rienced a qualm or two
when she thought of what a story her few remaining broken teeth would
tell. Still, like the world and all the "rest of mankind," she had
never fully realized that she had passed her prime and her usefulness.

This purchaser did not want her, nor did that, nor alas! the other! Each
and every one were eager for the boy. The auctioneer's instructions had
been to sell the two together, if possible, if not, at all events to
sell the boy, as he would command a good price, and _money must be_
raised.

Kizzie went wild when she saw her boy knocked off to a man who refused
to take her, even as a gift!

O angels in heaven, what pitiful sights do ye not behold upon this earth
of ours! Had ye no drop of balm from your vials of tender mercy to pour
into the desolate heart of the stricken slave-mother, as she returned
homeward in the dark, clutching frantically at her withered pinks, as
did the talons of the vulture of grief at her wounded heart!

This blow to poor Kizzie occurred about the time of her mistress'
marriage. The price of her agony, the money obtained for Joe, was sent
to New York, and returned to Mrs. Rush in glittering jewels. Had this
haughty woman been capable of realizing her sin, the showy baubles would
have melted in the fiery furnace of her shame and contrition.

Kizzie became a changed woman; crazed, as some thought. Joe had been her
baby, and her baby still at fourteen. How could her baby get along
without his mother? This was the burden of her complaint, her unceasing
utterance of sorrow. And still she lived on, sitting from morning until
night at her loom, her tear of sorrow or sigh of despair inwoven with
every thread, and from her bleeding heart going up the incessant prayer
for Heaven's vengeance upon her persecutor.

One day, not far off, shall it not be more tolerable for Kizzie than for
the beautiful mistress of Thornton Hall?

CHAPTER XVI.

TIME AND CHANGE.

Time and change! Why add the latter word? Doth not the former include
all? Doth not time sadly overcome all things?

And this Time, which, according to Sir Thomas Brown, sitteth on a
sphinx, and looketh into Memphis and old Thebes, which reclineth on a
pyramid, gloriously triumphing, making puzzles of Titanian erections,
and turning old glories into dreams--or something to that effect. This
old Father Time, so much abused, misused, has given ten years to
Kennons, ten years to Philip and his second wife in