t CJaiid C|iU 
 
OWNED AND DISOWNED; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE CHATTEL CHILD. 
 
 ale 0f Sfltttjmn fife. 
 
 BY 
 
 VAN BUREN DENSLOW. 
 
 H. DAYTON, 36 HOWARD STREET; 
 
 INDIANAPOLIS, IND. : ASHER A CO. 
 1860. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1857, by 
 
 H. DA f TON, 
 
 ll tho Clerk's Office of tho District Court of the United States for the 
 Southern District of Ne\T York. 
 
 J. J. REED, PRINTER & STEREOTYPER, 
 43 & 45 Centre Street. 
 
So 
 
 A DEVOTED WOMAN A ZEALOUS CHRISTIAN, 
 AND A LOVED RELATIVE, 
 
 THE REVERED 
 
 MKS. SARAH G. BARKER, 
 
 OF HARTFORD, 
 
 THIS VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY AND AFFECTIONATELY 
 DEDICATED, 
 
 BY HER NEPHEW, 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
 M181552 
 
PEEF ACE. 
 
 THE AUTHOR has endeavored, in the following 
 pages, to weave into the narrative only such truth- 
 ful and honorable sentiments as shall leave him no 
 opportunity to regret the impressions it shall con- 
 vey. The offspring of his thought, it has been to 
 him rather a child than a chattel, and he would 
 venture to hope that taking it with the hand of 
 kindness, the reader, after perusal, will receive it 
 as the same by adoption into the literary family 
 which is ranged upon his shelf, to each member 
 
 V. f 
 
 of which in turn he has been indebted for a plea- 
 sant and profitable hour. Great will he estimate 
 his reward, if in addition, it shall contribute aught 
 to the causes of social and spiritual freedom. 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE TRAVELER, - ' - - - 13 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MODERN CHIVALRY, " - - - 31 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE COVENANT, - ... ^ 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 BETROTHED, . m *g 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE " PECULIAR INSTITUTION " - - . - 54 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE COUNCIL, -,--.. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE BROTHERS, - * - - 78 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE BITER BIT, - - - - 90 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 EVIL COMPANY, -.-... ,. 
 
Table of Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MIDNIGHT MADE DARKER, . - 100 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 113 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE PRISONERS, - .... 123 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY, - 132 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 JULIA, A POSTULANT, - - 135 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 SYMPATHY, 140 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 "IASAACKS," - 161 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE PRISONER, - - 171 
 
 CHAPTER XVin. 
 
 IN PRISON, - 182 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 SANDY, THE VICTIM DF AN UNFORTUNATE ATTACHMENT, - 186 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE TIME IS UP, - - 189 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 PHILOSOPHY, - - 195 
 
Table of Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 FESTAL ISLAND, - - 203 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 A DREAM, - - 208* 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE VEIL REMOVED, - - 217 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 TO THE SLAVE-PEN, t - 229 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 REVELATIONS, - ... 236 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 A HEROIC ACHIEVEMENT, - - 244 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 THE HERO RETURNED, - - - "252 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 POOR ADA, - 258 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 AN EVENTFUL DAY, - 268 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 THE CAPTIVE, - - 278 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 SOULS AT AUCTION. - - 283 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 CONCLUSION, - 291 
 
OWNED AND DISOWNED: 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE CHATTEL CHILD. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE TRAVELER. 
 
 " THE winds camo o'er his cheek, the soft winds blending 
 
 All summer sounds and odors in their sigh ; 
 
 The orange-groves wav'd round, the hills were sending 
 
 Their bright streams down, the free birds darting by, 
 
 And the blue festal heavens above him bending, 
 
 As if to fold a world where none could die ! 
 
 And who was he that looked upon these things V 
 
 MRS. HEMANB. 
 
 " Look once again ! The moving canvass shows 
 
 A slave plantation's slovenly repose, 
 
 Where, in rude cabins, rotting midst their weeds, 
 
 The human chattel eats and sleeps and breeds ; 
 
 And, held a brute, in practise as in law, 
 
 Becomes in fact the thing he's taken for." WHITTIER. 
 
 THE sun was just sinking behind the rich tropical 
 verdure, which, some forty years ago, lined and still 
 continues to fringe, with agreeable, though somewhat 
 monotonous sameness, the low bottom lands of the 
 Mississippi Eiver for a day's ride at least above New 
 Orleans. 
 
14 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 A single traveler, who had for a time been riding 
 along in a careless revery, or occasionally reverting 
 from the abstractions which occupied his mind, to 
 glance at the broad lake-like river by whose banks he 
 was riding, now picking up his thoughts and his reins 
 together, studied for a moment a memorandum which 
 he held, at the same time carefully scrutinizing the 
 lonely scene around him, as if to compare it with the 
 written instructions he had received, and pausing fre- 
 quently as if doubtful of his way. Frequent paths 
 branched off to the right, leading away from the river, 
 into the dark groves or chapparells of cypress and cot- 
 tonwood covered with festoons of moss. One of these 
 courses he seemed desirous to take, but doubtful which 
 to pursue, he submitted entirely to the energetic pre- 
 ferences of his little dapper mare, which jaunted for- 
 ward with easy confidence until a turn in the rivei 
 brought them to a clearing. 
 
 In the midst of the opening was a cluster of cabins, 
 whose neatly white-washed fronts contrasted as sin- 
 gularly with the ebony forms now gathered in theii 
 doors and windows at the novel sight of a stranger, aa 
 their broad grinning countenances did with the white? 
 and ivories they encircled. Around the cabins were 
 some old, bent, white-headed negroes, who seemed to 
 have out-lived the whole line of their posterity, and as 
 if any future change in their aspect must certainly 
 
The Chattel Child. 15 
 
 make them appear younger. Upon the door-steps too, 
 were women of all ages and shades of darkness, some 
 wrinkled and homely enough to be hanged for verita- 
 ble witches, having their heads bandaged with a coro- 
 net of flaming red handkerchiefs. Whether these 
 were used to prevent the smoke of their dirty clay 
 pipes from escaping through any other than the pro- 
 per vent, or from the fear that their artificial heat 
 might crisp their natural head-dress into a tighter 
 curl, and thus stretch their black skins into a still 
 smoother and glossier tension, we must leave in doubt. 
 Around their knees, in the windows and upon the 
 sunny side of each cabin, were troops of shining little 
 oleagines, in whose garb, as in their condition, the 
 simplicity of nature was evidently but slightly marred. 
 
 A few small, shiftless vegetable gardens and the 
 stumps of the cottonwood trees, which had been cut 
 away to make the clearing and to build the cabins, 
 completed the prospect. Our traveler scrutinized the 
 picture with some attention, as he approached the 
 " quarters," and asked of a venerable old negro, if 
 they belonged to Mr. Preston's plantation. 
 
 After repeating the question once or twice, he found 
 the mumbling old patriarch had lost entirely too many 
 of the five senses to comprehend it, and riding on, he 
 addressed the same question to a younger mulatto, 
 who advanced with the air of one consciously superior 
 
16 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 to his fellows, and with a negro's best imitation of the 
 gentility of a Louisiana planter, said 
 
 " Mass Preston reside in de family mansion ob de 
 Prestons, 'bout half mile from dese ar quarters, an de 
 gemmen no 'jections an will acquiesce to Alexander 
 de great hem honor to 'scorch him from dis are to 
 Lindenhall, he no fear ob transgression on de way." 
 
 As the stranger was disposed to restore to his pocket, 
 with evident satisfaction, the written instructions by 
 which most travelers in new countries, and, especially 
 in the thinly settled parts of the Southern States, find 
 it so difficult to chart out their way, and as he was 
 equally pleased that as the negro seemed to express it, 
 Alexander the Great should have the honor of pre- 
 serving him from the sundry transgressions he might 
 have been tempted to commit on the way, he consent- 
 ed to the service of the negro, and taking the path 
 pointed out to him, rode on at a slow walk, and in a 
 train of careless thought, until they had passed from 
 the clearing. The slave attended closely but respect- 
 fully behind. 
 
 "How long has Mr. Preston resided here ?" inquired 
 the stranger, with a benevolent wish to give vent to 
 the loquacity which was struggling for utterance in 
 the negro. 
 
 " Oh, great many years, massa great many years. 
 Massa can hab no idea." 
 
The Chattel Child. 17 
 
 " Well, about how many ?" reiterated the traveler. 
 
 "Well," answered the negro slowly, pausing at each 
 word, and stroking the fingers of his left hand with 
 those of his right, as if entering into a labored calcu- 
 lation^ "Well, massa, to de bes' ob my recollem- 
 brance\ if I was to specify 'bout fifty years massa. 
 I am sartain sure it was summot not less than forty 
 nor more than thirty, an I think de 'zact time was jes 
 fifty. Massa jes fifty years." 
 
 " How long have you been with him ?" 
 
 " Why, yah ! yah ! de Lor" sakes bless yer, massa, 
 before he born before eider of us was born. Did'n' 
 my fader run all de little erran' for he fader an' mud- 
 der poor deah sainted angel God bless her -jes' to 
 tink dat me know he mudder when he nebber know 
 he ebber had a mudder if I did'n tell him dat I 
 should stan' by her bed, and see her lily angel face 
 whiter dan de whitest flower in de garden an' her 
 own chile neber climb her knee neber kiss her no, 
 neber see her poor tings poor tings !" and the warm 
 hearted negro who had begun his answer with a laugh 
 ended it with a tear. 
 
 " Your master has spent his whole life here then ?* 
 added the stranger after a pause. 
 
 " Oh ! no, massa ! he come here when he quite 
 young man, from Ole Virginny. He quite a man den, 
 an' he jis as young now, jis as handsome." 
 
, 
 18 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 Perceiving from the negro's own age 3 which could 
 not have passed forty, that the chronological informa- 
 tion he had derived was of very doubtful value, the 
 questioner concluded to direct him to topics better 
 suited to his capacity. 
 
 " I understand you that neither of his parents are 
 living." 
 
 " De livin' troof, massa. He mudder gabe him all 
 her life, which wasn' much, poor ting an' he fader 
 follow her for de berry nex' funeral. So Massa Pres- 
 ton grow up heself no fader, no mudder jis bad off 
 as poor little cotton-headed Sandy, when he stay in 
 Yirginny, an' he fader and mudder, bein only niggars, 
 was sole off down to Georgy. Jis bad, poor tings. 
 But de Lord take an' de Lord gib away, bressed be 
 de Lord. Dat's what de min'ster said, and I beliebed 
 it. So, bress de Lord, dars some consummation to 
 trouble after all an' dat ar's what I tell Massa Pres-. 
 ton 'bout he own fader and mudder." 
 
 At the recurrence to these subjects, the simple ne- 
 gro plied his sleeve with a melancholy vigor to the 
 corner of his left eye, and it was some time before his 
 voice ceased to tremble with emotion. 
 
 " Mr. Preston has a family ?" resumed the stranger. 
 
 Here the conversation was interrupted by the swift 
 pattering of the hoofs of horses which were approach- 
 ing them, accompanied by pleasant shouts and ringing 
 
The Chattel Child. . 19 
 
 laughter, which seemed to say as plainly as words 
 could say it, that two young misses, just loosed from 
 the fastidious shackles of a boarding-school, with 
 enough of unspoiled nature to lead them into a royster- 
 ing frolic, and with enough of cultivation to make it 
 both a novel and mischievous method of killing time, 
 were now spurring their fillys into a thorough boister- 
 ous race. 
 
 Our traveler had arrived at a fork in the roads, or 
 rather paths, where, as his swarthy guide informed 
 him, two avenues, crossing each other nearly at right 
 angles, yet led, by about equally direct routes, to the 
 mansion of Mr. Preston. One of these was lined by 
 willows, whose long whips projecting, overhung the 
 narrow road with their green curtains, so as to require 
 no little temerity as well as steadiness in the saddle, 
 to dash through them. Down this avenue came the 
 two adventurous, rollicking riders, whose shouts they 
 had heard, and who still, with their heads bent for- 
 ward, and their colts pressed to their utmost speed, 
 dashed forward in a style of boldness and off-hand 
 grace, their loud laughter pealing forth like the rich 
 songs of birds, the involuntary melody of enjoyment. 
 So engrossed were they in the conscious enjoyment of 
 such intense fun, that neither of them observed the 
 presence of Sandy and the stranger until within a few 
 feet of them. 
 
20 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 The latter, as if unused to witness such feats, and 
 not being certain but that the little steeds might 
 have taken the contest too much into their own hands 
 (or rather feet,) sprang quickly from his own horse, 
 and would have intercepted that of the last rider ; but 
 declining, with a smile, the proffered assistance, and 
 waving her hand as she turned to him in passing, she 
 showed him how little sense of danger she experienced, 
 and probably how little there was, by a smart stroke 
 upon" the flanks with her little whip ; and in another 
 moment the riders disappeared, and their more sub- 
 dued laughter came ringing again through the twilight 
 woods. 
 
 " Dat ar answers massa's question," said the negro, 
 as they resumed their way. " Dat's our missuses 
 Miss July and Miss Ada. Poor Sandy nebber hab 
 larnin' 'nuff to 'spatiate on dem ar. Bar's berry few 
 as can 'spatiate on any subjec' like me. De angels, 
 an' de debil, an' de garden ob Eden, an' de serpent 
 wot undertook to swallow de big apple, an' de whale 
 wot saved Jonah from de flood when de levee gub 
 away down to New Orleans, all dat ar I can 'spa- 
 tiate on to good 'ceptance. But a live minister 
 couldn't tell what dey are ; dey so good, so beautiful, 
 so much heart for poor sufferin' niggers. Now, sez I 
 to Aunt Tanzey, says I, I'm afeared de angels want 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 21 
 
 our missuses up dar,' " and Sandy pointed up into the 
 twilit sky. 
 
 " Dey change for de wos when dey make angels 
 such like ; for de angels don't lub niggers. I- 
 >rot a picture home ob de great judgment ob all 
 world before de big white throne ; an' der ain't a 
 single nigger in de picture 'cept one ; an' dat's de debil. 
 An' de angels nebber weeps ; I see 'em true as natur 
 in a lubly little picture dat Miss Julia gub me wen 
 my little girl die ; an' de angels hab a little girl in 
 der arms carryin' her up troo de cloud ; but dey no 
 weep a tear. But wen I was sick ob de yaller fever, 
 Miss July come an' lean down ober poor nigger wen 
 he breff was p'ison, jes' as de angels lean ober de white 
 baby in de picture. Her big tear fall on my forehead, 
 an' I get well. An' Miss Ada come too, and lean 
 ober my Sally, an' look at her, an' de big tear fall on 
 her temples, right on de big black veins, an' 'mediate- 
 ly de fever break, an' she get well. An' wharsomeber 
 dey go on de whole plantation, no one die ; and dey 
 go eberywhere so ebery body lib. An' if you don't 
 beleebe it, you can see dem all alibe and well when 
 you get up to de hall, and dat will prove every word 
 I say." 
 
 The stranger, smiling, intimated that he had not 
 the least doubt of his veracity, and Sandy, flattered 
 by his condescension, proceeded : 
 
Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 "But on ebery oder plantation dey all die. An* 
 why didn't none die here ? Kase ye see dey couldn't 
 hab de heart to die, for bom- bye poor Miss July took 
 sick as deff, and 'stead o' her cheek look like roses, dey 
 was jis' like de Lor' forgive me but dey was for all 
 de worl' jis' like us poor niggas. An' den you s'pose 
 we niggas lay down and tink ob our black, good for 
 n uffin fever, as never was worf mindin' no how ! Do 
 you s'pose dat ar, sir ?" and Sandy looked at the 
 stranger suspiciously, as if the latter had accused him 
 of picking his pocket. 
 
 " What did you do ?" inquired the stranger. 
 
 "Wot ! why, sa, no sooner we heard Miss July 
 sick, dan we all jump up, sick an' well ; an' one ole 
 man dat ebery body thought was dead long ago, 
 jump up an' leff de quarters, an' run up to de hall, 
 an' dar we stay weepin' an' cryin' an' runnin' ebery- 
 where ; for dough we couldn't do any good, who could 
 help doin' somefin ? An' so, before we knowed it, 
 ebery body on de plantation seemed well but Miss 
 July. But bom-bye we pray so loud, dat de Lord 
 spare her ; he couldn't help it. I spec' he got putty 
 tired hearin' us, an' concluded de plantation couldn't 
 git along widout her. An' so now you see her, jis' as 
 kind, an' good, an' beautiful as eber, an' jis' as much 
 like angels, both of 'em, as dey could be, widout bein' 
 not so good as dey am 'specially Miss July, and 'tic'- 
 
TJie Cliattd Child. 23 
 
 larly Miss Adv. Ebery body worships dem, an' dey 
 worships each oder." 
 
 " Do they live constantly at home ?" 
 
 ec Oh, no, massa ; dey libs all around, eberywar 
 part de time here, an' part de time at Fifty-six, an' 
 part de time at Concord-street, an' part at New Ha- 
 ven, an' part at Connecticut an' de New England 
 States, an' an' Concord-street, an' Connecticut, an' 
 an' all de oder big places 'twixt here and tliar" 
 said the negro, pointing upward. "I hopes dey won't 
 move dar very soon. Dem am both jis' back from an 
 emissary to de Norff." 
 
 " From a what ?" asked the traveler, amused. 
 
 "A large emissary, I tink, massa. But Fse no 
 larnin', you know, 'sept my natural science, an' it was 
 either an emissary, or a ceremony, or a sight-o'-money. 
 It was something that ladies have to get through with 
 before deyse superfine, an' I'm not 'zackly sartin 
 which." 
 
 " Don't you mean a seminary ?" 
 
 " Well, now, massa. Who'd a thought you'd a 
 knowed de place better than Sandy ! But 'twas dat 
 ar' 'zackly. Well, dar's nuffin' like larnin' it kinder 
 makes people know what dey don't know an' neber did. 
 Now, I didn't know whether they had been to an emis- 
 sary or a seminary, after bein 7 told, an' you knew all 
 about it without. That's larnin'. Sez I to Aunt 
 
24 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 Tanzey sez I, ( Tanzey, "brains, and larnin' is vittels 
 and drink/ Says she, ' Sandy, you fool, if it is how 
 should you know it, for you never had any of it ?' an' 
 sez I, ' Tanzey, de tings of de spirit am spiritually dis- 
 cerned/ " 
 
 Here Sandy paused to wipe off the perspiration en- 
 gendered by his enthusiasm, and the traveler re- 
 marked 
 
 " The ladies seem to pass their time very happily 
 here." 
 
 "Oh, bery happy, bery. I hope de bright birds 
 neber sing a sadder tune for de future to come dan 
 dey have herebefore sung. All joy, all heaben wid 
 dem ! I hope Miss Ada be happy, I know she will. 
 I hope Miss July be happy, but Sandy 'fraid. Sandy 
 be too wise. You know de Scripter somewhar says 
 ( de children of sinful generation/ which must mean 
 de niggers, ' am wiser dan de children ob white folks/ 
 I wish Sandy didn't know nuffin', den he wouldn' say, 
 'Good mornin', Miss July/ an' go away behind de 
 crib an' sit he down an' cry for de two angels." 
 
 " Why do you cry for them ?" asked the traveler, 
 adding, with assumed indifference, "mere whim, I 
 suppose. Why do you pity Miss Julia more than 
 Miss Ada ?" 
 
 " Oh, no reason 't all, massa Sandy don't know 
 nuffin' 'bout nobody, an' always did pity somebody as 
 
The Chattel Child. 25 
 
 is not to be pitied. I know nuffin' 'bout Miss Julia. 
 I hope she be berry happy." 
 
 Though the gentleman's interest in the conversation 
 had much increased with the few last remarks, behind 
 which he thought lay more meaning than the simple 
 Sandy had intended to reveal, his attention was diverted 
 from the conversation to the mansion of Mr. Preston, 
 or, as it was styled, Lindenhall, which a turn in their 
 path now brought to view. 
 
 It was a large, and rather antique and rusty-looking 
 mansion, without architectural style, though superior 
 in its commodiousness and air of wealth, to the major- 
 ity of planters' residences. A spacious colonnade sur- 
 rounded it on every side, and before it lay a wide 
 meadow lawn, sloping down from the gentle rise upon 
 which the mansion stood, till it reached the waters of 
 the Mississippi, which, stretching out in broad and 
 beautiful expanse, lent more than usual variety to the 
 prospect from Lindenhall. 
 
 But while our traveler is thus surveying the pros- 
 pect, let us take a closer view of him. Though rather 
 above the medium height and size, and of a somewhat 
 commanding presence, his smooth, almost beardless face 
 indicates that he has seen but few of manhood's sum- 
 mers. His long, waving locks, fall in a sophomorical 
 style over his shoulders. His eye is black, warm and 
 pasr>ionate, and as he lifts his broad-rimmed palmetto, 
 
26 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 that his brows may be fanned ly the cool evening air 
 that comes sighing up from the river through the in- 
 termediate pines and cypresses, he exposes a counten- 
 ance radiant with intellect and warmth equally ex- 
 pressive of mildness and energy. Indeed, spite of a 
 certain jaunty negligence in his dress and carriage, his 
 open black eye and slightly contracted brows had a 
 fixed expression of serene thoughtfulness, indicative 
 of that deep enthusiasm of nature which must needs 
 wear a veil of cloud over the burning geyser of its 
 emotions, that such colder spirits as cannot appreciate 
 may know nothing of its inward fires. 
 
 Having alighted at the Hall, and consigned his 
 horse and a " fip" to the servant, he had no sooner set 
 foot upon the steps of the colonnade, than the door 
 opened, and a tall, well-formed, fashionably dressed 
 man-of- the- world looking gentleman, with a keen grey 
 eye, a smooth, whiskerless face, a fixed and changeless 
 smile, and a low, soft, seductive voice, which involun- 
 tarily suggested to the mind the quiet rustle of grass 
 through which a serpent is moving, said 
 
 " Why, my dear old friend, if you had not been true 
 to the appointed time, I should not have recognized 
 you. Believe me, my dear Captain, I am most happy 
 to see you. I see you look astonished no doubt I 
 have changed much more than yourself. Why, you 
 
The Cliattel Child. 27 
 
 look younger than you did twelve years ago, but 
 walk in, sir/' 
 
 Our traveler, with an involuntary air of surprise, 
 was about to reply to this hurried tirade 
 
 " I beg pardon, sir I am no Captain, but simple 
 Mr. Defoe"- 
 
 " Oh, certainly, sir/' said Preston, in a whisper, in- 
 terrupting him. " Excuse my indiscretion. I admit 
 that we ought, in a matter of this kind, for it is," and 
 here his whisper sunk so as to be nearly inaudible, " it 
 is, to say the least of it, diabolical. We cannot be too 
 discreet ; but walk in, sir." 
 
 With this, Defoe returned the studied bow and 
 equally studied pressure of the hand, and entered the 
 hall. The expression of surprise at his reception had 
 vanished from his countenance, but a scrutinizing ob- 
 server might have perceived that he kept upon his 
 host, for some reason, an intensely interested and 
 watchful eye ; as the latter continued the conversation 
 in the same rapid though stealthy and half inaudible 
 manner. 
 
 " You shall see your game soon a perfect charm 
 believe me, a fetisha. You'll be entranced beyond 
 measure. But she is yours. Pity I can do nothing 
 better for her. I pity her as a father should. Step 
 into the library. There now we are secure from being 
 overheard. So is fate. So we're bora, you kaovv." 
 
28 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " Yes," replied the stranger. " ( There is a provi- 
 dence which shapes our ends, rough hew them as we 
 will/ " 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! Admirable. You will succeed no 
 doubt of it. Take that rocking chair, do, my dear 
 friend. Ah, that hair of yours is a chef d' ouvre in the 
 
 art of disguise. D my soul if it isn't, and your 
 
 face, the smoothest cheek certainly in your profession. 
 Why, you look as much like a northern freshman, as 
 the day we ran away from Yale twelve years ago. By 
 the way, hadn't you better appear in that character ?" 
 
 " I think I had," replied Defoe. 
 
 "Admirable and your name. What shall that 
 be ? Something sounding and distingue. Say De 
 La Fontaine heir to an immense estate in the south 
 of France. Or what think you of Fitz Gerald ? Say 
 Fitzmaurice Fitz Gerald, Esq., eldest son of the Earl 
 of Fitz What-d'ye-call-em. Women are devilish easy 
 taken by the Fitz, you know. What shall your name 
 be ?" 
 
 " Defoe." 
 
 " Devil ! Why use your real name ?" 
 
 " Why any other ?" 
 
 " Why ! hath your right hand forgot its cunning ? 
 I will tell you why. You must probably go into so- 
 ciety. Julia has seen something of the world, and 
 may prove a siege. For mind you, nothing shall be 
 
The Chattel Child. 29 
 
 done without her consent. Now nothing fritters away 
 a woman's moral stubbornness so quick as fashionable 
 life balls suppers theatres and how many of 
 these could you visit in New Orleans without being 
 unpleasantly recognized as Lieutenant Defoe of the 
 'Flying Scud?'" 
 
 "And then I perceive," suggested Defoe, "the 
 game with me and my flash brothers of the skull and 
 crossbones would be up." 
 
 " Precisely ! and instead of the noose of love, your 
 neck would find a noose of hemp ! Confide not too 
 much in past good fortune." 
 
 Defoe mused thoughtfully for a moment, and then 
 said 
 
 " I see the force of your objection. I think, how- 
 ever, I will still preserve the name of Defoe. I have 
 a lickspittle brother at the North, whom, as I have 
 heard, she met and remembers with kindness, and tLifl, 
 perchance, may be of advantage to me." 
 
 " Indeed !" 
 
 " Besides, I have lately traveled in nearly evi-ry 
 city of the South, and there is not the slightest dan- 
 ger of my being taken for the interesting young pirate 
 of Barrataria. Trust to me. Honor among thieves, 
 you know ha ! ha ! Preston." 
 
 "Ah! yes," said Preston, drily. "Ha! ha! I 
 didn't see the point at first, but ha ! ha ! that was 
 
30 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 always your motto. Here's my hand upon it, Captain 
 Defoe." 
 
 "Mr." 
 
 " Beg pardon, Mr. Defoe ; of what college ?" 
 
 "Yale." 
 
 " Sure enough J Yale college, of course ha I ha 1" 
 continued Mr. Preston, laughing. Defoe also laughed 
 with apparent heartiness. 
 
 But as the two gentlemen sat eyeing each other for 
 a few moments afterward in silence, it was well for 
 each that the shadows of evening twilight concealed 
 the expression which sat upon the countenance of the 
 other. As the wealthy planter rose to ring for a ser- 
 vant, the light of the harvest moon fell full upon his 
 countenance, which seemed to the calm but earnest 
 scrutiny of Defoe to wear the diabolical malignancy 
 of a fiendish heart daring only under cover of the 
 twilight to withdraw that veil of smiles, behind which 
 it lay like a beast of prey in ambush. 
 
The Chattel Child. 31 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MODERN CHIVALRY. 
 
 " Full of those dreams of good that, vainly grand, 
 Haunt the young heart, proud views of human kind, 
 Of men to Gods exalted and refined, 
 False views, like that horizon's fair deceit, 
 Where earth and heaven but seem, alas, to meet !" 
 
 MOORE'S "LaUa Rookh." 
 
 WALTER DEFOE had been among the most earnest, 
 enthusiastic, and ambitious students at Yale College. 
 He had been reared, or rather he had reared himself, 
 amidst the high-toned religious influences of a small 
 Puritan village in the neighborhood, for the early 
 death of his father had left his intelligent and pious, 
 but invalid mother entirely dependent upon him for 
 support. Mrs. Defoe had been the mother of two 
 children Conrad, the eldest of whom, Walter dimly 
 remembered among the other associations of his in- 
 fancy as a handsome and gallant, but wild and im- 
 petuous young man. The charity of his parish had 
 afforded to him a term in college ; but disgracing 
 their charity, he had been dismissed from college, and 
 after having done much to injure the health and wound 
 the heart of his affectionate parent, finally went to 
 
32 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 sea. Since then no better tidings had been received 
 from him than might have been expected from his 
 youthful career ; and the absence of all intelligence 
 of him for many years, had finally confirmed his friends 
 in the belief that he was dead. 
 
 "With a beauty of filial affection which won the 
 hearts of all who knew him, and by the incessant, but 
 feeble struggles by which youthful weakness finds it 
 so difficult to support itself, and still more another 
 dependent person, Walter sought to support and 
 make happy his mother's destined path of premature 
 decline. 
 
 He went into the hot, steaming factory when he 
 had to mount a stool to reach up to the work of the 
 other boys, and there toiled on from early dawn to 
 dusky twilight, till his little round red cheeks grew 
 thin and pale, and the bones began to show them- 
 selves in sharp lines upon his face, just as they did 
 upon his mother's. Still he toiled on, for his mother 
 day by day was dying. And though sometimes when 
 he stopped on his way to work, and peered between 
 the bars of the great iron fence around the lawns and 
 parks, and saw the rich people and their children en- 
 joying the bright day, the healthy air, and the green 
 grass and blossoming trees, and thought what a fine 
 place this world must be for them, and how, if he 
 should live to be a man of wealth, he would go about 
 
The Chattel Child. 33 
 
 doing good, and especially would endeavor to save 
 little children everywhere from having such a hard 
 life as he had, which made him feel often as if he 
 could not help stealing something, no matter what 
 when I say he thought of these things," he would 
 sometimes wish, on his way home, that he might not 
 be obliged to work in the hot, steaming factory, in 
 which he must die in two or three years, but that he 
 might find some healthier employment, in which he 
 could live to manhood. 
 
 But when he took his little earnings on Saturday 
 night and spent them all for tea, preserves, and medi- 
 cines for his mother, and the simplest food for both 
 of them, and when his poor sick mother would curl 
 up his little feet under him like the Turk in the pic- 
 ture books, and have him sit down beside her upon 
 the bed where she had lain for so long a time, and 
 talked to him about the dangers which would beset 
 him when he should enter the world as a man, how 
 hard it would be for him to keep himself unspotted 
 from the world, and how fondly she hoped he would 
 live and die as pure as he then was, and so would 
 come to her in heaven, then little Walter would fall 
 upon his mother's neck and cry ; and though he would 
 not tell her so, he would thank God that the hot, un- 
 healthy factory would hasten his flight home to his 
 dear, dear mother in heaven. Then for mornings 
 
34 Owned and Disowned] ir, 
 
 after, when he went to his work, he would not loiter 
 by the great park where happy children frolicked, but 
 would steal around by the cemetery, and peeping be- 
 tween the pickets, would think of the time when those 
 willows would weep and those cypresses sweetly moan 
 over the green, pretty graves of his mother and him- 
 self, and their souls should have been taken by the 
 Lord as a mother folds her child to her bosom. 
 
 But through the darkest clouds some cheering rays 
 of light will steal. 
 
 Deserted by her old friends, sick, poor, and without 
 hope, with no prospect but of destitution before her, 
 chance, or the unseen influence of angels of mercy, had 
 directed to her threshold one of those gentle creatures 
 whose mission on earth is to love and to bless not 
 one of those meteoric fashionables which glare up 
 with a train of sparks behind them, and having excited 
 the admiration of fools, who do not know that they 
 are nothing but a fizzle of powder and wadding, which 
 any Chinaman can make, then disappear just this side 
 of heaven, and fall forgotten before they reach the 
 ground but one of those lovely stars most admired 
 by loftiest minds, which illumine the darkness of pov- 
 erty and despair, ever guiding the erring, and attract- 
 ing th^ eyes of all to purity and heaven. 
 
 Younger even than Walter, this little girl, with 
 rich, pouting lips, and dark brunette complexion, jet 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 35 
 
 black ringlets, and large sparkling eyes of an irresisti- 
 bly melting softness and lustre, appeared to him like 
 an etherial vision in a dream. But the tasteful ele- 
 gance of her attire, contrasting with the tattered gar- 
 ments over his own squalid form, reminded him pain- 
 fully of this world of unequal realities, and of his own 
 inferior station. 
 
 What first brought her to their threshold they knew 
 not, but no sooner had she left than by indirect means, 
 which she delicately resorted to in order to divert their 
 attention from her as the donor, every comfort of life 
 was constantly supplied to them. With her own 
 hands she would sometimes bring a bit of jelly, or a 
 bouquet of flowers, or other delicate little attention for 
 the sick woman, or sitting down by her bed-side, dur- 
 ing long hours when Walter was obliged to be at the 
 factory, from her own lips she would read with melo- 
 dious beauty of voice and accent whatever she thought 
 would be most soothing and consoling to a sensitive, 
 sick, destitute and dying widow and mother. 
 
 Thus had she visited them for months, nor had the 
 little creature revealed herself to them by any other 
 name than that by which she fondly insisted upon 
 being known of "daughter" to the widow, and "sis-^ 
 ter" to the orphan who were the recipients of her 
 bounty. 
 
 At last, one day after his mother had been more ill 
 
36 Oivned and Disowned; or, 
 
 for several days than usual, while little Walter was 
 working in the factory, and so weak that he could 
 scarcely lift the light implements of his dull, monoto- 
 nous task, suddenly the machinery began to quiver and 
 tremble, as if the building was falling, and the poor, 
 sick child, shrieking the name of his mother, sank to 
 the floor. Weeks passed, and Walter did not return 
 to the factory, nor did his little hands toil there more, 
 for he lay tossed with a fever under the care and nurs- 
 ing of a kind old Quakeress. Sometimes he was so 
 feeble he would utter no sound for days, and sometimes 
 he was strong enough to converse with his mother, and 
 with the kind little girl whom he called his " sister." 
 He talked with them about the trees and flowers in 
 the park, and about the pretty, neatly dressed little 
 boys and girls, and would often smile and laugh, and 
 the time passed pleasantly. 
 
 But no mother, and, after the first few days of his 
 sickness, no sister conversed with him, save in the fan- 
 cies of his delirium. It was not, however, until he was 
 quite strong and well, that in answer to his continued 
 inquiries for his mother, the kind old Quaker lady told 
 him that she was no more, and that the little girl who 
 used to visit her in her sickness, had been obliged to 
 return a long way off to her home, so that Walter 
 could not even render one word of thanks to the beau- 
 tiful young stranger for whom he could not but feel 
 
The Chatttl Child. 37 
 
 the most intense admiration and gratitude. But the 
 good are never forgotten. Her sweet image, like a 
 guardian spirit, had been with him in his dreams, and 
 had guided and inspired his life with a mysterious but 
 hallowed influence. Delusive hope it may have been, 
 yet oh, how fondly the struggling youth cherished it, 
 how it encouraged him through " long days of labor and 
 nights devoid of ease," that at some of the turnings of 
 life, that sweet smile, that kind eye, would again rest, 
 if but for a moment, on him. 
 
 As soon as he had recovered, he left the " Orphan's 
 Home," of which the old Quakeress was but the ma- 
 tron, and went out and looked up and down the street, 
 and felt for the first time that he was utterly alone in 
 the world, Need we recount the long years of menial 
 struggles by which the lonely orphan worked his way 
 upward from indigence and despair to a position of 
 comparative ease. Need we say with what conscious 
 pride he entered, by means of the proceeds of his own 
 labors, the very college from which his brother had 
 been ignominiously expelled, or with what assiduity 
 he had there prosecuted his studies. 
 
 Though he had not yet chosen what profession he 
 should pursue, the generous instincts of his heart and 
 the influence of his revered mother, made him recoil 
 from the pursuits of selfishness, and caused him to 
 struggle for some position in which he might live a 
 
I 
 
 38 Owned and Disowned; or s 
 
 life of enlarged usefulness, and he had a noble ambi- 
 tion to be useful in alleviating, to some extent, those 
 social inequalities and evils against some of which he 
 had struggled, and which blight the happiness of the 
 majority of mankind. 
 
 Such were the day-dreams of the studious youth, 
 which, with another and more tender fancy that some- 
 times floated pleasantly before his mind, encouraged 
 him onward. When, one morning as he was passing 
 the celebrated seminary of the Misses Willis, the steps 
 of which a bevy of young ladies were at the moment 
 ascending, one of them strangely riveted his attention. 
 Her complexion, darker even than that which usually 
 obtains under Italian skies, was tinged so delicately 
 that an artist might have studied its hues entranced. 
 Her lips, faultless in form, were of ruby richness, and 
 her exuberant folds of raven hair fell around her finely 
 chisseled neck with a 
 
 " Grace beyond the reach of art." 
 
 But more than all, her softly intellectual forehead, be- 
 neath which shone the deep fond light of a benevolent, 
 yet languishing and passionate eye, might have per- 
 suaded the student that he had strayed into the soci- 
 ety of an angel, did not her finely moulded and volup- 
 tuously graceful form recall everything most beautiful 
 in woman. As she went tripping up the long flight 
 of steps, she turned, and her eye rested intently upon 
 
The Chattel Child. 39 
 
 that of the student. Did they recognize each other, 
 or had they ever met before ? for each marked the flush 
 upon the cheek of the other. 
 
 Back upon Walter's mind, like the rush of a spring 
 flood, came hurried thoughts of past years, of the old 
 Quakeress, of the factory, of his invalid mother, and 
 finally her angel nurse. 
 
 " Is it can it be her ?" the student half exclaimed, 
 as he turned to take one more look at that inexpressi- 
 bly fascinating countenance. But the vision had van- 
 ished, the door had closed, and he wended once more 
 upon his way, musing and in love. 
 
 A week of delightful imaginations determined his 
 resolution ; and notwithstanding the environing ob- 
 stacles with which the vigilance of most principals 
 guards the ladies in their seminaries from the forma- 
 tion of new acquaintances, another week of industry 
 and address sufficed to place Defoe upon calling terms 
 at the establishment of Miss Willis, where he found 
 that the Misses Preston one of whom was the bene- 
 factor of his infancy and of his mother's widowhood 
 had departed finally for their home, which was the 
 residence of a planter in the vicinity of New Orleans, 
 where, or whether ten or a hundred miles distant, he 
 could not learn. 
 
 Six months wore away, and Walter Defoe, though 
 in the apparent effort industrious, was in reality ab- 
 
40 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 sent, idle, and dreamy. At the end of this time, and a 
 few months before the opening of our narrative, he 
 disappeared from college, and not being heard from 
 for some time, nor responding to the anxious inquiries 
 made for him, as usual in such cases, such of his friends 
 as were worth having preserved their faith in his worth 
 undimmed, while those who were not shook their heads, 
 and said they had always thought it strange that any 
 brother to Conrad Defoe could sincerely be as gentle 
 and good a person as Walter seemed. They hoped 
 so ; but they had their doubts. And while they were 
 eagerly and suspiciously doubting, young Walter De- 
 foe had searched for, and at last found, the roof which 
 sheltered Julia Preston, and where, by some remarka- 
 ble coincidence, the cause or nature of which he darkly 
 suspected, but had not yet unraveled, he found him- 
 self a thrice welcome guest, but welcome on account 
 of some assumed character which had been unexpect- 
 edly thrust upon him, but which he, with prompt and 
 almost instinctive foresight, had determined to wear 
 as best he could, until it should re real to him some- 
 what more clearly the character of his remarkable host, 
 so strangely shadowed forth in the manner of his 
 reception. 
 
 " Julia and Ada, it affords me much pleasure," 
 said Mr. Preston to his daughters, at a later hour of 
 the evening in which the incidents of the former chap- 
 
The Chattel Child. 41 
 
 ter occurred, " to introduce to you a young man, yet 
 of long and dear acquaintance, the son of my old and 
 well-remembered friend, Mr. Defoe, of Virginia. I 
 commend him to your kindest hospitality, and hope 
 he will not regret having honored Lindenhall with his 
 presence, nor be found sighing too soon for the classic 
 precincts of Yale. 
 
42 Owned and Disotvned ; or, 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE C O V E N A N T. 
 
 " Together, 'neath the early morn, 
 
 We took our joyous way, 
 When clustering blossoms hid the thorn, 
 
 And all around was gay. 
 
 And now, when midnight's wildest storms 
 
 The troubled sleeper wake, 
 And fear unveils its phantom form, 
 
 Shall I thy side forsake?" MRS. SIGOURNEY. 
 
 IT was after midnight, and but a single glimmer? 
 taper told of life within Lindenhall. Near to this, 
 and before a large mirror, each gazing at the reflected 
 features of each other, stood Julia and Ada Preston. 
 Their arms fondly enfolded each other in a sisterly 
 embrace, and they seemed to twine together as vine 
 around vine, when it has no other supporting prop. 
 Their temples fondly met and pressed each other, and 
 Julia's luxuriant curls of glistening jet mingling with 
 Ada's waving locks of light auburn, fell upon their 
 shoulders as they stood 
 
 " Side by side,* * * 
 In rosy dream, hand interlocked in hand, 
 And clustering curls commingled." 
 
The Chattel Child. 43 
 
 The voluptuous loveliness of the Creole, Liingling, 
 perhaps, with the pride of the Spanish and the grace 
 of the French, combined in Julia with the mentality 
 of the American ; while Ada's golden hair, and 
 pale, slightly tinged cheek, blue eye, and slender, 
 fairy form shone with the pearl-like fairness of the 
 Saxon. But there was in her delicate and childish 
 features an infantile prettiness, which contrasted with 
 the dignified intellectuality of her sister, and compared 
 with her, she seemed like a doll-like, though lovely crea- 
 ture, whom no years could change from child to wo- 
 man. Such doubtless are sent to earth like flowers 
 and cloud-tints, only to gratify our taste and love for 
 the beautiful and pure. Julia had changed little since 
 she last arrested the eye of the New Haven student, 
 save that the few intervening months may have added 
 a richness to the rose upon her cheek which the brown 
 complexion she had derived from her Southern birth 
 and parentage could not hide, or may have perfected 
 the graceful contour of womanhood in a form which 
 seemed the fit temple of all that was pure and affec- 
 tionate in woman's nature. 
 
 " Ah, Julia," said Ada, smiling, " I knew you would 
 never love where there was no romance. Don't smile 
 and shake your head and say, c No, sister, I love none 
 but you/ for it won't do. That doesn't solve- the 
 
44 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 mystery. Now, isn't there a mystery about this mat- 
 ter, sister Julia ?" 
 
 " Certainly, it looks quite mysterious, but " 
 
 " Don't say c but/ Julia say it's a mystery, and 
 stop. Oh, I like mysteries. If ever I fall in love, it 
 will be with some one I never have seen nor heard of, 
 and don't know anything about, just for the sake of 
 the mystery. Wouldn't that be interesting ?" 
 
 " I should think it would be decidedly interesting," 
 said Julia, laughing. 
 
 " Well, this is just such a mystery exactly ! Here 
 you have hardly ever seen him or heard of him, and 
 of course you can know little about him. Is not the 
 case precisely parallel ?" 
 
 " Except that my pretty sister's imagination only 
 has supplied the fact that I am already in love with 
 him, which, you must know, is very presumptuous 
 and absurd." 
 
 " No matter how presumptuous 1 or absurd it is 
 since you have frankly admitted it to be a fact," re- 
 plied Ada, archly. " Now, sister, put your lips close 
 to mine there, not yet now. I want you to kiss 
 me if you think you are in love, if not, don't. There, 
 I thought you would. Now, you see, I've found it 
 all out, and I am very sorry for it, very sorry." 
 
 " Why would you be sorry, if you should find any 
 such fancy as you now entertain to be true, dear Ada ?" 
 
The Chattel Child. 45 
 
 " Oh ! there's something so horrid in the idea of 
 loving men. I don't see how girls that have any kind 
 of respect for themselves can do it. I am sure I never 
 could. They're all such rude, ungraceful savages. 
 When I fall in love, it'll be with a woman there ! 
 There's something kind and tender and gentle about 
 you. I wish I were a man, so that you could love me 
 more than a sister. A love deeper than ours would 
 seem so strange. The pilgrimage of this romantic 
 student to the shrine of his lady love would be nothing 
 compared with my knight errantry." 
 
 " Sister Ada thinks men are demons, whom it is 
 impossible to love, and yet wishes herself were one of 
 those demons." 
 
 " Oh, you are always cross-examining," replied Ada. 
 
 " I don't mean that exactly I only mean that I 
 shall be very sorry when you come to love any other 
 person more than Ada, and when you will leave all 
 others, including Ada, to cleave to that one. Then 
 we who have gathered nothing but flowers in the path 
 of life so pleasantly shall be separated. ,You shall 
 take one path and I another, and we shall not see each 
 other for months, who knows but years ! Oh, it would 
 be so sad Why can we not love each other only and 
 always until we die ? I should ask no other hap- 
 piness. A fig for marriage. I wish we were two old 
 maids now, so homely that nobody would want to 
 
46 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 marry either of us. I should be perfectly lappy. I 
 tell you I am going to be an old maid. I should like 
 to see some great monster ask me to love him. I 
 should like to be a vestal virgin, or a nun, or some- 
 thing, but to be loved. Oh, it must be horrid. Dear 
 me !" 
 
 " I fear pretty sister Ada must soon fall upon some 
 very terrible experiences unless she screens her person 
 as well from all mankind as she has hitherto retained 
 her heart," said Julia, kissing her. 
 
 " I have no fear of that," said Ada, " for I shall 
 not be pretty after a couple of years, but shall grow 
 to a very plain girl, and if I can only stand it the 
 couple of years, after that I shall ' not be tempted, 
 neither tempt any man" so you see I am almost an 
 old maid now." 
 
 " Well, by a hard struggle, I think you may con- 
 tinue to be," said Julia, laughing, " but come, can't 
 you solve this mystery ?" 
 
 "It is very strange," whispered Ada, " that the 
 awkward, bashful student, whose wits you frightened 
 out of his head, at New Haven, should have taken 
 this quixotic journey, or should have found business 
 which should bring him here." 
 
 " And still more strange," pursued Julia, " that he 
 should have met with such a cordial reception from 
 pa 1" 
 
TJie Cliattel Child. 47 
 
 " Wonderful !" repeated Ada, in an emphatic 
 whisper. Besides we learned in New Haven that he 
 was a poor orphan who had supported himself by the 
 vilest occupations until he had risen to his present 
 position, and yet pa told us he was the son of a 
 wealthy friend of his in Virginia, now living, and the 
 heir at his father's death to immense wealth/* 
 
 " Pa appears to take much interest in him, and is 
 very anxious indeed that we should be pleased with 
 him," continued Julia. 
 
 " Or rather that you should/' laughed Ada. 
 
 " I cannot conceive how or why pa should have con- 
 ceived anything particular relative to the matter." 
 
 " Oh, sister, I feel a strange presentiment that we 
 are some way to be separated. Our hours of joyous 
 companionship together are fading away, even now, 
 like the beauty of the clouds at sunset. A dark 
 cloud obscures our future, and I cannot penetrate it ; 
 but, dear sister, whatever may befal either of us, will 
 you, to your dying day, when you think of your poor 
 sister Ada, say, " Poor child, she did not mean to lo 
 wrong !" 
 
 Julia was too much accustomed to the child-like 
 waywardness of her sister to be much surprised by her 
 sudden and melancholy forebodings, and only replied, 
 
 " Yes, child, but do not be sad." 
 
 And as the streaks of morning light shone through 
 
48 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 the lattice, the sisters sealed the covenant of endless 
 affection with a kiss, and flinging themselves down 
 upon a couch, they folded each other in a still closer 
 embrace, and wept themselves to sleep. 
 
The Chattel Child. 49 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 BETROTHED. 
 
 " AH, happy love ! where love like this is found ; 
 
 Oh, heartfelt raptures ! bliss beyond compare ! 
 I've paced much this weary, mortal round, 
 
 And sage experience bids me this declare 
 If heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare, 
 
 One cordial in this melancholy vale, 
 'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair, 
 
 In other's arms breathe out the tender tale 
 Beneath the milk-white thorn, that scents the evening gale." 
 
 BURNS. 
 
 A WEEK had nearly passed, and not unpleasantly, 
 apparently, to the inmates of Lindenhall, since the 
 arrival of Walter Defoe. The mornings were occupied 
 by rides upon horseback along the romantic paths that 
 skirted the banks of the river, occasionally relieved by 
 a pleasant sail upon its own broad current. The short 
 afternoons passed swiftly away in the perusal or dis- 
 cussion of the merits of favorite authors, and other 
 subjects of a literary, poetical, or pleasing interest, in 
 which the rarely cultivated mind of the student de- 
 lighted to revel. Here, indeed, his richly stored intel- 
 lect appeared to the best advantage, and his earnest 
 
50 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 efforts to please were rendered still more certainly suc- 
 cessful by the consciousness that in one, at least, of 
 his audience, he found a tender and sympathetic ap- 
 preciation. 
 
 But it was especially delightful to the young student 
 to sit by the open window, or upon the long piazza, 
 and receive the gentle, refreshing influence of the cool 
 zephyrs of evening, while one or the other of the sis- 
 ters would cast a lulling, happy influence over his soul 
 by singing some plaintive or thoughtful melody, occa- 
 sionally accompanied by the piano or guitar, a melody 
 often that would recall his mother's sweet voice, or 
 remind him of the bitter hours of his childhood. 
 Sometimes, however, it would touch upon happier 
 themes, and stir his soul to warmer and more genial 
 thoughts. At such moments he would look out into 
 the future in a half bewildered but beautiful dream, 
 in which he was surrounded by associations and affec- 
 tions and beings who seemed thrown around him as if 
 by a providential love, desirous to make the perfect 
 bliss of his future life a contrast to the hard struggles 
 of the portion he had passed through. 
 
 These amusements Mr. Preston appeared to have 
 leisure only occasionally to favor with his encouraging 
 presence. But the labors and cares of superintending 
 his extensive plantation, one of the largest in the State 
 of Mississippi, was, and indeed seemed to have always 
 
The Chattel Cliild. 51 
 
 served with his daughters as a sufficient excuse for his 
 almost constant absence from the society of his house, 
 either upon his plantation or in New Orleans. The 
 happy hours of those few days had not been listlessly 
 passed by the New Haven student. With Julia he 
 had talked, walked, rode, sailed, played and sung, and 
 every moment added fresh evidence to him that the 
 external grace which had first drawn his attention was 
 but the fit shrine of the pure and lovely qualities 
 which had so soon after won his heart. As they com- 
 muned more and more together, there grew up rapidly 
 between them a fitness of thought and a congeniality 
 of soul, which seemed to open upon one of them like a 
 new world, while the heart of the other was borne 
 along as in a current, without herself realizing the 
 truth, or certainly much more rapidly than she would 
 have confessed it. Julia had seen much of society, 
 where her charms had brought her many admirers 
 and she had come to think the day far distant when, 
 with all her affectionate kind-heartedness, her womanly 
 vanity would not be better pleased to be the centre of 
 the admiration of many than to be the exclusive pos- 
 session of one. But she could not fail to see young 
 Walter's meaning, and notwithstanding the contradic- 
 tory and mysterious circumstances of his coming, it 
 would have been somewhat strange, as Ada hinted, 
 had she failed to have been pleased by it. 
 
52 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 It was at the close of a day which had passed like a 
 delightful trance ; in some of the amusements we have 
 mentioned, that Walter and Julia were seated upon a 
 rustic couch at the foot of a branching willow by the 
 margin of the river. 
 
 The evening had been warm, but now the gentle 
 zephyrs moved refreshingly through the dewy foliage 
 around them, and the moon glistened over the still 
 expanse of waters which stretched out in placid beauty 
 at their feet. 
 
 At the request of Julia, Walter had narrated his 
 whole early life, had depicted the wrongs and sting of 
 his early poverty, the story of which, up to the death 
 of his mother, she had long since known. Since that 
 time he had wandered, without a relative, without a 
 home, but such as his own often unsuccessful labors 
 provided for him, without friendship or any human 
 heart to whom he could look for encouragement or 
 love, cheered only by the vision of one never absent 
 from his mind, never forgotten, who had been the fos- 
 ter-daughter to his dying mother and the guardian 
 angel of her orphan son. 
 
 With a fluency which was kindled into eloquence 
 by the sympathy of his listener, he recounted the var- 
 ious steps of triumph or defeat in his school, mercan- 
 tile, and college life, up to the moment he had again 
 seen her, and then with blushing cheek and quivering 
 
The Cliattel Child. 53 
 
 lip he spoke of a few months of dreamy college life, in 
 which his books were neglected and his honors lost, 
 then of his departure from college, his arrival at New 
 Orleans, his various endeavors in a search in which he 
 had scarcely a clue to his success, his repeated dis- 
 heartening failures, and his final partial success. 
 
 At the word " partial" the delicate hand which 
 rested in his own tenderly returned its thrilling press- 
 ure, and a single dewy drop from the downcast eyo 
 of the maiden fell and glistened upon it. He stooped 
 to brush it with his lips away, and as he did so their 
 attention was arrested by a dark figure moving stealth- 
 ily along the path from which they had stepped aside 
 to the rustic couch. Walter started towards it, but 
 upon a nearer approach it seemed to resolve itself into 
 a young cypress tree, stirred by the gentle motion of 
 the evening winds. Taking Julia's arm within his 
 own, slowly and pausing often to lengthen out in 
 trembling but ill-disguised confessions the rapturous 
 moments which both felt, as if they would fain retain 
 and expand if possible into ages, they returned to 
 Lindenhall ! 
 
54 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 THE "PECULIAR INST 
 
 " Unchristian thought ! on what pretence soe'er 
 Of right inherited, or else acquired ; 
 Of loss, or profit, or what plea you name, 
 To buy and sell, to barter, whip, and hold 
 In chains a being of celestial make 
 Of kindred form, of kindred faculties, 
 Of kindred feelings, passions, thoughts, desires- 
 Born free, and heir of an immortal hope J 
 Thought villainous, absurd, detestable ! 
 Unworthy to be harbored in a fiend." 
 
 POLLOK'S " Course of Time" 
 
 SCARCELY had they reached the threshold, when 
 the door was opened, and Ada appeared, so pale and 
 agitated that her sister, flying to her arms, exclaimed : 
 
 " Dearest Ada, what is the matter ? Are you sick ? 
 Speak, sister 1" 
 
 " No," whispered Ada, laying her hand upon her 
 heart, as if to still its painful beatings " I am not 
 sick ; but oh, come with me 1" 
 
 Ada threw her arms around her sister, who was in 
 a tremor of agitation, and pale herself in her deep 
 sympathy for the suffering girl, and kissed her, as if 
 she feared she would soon be deprived of that oppor- 
 
The Chattel Child. 55 
 
 tunity, and repeating hurriedly, " Come with me," 
 she glided into the hall, and bounded up the stairs. 
 
 " Mr. Defoe, will you excuse me for a moment ? I 
 fear my sister is quite unwell," whispered Julia. " I 
 see my father waiting in the library. I am sure he 
 would like your company, which his business of late 
 has left him so little opportunity of enjoying/' 
 
 " Certainly," said Walter. 
 
 And as the maiden tripped lightly up stairs to join 
 Ada, she heard Mr. Defoe enter the library, and re- 
 ceive the same cordial greeting which had, from his 
 first arrival, seemed so remarkable, but which now 
 appeared to her only as one of a chain of circumstances 
 providentially linked together for their happiness. 
 
 Upon entering, her sister's room, she found Ada still 
 pale and agitated, kneeling before a small silver cruci- 
 fix, with her hands clasped, her sweet blue eyes, full 
 of devotion, lifted upward in the posture of prayer. 
 Never, she thought, had Ada appeared so lovely, as 
 kneeling now in woman's most graceful attitude not 
 indeed as revealing most grace of limb or of outward 
 form, but of heart. Julia paused in awe for a moment, 
 and then silently approaching, yielded to the power 
 of sympathy, and knelt by her side. 
 
 In a moment, Ada, turning with a tearless face, 
 though quivering with convulsive emotion, took 'the 
 hands of Julia in hers, and covering with them her 
 
56 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 own face, as if to hide from her sight the effect of her 
 words upon her sister, said : 
 
 " Julia, Julia ! prepare to be overwhelmed by an 
 affliction such as you can neither avoid nor bear, that 
 makes me doubt even while I pray. Oh, Julia, if 
 angels ever weep, all heaven is weeping for you now ! 
 Oh, if it is so hard to tell the story, how can you hear 
 it ! God ! help us both." And as she said this, 
 the fountain of her tears burst forth, and hiding her 
 face in the bosom of her sister, she wept, convul- 
 sively. 
 
 " God will help us, love/' said Julia, calmly. " Pray, 
 calm yourself, and do not fear but that I can bear 
 what you have heard. What is this danger of which 
 you cannot speak, and which affects me more than 
 yourself, or than our dear father, or from which he 
 cannot protect ?" 
 
 " He protect ! Oh, Julia, you have no father. 
 Would I had almost said that I had none !" 
 
 "Ada !" 
 
 " He whom you call your father is the father only 
 of your shame. Nay, he has sold you, as he would a 
 common negro, to yonder wretch, outlaw, pirate, fiend, 
 Defoe, who is even now bantering with him about the 
 psice. Oh, sister/ tis true !" she cried, embracing the 
 trembling Julia, who gazed upon her in incredulous, 
 speechless consternation, 
 
The Chattel Child. 57 
 
 " Sold me his daughter I" 
 
 " You ! his his Oh, sister of my soul ! mother 
 of all that is good in me ! you are indeed his child, 
 but his his I cannot say it." 
 
 Julia, growing paler and paler as her sister had 
 proceeded, now stood with cheek of livid whiteness, 
 with eyes uplifted, as if her mind were wandering 
 through the dim mazes of some fearful dream. Not 
 a tear coursed down her cheeks, or even moistened her 
 brilliant, flashing eye. Withdrawing herself from Ada's 
 embrace, she turned and gazed earnestly upon her re- 
 flected likeness in the nearest mirror, as if to read 
 there the hard story which her sister could not tell. 
 Unloosing her hair from her comb, she brought her 
 long jetty curls before her shoulders, until they cov- 
 ered her whole bosom, and fell down below her waist. 
 
 They were exuberant and beautiful, and her pride 
 had often looked upon those waving raven folds with 
 womanly delight. As she drew away her hand, she 
 held that off, and scanned its pallid whiteness. Then 
 her gaze wandered from feature to feature of her coun- 
 tenance, till at last it vibrated between her own rich 
 ruby lips and black, lustrous, and passionate eye. At 
 length her lips moved, and murmured in a low, dis- 
 tant voice, as if her soul had been spirited away, and 
 was speaking from afar off .,. 
 
58 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " Julia Julia is a slave ! I am Julia ; I am a 
 slave ; poor slave 1" 
 
 This delirious calmness lasted but for a moment ; 
 then her proud form rose to its full and beautiful 
 stature. She seemed in an exultant trance, then as 
 if it were the sound of the spirit of liberty vacating 
 the chambers of her soul for the demon of slavery to 
 enter, throwing up her arms, her pent-up passions 
 burst forth, half whispering, half shrieking 
 
 " No, I am free I" 
 
 But slowly returning to her former attitude, again 
 ever and anon muttered, 
 
 " No ! no ! I am a slave a slave 1" 
 
 Suddenly arousing from her lethargy, she shrieked 
 with a fearful vehemence 
 
 " Prove this. Prove it. Quick, Ada, for the air 
 of slavery is the air of hell ! It stifles me, and I can 
 breathe it no longer. If I am a slave, let me know 
 it that I may die and be free I" 
 
 As she said this, a form which she had not recog- 
 nized before, and which, at any other moment, would 
 have startled her, but to which she now calmly 
 looked as the natural response to her enquiry, arose 
 from his seat in a shadowed corner of the room, and 
 came forth where the light of the single lamp fell upon 
 his features. His bald and venerable head, white 
 neck-band and priestly cassock, but above all, his 
 
Tlie Chattel Child. 59 
 
 reverend and holy mien, filled her with instant confi- 
 dence, and falling down before the holy father, with 
 her cross to her lips, she besought his blessing and his 
 aid. 
 
 " The former I give you now/' said he, blessing her. 
 " The latter I have come to give you if I can." 
 
 Then raising her up, he continued 
 
 " Daughter, in the secrecy of the confessional cham- 
 ber, I have learned of the villainy which plots your 
 destruction, from the very pirate and fiend who this 
 night kissed your hand under the branches of the wil- 
 low by the river. I knew your mother well. She 
 was beautiful and accomplished, virtuous and pious, 
 but a quadroon, and the property of Mr. Preston. 
 Her father and owner had intended to free her, but 
 died suddenly, and she was thrown into the market 
 for sale. Young Preston, impressed by her mental 
 and moral superiority, purchased her through an agent, 
 and did not even permit her to know that he was her 
 owner, but visiting her as a friend, with honeyed words 
 upon his lips, proposed to secure her liberty and make 
 her his wife. So he gained her affections, and she 
 yielded to her lover and affianced husband, what as 
 her owner even he would blush to have enforced. It 
 was not until after your birth, that he received the 
 title papers for yourself and mother. Accident has 
 placed them in my hands. You may read them," 
 
60 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 said the priest, producing a soiled, worn paper, and 
 carefully unfolding it, lest it should fall to pieces in 
 being opened. 
 
 Julia glanced over the paper hurriedly. Having 
 acted often as her father's secretary in engrossing and 
 arranging many papers of the same nature, it was not 
 difficult for her to judge of its genuineness or import. 
 It was the bill of sale of her body and soul. Attach- 
 ed to it as subscribing witness was the single name 
 which thrilled her to her very heart " Defoe !" 
 
 " Shortly after your birth," continued the priest, 
 " your mother was at the same time, by the small-pox, 
 deprived of her beauty and freed from her slavery, but 
 repentance and anguish wrought so powerfully upon 
 her mind, and the sins which she saw in a life in which 
 others saw only misfortunes, induced her to seek a 
 refuge in the arms of the church and in the holy order 
 of mercy, from the pollution of the world. But in tak- 
 ing the vail, she did not banish from her heart her love 
 for her child, and though you have not known it, her 
 prayers and her watchfulness have ever attended you." 
 
 " Yes," said Julia. " Holy father I see it and be- 
 lieve it all. It is hard. It stuns me. I am blinded 
 and bewildered. I hoped at first this dream would 
 break, and I awaking would clasp my pillow in my 
 frenzied hands as I have often done when some hor- 
 rid vision of the night had passed, and smile to think 
 
The Chattel Child. 61 
 
 it was all false. But no. I see it all now. It is all 
 true. My thanks, reverend father, for the kind man- 
 ner in which you have performed this task, for I sup- 
 pose my master Oh, God !" exclaimed the stricken 
 girl, as she clasped her throbbing brows in anguish at 
 the utterance of that word " I suppose my owner 
 has bid you break this fearful news to his chattel 
 child. Go then and tell him him whom my best 
 nature hath always taught me to fear and loathe, that 
 his slave has heard his message and is ready to obey 
 him. As I have lived a mistress, believing myself 
 born free, so I will live a slave, knowing tha-t I was 
 born in bondage. The difference is terrible, but as 
 mistress I upheld the institution as ordained of God. 
 As slave I shall at least have a fair opportunity to 
 learn whether it was or not. But oh I" she continued 
 in a milder tone, and her tears burst forth afresh, 
 " why did he cradle me with his own pure offspring ? 
 Why make of me his child, and teach me to call him 
 ' father/ and thee, my mistress Ada, by the name of 
 ' sister/ Why educate me for a condition in which the- 
 misery is proportionate to the mind, and which bestial 
 ignorance alone makes endurable ? Has he refined 
 and cultivated my sensibilities only that my torture 
 may be the more exquisite ? But I will not com- 
 plain. What right has a slave to complain, when no 
 lash blisters her back and her blood cries not yet from 
 
62 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 the ground for vengeance ? And what right even 
 then has he to cry, save in secret to God ? Tell him 
 I am ready to be led forth in his rudest garments to 
 his vilest work, to be worked as a slave, lashed as a 
 slave sold as a slave ! 
 
 " But before I fall to that despised contempt in which 
 no request of mine will be heeded, tell him that as a 
 last and only favor, after which the lips of the slave 
 shall be forever mute, I would that, for the love my 
 mother bore him, he will take this little cross, and 
 without changing its form, will have the lower part 
 made to ensheath a dagger. These cross pieces upon 
 which the arms of the Saviour were nailed shall be the 
 hilt. And if, with it sheathed, I would lose my hea- 
 ven, with it unsheathed, I shall save my heaven." 
 
 " Nay, my daughter, you mistake the object of my 
 visit," said the priest. " I come not from your father ; 
 nor can I convey to him your answer. But unhap- 
 pily, he seeks not to employ your comeliness upon the 
 labor of his plantation. The purchaser in whose arms 
 he would find a market for you is the pretended col- 
 lege student, the smooth-cheeked Defoe. I saw him 
 in your company to-night ; and though I saw him but 
 imperfectly, and so disguised as to make him appear 
 much younger than he really is, his voice and form I 
 knew they were unmistakable ; and even had I not 
 learned of his presence here, and come in pursuance 
 
Tfie Chattel Child. 63 
 
 of it, I should have recognized him. Accomplished, 
 skillful, and of wonderful powers of deception and fas- 
 cination, he is nominally the lieutenant, but really the 
 ruling spirit of Lafitte. His career is written in blood 
 and tears. Hell holds no scoundrel of a blacker die." 
 
 " Reverend father, though thou seemst, I believe 
 such tales are false," exclaimed Julia, in a voice of 
 smothered indignation. 
 
 " Would for thy sake," said the friar, calmly, "that 
 what I say were false ! But visit not upon the re- 
 vealer of your fate the anger due to the authors of it." 
 
 " No, no," said Julia, tearfully, " forgive me, holy 
 father ; I know not what I say. But where have you 
 learned of these horrors ?" 
 
 " By your father's letter," replied the priest, hand- 
 ing it to her, " which was handed by the negro, Sandy, 
 to your mother, on its way to Defoe ; for it is through 
 that faithful servant that she has been enabled thus 
 far to watch over your welfare." 
 
 " My master's letter ! Yes, it is in his hand the 
 same in which he has written me so many epistles full 
 of kindly affection. Bead it for me, good father ; I 
 cannot." And sinking upon a couch, and burying her 
 face in her hands, she wept violently. 
 
 The priest read : 
 
64 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " LlNDENHALL, 
 
 " My Dear Defoe : 
 
 " I was grieved to learn by the propositions 
 contained in your last letter, that the only terms upon 
 which you will furnish me with the funds necessary 
 to save my family from ruin and myself from bank- 
 ruptcy, are the surrender to you of a person who, 
 though legally my slave, is in fact my child. You 
 will acknowledge the sacrifice I am making to you ; 
 for could I wait but a few years, her intelligence and 
 beauty, united as they are with the most amiable dis- 
 position, could not fail to secure for me through her 
 an alliance, by marriage, with some of the ( first fami- 
 lies' of the South a connexion which would ensure 
 me treble what I can get for her as a slave, even from 
 you. Such was my design in rearing and educating 
 her. But I can fully sympathize with the companion 
 of my boyhood in the intensity of his wishes in such 
 a matter, and I trust you will believe that my old 
 friendship for you is my strongest inducement for 
 taking this step. After all, however, the girl Julia is 
 but a chattel ; and though I thought of passing her 
 off as my child and as white, my duty to myself and 
 my creditors in my present embarrassments, makes 
 such benevolence too expensive a luxury. It would 
 be nothing more or less than a cheat to deceive the 
 world as to her rightful condition ; and the best course 
 
The Chattel Child. 65 
 
 is to let her occupy the position for which nature and 
 her birth designed her. 
 
 " One thing, however, I require, my dear chum, or 
 the matter might create a stir. Nothing must be done 
 by force. Her consent must be obtained, so that she 
 can never charge me with her misfortune. But you 
 know what every woman is at heart, and these quad- 
 roons are naturally of easy affections. The task will 
 not be a difficult one. Make yourself spruce and 
 young. Look just as when I last saw you ten years 
 ago, and you will do. She is pious as an angel, and 
 you had better assume some suitable character. A 
 show of money would have no effect whatever, as she 
 is too foolish to be attracted by it. Play a cautious 
 game until the bird is in the cage, for she knows more 
 than both of us. Above all, come quickly, as I want 
 the money and you the game. Hoping to welcome 
 you soon to Lindenhall to a skillful siege, and easy 
 conquest, and a rich booty, 
 
 " I remain your tried friend, 
 
 " BUTLER PRESTON." 
 
 " Holy Father !" exclaimed Julia as the letter 
 closed. " No ! no t still I cannot believe it. My 
 father may be a fiend : I never loved him, but my 
 Walter gentle Walter, with whom in our infancy I 
 have prayed by the bedside of his dying mother he 
 
66 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 a seducer, he a pirate and a fiend ! Sooner will I be- 
 lieve the sun sheds darkness, or that angels sin. Oh, 
 father, though it caused the heavens to fall to the 
 earth, and shiver the world from its foundations, if I 
 were asked for my heart's love I could but answer, 
 ' My dear Walter has it/ For he came to me as no 
 wicked man could come, and all that was true and 
 good in my nature was so attracted by his greater truth 
 and goodness, that I could but yield to his power, as 
 a lesser planet revolves around a greater. My whole 
 soul was drawn to him, I yearned for him, and my 
 powerless arms could not withhold, but stretching out 
 fondly enfolded him, and my lips were thrilled with 
 his kiss of plighted love as the trembling harps of hea- 
 ven thrill at angels' touch. Holy father," she cried, 
 rising, " I will rush to him, I will tell him all, and all 
 shall be explained." 
 
 " Hold !" said the priest, firmly and authoritatively 
 laying his hand upon her arm, " such rashness would 
 only be my death v Did he know of my presence here 
 I should die. But, come, he is now probably convers- 
 ing with your father in the library : if there is a place 
 where you may listen I doubt not you may satisfy 
 yourself/' 
 
 Almost overwhelmed by the weight of her grief, yet 
 not unwilling to embrace any opportunity of gaining 
 new light upon the matters revealed by the priest, 
 
The Chattel Child. 67 
 
 whose whole manner seemed indicative only of a kind 
 and pure intent, and animated by the possible chance 
 of explaining away that part of the story which pointed 
 to the guilt of Defoe, she readily assented to this pro- 
 posal, and Julia, followed by Ada and the priest, 
 glided quickly and stealthily down the stairs and along 
 the hall to a small closet or recess, entered by an ad- 
 joining room and opening into the library. Crouching 
 down they listened to a few words, apparently the con- 
 clusion of a conversation between Preston and Defoe. 
 
 " So, captain, it is fully understood that you are to 
 pay me five thousand francs as soon as Julia shall be 
 placed on board the Flying Scud, at New Orleans ?" 
 
 Was it some superhuman power that pressed down 
 the shriek that trembled upon Julia's lips as she heard, 
 in the calm voice of him in whom her soul had trusted, 
 the answer 
 
 " Yes/' 
 
 " And the balance of the thirty thousand when she 
 shall have been safely conveyed to Barrataria, precisely 
 as agreed in your letter." continued the stony voice of 
 Preston. 
 
 "Exactly." 
 
 . " You already boast of being certain that she will 
 consent ?" 
 
 " I know that she suspects not the slightest decep- 
 
68 Oivned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 tion, and were I really the chicken she mistakes me 
 for, she could not love me more." 
 
 " You will proceed to-morrow, then, for New Orleans, 
 to make the necessary arrangements for caging the 
 bird and the payment of the first instalment." 
 
 " If you will furnish me with a horse and guide I 
 will proceed to-night. If, as you think, her mother 
 has got wind of the matter, delay is dangerous, and 
 we must act promptly and immediately, ' peaceably if 
 we can, but forcibly if we must/ " 
 
 " Well said, old chum. l Faint heart never won 
 fair lady/ But d my soul if I ever saw a scoundrel 
 who had passed through quite as much blood and 
 thunder as you, come out at your age with such a 
 devilishly innocent and sanctified appearance. I 
 couldn't have believed it. Why, d me, you are 
 just the man for the part. No wonder the wench 
 works well. I'll back you, captain, against the world." 
 
 " That you may, friend Preston," replied Defoe with 
 a laugh, " but ring for the horse and nigger, and I will 
 SxOpe immediately." 
 
 " That's the talk. I think Sandy is waiting, for I 
 hear a noise as if some one was up in the house." 
 
 Julia sunk insensible to the floor, and, as quietly as 
 possible, the priest and Ada removed her to her room. 
 
 Within an hour a party of two on horseback, Defoe, 
 and his guide Sandy, whose acquaintance we have made 
 
The Chattel Child. 65 
 
 in a former chapter, set out by one direction from Lin- 
 denhall. They parted from Mr. Preston at the front 
 door of the hall with a cordial grasp of the hand of 
 Defoe, and a wish for his success. 
 
 Scarcely had the sound of their horses' hoofs ceased 
 to be heard among the rustling leaves of the wood, 
 before another party of two, the priest and Julia, 
 closely mantled, entered a small row-boat that lay in 
 a concealed nook of the river, underneath the dark 
 shadows of a cluster of cypress that stood in a retired 
 part of the ground. 
 
 The overwhelmed and almost insane Ada accompa- 
 nied them to the shore, begged earnestly and even pit- 
 eously to be permitted to accompany them, but was 
 by both as earnestly persuaded to remain. With warm 
 embraces and many tears, and a heartfelt prayer of 
 each that heaven might save the other from every dan- 
 ger and be with them both forever, the sisters sadly 
 parted, and Ada, standing upon the shore, watched 
 and wept till the little skiff was lost in the mist of 
 night, and then returned to the hall and to her couch, 
 but not to repose. 
 
70 Owned and Disowned ; or. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE COUNCIL. 
 
 " IP we should wait till you in solemn council 
 
 With due deliberation had selected 
 
 The smallest out of four-and- twenty evils, 
 
 I' faith we should wait long. 
 
 Dash and through with it that's the better watchword, 
 
 Then after, come what may come." PICCOLOMINI. 
 
 UPON the wings of the wind, or which is much the 
 same, of the imagination, let us away to one of the 
 wharves of New Orleans. Gazing around at the 
 numerous and varied craft which line the levee, our 
 attention is arrested by one whose sailing qualities 
 would strike a sailor, as certainly as her beauty of 
 build would please the least experienced eye, or her 
 particular business puzzle a Custom-house officer. 
 
 A little three-cornered pennant drooping from the 
 mast-head of the cutter announces her as the " Fly- 
 ing Scud." The Scud is a sharp, narrow, schooner- 
 rigged vessel, of hardly sixty tons, with raking inasts 
 and clipper built, resembling our modern yachts in her 
 length of beam and spreav of canvass. Three or four 
 
The Chattel Child. 71 
 
 stout, sinewy sailors, evidently full of nerve and mus- 
 cle, and bronzed under the suns and storms of so many 
 climes that they have lost all nationality of appear- 
 ance, lounge carelessly around the forecastle, or with 
 a sailor's love of liberty, look listlessly over the levee, 
 and down into the town, as if there are those there 
 whose jovial rollicking they contemplate with envy. 
 
 Ever and anon they glance with the same careless, 
 listless hopefulness at the entrance to the cabin, as if 
 expecting its doors to open and with it their release ; 
 but they do not open. 
 
 Behind those doors and within that little cabin, 
 bent earnestly forward until their faces almost meet 
 over the narrow table between them, sit two persons, 
 in whose widely contrasted lineaments and appearance, 
 it seems difficult to discern the affinity which brings 
 them thus even though temporarily together. 
 
 The first is a young man, who may be thirty, or 
 even more, but who, at the first glance, might be 
 readily mistaken for one not older than twenty-two. 
 His high, intellectual forehead, regular and handsome 
 features, and dark, long and flowing hair, falling even 
 to his shoulders, are heightened in their effect by the 
 raven beard which sweeps his breast. His small and 
 delicate hand, with soft tapering fingers, a lady might 
 envy, while his graceful and manly form seems, at first 
 sight, inspired in its erect carriage by a manly mind; 
 
72 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 He smiles. What can be more pleasant or winning 
 than that smile ? No trace of impurity or guile seems 
 to dwell in its open simplicity. What a delicate 
 curling of the lips how placid the brows as a moon- 
 lit lake at evening how soft and pleasant the ex- 
 pression of the eye ! And, too, that frank and open 
 language of the whole countenance, would rob the 
 shrewdest detective of his faintest suspicion. 
 
 But look ! the tenor of his thoughts has changed, 
 and with it, the smooth brows are contracted into a 
 mad frown ; the pleasant lip wreathes a smile of 
 proud scorn, and the dark, handsome eye flashes a 
 scowl of hatred ! and the delicate feminine hand is 
 clenched fiercely above his head, and then brought 
 down upon the table with a force which startles his 
 companion from his revery, and makes every fragile 
 article in the cabin ring under the blow. 
 
 Young man, we need see no more to prove how the 
 thunder cloud and the rainbow lower and smile to- 
 gether in your character. Dark passions now speak 
 from his bold countenance, and the precipitation of 
 an angel from the realms of purity and bliss to the 
 nether depths of misery, never wrought greater contrast 
 than the apparent change by which his smile thus 
 ends in a scowl. 
 
 A wide contrast exists between him and his com- 
 panion. The latter a short, stout, thickset man, 
 
The Chattel Child. 73 
 
 powerfully athletic in appearance, exhibites in his 
 broad, weatherbeaten, ill-favored countenance and pas- 
 sionate eye, little evidence that the kindlier feelings 
 ever reign where the ruder if not the brutal qualities 
 undoubtedly predominate. His short, thick neck 
 gives him a squat appearance, which a slight squint 
 of his left eye either partially caused or concealed, 
 or both, by a habit of closing that eye, and leaning 
 his head over to the right, as if his neck had been 
 designed expressly for the halter, does not by any 
 means relieve. 
 
 Added to this, his face is thickly freckled and over- 
 hung by hair, originally of a red, fiery hue, enough 
 to enrage the heart of a Spanish bull, but which fifty 
 winters have streaked with frightful grizzly locks of 
 white. A low, vulgar cunning, which could scarcely 
 be dignified by the term intellect, glistens in his eye, 
 and his whole appearance is fierce and vulgar. In 
 keeping with this is his dress, which consists of a much 
 soiled red flannel jerkin covering a shirt of the same 
 material, and a pair of closely fitting blue trowsers, 
 bound at the waist -by a belt, from behind which the 
 blade of a bowie-knife appears. A moment's closer 
 observation, however, would reveal to the observer 
 that there is one quality which might form the lead- 
 ing, perhaps the sole chord of affinity between two 
 
74 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 such spirits. An expression of devil-may-care reck- 
 lessness predominates in the faces of both. 
 
 " I tell you, Conrad," said the elder of the two, 
 " to nab the wench at home. It's your only go, and 
 that now. These parts are getting hot as hell, and 
 we must change berths soon. Time's life to us." 
 
 "I see no danger, captain, as long as Preston is 
 true," replied the person addressed as Conrad. 
 
 " D Preston. He's a villain, it's true double 
 
 dyed, but howsomdever I can't trust him. These vil- 
 lains that's not brought up to the trade like us, but 
 kinder take to it nat' rally the devil can't trust. I 
 hate him. Why don't he come out and be one of 
 us ?" 
 
 " He's of more service to us where he is, Lafitte," 
 suggested Conrad. 
 
 "We are of more service to him/' returned the 
 captain, "or at least have been till lately, and now 
 that we are not likely to be of much more, that's just 
 the reason why I am afraid he'll peach." 
 
 " He'll not be likely to let out much after we've 
 got this girl," remarked Conrad. 
 
 " No," replied the pirate, " or we shall let her out," 
 instinctively clutching and drawing partially from the 
 scabbard the bowie knife which hung at his side. 
 " Again, I say," growled the pirate, " the only way 
 to accomplish this piece of crack-brained nonsense of 
 
The Chattel Child. 75 
 
 yours is to start at dusk to-night, with a picked crew, 
 for Preston's. You will reach there and lynch the girl 
 by twelve, and. sunrise will see us with your lady in 
 the cabin of the swiftest sail in port, with thirty guns 
 and fifty men to guard her, and ourselves ten miles 
 below New Orleans/' 
 
 " Good !" said the youth, enthusiastically. " Win 
 her first, and court her afterwards at leisure that's 
 according to the tactics of our craft." 
 
 " Bravo ! what could be better ? Go there, place 
 yourself a whole month in the power of Preston and 
 all for what ? to get a girl's consent when you could 
 just as well have her without. Catch me or you in 
 that trap not while my name's Lafitte. D me !" 
 
 " But, then/' mused Conrad, more to himself than 
 to his listener, " I have heard much of this lady, and 
 I have a sort of presentiment that I shall love her, not 
 as a pirate, but as a husband, and that she will some- 
 how or other be a sort of star in my pathway a sort 
 of destiny to lead me on." 
 
 " Humph !" said Lafitte " depends altogether on 
 how you train her. I've known the puniest, shilly- 
 shalliest women, when they've took a fancy to a man 
 like us. after being deceived and a little abused, so as 
 to find out what we are at last, throw away their 
 prayer-books, and go into life with us with ten times 
 more of the devil in them than the best of us. Wo- 
 
76 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 men are strange things. The Lord knows that, as 
 they are brought up ashore, tender as birdlings, and 
 feeble as flo wers, and silly as lambs, they are not made 
 for the likes of us. But somehow or other there isn't 
 the man, that is half a man, that can't get the love 
 of any woman of his rank in life, if he works for it ; 
 and when that's done, no matter how they deal with 
 others, they all act alike to the man they love. Wo- 
 men are either angels or devils. The devils are best 
 for our mode of life. Train her into a devil, boy ; it 
 won't take long, if she's a girl of spirit." 
 
 "But is there no danger that we shall needlessly 
 offend Preston, by thus throwing aside his offer, and 
 taking the matter into our own hands ? Though not 
 worth much as a friend, he would be powerful as a 
 foe. Besides, after all, she is his daughter, and as 
 such he has always regarded her ; and his feelings as 
 a father might prompt him to something rash, if 
 wounded." 
 
 " Ha ! ha! Preston's feelings as a father! ha! 
 ha !" laughed the pirate, with a bitter, ironical sneer, 
 as if there was something in the falsehood which the 
 words expressed which even he could look down upon 
 and despise. " I warrant you against all harm from 
 - that quarter. I never knew a slaver yet that wouldn't 
 sell every child that the law gave him a right to. He 
 has sold her already, and I warrant you aga,inst all 
 
The Chattel Child. 77 
 
 conscientious scruples on his part as to the manner of 
 
 her delivery." 
 
 % % # & # #- # 
 
 As the dusky shades of twilight fell upon the city, 
 and the dull lamps came, one by one, glimmering forth 
 in its streets, a yawl, manned by six stout mariners, 
 launched from the stern of the " Scud," and came 
 around to her side. Here and there beneath their 
 clothing one might have detected the outline of a 
 pistol or the handle of a bowie. They were armed to 
 the teeth, and evidently bound upon such a mission 
 as the covert of the stealthy moon, rather than the 
 open light of day would most favor. Arrived at the 
 vessel's side, Lafitte, leaving the young and ardent 
 Conrad, with whom he had been conversing, stepped 
 down into the yawl, and in another moment they were 
 out into the stream and pulling steadily up its current. 
 
78 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE BROTHERS. 
 
 " His heart was formed for softness warped to wrong, 
 Betrayed too early and beguiled too long, 
 Each feeling pure as falls the dripping dew 
 Within the grot, like that had hardened too ; 
 Less clear perchance, its earthly trial passed, 
 But sunk and chilled and petrified at last." BYRON . 
 
 THE half-moon, which now and then stole fitfully 
 forth from its covert among the clouds of the zenith 
 at the departure of Lafitte and his confederates, had 
 now nearly sunk behind the thicker night clouds of the 
 west. The city was shrouded in silence, except where, 
 in some low saloon or place of carousal and debauch, 
 the drunken ditty and obscene jest brought forth peals 
 of sad laughter to mock the holy influence of the night's 
 stillness. The quays and resorts of business were de- 
 serted, and naught moved along the forests of masts 
 which lined the levee except the soft measured plash- 
 ing of the rippling waves, as they struck the sides of 
 the vessels. But still Conrad lingered upon the deck 
 of the " Scud," now leaning over the vessel's side and 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 79 
 
 looking down into the water, as if striving to read in 
 its smooth surface the unknown story of the future 
 now gazing up among the flying, fitful clouds, and now 
 sitting long and thoughtfully upon a low stool, with 
 his arm dangling over the gunwale of the cutter. His 
 air of deep abstraction was such as we have seen some 
 young men wear, when it seemed as though they had 
 arrived at a turning point, a fork in the roads of life, 
 and were in doubt for a long and painful period which 
 to pursue. Perhaps it might have been so with him, 
 perhaps not, but whatever may have been the occasion 
 or theme of his meditations, the silent passage of mid- 
 night did not interrupt the tenor of his revery. The 
 doors of the cabin opened, and a dark-eyed and beau- 
 tiful girl, of hardly more than twenty years, stole 
 softly to his side and laid her hand a moment upon his 
 shoulder. But the hand was scarcely noticed, and its 
 owner, as if taking this for an intimation that her 
 presence was at that moment unwelcome, as silently 
 retired. Probably his revery might have continued 
 until the city bells, now tolling the requiem of the 
 dying day, chimed in merry welcome of the rising sun, 
 had it not been gently broken by the low, servile in- 
 quiry coming from a dark skin and bowing form, whose 
 voice is familiar to us 
 
 " Am dis Massa Conrad ?" 
 
 The skipper turned to the quay, and in a moment 
 
80 Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 recognizing the voice and form together, exclaimed 
 " Why, Sandy, what the devil brings you here ! 
 Any word from your master ?" 
 
 " Not 'zackly," said Sandy, revealing two long rows 
 of nature's dentistry with an apparent delight, which 
 in a person of any other race it would have been diffi- 
 cult to account for, but which, in a negro, is merely 
 the natural consequence of having been spoken to by 
 a white man. 
 
 "Well, what's up?" 
 
 " I dunno, massa," said the negro, still grinning and 
 working his body into an amiable squirm, as if trying 
 to think what he came for. 
 
 " Well, what do you want ?" 
 
 "Dunno, massa," replied Sandy, in whose coun- 
 tenance the distortions were by this time growing 
 frightful. 
 
 " Well, what the devil are you here for ?" 
 
 " Dunno, massa/' reiterated the negro after a slight 
 pause, from whom every vestige of his mission seemed 
 entirely to have disappeared. 
 
 " Who sent you, you blackskin ?" said the skippei 
 angrily. 
 
 ' I wish I knew, massa but I dunno, Sandy so fus- 
 ticated ; heah ! He dunno nuffin, nor that either. 
 He allers did know that ar much till he cum here. I 
 beg pardon, massa, I go back and ax him," said the 
 
The Chattel Child. 81 
 
 slave, his eyes brightening at this happy method of 
 extricating himself from his quandary. 
 
 Conrad eyed the poor fellow for a moment, as if 
 doubtful whether to laugh at the ridiculous absurdity 
 of his position, or, after the most approved custom, to 
 break his skull for him. 
 
 " Did he send you a letter or anything forme ?" he 
 demanded at length. 
 
 " Ho ! be sure he did, massa ;" said Sandy sud- 
 denly, at the same time diving energetically into one 
 after another of the recesses of his wardrobe, and finally 
 producing, to his infinite gratification, the billet whose 
 delivery constituted the object of his mission " be 
 sure ; why how forgitful nigger's is ain't dey, Massa 
 Conrad ? I'm so glad I thought of it at last, he ! he !" 
 and Alexander grinned with as much complacency, and 
 far more genuine enjoyment, than that with which his 
 great namesake swayed the sceptre over a world sub- 
 dued. 
 
 The skipper took the letter, and directing Sandy to 
 wait, retired a moment into the cabin. An exhaus- 
 ted wick was burning in the socket upon the table, 
 and by that he first rapidly, then measuredly and half 
 in mystery perused the letter. In a moment he re- 
 turned to the deck, and first examining carefully a 
 brace of richly wrought and engraved pistols, and hav- 
 ing satisfied himself that they were properly loaded 
 
 4* 
 
82 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 and primed, and giving a rap on the scuttle which 
 brought up two drowsy tars to watch on deck, he 
 directed the slave carelessly to lead the way. 
 
 They stepped upon the levee together, and went 
 down through the muddy, dingy, glimmering streets 
 of the city. After a short walk, Sandy stopped before 
 a medium looking frame house, over the low door of 
 which was displayed the sign " Hotel d' Espagnol," 
 into which they entered, and, passing through the bar- 
 room, the skipper, with an air half jaunty, half watch- 
 ful, suffered himself to be led into a small, retired 
 room, in the middle of which was a single table, with 
 two chairs by it, in the opposite one of which a person 
 was sitting. 
 
 As the waiter retired, and the door closed upon them, 
 the two persons gazed at each other for a moment, and 
 then the last comer, with a calm, indifferent air, took 
 the vacant seat, and looked across it at his companion 
 in silence. No word or sign of greeting passed between 
 them. 
 
 Their features were strangely alike. Scarcely could 
 a resemblance have been more marked and perfect. It 
 was almost a reflection. Save that a few scarcely per- 
 ceptible wrinkles gathered around the eye of the last 
 comer, and here and there a thread of gray strayed ' 
 from his crown in disagreeable contrast with the re- 
 mainder of his jet black locks, and perhaps, as we now 
 
The Chattel Child. S3 
 
 see him, save also the gathering scowl of ill passions 
 which seem to speak forth from his once over handsome 
 face like the lightning flash from the thunder cloud, 
 and which contrast forcibly with the calm, earnest, and 
 thoughtful expression of the other's countenance, over 
 which, perhaps, a few less winters may have passed, 
 and a few less vicissitudes with these exceptions, the 
 likeness seems, as we have said, more like a reflection 
 than a resemblance. The skipper was the first to 
 break the silence. 
 
 " My brother, I suppose," he said calmly, his voice 
 firm, and not abating in its sternness. 
 
 " Yes," spoke the other. 
 
 A pause succeeded, in which the eye of the elder 
 person wandered occasionally, and restlessly, from the 
 other to various objects around, none of which, how- 
 ever, he seemed to see, while the other looked at him 
 with a steady and serious eye, unaverted. 
 
 " She is she living ?" resumed Conrad at length, 
 though at this question his voice trembled, and he 
 feigned to brush his handsome hair back from his fore- 
 head and temples, that he might, unobserved, wipe a, 
 tear from his eye. 
 
 " Our mother is dead long ago. She died in my 
 childhood," replied the other, whom the reader has 
 already recognized as Walter Defoe. 
 
84 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 Conrad breathed a sigh, as if relieved, and con- 
 tinued 
 
 " She never knew of my life after I left home ?" 
 
 "I think," said Walter, "I think, my brother, 
 that she knows of it now has always looked down 
 upon you, and watched over your every step. Bro- 
 ther, have you never heard her whisper, or felt her 
 presence ?" 
 
 Conrad bit his lip in anger, and for a moment a 
 pallor overspread his countenance ; but it instantly 
 vanished, and was replaced by a cool smile of skeptical 
 assumption and self-complacency. 
 
 " No, Walter/' he said calmly, " I have neither 
 seen nor heard her. If I had, I might have been a 
 different man. And such has been my life, that this 
 very fact proves to me that she neither hears nor sees 
 aught of me, for if there is such a thing as a spirit I 
 know she would have appeared and spoken to me. 1 
 wish these religious vagaries were true. But I have 
 studied them to the bottom ; they are false. Keli- 
 gion is a farce piety a, delusion heaven a scheme 
 hell a scarecrow and God an invention of the human 
 imagination. Thank God if I may say so, when I 
 believe in no such thing as a God I have one com- 
 fort which sustains me in my mode of life, and leaves 
 me free to enjoy myself ! I am an infidel- My God 
 is myself ; my heaven and my hell are here ; and the 
 
The Chattel Child. 85 
 
 
 
 grave is a finality. Take away these truths, and I 
 am a wretch." 
 
 "And with them, you are a -pirate!" pursued 
 Walter, calmly. 
 
 He had well nigh suffered for his temerity ; for 
 scarcely had the last word fallen from his lips, ere 
 Conrad, with a bound, stood over him, with his fin- 
 gers clutched in a choking grasp upon his neck-band, 
 and Walter saw the point of the bowie knife glisten- 
 ing at his breast. His face livid with rage, and his 
 eyes glaring like a demon's, the pirate stood a mo- 
 ment thus, glanced hesitatingly around, and then, 
 as if controlled by a second thought, quietly releasing 
 his hold, resumed his seat, saying, in the same calm 
 voice, as if nothing had occurred 
 
 " How do you know that ?" 
 
 " From Mr. Butler Preston ?" 
 
 " Preston !" 
 
 " The same. And my business with him has brought 
 me to you. I will tell you all, for I desire your con- 
 cert and action, or at least your forbearance, in a mat- 
 ter upon which my life and happiness depend. I met 
 his daughter, Miss Preston " 
 
 " Which one ?" 
 
 " Miss Julia Preston ; first at the couch of our sicK 
 mother, whom she used often to visit, with a kind- 
 
86 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 
 
 ness worthy of an angel, and afterwards at a northern 
 boarding-school." 
 
 " Yes, you loved her. Well !" 
 
 " From what I saw of her there, I was induced to 
 hope that our acquaintance might ripen into intimacy, 
 and for that purpose I left college, after a few months, 
 as she had unfortunately returned to her home, and 
 came on to New Orleans." 
 
 " Well you saw her ?" 
 
 "After some search, I at last found her where- 
 abouts ; and on arriving at the residence of her father, 
 a few miles from here, great was my surprise to find 
 myself welcomed to the hospitality of his house and 
 the society of his daughters, as an old acquaintance 
 of his, though I had never seen or heard of him prior 
 to my arrival at New Orleans." 
 
 The d 1 it was !" 
 
 " Still greater was my surprise when I learned that 
 this welcome arose from the supposition by Mr. Pres- 
 ton that I was yourself, whom I supposed to be dead, 
 but whom he seems to have well known some twelve 
 or fifteen years ago." 
 
 " And so you played the part of Conrad Defoe with 
 the old fool !" 
 
 " The part was in a manner thrust upon me ; and 
 ascertaining that it would answer my laudable pur- 
 pose for the time, and moreover, that it was somehow 
 
T/ie Chattel Child. 87 
 
 involved with facts which it was important for rne, as 
 an honorable suitor for the lady's hand, to know, I 
 did continue to wear the assumed character." 
 
 " You won her love ?" snarled Conrad, impatiently. 
 
 " I believe so." 
 
 " You believe so ! Yes ; so do I. What then 
 brings you to me ?" 
 
 " The fact that this young lady though pure and 
 lofty as the stars of heaven ; a high-souled Christian ; 
 an accomplished and lovely woman, gifted with all 
 that could unite to make woman attractive is not a 
 free agent, but a chattel, entitled by law only to yield 
 to the will of creatures as far beneath her as earth is 
 beneath heaven. The fact that she has been sold, 
 and is soon to be delivered, body and soul, to you, to 
 be at best a soulless plaything in your hands, or 
 who knows but ultimately a shameless outcast among 
 outlaws ? Will you bring this doom upon one whom 
 you have but casually seen, and whom you can neither 
 love nor hate ? Oh, spare her ! Spare for the sake 
 of the dear and virtuous mother who kissed you in 
 your infancy ! Spare, oh, spare her," cried Walter, 
 kneeling before his brother, who hid his bowed face 
 in his hands, and taking his brother's hand in his 
 " for the sake of the chaste maiden you once loved, 
 and whom God removed from your very arms for the 
 company n hoaveu j Spare her for the sake of the 
 
88 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 t innocence of your own infancy, to which, would to God 
 you might return ! Spare her, my brother, for the 
 sake of him who still loves you with a brother's love, 
 and who now and always yearns for you to leave your 
 wandering life of evil and of misery, and come and find 
 a home with him ! Spare her for the sake of her own 
 pure soul, which living, will pray for and bless you, 
 and having arisen to heaven, will intercede before the 
 throne of that God who does exist, for your forgive- 
 ness ! For your brother's sake ; for your mother's 
 sake ; for heaven's sake, and for the lovely Julia's 
 sake, spare her from such a fearful and horrible doom ! 
 Why if you will not, but will insist upon carrying out 
 this nefarious and diabolical scheme, you cannot make 
 her outlive wrongs at which devils would hide their 
 faces and weep. The very earth shall yawn beneath, 
 and a dagger, wafted up by the pity of the bottomless 
 pit, shall be placed in her hand. When you have won 
 her, you will have won a corpse. brother ! the 
 heart of your mother is speaking in those tears. Will 
 you not spare her ? Speak I know you have done 
 so already in your heart. Let not an opportunity of 
 redeeming the worst act of your lifetime elude your 
 grasp. It is before you now. Seize it !" 
 
 " I do !" said Conrad, weeping audibly. 
 
 " She is yours forever." 
 
 " Heaven bless you/' replied Walter. 
 
The Chattel Child. 89 
 
 " But hold," said Conrad. " Determining not to 
 trust to the precise terms which Preston offered me, I 
 have this night sent a detachment of men to seize her, 
 and she is ere this in their custody/' 
 
 " Holy heaven, forbid it I" Walter ejaculated. 
 
 " It is too late now to forbid or to prevent it. Be- 
 fore daylight they will have conveyed her apast the 
 city down to the bend, where she will, unless prevent- 
 ed, be embarked upon the c Scud/ and a few days will 
 land her at Barrataria." 
 
 u How can this be prevented ?" groaned Walter. 
 
 " In this way. You, with a dozen picked men from 
 the Scud, and I with another crew, will watch the 
 river and stop Lafitte with the yawl as they pass. 
 Miss Preston shall be rescued, and the next packet for 
 New-York shall convey you safely to your homes." 
 
 They rose, and leaving the Hotel d'Espagnol, in a 
 few minutes Walter found himself in the stern of a 
 small open boat upon the opposite side of the river, 
 and temporarily in command of as rough looking a 
 crew of cut-throats as ever boarded an East Indiaman 
 or made an unfortunate prisoner walk the death plank. 
 
90 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE^BITER BIT. 
 
 " I will discover such a horrid treason, 
 
 As, when you hear 't, and understand how long 
 
 You've been abused will run you mad with fury." 
 
 BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 
 
 GREAT was the surprise of Mr. Preston, when, on 
 returning from his ride over the plantation on the 
 morning following the departure of Defoe and Sandy, 
 he learned that Julia also was missing, and, after a 
 thorough search, could not be found. We cannot say 
 that he was grieved, though he may naturally have 
 recoiled from a contemplation of the effect which a 
 discovery of his schemes, when made hy Julia, must 
 have had upon the pure heart of one who had been to 
 him so fond and apparently loving a child. But it 
 placed him in a quandary of doubt, in which the more 
 he endeavored to see his way clearly, the denser grew 
 the fog. 
 
 Two suppositions only occurred to him. One wag 
 that Julia had in some way discovered his intentions 
 and fled to avoid their fulfillment. But in what way ? 
 Defoe himself could not certainly have informed her. 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 91 
 
 It would but frustrate a scheme which that person had 
 as much at heart as himself. But no other person 
 had access to her who was at all acquainted with it. 
 At first it occurred to him that Ada might possess 
 some clue to the mystery. But her frantic grief and 
 distracted manner ever since Julia's flight was known 
 to the household, made it painful for him to address 
 her, and moreover convinced him that she could not be 
 a party to it, and besides he had not sufficient confi- 
 dence in her strength of mind to believe that she could 
 act a dissembled part or retain so long anything which 
 was really a secret. 
 
 This supposition vanished from his mind, therefore, 
 almost as readily as it had occurred. The only one 
 remaining was, that of Defoe had foreclosed the agree- 
 ment between them in a summary manner, by induc- 
 ing Julia to fly with him. Defoe's arch subtlety he 
 had never doubted, and during his late stay at Linden- 
 hall, it had sometimes been exerted so skillfully that 
 Preston himself often felt half deceived by it, and 
 could scarcely believe his guest was the veritable Con- 
 rad Defoe of his youthful days, and whose name car- 
 ried terror through the Gulf, second only to that of 
 Lafitte. 
 
 People who are controlled by but one strong motive, 
 easily transfer that motive upon others in passing 
 judgment upon their acts. Preston could conceive of 
 
92 Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 no other motive than cupidity, which would have in- 
 fluenced him to act in like manner under the same 
 circumstances, and it is not strange that he who was 
 so treacherous to others, easily came to the conclusion 
 that he was the pitiable victim of a scheme by -which 
 he had been swindled out of his child, or what was in 
 his eyes more valuable, his chattel ; and, as he now 
 began to think, his dearest and warmest feelings had 
 been grossly outraged and wounded by a renegade, 
 who would leave him to whistle for the heavy sum 
 which he had sacrificed so much to ensure, and which 
 was necessary to preserve his standing in society, not 
 only as a man of family and wealth, but as a man of 
 honor. Not long did he calmly revolve this theory in 
 his mind. Stung to the quick at the bare apprehen- 
 sion of such an injury, he instantly set about the 
 means to defeat it, or if that was impossible, to avenge 
 it. The latter task he thought could be managed in 
 a way as harmless to himself as it would be certain in 
 its results. In a moment he too had mounted the 
 best horse upon the plantation, and leaving the latter 
 in the care of a venerable old negro, he without guide 
 or companion set out at a rapid pace for the city. As 
 he rode through the quarters, not an eye met his of the 
 many ignorant, degraded, almost heathen Africans svho 
 performed the labor of his plantation, but was dimmed 
 with tdars which would not dry, at the loss of their 
 
The Chattel Child. 93 
 
 angel mistress. Poor creatures ! Brutal and selfish, 
 and half savage as they were, it is doubtful whether 
 there was one among them who would not cheerfully 
 have given up his own life to have saved from injury 
 one whom all loved so much. The faith of the pious 
 was shaken at the thought that harm could follow so 
 good and pure a creature. 
 
 " Deah me !" said old aunt Tanzey, as she shaded 
 her eyes with her hand, and from the door of her rude 
 cabin-Df logs and mud watched the receding form of 
 the proud planter " deah me ! if harm do come to 
 angel like Miss July, who will de Lord help ?" 
 
 " Nebba feah nebba feah," said her good old man 
 uncle Tim, holding up his hands devoutly " De Lord 
 will take care ob missus. He got her now in de holler 
 ob he hand, or old Tim no prophet. Mind when you 
 heah from her, you heah dat dis day dis how she 
 safe tank de Lord. Else dares no vartue in ole Tim. 
 Didn't ole Tim look ober his right shoulder at de new 
 moon last night, and did you eber know anyting bad 
 to happen arter he'd done that? All's well. Mind old 
 Tim. Mind him/' 
 
 Ah ! how upon the book of the recording angel 
 compared the simple, honest feelings of those poor 
 chattels, with the talented and accomplished villainy 
 of their lordly proprietor ; contrasting the sphere given 
 them and the manner in which they had filled it, theirs 
 
94 Owned and Disowned; or,- 
 
 would have been like an inscription in gold upon a 
 ground of black ; his like stains of black upon a 
 ground of gold. 
 
 The sun was approaching the horizon when he ar- 
 rived in the city. A short ride brought him upon its 
 principal street, upon which were the offices of the 
 Governor and Mayor of the city. The latter and then 
 the former he entered, where his appearance or mission 
 seemed to create an unusual stir. In less than half 
 an hour a strong, fully equipped and armed body of 
 some two hundred men rapidly passed under a quiet 
 review, at the rooms of a hotel near the City Hall. 
 There they remained until past twelve o'clock at night, 
 when, at a signal, they issued forth in citizens' dress, 
 and in small, irregular squads, and proceeding to the 
 levee, in a short time swarmed out upon the river. 
 
The Chattel Cliild. 95 
 
 CHAPTEK IX. 
 
 EVIL COMPANY. 
 
 " Friend to the sea, and foeman sworn 
 To all that on her waves are borne." ROKEBY. 
 
 IN a recent chapter we left young Walter Defoe in 
 the midst of his novel associates, from whom, as he 
 looked around upon them more deliberately, his first 
 instinctive wish was to extricate himself, but a second 
 thought told him they were the necessary means to 
 accomplish a great purpose, upon which his life's hap- 
 piness, and the life and honor of one dearer to him 
 than life depended, and he submitted to his embarrassed 
 position. From the singularity of his immediate posi- 
 tion, his mind reverted to the chain of novel vicissi- 
 tudes which seemed to have attended his whole adven- 
 ture of love, and which, a short time before, would 
 have seemed to him like the dream of a romancer, 
 rather than a succession of actual events. 
 
 But the vicissitudes through which he had passed 
 were not more strange than the issue now before him 
 was exciting and important. The " Scud" had already 
 
96 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 dropped down the river, and rumors afloat through 
 the town of a strong and well organized plot for the 
 capture of some suspected vessel now in harbor, made 
 their stay every moment more dangerous, and the facts 
 that the Scud would never return to New Orleans, 
 when her captain and crew were once more safe upon 
 her decks, and consequently that Julia, if their expe- 
 dition had been successful, would be borne away never 
 to return, were to the mind of Walter both morally 
 certain. 
 
 " Can it be," said he, " that within these few mo- 
 ments, upon this quiet river, and depending upon the 
 fitful coming and going of these obscuring mists, 
 through which I can scarcely see the lights on the levee, 
 this greatest question of my life, and the great crisis 
 of hers, hangs like a world upon nothing ? Is there 
 no providence to overrule and govern these things ? 
 Do issues so great as the life's happiness of one human 
 soul, and the eternal welfare of another, depend upon 
 causes so shadowy as the coming and going of these 
 thin night mists ?" Amidst thoughts like these the 
 awaiting lover had unconsciously fallen into a revery, 
 and did not notice that one after another until three 
 boats had almost simultaneously appeared in the river, 
 either of which might have been, for aught he or the 
 drowsy tars, at the oars observed, the one for which 
 they were in wait and watching. Just at this moment, 
 
 v 
 
The Chattel Child. 97 
 
 not from either of those boats, but apparently from 
 some one which had been skirting close under the 
 shadow of the levee, came the loud, shrill shriek of a 
 female" help I" 
 
 But once the shriek was uttered, but that once was 
 enough ; and the fact that it came not again added to 
 its terrible power. He thought he recognized it as the 
 voice of Miss Preston. 
 
 " Spring to it, lads/' cried Walter, and in another 
 moment, under the quick, powerful strokes of their 
 oars, they were bounding in the direction from which 
 the shriek was heard. Now it is in sight, and Walter 
 discerns in the rear the form of a short, thick-set and 
 powerful man, to whom his conceptions easily gave the 
 name of Lafitte. He held in his arms a burden, at the 
 sight of which Walter trembled in every nerve, and 
 over which another outlaw, equally powerful, sus- 
 pended a drawn and glistening sabre. 
 
 " Thank God," thought Walter, " it will soon be 
 over, and Julia will be saved." The boats had nearly 
 touched. The oarsmen were about to rest upon their 
 oars, when those in each simultaneously discovered, by 
 the light of morning which was now dawning, in their 
 stern and upon either side of them, and rapidly making 
 for their front, though at some distance, a swarm of 
 boats, swiftly rowed and heavily manned, while the 
 loud report of a volley of rifles, and the noise of their 
 
98 Owned and Disowned] or, 
 
 balls as they went swiftly by, left the pirate bands no 
 longer unconscious of their danger. In a moment a 
 return of their fire found its victims in every pursuing 
 boat, and now, amidst the groans of the wounded and 
 the shouts of the enraged pursuers, commenced a fierce 
 and doubtful contest of death and speed. The pirate 
 boats had by some thirty strokes the start, and every 
 conceivable motive to exertion, giving additional 
 power to their sinewy arms, their boats shot through 
 the water with steady and almost superhuman speed. 
 The piers of the city danced rapidly behind them, and 
 they were upon the open river amidst the open country. 
 Bend after bend was skillfully rounded by both, yet the 
 contest remained equal. Stroke after stroke, minute 
 after minute, left them still the same. The contest 
 hung doubtfully as by a thread, for the pursuers were 
 in discharge of a great duty. The enemy of mankind, 
 and the terror of their commerce, sat in yonder boat, 
 now hastening to the successful completion of one of 
 his darkest tragedies. Upon each pull of the oar de- 
 pended the security of the seas, and the lives of help- 
 less widows and orphans. Almost overcome with ter- 
 ror and grief at his false and anomalous position, as 
 well as at the utter apparent failure of all his hopes, 
 oh ! how Walter now wished himself at the head of 
 that pursuing force, cheering them on and but here 
 a ball from the pursuing party shattered his arm, and 
 
The Chattel Child. 99 
 
 seemed to enter his very heart. A whirling sensation 
 that he was wounded, a feeling that he was dying 
 came over him. He sunk in the stern of the boat, and 
 as he placed his hand to his side it slipped in the 
 oozing gore. His vision and his consciousness grew 
 dim together. He thought he was lifted over the side 
 of the boat, and that he sunk slowly and peacefully 
 under the water. A confusion of wild, strange, fan- 
 tastic thoughts filled his brain, among which none 
 were distinct save the image of his mother and of 
 Julia, whose name he murmured last as the waters 
 closed over him, and he remembered no more. 
 
100 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MIDNIGHT MADE DARKER. 
 
 " She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur, 
 1 They'll have fleet steeds that follow !' quoth young Lochinvar." 
 
 MARMIOIT. 
 
 WHEN the last ripple of the waves, upon which 
 floated away from her vision the fugitive Julia and the 
 good father, had disappeared, the weeping Ada re- 
 mained for a long time overwhelmed with grief, and 
 riveted to the spot. Up to this time, Julia had been 
 both a sister and a mother to her ; for, though but a 
 year her senior, Julia's naturally powerful mind, warm 
 heart, and superior accomplishments, had fitted her 
 for the bright star of whatever society should feel the 
 magic influence of her presence ; but especially had 
 she won from Ada that affectionate, up-looking, half- 
 worshiping confidence with which the good, but weak, 
 ?ver follow the good and strong. As from an inexhaust- 
 ible, ever-welling fountain, she had, from her infancy, 
 drawn from Julia's lips rich draughts of instruction, 
 of practical philosophy, and of liberal, generous 
 thoughts. Her mind had seemed to the less brilliant 
 
The Chattel Child. 10: 
 
 Ada a curious magazine of all that was useful and 
 pleasing, and her heart of all that was lovely and pure. 
 Indeed, whenever the amiable Ada, in prayer or in 
 moments of silent communion and thought, or at any 
 other time, had felt as if she ought to thank God for 
 something, her heart irresistibly responded to the call 
 for gratitude when she thought of the sweet sister 
 which heaven had given jher. To think how different 
 might have been her lot nay, her whole mind, and 
 heart, and self, but for the influence of Julia ; how 
 lonely would have been the hours of her infancy, and 
 how ill-informed and wayward she would have grown 
 up ! For Ada was a pliable and gentle, though 
 affectionate thing, and felt that she was one of those 
 who are fashioned in the mould of circumstances. 
 
 From the dawn of her infancy ; through all the 
 sports of childhood ; in her girlhood's studies, and 
 during the tedious hours of boarding-school life, not 
 less than amidst the lordly and aristocratic solitude 
 of Lindenhall, Julia had been with her. In the morn- 
 ing walk at their toilet in their forenoon ride, or 
 by the piano over the novel or the poem floating 
 in a tiny skiff among the winding, shady inlets of the 
 river, or culling flowers by its banks sleeping or 
 waking laughing or weeping Julia's fond embrace 
 had enclosed her until now ; and in that embrace her 
 life had passed like a dream of sunshine. 
 
102 -. Owned- and Disowned ; or, 
 
 And now by power, as of a hideous, formless, shape- 
 less monster, which she. could scarcely comprehend 
 in its character, farther than to feel that it was terri- 
 bly evil, Julia had been torn from her, and for the first 
 time in all her life she felt a miserable, a horrid sense 
 of loneliness a feeling as if she hung suspended and 
 alone in a dark void, with nothing to lean upon 
 nothing to love came over her, and her soul turned 
 from the world and the future, and from life in upon 
 herself, and she longed to die. 
 
 u Oh/' thought she, " that I could have lived just 
 such a life as I have lived until this morning, and then 
 have died ! But now all is dark," she cried " dark, 
 dark. Poor sister Julia ! poor me I" 
 
 But after a time better thoughts prevailed, and she 
 kneeled down upon the dewy verdure, there where the 
 sigh of the old and young pines seemed to mingle with 
 her voice, and the willow waved its long, weeping ten- 
 drils in sympathy, and the dark cypress wore its deep- 
 est shade of mourning, and prayed. The evil before 
 her was so mysterious, so overwhelming the remedy 
 for it so indefinite, and the blight of a great misfortune 
 seemed so inevitable, that she could only pray that 
 God would look in pity upon her loved sister, and 
 shield her from all evil and from every foe. 
 
 "When she rose to return to the old home of her in- 
 fancy, the night was draped in that dense fold of dark- 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 103 
 
 ness which precedes the dawn. How changed were 
 her feelings towards the venerable old mansion, hith- 
 erto so pleasant, but which she now trembled to enter 
 and almost a revulsion came over her as she noise- 
 lessly lifted the latch, and crossed the threshold. But 
 a second thought assured her that whatever its inmates 
 might be, the old house was as sinless and good as 
 ever, and so she glided up silently to her room, and 
 threw herself exhausted and weeping upon her bed. 
 
 No refreshing slumber visited her eyes. Her mind, 
 with feverish activity, was following her sister and the 
 holy father upon their toilsome night journey. The 
 conduct of her father came up before her with a clear- 
 ness and vividness with which she had never before 
 
 \ 
 
 seen it. The winning exterior and the innocent man- 
 ner of Defoe, whom she had, until a few hours since, 
 thought to be the only person in the wide world quite 
 worthy of the love of Julia, presented themselves to her 
 in vivid contrast with his, as she now thought, fully 
 proved baseness ; and she longed, for once, for the power 
 of a knght-errant of olden time, that she might go forth 
 and rid the world of such monsters of wickedness. And 
 then she thought of Julia a slave and a fugitive a 
 thing she had been accustomed to hear of as being 
 hunted into swamps, and jungles, and morasses, amid 
 crocodiles and wild beasts, until neither men nor dogs 
 could follow them farther, and there left to linger out 
 
104 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 a few years in a wild, laborious, lonely life, living 
 friendly companionship with starvation and serpents, 
 and fearing only dogs and men. True, she knew that 
 no such a fate was in reserve for her sister. If the/rcer 
 feelings of humanity would not save her from such a 
 doom, there were others, unfortunately, that would 
 reserve her for a worse. She thought of her sister, 
 pure, elevated, and refined, cast upon the will of others, 
 without friends, without protection, without home, 
 without money, without even the ownership of her own 
 person or the legal right to remain pure, and compelled 
 perchance to associate with the vile and dissolute, too 
 abandoned to stand in awe of that superiority which 
 they could not but see, or to befriend the helpless or- 
 phan whom destiny had given them the chance to spit 
 and trample upon. 
 
 She thought of all these things as she tossed rest- 
 lessly upon her couch, until the slow steps of morning 
 came, and one by one the stars disappeared, and the 
 darkness grew slowly gray ; and at last streaks of light 
 tinged the long straight clouds, till they became lurid, 
 and then the sun fairly arose, and the morning ad- 
 vanced, and it was after the usual hour to rise. Still 
 her hands clasped her sleepless lids, and her brain was 
 racked with torture. 
 
 By-and-bye the faithful old house servant came to 
 the door and knocked, and said 
 
The Chattel Child. 105 
 
 % 
 
 " Miss Julia Miss Ada !" 
 
 " Come in, Betsey," said Ada. 
 
 Betsey came in, and folding her hands, exclaimed 
 
 " Why, bless us, wot de matta, Miss Ada ? De 
 Lor 7 bless us ! whar Miss July war Miss July ?" 
 
 " She has gone," said Ada, weeping again bitterly. 
 " She has gone away entirely, and we shall never see 
 her again. Don't ask me where ; I don't know where. 
 She is lost and dead and buried and worse." 
 
 The old wench, as she left the room, burst out in 
 loud sobs of 
 
 " Poor missus ! De Lord help her, poor missus ; 
 and save her, poor missus ; and bless her, poor poor 
 poor " 
 
 By this time she had reached the kitchen, and soon 
 there was not a dry eye in Lindenhall. All were weep- 
 ing for " poor missus." How remarkable ! chattels 
 weeping in sympathy for chattels. 
 
 Late in the morning, her father returned from his 
 usual ride over the plantation, but Ada did not seek 
 him ; she could not. She had always been afraid of 
 him had never had the hardihood to give him her 
 confidence ; and now she could not help feeling that 
 she could regard him no longer as a father. She saw, 
 however, the utter absence of parental grief, with which 
 he heard the news of Julia's disappearance. It seemed 
 
 to involve him in doubt, and he thought, but not in 
 5* 
 
106 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 sorrow. She heard him in the library, walking mea- 
 euredly and steadily up and down, as was his wont 
 when devising new plans for the improvement of his 
 plantation. This lasted during the forenoon, and at 
 noon he suddenly mounted his horse and rode rapidly 
 away, and Ada was left the sole white person within 
 a circuit of many miles. Yet the hearts of those 
 around her, though beating beneath tawny skins, beat 
 faithfully and truly, and there was not one of them in 
 whose custody she would not have felt secure. 
 
 Hour after hour, minute after minute of the remain- 
 der of the livelong day, passed wearily and tediously 
 away. Never did a week seem so long to her as that 
 day. It seemed as if the sun never would reach the 
 horizon. Anon, the sorrowful Ada would rise from 
 her couch, and go down into the parlor. But the 
 piano and the guitar were silent ; the bird was mute ; 
 tears were in the eyes of all she met, and every famil- 
 iar object served only to recall to her mind her lost 
 sister. Neither refreshment nor occupation could she 
 avail herself of. Her mind could not fix upon the 
 one, and her palate sickened at the other. At last, 
 however, evening came, and Ada, yielding to the ad- 
 monitions of the faithful old " Betsey," returned to 
 her couch. 
 
 For a long time her weary brain still wandered 
 wildly over the strange realties of the past few days, 
 
The Chattel Child. 107 
 
 and their bitter consequences ; but after it had been 
 dark many hours, and the domestics of the hall had 
 retired, and the little life of that little world was again 
 hushed into perfect silence and repose, her exhaustion 
 partially triumphed over her miseries, and she sunk 
 into a dreamy, drowsing slumber. In her slumber, 
 Julia came to her and took her hand, and began to 
 converse with her ; but when Ada would have replied, 
 she awoke, and the vision vanished. After finding it 
 was but a dream, the poor girl closed her lids, and 
 wished that dream might come again. Then as she 
 passed again into slumber, Defoe came to her, and 
 reasoned with her so calmly and earnestly in favor of 
 his innocence, that her confidence in him was restored, 
 and she was about to extend her hand to him, when 
 she awoke and found that he too had vanished. 'Twas 
 but a dream, and she returned once more to her slum- 
 bers, and wished for that dream also again. And 
 then she thought a number of strange looking persons, 
 none of whom she knew, stood by her, and that after 
 a moment one of them lifted her slowly up from the 
 couch in which she lay, mantling her form in the cov- 
 ering under which she was sleeping, and bore her soft- 
 ly down stairs ; but this seemed so wild and strange, 
 that this she knew was a dream, and so she thought 
 she would not awake or shriek, but would see the is- 
 sue of the vision, which came to her almost with the 
 
108 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 vividness of reality. Her next sensation after crossing 
 the threshold, was of being at the shore of the river, 
 where she had parted from Julia and the priest. By 
 what means she had come from the house there, she 
 knew not ; but there, holding her in his strong arms 
 like a plaything, was the very same man who had 
 lifted her from her couch. She seemed to see his 
 features as distinctly as in the open day ; and around 
 were the forms which had stood in her chamber, and 
 down at the water's edge ; and within a few feet of 
 her was a row-boat, filled with people of the same 
 wild, uncouth, and even fierce expression. So much 
 like reality did it now appear to her, that she tried 
 to shriek, but felt the hand of the strong man upon 
 her mouth, so that she could not ; and sick with ter- 
 ror, and feeling that she had awoke, she waited a mo- 
 ment for the dream to pass, but it did not. 
 
 In a twinkling, still held by the same iron grasp, 
 she* was in the boat, the crew also ; and under the swift 
 strokes of their oars, they were rapidly shooting down 
 the river. Then the horrid consciousness flashed upon 
 her soul. It was not a dream, but all a living and 
 terrible reality ! 
 
 "Oh, God!" she groaned " oh, oh, God!" and 
 sunk, in a lethargy of despair, powerless in the arms 
 of her supporter. Hqw long she might have remained 
 thus, silent and unresisting, she knew not. For a 
 
TJie OJiattel Child. 109 
 
 time, whether for moments or hours she knew not, she 
 was borne along by the almost superhuman speed of 
 the rowers, down the river, in darkness, solitude, and 
 silence. The hand was removed from her mouth ; she 
 could have shrieked, but she cared not to. She felt 
 as if her destiny was taken out of her own control, and 
 she recked not what should become of her. Besides, 
 had she shrieked, no human ear was near ; no human 
 hand could have aided her. At last, after being borne 
 along for several hours in this manner, she saw close 
 upon her right here and there a light, and soon another 
 and another. The lights approached and increased 
 in numbers, and then she saw dimly through the mist 
 here and there a spar a mast a chimney top, and 
 at last a man moving along the levee. Quietly and 
 calmly for a moment, she summoned all her energies, 
 and then, without warning or changing her position, 
 sent up, with the utmost of her power, one loud, shrill 
 shriek for " Help ! " It was this shout which Walter had 
 heard as narrated in the last chapter. In another mo- 
 ment her face was so tightly gagged that she could scarce- 
 ly breathe, and pinioned hand and foot, she was thrown 
 rudely in the bottom of the boat ; but she knew that 
 her effort had been successful, for in a moment after she 
 heard the sharp, clattering reports of a volley of mus- 
 ketry, and the blood of those who were bearing her away 
 flowed down around her. She looked out, and close 
 
110 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 beside her was a boat manned like their own, and in 
 the stern stood Walter Defoe. Alas ! she thought, 
 my dream of him was as false as himself. Here he 
 stands forth in his true character a pirate and a 
 fiend. There is no longer any room for doubt. Eising 
 convulsively, as well as she could, she looked for a 
 moment at the boat, as if fearing it might contain 
 some other form which she could recognize ; and then 
 falling back, Ada clasped her pinioned hands and 
 imirmured 
 
 " No, no, Julia is not there. Thank God, I can 
 still hope she is safe 1" 
 
 The volley which had been fired into their boat was 
 answered by running shots from their own, and Ada 
 discovered from the fierce excitement of those around 
 her that they were being hotly pursued. But by 
 whom ? How grateful she felt already to those who 
 she believed must triumph ! How she wished she 
 could assist them, or rise and encourage them in the 
 task but she could not. Amidst the blood and strife 
 and shots thickly flying above her, the fancy even 
 crossed her mind that they were led on by some bold 
 generous youth, who when he saw her would love her, 
 as she had often seen detailed in romances, and she 
 even then made up her mind that if such a one did 
 present himself, though he were the very quintessence 
 of ugliness, she would perfect the romance by giving 
 
The Chattel Child. Ill 
 
 him her hand. Strange thought for such a moment 
 during her whole life before 3 she had never yet so much 
 as thought of love. 
 
 Kising with difficulty, once more she caught sight 
 of her persuers, rapidly but ineffectually following 
 them, alternately cheering, shouting and firing. But 
 in her own boat and in that immediately in their wake, 
 were strong, sinewy and experienced men, struggling 
 as if their very lives hung, as they did, upon the con- 
 test. Just then, after a solitary shot from their pur- 
 suers, she saw Defoe sink wounded and bleeding into 
 the water. She could not but pity the poor fellow 
 tfith whom she had spent so many pleasant moments, 
 who seemed capable at least of so .much that was gene- 
 rous and good, and whose guilty nature and guiltless 
 appearance were to her so incomprehensible and this 
 spectacle, and the red gore which was flowing fast 
 around her, and in which she almost lay, filled her 
 heart with sickness. A mazy film gathered over her 
 vision, and she saw no more until she felt herself upon 
 the deck of a large schooner-rigged craft, and knew 
 that her pursuers had been distanced, and were now 
 kept at bay by the guns of the schooner, and that she 
 was fully in the power of as veritable a legion of cut- 
 throats as ever hoisted the pennant of the skull and 
 cross-bones at their mast-head and who were now 
 with sails unfurled and a fair wind rapidly and secure- 
 
112 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 ly bearing out to sea. She was then led into a tiny 
 but beautiful cabin, resembling rather the bower of 
 some eastern princess than a room in the craft of a 
 buccaneer, richly hung with tapesty of velvet, inwrought 
 with gold and silver, which, however, the poor girl 
 had little disposition or intellect remaining to admire. 
 A pretty and amiable waiting-maid removed the un- 
 suitable and gory night-covering in which she was 
 enveloped, and arrayed her form, now passive under 
 despair, in a toilet very much after her own taste and 
 fancy. 
 
The Chattel Child. 113 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 ADA AT SEA. 
 
 " Two things break the monotony 
 
 Of an Atlantic trip, 
 Sometimes, forsooth, we ship a sea, 
 
 Sometimes we see a ship." HOOD. 
 
 -I have dreamt thou wert 
 
 A captive in thy hopelessness ; afar 
 
 From the sweet home of thy young infancy, 
 
 Whose image unto thee is as a dream 
 
 Of fire and slaughter : I can see thee wasting 
 
 Sick for thy native air." L. E. L. 
 
 FOR several days scarcely an incident occurred to 
 break the monotony of Ada's life on ship-board. 
 Except the pretty and chatting waiting-maid Annette, 
 who was constantly in attendance upon her, endeavor- 
 ing, by every means in her power to please her, she 
 saw no one. 
 
 At first the intense and agonizing excitement under 
 which she had labored, rendered this monotonous quiet 
 an agreeable relief, and she almost felt like thanking 
 her malefactors for the interval they had left her for 
 reflection. The " one fell swoop" which had stripped 
 
114 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 her of her home, and placed her powerless, in the 
 midst of the most abandoned of men, was so unreal 
 in its appearance, and so overwhelming that it blinded 
 and confused her mental vision, and she could scarcely 
 comprehend it, but moved, and spoke, and saw it all, 
 as in a dream. 
 
 Sometimes she would be strangely calm, and her 
 despair having seemed to conquer all her natural 
 instincts, she would look forward to her new sphere 
 of life, as if she were the submissive toy of destiny, 
 ready to fill the sphere allotted to her, and to take 
 upon her, without a pang, whatever form or character 
 chance and circumstances might require. At others 
 her very blood would boil at the outrage under which 
 she suffered, and her gentle girlish soul, stung to 
 madness by the thought of the dark prospect before 
 her, would rave against mankind and curse her male- 
 factors. In these moods the vision of death came to 
 her like a pleasant thought, and she would resolve to 
 put an end to an existence which had so little to hope 
 and so much to fear. But to elude her misfortunes 
 by this means was as impossible as by any other. 
 She soon perceived that the shrewd Annette acted in 
 the triple capacity of a faithful nurse, an amusing 
 companion, and a watchful body-guard. 
 
 Not the slightest article by which she could, in 
 these disordered moods, have put an end to her exist- 
 
The Chattel Cliild. 115 
 
 ence, was suffered to remain within her reach, and 
 the ever- watchful Annette was every moment by her 
 side, striving with the most amiable perseverance and 
 tact, to relieve the tedium of the long hours and 
 reconcile Ada to her new position. 
 
 Ah ! it is in such moments, when the pure and un- 
 suspecting heart of woman is suddenly brought face 
 to face with the falsehood, vice and wickedness of the 
 world, when a fair and gorgeous dream of innocent 
 life seems to rise like the elysian picture upon the 
 curtain of a theatre, and reveal instead life's real 
 tragedy enacted in subterranean scenes, and clothed 
 in unearthly horrors it is in such moments when aged, 
 schooled and experienced vice, seems to trample upon 
 youthful simplicity and virtue with impunity, that 
 the courage fails, sin grows familiar, and virtue loses 
 its elastic power of endurance. 
 
 Our faith in a higher sustaining source of strength 
 than ourselves wavers, and with that wavering our 
 own strength grows weak indeed. Like the young 
 bud quickened into life by a few warm February days, 
 and expanding when, as its leaves begin to develop 
 their beauty, and the serial shield which covers them 
 parts, and the tender fibres lie open to the genial sun 
 and warm air if suddenly winter whitens the face of 
 nature and withering frosts pierce again deep into the 
 flowing sap of the forests, and down into the rivers 
 
116 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 and the soil, converting nature into a rock of ice, how 
 quickly does that tender unfolding bud curl its blasted 
 leaves and die, falling to the ground ; so if that deli- 
 cate bud, the human soul, thus, at the very crisis of 
 its unfolding, be surrounded by all that could freeze 
 out its life, and chill it through and through, how 
 shall it put forth its virtues like a green foliage, and 
 blossom and flower as if nurtured under every favoring 
 influence ? 
 
 The heart can only triumph over wrong when it en- 
 ters upon the contest braced by the assurance that the 
 right must ultimately triumph ; and how opposite the 
 effect where the first lesson taught it of the difference 
 between virtue and vice is that vice is all-powerful, 
 and that virtue cannot resist ! There the reason acts 
 supinely, the nerve grows feeble, and the soul drifts 
 onward with the eddying current of circumstances. 
 
 As Ada was sitting at the little window of her cabin, 
 on the evening of the third day after her capture, medi- 
 tatively gazing out upon the ever-restless motion of 
 the billows, and upon the calm beauty of the western 
 sky, where the sun was now sinking into his watery 
 couch, and drawing around him, as he departed, the 
 cloudy glories of the firmament, Annette observed in 
 her placid features and half-thoughtless, half-dreamy 
 eye, that the mind of Ada had borrowed a temporary 
 respite from sorrow. In fact, Ada had for many hours, 
 
The Chattel Child. 117 
 
 at intervals, turned to listen to the chatty and viva- 
 cious Annette, until she had begun to imbibe certain 
 good-natured, submissive, try- to-be-happy impressions 
 which Annette had striven to console her with, and 
 had found a degree of pleasure and interest in her dis- 
 course, partly from the relief it afforded to the con- 
 templation of her own misfortunes, and partly from a 
 growing interest in the creature whom fortune had so 
 singularly made her companion. 
 
 Availing herself of the favorable moment, Annette 
 had plied her efforts as usual, and, for this afternoon, 
 not unsuccessfully, to draw the desponding girl into 
 discourse. They had now been conversing for more 
 than an hour together. After a pause, in which both 
 seemed to be reflecting upon the topics which their 
 discourse had suggested, Ada turned to Annette and 
 said 
 
 " Annette, you are a singular creature ! I am be- 
 ginning to love you. Will you not tell me your his- 
 tory, and how and why I have found you where you 
 are ?" 
 
 "Oh," replied Annette, "I have not much of a 
 history. A simple girl has a few joys, little knowl- 
 edge, some love, and much trouble, and you have my 
 history/' 
 
 "But do tell me more particularly/' asked Ada. 
 
 " If it will serve to wile away a tedious hour more 
 
118 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 pleasantly to you it is at your service," replied the 
 girl, and commenced the 
 
 STORY OF ANNETTE. 
 
 "My earliest recollections are of a gloomy old man- 
 sion in the outskirts of New Orleans. Mother I had 
 none, but a wicked old crone, in the shape of a house- 
 keeper, reversed the order of nature by substituting 
 for that fostering kindness and maternal care, which 
 are due to immortal souls just embarked in this world, 
 the perverse malignity which could only be due to 
 devils in the next. If I ever had an innocent wish or 
 fancy which she did not thwart, or a guilty one which 
 she did not encourage and endeavor to gratify, then it 
 was because in some few instances she mistook the 
 one for the other, and so missed her baneful intentions. 
 
 My father was an old Jew, and if my natural dispo- 
 sition was a medium between his and my mother's, she 
 certainly must have been an angel, for no sooner was 
 I old enough to entertain that assemblage of unhappy 
 feelings called scorn, than I heartily despised him. 
 He was rich and lent much, and the only text of 
 Scripture which he ever knew was ' the borrower shall 
 be servant to the lender/ The chink of money would 
 have drawn his attention away from the sound of 
 heavenly harps. Until I wa& eleven or twelve years 
 
The Chattel Child. 119 
 
 of age, I scarce ever saw any other than these two 
 persons. Shut up in the great gloomy prison mansion 
 of my father, the rooms of which were seldom entered 
 except by the old housekeeper and myself, and which 
 were even then shrouded in twilight by the closed 
 windows, and seeing nothing whatever of the great 
 world around me, except what passed in the quiet 
 back street in front of our door, or could be learned 
 by looking out of my little bed-room window into the 
 pent up yards and gardens in the rear of our house, 
 I grew up to that age in as perfect ignorance of the 
 world in which I lived, as the fluttering little .canary 
 in yonder cage of yours, Ada, is of the course we are 
 now sailing." 
 
 " Oh, how lone !" sighed Ada. " Sister and I often 
 thought our plantation life very lonely, but it was 
 gaiety itself compared with your hermit home. How 
 very dull 1" 
 
 " Pardon me I did not say it was dull. Would 
 that I were as happy now as then !" said Annette, 
 with a sudden emotion which for a moment choked 
 her further utterance. " Dull ! it was the happiest 
 portion of my life. I knew nothing ; but then I was 
 very much happier than if I had known much, for the 
 same reason that I often think those born blind must 
 be happier than those who see. The most of what 
 we see is unsightly, and pains us. It would be better 
 
120 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 if we could shut our eyes, and dream of it as all fair 
 and beautiful. So the most that we learn is evil ; but 
 when, in our childish ignorance, we are free to dream 
 of all things, we dream of nothing but good, and are 
 therefore much happier." 
 
 " Time was/' said Ada, " when I should have 
 laughed at such a fancy ; but now it seems truth. But 
 was your hermit-like retirement never broken in upon ?" 
 
 "Oh, yes. Though the house-keeper was positively 
 forbidden to receive into the house any person whatever, 
 yet the wily old woman, for purposes best known to 
 herself, often relieved my loneliness by the secret and 
 always pleasant visits of a person whom she had in- 
 troduced to me as her son. Handsome and compan- 
 ionable, though violent and passionate in the prime 
 of youthful buoyancy, being a few years my senior 
 well studied in the world of fashion and elegance, his 
 stolen visits were to me seasons of unalloyed bliss. 
 From him I learned that I was beautiful ; and poor 
 child that I was, this, with his gallantry and a kindness 
 of manner, to which I had been a stranger, soon ena- 
 bled him to learn that I loved him. Books, flowers, 
 and music, through his unceasing attentions, and the 
 easy opportunities afforded by the absence of my mi- 
 serly old father, found their way to me, secretly, yet 
 almost constantly. He taught me the language of 
 edch. And need I tell you that from his lips the Ian- 
 
The Chattel Child. 121 
 
 i_ - 
 
 guage of them all was one which my longing and sus- 
 ceptible heart readily understood ? 
 
 Two years had thus pleasantly and innocently 
 ripened our attachment, when my father returned one 
 evening from his business where or what that might 
 be I never knew accompanied by a stranger. 
 
 Little as had been my knowledge of the world, from 
 the moment I first saw that tall, polished, genteel 
 scoundrel, I hated him from the bottom of my heart. 
 The obsequiousness of his heartless, grey eyes was 
 satanic. The smile had a crawling, serpent-like way 
 of winding around his face, that made me shudder ; 
 and there was a clammy softness to his hand as he 
 took mine, which filled me with pain. He spoke in a 
 low, insinuating voice, and this, with his flattering 
 manner, encouraged me after a time to tolerate him, 
 and endeavor to overcome my first prejudices. He 
 seemed very kind to me ; and as often thenceforward 
 as he repeated his visits, he showed me many atten- 
 tions. Almost the only glimpse I ever obtained of the 
 great world outside the little world of my birth, until 
 I left forever that little world for that great one as 
 my home, was when, in a reluctant compliance with 
 his repeated request, I accompanied him to his plan- 
 tation, a long way above the city. But his two daugh- 
 ters, of nearly my own age, of whom he had spoken to 
 
 me often, and whom I longed to see, were absent at a 
 
 6 
 
122 Owned and Disowned] or, 
 
 northern school, and I returned disappointed. Judge 
 my surprise, when, after a few months of this reluc- 
 tant acquaintance, my father intimated to me a de- 
 sire that I should marry this Mr. Butler, for such was 
 his name, immediately. That which before had been 
 mere indifference, now ripened into loathing hatred. 
 The time was fixed for my marriage, but my soul re- 
 coiled from the sinfulness of such a union, and a few 
 days before the time of fulfillment,' by a secret arrange- 
 ment with my beloved Conrad, who I was not then 
 aware was connected with the notorious Lafitte and 
 his companions, I left the paternal threshold forever, 
 and cast myself upon the protection of one who I was 
 persuaded would return my confidence with a love 
 deeper, purer, and infinitely more happifying than the 
 paternal meanness and indifference from which I had 
 escaped. But alas ! no long time has elapsed since 
 I have done so, and now I fear his affections are being 
 transferred to another object, as youthful, as beautiful, 
 and as much my superior as yourself." 
 
 " And who is she, pray ?" inquired Ada. 
 
 " I scarcely can tell, although I have seen somewhat 
 of her ; but ask me no more, I pray you, for this last 
 blow to my happiness is so recent, and preys so much 
 upon my mind, that I fear it will sadden me, and 
 make me a dvll companion to you." 
 
The Chattel Child. 123 
 
 CHAPTEK XII. 
 
 THE PRISONERS. 
 
 " AND how ?" asked Ada, when the simple narra- 
 tive to which she had listened with sisterly interest 
 had ended. 
 
 " How, Annette, can one so pure and gentle aa 
 yourself, remain in, the companionship of those who 
 are your associates here ?" 
 
 " I may reply," said Annette innocently, " by in- 
 quiring how one so refined and amiable a^ yourself 
 could endure to remain among such associates." 
 
 " Are you too, then, a prisoner ?" asked Ada. 
 
 " I have been so long a prisoner," responded Annette, 
 " that I have ceased to prize the story of freedom, and 
 have learned to find pleasures and to confer happiness 
 even in the wild and romantic sphere of lifo into which 
 circumstances have thrown me. True, when I was 
 first brought into this mode of life, I lost much time 
 in misery, which a wiser head would have taught me 
 might just as easilj be spent in a moderate degree of 
 happiness." 
 
124 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 " How can you speak of the scenes you most witness 
 as being romantic ?" asked Ada, " they seem to me to 
 be rather wicked than romantic." 
 
 " Do not think so, dear Ada," responded Annette 
 earnestly, " it pains me much to hear you. You must 
 remember that you and I are of the weaker sex. Na- 
 ture makes it our duty, and love renders it our pleasure 
 only to obey. We cannot control events. That is the 
 work of men. But wherever our lot is cast whether 
 amid riches or poverty, amid virtue or crime, in the 
 quiet homes of our infancy, or out upon the wild, im- 
 pressive and beautiful ocean, it is our duty to cling to 
 man like the fruitful vine to the leafless tree, compen- 
 sating by our love for his labors, and by our virtues 
 and good qualities for his follies and faults, and the 
 many other sources of his misery." 
 
 " You cannot possibly mean," questioned Ada 
 proudly, " that the virtues of the female sex are to be 
 allied to the vices of the male, so as to make up to 
 the wicked the happiness which, by the error of their 
 lives, they have forfeited ?" 
 
 "Not exactly that," replied Annette, "I do not 
 hold that any woman is called upon to ally herself 
 with aught which is beneath her morally or intellec- 
 tually. Though if women ordinarily wait until they 
 find their moral and spiritual equals among men, very 
 few will ever love or marry. We are made by nature 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 125 
 
 the purer vessels, and should exert the purifying influ- 
 ence over the other sex, and how can we do so unless 
 we ally ourselves to those who are, to some extent, in 
 need of that influence ?" 
 
 " By teaching all men by our example," replied 
 Ada, " that woman can never descend to their level, 
 but that they must rise to woman's level before they 
 can aspire to woman's love." 
 
 " Nobly said," returned Annette, " but before we 
 may set them such an example, it is necessary that 
 we should be free to set such an example as we choose. 
 But all women are dependent very few of them are 
 free to do as they would. Some are controlled by 
 fathers, brothers, owners, poverty or circumstances. 
 We, too, are controlled, and the question with us is 
 not whether, being in the society of pious, prayerful 
 people, we shall voluntarily violate their wishes and 
 our taste by descending to the companionship of the 
 dissolute and erring but whether, being thrown by 
 destiny into the power of the dissolute and erring, we 
 shall not yield to circumstances in part, and endeavor 
 to raise up those around us more than we descend our- 
 selves, or whether we shall die ?" 
 
 " Oh, Annette, Annette," replied Ada weeping, " I 
 can never agree with you. And yet it seems hard, 
 now I think of it, that such men should be utterly 
 without love. If love is to redeem, reform and elevate, 
 
126 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 surely they most need its power. And how shall they 
 be expected to amend, when they are under no helping 
 influence ?" 
 
 " Yes, gentle one," continued Annette, " and it 
 seems to my erring imagination as though there was 
 something beautiful in the thought that until I be- 
 came a prisoner of love here, among the entire popu- 
 lation of the wide, wide world, the influence of woman's 
 affection was in some nobler or baser degree felt every- 
 where, except among this abandoned band of generous 
 outlaws, and that when I became one of them the 
 silken chain by which woman rules the world was com- 
 plete and perfect." 
 
 Ada could not help smiling at this singular fancy, 
 worthy of an enthusiast, and said 
 
 " You style them generous outlaws, and I have often 
 heard you speak of them in terms even of admiration 
 in the same breath in which you condemn them. 
 Pray what is there, in their conduct or profession, 
 which entitles them to be called generous ? I will lis- 
 ten to any redeeming qualities they may have, though 
 what I have seen of them has been so fiendishly wicked, 
 that I fear you will find me a difficult convert." 
 
 "Is it wicked or righteous to enter the homes of 
 poor, inoffensive Africans, and tearing children from 
 their parents, and sisters from their brothers, transport 
 
The Chattel Child. 127 
 
 them in the diseased and deadly holds of vessels to 
 America for slaves ?" 
 
 " A month ago/' replied Ada, " I should probably 
 have said I did not know, but now I think it is 
 wicked !" 
 
 " And that such acts of wickedness can never give 
 them a moral right or title to the property so stolen ?" 
 
 "Never!" said Ada. 
 
 " But ought not the property, the wealth accumu- 
 lated by such wicked means, to grow and gather un- 
 disturbed in the hands of those who perpetrated the 
 wickedness, so that the crimes having been successful 
 they can flourish and fatten upon the spoils ?" 
 
 " It ought to be scattered to the four winds," an- 
 swered Ada warmly, "and an avenging providence 
 will see it done." 
 
 " But that avenging providence," continued Annette, 
 " will employ human agents to accomplish the work, 
 and among the most industrious and ever active of 
 them is Lafitte." 
 
 " The wealth which he obtains is the ill-gotten pro- 
 ceeds of others crimes. His profession introduces him 
 into the company of wickedness, and he keeps company 
 with it that he may betray it and prevent its success. 
 He strikes the criminally wealthy to avenge the suffer- 
 ing and the down- trodden. He rebukes meanness and 
 parsimony at the points of the sabres of his followers. 
 
128 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 He takes from the wicked what they have wrung from 
 the unfortunate, and gives to the unfortunate what he 
 has wrung from the wicked." 
 
 " If that be true/' said Ada, " I confess to a feeling 
 of leniency, if not admiration, for one who thus acts 
 the part of scavenger in the moral and commercial 
 world ; and, after all, I feel less abhorrence for the 
 reckless brutality of those who tore me from my home, 
 than for the cold, calculating and criminal heartless- 
 ness of my own father, who designed to sell sister Julia 
 into my present condition. By the way, I know not 
 but my fate is just. There seems to be a sort of sys- 
 tematic plan of revenge in the events which have saved 
 my sister, and consigned myself to the fate prepared 
 by our common parent for her. If I thought that 
 providence designed it as just, I should submit to all 
 its exactions and degradations with cheerfulness/' 
 
 " You may rest assured that providence has con- 
 trolled and will control it all/' urged Annette ; " the 
 other prisoner, of whom, by the way, I have not be- 
 fore spoken to you, was at first almost as despairing 
 as yourself and I." 
 
 " Another prisoner, who and what is she pray ?" 
 
 " The other prisoner is a gentleman, Mr. Howard. 
 He is supposed to be the owner of a large plantation, 
 and is detained with the view of effecting a ransom. 
 He is very unfortunate and miserable. Suddenly cut 
 
The Chattel Child. 129 
 
 off from society and friends, lie drags out a wretched 
 prison life, as much in need of consolation and sympa- 
 thy as ourselves. Poor fellow !" 
 
 " And can we not see him ?" asked Ada, her heart 
 as fully prepared to extend sympathy and relief to a 
 worthy object, as it had been unwilling to feel the con- 
 tact of one unworthy. 
 
 "Hush," whispered Annette, "if you desire to see 
 him, though our lives would be sacrificed should it be 
 discovered, I think I can afford you an opportunity, 
 and I am sure that if once acquainted with him you 
 would admire and like him, to say the least" she con- 
 tinued, archly smiling, " what more two such sympa- 
 thetic young companions in adversity might possibly 
 do, I cannot even surmise." 
 
 Assuring Annette that any danger to her own life 
 she would welcome rather than avoid, and that she 
 could not bear to let an opportunity pass of extending 
 her sympathy to one so deserving of it, Ada begged 
 that she would, however, for the stranger's safety, 
 arrange a secret and stealthy interview, and, if possi- 
 ble, immediately. 
 
 " I will do so," said Annette, rising. 
 
 " But wait a moment," said Ada. " Look !" 
 
 Turning, Annette beheld Ada standing before the 
 mirror with a countenance suffused with blushes. She 
 
 seemed very beautiful. Her rich folds of auburn hair 
 
 6* 
 
130 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 fell in curls and negligent waving ringlets down by her 
 small, well-moulded neck, upon her statue-like shoul- 
 ders. The simple though costly dress of white satin, 
 trailed loosely and gracefully as she walked, while at 
 the waist her fairy form, just "budding into woman- 
 hood, was closely fitted and favorably shown by its 
 neat, short bodice. Her dress after a manner much 
 used in the familiar or home toilet of tropical coun- 
 tries, was cut low in the neck, while the mere delicate- 
 ly ruffled band which surrounded the armpits, left re- 
 vealed her graceful and tapering arms. 
 
 " Annette/' said Ada, blushing, " I have consented 
 to wear this dress when none but you were present. 
 Do not ask me to do so on this occasion/' 
 
 " My dear little prude," said Annette, laughing, 
 we shall have to forego the opportunity of seeing him 
 then. For our poorly provided wardrobe contains no 
 more Quaker-like dresses than the beautiful one you 
 wear. And if we wait until our arrival at the next 
 port, it will be too late, for there I have learned Mr. 
 Howard is to be exchanged to another vessel." 
 
 "I suppose I must submit then," said Ada, and 
 after once more glancing in the mirror, at a costume 
 which ill-accorded with her delicacy of taste, she sat 
 down and awaited the arrival of the stranger, Mr. 
 Howard. 
 
 Upon his entrance, Ada started back for a moment, 
 
The Chattel Child. 131 
 
 so certainly did she seem to see before her some per- 
 son whom she well knew and whom in a moment 
 she remembered to be Mr. Defoe. But remembering, 
 that but a few days before, she had seen him with 
 her own eyes, shot and consigned to a watery grave 
 she banished the illusion, and a closer glance resolved 
 into a mere resemblance what at first appeared as an 
 identity. Strange and marked, however, was that 
 resemblance, and more than once during the evening's 
 conversation, she observed it forcibly. 
 
 The evening passed away very pleasantly, and when 
 Mr. Howard arose to depart, Ada, sensible of the sym- 
 pathy which his misfortunes had aroused in her heart, 
 now kindled into a livelier interest by his attractive 
 discourse and gentlemanly bearing, freely assured him 
 that the society of one whose misfortunes were so allied 
 to her own, would be ever welcome to her, an invi- 
 tation which Mr. Howard received with gratitude and 
 pleasure, and promised frequently to avail himself of. 
 
132 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTEK XIII. 
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY. 
 
 " Faith, hope, and charity these three ; 
 But the greatest of these is charity." 
 
 THE day had just broken over the damp and muddy 
 streets of New Orleans, when the reverend priest and 
 the fugitive Julia stepped through an outer gate, in 
 a high wall enclosing a capacious yard, at the end of 
 which stood a plain two story building, of grayish 
 stone, moss-covered and dingy. 
 
 " Is this the house of the Sisters, holy father ?" 
 asked Julia. 
 
 " It is, daughter," said the priest, kindly. " You 
 will find in these hallowed precincts, if nowhere else, 
 a place where our holy religion will guard you, and 
 where the soul, in conscious purity and pious contem- 
 plation of divine things, may approach, as near as the 
 veil of mortality will permit, to a vision of the rest 
 and peace of heaven." 
 
 " How delightful," exclaimed Julia, " is such a re- 
 treat to one who is fleeing from the snares and machi- 
 nations of a wicked world ! How could I but fee] 
 
The Chattel Child. 133 
 
 grateful to God and to that religion which has given 
 me such a home !" 
 
 " Delightful, indeed !" responded the priest " "but 
 only to a soul fitted to find delight in the things of 
 heaven. For the pale countenances and wan forms 
 of the Sisters whom you will see here, indicate that 
 their lives are those of toilsome self-denial, for the 
 good of others ; lives in which, in the eyes of the world, 
 there is little that is delightful or attractive." 
 
 " The more attractive to me," exclaimed Julia. 
 " For why should I not willingly flee from that world 
 which has been to me so vile an enemy ? Why should 
 I not freely devote the remainder of a life which has 
 been filled to the brim with worldly happiness, and 
 which has now nothing but degradation to hope, to 
 the pure and holy service of Him who alone can con- 
 fer true and lasting happiness ? Why should I not 
 willingly sacrifice myself to the good of mankind I 
 who have been made to feel so deeply how much they 
 are in need of every redeeming and saving influence ?" 
 
 The priest had rung several times at the door, and 
 it was now slowly opened, though Julia saw not by 
 whom ; and entering, she was led through the dimly 
 lighted hall and the dark passage way into the parlor. 
 
 Here the priest, after a solemn assurance that by 
 no possibility could her father obtain any clue to her 
 whereabouts, left her with his blessing, and she sat 
 
134 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 down alone in the great rocking-chair, and looked at 
 the grate of iron bars which formed one side of the 
 apartment, and around at the simple, but elegant fur- 
 niture which adorned the room, and up at the beauti- 
 fully stained glass windows, just kindled into many 
 colored hues by the rays of the rising sun. She felt 
 alone ? No, not alone ; the folding arm of Christ 
 seemed thrown over her, and she felt safe. 
 
 In a few moments a figure wearing the plain black 
 gown of a Sister of Charity, with long cape, and a 
 white cap partially concealing her thin, pallid face, 
 stood within the door, bearing in her hand a small 
 lamp. Without raising her eyes from the floor, or 
 speaking, she slightly beckoned to Julia to follow her, 
 with which sign Julia complied ; and after passing 
 along several narrow corridors, and up a flight of stairs, 
 she placed the lamp upon a table in a small, neatly 
 furnished apartment, and as noiselessly retired. Julia 
 gazed for a moment earnestly and interestedly after 
 the mute figure of her who seemed thus to walk through 
 earth, with her thoughts not even for a moment with- 
 drawn from heaven ; and after repeating her accus- 
 tomed prayers, retired to that repose of which she 
 stood so much in need. I 
 
The Chattel Child. 135 
 
 CHAPTEK XIV. 
 
 , JULIA, A POSTULANT. 
 
 No feverish cares to that divine retreat 
 Thy woman's heart of silent worship brought ; 
 ut a fresh childhood, heavenly truth to meet 
 With love, and wonder, and submissive thought." 
 
 MOORE. 
 
 DURING those intervals of Julia's early life which 
 had been spent away from Lindenhall, not the least 
 pleasing of the opportunities attending the change of 
 scene, were those of attending upon public worship in 
 the cathedrals of the Church of Home. Her poetic 
 imagination was charmed, and her love of the mystic 
 and incomprehensible gratified by the imposing sym- 
 bolic ceremonies which there constantly passed before 
 her. 
 
 The flock where the highest and the lowest of soci- 
 ety seemed to bow in confessed equality before God, 
 kneeling reverently in the humble posture of worship, 
 with the emblem of their Saviour's suffering before 
 them the holy stillness which rested over the congre- 
 gation now broken by the soft, deep tones of the 
 
136 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 organ, as they wandered among the columns, and 
 echoed from the vaulted roof of the sombre cathedral, 
 accompanied, perhaps, by a single delicate female 
 voice, which one moment swells upon the ear with a 
 rich harmonious fullness, and the next dies away upon 
 the heart, soft as the sigh of an 2Eolian harp, and 
 anon deepens into the full chorus of congregational 
 praise the mute language of worship of the priests, 
 whom she so much revered the majesty and sonorous 
 beauty of the unknown tongue in which the nations 
 of such varied languages and kindred unite in chant- 
 ing the same praises to their common Father the cos- 
 tume and genuflections of the assistants before the 
 altar the altar itself, with its beautiful image of the 
 crucifixion and of the loved Virgin, decorated with 
 ever-fragrant flowers, and lit by a thousand tapers 
 all of this mute typical language of the soul charmed 
 her with the sensible majesty of the cross and the 
 beauty of holiness. 
 
 Upon the incense that rose before the altar, she 
 breathed her prayers, confident that that ascending 
 mist would bear them to heaven, there to unite with 
 those that curtain the glories of the Father. 
 
 At times, entranced in a delightful rapture of ado- 
 ration and delight, she would find herself kneeling in 
 her place after the congregation had dispersed. Upon 
 one of these occasions, a venerable father, whose grey- 
 
The Chattel Child. 137 
 
 haired age filled her with reverence, had spoken to her 
 so kindly and earnestly of the dangers by which she 
 was beset in a world of wickedness, and gave her inci- 
 dentally so touching and pleasing a picture of the quiet 
 and happy foretaste of heaven which those enjoy who 
 devote their entire selves to the service of God, that 
 from that moment the whole vista of life to her wore 
 a less dazzling, and more subdued brightness. Though 
 she had no thought of devoting herself to such a life, 
 yet it occurred to her that had she been differently 
 situated, with no father whom it was her duty to com- 
 fort and make happy, and no gentle sister Ada whom 
 she could guide, enjoy, and love, or should these be 
 taken from her, the life of a religeuse would have 
 seemed to her a congenial duty. 
 
 And now, that she had discovered for the first time 
 the calamity into which she was borne, and which at 
 once deprived her of her father and sister, and even 
 of herself, and took from her the most sacred of all 
 rights the right to be pure and holy she felt a thrill- 
 ing consciousness of her right to be the servant of God 
 rather than of man. 
 
 In this calamity, the same holy father whose con- 
 versations in the chapel had so deeply impressed her, 
 had come to her as we have'seen had revealed to her 
 her misfortune, and had afforded her her chosen refuge 
 within the enfolding and protecting arm of the church. 
 
138 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 The dream, upon which, she had pondered, now 
 seemed the mirrored reflection of her future, and she 
 entered without misgivings, but with a heart full of 
 gratitude and serene joy, into an institution where 
 she hoped soon to put on not only the modest habit, 
 but the benevolent life of a Sister of Charity. Another 
 motive afforded her an additional inducement. 
 
 In her infancy, when in the city, she had heard 
 from common rumor of the devoted Sister Clara, whose 
 never-tiring benevolence was the theme of many, and 
 of whom Father Reilly had spoken often as one of 
 whom even the church might be proud. 
 
 This holy woman, as Julia had now learned, was 
 her mother. When she thought of this, she could 
 almost, in anticipation, smile at the cruel stroke which 
 had deprived her of father and sister. She hoped soon 
 to meet, and, as she trusted, to embrace, in the double 
 fullness of religious and natural affection, this divine 
 woman. 
 
 When she arose the next morning, however, and 
 went down to ask permission of the mother superior 
 to do so, she was informed that Sister Clara had left 
 the house before the dawn, upon her daily routine of 
 charity, from which she would not return until late. 
 
 " Besides," said the mother superior, in a mild and be- 
 nign tone, which contrasted strangely, as Julia thought, 
 with the severity of the unexpected restriction laid upon 
 
The CJiattel Child. 139 
 
 her, " besides, daughter, you enter to-day upon the 
 preparation for a life in which the natural and sinful 
 affections of this world are to be replaced by purer and 
 holier attachments to the things of another world. 
 Christ must be your father, the holy virgin you* 
 mother, and we your sisters. That you may enter 
 upon your novitiate by putting away all worldly and 
 sinful affections, rather than by fostering new hindrances 
 to the perfect loves of religion, I shall direct that you 
 may not see Sister Clara until all tendencies towards 
 that worldly affection with which alone you, as a child 
 after the flesh, regard her, shall have been subdued as 
 an unworthy and sinful lust. You may then meet 
 her with the same, and no other affection, than that 
 which you would feel for any other member of the sis- 
 terhood." 
 
 This fell upon Julia like a heavy blow where a kiss 
 was expected, but a moment's thought convinced, or 
 partially convinced, her of its propriety, and she re- 
 turned to her room to meditate, and, after a few mo- 
 ments, to weep. How little she expected that such 
 would be her feelings upon the first morning of her 
 life as a postulant. 
 
140 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 SYMPATHY. 
 
 I 
 " Come, chase that starting tear away, 
 
 Ere mine to meet it springs ; 
 To-night, at least, to-night be gay, 
 
 Whate'er to-morrow brings. 
 Like sunset gleams, that linger late 
 
 When all is dark'ning fast, 
 Are hours like these we snatch from Fate 
 
 The brightest and the last." MOORE. 
 
 WITH each ensuing day Ada found a more and more 
 welcome relief from the sense of her own misfortunes 
 in the company of Mr. Howard, and she did not won- 
 der that a person so social, and who had been so long 
 compelled to commune only with his own melancholy 
 thoughts, should gladly avail himself of every oppor- 
 tunity to enjoy her society. The prisoner seemed to 
 have ingratiated himself but little into the acquaint- 
 ance of Annette, and, as for the other persons on board, 
 neither herself, nor, so far as she could learn, Mr. 
 Howard, were ever made aware of their presence, except 
 by hearing occasionally the harsh word of command, 
 or tramp of feet upon deck. 
 
 It was, therefore, with little surprise and no dis- 
 
The Chattel Child. 141 
 
 pleasure, that Ada, as she often sat silently gazing 
 out of one of the little stern windows which lighted 
 her boudoir, and thinking dreamily or sadly of other 
 days, would hear the light tap of her fellow-captive 
 upon the door, and rising, with a hasty glance at the 
 mirror, and a hurried arrangement of some wandering 
 curl, would lift the latch and receive him with a 
 pleased and familiar smile. 
 
 Nor would the reason have been difficult to guess. 
 An easy flow of pleasant imaginative thought seeming 
 ever to inspire him, was mingled with occasional in- 
 voluntary outbursts of bold energy which made her 
 tremble, yet attracted her. His heart-felt expressions 
 of interest in her safety, and the thousand little de- 
 vices and ingenious schemes which he would suggest for 
 her rescue, and the many reasons he would sanguinely 
 urge, for the belief that they were soon to be rescued 
 without harm, from the position of fear and danger in 
 which they were placed, cheered her spirits and called 
 forth her gratitude, at least for that friendly desire 
 which was father to his faith. 
 
 Sometimes during these visits, he would wile away 
 the hours by reading to her in a low, soft, agreeable 
 voice, from such authors as the little library of her 
 cabin, or his own trunk could furnish, or in narrating 
 some of the wild and thrilling adventures through 
 
142 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 which he had passed while upon one of the American 
 privateers in the still pending war with England. 
 
 In return for this kindness, Ada told him freely of 
 the trivial joys and sorrows of her bird-like infancy, 
 her school days and all her life up to the moment they 
 had met, to which he would listen with ravished in- 
 terest. 
 
 To this pleasant interchange of thought, Annette, 
 in whom Ada's interest had much diminished in the 
 more attractive society of Mr. Howard, though always 
 present, became less and less a party, until Mr. How- 
 ard and Ada both began to feel that her society was 
 rather a restraint than a pleasure to them. Still those 
 hours, sweetened by the thought that, as if providen- 
 tially, they had been permitted to cull them like 
 flowers from among the thorns of misfortune, relieved 
 the anguish of Ada, and seemed to turn her life into 
 a tolerable and even agreeable portion. 
 
 Often after Howard had returned to his room, or 
 rather cell, from which a narrow passage way led by 
 the rooms of Ada and Annette, she would gaze long 
 and fixedly at the closed door, and wonder that any 
 person could so soon have so fully enlisted her sympa- 
 thy as to make her so forget her own misfortunes. Of 
 his life, except the few detached adventures and ex- 
 ploits of his recent career, she knew almost nothing. 
 His strange resemblance to the arch- villain Defoe 
 
The Chattel Child. 143 
 
 sometimes flashed painfully across her mind, but she 
 no longer felt surprised that her sister had been in- 
 duced to love one who resembled so admirable, a per- 
 son as -Howard. 
 
 Several weeks had thus passed. It was the after- 
 noon of a beautiful summer's day. The sun was 
 shining warmly down upon the calm, unruffled waters 
 of the gulf, and the vessel slept motionless upon her 
 native element. Ada was sitting in her accustomed 
 place by the window, looking out upon the boundless 
 waves, and musing. Annette was reclining upon a 
 small sofa, beautifully carved of rosewood, and richly 
 cushioned. A Persian tissue of a tasteful pattern 
 yielded to their fairy footsteps. Rich satin curtains, 
 softened by overlying folds of gauze, hung in graceful 
 folds on every side, and shut out of view the fact that 
 this was not only a boudoir, but a sleeping apartment. 
 A guitar, and two or three ebony chairs, with broca- 
 telle cushions, furnished the room. Here and there, 
 from behind the curtains, appeared glimpses of paint- 
 ings which a critic would have attributed to the stu- 
 dio of some of his admired masters. A golden chan- 
 delier of fairy proportions suspended its tiny waxen 
 tapers in the centre of the room, while a large mirror, 
 suspended upon the farther side, twinned by its re- 
 flection the magic beauty of this little boudoir of taste 
 and luxury. 
 
144 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 Step by step, yielding to the persuasions of Annette, 
 Ada had suffered herself to be attired not as became 
 a captive, but rather as befitted the queen of her little 
 fairy dominion. Annette herself was prettily attired 
 in a gown of snowy white, bound at the waist by a 
 belt of scarlet velvet, held in front by a small silver 
 clasp. Her dark eyes were veiled by long curling 
 lashes, and her comely features, moulded after the 
 peculiar cast of Jewish female beauty, were shaded by 
 folds of her rich, luxuriant hair, that fell in graceful 
 though negligent curls below her waist. 
 
 With this simplicity, the attire of Ada contrasted. 
 Low over her shoulders fell her gown of purple satin, 
 united at the waist by a belt of plain black velvet and 
 a heavy gold clasp. Peeping out from under the 
 gown the folds of an underdress of gauze, swept over 
 the graceful contour of her bosom, and were joined 
 nearly down to the waist by a broach, richly studded 
 with brilliants, which gleamed forth from the witch- 
 ing recess in which they were embowered, faintly 
 yet interestingly as stars in mid-day. Just above 
 this a delicate chemisette spanned across and cast its 
 shadow, curved like cupid's bended bow, upon her full 
 bosom. There also reposed the image of the Saviour, 
 enwrought in ivory upon a plain, large golden cross, 
 suspended by a necklace of pearls, that rose and fell 
 with her frequent sighs. From its confinement, the 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 145 
 
 skirts parted, revealing her richly embroidered under- 
 dress of white muslin, from beneath which the toe of 
 her tiny moccasin witchingly protruded. Her hair 
 was confined only by a pretty band or coronet, which 
 crossed her brows, in the centre of which a diamond 
 of unusual brilliancy glistened like a star. Escaping 
 thence, her golden hair, in a flood of irregular tresses 
 rather than curls, sweeping by her meek, confiding 
 eyes of heavenly blue, fell upon her shoulders, and 
 across her bosom and down in luxuriant exuberance 
 among the folds of her skirts, as a pearling mountain 
 stream pitches from its topmost height, and dividing 
 in its course, reaches by many channels the base of 
 the beautiful precipice over which it loves to leap. 
 
 Powerful as was the charm of her beauty, so expres- 
 sive of the inner loveliness of her character, it had 
 borrowed additional potency from the faultless taste 
 of Annette, who had arrayed it as for the bridal, and 
 to whose taste Ada had to-day, for the first time, 
 yielded all her past scruples. No wonder that as Mr. 
 Howard entered soon after, it was with a flutter of 
 admiration, and that as he took the quivering hand 
 of Ada, his hand also trembled. 
 
 " I think," said Mr. Howard, seating himself by her 
 side, " the air of the sea more than compensates, in 
 its effects upon your health, for the close confinement 
 
146 Owned and Disowned; jr, 
 
 to which your are subject. Truly, I never saw you 
 looking so well." 
 
 " I am very well/' replied Ada. " Indeed, since 
 ray first pangs of despair have subsided, and especially 
 since my captivity has been releaved by Annette's 
 attentions and your kind society, I have been quite 
 cheerful, though I often wish I could enjoy both under 
 more favorable circumstances." 
 
 " Annette is a pattern of philosophical wisdom/' 
 replied Mr. Howard, deferentially. "I know not 
 what I would have done but for her cheering presence 
 to teach me the difficult art of picking roses from the 
 briars." 
 
 " Yes," said Annette, " my maxim is that what is 
 to be will be, and therefore that whatever is, is right. 
 Hence there is no use to try to sail against wind and 
 Jde. The best way is to float with both and we will 
 find it easy rowing for a while at least. For my part 
 I cannot think that any of us would suffer much if 
 we were only ready and willing to enjoy what we 
 could. But, alas ! my philosophy happens at this 
 moment to be overturned by my experience, for I have 
 such a violent headache, I shall not be able to enjoy 
 your company. Will you excuse me, dearest Ada ?" 
 she asked, faintly, as she rose to retire. 
 
 " Oh, Annette, I am very sorry you cannot be with 
 us," said Ada, with a slight tremor at the thought of 
 
The Chattel Child. 147 
 
 being left alone with Mr. Howard, though she had 
 often secretly wished it. 
 
 " I hope Miss Annette will try to be with us. Ada 
 is so well, and will be so lively this afternoon. I am 
 sure you will quite forget your illness presently," 
 smiled Mr. Howard. 
 
 " I am very sorry/' said Annette. " I had hoped 
 to enjoy the afternoon very much, but you know, Ada, 
 my head has been aching for several hours. I hope 
 you will excuse me." 
 
 " Oh, certainly," said Ada, " if we must," kissing 
 her as they parted at the door. 
 
 "Certainly," said Mr. Howard, with his fingers 
 upon the latch. 
 
 The door closed, and Mr. Howard conducted Ada to 
 the sofa. Never had she, in the presence of any per- 
 son, felt such a consciousness of her own weakness as 
 then. That Mr. Howard was in every way her supe- 
 rior, she did not doubt. There was something in his 
 calm, earnest, self-dependent manner, as well as in 
 the energy and intensity of his intellect, which had 
 ever overawed and impressed her, and which, at that 
 moment, made her feel as if she needed some support- 
 ing prop to rest upon. So sensibly was she impressed 
 with this feeling of weakness that she could scarcely 
 have resumed the conversation, but Mr. Howard re- 
 lieved her by saying 
 
148 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " Annette is a good creature, though her life has, 
 in some respects, been unfortunate." 
 
 " I pity and love her/' replied Ada. 
 
 " Her errors were those of a pure heart, and I should 
 admire much more that gentle portion of her sister- 
 hood, who loved and pitied, than that which con- 
 demned her." 
 
 Ada blushed and remained silent. 
 
 " Youth is the turning point of life," pursued her 
 visitor. " Ah ! with what sad reflections do I look 
 back upon mine." 
 
 " Sad !" said Ada, tenderly, lifting her long silken 
 lashes from their downcast droop, and resting her moist- 
 ened eyes upon his. " Your youth can scarcely yet be 
 said to be past. But I thought it was very happy." 
 
 " Some portions of it were," he replied, " but at the 
 last it was blighted witheringly blasted, and has 
 been miserable ever since." 
 
 "By w^iat affliction," asked Ada, involuntarily 
 leaning forward in her interest, and suffering her tiny 
 hand to repose upon his own. 
 
 " By the heaviest of all afflictions love," replied 
 Mr. Howard, smiling. 
 
 Ada relapsed into her former position with a coquet- 
 tish frown of pleased disappointment. 
 
 " Why, Mr. Howard, I supposed you were proof 
 against such calamities." 
 
The Chattel Child. 149 
 
 " Since that time I have endeavored to be ; but 
 every day convinces me how hard it is to keep my 
 resolution." 
 
 " Yon certainly could not be placed in better cir- 
 cumstances for keeping it than here, away from that 
 society in which alone you could be won to break it/' 
 said Ada, playing childishly with the twining tresses 
 of golden hair which strayed across her lap. 
 
 " Perhaps so," he replied, carelessly. " What a 
 noble vessel is now crossing so near our wake," said 
 he, passing one arm over her snowy shoulders, while 
 with the other he pointed out the approaching object. 
 
 " Yes," said Ada, turning, and leaning upon the 
 familiar arm that she might see it better. " It is so 
 seldom they cross our path, that their presence seems 
 very, very welcome. Ah ! how I wish you knew whom 
 you were approaching, and would try to capture 
 her." 
 
 " I am sure I would do so with pleasure, did I see 
 the possibility of success," replied Mr. Howard, with 
 a smile." 
 
 " You ! Why, Mr. Howard, of course you could 
 do nothing. I was talking to the vessel." 
 
 "Oh! I beg pardon." 
 
 "Alas !" she continued, turning from the vessel and 
 gazing into his warm, flashing eye, with innocent sim- 
 plicity, " in that matter I fear neither of us can assist 
 
150 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 the other much. Now, Mr. Howard there, never 
 mind your arm ; I did not change my position l^cause 
 it was unpleasant to me I prefer you should act with 
 the freedom of a brother with one towards whom you 
 have been so brotherly. Now, I have a favor to beg. 
 Will you not tell me all about the sad affection which 
 has rested like a blight over your happiness ? You 
 know it is an interest deeper than mere curiosity which 
 leads me to ask it." 
 
 " It is a painful, though brief story, which I have 
 never told to living mortal before," he said, "and which 
 I should prefer never to tell to you, as it involves the 
 prevalent charge against one of your sex. At least, 
 you will permit me to defer it to some other time." 
 
 " Ah ! Mr. Howard, another time we may never see 
 together. Do pray tell me, that I may sympathize in 
 your sorrow." 
 
 " And avoid," suggested Mr. Howard, smiling, "the 
 same error of inconstancy, which has so often converted 
 love from the richest of blessings into the deadliest of 
 poisons. For the last consideration, if you will accept 
 it, I will give you the brief, though to me affecting nar- 
 rative. 
 
 " Deeply and permanently associated with the ear- 
 liest recollections of my infancy," he commenced, " is 
 the image of Ellen Melrose. The humble homes of 
 our parents were closely adjoining, and in a district in 
 
The Chattel Child. 151 
 
 which there were no other neighbors for many miles. 
 My first recollections of her tiny little form are when 
 we would meet at the garden fence, which bounded 
 her father's garden from that of my mother, and there 
 spend hours in quiet, child-like communion, before we 
 were yet able to talk even to each other. ' As we grew 
 older, our companionship, though as free of guile and 
 more intelligent, was not less intimate. At play, at 
 school everywhere but at the table and in sleep we 
 were constantly together, until she was thirteen years 
 of age. Then she began to be less familiar, and 
 finally became quite demure and shy, but still very 
 kind, very winning, very pretty. I loved her the more 
 for the feminine, lady-like modesty which grew upon 
 her ; and though then we could not romp wildly 
 together as before, our walks were more seldom, and 
 more staid and quiet, and never continued far from 
 her house ; and though I was obliged to change my 
 old manner of testifying my regard for her by open 
 words, or by a hearty kiss, and instead to present her 
 a wild flower, or a little tame rabbit, or a dove, or 
 something of that description, yet I felt such a pro- 
 priety and beauty in all this, which without a word 
 of reproof or correction she mysteriously impressed 
 upon me, that in a word I was fully and fairly in 
 love. 
 
 " I was not long in making my heart known to her. 
 
152 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 At first, she fluttered modestly, like a timid bird when 
 first caught, but soon, as if by a decree of our natures 
 which neither of us could resist, the perfect confidence 
 of our infancy was fully restored, heightened by a 
 more powerful and tender attachment, which appeared 
 to me to borrow a softer, deeper, and lovelier hue as 
 we watched together each succeeding sunset." 
 
 " How happy !" remarked Ada, as her dreamy eyes 
 seemed to gaze upon the picture of unallowed affec- 
 tion. 
 
 " Those were indeed sweet and happy moments," 
 continued Mr. Howard. " Were I persuaded that 
 earth could ever renew them for me, I should be fully 
 content to endure all the evils of life with buoyant 
 hope." 
 
 "And have you no hope that earth can renew them ?" 
 asked Ada. 
 
 " Alas !" said Mr. Howard, " would that it might ! 
 But such affection is a mellow fruit, that ripens only- 
 in the sunshine of implicit confidence ; and I fear 
 that my subsequent experience has so corroded my 
 heart with distrust, that I am scarcely worthy of the 
 love of one so unselfish and angelic as I once supposed 
 Ellen Melrose to be." 
 
 Ada sighed, and said nothing, but the soft, heavenly 
 light of her blue orbs rested upon his dark, earnest 
 eye with an expression of unmingled sympathy, which 
 
The Chattel Child. 153 
 
 he seemed not to notice, as his thoughts were entirely 
 fixed upon the distant object of which he was speak- 
 ing, hut which, with the occasional sudden heaving 
 and falling of the crucifix upon her bosom, revealed 
 more of the heart than either seemed to be aware of. 
 " So," he continued, " our lives down to the age of 
 seventeen glided smoothly into each other, like two 
 pearly brooks which have met in one, to be divided 
 no more forever. Then I was obliged to choose a pro- 
 fession, and having an uncle in the command of an 
 East India merchantman, with whom my mother was 
 quite desirous to place me, thinking that a few years 
 of faithful attendance to my duties would raise me to 
 some responsible and lucrative command, I determined 
 to go to sea. I need not tell you how my betrothed, 
 who, I believe, verily thought she loved me as heart 
 never before loved, wept and sobbed when I broke to 
 her the news, that for the first time in our lives we 
 were to be separated, and that, too, for a very, very 
 long time, for two, or even three years, at the end of 
 which time I hoped to have the command of a similar 
 vessel, and then to claim her as my own and make her 
 my bride. She urged me by all that was good, or 
 could excite my pity, not to go where I should be 
 obliged to leave her alone so long. Poor fool that I was, 
 that I did not listen to her," groaned Howard, as for 
 
 7* 
 
154 Jwned and Disoivned] or, 
 
 a moment he covered his face with his handkerchief, 
 while his manly frame shook with emotion. 
 
 As he removed the covering from his face, and 
 turned again to Ada to resume his story, her downcast 
 eyes reverted from him to the floor. They were suf- 
 fused with tears several large drops of the pure dew 
 of sympathy lingered upon her cheeks, and one had 
 fallen upon her bosom, which ever and anon heaved 
 convulsively. 
 
 " I perceive," he continued, " my dear young friend, 
 that your warm, sympathetic heart is grieved, rather 
 than interested, by my story, and I will close the cur- 
 tain upon it now, for the rest is all all dark. The 
 ship was gone nearly three years." 
 
 " It was difficult for us to send letters, many of 
 them miscarried, and their answers were long in com- 
 ing. Besides, my port was changed so that but one 
 or two of her letters reached me. Feeling sick at heart 
 whenever I sat down to write, at the thought that the 
 whole world lay between us, and that the answer to 
 my letter could not by possibility reach me within a 
 year, and probably would not at all, I trusted my love 
 to her constancy, and wrote but seldom. At the end 
 of three years I returned to that lonely hamlet among 
 the hills, Faint rumors had reached home of my 
 death, but I knew they were not such as truthful love 
 would recognize. As the two cottages, in which she 
 
The Chattel Child. 155 
 
 and I had lived and loved away the sunshiny morning 
 of life, came to view, my bursting heart seemed as if 
 it would tear my feet from the earth, and bear me on- 
 ward upon hidden wings. I ran like a deer, and wept 
 like a child. There they were, the consecrated scenes 
 of my infancy and my love. I felt faint and sick, so 
 overcome was I with emotions of gratitude, that I had 
 been spared from the fearful tempests, and all the 
 dangers of war and the deep, to return now and be- 
 hold the cot of her infancy and mine, still the same, 
 not a tree removed, not a picket changed, not a flower 
 more or less than when I left it, that I involuntarily 
 sunk upon the sod and said, ' Heavenly Father ! all 
 this I have not deserved. Oh, God, I thank thee !' 
 Again I arose and ran on, across the heath and over 
 the meadows, as when a boy. My heart was in a 
 bursting storm of excitement. ' Where was she ?' 
 thought I, ' and why had she not come out to meet 
 me ? Alas/ I thought, ( she does not know of my 
 coming, or she would have met me with the pilot that 
 brought us into harbor. But so much the greater will 
 be her joy when I shall clasp her, after my long ab- 
 sence, to my bosom/ My mother's door was nearest. 
 I saw her aged form, more bowed, I thought, than 
 when I had last seen it come tottering out over the 
 threshold. But I could not stop. With the speed 
 of the \\ind I rushed past. I stood at the door of 
 
156 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 Ellen. I lifted the latch and entered. The room was 
 deserted. A moment sufficed for me to dart over the 
 house, through every room, but all was deserted and 
 still. Full of a thousand forebodings, I returned to 
 the house of my mother. The clear bell of the neigh- 
 boring village church chimed merrily forth, as it had 
 done in the hours of my childhood. After the first 
 joyful embraces were over, I begged of her to tell me 
 where Ellen was. But my poor old mother, as the 
 words fell from me, put her thin fingers upon my lips, 
 and laid her head upon my broad breast, now strug- 
 gling with every conflicting emotion, and weeping, 
 said 
 
 " c Forgive her, my poor boy, forgive her, for she 
 meant not wrong. But yonder chiming bells have 
 just ceased, and now Ellen Melrose is standing before 
 the altar to be married. All the people of the village 
 have gone to see her, for all say she will be the most 
 beautiful bride who has ever stood before that altar. 
 I alone remained at home, for I knew that on earth or 
 in heaven, she was plighted to my poor Arthur, my 
 boy far off on the ocean, and I could not see her given 
 to a stranger. God have mercy on you, my poor boy, 
 and help you to forget her/ 
 
 " As my mother repeated over and over again her 
 weeping wish, she led my tottering form to a chair, for 
 I could not stand. My head sunk upon my bosom, I 
 
The Cliattel Child. 157 
 
 thought I could feel that the throbbings of my heart 
 were growing less and less frequent, and I believed and 
 hoped that I was dying. I passed off into a sort of 
 lethargic dream, in which I saw over and over again 
 her hand given to another, and her sweet smile as she 
 bowed when asked ' to love, honor and obey' a stranger. 
 I remembered no more until I awoke the next morning. 
 
 " Then my mother informed me that at the wed- 
 ding thrice had the beautiful bride stood up to yield 
 to the ceremony, and thrice she had been obliged, by 
 sudden illness, to resume her seat, that strange vis- 
 ions of fear seemed to pass every moment before her, 
 and that her wedding had been a memorably sad affair 
 to all who had witnessed it. Then, Ada, I knew that 
 Ellen Melrose had loved me still, even while she had 
 vowed to love another ; but, alas, what pleasure could 
 I find in so doubly wretched a thought. I never saw 
 her again, but left my mother's house in a few hours, 
 to which I have never returned, but whither I was about 
 returning when I was taken prisoner by this vessel, and 
 I know not now whether I may ever again visit the 
 home of my infancy." 
 
 " Ah I" cried Ada, as he ceased the narrative, " how 
 I pity poor, poor Ellen." 
 
 " Ellen ?" inquired Howard with surprise. 
 
 " Yes," replied Ada. " You have no consciousness 
 of vows broken, or of tender affections blighted by 
 
158 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 your fault. The history of your love has been that of 
 a noble struggle on your part to bless and make happy 
 the object loved. On hers, it must remind her pain- 
 fully, that while you were engaged for her sake in this 
 noble struggle, her inconstancy and fickleness has 
 blasted her happiness forever. She has fallen from a 
 position so many would have envied, to that of being 
 bound eternally to one she does not love, while you 
 are free to centre your affections upon some more con- 
 stant object if you can ever meet with one worthy of 
 your regard." 
 
 As the beautiful Ada closed this sentence with a 
 trembling voice and hesitating manner, evidently too 
 much absorbed by her sympathies to be fully conscious 
 of the import of her words, and then blushed as if 
 fearful she might have expressed too much, Mr. How- 
 ard for the first time placed her hand in his, and for a 
 moment gazed upon her trembling, lovely form, and 
 steadily and passionately into her suffused and lustrous 
 eyes. How could he but read that the artless young 
 creature before him was sweetly and confidingly throb- 
 bing with a love whose nature and intensity she in her 
 simplicity had not paused to fathom, and which could 
 he otherwise than return ? 
 
 In another moment he knelt before her, and bowed 
 his lips to the tiny, trembling hand of Ada, which in- 
 
Tlie Chattel Child. 159 
 
 voluntarily unfolded to receive their pressure, like a 
 flower at the kiss of the sun. 
 
 " Can I dare I hope/' he murmured faulteringly, 
 " that the one person who in every feature and linea- 
 ment is the image of the once loved Ellen, and who 
 has called forth the boundless passion of a heart which 
 I had thought never could love again can you, dear- 
 est Ada, permit me to hope " 
 
 A slight, warm pressure from the soft and fairy 
 hand which rested upon his, seemed to course his 
 veins with a thrill of lightning, for it told him all a 
 lover could have asked. The other fell from the blush- 
 ing brows it had shaded down to her lap, as if invit- 
 ingly tendering him its fairy strength to lift him up 
 from his kneeling position. A sweet smile wreathed 
 her lips, which as he rose, now emboldened to press 
 them, he saw gathered into a bewitching readiness to 
 receive his own. They met, and still lingered and 
 clung together with a soft and delightful pressure. 
 Transported in a whirl of happy sensations, Ada sunk 
 languidly reclining upon his arm. Tenderly he clasped 
 her yielding form. Her arms involuntarily rose to 
 enfold the object of her love in their embrace, while in 
 the confusion of her thoughts she could but murmur, 
 in a broken whisper 
 
 "Let me be to you as Ellen. Nay, as Kuth to 
 Naomi : c Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return 
 
160 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 from following after thee ; for whither thou goest I 
 will go, and where thou lodgest I will lodge ; thy 
 people shall be my people, and thy God my God/ 
 Ah, dearest, never til] now had I learned how sweet 
 was the cup of love." 
 
 At that moment the dream of passion into which 
 they were passing was broken by a light rap at the 
 door, and Annette entered, bearing a lamp, for it was 
 now growing twilight. Lighting with it several of the 
 miniature tapers of the chandelier, and requesting Ada 
 to watch it and light others, as they would soon burn 
 out and leave them in darkness, she again excused 
 herself on account of her violent head ache, and left 
 Mr. Howard and Ada to themselves. 
 
The Chattel Child. 161 
 
 CHAPTEK XVI. 
 
 " Here lurked a wretch who had not crept abroad 
 
 For forty years no face of mortal seen : 
 In chamber brooding like a loathly toad ; 
 
 And sure his linen was not very clean. 
 Through secret loop-holes that had practised been, 
 
 Near to his bed, his dinner vile he took ; 
 Unkempt and rough, of squalid face and mien 
 
 Our castle's shame !" CASTLE OP INDOLENCE. 
 
 YERY early that morning, habited in her usual garb 
 of gray, with long cape, and a bonnet that nearly con- 
 cealed her features now pale almost to transparency, 
 yet still beautiful, notwithstanding the disease which 
 had marked them, and soft and winning in their expres- 
 sion Sister Clara might have been seen issuing with her 
 usually quick, though delicate step, from the threshold 
 of the house of the sisterhood, and through the heavy 
 iron gate into the street. The dawn had just broken, 
 and the lamps were not yet extinguished. The counte- 
 nance of Sister Clara beamed with the holiness and 
 charity of her vocation, and would have gone farther 
 towards converting the unbeliever to a faith in the in- 
 stitution to which she was attached, than volumes of 
 
162 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 argument. Her eyes, though very black, large, and 
 lustrous, were now more subdued, perhaps, than in 
 their youth, and beamed with an expression of exceed- 
 ing kindness and benevolence, softened by a shade of 
 sadness. Her complexion had never been removed 
 from the pure Circassian by a shade sufficient to hide 
 the rose upon her cheek, though now that rose had 
 vanished, and was replaced usually by a lily-like pale- 
 ness, occasionally substituted by the hectic flush of 
 the consumptive. Here and there a delicate wrinkle 
 marked the footsteps of time, or the traces of deeper 
 destroyers upon her countenance. And as she paused 
 a moment in front of the gate, as if hesitating which 
 route to pursue, the slightly chilly air even of that 
 August morning, went painfully to her lungs, and 
 she coughed with a deep, hollow, and fearful sound, 
 which seemed to say that she was more fit to receive- 
 than to give the nursing and healing attentions of a 
 Sister of Charity. 
 
 In a moment she took the street which led to the 
 left from the institution, and seeming at every turn 
 to avoid the more respectable thoroughfares, she came 
 at length into one of the lowest streets, or rather alleys 
 of the city. 
 
 The buildings old and wooden were nearly all 
 of one story, none of them more than two unpainted, 
 rudely patched, black, reeling, and dilapidated and 
 
The Chattel Child. 163 
 
 occupied almost entirely as liquor stalls and junk 
 shops. Into the narrow street were now skulking or 
 emerging a population corresponding to the locality 
 ragged, besotted, and bruised mostly negroes or whites 
 of the grossest appearance with pitiable and brutal 
 faces, expressive only of poverty, crime, and misery. 
 
 The Sister pursued her way as if habituated to the 
 scene around her, until by a narrow doorway, the dooi 
 of which hung suspended upon one hinge, and which 
 she had some difficulty in removing, she passed into 
 a still narrower passage, the paved floor of which 
 seemed to have been used rather as a sewer for refuse, 
 slops and filth than as an alley, and by this reached a 
 small yard, indescribably filthy, at the further end of 
 which was a more commodious rear house, which might 
 once have been respectable in appearance. Its doors 
 and shutters were fastened, and the moss grew over its 
 threshold and window-sills, as if it had been asleep for 
 a century. 
 
 Drawing a bunch of keys from her pocket, Sistei 
 Clara noiselessly applied one of them to the door. It 
 opened, and she as noiselessly entered into a hall, in 
 which, as she closed the door, the faint morning light 
 which came in through a few panes over the door, 
 partially covered with green paper, scarcely relieved 
 the darkness. An open door, however, led into a par- 
 lor, better lighted by a hole in a broken window-blind, 
 
164 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 beneath which was a broken pane, as if some heavy 
 niissil had been thrown through. A shattered chan- 
 delier stood upon the mantel-piece, beneath which 
 were its fragments of glass, and in one corner of the 
 room lay a heavy paving stone. With these excep- 
 tions, the neat antique furniture of the room appro- 
 priate to the parlor of a person in medium circum- 
 stances, corresponded with the outward appearance of 
 the house, and looked as if it might have slept there 
 in undisturbed repose for half a century. Through the 
 great hole in the window-blind and pane, the dust 
 had entered, and lay beneath it like a snow-drift upon 
 the floor. A chair that sat in its way, had caught its 
 due share of the descending cloud ; and upon every 
 article of furniture the undisturbed film of dust, here 
 and there relieved by the web of the house spider, in- 
 dicated that no housewife or other meddling person 
 had there intruded for many years. 
 
 We have said that she entered the hall in silence : 
 not so. Hardly had the door closed upon her, when 
 a springing and creaking sound, as if a lunatic were 
 turning a somerset upon a rickety bedstead, was 
 heard, and at her first step along the hall she stopped, 
 and involuntarily quaked for a moment, as a weird, 
 shrill, piping voice shrieked rapidly from beneath 
 " Who's there ? who's there ? who's there ?" 
 Without immediately answering, she again pro- 
 
The Chattel Child. 165 
 
 * 
 ceeded, stepping cautiously down the dark stairs, in 
 
 the direction of the voice, which came from the rear 
 of the house, and apparently from the cellar. 
 
 " Who's there ? Kobbers ! thieves !" shrieked the 
 voice fearfully, and in accents of almost maniac earn- 
 estness. "I've got nothing ; go away ; don't come 
 here ; lasaaks is poor ! Who are you ? Who's 
 there, I say ?" 
 
 " Sister Clara," responded the holy nun, in a voice 
 which seemed for a moment to abate his insane anxiety. 
 
 " Sister Clara ! Ah, yes quick let me see you. 
 Where's my child ? Have you brought her ? Have 
 you found her ?" And then, as she crept stealthily 
 along the dark passage, she heard his high, shrill 
 voice, as he again piped forth, between a yell and a 
 whisper 
 
 " I don't believe it it's a cheat ! Sister Clara ? 
 No ! robbers robbers ! 1 tell you, don't come here ! ' 
 And again the springing sound came, and the bed 
 creaked awfully. At length she reached the door from 
 whence these fearful, incoherent ravings still issued, 
 and opened it. 
 
 The room was very dark lit only like the parlor by 
 two similar holes in the broken shutter and pane. The 
 air was earthly damp and offensive. The apartment 
 was quite large but almost naked of furniture. A 
 few broken chairs and three or four chests were ar- 
 
166 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 ranged along the sides of the room, and scattered over 
 the floor, which was of earth, trodden to hardness. 
 The walls were of brick and stone. In the farther 
 and darker corner of this cellar, holt upright upon a 
 rude, hare, unpillowed bed, thin and formed of straw, 
 sat a shrivelled figure, covered to the waist only with 
 its soiled linen, and inadequately concealed as to the 
 remainder by the remnant of a sheet and an old 
 blanket. 
 
 As she entered he withdrew his shading hand from 
 above his peering eyes and revealed a gaunt face, 
 which might have been copied by Hogarth as the 
 picture of famine. A few white hairs formed a sort 
 of beard, running around the back of his head from 
 ear to ear. The rest of his small, low cranium was 
 entirely bare. He had no forehead, but the top of his 
 head commenced at the root of his great heavy nose 
 and run backward and upward. His small, snake-like 
 eyes emitting a wild maniac glare, by which they 
 seemed to have looked themselves into blindness, were 
 far apart, and his head immediately behind them 
 broad. His mouth was small and gathered into a 
 whirlpool of wrinkles, which also formed two minor 
 eddys around his eyes. His chin was almost wanting, 
 and his cheeks sunken, so that his whole face seemed 
 merged into one gigantic feature the nose. Here 
 and there a single penurious, stinted hair, of several 
 
The Chattel Child. 167 
 
 inches in length, strayed over his countenance, like 
 the long effort of some seed sprouting towards the 
 light in a dark cellar, but he had no beard. Beside 
 him upon his bed, and with one of his arms resting 
 upon it, lay a plain open coffin, the lid of which was 
 leaning against the wall behind him. A part of an- 
 other chest appeared from beneath his bed ; upon the 
 end of which were a tin cup of water and a broken 
 remnant of bread. There was no fireplace in the 
 apartment. It was a bare cellar. 
 
 " Have you found her ?" exclaimed this frightful 
 apparition, eagerly, as she entered. " Do you bring 
 my daughter ? Speak, woman !" 
 
 Sister Clara shook her head, and advancing, took 
 from the basket which she carried under her arm, a 
 portion of a loaf of bread. 
 
 "Have you heard nothing from her?" he continued. 
 
 " Nothing whatever," said Sister Clara. 
 
 "Away away then, you harlot," raved the drawl- 
 ing lunatic. " What do you come here for ? You 
 come here to find me dead, so that you can get my 
 money. I've got no money. lasaacks is poor. There, 
 give me that bread." 
 
 She cut him off a piece and watched him while he 
 ate it. 
 
 " If it were not for you I'd starve. But it's not 
 charity that brings you here. If I waited for that I'd 
 
168 Owned and Disowned ; or 
 
 starve too. You think I've got money, and that I'll 
 turn Christian and leave it to you. I want you to 
 think so but I won't. I'll not leave the worship of 
 my fathers. Besides, I've got no money. Don't I 
 tell you I'm poor, you miserable shrew ? Don't I 
 tell you 
 
 " Give me the whole of that bread. Why not ? 
 do you think I'll hide it, and not eat it ? What a 
 fool ! lasaacks is poor. lasaacks is hungry but 
 lasaacks is poor, and can't buy anything to eat. It's 
 very kind in you to come and feed him," muttered the 
 old chatterer as he rapidly devoured piece after piece of 
 the victual she had brought "for you know lasaacks 
 is very poor and would starve. Yet people that don't 
 know him say he's got money. Where, I'd like to 
 know ? In these chests ? Ha ! ha ! Here are the 
 keys there they are take them. You may have all 
 you can find. No secret drawers no springs and, 
 ha ! ha ! no money. Why should there be ? lasaacks 
 is poor lasaacks is poor." 
 
 " Now," said Sister Clara, in a tone whose mild, 
 soothing gentleness contrasted strangely with that of 
 the shattered being before her, " now take this cup of 
 water. It will cool your heated brows, and do you 
 good. Our religion teaches us that to give a cup of " 
 
 " Fire and brimstone ! D your religion," 
 
 shrieked the man, with one hand gesturing wildly in 
 
The Chattel Child. 169 
 
 the violence of his passion, and with the other eagerly 
 snatching the cooling cup. " You can't convert me," 
 said he, pausing for a moment to drink spasmodically. 
 " Make an apostate renegade of me ! I follow the 
 faith of my fathers. There, leave me this piece for 
 my supper. You won't leave me to starve, will you ? 
 You who expect to get all I'm worth which is noth- 
 ing ! There, that's right," said he, seizing the rem- 
 nant of bread she gave him. 
 
 " Now I've got enough of you clear out. Do you 
 want to stop and eat up yourself this miserable morsel 
 which will just barely last me till I die ? Yes ! 
 you'd like to, and leave me to starve. You pretend 
 you are trying to find my daughter. Poor Annette ! 
 poor Annette ! But you're not you witch you hag. 
 You're deceiving me. Now," said he, raising his 
 voice as the holy sister prepared to retire, flinging 
 aloft his arms, and flourishing his clenched fists in a 
 manner that would have been frightful to one of less 
 nerve than Sister Clara. " Now do you hear me ? 
 I've had enough of your hypocritical charity. You 
 come here to eat out my substance. Clear out be- 
 gone, you wretch begone begone !" 
 
 She closed the door. Scarcely had she done so, 
 when he tottered to the floor, and lifting the lid of 
 the chest which protruded from beneath his bed, ex- 
 posing its contents, consisting of decaying scraps of 
 
 8 
 
170 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 bread and other filthy food, which he had received and 
 saved in the same manner, he thrust the portion she 
 had left with him, into the offensive receptacle, and 
 closing the lid quickly, fell once more hurriedly upon 
 the couch, turned towards the door and listened to the 
 receding footsteps of the saint, until she had emerged 
 into the yard, and then placing one of his fingers be- 
 side his nose, and with those of the other hand rap- 
 ping a hollow tune upon his coffin he, still sitting up- 
 right on his bed, stared against the vacant wall, and 
 grinned horribly, then threw off his covering, jumped 
 into his coffin, and laid down. 
 
The Chattel Child. 171 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE PRISONER. 
 
 Daniel. " Quot homines tot scntentias." 
 Martin." And what is that!" 
 
 Daniel. " 'Tis Greek, and argues difference of opinion." 
 
 JOHN WOODVILLE. 
 
 THE sun had risen, and industrious people and 
 slaves were entering upon the business of the day, and 
 aristocrats and vagabonds were just gliding off into 
 their second nap, when Sister Clara emerged from the 
 dingy passage leading to the house of the Jew, into 
 the scarcely less dingy street. The vagabonds being 
 almost the only inhabitants of this immediate vicinity, 
 but little life yet animated it. A few thieves and rag- 
 pickers were returning to their rendezvous, and some 
 hucksters, organ-grinders, and pea-nut sellers were 
 emerging. A feeling of intense sadness shadowed her 
 soul, as it had often done before, as she came forth 
 into the narrow and filthy lane, and glanced at the 
 wretched beings who were dodging into the alleys, or 
 leaning sleepily from the windows, with besotted and 
 
172 Owned and Disowned ; >r, 
 
 
 
 diseased countenances, and in listless rags. Age, else- 
 where venerable, and made kind and pious by the ordi- 
 nary chastisements of life, here wore only the sullen, 
 misanthropic scowl of those whose life is suffering 
 alone. Womanhood, elsewhere the purifying element 
 of society, here gross, abandoned, and shameless, 
 teaches lisping infancy to swear like a pirate, instructs 
 the tongue to lie, and punishes the cheek if it blushes, 
 and persuades trembling honesty to pluck up courage 
 and steal. Here infancy, even at the bosom of its 
 drunken mother, tastes a stimulant which starts it in 
 life with a besotting and ruinous thirst. Here, out of 
 one generation loathsome with inherited and acquired 
 sins and diseases, is constantly issuing another, which, 
 by the law of hereditary transmission, enters the 
 world the involuntary heir of wicked hearts and dis- 
 eased bodies, in which the soul of a saint could not 
 live righteously. Here youth finds its school in the 
 tippling den, its college in the gambling hell, its 
 church in the brothel, and its home in the penitentiary 
 wasting, in its continuous shifting between these 
 institutions so kindly fostered by most governments, 
 out of polite deference for the devil's love of liberty, 
 the small residue of health which inherited disease and 
 imbecility have left them. Here maidenhood, else- 
 where flowering in such moral and physical loveliness, 
 that poetry and prose have soared above all other fields 
 
The Chattel Child. 173 
 
 in the effort to embody it, and have soared in vain 
 maidenhood so purifying, so refining, so angelic when 
 in virtue 
 
 " Standing with reluctant feet, 
 Where the brook and river meet, 
 Womanhood and childhood sweet," 
 
 here plays a kindred part with whisky in the drama 
 of ruin. 
 
 "Alas/ 7 thought Sister Clara, "what can be the 
 effect of the death of Jesus of Nazareth, of whom they 
 know little and care less, upon these people ! As well, 
 I am convinced, might we look for a saving power in 
 the cup of Socrates. And yet, is it credible that God 
 has created any portion of humanity to be from birth 
 eternally beyond the moral possibility of salvation ? 
 Can it be possible that that portion exists in the heart 
 of a great and Christian city ! Oh," murmured the 
 benevolent Sister, as the tears dimmed her eyes, " that 
 I had a thousand lives, that I might give them all up 
 "to save these miserable wretches." But what could 
 she do, single-handed and alone ! As well attempt to 
 mow down forests with a sickle. She was without in- 
 fluence in the church, being controlled and not con- 
 trolling, even in the limited sphere of her own daily 
 labors. Besides, the reply which she had ever received 
 from the church, was that the souls of these people 
 were as secure as any, and even more. For nearly all 
 
174 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 of them were unquestioning believers in the true 
 church, and thus better off than many whose smatter- 
 ing education and misdirected information led them 
 into heinous errors of doctrine, much more flagrant 
 than any acts of mere weakness and passion, and which 
 inevitably effected their endless damnation. There 
 were many of these who, almost in proportion to their 
 apparent darkness, were steadfastly attached to the 
 faith, received before their death full absolution for 
 their past sins, and as Paul brought the energy ac- 
 quired in persecuting the church, when converted, into 
 the service of the church, so these wretches saved 
 money enough, even from the proceeds of their wick- 
 edness, to pay penance, and redeem their souls from ^ 
 purgatory, and were saved, in overwhelming proof of 
 the great mercy of God, while thousands of the most 
 learned, upright, and well-meaning men, who were, 
 unfortunately, the most likely to be mistaken heretics, 
 did not repent, paid no penance, received no absolution, 
 and were irrevocably and endlessly damned in a lake 
 of fire and brimstone, in proof of his justice. 
 
 Of these facts there could be no doubt, as nearly 
 the whole Christian world, Catholic as well as Protes- 
 tant, were united upon the point that belief in a par- 
 ticular creed was the only and necessary condition 
 precedent to salvation, the only question being as to 
 what the right creed might be. Upon this point the 
 
The Chattel Child. 175 
 
 argument was equally plain in favor of the truth of 
 the Roman Catholic Church, and hence of the benefi- 
 cent condition and final endless bliss of these seemingly 
 wretched creatures, for it is evident that a just and 
 benevolent God never would give the light to a few, 
 and leave the great majority in darkness, when their 
 eternal condition depended upon it. But, inasmuch 
 as the Koman Catholic Church embraced nearly all of 
 Christendom, and the small remnant of Protestants 
 was divided into hundreds of disputing sects, each 
 one of which differed within itself, so that probably 
 there were scarcely two Protestants fully agreed upon 
 all points, it follows that if salvation depends upon 
 belief, the question will be whether one Protestant is 
 to be saved, and the millions of the Roman Catholic 
 Church are to be damned, or whether a benevolent 
 God has so framed the truth that a majority of his 
 people will believe it and be saved. 
 
 Revolving these thoughts not very satisfactorily in 
 her mind, as she had often done with equal ill-success 
 before, Sister Clara hurried quickly out of the dingy 
 and loathsome district, and was threading her way 
 homeward into more respectable thoroughfares and 
 through increasing numbers of people, when she found 
 herself suddenly environed by a crowd who seemed 
 called together and excited by no usual circumstance. 
 Lifting her eyes from the ground, where they had 
 
176 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 been meditatively resting, they fell upon an object 
 which could not fail to enlist her sympathies. In the 
 midst of a great concourse of people, drawn together 
 apparently by absorbing curiosity, and followed by a 
 score of armed men, dressed partially in the uniform 
 of soldiers and of police, walked four persons, bearing 
 upon a litter which rested upon their shoulders, the 
 form of a -young man. 
 
 He was wounded, for his arm was bandaged, and 
 bandages were around his waist, all red and oozing 
 with gore. Notwithstanding his wounds, his- hands 
 were tied behind him, and his ancles bound as those 
 of a criminal. Beautiful locks of raven hair, parted 
 in mid forehead, fell gracefully down to his shoulders, 
 past features intellectual and handsome ; but now, as 
 he turned from side to side, and looked vacantly in 
 confused and dreamy wonder upon the crowd that were 
 bearing him on, that face was pale and full of anguish. 
 
 ISTo inquiry was necessary to explain the scene before 
 her ; for from mouth to mouth the explanation was 
 passing 
 
 " It is Conrad, the great pirate Lafitte's lieu- 
 tenant." 
 
 "They'll make short work of him," remarked a 
 burly merchant, standing upon his door-steps, to his 
 neighboring knight 01 the tape and scissors. 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 177 
 
 " That they will ! And they ought to, for he is 
 the veriest scoundrel unhung." 
 
 " I wonder if they will stop to try him ? It seems - 
 like a waste of money to do so, when the proof is so 
 plain. They caught him upon his return from some 
 nefarious expedition, and shot him in the midst of his 
 own crew. What better evidence do they want than 
 that ?" 
 
 " Sure enough ! They say that the expedition of 
 the pirates was to kidnap the heiress of a rich planter 
 up the river, named Preston a tall prize that. The 
 old fellow owns a thousand niggers. She'd a' brought 
 a nice ransom if they could have got her to Havana. 
 But it seems the honest, unsuspecting old gentleman 
 discovered something wrong after awhile, and set the 
 police at work just in time to capture this fellow, 
 though not to save his daughter, whom they suc- 
 ceeded in getting off with." 
 
 " Horrible damnable ! Just think what will be- 
 come of the poor girl ! The whole city ought to rise, 
 as one man, and capture those bloody hounds. It 
 serves us right. It has been rumored that for years 
 this Conrad has passed, under a thin disguise, through 
 the best society of New Orleans, and that some even 
 knew him, and were bought off by a few niggers. I 
 hope this Preston, who is more than half suspected, 
 
 though nobody knows why, of being no better than he 
 
 8* 
 
178 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 ought to be, was one of those who took such a snake 
 to their hands. He ought to be bit, if only for ap- 
 pearing so crawling and mean as he does, if he is 
 honest, which I don't believe he is." 
 
 Don't judge too harshly. I have seen many people 
 in my day, and I watched very carefully the face of 
 that young man as he passed just now, and what's 
 more, I was in the boat that picked him up and brought 
 him to shore, and manacled him, and I don't wonder 
 a country planter should be deceived by him." 
 
 " He had such a pious expression of overwhelmed 
 innocence," said another, "that in spite of the evidence 
 of my own eyes, for I saw him shot, every time I 
 looked at him I believed him innocent." 
 
 " Possible what an incarnate devil !" 
 
 " You wouldn't say so after seeing him." 
 
 " What does he say for himself?" 
 
 " Oh, most of the time, till they put the irons on 
 him, he was insensible ; and then he picked up, and 
 grew flighty, and acted off raving, about the girl and 
 about his mother, with a naturalness that would have 
 made your heart break." 
 
 " Gave the world some new lessons in fancy swear- 
 ing, I suppose," suggested the Scissors. 
 
 "Too cunning for that," replied the merchant 
 "never dropped a word that a lady would not have 
 felt lika loving him for prayed that the spirit of his 
 
The CJiattel Child. 179 
 
 mother would be with him in his affliction, and prayed 
 actually prayed, with his hands clasped in front of 
 him, and with tears streaming from his eyes that 
 God would save ' Julia' that's the girl he's kid- 
 napped, I suppose from her terrible destiny. So he 
 did until we all felt shocked at the wretch, and tied 
 his hands behind him, to prevent him from going 
 through his blasphemous performances. Oh, he's the 
 devil's own." 
 
 " What a bird ! Does he mean to make any one 
 believe he is innocent ?" 
 
 " Not exactly, I shouldn't think ; for when we 
 asked him if he was one of the pirates, and whether 
 he did not command at least the boat we saw him in 
 for we saw him acting in command of it and whether 
 he was not Conrad, he said, ' It's no use ; you know 
 where you have found me.' . And once, while he was 
 still insensible, one of us asked him his name, and he 
 unguardedly said, ' Defoe,' which, they say, is Con- 
 rad's surname." 
 
 " That is proof positive," rejoined Scissors, with the- 
 dignity of a member of the Inner Temple. 
 
 " Proof ! there couldn't be more proof. Yet, mark 
 my words I'm in favor of hanging the man now ; 
 and I believe the city would have seen it done in- 
 stantly, if old Jackson, who is prophet, priest, and 
 king here now, hadn't got an inkling of it, and sent 
 
180 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 .+ : . 
 
 the man to jail, under an escort, saying that he should 
 have a trial ; for my opinion is that if that man is 
 tried before a jury who can look at him, they'll admit 
 his pious face in evidence, and let him go." 
 
 " We might as well be under martial law, and done 
 with it, as to yield to that man's dictation in every- 
 thing. If I was the Governor I wouldn't stand it." 
 
 " The Governor don't like him, but dare not resist 
 him for that very reason/' said the merchan^. " He 
 is afraid of losing the little power he has got ; and 
 my opinion in relation to that matter is, that if the 
 British do come here, which nobody seems to have 
 the slightest expectation of but old Jackson, then the 
 Governor will settle down into private life, like an 
 oyster into the mud." 
 
 " If I were the Governor of Louisiana, I wouldn't 
 be so cowed by the irony old Tennessean, if he did 
 know a little more than I did." 
 
 "Nor I." 
 
 " Why^can't he stop to convince people, and not 
 
 do just as he d pleases with everybody until 
 
 everything is over, and then ask them if they see any 
 objections to his policy ?" 
 
 " I tell you if the British ever do come here, we 
 shall have such a kind of martial law as will make us 
 all run over to them, for fear of General Jackson. 
 Mark my words !" 
 
The Chattel Child. 181 
 
 Sister Clara had watched thus long the receding 
 procession, for such it was, as if hesitating in her 
 course ; and then, dashing quickly down by a nearer 
 cross street, arrived before the procession at the city 
 jail. The keeper received her kindly, for she was not 
 an unfrequent visitor there, and promised her that, if 
 possible, he would get permission for her to visit the 
 coming prisoner as soon as the surgeon had dressed 
 his wounds. The keeper left to obtain this permission, 
 while she, not to lose her time, allowed the key of the 
 outer door of the apartment of cells to be turned upon 
 her, and wandering from door to door, talked kindly 
 and familiarly with the inmates, occasionally dispen- 
 sing little presents from her cornucopian basket. 
 
182 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 IN PRISON. 
 
 | 
 
 " The quality of mercy is not strained, 
 
 But droppeth as the gentle dew from heaven 
 
 Upon the place beneath." SHAKSPEARE. 
 
 Two hours had passed. The crowd of spectators, 
 drawn thither by eager curiosity, had dispersed from 
 around the jail. The physician had departed, and the 
 Sister of Charity, full of the spirit of her vocation, had 
 entered alone, and was bending tenderly over the 
 wounded man. Few would have been allowed the 
 privilege of being thus servicable to the wretched one, 
 lest he might procure some means of self-destruction, 
 but her name was a passport into the cell of the most 
 abandoned, as it was a welcome at the threshold of 
 poverty. Upon a hard pallet of boards, covered over 
 with a blanket, reaching the length of the cell, yet 
 still hardly long enough for him to recline at full 
 length the prisoner lay. The cell was. about five 
 feet wide, and its ceiling so low that many could not 
 have stood erect under it. It was lighted only from the 
 passage way through the iron bars of the door or gate, 
 
The Chattel Child. 183 
 
 at which she entered, and which was now closed and 
 locked upon her while the jailor waited and guarded 
 without. Except this gate or door, the remaining 
 sides of the room as well as the ceiling and floor, were 
 dark and of solid masonry. 
 
 Sitting down upon the side of the hard pallet, upon 
 which the prisoner lay, in alternate states of slumber, 
 dreaming, raving and insensibility, she tenderly ex- 
 amined his wounds. The left arm was badly shatter- 
 ed, but the ball had passed it, entering his side, near 
 the heart, and leaving a dangerous, and it was feared, 
 a fatal wound. After ascertaining that the wounds had 
 been dressed with a professional rudeness and skill 
 equal to that with which they had been inflicted, she 
 procured a pillow to be placed under his head, and 
 another upon which to rest his wounded arm, which 
 much relieved him. 
 
 When his lips moved, too, she bent over eagerly to 
 cat ell their faintest mutterings. They were of a name 
 that was familiar to her soul, and she heard it uttered 
 at first with a shrinking feeling as of repugnance and 
 horror. 
 
 " God forbid that Julia should ever mention thy 
 name with the same unholy love," she murmured, 
 bending still closer over his features, and fixing upon 
 them an earnest and sorrowful glance. 
 
 Suddenly, as if reading more there than she could 
 
184 Owned and Lisowned ; or, 
 
 solve, she lifted his head gently from its pillow and 
 brought it more fully into the light which feebly en- 
 terel at the door. For a moment her gaze was riveted 
 upon it with eager intensity. Almost with rude sud- 
 denness she dashed back those beautiful waving locks 
 of jetty black from his high manly brows. 
 
 Freshened by the water into which she had been 
 bathing his brows, and disturbed and partially awak- 
 ened from his slumber by the motion, he muttered the 
 first coherent sentence 
 
 " I am not he. Oh, God ! I am innocent." 
 
 Sister Clara turned away for a moment, and shaded 
 her brows with her hand, as if trying to recall some 
 long lost, almost forgotten face or form. Then she 
 fixed her riveted glance once again upon him with a 
 still closer scrutiny and a still increasing intensity. 
 And now, slowly and with eyes upturned to heaven, 
 she lays his head back in its former position, murmur- 
 ing 
 
 " No thou art not Conrad ! Here is some fearful, 
 some terrible error. My lovely son, thou art wholly 
 innocent," she cried, now bathing his hand in her 
 tears, and kissing it with a mother's affection. "This 
 fair countenance is not the abode of wickedness. Thou 
 art very like but, thank God, thou art not he." 
 
 Then kneeling down by the bed-side, she clasped 
 'her hands and wept with emotion. For a moment 
 
The Chattel Child. 185 
 
 she knelt with hands thus clasped, and eyes uplifted 
 and streaming, as if in a fervent prayer of gratitude 
 then once more lifting up his head, and bringing his 
 features into the light, she smiled as affectionately as 
 a mother when looking at her first-born, and again 
 turning back his silken locks, she kissed his brow, and 
 restored his head to his pillow, and adjusted his limbs 
 so that he might rest easily. She then rose and took 
 up her little basket and knocked at the door of the 
 cell. It was opened, and in a moment more Sister 
 Clara had crossed the threshold, where so little of 
 good and so much of evil crossed, and stood in ikt 
 street. 
 
186 Owned and Disowned ; or. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 SANDY, THE VICTIM OF AN UNFORTUNATE ATTACHMENT, 
 
 She had not proceeded far when a voice behind her 
 arrested her attention, and she turned around. 
 
 " What, is this you, Sandy ?" 
 
 " Yes 'ern Missa Clara/' replied that worthy indi- 
 vidual. " I've diskibbered her fust at last." 
 
 " You've found " 
 
 " Miss Annette," replied the slave, grinning with 
 evident inward elation. " I been seen her my own 
 eyes last night, an' if you come along o* me, I den 
 show you jis war she be, Missa Clara." 
 
 " This is good news if you are sure of its truth," 
 exclaimed Sister Clara. " I will follow you, Sandy." 
 
 The slave darted off at a rapid and buoyant pace, 
 evidently stimulated in his task by his infinite enjoy- 
 ment at the approaching achievement of some long 
 pending and important task, and turning occasionally 
 to await the more staid and leisurely pace of Sister 
 Clara. 
 
 In a few minutes they stood at the quay, where 
 Sandy had appeared on the evening before, as we have 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 187 
 
 seen, with his forgotten message. Here a scrutiny 
 seemed necessary, for the prospect did not wholly 
 realize Sandy's expectations. Something had changed. 
 He looked back at his route it was the same. 
 " Missa Clara, I certain shure I been come right, 
 but she no here !" 
 
 " Who is not here ?" 
 
 " Ebberyting else de same but de ship I come 
 here de berry last night late, and I berry skered I 
 tell de capin Massa Defoe want to see him, an 7 I take 
 de capin down to Massa Defoe. And dar was de 
 capin in de ship, and dar wi' de capin, Miss Annette, 
 an' I tink she looked at him berry kind and good. 
 Ah ! say I, Miss Annette is de capin' s wife. But 
 now no ship no capin no Miss Annette no 
 nuffin'." 
 
 " Are you looking for the vessel ?" asked a pertly 
 man, in half uniform, who had been watching them 
 with some attention, since they had stopped. 
 
 " Yes, massa. Tank you !" replied Sandy. " You 
 know war she gone ?" 
 
 " Do you remember the name ?" asked the gentle- 
 man. 
 
 " De Flyin' Scud," answered Sandy. 
 
 "And the captain?" 
 
 " Mass' Conrad " 
 
188 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " Did you go aboard of that vessel ?" continued 
 the stranger. 
 
 "Yeth, Massa No not 'zacldy," said Sandy, 
 timidly. 
 
 " Come along with me," said the stranger, ad van 
 cing to him. " I'll show her to you. I thought you 
 were not all right." 
 
 In another moment, and before the astonished 
 Sandy was aware of his intentions,, his hands were 
 seized. The handcuffs snapped upon his wrists, and 
 yelling wildly in his terror and flight, he was hurried 
 swiftly away. The sympathizing Sister Clara heard 
 the cries of the simple African. 
 
 " Wat dis for ? De Lord help us. Sandy done 
 nuffin'. De Lord help us. Wat Sandy stole ? Oh, 
 Lord !" 
 
 Unable at present to avert the catastrophe which 
 had overtaken the poor negro, though she partly un- 
 derstood its nature, she retraced her st ^ps tc w$rds the 
 horns of the Sisters of Charity. 
 
The Chattel Child. 189 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE TIME IS UP. 
 
 " Thou wealth to many poor, disgrace to many noble, 
 
 Thou hope and fear, thou weal and woe, thou remedy, thou ruin, 
 How thickly swarms of thought are clustering round To-morrow." 
 
 PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 HAVING succeeded, as he supposed, in immuring his 
 former accomplice and would-be betrayer, Conrad De- 
 foe, within the walls of a dungeon, awaiting with dread 
 certainty a felon's doom, Mr. Preston returned to his 
 accustomed hotel. 
 
 His mind was restless and ill at ease. Whatever 
 might have been his feelings in sacrificing Julia to the 
 exigencies of his pecuniary embarrassments, he was not 
 prepared for the turn in the wheel of fortune which 
 had consigned his daughter Ada to the fate intended 
 for another, and thus stripped him at once of every 
 kindred tie. 
 
 Not that his wounded affections, as a father, caused 
 him very great pain, but the prospect of the utter loss 
 of caste in society, which inevitably ensues to the base 
 
190 Chimed and Disowned; or, 
 
 when poverty comes upon them, coupled with the pos- 
 sibility of arraignment, exposure, and condign punish- 
 ment for the criminal relation in which he had stood 
 towards Conrad and his fellows, filled him with appre- 
 hension. 
 
 In this state of mind, as soon as the clock had 
 struck ten, he left his apartments at the hotel, and 
 passing into Street, entered a building once occu- 
 pied as a gentleman's residence, whose ancient archi- 
 tectural frippery was now smeared over with the tin 
 signs of a nest of attorneys, lo'oking like a last year's 
 bird's nest filled with spiders. 
 
 Passing up several of the flights of stairs and along 
 a narrow passage-way, as if diving into this recess for 
 }ne of the poorest or meanest of the fraternity, he 
 stopped at length before a door upon which was a 
 small " tin shingle" bearing the name " Snacks !" 
 
 He opened the door and entered. A very lank per- 
 son, in a seedy black coat, whose skirt hung fi om his arm- 
 pits to his knees, with legs like two stilts, whose cadav- 
 erous appearance was heightened by close-fitting knee- 
 breeches of faded velvet, terminating in a substantial 
 pair of blue woolen stockings, which in turn were buried 
 in a long pair of slab-soled cowhide shoes, turned slowly 
 round, and with a silent nod indicated to Mi. Preston 
 to take a chair. 
 
 Everything about this man was so long that it was 
 
The Chattel Chile 1 . 191 
 
 tedious to follow it to its legitimate conclusion. His 
 gaunt, skeleton fingers coiled around Mr. Preston's 
 hand like the grasp of five anacondas. His forehead, 
 nose and chin rivalled each other in longitude, though 
 his chin bore off the palm. Long files of papers lay 
 by his side. A very long brief in a tall, slim hand- 
 writing, of some exceedingly protracted case, was in his 
 hand, which, however, he laid aside as Mr. Preston 
 sat down. 
 
 Then turning to the latter, he wreathed the wrinkles 
 upon his long face into a peculiar labyrinthian smile, 
 and drawled $s if his organs of speech, like an unruly 
 legislature, no sooner commence business, than they en- 
 deavor to adjourn sine die 
 
 " Grlad to see you, Mr. Preston. I 'spose 
 you come to pay " 
 
 " No, Mr. Snacks, I am sorry to say I am not pre- 
 pared to pay the ten thousand francs to-day." 
 
 "N o t!" drawled Snacks. 
 
 " No, Mr. Snacks. I have done my utmost, but the 
 plan by which I hoped to raise the money has utterly 
 failed. I will promise, however, in a few months, if 
 you will grant me that time, to satisfy your debt by 
 another means which is sure of success." 
 
 Mr. Snacks had occupied the time during which Mr. 
 Preston had uttered this speech in a long sigh, 
 
192 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 ^ 
 
 Then lie turned slowly around, and running his long 
 fingers over a list of court- terms pasted upon the door 
 of his book-case, he said 
 
 Yes, I can 1" 
 
 " You can give me ths time then ?" inquired JVii. 
 Preston. " Mr. Snacks, you are my friend ; sir, I 
 know you are. I admire your generosity, and, sir, I 
 shall reward it. To the extent of my means, sir, you 
 shall be rewarded ! I understand you rightly, sir, that 
 you can give me the time," said he, startled at the 
 expression of ineffable surprise with which Mr. Snacks' 
 eye slowly weathered around towards him, and the 
 altitude to which the legal functionary's brows were 
 climbing as he looked at him. 
 
 " No," drawled Mr. Snacks,- " never extend but 
 twice. Am very glad I have a chance to 
 serve you, but sorry I can't embrace it. "I 
 must fore close !" 
 
 "When?" 
 
 " As soon as I can." 
 
 " When will that be ?" 
 
 u And when will that be ?" 
 " On the return of the chancellor." 
 " Will you be good enough, Mr. Snacks, to tell me 
 when that will be ?" said Preston impatiently. 
 " To mor row !" 
 
The Chattel Child. 193 
 
 " Do you mean to say that you can and will seize 
 upon my whole real and personal estate, and make a 
 beggar of me to-morrow ?" 
 
 At the word "say," -Mr. Snacks commenced at the 
 same imperturbable pace to repeat 
 
 " To mor row !" 
 
 " Is there no alternative ? Good God, do not ruin 
 me !" exclaimed Preston with emotion and terror. 
 " Mr. Snacks, I appeal to you as a man, as a Christian, 
 I beg your pardon, sir, as a Jew, what time, if it be 
 only a few weeks, will you give me to raise this sum ?" 
 
 " To mor row." 
 
 In that look Mr. Preston read his destiny. In thos* 
 words he heard and felt his doom. A film came over 
 his eyes, and he thought he would have sunk upon 
 the seat from which he had risen. 
 
 How, he knew not, for he saw and thought of 
 nothing on the way, he returned to his hotel apart- 
 ments. A vision of horrors rose before him. Floods 
 of grief, rage, remorse and chagrin poured in upon his 
 soul, and he rushed out of the hotel, as he had often 
 done before, to seek relief at the source of his misfor- 
 tunes and the cause of his crimes the faro table. 
 Just as he reached the street, a messenger informed 
 him that the mother superior of the mother house of 
 the Sisters of Mercy, was desirous to see him. "Won- 
 dering what could be the reason of a call for his pres- 
 
 9 
 
194 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 ence from such a source, he changed his course and 
 hastened to the house indicated. 
 
 The streets were filled with the munitions and array 
 of war, and the preparations of the arbitrary Tennessee 
 captain, for the approaching contest with the veterans 
 who had fought under Wellington on the Peninsula. 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 195 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 Hamlet, " There aw more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, 
 
 Than are dreamed of in your philosophy." SHAKSPEARE. 
 
 EARLY one morning Ada arose, and looking out of 
 her window, for the first time since her captivity, her 
 eyes fell upon the joyful spectacle of land. True, from 
 her window, the scene was rather desolate than inviting, 
 for though the sun had hardly risen from the sea, which 
 calm and bathed in his glory, seemed like a plain of 
 molten fire though the sea itself was so motionless, 
 unrippled, and still, beautifully reflecting from its 
 placid bosom the blue sky and sailing clouds, yet the 
 land which met her view was but a continuous ledge 
 of precipitous rocks, without entrance or harbor, stretch- 
 ing away as far as the eye could reach. The nearest rose 
 apparently to the height of several hundred feet. 
 
 "Ah, how delightful !" exclaimed Annette, this mo- 
 ment rushing into the room. " Cheer up, my drooping 
 prisoner I have good news for you." 
 
 " What, pray ?" said Ada, starting. 
 
 " We are at the Festal Isknd the fairy Island 
 
196 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 the bewitching, the entrancing island. Only look at 
 it," she continued, joyfully, encircling Ada's waist in 
 her pretty arm, and drawing her to the window. 
 
 " I see nothing but a long ledge of rocks," replied 
 Ada, smiling, "which would be perfectly horrid were it 
 not that I so long for a glimpse ,of land, that the 
 dreariest prospect is welcome. I am sure there is not 
 a green thing upon it." 
 
 " Oh, yes," said Annette. " These cliffs. hide nearly 
 all of its beauty ; but look far away to the right," 
 she said, pressing Ada's head through the cabin win- 
 dow, where she might see farther in that direction. 
 "Do you not see the top of Magnolia Grove ? What 
 a rich, dark, tropical green it wears ! What an exu- 
 berance of foliage ! Oh, methinks I can almost scent," 
 she said, delicately snuffing her little nose towards the 
 island, " the rich fragrance which is wafted down by 
 the morning breeze from the groves of oranges and 
 fields of bananas and pineapples." 
 
 " You have been here before, then ?" inquired Ada. 
 " Why have you never told me of this paradise of 
 sweets ?" 
 
 " Oh, I thought it would be such a glad surprise !" 
 exclaimed Annette, now popping her head from the 
 window, and now waltzing and skipping around the 
 room, and clapping her hands with the gaiety of a 
 school girl on the first day of vacation, " and here I 
 
The Chattel Child. 197 
 
 have been breaking the charm which I had so care- 
 fully reserved for you, by telling you all. Come, Miss, 
 let us take one more look at Magnolia Grove," she 
 said, thrusting her head out of the window, " and now 
 let's pack up." 
 
 " Pack up ! You do not mean that we are going 
 ashore, Annette ?" inquired Ada. 
 
 " Of course I do," replied Annette. 
 
 " And leave this hated vessel ?" exclaimed Ada. 
 
 " I certainly do not think the vessel will accompany 
 us very far inland," smiled Annette. " But why you 
 should hate the innocent bit of live oak I cannot see 
 you who have, with the joys of conquest, cheated 
 captivity of her sadness." 
 
 "Ah, no," sighed Ada "under any other circum- 
 stances I would feel very happy in the love of Mr. 
 Howard ; and sometimes I do, as it is. But how 
 can I help sighing very, very often ? Oh, no, Annette ; 
 I fear I arn doing fearfully wrong. I am unhappy 
 very, very un " 
 
 " Do not speak thus sadly, dear," said Annette, em- 
 bracing her tenderly. " Mr. Howard is in high spirits 
 at the thought of being left for a short time at the 
 island, and told me to assure you for Lafitte and his 
 officers were running up and down the companion- 
 way, busily preparing for landing, so that he could not 
 safely visit you that this haunt of the pirates is a 
 
198 Owned and Discwned ; or, 
 
 suspected one, in the very midst of the Florida keys, 
 through which vessels of every nation are almost daily 
 passing, and that our being here greatly increases the 
 chances of our deliverance." 
 
 " Was ever a person so sanguine as Arthur ?" 
 smiled Ada. " Alas ! I have not his hope nor your 
 light heart. I look for no deliverance but in death." 
 
 " Oh, Ada !" exclaimed Annette, almost weeping 
 with emotion. " It is not kind to him, it is not true 
 to yourself, to be so sad on this morning of joy ; dry 
 your tears." 
 
 " Oh, Annette ! our position is so terrible. How 
 completely are we at the mercy of these wild outlaws. 
 Sometimes I wonder that I, or you, or any other per- 
 son should have been treated by them with such gen- 
 tleness. But who knows at what moment all this may 
 change, and we be made the victims of their brutal 
 natures !" And the shrinking, trembling girl wept at 
 the pictures which her imagination painted. " But 
 tell me, why do we leave this vessel, where we have 
 been unharmed, and what is to become of us ?" 
 
 " And can it be that my fickle little bird is regret- 
 ting to leave the cage in which she now feels so secure, 
 to flit in freedom amdng the lime trees and make vocal 
 the air of the magnolia groves of Festal Island ? But 
 as you are so inquisitive as to demand for what reason 
 our captors do with us as they will, I can only answer, 
 
The Chattel Child. 199 
 
 because there are none here to prevent them from 
 doing their pleasure. If you ask for their motive for 
 removing us to the island, it is doubtless that in case 
 of the capture of this vessel, not only may we be secure 
 from recapture, which were comparatively a trifling 
 loss, though it would prevent them from realizing the 
 large ransom they expect from us, but they also 
 would be secure from disclosure of this their great 
 hiding place, a revelation which would immediately 
 lead to their effectual overthrow, and which they have 
 endeavored to avoid by directing the public attention 
 as much as possible to Barrataria, where a few of their 
 smuggling vessels, and but little piratical wealth, 
 gives a semblance of comparative honesty to their 
 business." 
 
 " Comparative honesty !" exclaimed Ada. " I have 
 heard you express your admiration of their mode of 
 life, and claim for them the merit of smiting the op- 
 pressor and succoring the oppressed. Pray, tell me 
 whether you do really regard them as valiant knights- 
 errant or as monsters of evil ?" 
 
 "Ah 1" replied the ingenious Annette, "everything 
 is good or evil, not intrinsically, but according to the 
 point of view from which we look at it, and that point 
 always happens to be self. There is no vice, no crime, 
 which seen from some point of view and placed in 
 contrast with something worse, cannot be justified and 
 
200 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 shown to be good, while on the other hand, seen from 
 another point of view, and contrasted with something 
 better, it can, with equal clearness, be proved to be 
 evil. All depend upon the stand-point from which 
 we Icok at it, and as that stand-point is ourselves, all 
 things come to us like strange dogs by whatever name 
 we choose to call them. One will call such and such 
 things ' good/ and show how the title fits them. 
 To him they are good, and he worships them as an 
 Egyptian worships his cow. Another will call them 
 ' evil/ and they answer to the name just as well. 
 The Christian lifts his hands in holy horror at all hu- 
 man action, and says ' it is impossible that the human 
 heart shall conceive of any good thought/ and conse- 
 quently that whatever we do is wrong. This brings 
 no charge against the pirate, for in doing wrong to 
 the utmost of his power continually, he does no dif- 
 ferently from all others, and to ask him to do a good 
 thing is to ask an impossibility. Not to do what it 
 is impossible for him to do is certainly no moral wrong, 
 and therefore whatever he does is right. Keligion is 
 philosophy enveloped in a thin veil of absurdity. Re- 
 move the absurdity, and the naked philosophy ap- 
 pears, saying, l Whatever is, is right/ When thus 
 both religion and philosophy acquit wickedness, what 
 shall poor Annette say ?" 
 
 " Poor Annette should listen to the teachings of her 
 
The Chattel Child. 201 
 
 % 
 
 own heart/' replied Ada, "and not trust to such 
 blinding sophistry." 
 
 " But, alas, my poor weak heart teaches me only to 
 distrust its own teachings," replied Annette. 
 
 " Oh, Annette, Annette," replied Ada weeping, 
 " your mind is stronger than mine, and I can scarcely 
 believe it has had no other advantages than those you 
 tell me ; but do not, for pity's sake, lead me into such 
 dark places. Do not take away my star of faith, faintly 
 as it now shines through the cloud of my transgressions, 
 and leave me only the dull lamp of my reason. There 
 was a time when I could have directed you to a higher 
 authority, but, alas, I fear " Ada with downcast eyes 
 stood trembling and silent. 
 
 The jingle of a bell now summoned Annette ty the 
 cabin of Lafitte, and she vanished, but returned in a 
 moment, and entered in a glad, frisking, hop-skip-and- 
 jump style, which contrasted singularly with her recent 
 gravely philosophical mood, upon the all-absorbing 
 business of " packing up." 
 
 In two hours this task had been accomplished, and 
 Ada, permitted by her swarthy jailors to lean upon the 
 arm of Mr. Howard, was conducted with Annette 
 through the narrow passage-way, which she had not 
 before crossed since her imprisonment, and up the 
 companion-way to the deck. Once more the blue 
 
 heavens, enlivened with their fleecy clouds, hung over 
 
 9* 
 
202 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 her head. It was cheerful to emerge again into the 
 open day, and breathe the fresh, free air of heaven ; 
 but it was terrible to meet also the glances of the crowd 
 of silent, ill-looking outlaws who thronged the deck, 
 and filled the yawl into which they were requested to 
 descend. Ada's joy shrunk into fear. In a moment 
 they were swiftly gliding over the long deep swells to- 
 wards the wild, mysterious, and forbidding battlements 
 of rock, which Ada scanned earnestly, but in vain, for 
 some crevice or place of entrance. 
 
The Chattel Child. 203 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 FESTAL ISLAND. 
 
 " To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell, 
 To slowly trace the forest's shady scene, 
 Where things that own not man's dominion dwell, 
 And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been ; 
 To climb the trackless mountain all unseen, 
 With the wild flock that never needs a fold, 
 Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean 
 This is not solitude : 'tis but to hold 
 
 Converse with nature's charms, and view her stores unrolled." 
 
 BYRON. 
 
 As they drew near to the precipitous rocks, they 
 seemed to present no less smooth, even, and unbroken 
 a barrier. Not a break, chink, or crevice relieved the 
 monotonous majesty of this dissevered mountain, which 
 thus presented its section to the waves which beat, and 
 foamed, and surged around its feet in frothy impo- 
 tence. Still the boat swiftly darted towards the im- 
 passable barrier as hopefully as it would to its chosen 
 harbor. Suddenly, as Ada was about bracing herself . 
 for the shock, for it seemed as if the boat were driving 
 with all its speed against the very base of the solid 
 cliff, a curtain of canvas, painted in nice imitation of 
 
204 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 the rock, parted, and the boat glided smoothly through 
 into a vaulted tunnel or cave, the entrance of which 
 was barely broad and high enough to admit the yawl, 
 but which soon enlarged into a vaulted chamber, where 
 the echoes returned to each stroke of their oars in the 
 placid waters, alone indicated the great size of the 
 cavern, for all was darker than the blackest midnight 
 known to dwellers upon the surface. 
 
 Kesting their oars, the boatswain applied a match 
 to his lantern, and in another moment its imperfect 
 light had kindled the cavern of darkness into a palace 
 of beauty. The distant, irregular ceiling glistened as 
 if studded with myriad gems 'of every hue and lustre, 
 or as if the stars of heaven, enamored with Neptune, 
 had fled from the day into this festal hall of his, that 
 he might woo them. 
 
 As their oars rippled the placid waters, a bright 
 phosphoric light shone from them ; while here and 
 there the sides of the cavern exposed dark entrances 
 into other rooms, the farther sides of which glistened 
 more dimly under the fainter light which reached 
 them. 
 
 " How lovely !" exclaimed Ada, as the boat shot 
 silently and swiftly into other chambers, some of them 
 even larger than the first some of them mere passage 
 ways, beneath which they stooped to pass through. 
 
 At length they came to one which, as they entered, 
 
The Chattel Child. 205 
 
 presented no other apparent opening than that through 
 which they had come, and again, as the boat seemed 
 about to strike the solid rock of the cavern, the ob- 
 stacle before it parted like a certain, and they emerged 
 into the open day, in the midst of a calm crystal 
 lagoon, around the sides of which the unrivaled rich- 
 ness of tropical vegetation, flourishing in undisturbed 
 luxuriance and beauty, burst like a dream of Arcadia 
 upon their mute, wondering gaze. This lagoon, of 
 but a few hundred yards in width, soon narrowed, as 
 they dashed over it, into a mere passage, very narrow 
 and winding, with coral shores and bottom, through 
 which they passed into one of much larger dimensions. 
 
 Nearly circular, stretching far away in either direc- 
 tion, ran the groves of magnolia, cocoa, and live oak, 
 and here and there the palm tree, the pine of the tro- 
 pics, towered in stately and graceful dignity. Within 
 this wall of verdure the roar of the great ocean was 
 unheard, and a beautiful little world slept there, effec- 
 tually shut in from the great world around it. 
 
 Ada could not help surveying the fairy scene with 
 pleasure and joy, that even the desolate and unknown 
 places of the earth were thus filled with beauty, and 
 prepared to delight the eye of man when he should 
 come to occupy them. 
 
 Upon one side of this .lagoon was the pirate settle- 
 ment, consisting of half a dozen low, rudely constructed 
 
206 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 houses, surrounded by rude gardens. Drawn up on 
 the shore, were many beautifully modelled and 
 painted boats. Passing no nearer than was necessary 
 to the " village," and through a similar narrow pas- 
 sage-way, they entered and crossed a third lagoon of 
 similar appearance, though smaller, upon the opposite 
 side of which they landed. So accustomed had Ada 
 become to novelty of every kind, that she was not sur- 
 prised to find two tough little Shetland ponies, whose 
 manes and tails almost reached the ground, held by a 
 mute negro boy, in waiting for them. So inviting did 
 the long green grass of the shaded plain before them 
 appear, that Ada would have preferred to walk, and 
 almost envied the little pony the pleasure with which 
 he trotted over his green carpet, had not the diminu- 
 tive proportions and grace of the pony himself, made 
 her long to sit once more in the saddle. Accepting, 
 therefore, the direction of their guide, and of Annette, 
 to whom the whole scene was familiar, the ladies 
 mounted the two ponies and trotted leisurely into the 
 wood, Mr. Howard walking by their side. 
 
 " Ah !" exclaimed Ada involuntarily, as her eyes 
 wandered through the magnificent trunks, and up 
 among the sweeping branches, which terminated far 
 up in a firmament of foliage, through which faint cre- 
 vices admitted the day, "methinks, when I look at 
 those glimmering crevic ,s in yonder foliage, I am re- 
 
The Cliattel Child. 207 
 
 minded of the beautiful Indian conception, which 
 teaches that the stars are eyelets in the crystal sphere 
 of heaven, to let the glory of the outer world shine 
 through upon the darkness of this \" 
 
 "I thought you would lapse into a poetical dream 
 here, if anywhere in the wide, wide world I" said An- 
 nette smiling. " Ah ! long may it be ere my invading 
 friends shall disturb me in the quiet enjoyment of this 
 celestial retreat ; I ask no other home." 
 
 A short ride brought them to a clearing, or open 
 space, in which rose a lightly constructed, but neatly 
 finished cottage of two stories, the second surrounded 
 by a verandah, and embowered in lime and orange 
 trees. The air wafted from an adjacent thicket of 
 pine-apples, came loaded with delightful odors, and 
 all things seemed thrown around this snugly embow- 
 ered and concealed retreat which might gratify the 
 senses or delight the imagination. Nor did the exte- 
 rior of the woodland cottage surpass the interior in 
 appliances to the comfort and the taste. The rooms 
 were tastefully, and even richly furnished, with levies 
 upon the necessaries and luxuries of every clime. 
 Music, books, and birds were ready to charm the soul 
 with their varied harmonies. 
 
208 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTEK XXIII. 
 
 A DREAM. 
 " I had a dream it was not all a dream." BYROK. 
 
 MANY days glided rapidly and happily by to the 
 captives, if indeed their liberty to roam unrestrained 
 over the island, could deserve the name of captivity 
 Mute, black menials who, in response to Ada's in- 
 quiries, opened their mouths and revealed their muti- 
 lated tongues, silently supplied their every want, and 
 attended to the cultivation of the small plantation 
 * attached to the house. Except these they saw no 
 other person, for the pirate village was some two miles 
 distant on the shore of the second lagoon. 
 
 Mr. Howard availed himself of these morning and 
 evening rides on horseback over the island, to enjoy 
 more abundantly and freely the society of the gentle 
 Ada, while she daily yielded a happier and more ab- 
 solute homage to her lover's passion. Indeed, even 
 she began to realize that she was the captive not so 
 much of the terrible Conrad and of Lafitte, as of the 
 elegant and captivating Howard. It was his step, at 
 
, The Chattel Child. 209 
 
 which her pulses thrilled, her cheek flushed, and her 
 heart beat. Her "whole heing responded to the 
 tones of his soft voice, as the strings of the harp 
 thrill under the touch of the skillful player, and con- 
 stant, unintermitted communion, rapidly fanned the 
 flame of passion in their souls. Hours, days, flew by 
 uncounted, unregretted. Their bliss knew no bounds ; 
 they were very, very happy. So wild and strange, so 
 unlike her whole previous life had been her recent ex- 
 perience, that Ada began to live a dream life, and all 
 that was real seemed to her as a doubtful dream, and 
 in return her dreams often borrowed the vividness of 
 reality. It was after the noon of a balmy and beau- 
 tiful December day, in that clime where winter comes 
 only like a gentle zephyr to fan the summer-heated 
 brow to a delightful coolness ; Howard had for once 
 consented to accompany Annette instead of Ada upon 
 an afternoon ride, and Ada, throwing herself upon a 
 couch, closed her eyes that she might visit for a few 
 moments, in thought, old Lindenhall, with its tawny 
 faces, its peaceful security, its delightful scenery, and 
 especially might commune for a brief though mournful 
 season with the spirit of her sister. From this revery 
 she passed to sleep, and in that sleep she dreamed. 
 
 She saw two souls upon their downward flight from 
 heaven. They were clothed in mist, and had the 
 form of dew- drops. Side by side they descended and 
 
210 Owned and Disowned ; or. 
 
 had almost united in one. They were blending to- 
 gether, when in their fall the thorn of a rose divided 
 them, and they fell on opposite sides of the scented 
 bush, which bloomed on a tuft of earth, between two 
 springs, one of them clear, the other disturbed by an 
 evil spirit. One of the dew-drops, with its precious 
 burden, fell in one spring and the other in the other. 
 The fountains were not connected, but welled forth 
 far up in the mountains of the north-west, and it so 
 happened that their waters flowed down on the oppo- 
 site sides of the mountain. And the distance between 
 the two souls, borne along on their respective currents, 
 was greater and greater every day forever, until the 
 one was lost in the great ocean of the west, and the 
 other in that of the east. 
 
 While the dreamer still gazed at the two oceans, 
 their appearance changed. Over that one into which 
 the waters of the turbid spring had flown, flew the 
 same evil spirit which had disturbed the spring, and 
 forthwith it became a billowy sea of human forms, 
 the waves of which were but- their heavings and fall- 
 ings as they writhed in intense agony. And she saw 
 one sparrow alight upon that ocean shore for a pebble. 
 It took one and fluttered away in the direction of a 
 distant star, from which the swift-winged light would 
 not reach the earth in sixty centuries ; and an 
 angel whispered that for millions of centuries the 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 211 
 
 little bird would flutter onwardto the distant star, 
 and at last deposit its pebble and return for another. 
 So should that sparrow repeat its flight until no peb- 
 bles should be left upon the sea-shore, and the 
 prairies and the mountains be removed, nay, the whole 
 earth should, pebble by pebble, have been borne to that 
 distant planet, yet that writhing ocean of agony would 
 remain the same. 
 
 On the other hand, for each drop of the ocean, sup- 
 plied from the crystal spring, there was a resurrection 
 of joyous life and bliss. Broader than the continents 
 of earth, nay, from the earth to the stars, stretched out 
 than the sea of angelic faces, with love in their eyes 
 and harps in their hands. Every moment was one of 
 rapture, like the first thrill of joy in the heart of the 
 accepted lover or the forgiven penitent. The atmos- 
 phere they breathed, the rivers of life in which they 
 bathed, the nector of wisdom they drank, the delicious 
 manna of purity upon which they fed, the conversa- 
 tion which they indulged in with each other, the 
 beauties of the world around them, which they learned, 
 the hymns of adoration and worship which they sang, 
 all were not merely pleasant, or even delightful, they 
 were the food of an intensely blissful intoxication that 
 never subsided. For when the little sparrow, in hia 
 long flights to the distant star, had removed the earth, 
 their joy was still increasing. 
 
212 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 Trembling with the emotions excited by this dream, 
 Ada awoke and wept. Her eyes had not the quiet, 
 serene light which was their wont. Her expression 
 was one of anxious and timid unrest. She rose from 
 her couch, and tried to kneel down by it, but without 
 praying, she burst into tears, and threw herself once 
 more upon the bed, murmuring 
 
 " Oh ! whither, whither have I drifted ?" and went 
 to sleep, and again she dreamed. 
 
 Surrounded by a countless host, she stood upon the 
 brink of a precipice, before which yawned a deep, but 
 not forbidding abyss ; it was not forbidding, for it 
 seemed a pleasant valley filled with inviting fruits, 
 languishing forms, and happy sounds and scenes of 
 fearless pleasure. A mist rose out of this abyss, through 
 which she was faintly able to discern the spires and 
 temples of a distant country, which her heart instinc- 
 tively prompted her to try to gain. Angels flew back- 
 ward and forward over this abyss at pleasure, but the 
 only bridge by which wingless mortals might cross it, 
 was a single hair suspended from side to side. Who- 
 soever ventured upon the hair, depending upon his 
 own skill to balance himself, fell ; and though all be- 
 low, as nearly as could be discerned through the 
 rising mist, seemed indicative of pleasure only, such 
 as fell invariably thre\^ towards their friends who 
 stood upon the precipice a last glance of unutterable 
 
The Cliattel Child. 213 
 
 anguish and woe. This alone informed them that the 
 abyss, notwithstanding its appearance of gratification, 
 was full of unhappiness and pain. But whosoever 
 approached the abyss, and were sensible enough to 
 perceive their own inability to cross it without aid 
 from above, and besought that aid, such were upheld 
 and steadied by angelic powers, which hovered around 
 about them, and they walked, in fear and trembling, 
 safely over, and were welcomed to the embrace of a 
 shepherd. 
 
 Seeing this, Ada besought the heavenly powers to 
 aid her, and ventured forth. But when she had gone 
 a short way in safety, the beauty of the scenes in the 
 vale beneath her, and her love for some whom she 
 recognized there, drew her down, and she felt the hold 
 of the angels loosening, and herself not unwillingly 
 descending to other embraces, while her sister Julia, 
 who had started just before her, with eyes turned up- 
 ward in pleading faith and constancy, saw her not, but 
 continued on to the farther shore. And now a quick, 
 intermittent fever, of alternate bliss and pain, thrilled 
 and consumed her. One minute her pulses bounded in 
 ecstatic joy the next her heart sickened with heavi- 
 ness and woe. Her whole body also vibrated each 
 moment between misery and delight, pain and plea- 
 sure. But swiftly as she fell deeper and deeper, the 
 intervals of p.easure grew less frequent, more brief, 
 
214 Owned and Disoiuned', or, 
 
 and less ecstatic, until anon, the burnings of bodily 
 pain, and of mental anguish and remorse, convulsed 
 her frame. Flame, not blood, coursed through her 
 veins. Every disease peculiar to the various parts of 
 the human body attacked those parts, and mercilessly 
 fed upon the deathless agony which they could not 
 in mercy consume or kill. The beautiful vale around 
 her, in which she had thought to sink as into a plea- 
 sant couch, resolved itself on a nearer view into a lake, 
 not oi water nor of fire, but of loathsome, leprous, 
 corpse-like beings, in monstrous forms, half man and 
 half beast and serpent, which rolled and writhed to- 
 gether in one commingled mass, swimming in the 
 sweat of their agony. Their faces were now livid with 
 fiendish rage now black with choking anguish and 
 despair. No hope, no love, no trust or confidence 
 beamed in their downcast eyes. Nor amidst all 
 this seething, rolling mass was there a single one 
 struggling to look up or to rise ; but each one was 
 striving, with all his might, to bury himself beneath 
 his fellows, from the tearful glances of the angels who 
 flew over the abyss, and vainly offered to assist them 
 to rise from their lost condition. 
 
 Incessant wailings rent the air, and formed the hor- 
 rible music of the fiery vale. 
 
 Into this damned sea of suffering humanity, with 
 all its pains and terrors, Ada felt herself sinking. She 
 
The Chattel Cliild. 215 
 
 shrieked. The spires and temples of the distant city 
 were growing dim to her vision. The infernal tortures, 
 seizing upon every vital part, racked her. Each nerve 
 which was capable of sensation endured its separate 
 agony, increasing with every moment. - 
 
 The miseries of insanity, without its forgetfulness, 
 made cruel sport of her imagination, and in each cham- 
 ber of her soul a separate devil laughed in delirious 
 misery. A dream within this dream increased its hor- 
 rors by a clear vision of the purity, beatitude, and holy 
 bliss of heaven, where harmonious spirits listened to 
 the music of the spheres, and learned new lessons 
 daily of the wonders of the universe, whose minds 
 swept all time, conceived all beauty, comprehended all 
 wisdom ; whose hearts were steeped in love and intox- 
 icated with bliss, whose every nerve thrilled with de- 
 light, and whose hymns were the ceaseless carols of 
 overflowing joy. 
 
 The dreamer could no longer endure the vision 
 with a shriek and a moan she awoke, weeping bitterly. 
 
 " What is the matter ?" asked Annette, who had 
 returned, and had been bending over her during the 
 convulsions with which the dream had been accompa- 
 nied, " you have had a sad dream." 
 
 " Ah, Annette, Annette, reason with me no more," she 
 cried, " that there is no contrast between good and evil/' 
 
 For days after her wild, delirious dream, Ada was 
 
216 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 exceedingly sad. No efforts of Mr. Howard or Annette 
 could avail aught to enliven her. Her cheek grew 
 pale, her form thin. The accustomed ride no longer 
 conferred its usual pleasure. She was deaf to the 
 songs of birds, blind to the loveliness of flowers, indif- 
 ferent utterly to all things. Her soul seemed fast set- 
 tling into the deepest despondency. Her interviews 
 with Mr. Howard began and ended not in smiles, but 
 in tears. From what reason she knew not, but this 
 had not continued many days before Mr. Howard, An- 
 nette and Ada were again required to embark on board 
 the " Flying Scud." Mr. Howard kindly expressed a 
 hope that the change of air might be found a provi- 
 dential interposition to restore her sinking health and 
 spirits. 
 
The Chattel Child. 217 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE VEIL BEHOVED. 
 
 " With her hands clasp'd, her lips apart and pale, 
 The maid had stood, gazing upon the veil 
 From which these words, like south winds through a fence 
 Of Kerzrah flowers, came filled with pestilence ; 
 So boldly uttered too ! as if all dread 
 Of frowns from her, of virtuous frowns, were fled, 
 And the wretch felt assured that, once plunged in, 
 Her woman's soul would know no pause in sin." 
 
 MOORE. 
 
 As one experience after another revealed more fully 
 to the gentle and intellectual Julia the character of 
 the refuge to which she had flown, she found at first 
 much to displease, and gradually sufficient to disgust, 
 if not to terrify her. Instead of inviting the mind to 
 periods of holy thought and study, the rules of the in- 
 stitution and the efforts of its members seemed to com- 
 mit the real sin of punishing imaginary transgressions 
 by unnecessary pains. Instead of contemplation, which 
 should purify and invigorate the soul," self-mortifica- 
 tions, in an unexpected manner and absurd degree, 
 were inflicted to weaken and abuse the body. The 
 
 b 
 
 beauty of humility she deeply appreciated, but she 
 
 10 
 
218 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 had none of that pride which, pluming itself upon its 
 own humbleness, could bear up and stimulate her re- 
 fined and educated soul to plod constantly and unne- 
 cessarily through a routine of menial drudgery, for 
 which neither her education nor her physical strength 
 at all qualified her. No sister cared less than she for 
 the bauble of dress or ornament; but she had too 
 much good sense to suppose that it was any worse to 
 fritter away our minds in cultivating ornament, than 
 equally to fritter them away in avoiding all that was 
 seemly, or that piety was assisted by unnecessarily 
 wearing garments as uncomfortable to the body as they 
 were unsightly to the eye. 
 
 For delicate food she cared not, but a coarse, vul- 
 gar diet, which immediately affected her health and 
 spirits, and rendered her less fit to perform any of the 
 arduous menial, and not less arduous devotional duties 
 assigned to her, was not at all to her taste. Far was 
 her natural disposition from being otherwise than sub- 
 missive to the direction and counsel of her superiors, 
 or amiably pliant to the wishes of those whose wishes 
 were the more joyfully obeyed because uttered as re- 
 quests. But nothing can be more painful to the truly 
 sensitive and refined mind, than to be subjected to the 
 accidental authority of our inferiors in mind and heart, 
 who, conscious of an inferiority in those respects, en- 
 deavor to compensate for it by additional exercise of 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 219 
 
 those faculties in which they excel, viz., insolence and 
 rudeness. Of the delightful pleasures of parental and 
 filial affection, Julia had, it is true, possessed little ex- 
 perience, but her union to Ada had taught her that 
 there are earthly affections which approach very near 
 to the intensity of angelic loves, and such affections of 
 a real sister contrasted strongly with the cold maxims 
 with which her self-styled sisters excused themselves 
 from taking any interest in each other or in her, by 
 fixing their eyes on their work, and their thoughts on 
 heaven. " If ye love not those whom ye have seen, 
 how shall ye love Him whom ye have not seen ?" she 
 said to herself. And again, when she became more 
 fully aware of the sufferings, both voluntary and invol- 
 untary, which the sisters endured, and when she de- 
 tected the consequences of thus abusing themselves, 
 and throwing back the precious boons of life and 
 health in the very teeth of the Giver, in the wan 
 cheek, the hectic flush, the fragile form, and the hollow 
 cough of those around her, and when she reflected how 
 much of this martyrdom of the body was self-inflicted 
 and unnecessary, and how it tended to sin by causing 
 a corresponding gloominess and moroseness among the 
 sisters, and how little of it ever went forth to work a 
 change over the face of a sin-stricken world ; in a word, 
 when she slowly began to realize how much of energy 
 and pious zeal was immured within those and ether 
 
220 Owned and Disowned; T, 
 
 convent walls to molder and waste in inaction the 
 effect of the pealing organ, and the solemn, impressive 
 chatint, and the imposing "beauty of the ceremonies of 
 the church died away, and often she felt as if her life 
 had displayed more true and practical benevolence 
 when relieving the ills of her father's small plantation 
 world, than when exorcised by the severe discipline of 
 a Sister of Charity. This was to her a sore disap- 
 pointment, for she had thought in becoming a sister 
 to be an humble instrument in the hands of God of 
 relieving the distresses of mankind. Instead of which 
 she felt that she, and most of her sisters, were cut off 
 from those distresses, and from all except that self- 
 manufactured misery which was the consequence of 
 their penances, fastings, and labors. In short, when 
 she reflected upon the usefulness they might have 
 wrought in the limited but potent sphere of domestic 
 influence, as daughters, sisters, wives and mothers, it 
 seemed doubtful to her whether they were not adding 
 to, rather than diminishing the sum total of human 
 suffering. 
 
 While revolving these thoughts, so opposite to the 
 dreams with which she entered the institution, in her 
 mind, the time at last arrived when, by the consent 
 of the Mother Superior, she was permitted the long- 
 sought boon of seeing, for the first time since the 
 hours of forgotten infancy her mother, 
 
Tlie Cliattd Child. 221 
 
 That interview, while it exalted ler appreciation 
 of the amiable virtues of Sister Clara, and thereby re- 
 deemed the clouded picture of convent life, of which 
 she saw in Sister Clara so fair and lovely an embodi- 
 ment, yet renewed in her heart the strongest of all 
 ties which could bind her to the outer world, and 
 which she had thought, and even hoped, was forever 
 severed. 
 
 The assurances given her by Sister Clara, seemed 
 to drive away from her soul the monster of wickedness 
 which haunted it, and to restore to her arms the pure, 
 the exalted, the noble Walter Defoe, whom, with the 
 slightest food for faith, she again loved with subdued, 
 but passionate ardor. How ready was she to believe 
 how joyfully she felt assured that the cloud which 
 rested over him was one of mystery and unfortunate 
 coincidence, but not of guilt ; and if not of guilt, was 
 she not called upon by all that was true, and de- 
 voted, and holy in the deepest and most soul-thrill- 
 ing of all the affections to fly to him, to share with 
 him his shame and imprisonment, as willingly as she 
 would have shared his fortunes or his liberty ? How 
 poorly was she fulfilling the Christian mission of love, 
 when immured in a cold receptacle of frozen and 
 chilled human hearts, and occupied wholly by servile 
 and menial labors, but a tithe of which seemed to go 
 to fill the urn of charity, while he whom God, by the 
 
222 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 strongest affection of which we are capable, had bound 
 indissolubly to her, was pining upon the bed of pain, 
 wounded suffering perhaps dying, without one kind 
 friend to alleviate his miseries, or offer up a prayer for 
 his departing soul. Agitated by a conflict of various 
 emotions, and unable clearly to perceive her duty, she 
 was glad to flee for refuge to the soothing relief of the 
 confessional. There she had been wont, and especial- 
 ly of late, to unburden all her soul to open the vol- 
 ume of her sinful and erring thoughts in the presence 
 of the holy representative of God. Why should she 
 not freely do so now, when the most important of all 
 the questions which she should be called upon in this 
 life to decide, and in the future to account for, must 
 soon be decided, and that, too, forever ! 
 
 As she entered the cell, she met a young and pretty 
 Sister, who looked younger and prettier under the in- 
 fluence of an ill- concealed smile and blush, which 
 seemed to Julia little in keeping with the sacredness 
 of the task she had just fulfilled. She thought little 
 of it, however, for since her entrance within the holy 
 walls, she had often painfully witnessed the degree to 
 which frequent and stated repetitions of prescribed 
 devotional exercises lessen the reverence of the devo- 
 tee, and convert his worship into a trifling and heart- 
 less mummery. Lamenting this thought, the door of 
 the cell closed upon her, and she approached and 
 
The Chattel Child. 223 
 
 kissed the ground before the worthy father. Kaising 
 her eyes from thence, she saw in him not the reverend 
 and aged priest, Father Eeilly, to whom she had pre- 
 viously confessed, hut a young and dark man, whose 
 lustrous eye and soft*, youthful form ill accorded with 
 the gloomy habit in which he was shrouded. 
 
 Hesitating for a moment whether to unfold the story 
 of her heart to him in whom, spite of his habit, her 
 imagination found it so difficult to recognize a spirit- 
 ual father, she in a few moments, with eyes modestly 
 fixed upon the ground, and unmindful of the effect of 
 her presence or her story upon the young father, found 
 herself revealing the inmost thoughts of her guileless 
 bosom even the touching story of her love. As if con- 
 scious that a person of his habits of contemplation and 
 heavenly meditation could know nothing of the intensi- 
 ty of such a passion, or of the power it possesses to swerve 
 us from duty, and distort even our notions of duty 
 itself, the gentle Julia pathetically, and with uncon- 
 scious eloquence, described its thrilling power, until a 
 glow of earthly admiration spread over the face of the 
 young priest. 
 
 " I can see but two ways by which you may escape 
 the suffering inflicted upon jour soul in consequence 
 of this guilty passion," he remarked at length. 
 
 " And what are they, holy father ?" 
 
 The first to yield to it ; which would be to return 
 
224 Owned and Disowned or, 
 
 to the malevolent and bitter world which you have 
 left, which, having once walked in the better path, 
 you should pray earnestly that you may never do." 
 
 "And the other?" 
 
 " Is to remain here, and seek to mitigate the power 
 of this guilty love, by directing it to other objects, or 
 replacing it by holier affections." 
 
 " But, reverend father, I could love no other ; and 
 even if I could, would it not be a fresh sin ? Besides, 
 I see no one but the sisters and the priests. Whom 
 could I love ?" 
 
 " Whether you could love no other, my dear daugh- 
 ter," replied the priest, " I suppose it would be diffi- 
 cult for any one situated as you are to prophesy. 
 Whether it would be an additional sin if you should, 
 it were well to leave to your confessor. But of this 
 be assured the daughter whose weakness must needs 
 give the reins to her affections, is happier when those 
 affections stray not beyond the pale of the church." 
 
 Already the atmosphere of sacredness and holiness, 
 which had hitherto seemed to Julia to fill the cham- 
 ber of confessional, vanished, and she felt a stifling 
 sense of vacuity, as if a world of nothingness were 
 concentrated in the being before her, or as if he were 
 one of those dark absorbents, sucking good out of all 
 around it, but radiating no spiritual light in return. 
 
 From the desire more fully to be assured of this, 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 225 
 
 to her, terrible truth alone, she new continued her 
 inquiry 
 
 " But how would you reconcile such an affection 
 with the vow of chastity which, as a novice, I have 
 solemnly taken ?" 
 
 " It needs but little reconciliation, daughter," .said 
 he, taking her fair hand into his own. " Thou art in- 
 deed under the three vows of poverty, chastity, and 
 obedience ; yet thou mayst, by the law of obedience, 
 be absolved from the law* of poverty, and at the will 
 of thy Superior become rich. If the temptation of 
 riches lead thee to sin, it is his sin who commanded, 
 not thine who obeyed ; for the law of obedience is 
 superior to the law of poverty, and thou dost right, 
 and the holy church will absolve thee from all sin in 
 obeying. So with chastity. Now shouldst thou love 
 the most pious young priest, and should he, which is 
 not at all improbable, have the weakness to yield to 
 the same irresistible affection, it would at least be a 
 comfort to you to know that the sin would be ascriba- 
 ble to his weakness, for that you were bound to him 
 by the vow of obedience, which is superior even to the 
 vow of chastity." 
 
 "And would you, then/ holy father, that I should 
 transfer the affection I have borne for Walter to you 
 and your good brothers ?" 
 
 " I would not willingly commit my brothers, or 
 10* 
 
226 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 speak for them without authority," said the priest, in 
 a voice intended to be of the most seductive sweet- 
 ness, but revolting to her from its excessive impudence. 
 " But for myself," he continued, " such an aifection 
 would find in me a genial and happy sympathy." 
 
 While he yet spoke, and ere she was fully aware, 
 the young father confessor had encircled her waist in 
 his left arm, and with the other stayed her hand 
 while he would have imprinted a kiss on her brow. 
 
 " No, priest !" she shrieked, recoiling, with a spring, 
 from his hated grasp. " Wretch ! fiend ! you who 
 but wear the livery of angels to serve the devil in ; the 
 air is stifling in your presence. Let me away !" and 
 hastily rising from her kneeling position, she rushed 
 from the apartment. 
 
 Her resolution was immediately taken, and no sooner 
 had she fled the presence of the unworthy one, than 
 she sought in haste the room of the Mother Superior. 
 She was admitted, and bowing with reverence as she 
 passed through the door before the form of the blessed 
 virgin, which stood in a niche in the wall, and kneel- 
 ing and kissing the ground, as was usual, before the 
 holy mother, she rose and requested leave to depart 
 the institution on the following day. 
 
 The mother, who was a lady hardly above forty years 
 of age, intellectual and somewhat handsome, with a 
 smooth, agreeable voice, and a benignant manner, in- 
 
The Chattel Child. 227 
 
 dicative rather of suavity than of real kindness, heard 
 her request without any manifestation of surprise. 
 She then enlarged, with much apparent kindness in her 
 manner, upon the advantages and elevated pleasures 
 of the life of a devoted recluse, contrasting them forci- 
 bly with the dangers and troubles which beset the wo- 
 man of the world, adjured her not to take any such 
 downward step, which she could only repent when too 
 late, told her that the prayers of the sisterhood would 
 be offered for her continuance in her present good life, 
 and finally assured her that at ten o'clock on the mor- 
 row, were she then of the same resolution, she should 
 return to the world as she had left it. 
 
 True to the hour, at ten o'clock on the morrow she 
 was summoned into the presence of the Mother Supe- 
 rior. She felt, as she entered the room, that she was in 
 the presence of another person, though from the habit, 
 now grown familiar to her, of walking with her eyes 
 fixed upon the ground, in token of humility, she saw 
 or rather felt no more than his presence. 
 
 " Daughter," spoke the matron, as Julia rose from 
 the usual prostrate salutation, "are you still of the 
 same mind ?" 
 
 " I still feel it my duty to go," replied Julia ; " I 
 would willingly devote myself to a life of charity, but 
 my heart tells me that I may do so even beyond these 
 walls." 
 
228 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " Of that," said the Mother Superior, " you may 
 judge better hereafter, but as such is your resolution 
 I can no longer, by a doubtful exercise of authority, 
 endeavor to screen you from your proper and lawful 
 condition. Mr. Preston," she said, addressing the 
 stranger, " she is yours." 
 
 Julia started a cold, shuddering chill shook her 
 frame, and seemed to freeze the very currents of her 
 heart. A frightful expression of terror distorted her 
 countenance, and drops of the sweat of agony stood on 
 her brow. For the first time in their lives the father 
 and daughter glanced toward each other in the mutual 
 consciousness of their real relation as master and slave. 
 The owner shrunk abashed before the eagle glance of 
 his high-souled chattel, while the latter fully realized 
 that the tender cord of filial love in her own heart was 
 at that instant cut severed forever. Her expression 
 of terror changed into one of heart-sickness and disgust, 
 and as she met alternately his cowering eye, and the 
 even more heartless calmness of the Sister of Charity, 
 she felt as if all that was good and pure and worthy 
 in her conceptions of the world, were now passing from 
 under her feet, and ready to precipitate her into a 
 boundless abyss. 
 
The Chattel Child. 229 
 
 CHAPTEE XXV. 
 
 TO THE SLAVE-PEN. 
 
 " They mourn, but smile at length ; and smiling mourn. 
 
 The tree will wither long before it fall ; 
 
 The hull drives on though mast and sail be torn, 
 
 The roof-tree sinks but moulders on the hall 
 
 In massy hoariness : the ruined wall 
 
 Stands when its windworn battlements are gone ; 
 
 The bars survive the captive they enthral ; 
 
 The day drags through though storms keep out the sun ; 
 
 And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on." 
 
 CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 
 
 BY the aid of an attendant, Julia, over whom the 
 lethargic prostration of despair seemed for the time 
 to brood, was borne rather than led to a ^carriage, 
 which stood waiting at the street-gate, into which, 
 scarcely sensible, she was deposited. During the last 
 half hour there had protruded from the door of this 
 carriage, in eager watchfulness, a lean, long, skinny 
 and cadaverous face, shaded, by a bushy growth of 
 fiery yellow hair, and ornamented by two small and 
 restless gray eyes, a nose which, in size and color re- 
 sembled an inverted beet, and a hair-lip, the effect of 
 which was heightened by a bristling moustache, which, 
 
230 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 totally undisciplined by the comb or adjusting finger, 
 stood out in every direction like a Canada thistle. 
 
 " Guv -us yer pawr, Judy, an' don't whimper afore 
 yer hurt nuther," said this head, as it withdrew into 
 the carriage, allowing room for them to lift in the 
 half-senseless Julia, in which operation the owner ol 
 the head assisted, by seizing both her arms in a very 
 business-like way, and requesting those outside to 
 " guv her a gentle boost, an' not hurt the gal," pur- 
 suant to which tender entreaty she was lifted into her 
 seat. 
 
 " Wull neaow, friend Preston," said the lurid head, 
 now widened by a broad grin of disgusting admiration, 
 as he stared at Julia, " yer see, she arn't 'zackly wot 
 I thot she waur, but howasever she's 'bout as likely a 
 lookin' parcel as I've sold for some time. Yer see, 
 Joe Swingler can't be cheated on a girl he's bought 
 and sold too many on 'em. I see her better and wors 
 pints as quick as I woud a mare's." 
 
 Julia looked at the unsightly wretch before her with 
 loathing and astonishment. She had not dreamed of 
 the existence of such creatures. 
 
 " Be still, my honey I arn't gwine to bruise yer. 
 Yer as safe in Joe Swingler's hands as in most peo- 
 ple's. Yer'll be fed purty well, and dressed nice, an* 
 I guess yer won't be worked very hard ha, ha, Judy, 
 T guess yer won't be worked very hard. But, Mr. 
 
The Chattel Child. 231 
 
 Preston, arter all, her figger is mis'able. That is, it's 
 neat and purty enough, in a common way, but nuthin 
 to what it might be. She's been on low diet among 
 the nuns, an she wants fatten up. An then she's got 
 the devil's own pluck, an it '11 be the job to break her 
 in. Yer see " 
 
 " Beg pardon, Mr. Swingler, I would rather talk 
 with you of business, when we have more leisure," for 
 even he blushed with shame, and hurriedly turned to 
 depart. 
 
 " But, hold up, Preston don't go off half cocked. 
 Now my motto is 'bizness is bizness' that's my 
 maxim, friend Preston, an I swow it's a true one. 
 'Cordin'ly, yer see my rule is, when I am doin' a thing 
 to do it don't yer see ? and then when it's done it's 
 done and it never has to be done a second time, unless 
 it's done so the first time, that it has to be done over 
 agin don't yer see ? Them's my conwictions, and 
 what better can a man do than to foller his own 
 conwictions right and wrong Mr. Preston. Now, 
 as I was sayin' various pints about the gal arn't 
 purty, though they're tolable, and then her waist is 
 too small altogether although, I say again, she's 
 considerable neat but she won't bring nothing like 
 the full thousand at a reg'lar sale. Take my word 
 and sacred honor for that. Now, Preston, I'd like to 
 'commodate you with the money right off wot d'ye 
 
232 Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 say ? I won't deal close, seein' it's you, for I know 
 it would be no go so I'll come right up to the very 
 highest mark at once/' said he, producing a roll of 
 bank bills and twirling them lightly and leisurely in 
 his left hand. " Say five hundred and fifty, Mr. Pres- 
 ton ? Not a cent more can you get by waiting till 
 the day of judgment and you know, Mr. Preston, you 
 would'nt want to wait quite till that time to sell her." 
 
 " Positively," said Mr. Preston, " you must excuse 
 my departure. " I have an engagement which I must 
 keep. But less than the thousand I cannot think of 
 taking. Good morning, Mr. Swingler." 
 
 " Hallo ! Say the even six hundred, Mr. Preston," 
 said Swingler, darting his head out of the carriage 
 window, and looking earnestly after the receding Mr. 
 Preston, who bowed a negative, and turned again 
 upon his heel. " Say six-fifty ; seven hundred, Pres- 
 ton seven hundred," he bawled, " cash down. I say, 
 hold on, Preston I'll go the eight now. Never'll 
 give as much again to save your soul from h !" 
 
 In justice to the various charitable and kindly 
 qualities of Mr. Swingler, we should state that the 
 peroration of this amiable exhortation was not intended 
 to hurt the feelings of Mr. Preston, but purely to re- 
 lieve his own, as they were uttered in so low a voice, 
 the golden head and lustrous nose receding into the 
 
The Chattel Cliild. 233 
 
 carriage at the time, as never to reach the unsuspect- 
 ing ears of his friend Preston. 
 
 The driver cracked his whip, and the hack was 
 splashed through the mud, and walked over the dry 
 pavement in the usual style and pace of worn-out 
 nags, whose owners consider whips cheaper than oats. 
 
 What, during that brief ride, were the sensations 
 of that proudly intellectual, superbly beautiful, and 
 thrillingly spiritual chattel, as she thus confronted the 
 vile and soulless merchant dealer, upon whose counter 
 her life, hopes, and destiny were about to be laid for 
 bargain and sale ! Oh, reader, have you ever subtly 
 philosophized upon the inequalities among mankind, 
 which render the subordination of the lower to the 
 higher orders necessary, and therefore just ? Look 
 into that carriage ; behold the inequality, and ask 
 yourself if it justifies the " subordination." 
 
 After a short drive, by which Julia was, in part, re- 
 stored to the possession of her scattered senses, the 
 carriage halted before a neat, plain building, apparently 
 a dwelling, and having nothing peculiar in its outward 
 appearance to indicate that it was otherwise, except 
 the number of careless, jaunty scrutinizers wlo thronged 
 in the hall and around the doorway. But Julia re- 
 coiled instinctively as the steps were let down, "for she 
 felt that with her entrance into this place, the first 
 poisoned barb of the inquisitorial machine would pen- 
 
234 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 etrate and fester in her soul. But she mustered cour- 
 age and descended. As she did so, a crowd of peering 
 faces, all distorted by equally disgusting expressions, 
 vulgar interest, and lewd admiration, crowded around 
 her. 
 
 " There's a beauty for you," said Swingler, with a 
 business nod, wink, and smile. " Pick her up, boys, 
 and bring her in," he continued ; for at this moment 
 Julia her face livid and moistened with agony, every 
 lineament quivering with deep, unutterable woe had 
 sunk in the grasp of her supporters upon the earth, and 
 raising her clasped hands, had prayed, (a whim not 
 unusual with slaves on such occasions.) 
 
 " Oh, good Father ! let me die. Oh, Lord Jesus ! 
 will you not take me ! Holy Virgin ! Oh, oh let 
 me die !" 
 
 " Never mind the Lord Jesus, Judy ; I'm inclined 
 to think he don't keep this place. Call on Joe Swin- 
 gler," urged that worthy gentleman, in hilarious mock- 
 ery. " He can help you. And as for holy virgins, 
 they've sometimes been here, but they didn't remain 
 here long. They're a kind of thing we don't believe 
 in." These happy hits were received by the bystanders 
 with appreciating laughter, and he continued : " There, 
 boys, don't muss her feathers ; she's too nice 'a bird 
 to be roughly handled. Put her in number fourteen ; 
 there's only three women and a boy in there now. 
 
The Chattel Child. 235 
 
 By the limpin' Jove ! if they can sell that critter for 
 a quadroon, Fd like to know why I couldn't sell my 
 wife, born in the State of Vermont, of an English mam 
 and a Scotch dad, and as brown as a mouse, for a pure 
 mulatto ? By the limpin' Jove ! I wish I had her 
 here ; I'd try it." 
 
 While this affectionate allusion to the loved but ab- 
 sent Mrs. Swingler was being uttered, Julia was led, in a 
 bewildered trance, through the hall, at the end of which 
 an iron-grated door creaked fearfully after her, and 
 across a wide court surrounded by high brick walls, 
 and in the centre of which was a small raised plat- 
 form, and up a staircase, and along a corridor to the 
 designated cell. Again a heavy grated iron door 
 creaked fearfully upon its hinges she entered. The 
 door closed upon her, and the sound of the bolt of 
 the lock, as it was moved into its place by the key 
 that most dismal of all sounds, save the falling of the 
 earth upon the coffin of a living man was heard, and 
 Julia Preston, sitting down upon a rude pallet of 
 st r aw, upon the other side of which a drunken negro 
 was sitting, looked around at the four walls of her 
 cell in the slave jail. 
 
236 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 REVELATIONS. 
 
 " 'Tis then delightful misery no more, 
 But agony unmixed, incessant gall, 
 Corroding every thought, and blasting all 
 Love's paradise. Ye fairy prospects, then, 
 Ye beds of roses, and ye bowers of joy, 
 Farewell ! ye gleamings of departed peace, 
 Shine out your last ! the yellow-tinging plague 
 Internal vision taints, and in a night 
 Of livid gloom imagination wraps. 
 Ah then ! instead of love, enlivened cheeks, 
 Of sunny features and of ardent eyes 
 With flowing rapture bright, dark looks succeed 
 Suffused and glaring with untender fire ; 
 A clouded aspect and a burning cheek, 
 Where the whole poisoned soul malignant sits, 
 And frightens love away." THOMSON 
 
 LET us return for a few moments to the " Flying 
 Scud." Within the same little cabin in which we 
 have already witnessed an interview between Lafitte 
 and Conrad, the former has been seated for a time, 
 with several letters and a heavy pistol before him 
 alone and in thought. But now he rings, with his 
 usual impatience, a bell which lies upon the table, and 
 
The Chattel Child. 237 
 
 which is answered in a moment by the appearance of 
 Annette. 
 
 " Conrad," snarled the pirate laconically, for he was 
 in one of his thoughtful moods, " call him." 
 
 " He is more pleasantly engaged in sighing and sim- 
 pering over his new conquest," replied Annette ; "of 
 course you would not have me disturb him." 
 
 " Wench, call him instantly I" growled Lafitte in a 
 tone that precluded any further display of flippancy on 
 her part, and Annette vanished to obey the summons. 
 The cabins of the vessel being connected by a single 
 passage-way, a step brought her to the door of Ada. 
 She knocked, and Ada's soft voice answered 
 
 " Come in, dear !" 
 
 Ada was standing in the centre of the room. A 
 loose gown of white muslin fell like a drapery over her 
 beautiful form, unconfined save at the waist by the 
 encircling arm of Mr. Howard, or, as the reader already 
 perceives him to be Conrad Defoe. Her right hand 
 yielded fondly to the pressure of his remaining one, 
 while her other rested affectionately, and, it seemed 
 pleadingly, upon his shoulder. 
 
 " Dearest Arthur," she murmured, the presence of 
 Annette indicates that it is not safe for you to remain 
 longer ; and yet it seems as if I cannot part from you, 
 even for a few hours. Oh, Arthur !" 
 
 " My own Ada !" said Mr. Howard, while a tear 
 
238 Owned and Disowned, or, 
 
 that trembled upon his lid coursed down and fell upon 
 her cheek, as he drew her still closer to his bosom, and 
 bending over pressed a kiss upon her upturned lips. 
 " Dearost Ada, for a brief time shall the sweets of 
 love be thus marred, but fear not. Soon, very soon, 
 we shall be delivered from the evil wretches into whose 
 hands we have fallen. Good-bye, dearest Ada !" 
 
 The girl still hung fondly and passionately upon his 
 arm, as if she feared to release her hold upon it. 
 
 " Good-bye, Ada !" he repeated, gently releasing 
 himself, and again imprinting upon her fair, pale brow, 
 the pledge of his affection. 
 
 Annette, who had returned to the outside of the 
 door, as if to watch against foreign interruption, and 
 upon whose countenance a bitter, malignant smile had 
 alternated with the scowl of hatred as one or the other 
 of the lovers had spoken, now re-opened it, and en- 
 tered with a face wrought with marvellous quickness 
 into a sweet smile, mingled with apprehension and 
 fear, and whispered hurriedly 
 
 " Positively, Mr. Howard, you will be discovered if 
 you delay a moment longer. I am sure your sweet 
 little wife will excuse you, after enjoying your company 
 so long," she said, embracing Ada and kissing her, 
 " what more could you ask, little charm ?" 
 
 " Only that," replied Ada coaxingly, as she followed 
 Mr. Howard to the door, and again reposed her clasped 
 
The Chattel Child. 239 
 
 hands affectionately upon his manly bosom, " only that 
 you too should call me by that same endearing term." 
 
 Mr. Howard folded her clinging form once more in 
 his embrace, and whispered in her ear the sweet, small 
 word, "wife," kissed her affectionately, and slowly 
 withdrawing from her embrace left the room with An- 
 nette, leaving the confiding Ada full of varied emo- 
 tions, and reflecting upon a flood of recent experiences 
 which she could scarcely realize, but on the whole 
 happy. 
 
 " It was hard for me to call her wife in your pres- 
 ence," said Conrad, when the door had closed, enfold- 
 ing Annette in his arms, and kissing her with less of 
 passion and more of familiarity than he had lately 
 shown : " I could not have done so, had you not com- 
 pelled me to " 
 
 " Ah, no ! I suppose not," said Annette, with an 
 attempted sneer, though pleased in spite of herself 
 with his dalliance. " But it is entirely unnecessary 
 for you to ply your art of flattery upon me. I am 
 yours without that trouble. Besides, you know that 
 I place not the slightest confidence in your expressions 
 of regard. Oh, would for our poor sex that honest 
 men, if there are such, could win our love as easily as 
 rogues." 
 
 " What does the old devil want of me ?" whispered 
 
240 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 Conrad, sharply, as they halted before the door of 
 Lafitte's cabin. 
 
 " The devil knows, ask him," replied Annette, open- 
 ing the door and entering the cabin. 
 
 " We want to plan," said Lafitte, with the same 
 terse fierceness as before, indicating that his dark spirit 
 was more than usually troubled. " Wench, leave !" 
 
 " I have the same interest in the success of your 
 projects that you have, and my judgment is probably 
 as good," replied Annette, calmly, seating herself, 
 " and I prefer to stay." 
 
 With equal calmness the pirate took up the loaded 
 pistol from the table, shook it gently, examined the 
 priming, and then aimed it at the girl, and pulled the 
 trigger. It snapped. Except the slight nervous 
 twich that stirred her, she flinched not. He pulled 
 back the trigger again, aimed and drew, but again it 
 snapped. 
 
 " Have you concluded to go ?" thundered the pirate, 
 in a tone like the growl of the lion when he vaults 
 upon his prey. 
 
 " No, captain Lafitte." 
 
 " Fiends in h , you havn't, eh ? Get me an- 
 other pistol then," he yelled with still more terrible 
 fierceness. 
 
 " I shall do nothing of the kind," replied Annette 
 calmly. 
 
The Chattel Child. 241 
 
 His face, now livid with supprest but almost burst- 
 Ing rage, the pirate, with a tremulous hand which 
 his forced calmness would not render steady, once 
 more knocked the breech violently, adjusted the 
 priming, and taking a steady aim, pulled the trigger. 
 Again it snapped. Again she flinched not. Circum- 
 stances for which the astonished outlaw might have 
 more easily accounted had he witnessed Annette half 
 an hour before when she withdrew the charge and 
 dampened the priming. 
 
 " Child of the devil do you want me to shoot 
 you ?" 
 
 " I do !" replied Annette, " exactly/' 
 
 " Oh, eh ! you do indeed," said the pirate, in a 
 quieted tone, flinging the pistol into a corner, and for 
 some whim, best known to himself, changing his pur- 
 pose. " Well, sit where you are. I will wait then 
 till some time when you don't. Conrad," said he, 
 taking up a letter before him, " I have been offered 
 by Pakenham the rank of Captain in the royal navy, 
 and the sum of" (and here his voice sunk as he named 
 the reward into a low whisper inaudible even to An- 
 nette) " to furnish him with all the information he 
 wants relative to New Orleans, and to assist him in 
 taking the place." 
 
 " Better not accept it," remarked Annette, quietly. 
 
 " Devil's own hound," yelled the pirate chief, now 
 11 
 
242 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 fully enraged. " Speak again, woman, and you die ! 
 What do you think of the proposition ?" he con- 
 tinued, returning to Conrad, with a fierceness scarcely 
 abated. 
 
 " Friends," said Annette, advancing and laying the 
 tips of her fingers upon the table, upon opposite sides 
 of which they were sitting. "For once I shall advise 
 you, whether you choose to follow my advice or not. 
 You cannot float much longer unhung, in your present 
 business. Not only these parts but the world is getting 
 too hot to hold you. With the close of this war you 
 will be immediately hunted down and destroyed. Be- 
 sides, how can you wish to die as pirates, when you 
 are rich enough to buy a principality and live as 
 princes ? Mark my words, Jean Lafitte, you had 
 better go back and live an honest blacksmith by ham- 
 mering at your old anvil in New Orleans, than to con- 
 tinue longer in your present business. America is, 
 after all, your country, and the only one that will dare 
 protect you. If you are going to show the white 
 feather, you might as well surrender to your friends 
 as your enemies. You have the power, by exposing 
 the whole of this diabolical scheme, to do your coun- 
 try a great service. Do so, and she will receive yon 
 with open arms if not respectable, at least pardoned. 
 I have said all I mean to say, and have done my duty. 
 
The Chattel Child. 243 
 
 t 
 
 Live or die, I am with you. I leave you to reflect 
 upon this and form your own conclusion." 
 
 This saying, she retired, while the two pirates, not 
 a little astonished at so strange and unaccustomed a 
 demonstration, stared at each other in silence. Con- 
 rad first broke the spell. 
 
 " It strikes me that the " 
 
 " Girl is right," interrupted Lafitte, with an em- 
 phasis from the fierceness of which his vein of admira- 
 tion for the heroine did not detract. " The girl is 
 right," he repeated, bringing his huge fist down upon 
 the table with a force that seemed adequate to shiver 
 it to atoms. 
 
 " For nnoe I take counsel of a woman '' 
 
244 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 A HEROIC ACHIEVEMENT. 
 
 " A kind of change came in my fate ; 
 My keepers grew compassionate : 
 I know not what had made them so 
 They were inured to sights of woe ; 
 But so it was." THE PRISONER OP CHILLON. 
 
 WHILE the events recorded in the few last chapters 
 were transpiring, an enterprise profoundly interesting 
 to the person most concerned, was approaching its 
 issue. A short time was to decide whether this was 
 to be added to the long list of heroic and skillful 
 achievements over which the magic wand of success 
 has dropped the unfading wreath of glory, or whether 
 it, like many others equally well devised, was to be 
 stamped by failure with the brand of demerit, thence 
 to sink into undisturbed oblivion, or to be remembered 
 only with untimely levity ; for while it may some- 
 times be true that the hero makes success, it is inva- 
 riably true that success makes the hero. 
 
 Had we followed Sandy and the unceremonious 
 stranger in half uniform who so summarily introduced 
 
The Chattel Child. 245 
 
 himself to his acquaintance at the quay, we should 
 have inferred that nothing short of the fastidious 
 politeness in which, as a family servant of the Pres- 
 tons, Alexander had been educated, could have in- 
 duced him to follow, without dissent, the route pur- 
 sued by his newly fledged acquaintance. By what- 
 ever motive actuated, however, he did so, and the 
 result was that Sandy had been for several weeks 
 contemplating, with the most unphilosophical want 
 * of serenity, the iron-grated door, hard plank bed, four 
 walls, ceiling and floor of his little box-like cell in the 
 city prison. There was, indeed, one small, closely 
 grated window, very high up, in one side of his cell, 
 through which opened a heavenly prospect of incon- 
 ceivable dimensions, the value of which Sandy's limited 
 amount of astronomical knowledge did not enable him 
 fully to appreciate. Occasionally during the long 
 nights, a twinkling star would come within the range 
 of his vision through this loop-hole, which Sandy 
 would watch until it would pass into a total eclipse 
 behind one of the bars, and then until it would come 
 out again and pass behind another, so that Sandy was 
 not entirely without amusement. 
 
 He was the possessor of a jack-knife ; and had he 
 also possessed a stick upon which to use it, or a piece 
 of chalk and the liberty to mark upon the walls, or a 
 smooth, round stone, which he could have tossed from 
 
246 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 one hand to the other through the livelong day, he 
 would have been tolerably happy. Especially could 
 he have monopolized a jews'-harp or a violin, he would 
 have been secure against monotony. But neither of 
 these were his. Occasionally the keeper vouchsafed 
 a grateful quid of tobacco, and twice Alexander had 
 gloried in a segar. But with these slight exceptions, 
 he had been thrown for his entertainment and relief 
 from the monotonous tedium incident to his limited 
 quarters and select society, entirely upon his own tact, 
 talents, and abilities. Sometimes he would tie his 
 legs in a hard knot, and walk around his cell three 
 times upon his hands ; then he would whistle for an 
 hour, and occupy himself in conversation with imagi- 
 nary spectators ; then he would fling his pedestals in 
 the air, until his feet would graze along the sky of his 
 little world, or perhaps rest against it ; and there he 
 would stand with his hands upon the floor, and his 
 feet upon the ceiling, as if he had forgotten which 
 way the attraction of gravitation worked, until one 
 would have thought he had gone to "sleep ; then he 
 would whistle again ; then he would join his hands 
 in front of him, and jump over them, and then whis- 
 tle violently. 
 
 But notwithstanding these and many other perfor- 
 mances so interesting as to be repeated again and 
 
The Chattel Child. 247 
 
 again, it would be vain to say that Sandy was not, on 
 the whole, weary of his new way of life. 
 
 " Sandy," said he to himself one day, after a long 
 re very, " Sandy, sit down here on dis bed ; I'm gwine 
 to talk to you like a fader." i, 
 
 So Sandy sat down upon the hard pallet, and pro- 
 ceeded to listen to his own fatherly discourse. 
 
 " Sandy, you're a rascal you're de greatest rascal 
 out o' jail ; no, you ain't out o' jail. Beg pardon, 
 Sandy. I wish de Lor' you was you are de greatest 
 rascal in jail. I specs dere may be some greater ras- 
 cals out o' jail . dan you are. Kaze why if dere 
 hadn't been, you wouldn't a been in jaiL So dat's 
 clar. But, nebberdeless, Sandy, you're a rascal. You 
 whimp an' say, ' Now, done say dat to Sandy, I neber 
 means to do nuffin' wrong/ 
 
 " So much de wos for ye. You's wos 'n dat. You's 
 onlucky. Now, Sandy, I neber thought dat o' you. I 
 know you'd steal oats, but dat's nuffin' so long as you 
 was lucky massa neber kotch you. I know you lie, 
 but dat ars nuffin' unless you are onlucky in get found 
 out. But if you's onlucky, I'm down on yer. 
 
 " Now, Sandy, jis look at it, an' if you'll hark to 
 reason I'll 'splain it to you. Friend Sandy, if you had 
 only bin stealin' oats twice, an' not got kotched. an' 
 den steal oats once more, an' jis as you goin' out wid 
 de oats, de dog's teeth stick like a poor nigger's plas- 
 
248 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 ter to de small o' your back, an' you bawl an 7 bawl 
 till massa come and say, e Sandy, you take twenty 
 lashes jis where de dog bit yer/ or, ' Sandy, you go to 
 jail till I git time to lick yer/ I feel in my heart like 
 saying * Tankee, massa/ because Sandy been lucky, 
 Sandy got off cleah twice, an' you, massa, try bery hard 
 an' jis make out to kotch him once. But now, Sandy, 
 you 'fernal rascal, I'd like to know what got you here 
 but onluckiness. How many times, on dis 'tickler 'ca- 
 sion, did you do somefin' bad an' go cleah ? None at 
 all. You did nuffin' bad as you knows on. An' heah 
 you be in jail, you 'fernal rascal. You's de greatest 
 rascal I know you's was. You's onlucky enough to 
 be hung some day, an' you will be hung. Now, Sandy, 
 mark my words, you'll be hung, not because you's bad, 
 but because you's onlucky. Sandy, I'm down on you, 
 I'm ashamed of you. Sandy, good-bye, I cut youah 
 'quaintance jis as I would cut any friend as was on- 
 lucky until he got out o' trouble." 
 
 What might have been the lamentable consequences 
 of Sandy's positive refusal to have anything more to 
 do with himself, we are happily prevented from know- 
 ing, for just at this critical moment, as if through his 
 widely-opened mouth a flood of light had suddenly 
 poured in upon his brain, Sandy sprung to the flooi, 
 stood a moment in dreamy thought, looked out of the 
 little grated window, whistled a long, shrill blast, and 
 
The Chattel Child. 249 
 
 then, after several unwieldy somersets and other 
 gymnastic performances, having somewhat shaken off 
 his joy, sat calmly down and held his sides and laughed 
 with a low, quiet, cunning chuckle. 
 
 "No, Sandy, you's mighty smart Sandy, you's 
 lucky 111 stand up for you, Sandy, after all you've 
 got it now, Sandy, good for you good boy, good boy !" 
 
 So saying, Sandy put up both hands and patted 
 himself on the back twice, in token of his high appre- 
 ciation of the talents which nature had enriched him 
 with, and of the wonderful perfection to which they 
 had been developed by education. 
 
 In a few minutes the warden's wife appeared, to 
 hand to Sandy, through the slide in the grated door, 
 his unsavory dinner. 
 
 " Please, missus," said Sandy in a voice of pleading 
 humility, " I so dirty I can't feel no consolation o' 
 religion. Fse so dirty makes me feel wicked. Now, 
 if missus hab de kind consequentiousness on a poor 
 nigger as has seen better days, to send him a tub o' 
 water, to bathe and cleansify his ole duds with, he 
 save missus de trouble o' havin' 'em washed, an' to- 
 morrow he come out clean an' nice, an' he feel like 
 tankin' missus an' prayin' for de Lord to permit an' 
 pardon his sins." 
 
 Whether it was to deliver poor Sandy from his 
 
 wickedness, or to save herself from trouble, or on ac- 
 
 11* 
 
250 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 count of the touching character of the whole appeal, 
 the matron promised assent. 
 
 " Please, missus," said Sandy as she was leaving. 
 
 " What more do you want ?" 
 
 "Please, missus, a good big tub, for Sandy am 
 bery fond ob his bath." 
 
 The articles were soon brought, to the satisfaction 
 of Sandy, who, as the door again closed on him and 
 the porters disappeared, mentally rewarded them by 
 placing his finger at the base of his broad, flat nose, 
 and leering quizzically after them. 
 
 No sooner had they retired, than Sandy commenced 
 operation ; carefully donning his own garments, which 
 had been temporarily provided him for the purpose, 
 he hurriedly ran his prison apparel through the water, 
 and hung the latter upon a string which he had at- 
 tached to two nails, driven in the mortar of the wall. 
 When he had thus suspended them, he proceeded 
 very industriously to remove, by the aid of his jack- 
 knife, the mortar from around the small wedge stones 
 which held fast one of the heaviest stones in the wall, 
 immediately behind one of the garments he had washed. 
 In a few moments, with some labor, these little stones 
 and much mortar were removed, and carefully put to 
 soak in the suds which his recent cleansing operations 
 had made opaque with dirt. Soon the great stone be-, 
 gan to loosen, and in an hour it also was safely de- 
 
The Chattel Child. 251 
 
 posited in the tub, where the water rose over it and it 
 was invisible. Thus he labored until the first faint 
 beam of light shone through the orifice, and then 
 waited until the warden's man entered with his even- 
 ing meal. Sandy's apparent work then fell down over 
 his real labors, and when the warden's man asked him 
 what he was doing, he pointed to the tub and to the 
 shirt upon the wall, and said with a grin 
 
 "Don't yer see, massr, Sandy wants to come out 
 clean if he can." 
 
 The warden's man smiled good-naturedly, and de- 
 parted. Sandy jumped up immediately, and, as it 
 was now twilight, silently and cautiously removed 
 stone after stone and laid them on the floor, as con- 
 cealment of his work would have been no longer pos- 
 sible. When the orifice was large enough to admit 
 his shoulders he looked out, to his infinite gratifica- 
 tion, upon a narrow alley, lined with stables. There 
 was not a person in sight. Half an hour more he 
 worked industriously, and again looked forth. He was 
 in the second story of the building, but all beneath 
 was wrapped in auspicious silence and repose. In a 
 trice he had leaped to the ground, and the dawn of 
 the next morning found him pursuing the even tenor 
 of his way to Lindenhall, occasionally ejaculating, 
 " Sandy, you's mighty smart Sandy, you's lucky." 
 
252 Owned and Disowned', or, 
 
 CHAPTEK XXVIII. 
 
 THE HEKO KETUKNED. 
 
 SANDY dared not approach nearer to Lindenhall, 
 but lurking in the chapparel till dusk, he then ap- 
 proached the hut of old Tim and Aunt Tanzey, which 
 stood, fortunately, upon the very outskirts of the 
 quarters. ^ 
 
 " Why, de Lor' bless your dear soul, honey," ex- 
 claimed old Aunt Tanzey, seizing him in her arms with 
 a heartiness of embrace worthy of her younger days, as 
 soon as she recognized him, while the tears chased 
 each other down her cheeks. " Lor 7 bless us, if it arn't 
 Sandy, for all de worl' true as Gospel. Sandy 
 Preston my eyes is it you ? du tell. Now for de 
 Lor's sake, do tell us what's happened and what's 
 goin' to happen. Is the world comin' to an end ? 
 Did you eber ! If my old Tim ain't jis done gone up 
 to de Hall and dare dey be all de week holden 
 meetin' and prayin' and shoutin', for old Tim says 
 de debil's comin' now for all on us an I b'lieve he 
 is. But we'd all gin you up for dead and gone, and 
 
The Chattel Child. 253 
 
 jes' now as I was a mixin de biscuit for poor old Tim, 
 who keeps a sayin', now, Tanzey, dere's no use for to 
 mix it, for it'll bum afore mornin' and I says, No 
 it won't burn afore mornin', for I won't put it on de 
 fire till mornin' and be says says he Tanzey, I say 
 unto you, verily, de debil will put us all on de fire 
 afore mornin' for de worl' aint goin' to last annuder 
 day. Well, as I was sayin', j is as I was mixin' ob do 
 biscuit, as poor Tim talks so about who should come 
 in but Sandy Preston. Now, Sandy, can't yer tell 
 us somefin' about Miss July and Miss Ady ? You 
 always knows ebberyting." 
 
 " De Lor' sakes," said Sarjdy, " you don't tell me 
 anythin's happened to dem angels do ye ?" 
 
 " Don't teU yer. And 'av I got to tell yer ? Yer 
 poor, miserable, ignorum, runaway wagabone has ye 
 been down in de big swamp dis seven week or whar 
 has ye been, dat ye ain't heerd what de whole libbin 
 world is cryin' an goin' on about ? Ain't der a foren 
 army around de city goin' to take it, and ain't it highly 
 possible dat de whole world'll burn up unless Misses 
 July and Miss Ady brought back soon, an' you ain't 
 heerd nuffin' about it ? Whar you been, you igno- 
 rum scamp ? down in de swamp ? you wagabone. 
 De Lor' blastize us dat we didn't set de dogs on yer. 
 We might a knowed you was dare." 
 
254 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 "Hush, Aunt Tanzey," said Sandy with assumed 
 dignity " I tell yer I ain't been in de big swamp." 
 
 " Wot a lie, you waga " 
 
 " No, Aunt Tanzey," continued Sandy, bridling 
 " Ise been in de calaboose all dis time, an ain't eat 
 nuffin' for two days an nights an now I've got into 
 old Tim's cabin at last, I didn't spec to be 'bused quite 
 dis way." And what with fright at the news which 
 had just broken upon him, together with his exhaus- 
 tion and his real grief at the unwelcome animadver- 
 sions of Aunt Tanzey, Sandy sunk upon a stool, 
 covered his face with his hands and wept. 
 
 This was too much for the really kind-hearted old 
 negress. 
 
 " Why, de Lor' bress yer deah soul, honey don't go 
 on so !" she said, as kneeling before him and loosen- 
 ing her bunch of gray wool from the folds of her red 
 bandana handkerchief, she applied it in a motherly 
 way to his eyes. " I did'n mean nuffin'. Only I thort 
 you might tell somefin' about de poor los' angels, God 
 bless 'em. I fraid we neber heah nuffin' more good 
 bout dem in dis worl, an we be mighty sure we neber 
 heah nuffin' bad in de nex'." 
 
 " Neber hear from dem ar wat yer mean, Aunt 
 Tanzey ?" exclaimed Sandy. 
 
 " Woll now, you poor soul, I tell yer. Poor Miss 
 July, an' dat ar strange gemman o' hers, an' you, all 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 255 
 
 went off onbeknown to no one, de same night, leavin' 
 pool Miss Ady all alone ; an 7 sez I to ole Tim, sez I, 
 < Tim, de nex' ting be Miss Ady/ An' sure enough, 
 de bery nex' day Miss Ady nowhar to be diskibbered, 
 'dough we all scour up an' down, high an' low, and 
 look nine ways for Sunday. An' Massa Preston hardly 
 been here since ; an' dey say we're all gwine to be sole 
 off agin, if we ain't sole off already, for de hall, an' 
 de niggers, an' eberyting is all gone to de new owner. 
 Dey call him lasaacks, I b'leeb, an' his ole lantern- 
 jawed, slinkey-slawney lawyer's been up here. Dey 
 call him Snakes, and he looks enough like 'em, I'm 
 sure. 
 
 " So ye see, all de Prestons is goin' right down in 
 de worl', right down to nuffin', an' we're gwine To be 
 sole, one one way an' anoder anoder ; so we must 
 make up our minds all to part soon, to meet no more 
 on dis side Jordan. Oh, poor Tim," wept the old 
 negress, " poor Tim, what will 'com' ob him ?" 
 
 " Lor' sakes ! ain't it too bad ?" blubbered Sandy. 
 " But whar de Lor' sakes Miss July an' Miss Ady 
 gone ?" 
 
 " Whar am dey ! Ax de moon. She's de only one 
 we know dat's seen 'em. Dead or libin', weal or woe, 
 not a libin' soul knows wot's happened 'em," sobbed 
 the old lady, while the hot tears, thicker and faster 
 
256 Oivned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 with, every word she uttered, coursed down the face of 
 honest Sandy. 
 
 " So yer see, bless yer, honey, I was only a little nat'- 
 ral pervoke like when I foun' yer didnt know nuffin'. 
 So don 7 go on so now, God bless yer. But wot de Lor' 
 sakes ye been to de calaboose for ? Wot ye did ? 
 Ye kilt anybody ? Don' tell me de stain o' blood on 
 yer, Sandy." 
 
 " No, no, Tanzey." 
 
 " Anybody kilt dem murdered dem ! Say, Sandy, 
 yer wagabone, wot yer been to de calaboose for ?" 
 
 " I habn't de leas' inception," replied Sandy. 
 
 " Wot's dat mean ? Speak plain, an' no big words, 
 Sandy. Ise no larnin, I tell yer ; an' while you'm 
 makin' up some lie or oder, I'll git yer some supper, 
 for yer looks as if yer hadn' eat a mouthful sin' yer 
 been hidin' away in de swamp ; an' I done b'leeb yer 
 hab." 
 
 " I dun no wot I ben to calaboose for. How should 
 I know ?" said Sandy. 
 
 " Dun no !" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Mus' ben some reason, else how come yer in ?" 
 
 " 'Cos I was onlucky, I 'speck," replied Sandy. 
 
 u An' how come ye out ?" 
 
 " 'Cos I was lucky agm, I 'speck/' said Sandy. 
 
The Chattel CJiild. 257 
 
 "Did yo i eber I" exclaimed Aunt Tanzey, in amaze- 
 ment. 
 
 " No, I neber !" rejoined Sandy, by which exclama- 
 tions the impression was mutually arrived at that 
 events had at last become to them too wonderful to 
 admit of narration, much less of explanation. 
 
258 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 "POOR ADA/ 
 
 ' The storm is stilled. 
 
 Father in heaven ! Thou, only thou, canst sound 
 The heart's great deep, with floods of anguish filled, 
 For human line too fearfully profound. 
 Therefore, forgive, my Father ! if thy child, 
 Eocked on its heaving darkness hath grown wild, 
 And sinned in her despair ! It well may be 
 That thou wouldst lead my spirit back to thee 
 By the crushed hope too long in this world poured, 
 The stricken love which hath perchance adored 
 A mortal in thy place ! Now let me strive 
 With thy strong arm no more ! Forgive, forgive ! 
 Take me to peace." MRS. HEMANS. 
 
 IT was on the eve of the memorable eighth of Jan- 
 uary, 18 . Ada was watching from the window of 
 her cabin prison the last rays of the declining sun, as 
 they cast their bright golden sheen over the calm wa- 
 ters of the Mississippi, for the boundless expanse of 
 ocean was no longer before her, but the distant line 
 of low, flat, interminable marshes and lagoons which 
 surround the outlets of that noble river, formed the 
 horizon. Her little chin reposed in a revery, which 
 
The CJiattel Child. 259 
 
 seemed to be one of sadness, upon her left hand. In 
 her right was a small miniature in her eye a tear. 
 Whose is the miniature and whose the tear ? The 
 features of the former are those of Mr. Howard ! Ada, 
 gentle Ada, what change hath passed over thee since 
 we saw thee last ? Wreathe once more the fond smile 
 of infantile innocence, that we may see thee now as 
 first at Lindenhall. Look not so desponding, heart- 
 sick, and weary. Thine eye hath lost its serene joy, 
 and beams with a restless lustre. Why start with 
 every gentle breath of air, why flutter with every foot- 
 step, why, trembling, echo so mournfully as from an 
 over-burdened breast the melancholy sighs of the night 
 wind ? Where have thy joy and peace flown and 
 why doth this insane unrest speak in every feature and 
 every action, as if it oppressed heavily thy soul ? Oh, 
 Ada, Ada, tearful Ada, thou seest the angels weeping 
 for thee. See, she sighs. Ah, that sigh ! 
 
 " Will he never never come ?" 
 
 For some time after the departure of Ada and 
 ner lover from the Festal Island, the latter had 
 been even more constant than ever before in his visits. 
 When he was present, her waking hours flew away 
 uncounted in a dream of pleasure, which she neither 
 seemed to have power to weigh or to control. During 
 his short absences the recollection of the recent past, 
 the anticipation of the near future, left little time for 
 
260 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 painful reflection, and the gentle Ada borrowed from 
 his influence a new nature, which, though foreign to 
 her for the time, sat upon the throne of her soul, and 
 swayed her emotions as he listed. 
 
 But gradually his visits grew less frequent, his ca- 
 resses less endearing, his enjoyment less evident. 
 During these absences the demon Sorrow, in dark robes 
 and mournful aspect, stalked like a spectre into the 
 dimly-lighted chamber of her soul, and sat in the chair 
 of Joy. Accusations, distrust, and jealousy chilled 
 their meetings, and their vows of love trembled as 
 they were uttered, with the weight of their own false- 
 hood. Let us not further draw aside the veil. The 
 rest was wretchedness and woe unutterable. 
 
 A gentle rap at the door jars her shattered nerves 
 as if it were an earthquake, and, rising hastily, she 
 adjusts her bosom-pin, and twining a stray ringlet be- 
 fore the mirror, says softly 
 
 " Come in \" 
 
 The door opens " Ah, is it you, Annette ?" 
 
 " Yes, poor dear," said Annette with a smile, " I 
 am sorry it is no other, but he cannot come with 
 safety within an hour. We are very near to the city. 
 A great excitement is tumbling everything upside 
 down, as if they were preparing to board an India- 
 man, and Lafitte dashes in and out of his cabin every 
 minute." 
 
The Chattel Child. 261 
 
 " How strange, Annette, that this wild crew should 
 have caged me here so long, and that I should never 
 have seen aught of any of them ; when will this terri- 
 ble dream pass away ?" said Ada, trembling and 
 weeping, for of late it was difficult for her to speak 
 many sentences without a burst of tears. 
 
 " Do not cry, child," said Annette, as she kissed the 
 weeping girl with a touch of real feeling, " you will 
 soon be ransomed." 
 
 Annette retired and the door closed, but the words 
 she Had uttered sent a thrill to the childish heart of 
 the simple girl to whom they were spoken. Drawing 
 a cross from her bosom, she knelt before it and clasped 
 her hands, but she could not pray. The words of 
 prayer seemed to have been stricken from her memory, 
 and the spirit of prayer banished from her soul. But 
 in the low and incoherent accents of deepest woe, we 
 can distinguish the words 
 
 " Kansomed ! Oh, that I might be one of the ran- 
 somed ! But that will never be." 
 
 At last she rose, and looking a moment around her 
 little boudoir, now wrapped in the shadows of twilight, 
 she placed her finger upon the latch. 
 
 "Death," she whispered, "is better than this terrible 
 suspense. What terrors can there be in danger to one 
 who longs for death ? He fears to come to me I 
 will go to him." 
 
262 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 Feeling her way cautiously along the passage, her 
 attention was in a moment arrested by the deep, pon- 
 derous tones of him whose voice carried her back to 
 the scene of her abduction from Lindenhall. A blank 
 paleness flashed across her face as she heard, in earn- 
 est conversation with that^rude, brutal voice, the rich, 
 melodious, generous tones of Mr. Howard, and the 
 voice also of Annette. 
 
 " Friends," said the latter, " you have now thrown 
 yourselves too far into this breach either to falter or re- 
 fuse. You have made a bargain, as men of honor, 
 with a man of honor. Depend upon it, he will fulfil 
 it if you will ; and he can now seize and hang you if 
 yon show a mind not to act up to your promise. 
 Hitherto you have sailed the seas with the brand of Cain 
 on your brows ; your hands have been against every 
 man, and every man's hand against you. Seize upon 
 this opportunity which the American general has offered 
 you of washing out, in their eyes, your past offences 
 in the blood of their enemies." 
 
 " Bravo !" spoke that familiar voice, which never 
 failed to send a thrill of pleasure or of pain to the 
 heart of Ada. 
 
 " I don't know but it's as well," growled Lafitte. 
 " Our men would fight in a breach like tigers at bay, 
 so that at all events old Jackson will know enough 
 not to hang us till the battle's ever." 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 263 
 
 " And now," said Annette, " that father Eeilly here 
 has done so much to save our necks from the halter, 
 and, if possible, our souls from hell, by being the 
 bearer of such dangerous messages, but one service 
 remains by which he can increase the debt of our at 
 least, Conrad, of our gratitude ?" 
 
 " What is that ?" replied the smooth tones of Mr. 
 Howard, revealing to Ada's poor, desolated heart for 
 the first time, as if the light of hell had shone in upon 
 it, what he was, and therefore all that she had been. 
 Sustained in consciousness by the intensity of her 
 agony, she listened still. 
 
 " To marry us," replied Annette, firmly. From 
 to-morrow's work we may never return alive. If you 
 die, I die with you. If you live, I am still yours. 
 But this late act of justice you will not refuse it, Con- 
 rad ? I know you will not." 
 
 " A sorry wedding that !" said Conrad, with a 
 scornful laugh. " As well might this priest's chattel 
 attempt to change water into wine, as undertake, at 
 this late hour, to hallow our relation." 
 
 " Oh, God !" groaned Ada, " is this him whom I 
 have loved ?" 
 
 She heard the low, measured murmur of the priest, 
 as he read the holy ceremony of the church. Trem- 
 bling, she sunk upon her knees. A shriek quivered 
 each moment upon her lips, but she suppressed it ; 
 
264 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 and crawling back to her room, threw herself, ex- 
 hausted and almost senseless, upon her couch. 
 
 That wild shriek was still in her heart, ready every 
 moment to burst with the intensity of her passion. 
 Ever and anon it came to her lips, but still it hung 
 there, till drivelling insanity shone in the fierce glare 
 of her once mild and beautiful orbs ; yet she did not, 
 could not utter it. But when Conrad entered her 
 room, and she felt, though she could not see through 
 the darkness, that he was present, that long, wild, 
 demoniac shriek of desperation and woe, such as none 
 but seducers hear, and all but devils pity, told him 
 that his victim had at last read to the end of the chapter 
 of his villany. He stood stricken for a moment, as 
 he had often stood before not with astonishment, but 
 with deep, heartfelt grief, at the terrible results of his 
 dexterous and heartless wickedness. Agitated, and 
 trembling almost as violently as the poor being who 
 had thrown herself at his feet, while the tears of in- 
 voluntary penitence rolled for a moment, thick and 
 fast, down his cheeks, he murmured 
 
 " I cannot ask you to forgive me : God if there is 
 a God will not. But, oh ! I am weaker than you. 
 Pity me, pity me, Ada ; do not hate, but pity me !" 
 
 Strange power ! as he lifted up all that remained of 
 the once angelic and high-souled Ada, she involunta- 
 rily gasped 
 
The Chattel Child. 265 
 
 " No, Arthur I cannot hate you. I do pity both 
 of us. May God and the angels do likewise." 
 
 " Ada," he exclaimed, striving to suppress his emo- 
 tion, " have you a a last request for we meet no 
 more forever." 
 
 A long silence followed, during which the poor girl 
 stood trembling, leaning upon his arm, as she had so 
 often done in happier hours. At last she spoke : 
 
 " My home !" 
 
 " Would you see it ?" 
 
 " Do not take me there do not let them see their 
 lost Ada. No, the lowest of them are princes and 
 angels beside me.,, Do not let me stain the threshold. 
 Nor my heavenly sister I cannot meet her glance. 
 Let me have one last, long look from the distance 
 from the river." 
 
 Uttering this with frequent sobbings, she permitted 
 the last unholy kiss to be imprinted upon her pallid 
 brows. * * * * 
 
 The midnight moon shone down with that noonday 
 clearness and brilliancy, by which she sometimes strives 
 to combine the splendor of the day with the loveliness 
 of night, wrapping the whole earth in her soft mantle 
 of light and glory. Ada was alone, looking thought- 
 fully, tearfully, sorrowfully, forth from her little cabin 
 window, over the smooth moonlit waters of the Miss- 
 issippi, uport the home of her infancy the scene of 
 
 12 
 
266 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 her childish sports and girlish innocence. There were 
 the same old cypresses, willows and cottonwood, scat- 
 tered in groves and clusters, and robed in the beauty 
 of night, as she had often watched them from yonder 
 chamber window in the serenely contemplative, dreamy 
 hours of her girlhood. 
 
 . Thick and fast fell her tears, as she heard the an- 
 chor drop from the bow of the vessel, and for the first 
 time since she had been ruthlessly torn away from 
 that happy home, to roam a prisoner upon the bound- 
 ing wave, a loved and familiar scene was again before 
 her, calm and motionless, inviting bitter, bitter re- 
 flection. 
 
 The hours wore away. It was near morning, and still 
 she remained wrapt in that tearful, sorrowful revery. 
 Suddenly she recovered her consciousness, and kneel- 
 ing before her crucifix, she faintly endeavored to whis- 
 per words of prayer. Then rising, she stepped to the 
 open window, and took one last, long, tearful gaze at 
 the starry heavens above her, at the old home of her 
 childish days so full in view, and down at the calm, 
 deep waters that rolled sluggishly by, and ere another 
 moment passed, she had consigned her frail foim, 
 without a sigh, without a murmur, to the waves. 
 
 " One more unfortunate, 
 
 Weary of breath, 
 Rashly importunate 
 
 Gone to her death.' 1 
 
The Chattel Child. 267 
 
 From the deck of the vessel, in a dark and gloomy 
 mood, with folded arms and knit brows, Conrad Defoe 
 watched her golden hair, as it floated down with the 
 current, and for a moment its streaming ringlets lin- 
 gered and played upon the surface. There was a faint 
 struggle, as if the poor maiden would have risen to 
 snatch one more glance at the home of her infancy, 
 and then she sank to rise no more. 
 
 He saw it, and sighed 
 
 "Poor poor Ada!" 
 
268 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTEE XXX. 
 
 AN EVENTFUL DAY. 
 
 " Give order that these bodies 
 High on a stage be placed to the view ; 
 And let me speak, to the yet unknowing world*, 
 How these things came about : So shall you hear 
 Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts ; 
 Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters ; 
 Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause ; 
 And in this upshot, purposes mistook 
 Fall'n on the inventors' heads." 
 
 HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK. 
 
 THE next morning, at an hour even earlier than 
 usual, Sister Clara, emerging from the gate of the 
 house of the Sisters with her little basket upon her 
 arm, and following precisely the same route in which 
 we have once before accompanied her, passed mechani- 
 cally and without appearing to notice her way, through 
 the same low streets into the narrow, filthy alley which 
 led to the house of lasaacks. The streets did not 
 wear the lifeless and silent aspect usual at this early 
 hour, but were full of the evidences of stirring action, 
 excitement and anxiety, if not of fear. 
 
The Chattel Child. 269 
 
 " And there was mounting in hot haste ; the steed, 
 
 The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, 
 Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, 
 
 And swiftly forming in the ranks of war; 
 
 And the deep thunder, peal on peal afar, 
 And near, the beat of the alarming drum, 
 
 Roused up the soldier ere the morning star , 
 While thronged the citizens with terror dumb, 
 Or whispering with white lips, ' The foe they come they come.' " 
 
 Sister Clara trembled, and hurried more swiftly on 
 her way, as she timidly called up in her imagination 
 the terrible realities which must, and the inconceiva- 
 ble horrors which might be the result of that day's 
 carnage. But she felt that it should be to her, and 
 to those of her vocation, a day of arduous and holy, 
 though dangerous and painful duties, and counted 
 her beads involuntarily as she flitted swiftly on her 
 way, and prayed that she might have the love and 
 courage to fulfill her duties as became a daughter of 
 Christ, whose mission was to carry to the hearts of the 
 unbelieving, the despairing and the needy, the price- 
 less blessings of " faith, hope and charity ;" but most 
 of all charity. 
 
 She had started earlier than usual upon her accus- 
 tomed circuit of morning visits, that she might not be 
 obliged to neglect them for the weightier duties which, 
 with the defence, or possibly the seige or sacking of 
 the city by those who came on under the infamous 
 watchwords of " Beauty and booty," would multiply 
 
270 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 so infinitely beyond the power of her, and her co- 
 workers to perform. Before, however, she had reached 
 the doorstep of the unfortunate object of her present 
 visit, the first loud booming of the distant cannon 
 suddenly told her that below the town the fierce con- 
 test had already begun. Scarcely had it struck upon 
 her ears, when within the old, rickety, moss-grown 
 house, upon whose steps she stood, arose a frantic and 
 infuriated shriek, than which its occupant could have 
 sent up none more expressive of hopeless terror if 
 every ball of the distant volley had come rattling down 
 upon the sunken roof, and around the broken, cob- 
 webbed windows of the tottering tenement. 
 
 Fearing for the time to go farther, she stood for a mo- 
 ment within the door, expecting, as the loud booming 
 sound increased rather than diminished, to hear, as soon 
 as the demented lasaacks had sufficiently recovered his 
 strength, to hear the continued raving with which her 
 entrance was usually accompanied, and which by ex- 
 hausting his strength rendered it safer for her to ap- 
 proach him. The distant booming cannonade con- 
 tinued, but her patient must have been overwhelmed 
 to silence by his intense fear, for there was no sound. 
 She slammed the front door violently to, but all be- 
 sides was as still as before. She repeated the noise, 
 and a sensation of tremulous fear and awe thrilled her 
 at the same unwonted silence. She hurried along the 
 
The Chattel Cltild. 271 
 
 entry and down the dark and narrow stairs, half ex- 
 pecting every moment to be rudely seized in his insane 
 grasp, for this was the first exception to the usual 
 wild weird manner in which her presence had been 
 acknowledged by her host. But all continued still. 
 No furious grasp rested upon her arm, or threatened 
 to throttle or murder her in fiendish return for her 
 benefactions. She arrived at the door of his apart- 
 ment. It was ajar the room was very cold and 
 damp, but there was no fire. There had been fire 
 the ashes were still wet. Water had been poured 
 upon it, to put it out and save the fuel. She shoved 
 the door widely open, and spoke softly and timidly 
 
 "lasaacks?" 
 
 The coffin lay as usual upon the bed. The lid had 
 been adjusted neatly in its place. Again she called 
 louder and more distinctly 
 
 " lasaacks lasaacks ?" 
 
 There was no sound. She approached and timidly 
 removed the lid. At first she started back, for the 
 open glazed eye, glaring out from his gaunt, haggard 
 and starved face looked horridly terrible. But in a 
 moment she saw that its lustre had nearly departed. 
 She placed her palm upon his low, retreating brows 
 they were quite cold. Closing the lids over those 
 fearful, insane orbs, she deprived the face of half its 
 terror. Death, which had long ago rested upon the 
 
272 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 affections, settled over the moral nature, and darkly 
 clouded the reason, had at last deigned to take pos- 
 session of the body, which, without a moral, an affec- 
 tional, or a reasonable nature, it were vain to say, 
 were better out of the grave than in it. 
 
 So Sister Clara could not but think as she knelt 
 and offered a prayer for the shattered soul which had 
 just been freed from its tenement. Then rising, she 
 readjusted the lid over the coffin, and took up her 
 basket and crept through the dark passageway up the 
 narrow stair-case, and emerged from the creaking old 
 hall-door once more into the open day. She felt like 
 a weary porter relieved of his burden, as if a duty had 
 been fulfilled ; and the lightness which this conscious- 
 ness gives under all circumstances, seemed to buoy up 
 her step with a soul-satisfying joy, which went far to 
 dispel the sadness of the scene she had just witnessed. 
 But the roar of the distant cannon hurried her away 
 to new and more arduous labors. 
 
 How different was her mission from that of nearly 
 all of the thousands who had earlier on that morning 
 hastened to the same eventful scene. They, strong in 
 the flush of life, health and manly strength, had hur- 
 ried there to wound, to slay, to blast and curse their 
 fellow men. She, weak in all these things, and clad 
 only in the armor of faith and charity, hastened thither, 
 
The Chattel Child. 273 
 
 to bind up, and heal, to pour oil into their bleeding 
 wounds, and give consolation to their dying souls. 
 
 When she arrived upon the field, the contest was 
 just over. Not ill pleased to learn, but rendering 
 fervent gratitude to heaven that the enemies of her 
 country had been driven back in defeat, she set herself 
 immediately to inquiring for those to whom she might 
 be of service. 
 
 " You had better go on the 'fcother side of Jackson's 
 cotton if you want business in that line," replied a 
 soldier, proudly, of whom she had inquired where the 
 wounded and dying had been carried. " I don't think 
 there's anybody hurt among us. I arn't heerd nobody 
 complain, except the brave fellows that went over 
 there to try and help our enemies wounded, and act'ly 
 got shot at by them they tried to help for their pains. 
 But over there I think you'll find a few," he continued, 
 pointing beyond the entrenchments at the wide plain 
 piled for a quarter of a mile with the slain and curs- 
 ing, writhing and yelling wounded, indicating how 
 determined and firm had been the advance of the vete- 
 rans who had fought under Wellington on the Penin- 
 sula, and how ruthlessly they had been mowed down 
 and defeated by the militia ploughmen of Tennessee. 
 
 " Were there really no wounded among our party ?" 
 questioned Sister Clara eagerly. 
 
 " Perhaps there might have been a few. They say 
 12* 
 
274 Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 there were half a dozen or so," said the soldier, trying 
 to assume the indifference of a veteran, while a tear 
 stood in his eye. " Noble fellows ! 'specially that 
 infernal ' Conrad' and his crew from Barrataria. They 
 fought in the very hottest of it, when the enemy had 
 very nearly carried the works, and would have done so 
 
 but for those d piratical cutlasses which, when it 
 
 came to close quarters, fiddled away upon their ene- 
 mies' throats until they made them sing a most terri- 
 ble tune. I think you'll find them at the head-quar- 
 ters of the General," said the soldier, or rather the 
 boy, for he could not have passed eighteen, pointing 
 at the same time to a large flag-tent, around which 
 many soldiers and curious citizens had already gath- 
 ered. From the random remarks dropped from the 
 persons who formed the crowd, as she hurried through 
 it, which she easily did, where all quickly made way 
 for her in double reverence for her sex and sacred 
 habit, she rejoiced to learn that there were among the 
 Americans but " eight killed and thirteen wounded." 
 
 She found ready admission to the tent, upon enter- 
 ing which, her attention was immediately withdrawn 
 from every other group to one, the figures in which 
 she recognized. 
 
 There, recumbent upon a pallet of military cloaks, 
 which had been laid down to receive him, and his 
 head supported by a woman, who bent fondly and 
 
The Chattel Child. 275 
 
 tenderly over him, lay the wounded and bleeding form 
 of Conrad Defoe. His proud, handsome features were 
 livid with the paleness of death, and a languid stupor 
 was settling over his lately piercing and passionate 
 eye. A gashed arm, at which his angry eye flashed 
 in impatient resentment, seemed to fill every moment 
 with unutterable pangs. But beneath that arm, from 
 a wound in his side breast, the gushing of the red ar- 
 terial gore was painlessly, but rapidly bearing away 
 his life. Oh, between the late terrible " Conrad," as 
 he rushed into the. melee of battle, fierce, impetuous, 
 and powerful, striking down the enemies of his coun- 
 try with his own strong arm and trusty sabre, as he 
 only could who combined the bravery and skill of one 
 who had long fought in a bad cause, with the zeal of 
 one who was then fighting in a good one ; and that 
 same Conrad, as he now, with clotted locks, and pallid 
 hue, and deathly languor, glared restlessly, feebly, 
 and feverishly around him what a contrast ! Lan- 
 guidly, ever and anon, he parts his heavy lids with 
 difficulty, and rolls his fading orbs around, as if ex- 
 pecting the appearance of some person, and whispers, 
 huskily 
 
 " Annette, is he coming yet ?" 
 
 Just now a tall, old man, with a piercing gray eye 
 and commanding, soldierly bearing, steps quickly to 
 
276 . Oivned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 the side of the wounded Conrad, and bending low 
 over him, says 
 
 " Courage, comrade you may yet hope." 
 
 "Ah, is it you, commander?", smiled the dying 
 one, over whose dark and troubled features a ray of 
 sunlight seemed to stgal, as he felt his general's hand. 
 " No, there is no hope for me. I am sinking," he 
 cried, his hands clasped in anguish, " into a fearful, a 
 terrible grave. But no more of that. You know me. 
 I am Conrad Defoe. My brother, in prison, has been 
 mistaken for me. He is innocent. You will see that 
 injustice is no longer done him ?" 
 
 "I will," was the response, in clear, deep tones, 
 which satisfied the soldier's heart. 
 
 "One word more. This woman, Annette, is my 
 wife. She has not a friend. I commend her to you." 
 
 " Oh, Sister Clara," said Annette, in tears, as the 
 former now knelt down beside her, " you have sought 
 me long, and at last you have found me. But tell 
 me, quick is my father living ?" 
 
 Sister Clara shook her head negativelv. For a mo- 
 ment Annette buried her hand in her bosom. As she 
 withdrew it, her bosom and hand both were stained 
 with crimson. Beckoning to the Sister to support the 
 head of Conrad in her stead, she moved to his side, 
 and resting one arm upon the ground, and passing 
 the other tenderly around him, she gazed in longing 
 
The Chattel Child. 277 
 
 affection into his eye. From her bosom the rich red 
 stream of life was gushing forth and mingling with 
 his own. 
 
 " No, husband ; commend me to none. There is 
 none for whom I should live no, not one. Have I 
 not said that I will die with thee ? See here," she 
 said, withdrawing the folds of her dress from the fatal 
 wound which her own hand had just inflicted, " I have 
 struck home." 
 
 As she said this, her head sunk with weakness, 
 lower and lower, over him, till her breast rested upon 
 his own, and their life-blood mingled in a common 
 stream. She had indeed struck home. The trem- 
 bling motion of her lips the heaving and falling of 
 her bosom, soon ceased, and she grew cold in his em- 
 brace. A smile wreathed his lips at this last needless 
 evidence of a too fatal constancy, which hung upon 
 them for hours. At last his smile also grew cold, and 
 stark, and stiff, in the chill embrace of death ; and 
 he, too, slept. 
 
 " He left a corsair's name to other times, 
 Linked with one virtue and a thousand crimes." 
 
278 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 CHAPTEK XXXI. 
 
 THE CAPTIVE. 
 
 " Imputed madness, prisoned solitude, 
 And the mind's canker in its savage mood, 
 When the impatient thirst of light and air 
 Parches the heart ; and the abhorred grate, 
 Marring the sunbeams with its hideous shade, 
 Works through the throbbing eye-ball to the brain, 
 With a hot sense of heaviness and pain; 
 And bare, at once. Captivity displayed', 
 Stands scoffing through the never-opened gate, 
 Which nothing through its bars admits save day, 
 And tasteless food which I have eat alone, 
 Till its unsocial bitterness is gone ; 
 And I can banquet like a beast of prey, 
 Sullen and lonely, crouching in the cave, 
 Which is my lair, and it may be my grave." 
 
 BYRON'S LAMENT OF TASSO. 
 
 THE next morning's sun had hardly risen upon the 
 field of battle. Its faint rays came peering sadly into 
 the dungeon of Walter, who, slowly recovering from 
 his wounds, had begun with more painful weariness 
 to feel the tedium of his solitary cell. What were 
 his thoughts as he lay stretched upon his straw couch, 
 or rising, stared around upon his prison walls. His 
 own prospect, notwithstanding his innocence, was 
 
The Chattel Cliild. 279 
 
 gloomy. The anomalous and deceptive circumstances 
 under which he was captured, and the strong likeness 
 he bore to Conrad Defoe, insomuch that the few who 
 knew the latter almost unanimously agreed in identi- 
 fying him as the man, seemed to leave him no room 
 for doubt that an ignominious death the death of a 
 common enemy of mankind awaited him. 
 
 And how did she regard him the pure, amiable, 
 and high-souled Julia ? Was he mentioned only 
 upon her lips as an outlaw and a wretch ? The 
 thought distracted him. 
 
 Through the visits of the kind Sister Clara, whose 
 brain was almost kindled into frenzy by the wrongs 
 inflicted upon her daughter, he had learned that Julia 
 was now in a slave pen, awaiting a sale at public 
 auction. 
 
 Yes, before him, upon his prison walls, was posted 
 the notice of sale a handbill which Sister Clara had 
 brought to him. Through the livelong night, though 
 he could not see it, his eyes had been turned towards 
 it, with the stare of approaching insanity ; but as 
 morning dawned, he was enabled once more to read 
 its fearful characters : 
 
280 Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 FOR SALE AT AUCTION, f 
 
 On Jan. 2$th inst., at 10, A. M., 
 
 WITHOUT RESERVE, 
 
 THE BEAUTIFUL AND NEARLY 
 
 WHITE SLAVE JULIA! 
 
 Aged 19 highly educated, refined and pious suitable for | 
 Governess or Companion now on exhibition. Call and see 
 her at the pen of J. SWINGLER. 
 
 Fixedly and vacantly the sick, wounded, and half- 
 demented lover gazed upon the terrible announcement, 
 in utter and powerless despair. The sun was now far 
 up in the horizon, and the mind of Walter, in a clair- 
 voyant dream, was with his mistress in her slave pen. 
 The hour had nearly arrived. Even now he saw them 
 entering to lead her away to the sale. The bell upon 
 the tower had struck nine. 
 
 " Why do these prison walls enclose me ? Burst 
 asunder open for me !" shrieked Walter, wildly 
 raving. But still the dead stones shut him in. "I 
 tell you, burst asunder ! In the name of innocence, 
 of justice, and of Grod, fly apart, ye doors !" raved the 
 lunatic, insanely. 
 
 But the iron doors moved not. 
 
 -He rose, with the calm confidence of the maniac, 
 whose perverted and disordered fancy seems to subject 
 everything to his will, and shouted 
 
The CJiattel Child. 281 
 
 "Again, and for the last time, I command, fly 
 back, ye bolts open, ye bars !" 
 
 This time the bolt did fly back, the strong door 
 opened, and the bailiff, followed by no less remarkable 
 a couple than the ubiquitous Sister Clara and the 
 lengthy Snaacks, appeared. 
 
 " My son, my son God be praised, you are free !" 
 shrieked Sister Clara, rushing into his arms, without 
 waiting for. the slow jailor to read the warrant he held 
 in his hands. 
 
 " Free I" shouted Walter, ha ! ha ! ha !" And 
 he laughed in his hysteric madness, with a maniac 
 laugh that chilled the Sister to the very soul. 
 
 "And I have the honor," said Snaacks, with more 
 than his usual celerity of speech, " to deliver to you 
 the title papers of the late Moses lasaacks, a respected 
 client of mine, whose estate, by his death, having de- 
 scended to his daughter, the wife of your late brother, 
 and both your brother and his wife having died, has 
 passed to you as their sole heir at law. The amount, 
 sir, of your wealth, including the Preston estate, 
 which, by the recent foreclosure of a mortgage thereon, 
 has just been added thereto, is almost incalculable, 
 and I only trust that his long experience in managing 
 the estate, will induce you to retain as your attorney 
 the past incumbent of that responsible position, your 
 obedient servant, Mr. Snaacks. Full returns shall be 
 
282 Owned und Disowned ; or, 
 
 made quarterly, as heretofore, and moneys invested on 
 good security " 
 
 How long Mr. Snaacks would have protracted his 
 speech, we would not pretend to say, had not Walter, 
 over whose dim returning intellect some faint reali- 
 zation of .his true circumstances was slowly stealing, 
 been aroused and fully restorejd to his scattered senses, 
 as the clock struck ten. 
 
 "Away, away!" he cried, " to the slave pen to 
 the rescue !" 
 
 But the little strength which his wounds and sick- 
 ness had left him, failed him in the intensity of his 
 excitement; and sinking inanimate into their arms, 
 they bore him out of the jail and along the street, in 
 the direction he had indicated. The cool air of the 
 street fanned and refreshed him, and he was in a few 
 moments able to rise and accompany them. 
 
 Let us hasten there in time to precede by a few 
 moments his arrival 
 
The Chattel Child. 283 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 SOULS AT AUCTION. 
 
 " Without, surrounded by a motley crowd, 
 The shrewd-eyed salesman, garrulous and loud ; 
 A squire or colonel in his pride of place, 
 Known at free fights, the caucus, and the race, 
 Prompt to proclaim his honor without blot, 
 ****** 
 Yet never scrupling, with a filthy jest, 
 To sell the infant from its mother's breast 
 Break through all ties of wedlock, home, and kin, 
 Yield shrinking girlhood up to gray -beard sin ; 
 Sell all the virtues with his human stock 
 The Christian graces on his auction block ; 
 And coolly count on shrewdest bargains driven, 
 In hearts regenerate, and in souls forgiven." 
 
 WHITTIER. 
 
 " ' BISNESS is bisness ' that's my motto, an' I 
 b'leeve it's a good one," shouted the little squat- 
 shouldered, low-visaged, red-haired Mr. Swingler, from 
 his throne on the elevated auction-block in the centre 
 of the yard. " And when it's done, it's done, gentle- 
 men them's my conwictions ; an' what can a hon'ble 
 man do better as follerin' his conwictions ? 
 
 " Now, gentlemen, I've got a few common niggers, 
 
284 Owned and Disowned; or] 
 
 compar'tively speakin' that is, an' I'll put 'em on the 
 block ; and the thing you've mostly come for will be 
 the next thing on the board." 
 
 This speech was addressed to a mixed crowd, made 
 up of a few inland planters, just come in town to buy 
 a stock of hands, a large sprinkling of gamblers, 
 black-legs and fancy men, several stray negro children 
 and dirty whites, and some nondescript hangers-on, 
 to whom it would be difficult to assign any description 
 or occupation. 
 
 " Bring in No. One," shouted Swingler. 
 
 " Gemmen, here's No. One as fine a little nigger 
 as you ever owned. Five years old, an' not a scar on 
 him ; not a bruise. If that don't show him a good 
 disposition, I'd like to know what would. Goin', 
 gemmen ; anything to "start the bid. What do I 
 hear ? Do I hear fifty dollars ? Do I hear fifty ?" 
 
 As nobody seemed disposed to inform him whether 
 he heard fifty or not, Mr. Swingler concluded he had 
 not, and so bawled 
 
 "Away with the d d nigger! Bring on No. 
 
 Two." 
 
 No. Two was a young mulatto, of unmistakably 
 strong passions and good intellect. He mounted the 
 block with a defiant air of superiority, rather than 
 with the abject submission of a slave ; and as he 
 looked around upon the hundred or more persons, 
 
The Chattel Chu;l. 285 
 
 either of whom might within a minute become his 
 owner, his expression was one which would strike 
 every experienced purchaser as that of a man sullen 
 and hard to manage. 
 
 " No. Two is now up," said Swingler. 
 
 No. Two, however, now held his head, and seemed 
 decidedly down. 
 
 " What do you say for him ? A smart nigger. 
 Look at the scars. Been well broke in, you see. 
 Walk up and examine his teeth, gemmen." 
 
 Here a gentleman walked up, and putting his 
 thumbs into the negro's mouth, made a thorough and 
 apparently satisfactory examination of his teeth. 
 
 " Perfectly sound. Going, going, going ! What 
 do you say for him ?" 
 
 But no bids were heard, and Mr. Swingler ordered 
 No. Two back, with the further suggestion 
 
 " Give the d d nigger fifteen lashes ; it will 
 
 put him into a smile. Who the hell's going to buy 
 
 such a d d sulky devil ! I'll show him a thing or 
 
 two. Now, gentlemen, we'll have a little the nicest 
 girl that ever went to market. I have sold such 
 
 things afore in my time, but I tell you Boys, 
 
 bring out No. Three. No, not often, gentlemen, you 
 can buy such property as No. Three." 
 
 Disdaining the touch of the attendants who would 
 have led her forth, with eyes not suffused with tears, 
 
286 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 but flashing with suppressed rage, Julia advanced 
 with a firm, elastic step, and after upraising her dark 
 orbs for a few moments, as if in prayer, to heaven, 
 for support through this last and most degrading or- 
 deal, she turned and faced the curious and disgusting 
 gaze of the wondering audience, with a dignity not 
 unlike that with which a brave European princess, 
 wrecked among savages, would have looked around at 
 her captors. 
 
 "Here, gentlemen, is No. Three," said Swindler, 
 mounting by her side ; and taking her by the hand, 
 he would have held it up after his manner with female 
 slaves, as a tradesman would exhibit his stuffs. 
 
 " Hands off, low -man !" shrieked Julia, starting 
 suddenly from him, and bending her eagle eye for a 
 moment upon him, with a fierceness before which he 
 quailed. " Hands off, vile monster, I repeat." 
 
 " Yer see, gentlemen," said Swingler, swallowing, 
 with an ill grace, his anger, " yer see she's a gal of 
 pluck. She ain't tamed yet. But any o* yer as wants 
 a putty governess " 
 
 u Silence, dog ! be silent, I tell you," screamed No. 
 Three, with a fury that cowed him. Sell me, work 
 me, lash me to your heart's content, if you choose, 
 but dare not to insult me !" 
 
 Swingler's finger twitched nervously around the 
 
Tlie Chattel Child. 287 
 
 handle of a whip which he held in his hands. Could 
 he endure such impudence ? 
 
 " Now, you know," said Swingler, turning appeal- 
 ingly to the bystanders, " no man will take more from 
 a white man than I will, but, by G , no man will 
 take less from a nigger." 
 
 But some of the spectators were merciful, and cried 
 out 
 
 " Set her up we're ready to bid never mind the 
 speech if the gal's squirmish !" 
 
 Swingler- complied. 
 
 "Goin' goin' goin'. Gentlemen, start the bid 
 bold, for I don't let her go at no small price. By G , 
 I want to thrash her liver out on her afore she leaves 
 Joe Swingler's pen. So you bid high or she won't go 
 at this sale. Goin', goin' what do I hear ? Start 
 it at five hundred." 
 
 Four hundred and fifty dollars then, a high price, 
 was bid. 
 
 " Four fifty five hundred is bid five five five 
 fifty. She can't possibly sell for less than one thou- 
 sand, gentlemen. Walk up an' look at her. Don't 
 be afeared, gemmen, if she is shy. Feel of her, gen- 
 tlemen." 
 
 In compliance with this request, a flashly dressed 
 young man, with a dissipated blaze air, sauntered up, 
 and was about to place his hand upon her shoulder. ' 
 
288 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " Away with you wretch among wretches/' shriek- 
 ed the proud girl. 
 
 This insult to a customer was more than Swingler 
 could bear. 
 
 " Wretches, eh ! Wretches, eh ! I'll show you 
 who are wretches. Give me my whip. Here, John, 
 Bill, Sam, hold the white skinned wench, while I lash 
 her." 
 
 Three stout negroes advanced, but respectfully hesi- 
 tated to lay hands upon her, for ignorance, however 
 deep, still recognizes and respects the true lady with 
 politeness, which depravity, however cultivated, fails 
 in the attempt to dissemble. Julia sunk upon her 
 knees and looked around upon the pitiless visages of 
 the slave-buyers with an expression of despair which 
 might have softened the stoniest heart, and piteously 
 shrieked as she saw the long lash preparing to descend 
 upon her. 
 
 " Oh, God, help me." 
 
 " God help you, you strumpet !" roared Swingler. 
 God d your half- white soul. I tell you once more, 
 call on me for help. This 'ere slave-pen I'm lord and 
 master of. God Almighty ain't known around 
 these " 
 
 Ere he had finished the sentence, he lay sprawling 
 upon the earth by a furious blow from the hand of 
 Walter Defoe, who that moment sprang through the 
 
The Chattel Child. 289 
 
 crowd, and summoning all his strength, in spite of 
 the effects of his recent wounds and sickness, felled 
 the blaspheming fiend, and was now bending over the 
 fainting form of Julia, who only whispered 
 
 " Dear, dear Walter, I felt that you were coming 
 to save me. Oh, these awful horrors. Take me 
 away/' and sunk exhausted into his embrace. 
 
 " By what authority is all this ?" demanded 
 Swingler, rising. 
 
 " Mr. Snaacks," said he, addressing that gentleman, 
 who had now come up, " Do you know anything about 
 this houtaloo ? The gal's Mr. Preston's, and I have 
 a power of attorney from him to sell her." 
 
 " A mistake," replied Snaacks, " this piece of pro- 
 perty was of course included in the general mortgage 
 given upon all his goods and chattels to Mr. lasaacks, 
 my client, of whom this young man is the heir-at-law. 
 The property not yet having passed into the hands of 
 any innocent purchaser, he has the undoubted right 
 to foreclose, which you see he has done." 
 
 "I don't believe a word of it, and I demand 
 damages any*way for the crack on my head," growled 
 Swingler. 
 
 " If you will prove that your head is a thing capa- 
 ble of being damaged, or in any way made worse than 
 it is, we will pay you," replied Snaacks, with that 
 
 13 
 
290 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 contempt with which the slave-trader is everywhere 
 treated by the slave-owner. " In the mean time we 
 will convey this young lady to a carriage/' 
 
 Swingler set down upon his auction block and mut- 
 tered gloomily as they drove off, "A d -n good job 
 spoiled 1" 
 
The Cliattel Child. 291 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 " I saw two clouds at morning, 
 
 Tinged with the rising sun ; 
 And in the dawn they floated on, 
 
 And mingled into one : 
 I thought that morning cloud* was blest, 
 It moved so sweetly to the West." BRAINARD. 
 
 A MONTH had swiftly glided away, and evening's 
 soft shadows again stole down upon Lindenhall, whose 
 usual silence was to-night exchanged for merry voices, 
 music, dancing, and revelry. 
 
 From near and far, old and young men and maidens, 
 of the hospitahle planters of Louisiana, had come to 
 the marriage of the wealthy young master of Linden- 
 hall with the lovely girl whose history, especially now 
 that she was restored to her true position, touched a 
 responsive chord in the hearts of all Lingering 
 emotions of sadness there were, indeed, as Julia 
 stepped through the halls familiar to her childhood, 
 and saw nothing of the two forms in childhood so 
 dear to her. Her gentle sister Ada she could not 
 forget ; and as she went to the front windows, and 
 
292 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 looked out upon the river at the spot where, as Sister 
 Clara had learned from the dying confession of Con- 
 rad, her sister had taken her last look at the home of 
 her infancy and of the world, her eyes were suffused 
 with tears. 
 
 " Do not weep, my daughter/' said Sister Clara, 
 whom her child's experience had induced to dissolve 
 her connection with the Sisters "do not weep, for 
 this is your wedding day, and I had thought you were 
 very happy." 
 
 " Poor, poor sister Ada I" murmured Julia, and her 
 tears flowed afresh, 
 
 But spite of this tinge of sadness, Julia felt, as the 
 last words of the ceremony fell from the lips of the 
 good Father Eeilly, and she leaned upon the arm of 
 her husband, that so far as the past would permit, 
 the cup of the present was full of deep, blissful joy. 
 
 There was joy, too, among the lowty. Not only 
 the whole force of the Preston plantation, but also 
 several scores of negroes the former property of the 
 demented Jew had assembled down at the quarters, 
 some of them gaily dressed ; hotel waiters and bar- 
 bers, ashamed to be seen in company with field ne- 
 groes ; some mechanics and book-keepers, with their 
 intelligent countenances and light mulatto wives and 
 children, were mingled with low, slatternly clodhop- 
 pers and field hands, who felt ill at ease in the new 
 
The Chattel Child. 293 
 
 garments in which they had gaudily decked themselves 
 for the occasion. Many of them had heretofore been 
 let to various employers at a stipulated price, and 
 allowed to retain a certain portion of the price as their 
 own, with which, by long and patient diligence and 
 economy, they had nearly saved enough to buy their 
 liberty. But now what was their joy, for their new 
 master had been among them, and to those who had 
 nearly accomplished the work of purchasing their lib- 
 erty, he had remitted the balance, and freed not only 
 themselves, but their aged parents and wives and chil- 
 dren. Upon those who, heretofore less apt, industri- 
 ous or prudent, had not been educated to thriftiness, 
 Walter had concluded to impose certain easy terms 
 as the price of their freedom, which would at the same 
 time fit them better for the competition with the 
 always free and skilled laborer of the North, upon 
 which they would enter, and would make them feel a 
 greater degree of pride in the liberty which they had 
 earned ; for he felt that to free some of them imme- 
 diately, with those habits of thoughtlessness, laziness, 
 and improvidence, which the system of slavery had 
 left them with, would be a boon as dangerous as to 
 right a patient who had been sent to an infected hos- 
 pital, when he had no disease, by freeing him after 
 the disease was -upon him. Tears of gratitude were 
 in every eye. A third of the fortune which Walter 
 
294 Owned and Disowned] or, 
 
 had inherited, had nw assembled with its free papers 
 in its hands, and so much of his riches would soon 
 take wings and fly away ; but as his benevolent heart 
 went out to them in freedom, he thanked God, who 
 had thus given him the means of bringing joy to the 
 hearts of the lowly. No wealth could have so rewarded 
 lii in, or have made his heart leap with such pure, un- 
 alloyed joy, as when, before the festivities were over, 
 and while the aristocratic, though social sons and 
 daughters of wealth were joined in the merry dance, 
 a deputation, in the person of the delighted " Alex- 
 ander," waited upon him with a request from "de 
 colored ladies and gemmen" outside, that they might 
 be permitted to serenade them. Good naturedly 
 granting their request, the company listened to the 
 following strain, sung in that simple, yet touching 
 style of melody of which the African is the inimitable 
 originator : 
 
 THE SLAVES' SERENADE. 
 
 White folks pleas hear de darkies' song, 
 
 Before you go away ; 
 We want to tell it won't take long, 
 
 How glad we are to-day. 
 
 Chorus Ring ring de banjo Ole Massa gone, 
 
 De new one set us free, 
 Roar wid de fiddle bang- de bone, 
 Ho ! yah ! how glad we be ! 
 
The Chattel Child. 295 
 
 De poor ole slave his heart am joy, 
 
 Dough tears am in his eye 
 For free is he, his wife an' boy ; 
 
 How can dat tear be dry! 
 
 Chorus Ring ring de banjo, &c. 
 
 He dance all day, he dance all night, 
 
 Likewise de cage-bird sing, 
 Butbress de han' dat free him cmite, 
 
 And gib de cage-bird wing. 
 
 Chorus Ring ring de banjo, &c. 
 
 We know we are poor slaves by law 
 
 But mercy set us free, 
 An' He will bress you from whom a' 
 
 Can only ask mercy. 
 
 Chorus Ring ring de banjo. &c. 
 
 Good-bye good-bye, our massa dear, 
 
 Our missus, too, good-bye ; 
 We meet whar slave shed neber tear, 
 Whar massa neber sigh. 
 
 Chorus An' dar we'll sing, ole massa gone, 
 
 New one set us free. 
 And play de harp an' de soft trombone, 
 How happy dar we be ! 
 
 Just as the last strain of the melody, which was 
 sung and played in a truly touching if not artistic 
 style, died away, the sharp crack of fire-arms was 
 heard immediately under the windows of the mansion 
 a heavy falling and a groan, as of one wounded, fol- 
 lowed. The company started the ladies shrieked, 
 and gentlemen seizing lights, rushed in the direction 
 of the fearful sound. 
 
 There, with a discharged pistol in his right hand, 
 
296 Owned and Disowned; or, 
 
 another having just fallen from the left prostrate 
 upon the sward, over which his blood and brains were 
 scattered, lay the former proprietor of Lindenhall, 
 Butler Preston. After having maintained the strict- 
 est silence and concealment for the past month, stung 
 by remorse, overwhelmed by rage, shame and chargin, 
 having no motive to survive his irrecoverable disgrace, 
 he had returned to the scene of the wealth he had 
 abused and the opportunities for good which he had 
 prostituted to evil to blow out his brains. 
 
 Many years have glided serenely and happily away 
 since then. With the immense fortune placed at his 
 disposal, but which has considerably diminished in 
 the advancement of his philanthropic schemes, Walter 
 Defoe has been constant to the lofty dream of useful- 
 ness which cheered and ennobled the struggles of his 
 youth. Not unmindful of that time when all he held 
 most sacred upon earth, stood with uplifted hands and 
 tearful eyes, in the presence of her buyers her hu- 
 manity degraded her immortality denied her every 
 right infamously and brutally trampled upon owned 
 as a chattel and therefore disowned as a child he 
 did not hesitate for a long time boldly and publicly to 
 oppose the institution which had legalized the outrage, 
 and privately to labor to mitigate its evils in such 
 special and peculiar instances as came under his know- 
 ledge. For a while the influence of his immense 
 
The Chattel Child. 297 
 
 fortune, his talents, tact and many amiable social 
 qualities, enabled him to pursue this course compara- 
 tively without molestation. During this season of 
 privileged opportunity, he endeavored to sow the seeds 
 of a loftier and more honorable feeling among masters 
 generally, by which they should look upon themselves 
 not merely as the owners, but also as the beneficent 
 guardians of their slaves, and as such bound to edu- 
 cate them so far as their capacity would admit, and 
 elevate and christianize them looking upon the slaves 
 not merely as cattle to be worked in this world, but 
 is immortal souls to be prepared for the next. 
 
 Particularly urgent was he for the repeal or modifi- 
 cation of those laws which prohibit the education of 
 slaves under penalties more frightful than those visited 
 upon many flagrant felonies, which place obstacles in 
 the way of emancipation, and which give the owner 
 such an unlimited sway over the life and limbs as 
 well as the liberty of the slave. To encourage a re- 
 spect also for the unity of families, to prevent the 
 eternal and bittes separations of husbands and wives, 
 parents and children, brothers and sisters, and to 
 maintain the inviolability of the laws of morality in 
 the intercourse of the master and slave, were also 
 among his enthusiastic but ill-requited labors. His 
 efforts in this behalf were principally useful, however, 
 
 in making him acquainted with those individual in- 
 
 13* 
 
298 Owned and Disoivned ; or, 
 
 stances of special injustice, which his ample means 
 were ever ready to relieve. 
 
 Many honest hearts, beating beneath tawny skins, 
 far away under his own northern sky, offered up 
 daily prayers of gratitude for deliverance from 
 bondage, and called down blessings upon him as their 
 deliverer. 
 
 The fear of diminishing his estate, never, in a soli- 
 tary instance, deterred him from giving liberty to 
 whomsoever he could. Whether they were "suffi- 
 ciently developed to be entitled to their freedom," was 
 in his view a miserable interrogatory which he did not 
 ask. The sacred charter of American liberty ceased 
 not to thunder in his ear " ALL MEN ARE CREATED 
 EQUAL, and are endowed by their Creator with certain 
 inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and 
 the pursuit of happiness." With this gospel before 
 him, he could but preach freedom to all, not merely in 
 his words and pretensions, which is cheaply and easily 
 done, but more expensively also by his acts. 
 
 But there are two classes of people to whom the 
 common sense or prevailing opinions and common 
 laws of mankind are equally opposed, viz., the ex- 
 tremely bad and the extremely good. As one of the 
 latter, he was proscribed by the American despot, 
 public opinion. When much of his fortune had faded 
 away in the industry of his philanthropic efforts, and 
 
TJie Chattel Child. 299 
 
 the influence which his wealth at first gave him was 
 somewhat diminished, he was accused as an agitator 
 and incendiary. 
 
 Incendiary ! Look, gentle reader, who hast not 
 yet learned to despise words and hold fast only to 
 their meaning, over the entire field of human history, 
 and learn how often that word is applied to the pio- 
 neer of light and liberty and truth, because he burns 
 down the thorny thickets of error, darkness and 
 slavery, that God's green harvest may wave in their 
 place ! 
 
 To him the alternative was presented of discon- 
 tinuing his philanthropic labors, of leaving the dis- 
 trict in which he had resided, or of remaining and 
 continuing those labors at his peril. His resolution 
 was immediately taken. Sell out, and transfer those 
 slaves, to whose approaching emancipation he looked 
 forward as a parent looks forward to the majority of 
 his child ! No. Permit them to pass into the hands 
 of other owners, who would entail endless bondage 
 upon their posterity, he could not. Free them he 
 must. He spake and they were free. 
 
 Deprived thus of what was found, after paying his 
 debts, to be nearly the whole of the estate, he devoted 
 the remainder to the pious fulfillment of imperative 
 obligations of gratitude, by investing it for the bene- 
 fit of Sister Clara and of the kind old Quakeress of his 
 
300 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 infancy. Once more, therefore, cheered and en- 
 couraged by the love of Julia, he now, in the prime 
 of manhood, returned to the North with as little 
 means as those with which he had left it, and entered 
 with the labor of his own hands and head upon the 
 pursuit not merely of fortune but of usefulness. 
 Could he fail ? Never ! 
 
 After a long career of noble success, the merchant 
 prince has retired from the excitement of his counting- 
 house in the metropolis, to his beautiful villa upon tho 
 banks of the Hudson. We cannot describe it to you, 
 but, gentle reader, if you will call upon us on some 
 one of those beautiful October days, when a sail in a 
 steamer or yacht over the bosom of that noblo river 
 is so delightful, when the woods that conceal its ro- 
 mantic shores, are clothed in their autumnal richness 
 and glory, and the air is balmy and delicious, we will 
 point it out to you. 
 
 There, when we last saw him, he sat upon a rustic 
 seat, beneath the branches of a weeping willow, that 
 stands down by the water's edge, in front of his man- 
 sion, which resembles Lindenhall, after which it is 
 named, as much as possible in its architectural 
 style. There also are fac-similes of the green lawn, 
 the groves of cypress, the branching willow, and the 
 rustic couch beneath, upon which Walter and Julia 
 sat on a certain eventful evening. And there too in 
 
The Chattel Child. 301 
 
 that rustic couch now sat the ripe, hale Walter, whose 
 hair is beginning to be silvered, and his still hand- 
 some wife, her long dark hair as jetty, her complexion 
 as brunette, her lips as rich and red and almost as 
 tempting, and her large lustrous black eyes, full as 
 bright, fiery and flashing as ever. 
 
 In rural arm-chairs, one upon either side of the 
 rustic seat above mentioned, sat two old ladies with 
 wrinkled countenances, whose benevolent expression 
 made them lovely. One of them was dressed with the 
 scrupulous neatness, precision and plainness of a 
 Quakeress. The other is Sister Clara. She had just 
 removed her spectacles to wipe from her eyes a tear, 
 w*hich had involuntarily moistened them, for Mr. 
 Defoe had just finished perusing the manuscript of a 
 book in which a young friend had set forth the history 
 of the romantic vicissitudes of a portion of the life 
 of Julia and himself. 
 
 A bright looking little girl (their youngest) in whom 
 we scarcely know whether more closely to trace the 
 features of Walter or of Julia, was standing beside his 
 knee. 
 
 " Is that all, papa ?" she lisped, looking up to him 
 sweetly as the volume closed. 
 
 " That is all." 
 
 " Well, do tell us what became of Sandy." 
 
 " I think you will find him at the house/' 
 
302 Owned and Disowned ; or, 
 
 " What ! old uncle Sandy, who is so good-natured 
 and fat, and whose wool is so white ? Is he the 
 same ? Sure enough, I knew he'd always been with 
 you. Why, how very old he is, isn't he ? Wouldn't 
 it be funny to see him jump out of a second story 
 window now though ?" exclaimed the little girl, 
 clapping her hands at the idea. 
 
 : And what became of good old Betsey, and aunt 
 Tanzey, and old Tim ?" 
 
 " They did not wish their freedom, but lived and 
 died with us. They died long ago." 
 
 " Oh, yes/' exclaimed the little one, " as the song 
 says, they 
 
 " Died long ago long ago," 
 
 and I suppose she continued singing 
 
 " They had no wool on de top o' der heads, 
 De place whar de wool ought to grow." 
 
 " But now, papa," she whispered, throwing her 
 little arms around his neck and kissing him, " Tell 
 me, is that all true, or is it a novel ?" 
 
 " Substantially true, child," replied Mr. Defoe. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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 with great earnestness to our young and rising ministry, as eminently adapted 
 to their wants." 
 
 From Rev. William Crowell, of Missouri. | 
 
 11 This republication in this country, at the present time, is an object, in my lj 
 opinion, greatly to be desired. The works of that great and good man have not 
 been properly appreciated of late years, on account of the author's unattractive * 
 ,-ityle of language. Could his massive thoughts be set forth in proper dress, they 
 could not fail to be highly valued." 
 
 (| Sent by mail, postage paid, on receipt of the price. 1.25. 
 
 Address, H. DAYTON. Publisher, 
 
 36 HOWARD-STREET, N. V. 
 
 te^*^S^&3*^^ 
 
Should Be Read by All! 
 
 THE 
 
 FEMALE JESUIT 
 
 OR, 
 
 ^ 
 
 :! 
 
 12mo., Cloth, Price $1. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Chapter 1. Peculiarities of the Order of " The Faithful Companions of Jesus. 
 
 2. Convent at I . 3. The Omnibus. 4. Marie's New Found Friends. 5. | 
 
 Farther Unexpected Events. 6. The Convent in Commotion. 7. Reverend Mo- | 
 ther a little Too Late. 
 
 PART II. ? 
 
 AUTO-BIOGRAPHY OF THE FEMALE JESUIT t 
 
 OR, SEVENTEEN YEARS OF CONVENT LIFE IN CONNECTION WITH THE " FAITHFUL | 
 COMPANIONS OF JESUS." 
 
 Chapter 1. Motives for Publishing. 2. The Convent School. 3 First Con- $ 
 
 fession. 4. First Communion. ^Two Years at I , 6. Death of a Pupil at | 
 
 Chatearoux. 7. The Novitiat^MBpTaking the White Veil. 9. Mental Dis- 
 quietude. 10. Removal to ManotreV 11. Visit of my Brother. 12. Religious 
 Doubts. 13. Mamma's Death. 14. Difficulties about Purgatory. 15. The 
 Dying Nun. 16. Entering the Community. 17. Description of a Convent Life. 
 18. Removal from Carrouge. 19. Christmas-Day. 
 PART III. 
 
 THE SEQUEL. 
 
 Chapter 1. Marie's Book-Making. 2. Marie a'Governess. 3. Uncle's First 
 Letter. 4. Marie's Perplexities. 5. Marie's Reply. 6. The Fire in the House. 
 7. The Uncle Expected. 8. Marie an Heiress. 9. A Mysterious Occurrence. ^ 
 10. A Correspondence in the House. 11. The Uncle's Admonitions. 12. Marie's^ 
 Occupations. 13. Marie's Answers for the General of the Jesuits. 14. The 
 Midnight Bell. 15. The Uncle Knows all. 16. Marie's Poetry and Essay. 17. i 
 Delays in Uncle's Arrival. 18. New Traits of Character. 19 Attempts at Con- ? 
 fession. 20. Rehearsal of a Death-Bed Scene. 21. Trifling Circumstances 1 
 Leading to Great Events. 22. The Scene begins to Change. 23. Startling, 1 
 Discoveries. 24. Marie in Unconscious Custody. 25. The Sisters Endeavor to 5 
 Kill the Uncle. 26. The Uncle Disappears. 27. Progress of Discovery. 28. | 
 Convent Disclosures. 29. Cross Purposes. 30. The Trial Morning. 31. Marie's % 
 Transmigrations. 32. The Bandaged Arm. 33. Temporary Exile. 34. Waj fe 
 she not a Jesuit ? 
 Sent by mail, postage paid, on receipt of price, $1.00. 
 
 Address, H. DAYTON, Publisher, 36 Howard-Street, N. Y, 
 
 ^s3!^^$sr*^^ 
 
H DAYTON'S PUBLICATIONS 
 
 ;iCTS58OT8S^^ 
 
 Uncle Frank's 
 
 iPLEASANT PACES, 
 
 FOE THE FIRESIDE. 
 
 A MISCELLANY OF 
 
 POETRY, ETC, 
 
 BY 
 
 FRANCIS C. WOODWORTFL j 
 
 1 2mo., cloth, beautifully illustrated 7 5 cts. | 
 
 Mr. Woodworth has long been known to the juve- f 
 nile world, and children will find their anticipations of | 
 a delightful treat realized in the above volume. It is | 
 filled with choice anecdotes, stories, jj^-uctive articles, p 
 poetry, &c., and we think is one of ^remost entertain- 
 ing children's books that have been published for many 
 a clay. Parents will find it a most capital book for a 
 present. 
 
 j From the New York Chronicle. 
 
 This is a book of all kinds of short articles and stories, illustrated by 
 wood-cuts, for the instruction and entertainment of children and youth. 
 Even men and women would no doubt feel as much interested in it as 
 the younger members of their family, as it is full of information about 
 a thousand things of which they probably never before heard. It is a 
 12mo., of 314 pp. 
 
 From the News, Lowell, Mass. 
 
 The matter embraced in the book before us is chaste and instruc- 
 tive, aad of the right kind to be laid before young people by their 
 parents. . 
 
 From the Transcript, Boston, Mass. 
 
 This is a capital work for juvenile readers. The author possesses the 
 rare gift of writing so as to secure the attention of young people. He 
 v is a genial and much loved " Uncle" to a wide circle of readers. 
 
 JtST Sent by mail, postage paid, on receipt of 75 
 cents in postage stamps. Address, 
 
 H. DAYTOtf, Publisher, 
 
 36 HOWARD STREET, N. Y 
 
RECOLLECTION 
 
 OP THE 
 
 OB, 
 
 atiir 
 FROM COURTS OF JUSTICE. 
 
 BY 
 
 PETER BURKE, ESQ., 
 
 OF THE INNER TEMPLE, BARRISTER AT LAW. 
 
 I'll show thee wondrous things 
 Complots of mischief, treason ; villainies 
 Ruthful to hear, yet piteously performed. 
 
 SHAKSPEARE. 
 
 12no., Cloth. Price $1.00. 
 
 The popularity of the Recollections of the Court Room in England, 
 has induced the American publisher to issue the work uniform with the 
 series of tales known as " The Confessions of an Attorney," ' ; Experiences 
 of a Barrister," etc.J|^:ks which have had extraordinary success. In 
 addition to the fact that these talcs are authentic, it is certain that their 
 aim and tendency aregood ; they are pure, and they are instructive as 
 well as interesting. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Two Singular Cases of Isolated Treason. 
 Falsehood Fatally made use of by the Innocent. 
 A Murder in the time of the Crusades. 
 Monarch's prosecuting their own Sons. 
 The Widow's Discovery. 
 The Poet Savage. 
 An Extraordinary Defence. 
 A Comical Misdemeanor. 
 Adventures of De LaFontaine. 
 Criminals Reviving after Execution. 
 A Tragedy of the Reign of Terror. 
 The Woman Husband. 
 The Pseudo Nobleman. 
 The Keswick Imposture. 
 The Discovery in Nusemberg. 
 Revenge of the Injured Husband. 
 The Duke and Dutchess of Praslin. 
 The Unlawful Gift. 
 Eugene Aram. 
 A Singular Dying Speech. 
 The FoKce of Fear. 
 Sent by mail, postage paid, on receipt of the price, SI, 00. 
 
 Address, H. DAYTON. Publisher, 
 
 * 3(5 HOWARD-STREET. N. Y. 
 
FEW WOUK 
 
 BY THE REV. J. H. INGRAHAM. 
 
 FIRST EDITION TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND COPIES. 
 JUST PUBLISHED. 
 
 THE PILLAR OF FIRE; 
 
 v3* L&iiJasJsif tii\l J&wi^JL/efljstr.B'i 
 BY THE AUTHOR OF 
 
 "THE PRINCE OF THE HOUSE OF DAVID." 
 
 Being an account of the wonderful scenes in the LIFE OP THE SON OP PHARAOH'S 
 
 DAUGHTER, (MOSES,) from his youth to the Ascent of Sinai ; comprising, 
 
 as by an eye-witness, his Miracles before Pharaoh, 
 
 THE F THE HE SEA, 
 
 AND THE 
 
 RECEPTION OF THE LAW ON MOUNT SINAI, ' 
 
 CONTAINING 
 
 An elaborate and richly colored Description of the Architecture of the Egyptians, 
 their Manners and Customs in Peace and War, in the Temple, the Family, the 
 Mart, and at the Tomb ; and also ef the Israelites, while in the Land of 
 Bondage ; 
 
 TOGETHER WITH 
 
 PICTTJKESQTJE SKETCHES 
 
 OP THE 
 
 HEBREWS UNDER THEIR TASK-MASTERS, 
 
 Of Scenes, Processions, and Spectacles upon and beside the Nile, and Legends of 
 the Obelisks, Sphinxes and Pyramids, and of their Founders before the Flood. ^ 
 DELINEATIONS OF BEAUTIFUL WOMEN, of Miriam, Amense, Luxora, and | 
 Osiria, and of WONDERFUL MEN Aaron, the Prince of Uz (Job,) and Reme- 
 ses (Moses). 
 
 Narrated in a Series of letters from a Syrian Prince traveling 
 in Egypt, to his Royal Mother, Queen of Tyre. 
 
 THE VOLUME ABOUNDS IN CHARACTERISTIC PASSAGES OF 
 
 iji^Ijlg tDrougtyt 33mttt, w Dramatic Jncibcnt, 
 
 AND IN 
 
 ORNATE DESCRIPTIONS_OF FEMALE LOVELINESS. 
 
 One Vol., large 1 2mo. 5OO Pages. Illustrated. Price $1, 25. 
 
 Sent by mail, postage paid, on receipt of the price, $1.25. 
 
 Address, H. DAYTON, Publisher, 
 
 36 HOWARD-STREET, N. Y. 
 
 5 
 
H. DAYTON'S PI BLICA1 ONS 
 
 sljoulfc Ijarje a 
 
 THE 
 
 HAND BOOK ; 
 
 OR. 
 
 Chemistry Applied to Agriculture, 
 
 THE ONLY PROFITABLE METHOD OF 
 
 TILLING THE SOIL 
 
 J. E. KENT, A. M., M. D. 
 1 8mo., Cloth, Price 25 Cents. 
 
 We begin to find thait the great question of the day in all our large 
 
 commercial cities, is not so much upon stocks in exchange, as upon the I 
 
 probable state of the crops this season. Therefore it may well be said, | 
 
 he who makes two blades of grass to grow where bnt one blade grew 
 
 i before, is a benefactor to mankind. This is the work of agricultural 
 
 J chemistry to perform ; and without this chemical knowledge, the lands 
 
 I of the farmer will soon become unproductive, notwithstanding it may 
 
 | be highly manured and laboriously work edr** Still, in addition to being 
 
 a practical man, in order to be a successful farmer he must understand, 
 
 in a measure, the nature of the crops he raises, the character and con- 
 
 | stituents of the soil on which they are grown, and the different kinds of 
 
 1 manures and compost most suitable to prevent exhaustion of different 
 
 v kinds of land ; thereby, with the aid of agricultural chemistry, the 
 
 j wealth of the United States could be doubled in one year, were all that 
 
 I saved which is now lost by bad management. In short, the wealth of 
 
 call nations depends upon the rising generation of practical, chemical 
 
 [farmers, who will till the soil as much by the laws of chemistry as by 
 
 } the sweat of the brow ; and the simple facts and information contained 
 
 > in this little volume, for 
 
 ONLY TWENTY-FIVE CENTS, 
 
 j Cannot be estimated in dollars and cents, and should be in the hands of 
 every man in this country as a book of reference, even if he improves 
 nothing more than a garden spot of twenty-five feet square. 
 
 Send us twenty-five cents in a letter, and we | 
 will send you a copy by return of mail, post-paid. 
 Address 
 H. DAYTON, Publisher, 
 
 107 NASSAU-STREET, N.Y. 
 
H. DAYTON'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 -TRUTH IS STRANQER THAN FICTION." 
 
 FIFTY YEAES IN CHAINS; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE LIFE OF AN AMERICAN SLAVE. 
 
 WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 
 
 "My God! can such things bo ! 
 Hast thou not said that whatso'er is done, 
 Unto thy weakest and thy humblest one, 
 
 Is even done to thee 1" WHITTIER. 
 
 430 PACKS, CL.OTH, GILT BACK, PRICE $1. 
 
 This is the title of one of the simplest, yet most intensely interesting biographies | 
 of the day. It is the plain, homely history of an American slave in the far South, | 
 who, after two or three escapes and recaptures, finally, an old man, found fresdoin | 
 and rest in one of the Northern States. 
 
 | " The story," says the Preface, " is TRUE in every particular. Responsible citi- | 
 
 ' , zens of a neighboring State can vouch for the reality of the narrative. The language j? 
 
 of the slave has not at all times been strictly adhered to, as a halt century of bond- ^ 
 
 age unfitted him for literary work. The subject of the story is still a slave by the * 
 
 * laws of this country, and it would not be wise to reveal his name." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Few works are better calculated than that now before us to spread sound views ^ 
 on the subject of slavery, as it deals directly with the fortunes of individuals, Sj 
 i always more attractive themes with the mass of mankind than the ablest argu- 
 ments that can be directed against the evils of a system. Boston Trr ^eler. 
 
 The story is told with great simplicity, but with much power and pathos. Who- 
 ever takes it up will find it difficult to lay it down until it is finished. The merit 
 of the work lies in its narration of personal experience. The writer does not stop 
 u to argue about slavery, and rarely to exclaim against it as a gigantic system of Q 
 ", wrong, but contents himself with narrating his own experience while a slave, and ^ 
 it the reader can make his own deductions. This is the way in which all such books ' J 
 i should be written. Leave the reader to reason, to moralize ; 1 .t the writer, the 
 * sufterer, tell his story ! As a very interesting piece of self-history, this work has 
 1 high merit, and as a picture of American Slavery, higher still. National Era, 
 3 Washington, D. C. 
 
 ~ This is an autobiography, written in an earnest, simple, and touching style. It 
 ^ will be read with deep interest by very many, and will make no converts to sla- 
 very. Christian Chronicle, Philadelphia, Pa. 
 
 The narrative will be found deeply interesting to all who sympathize with the op- 
 pressed and down-trodden slave. Christian Secretary, Hartford, Ct. 
 
 Sample Copies sent by mail, postage paid, to any part of the U. 
 States, on receipt of the price. Address 
 
 H. DAYTOT3T. Publisher, 
 
 36 HOWACh-STRTCET, V. Y. 
 
H. DAYTON'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 A BOOK THAT WILL PLEASE THE CHILDREN. 
 
 A COLLECTION OF 
 
 HIEBOGLYPHICAL KEBUSES, PUZZLES, 
 
 KIDDLES, CONUNDRUMS, ENIGMAS 
 
 and QUESTIONS for the CURIOUS, 
 
 SELECTED FROM 
 
 MERRY'S MUSEUM 4 PARLEY'S MAGAZINE 
 
 WITH LARGE ORIGINAL ADDITIONS, 
 
 j By ROBERT MERRY fc HIRAM HATCHET. 
 
 PRICE 25 CENTS. 
 
 Robert Merry to his friends 
 A kindly greeting sends, 
 ^ With a general assortment of Questions, 
 Conundrums, Charades, 
 Puzzles, Riddles of all shades, 
 And Rebuses, as aids 
 To intellectual and social digestion. 
 
 Now, if any of you wish 
 For a real spicy dish, 
 
 That will tickle your palate like nectar 
 That will serve for nuts and wine 
 When you sup, or lunch, or dine, 
 And your inner man refine 
 
 Make "Merry's Book of Puzzles" your | 
 
 reflector. 
 
 Every collection of children will want one and some of the older folks will be 
 likely to glance at the curious pictures. [Journal, Portsmouth, N. H. 
 
 It will furnish amusement for the young folks during a whole winter of evenings 
 'it home. [ Whig, Bangor, Me. 
 
 There is no pleasanter and safer amusement for young people than the exercise | 
 of their wits on Conundrums, Charades, Puzzles, &c., and many a little coterie, to T 
 say nothing of the papas and mammas, will thank Mr. Merry for this abundant 
 contribution to their festivities, which are an ever renewing pleasure, as they will 
 never wear out, while the memory serves to return and reproduce them for suc- 
 cessive audiences. [Inquirer, Nantucket, Mass. 
 
 Merry's Book of Puzzles will cause a wreath of smiles on the face of any juvenile 
 that may be the fortunate recipient. Such a fund of instruction and amusement 
 for the juvenile community was never published before. It will please alike the _ 
 old folks and the young ones, and no one should be without such a cheap and | 
 pleasant source of amusement. 
 
 The way to get " Merry's Book of Puzzles," is to send us I 
 twenty-five cents, in a letter, and we will send a copy by re- 1 
 turn of mail. Postage paid.- Address, 
 
 H. DAYTON, Publisher, 
 
 107 NASSAU-ST., N. Y. ? 
 B8QnBffi8ffimi^688$*U&ft^^