towards the new comer ; but that, 
 when the sagacious, brave, and patriotic Smith, and the 
 other gentlemen present, began to perceive and develop 
 the character of the incendiary, he changed his course 
 entirely, became the protector of the man against whom 
 he had pretended hostility, and not only yielded him 
 lodging, but received him into the most intimate connec- 
 tion with his own domestic circle. We could make this 
 still more clear but for that provision of our laws which 
 prevents the testimony of negroes from being taken in a 
 court of justice. For once, let that provision, which, 
 wise and just as it is, has been so maligned by abolition- 
 ists, extend an undeserved but magnanimous protection 
 to the secret plottings of its enemies ; we have still 
 enough of evidence to show their guilty nature. We shall 
 prove, by the evidence of many witnesses, that when the 
 heroic Smith, indignant at the treacherous designs which 
 he had unmasked, attempted to inflict personal chastise- 
 ment on the incendiary, the prisoner gave his aid to that 
 incendiary, and violently ejected the patriot from his 
 house ; we shall show that when a number of citizens, 
 justly indignant, assembled to inflict condign punishment 
 on the abolition agent, the prisoner, in a scornful and 
 vindictive manner, refused to hear what their brave leader 
 had to say regarding the object of their coming ; that he 
 locked the door of his house in the face of his incensed 
 18* 
 
210 HONOR; OR, 
 
 fellow-townsmen, taking under his protection the agent 
 of insurrection and murder ; for we shall prove to you, 
 gentlemen, by the highest testimony, that the abolitionist 
 Bryant was with the prisoner in the house. Circumstances 
 combine to show that while this man was endeavoring to 
 escape through the court, between the house and the ne- 
 gro quarters, he was intercepted by the gallant and watch- 
 ful Smith. Here, apparently, a struggle took place : the 
 base incendiary was on the point of being mastered by 
 the chivalrous son of the South, when his protector, the 
 prisoner now at the bar, raised a felon hand, and our 
 state was deprived of one of her bravest sons. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the jury, I have completed thus the 
 outline of the transaction, as we suppose it to have 
 been. To constitute murder, the court will undoubtedly 
 inform you, there must be the fatal act, and proof of the 
 criminal intention. The act is not denied ; and if it were, 
 its proof would be easy, for the prisoner was found stand- 
 ing stupefied, the moment after he had fired the fatal 
 shot, with his victim before him, and the pistol, still hot 
 from its discharge, in his hand. The criminal intention 
 is proved by the facts I have now related. 
 
 " But, before I proceed to the examination of witnesses, 
 I will meet one objection, which will, undoubtedly, be 
 urged against the view I have taken. My learned brother, 
 the counsel for the defence, will probably prove to you 
 that the prisoner at the bar has exercised the calling of a 
 buyer and seller of negroes. He may spare himself the 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 211 
 
 trouble of calling witnesses to prove the point ; we ad- 
 mit it, and while we believe that the calling is alike le- 
 gal and necessary, we do not think it one of that elevated 
 character that speaks much in favor of him who sustains 
 it. But my brother will probably ask you whether you 
 think it credible that a negro-dealer should become the 
 agent of abolitionists, and, by consequence, an abolitionist 
 himself? 
 
 " And why not, gentlemen of the jury? If a man can, 
 for the sake of sordid gold, subdue his natural feelings to 
 an employment which, if lawful and necessary, is cer- 
 tainly repulsive, is it likely that those feelings are deli- 
 cate enough to keep him from an unlawful employment, 
 provided it is but profitable ? We do not suppose that 
 the abolitionists employ their nefarious agents at the 
 South without price. The vast resources of the North 
 are, in a great measure, at their command ; and to en- 
 gage an agent in the unsuspected guise of a dealer in 
 slaves would give them an advantage well worth a heavy 
 outlay. We can prove, too, that indications had been 
 given, by the prisoner, of an alteration of feeling with re- 
 gard to his occupation, and a purpose to exchange it for 
 another. He is known, during the last spring, to have 
 purchased a slave woman, with the avowed purpose of 
 selling her in New Orleans, and subsequently to have 
 abandoned that intention, and disposed of her to a neigh- 
 bor of her former owner. Since that occurrence, he is 
 believed to have made neither purchase nor sale. It is 
 
212 HONOR; OR, 
 
 probable that this change was insisted on by the fanatical 
 party to which he had sold himself. 
 
 " We will now, may it please your honor, attend to the 
 examination of witnesses. When these have been heard, 
 it will be for you, gentlemen of the jury, to vindicate, by 
 your verdict, not only the violated law and the sacred- 
 ness of human life, but peculiarly the safety of southern 
 homes, and the permanence of southern institutions, while 
 you inflict due punishment upon the murderer of one who 
 bravely fell in their defence." 
 
 Murmurs of applause, and expressions of surprise and 
 indignation, had passed through the crowd during the ad- 
 dress of the state's attorney ; but when he ended, these 
 feelings, thus far held in check, burst forth in long and 
 repeated plaudits, which the crier vainly endeavored to 
 check. When these had nearly subsided, there mingled 
 with them cries of rage against the prisoner. " Down 
 with the murderer ! " " Hang the abolitionist ! " Such 
 were the shouts ; and the crowd pressed against the pris- 
 oner's dock, as if about to dispense with judge and jury. 
 Lizzie trembled in every limb, but, rising, stood facing the 
 crowd, leaning against the partition which separated her 
 from her father. As she looked round on them, she saw 
 Bryant's eye fixed upon her. His face was pale, but the 
 lips firmly compressed. As she looked, he raised his 
 hand, and pointed upwards ; Lizzie sunk again to her seat, 
 strengthened by the mute suggestion ; and at the same 
 moment the voice of the judge, sternly raised, restored 
 order in the court. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 213 
 
 " This disturbance must not be suffered," he said. 
 " The officers of the court will arrest any person guilty 
 of renewing it. The accused is entitled to a fair trial, 
 and the law of the land will accord impartial justice." 
 
 The examination of the witnesses for the prosecution 
 now commenced. The main facts of the death of Smith 
 from a pistol shot, of the pistol being found in Witham's 
 hand, of the previous expulsion of Smith from the house, 
 ancfc the high words which had passed in the presence of 
 the mob, were easily established. The witnesses who 
 proved them were, however, strictly cross-examined by 
 the counsel for the defence, with regard to the position of 
 the body, as indicating the attitude of the deceased at 
 the time of receiving the mortal wound. As the cross- 
 examination elicited the fact that Smith was shot while 
 his face was turned from his assailant, proving that the 
 deed was not done in self-defence, the state's attorney 
 smiled, and looked significantly toward the jury. 
 
 Evidence was now introduced on the subject of Bry- 
 ant's visit, and the commotion which resulted from it. 
 This led to frequent objections from the counsel for the 
 defence ; but in most instances the objections were over- 
 ruled by the court. Among the witnesses summoned 
 was Judge Hendrick, who testified that he passed through 
 the house to avoid the crowd ; that on his way he saw 
 both Witham and Bryant, but not together ; and that he 
 left the latter alone in the court-yard. The judge was 
 not asked whether he had seen Bryant afterwards, not 
 
214 HONOR; OR, 
 
 only as the question seemed unnecessary to the case, but 
 because it was thought best not to inquire too closely into 
 the mode of the young man's escape. For the same 
 reason, and in deference to Judge Hendrick's character, 
 the counsel for the defence declined entering upon any 
 cross-examination. 
 
 Young Elmsley and some other of the students were 
 examined, principally with regard to what had passed 
 between Witham apd Smith in the piazza. They testified 
 that when the struggle was over, which had commenced 
 with Smith's attack upon the stranger, neither Witham 
 nor Bryant was to be found, and the door of the house 
 was locked. 
 
 The presentation of the case on the part of the state 
 was now completed, and the court awaited the argument 
 of the counsel for the accused. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 215 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE DEFENCE. 
 
 E lawyer who now rose to defend the prisoner 
 was one of the most eminent men in his profes- 
 i/ sion in the state. He was from Royalton, the 
 residence of Mr. Stevens. How his services had been 
 obtained or were to be compensated, Witham himself did 
 not know ; but at an early period after the charge was 
 first made, he had called on the family, and had given 
 to the prisoner's daughter a note of introduction from the 
 Rev. Mr. Stevens, which procured for him the unre- 
 stricted management of the case. He now rose to ad- 
 dress the jury ; and there was a hush of expectation, for 
 Colonel Henley was not often heard to speak in the courts 
 of that portion of the state. In fact, he was not often 
 heard any where. His retiring disposition inclined him 
 rather to the less public part of the business of his profes- 
 sion ; but whenever an occasion arose which called him 
 forth, he was always found equal to it. He was one 
 whom those honors sought in vain, which other men seek 
 for. It was thought by his friends that his talents would 
 
216 HONOE; OB, 
 
 have shone most brightly in a military capacity ; and had 
 the war of 1812 continued to another campaign, his rank 
 of colonel would have been changed to that of brigadier- 
 general. For some years from that time he had cultivated 
 his more peaceful profession with assiduity and success, 
 and had engaged to some degree in political strife ; but a 
 duel into which this had led him, though resulting blood- 
 lessly, had occupied for a time the attention of the country, 
 far and wide. He had been judged severely by some, and 
 ridiculed by more. His proud heart shrunk within itself, 
 and thenceforth he turned from politics, and, as far as he 
 could, from public practice. Possessed of competence, 
 and not ambitious to increase it, his appearance in the 
 case now pending showed to those who knew him that 
 he must be deeply interested in it, either from his love 
 of justice or from personal feeling. 
 
 Colonel Henley's line of defence was marked out for 
 him by the facts of the case, as he supposed them to be, 
 and by what he knew of the temper of his southern 
 fellow-citizens. After closely questioning Witham, he 
 could not bring himself to believe the truth of the man's 
 assertion, that he had not killed Smith intentionally ; for 
 the only alternative seemed to be that the pistol had gone 
 off by accident, and the coincidence of this with the death 
 of an enemy in a lonely place, was too improbable for 
 him to yield it credence. Nor did he expect to make the 
 jury believe it. But, though ill pleased with the prison- 
 er's want of confidence in him, he resolved, if possible, to 
 save his life. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 217 
 
 He began, therefore, by remarking that his learned 
 brother had needlessly connected with the case before 
 them questions of a kind peculiarly suited to arouse the 
 passions of their community. What had the killing of 
 Smith to do with abolitionism ? Only this : that the 
 presence of an abolition agent, real or supposed, in the 
 house, had been the cause or the pretence of that riot in 
 which Smith lost his life. To suppose Witham himself 
 an abolitionist was absurd a man who had long lived 
 in the country ; who had not only held slaves, but traded 
 in them ; and who, if he was planning the destruction of 
 those around him, must see his own family involved in 
 the common ruin. Colonel Henley said that he yielded 
 to none in his determination to allow no interference 
 from abroad in southern institutions ; but he thought it 
 highly censurable to mingle that question, which so 
 naturally stirred the southern blood, with the calm 
 course of justice. 
 
 " The prisoner declares," said Colonel Henley, " that 
 he did not design the death of Smith, at the time of firing 
 the pistol. He does not declare that the pistol went off 
 by accident. That it did is certainly possible ; more prob- 
 able, perhaps, that, though aimed and fired, the action 
 was so involuntary as to leave no remembrance of de- 
 sign." Here a scornful laugh from the opposing counsel, 
 and a look of incredulity from the judge, brought Colo- 
 nel Henley to a sudden pause ; and the proud blood 
 mantled in his cheek as he sternly said that he thought 
 19 
 
218 HONOR; OR, 
 
 a case on which the life of a human being depended no 
 rightful theme of mirth. " But," he added, " allowing 
 that there was intention, we trust to prove that there 
 was cause sufficient to account for and to justify it. 
 
 " Here, gentlemen, was an assault made by this man 
 Smith, and others, upon the dwelling of the prisoner. 
 Turn your thoughts from the cause of the excitement, 
 and regard for the present, as justice requires you to do, 
 only the fact that a riot was going on, in which the 
 prisoner's property and the very lives of himself and 
 family were put in peril. Threats had been uttered by 
 some, and in particular by Smith, of burning the house 
 down, if the suspected person was not found. It will be 
 brought in evidence to you, gentlemen, that when the 
 prisoner was arrested, he had about him articles of value 
 and business papers, such as men are not accustomed 
 to carry on their persons : this fact shows the terror in 
 which he had been placed, lest the threat of fire should 
 be carried into effect. At the moment when his danger 
 and excitement are at the highest, the man who had 
 collected and inflamed the mob the man who had 
 threatened to fire his house enters his enclosure, with 
 the design, for aught that the prisoner knows, of carrying 
 his threat into execution. I ask you, gentlemen, is there 
 one of you who would not, under such circumstances, 
 defend his home ? Admit that the prisoner, in denying 
 that he intended to kill Daniel Smith, is only exercising 
 the right of every accused person not to give evidence 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 219 
 
 against himself ; admit that he did really intend it ; I ask 
 which of you would not have intended the same, when 
 an enemy rushed into your premises to set your house 
 on fire. Gentlemen, if this supposition is correct, all for 
 which I can blame the prisoner is an excess of caution 
 in not at once stating the truth, and throwing himself on 
 your just sense of what is due from a husband and father 
 to his endangered family ; nay, of what every man, 
 deserving of that name, will do by the very instinct of 
 his nature, when he is assailed. Let him learn, gentle- 
 men, from your verdict, that he has underrated the jus- 
 tice and generosity of your sentiments." 
 
 If one might judge from the thoughtful looks of the 
 jury, and the profound silence of the whole assembly, a 
 deep impression had been made by the appeal of the coun- 
 sel for the defence. But the train of argument by which 
 his legal protector sought to save him was far from being 
 agreeable to Witham himself. Conscious of innocence 
 with regard to any intention of taking the life of Smith, 
 Witham felt as if his counsel was betraying his cause in 
 admitting the thought of his having had such intention. 
 At the moment, therefore, of that deep silence, he burst 
 forth with the words, 
 
 " I didn't mean to shoot Dan Smith. I fired at the 
 abolitionist, at Mr. Bryant. I didn't want to tell this, 
 for " 
 
 " Silence," exclaimed at once judge, crier, and coun- 
 sel ; but the words had been spoken, and had been heard 
 
220 HONOR', OR, 
 
 by all. Colonel Henley struck his hands together in 
 vexation. The state's attorney rose with an air of 
 triumph. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the jury," he said, " the declaration 
 which has just been made is worth your notice." 
 
 Colonel Henley interrupted him by protesting against 
 such a declaration being received as evidence. 
 
 " I shall not," said the state's attorney, " contest the 
 point which my learned brother has raised. I refer to 
 that declaration not for the direct testimony it gives, for 
 I presume no one here considers it as true ; it is but the 
 desperate expedient of a criminal to save his life. I 
 share, gentlemen, your pity for the unfortunate man, as 
 his condition is shown in these turnings and windings ; 
 but that pity must not prevent us from doing our duty. 
 He has perceived, gentlemen, your just feeling against 
 the incendiary abolitionist, and can any thing be more 
 transparent than his effort to obtain your favor by pre- 
 tending that his fatal shot was fired against that enemy 
 of southern peace ? For myself, gentlemen, I will believe 
 his assertion when that man Bryant, who then succeed- 
 ed in rescuing himself from the just punishment of his 
 crime, shall venture back from the safety of his northern 
 home, to stand in the circle of those from whom he then 
 escaped, and tell us that the prisoner fired at him." 
 
 " He is here," cried a voice from among the specta- 
 tors ; and, coming forward, Frederick Bryant desired 
 permission to give his testimony. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 221 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE UNEXPECTED WITNESS. 
 
 surprise occasioned by the appearance of 
 Bryant was evident all around. Counsel, pris- 
 s oner, and jury started to their feet. Lizzie, 
 though aware of his presence, had not till then seemed to 
 realize the danger in which it placed him. She clasped 
 her hands in agony, bent forward, and closed her eyes, 
 as if to shut out the whole dreadful scene. Mr. and 
 Mrs. Livingston looked on with trembling interest. Mr. 
 Stevens came forward to meet his friend, shook him 
 cordially by the hand, and introduced him to Colonel 
 Henley. 
 
 "Who is this person?" inquired the judge, as order 
 was restored. " Does the counsel for the defence desire 
 to introduce him as a witness ? " 
 
 " I do, may it please your honor," replied Colonel 
 Henley. " This, gentlemen, is the person so frequently 
 referred to, and, I cannot but hope, so unjustly character- 
 ized as the abolitionist Bryant. Whatever ground there 
 may be, or may not be, for the prejudice against him, 
 19* 
 
222 HONOR; OR, 
 
 he has ventured himself here with a bravery which all 
 must\ honor fc to give his evidence in this important case, 
 this case of life and death. He is here before a court of 
 impartial legal justice, by whom he will be patiently 
 heard, and from whom he will meet all just protection." 
 He spoke witn stern impressiveness, for there were 
 marks of commencing tumult among those around. 
 
 The state's attorney started to his feet. " I share," 
 said he, " please the court, in the general surprise at the 
 appearance of this witness. I could have wished, for his 
 own safety, and that the course of justice should not be 
 disturbed by tumult, that he had not thought it necessary 
 to venture again into a state which he had but recently 
 found had little relish for his company. But since he 
 is here, far be it from me to object to his being fully and 
 fairly heard. He comes among us to give evidence in 
 an important case, and no friend of justice and of our 
 country can prevent him from bearing his testimony, or 
 injure him for so doing. Let him speak freely then. I, 
 for one, will protect him, if necessary, to the last drop of 
 my blood, so long as he confines himself to the simple 
 duty of a witness." 
 
 Bryant was accordingly sworn, and proceeded, in 
 answer to the questions addressed to him, to give an 
 account of what he knew in relation to the case. Those 
 questions, however, were at times so general, that nearly 
 all that had occurred during his stay in Tusculum was 
 included. That he had known Witham and his daughter 
 
i THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 223 
 
 in that northern village where the latter had been 
 adopted by the excellent pair who were now present ; 
 that he had come south on business with Witham which 
 he declared on oath had nothing to do with any abolition 
 designs, but was strictly private in its character ; all this 
 appeared, and the hearers, as they saw Lizzie's bright- 
 ening look of hope and blush of modesty, drew their own 
 conclusion as to the nature of that business. Ingenuously 
 he related the conversation into which the peculiar name 
 of the slave Toussaint had led him, injudiciously, as he 
 admitted, but without a thought of instigating insurrec- 
 tion. He declined entering into the details of his inter- 
 view with Witham, but testified that they had quarrelled ; 
 that he had entered the house from the piazza during 
 the riot, not under Witham's protection, but that of an- 
 other, whom he declined to name ; and that while in 
 the central court he had heard the report of a pistol, and 
 had believed it to be aimed at himself. 
 
 The evidence was heard with deep attention. It was 
 in a tone of surprise and respect that the state's attorney 
 addressed the question, " What motive had you for 
 coming hither, at the risk which you must have known, 
 to give evidence in this case ? " 
 
 " The motive of doing justice. This man was accused 
 of the intentional murder of Smith. I knew that, as far 
 as related to Smith, the occurrence was accidental." 
 
 " But the prisoner had intended to take your own 
 life." 
 
224 HONOR; OR, 
 
 " That did not alter my obligation to tell the truth, 
 when he was charged unjustly with taking the life of 
 another." 
 
 " Had you no other no softer motive in the case?" 
 inquired the lawyer, with a meaning look. 
 
 " I admit that I had another motive. It was to pro- 
 tect an innocent wife and daughter from disgrace and 
 misery. But neither this nor any of my private thoughts, 
 which you may imagine, was necessary to bring me here. 
 I am a lawyer, sir, as well as yourself, and I am vowed 
 to the service of justice." 
 
 " I do not desire," said the state's attorney, " to pro- 
 long the cross-examination. I will but remark to the 
 jury, before dismissing the witness, that his evidence, if 
 admitted, is conclusive against the prisoner." A murmur 
 of surprise passed round the court. " Yes," he resumed, 
 u by the prisoner's own declaration, he intended murder 
 the murder of Mr. Bryant ; Mr. Bryant's testimony con- 
 firms this. The deed of death, then, being done with 
 intention, its guilt is not affected by the fact that it fell, 
 through accident, upon the wrong victim. Death, the 
 death of an unoffending person, for such Mr. Bryant's 
 manly, straightforward narrative, and the courage of 
 conscious innocence which has brought him here to tell 
 it, declare him to be, his death was the design ; 
 death also was the result ; the design and the result go 
 together, and form the crime of deliberate murder." 
 
 As the state's attorney closed, the prisoner groaned 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 225 
 
 aloud, and covered his face with his hands ; Lizzie sat 
 pale and breathless. After a moment's pause, Bryant, 
 who was still on the witness stand, begged permission to n / 
 
 " It is due," said he, " to the prisoner, and to justice, 
 that I should declare the cause of his hostility to me. In 
 a case so solemn as this, where life is involved, I must 
 speak of things which otherwise are held most private. 
 I testify, therefore, that I came to the prisoner's house, 
 
 to ask of him the hand of his daughter, whom I 
 
 But that is nothing to the purpose. I had received 
 his consent, and all seemed when a discussion 
 arose between us on the subject of slavery. I testify 
 here, and I am prepared to meet whatever danger the 
 declaration may place me in, that I refused to become 
 his son-in-law, if I was to be in any way involved in the 
 guilt of his business as a slave-dealer, even by receiving 
 any share of the property he had accumulated. We 
 parted in anger. Afterwards, in making my escape from 
 the house, he came upon me at the moment of a farewell 
 interview with his daughter ; and then, as I believe, not 
 with malice prepense against myself or any one, but on 
 sudden impulse, the fatal shot was fired. It can avail 
 nothing, probably, to extenuate his act ; yet I will say, 
 that for that act, and for the anger that caused it, he has 
 my free forgiveness." 
 
 Judge Hendrick now came forward, and desiring to 
 be again heard as a witness, disclosed the part he had 
 
226 HONOR} OR, 
 
 had in Bryant's escape, confirming his statements with 
 regard to the manner in which it had been effected. 
 
 When his evidence was finished, Colonel Henley 
 approached Lizzie, and said a few words to her in a 
 low voice. She started, and seemed to shudder, but 
 bowed in acquiescence. The lawyer turned to the court, 
 and said, " If any doubt remains as to the correctness 
 of Mr. Bryant's statement, Miss Witham is- prepared to 
 give her evidence." "With a pitying voice, the judge 
 observed that her testimony certainly might be of great 
 importance ; and she was called to the witness stand. 
 But as she rose, her agitation was such, that the judge 
 directed that she should give her testimony where she 
 was seated. 
 
 " I will make the examination as short as possible," 
 said Colonel Henley. After the oath was administered, 
 he continued, " Miss Witham, did you see Mr. Bryant 
 on the evening of the riot ? " 
 
 " I did, sir," she replied, in a voice low, but clear. 
 
 " Where were you at the time?" 
 
 " At the window of the building used as kitchen and 
 negro quarters, where my father had placed us, as far- 
 thest from the mob." 
 
 " Please to relate what followed." 
 
 " I remember seeing my father, and how angry he 
 looked, and that I thought Mr. Bryant was killed. I do 
 not remember any thing else." 
 
 " That will do ; I will ask you no further questions." 
 
THE SLAVE- DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 227 
 
 The state's attorney refrained from cross-examination. 
 Mrs. Livingston whispered to Lizzie that she would leave 
 the court with her ; but the latter pointed to her father, 
 and shook her head. 
 
 The charge of Judge Stanley to the jury instructed 
 them in the distinctions between deliberate murder, man- 
 slaughter, and justifiable homicide. To the last he gave 
 a latitude unknown to the jurisprudence of most other 
 communities. He referred to a decision then recent, by 
 which a man who shot down another in the street had 
 been held guiltless, because the person he killed was 
 known to have threatened his life. He spoke also of ihe 
 charge given by an eminent western judge, holding that 
 for deeds committed by a mob, no individual can be held 
 accountable. The former of these decisions, he said, 
 might lead the jury to consider how far, if the death of 
 Smith was intended, the previous quarrel, and the riot in 
 which he was engaged, would extenuate the offence. 
 But if, on the other hand, the fatal shot was intended for 
 Bryant, the jury might find reason for a favorable judg- 
 ment on either of the two grounds, should the evidence 
 appear sufficient to sanction them that the deed was the 
 act of sudden passion from domestic provocation, or that 
 the prisoner joined in the feeling of the crowd. The 
 citizens, he said, from a patriotic impulse, though in a 
 disorderly manner, were pursuing a person thought to 
 be an incendiary. " I do not myself believe," said he, 
 " that this suspicion was correct : the deportment of the 
 
228 HONOR', OR, 
 
 witness, Mr. Bryant, and the very fact of his appearing 
 again among us with such modest fearlessness, vindicate 
 him against the charge. Nor do I approve of lawless 
 gatherings to punish supposed crime. But while our 
 institutions remain as they are, and who among us 
 would wish them changed ? any rumor of interference 
 from abroad will infallibly produce such gatherings. 
 And when a crowd are assembled, and are seeking, with 
 feelings we cannot entirely condemn, the punishment of 
 one whom they consider guilty, the act of any one per- 
 son in firing upon him must be considered as the act of 
 the whole assembly ; to be regretted, indeed, and blamed, 
 but not to be visited with punishment. There were 
 hundreds of persons assembled on that night, seeking the 
 life of Mr. Bryant. In the eye of the law, all were 
 equally guilty. It is not right to punish one for the crime 
 
 of hundreds. The decision, then, of Judge L is 
 
 applicable to this case ; and the shot, if fired in the pur- 
 suit of a supposed abolitionist, must be considered as the 
 act, not of the individual, but of the assembled multitude. 
 " But, gentlemen of the jury, crime must be punished, 
 and the dignity of the law maintained. If you believe, 
 therefore, that the prisoner fired that shot with deliberate 
 malice against either Smith or Bryant, that is, from 
 any motive except recent provocation or patriotic impulse, 
 then it was murder, and you must find him guilty. I 
 must remind you, however, that if there is any doubt in 
 your minds, the prisoner is entitled to its benefit. With 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 229 
 
 this, gentlemen, I leave you to the discharge of your 
 great and responsible office." 
 
 The jury, without retiring from the room, rendered a 
 verdict of " Not Guilty." 
 20 
 
230 HONOR', OR 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE CONCLUSION. 
 
 announcement, which gave safety to the ac- 
 cused, was received by the crowd with a shout 
 of applause. Compassion for the danger in 
 which he was placed, admiration of his daughter's 
 beauty and modesty, and respect for the courage of the 
 young man who had ventured into the scene of his former 
 danger to bear testimony in favor of one who had sought 
 his life, these mingled feelings influenced the better 
 portion of the crowd. But there were others who could 
 see in the result nothing but the escape of one abolition 
 incendiary by the false oath of another. As the applause 
 subsided, some of these gave vent to their anger in hisses ; 
 but the voice of the crier restored silence, the prisoner 
 was pronounced acquitted, and the court dismissed. In 
 a few moments, the spectators were crowding the passage 
 from the hall, or standing before the court-house ; some 
 with congratulations to each other on the result of the 
 trial ; others with loud declarations, interlarded with 
 many an oath, against the prisoner and the unexpected 
 witness, whose testimony had been so important. 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 231 
 
 Within the court-house, deeper feelings found a more 
 quiet expression. Witham himself, at the moment of 
 hearing the verdict, had sunk down, covering his face with 
 his hands. The work of repentance, begun within him 
 by his own horror at the unexpected issue of his deed, 
 and continued by the exhortations of the faithful Meth- 
 odist minister, was now completed by the providential 
 mercy that had rescued him from a felon's death. Thank- 
 ful as he was, contrition was his deepest emotion. He 
 felt himself to be a murderer in intention and in act, 
 though the object of the intention and the victim of the 
 act were different ; and fresh from the acquittal of a 
 human court, he breathed an earnest prayer for forgive- 
 ness before the bar of Heaven. 
 
 Lizzie had sunk fainting. She had nerved herself to 
 bear sorrow, but was unprepared for joy. Her foster- 
 mother bent over her, and called her by every endearing 
 name ; Bryant, assisted by his friend Stevens, had borne 
 her near an open window, and laid her upon benches ; he 
 knelt by her side and chafed her hands, while Mrs. Liv- 
 ingston threw water upon her face. She opened her eyes 
 at length, and looked around in a bewildered manner. 
 Her father had joined the circle, and was bending over 
 her. She looked up at him, and as she saw tears on his 
 rugged cheeks, her own eyes filled ; she folded her hands, 
 and said faintly, " Thank God, my father is acquitted ! " 
 
 " Acquitted ! Yes, by man's court, but not by God's ! 
 I meant to commit murder to murder you, Mr. Bryant ; 
 
232 HONOR', OR, 
 
 you, so generous Can you forgive me? If you can, 
 perhaps God will forgive me too." 
 
 " I forgive you, Mr. Witham, with all my heart ; " 
 and the young man took the hand of the penitent in a 
 cordial grasp. The Livingstons, and others who were 
 around, followed his example. 
 
 " Now," said Mr. Livingston, " let us leave this place. 
 Mr. Witham, we must have Lizzie for a while with us." 
 
 Lizzie was resting on Mrs. Livingston's breast, as she 
 had done when a child ; but at this she tried to rise, say- 
 ing, " Thank you ; but I must go back to my poor sick 
 mother." 
 
 " Not now, Betsy," said Witham, in a more tender 
 voice than she had ever heard from him. " Mother and 
 I will both spare you now for a while. Go with your 
 kind friends ; but let us see you before night, that we 
 may all thank God together." 
 
 Edward Elmsley now came forward, with a look of 
 deeper concern than his words implied, for they were only 
 an invitation to Mr. Bryant to dine at his father's, who 
 resided a short distance from the town. Colonel Henley 
 seconded the suggestion. 
 
 " You had better," said he, "be as much out of view 
 as possible, not only for your own safety, but for the com- 
 fort of us all. Every right-feeling person approves your 
 course ; but all are not right-feeling in our part of the 
 world, and I suppose not in any other." 
 
 Bryant hesitated, but Lizzie, too, pressed his going, 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 233 
 
 and with rather an ill grace, he accepted the proffered 
 hospitality. 
 
 There were many persons standing around the court- 
 house door when the two came out. Elmsley's servant 
 was holding the reins of a spirited horse, attached to a 
 handsome specimen of those four-wheeled vehicles which, 
 under the name of buggy, have nearly supplanted the 
 old-fashioned chaise. 
 
 " Robert," said Elmsley, speaking louder than seemed 
 necessary, " tell my uncle Burgess that I shall not be in 
 to-day, as I said, because I have Mr. Bryant's company 
 to dinner. You understand ? I have Mr. Bryant's com- 
 pany to dinner." 
 
 He took the reins, and seated Bryant and himself. 
 The young men both sat silent till they had turned into 
 another street, when Elmsley exclaimed, 
 
 " Now, Mr. Bryant, you think you are going to dine 
 with me at my father's, a mile out of town ; but you are 
 mistaken. We are to dine at Petersville, twenty miles 
 off; that is, if we have a chance to dine at all." 
 
 "What do you mean?" said Bryant, starting. "I 
 am not ready to leave the place so soon." 
 
 " You don't want to make your exit from the end of a 
 rope, I suppose? Nor even riding on a rail with a coat 
 of tar and cotton ? Ah, I have had a wish to see some- 
 body tarred and cottoned, for the downy beauty of the 
 thing." 
 
 " But, Mr. Elmsley," said Bryant, earnestly, " I can- 
 20* 
 
234 HONOR; OX, 
 
 not leave these friends without warning, and on a mere 
 fancy of danger, without dishonor. If there is real 
 danger, they are exposed to it, and " 
 
 " Not at all," said Elmsley. " Nobody would harm 
 that old gentleman and lady, nor that young lady either, 
 whom, I fancy, you are more anxious about. But listen. 
 I know there is a plan to waylay you this evening, and 
 punish you by Lynch law, on the old charge of abolition- 
 ism. I know it from the best of all reasons, because I 
 was asked to join in it, by one that was not aware exactly 
 how I stood towards you. Now, if you like the afore- 
 said tar and cotton, or riding on a rail, or forty stripes 
 save one, or any other pleasant experience of that kind, 
 I'll keep on to father's, and make old Dinah get us some 
 dinner. She is the only person there to do the honors ; 
 for father, and mother, and William, and Mouse, are 
 all dining at my uncle Burgess's. 4 Mouse ' is used, for 
 shortness, for my sister Georgiana." 
 
 " But to desert my friends ! " said Bryant. 
 
 " O, we'll take care of your friends. Much comfort it 
 would be to them to have you caught." 
 
 " You are right," said Bryant, after a moment's pause, 
 not in their motion, however, for the horse went like 
 the wind. " You are right ; and I thank you with all 
 my heart ; but it is hard, it is galling, to be forced a 
 second time to fly on this false and scandalous charge, 
 and that at a moment when " 
 
 " Yes, when all seemed bright," said Elmsley ; " I 
 
THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 235 
 
 understand you ; " and there was a tone of sympathy in 
 his voice that corresponded with his words. " But," he 
 added, " you need not leave the state. Only remain 
 away for a week or two ; and you can either come back 
 to Johnsonville, or arrange with your friends where else 
 to meet them." 
 
 A ride of two hours, with Elmsley's noble horse, 
 brought them to Peter sville, where, after a hasty meal, 
 they parted, Bryant taking the stage to Royalton, and 
 Elmsley returning to Johnsonville. The lover, however, 
 had found time to write a few lines to Mr. Livingston, 
 excusing his desertion, and another letter, which renewed 
 the offer of his hand and fortune to the daughter of John 
 Witham. 
 
 " Say that you will be mine," he wrote, " and no 
 danger, real or imagined, shall keep me from retracing 
 the way to where I may claim you. If you still say no, 
 it must be because it is right ; and Heaven bless you ; 
 but it will be best for me not to see you again. Only, if 
 any evil ever threatens you or yours, send but the slight- 
 est token, and you will see again before you your devoted 
 friend, F. W. B." 
 
 Lizzie did not recall him to Johnsonville ; for young 
 Elmsley's information had been correct, as the occur- 
 rences of that evening proved. A number of men had left 
 the hotel, where they had made no secret of their inten- 
 tion to try the abolitionist by Lynch law. They lingered 
 
236 HONOR; OH, 
 
 around Rosemount General Elmsley's house till to- 
 wards evening, when, instead of seeing any one issue 
 from the gates, they saw the general's carriage approach- 
 ing from the village. An explanation followed, and the 
 plotters slunk away ashamed. The skill with which 
 young Elmsley had baffled them, with the open approval 
 of Bryant's course by the best men in the community, 
 kept them quiet afterwards. Yet Lizzie and her friends 
 thought it best not to expose her lover to a renewal of 
 his danger. 
 
 But every other obstacle to their union was now re- 
 moved. Her father had lost that ill-won property which 
 Bryant had refused to touch ; and he had gained that 
 change of character which enabled him to begin life 
 again, if in some humble occupation, yet in one which 
 should not be felt as disgraceful by rightly-judging minds. 
 His wife appeared so far improved in health by the issue 
 of her husband's trial, that she combated the scruples on 
 her account which Lizzie alleged. Mr. and Mrs. Liv- 
 ingston, though suppressing any urgent claim for their 
 own pleasure, showed in all their demeanor how ear- 
 nestly they desired to have again the company of their 
 adopted daughter. Witham, though he had but recently 
 found that union of true parental and filial feeling which 
 1 could not exist while he was estranged from virtue, yet 
 felt anxious to make up to his daughter for her past self- 
 sacrifice. The advancing season seemed unpropitious 
 for a journey north ; but this objection was removed by 
 
THE SLAVE -DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 237 
 
 Mr. Livingston's proposing that himself and wife, with 
 the young couple, should spend the winter in visiting 
 other points of interest in the Southern States, and in 
 the West India Islands. 
 
 It was the afternoon of a pleasant day in the early 
 part of the mild southern winter, when the carriages of 
 a bridal party stood before the door of Mr. Stevens's 
 church, in Royalton. It was a humble building, but 
 there was grace in its humility, as it stood among its 
 trees, looking forth on the wide street that took its name 
 from Greene, the friend of Washington, but which every 
 visitor thought had been thus called from the verdure 
 which, even at that season, held disputed possession 
 with its trodden paths. From the first carriage descend- 
 ed the bridegroom and his friend, the minister ; from the 
 second, the bride, her father, and her adopted parents. 
 Edward Elmsley followed, with Anna Stevens, sister 
 of the clergyman, in the character of groomsman and 
 bridesmaid. There were none besides ; but the awe of a 
 holy presence filled the house of prayer ; jmd as the 
 lovers spoke in subdued tones their mutual vows, all felt 
 that they who had been true to duty when it forbade 
 their union, would be faithful through life, where love . 
 and duty now combined to mark and to bless their 
 course. 
 
 One marriage leads to another ; and this young Elms- 
 ley found, from his casual association at that time with 
 Anna Stevens. A warm friendship continued to unite 
 
238 THE SLAVE-DEALER'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 them with those whose history had thus influenced their 
 own. Another generation has now arisen ; and for them 
 the tree of slavery has borne the bitter fruit of civil strife. 
 When the State of Georgia, influenced in part by feelings 
 oF*mistaken honor, followed the rash leading of South 
 Carolina, Frederick Bryant Elmsley entered the Con- 
 federate army, and is now in 1864 a captain in the 
 Johnsonville Dragoons ; while Edward Elmsley Bryant 
 
 is major of the th Massachusetts Regiment. But 
 
 the mothers of the young men, while engaged in works 
 of charity for the poor, the sick, and the wounded of 
 their respective sections, send thoughts of love beyond 
 the lines of war. Mrs. Bryant thinks with pity of the 
 sufferings of those among whom she once experienced 
 generous protection ; and Mrs. Elmsley does not forget 
 her birthplace, and the home of her early years. Such 
 memories are among the means that will establish a 
 better harmony than ever in our land, when the great 
 rebellion, and the barbarous system from which if 
 sprung, shall alike have passed away. 
 
HOME LIFE: 
 
 WHAT IT IS, AND WHAT IT NEEDS. 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN F. W. WARE. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 WM. V. SPENCHR. 
 
 134 WASHINGTON STREET. 
 1864. 
 

 
 
 
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