bout the very latest cut of his coat, but he's got a heart bigger
than an ox--yes, big as ten oxen! I'd trust him with my life, and know
it was just as safe as his own. You'll like Hugh--Nell does."

The colonel never dreamed of the comfort his words gave Alice, or how
they changed her feelings with regard to one whom she had so dreaded to
meet.

"There 'tis; we're almost there," the colonel said at last, as they
turned off from the highway, and leaning forward Alice caught sight of
the roofs and dilapidated chimneys of Spring Bank. "'Taint quite as
fixey as Yankee houses, that's a fact, but we that own niggers never do
have things so smarted up," the colonel said, guessing how the contrast
must affect Alice, who felt so desolate and homesick as she drew up in
front of what, for a time at least, was to be her home.

"Where is Hugh?" Alice asked.

Aunt Eunice would not say he had gone to Lexington for the sake,
perhaps, of seeing her, so she replied:

"He went to town this morning, but he'll be back pretty soon. He has
done his best to make it pleasant for you, and I do believe he doted on
your coming after he got a little used to thinking about it. You'll like
Hugh when you get accustomed to him. There, try to go to sleep," and
kind Aunt Eunice bustled from the room just as poor Densie, who had been
entirely overlooked, entered it, together with Aunt Chloe. The old
negress was evidently playing the hostess to Densie, for she was talking
quite loud, and all about "Mas'r Hugh." "Pity he wasn't thar, 'twould
seem so different; 'tain't de same house without him. You'll like Mas'r
Hugh," and she, too, glided from the room.

Was this the password at Spring Bank, "You'll like Mas'r Hugh?" It would
seem so, for when at last Hannah brought up the waffles and tea, which
Aunt Eunice had prepared, she set down her tray, and after a few
inquiries concerning Alice's head, which was now aching sadly, she, too,
launched forth into a panegyric on Mas'r Hugh, ending, as the rest had
done, "You'll like Mas'r Hugh."

CHAPTER XIX

ALICE AND MUGGINS

Had an angel appeared suddenly to the blacks at Spring Bank they would
not have been more surprised or delighted than they were with Alice when
she came down to breakfast, looking so beautiful in her muslin wrapper,
with a simple white blossom and geranium leaf twined among her flowing
curls, and an expression of content upon her childish face, which said
that she had resolved