n I
think of it."

"Oh," he answered, "it was easy enough. I came in with a fellow who
was driving cattle into town."

"Oh, Sed!" his sister whispered; "you ran an awful risk; how will you
manage to get back without being discovered?"

"There'll be no trouble about that," he answered. "Don't you and
mother go and worry yourselves about me. I'll be all right, so cheer
up and don't look so doleful."

Urged on by fear, they now almost hurried him away, and Mammy, while
filling his haversack with provisions, entreated him to be careful.

"De ain't no tellin' what dem Yankees would do ef dey once clapt hands
on you."

Sedley might guess shrewdly enough what his fate would be in such
case, but he replied, with his old boyish laugh, that it was his trade
to outrun the Yankees.

"Never fear, Mammy," he said at parting. "Trust me to beat 'em at
that game."

Then the sad good-byes were said, and manfully he strode down the
little path, turning only once to wave a last good-by to the sorrowful
group on the broad front porch, who watched till he passed out of
sight.

The night was spent in anxious watching, but confidence returned with
the morning, and all again settled back to their employments and
amusements. Sybil wandered into the parlor, and, sitting down to the
piano, sang in a low, sweet voice some of the pathetic war melodies.
The "colts of the wild ass seeking after every green thing" had sought
the sorghum patch, and Mammy had taken a basket into the garden for a
final gathering of sage leaves. The day was dreamy, as only an October
day of the South can be. The tempered sunlight, streaming softly
through the filmy autumnal mist, threw a veil of loveliness over the
homeliest objects; the old gray fences, the russet fields, the lonely
pastures, where from beneath the grass roots the tiny crickets
chanted their low, sweet dirge the long day through, the cawing of the
crows from a distant tree-top, all told in notes of most harmonious
pathos that "the fashion of this world passeth away."

As Mammy, with back stiffened from stooping, raised herself for a
moment's rest, she saw Jim lounge into the backyard and speak to
Dinah. Mammy had but little use for Jim in general, but now she felt
anxious to know what had been going on in the village, and for that
reason she left her basket among the sage and went near to hear what
he was saying. As she drew near, Dinah suddenly threw up her hands,
and, starting from the he