. He had evidently just
gotten over the "worm-fence" into the road, out of the path which led
zigzag across the "old field" and was lost to sight in the dense
growth of sassafras. When I rode up, he was looking anxiously back
down this path for his dog. So engrossed was he that he did not even
hear my horse, and I reined in to wait until he should turn around and
satisfy my curiosity as to the handsome old place half a mile off from
the road.

The numerous out-buildings and the large barns and stables told that
it had once been the seat of wealth, and the wild waste of sassafras
that covered the broad fields gave it an air of desolation that
greatly excited my interest. Entirely oblivious of my proximity, the
negro went on calling, "Whoo-oop, heah!" until along the path, walking
very slowly and with great dignity, appeared a noble-looking old
orange and white setter, gray with age, and corpulent with excessive
feeding. As soon as he came in sight, his master began:

"Yes, dat you! You gittin' deaf as well as bline, I s'pose! Kyarnt
heah me callin', I reckon? Whyn't yo' come on, dawg?"

The setter sauntered slowly up to the fence and stopped without even
deigning a look at the speaker, who immediately proceeded to take the
rails down, talking meanwhile:

"Now, I got to pull down de gap, I s'pose! Yo' so sp'ilt yo' kyahn'
hardly walk. Jes' ez able to git over it as I is! Jes' like white
folks--t'ink 'cuz you's white and I's black, I got to wait on yo' all
de time. Ne'm mine, I ain' gwi' do it!"

The fence having been pulled down sufficiently low to suit his
dogship, he marched sedately through, and, with a hardly perceptible
lateral movement of his tail, walked on down the road. Putting up the
rails carefully, the negro turned and saw me.

"Sarvent, marster," he said, taking his hat off. Then, as if
apologetically for having permitted a stranger to witness what was
merely a family affair, he added: "He know I don' mean nothin' by what
I sez. He's Marse Chan's dawg, an' he's so ole he kyahn git long no
pearter. He know I'se jes' prodjickin' wid 'im."

"Who is Marse Chan?" I asked; "and whose place is that over there--and
the one a mile or two back--the place with the big gate and the carved
stone pillars?"

"Marse Chan," said the darkey, "he's Marse Channin'--my young marster;
an' dem places--dis one's Weall's, an' de one back dyar wid de rock
gate-pos's is ole Cun'l Chahmb'lin's. Dey don' nobody live dyar
now,