you all w'ite folks now?"

"What did he say to you?" asked Mr. Walthall.

"He ax me w'at make de niggers stay in slave'y," said the frightened
negro; "he ax me w'at de reason dey don't git free deyse'f."

"He was warm after information," Mr. Walthall suggested.

"Call it what you please," said the Vermont colporteur. "I asked him
those questions and more." He was pale, but he no longer acted like a
man troubled with fear.

"Oh, we know that, mister," said Buck Ransome. "We know what you come
for, and we know what you're goin' away for. We'll excuse you if you'll
excuse us, and then there'll be no hard feelin's--that is, not many;
none to growl about.--Jake, hand me that bundle there on the barrel, and
fetch that tar-bucket.--You've got the makin' of a mighty fine bird in
you, mister," Ransome went on, addressing the colporteur; "all you
lack's the feathers, and we've got oodles of 'em right here. Now, will
you shuck them duds?"

For the first time the fact dawned on Little Compton's mind that the
young men were about to administer a coat of tar and feathers to the
stranger from Vermont; and he immediately began to protest.

"Why, Jack," said he, "what has the man done?"

"Well," replied Mr. Walthall, "you heard what the nigger said. We can't
afford to have these abolitionists preaching insurrection right in our
back yards. We just can't afford it, that's the long and short of it.
Maybe you don't understand it; maybe you don't feel as we do; but that's
the way the matter stands. We are in a sort of a corner, and we are
compelled to protect ourselves."

"I don't believe in no tar and feathers for this chap," remarked Major
Jimmy Bass, assuming a judicial air. "He'll just go out here to the town
branch and wash 'em off, and then he'll go on through the plantations
raising h---- among the niggers. That'll be the upshot of it--now, you
mark my words. He ought to be hung."

"Now, boys," said Little Compton, still protesting, "what is the use?
This man hasn't done any real harm. He might preach insurrection around
here for a thousand years, and the niggers wouldn't listen to him. Now,
you know that yourselves. Turn the poor devil loose, and let him get out
of town. Why, haven't you got any confidence in the niggers you've
raised yourselves?"

"My dear sir," said Rowan Wornum, in his most insinuating tone, "we've
got all the confidence in the world in the niggers, but we can't afford
to take any risks. Why, my dea