Camilla was delighted with her tour; the constant companion of her
father, she visited with him every place of amusement or interest they
could find. She was much pleased with the factories; and watched with
curious eyes the intelligent faces of the operatives, as they plied with
ready fingers their daily tasks. Sometimes she would contrast their
appearance with the laborers she had seen wending their way into their
lowly huts; and then her face would grow sober even to sadness. A
puzzled expression would flit over her countenance, as if she were
trying to solve a problem which was inexplicable to her.

One day on the hunt for some new excitement, her father passed down
Tremont St., and saw advertised, in large letters, on the entrance to
Tremont Temple, "Anti Slavery Meeting;" and never having been in such a
place before he entered, impelled by a natural curiosity to hear what
could be said against a system in which he had been involved from his
earliest recollections, without taking the pains to examine it.

The first speaker was a colored man. This rather surprised him. He had
been accustomed to colored men all the days of his life; and as such, he
had known some of them to be intelligent, shrewd, and wide awake; but
this was a new experience. The man had been a slave, and recounted in
burning words the wrongs which had been heaped upon him. He told that he
had been a husband and a father: that his wife had possessed (for a
slave) the "fatal gift of beauty;" that a trader, from whose presence
her soul had recoiled with loathing, had marked her as his prey. Then he
told how he had knelt at his master's feet, and implored him not to sell
her, but it was all in vain. The trader was rich in sin-cursed gold; and
he was poor and weak. He next attempted to describe his feelings when he
saw his wife and children standing on the auction block; and heard the
coarse jests of the spectators, and the fierce competition of the
bidders.

The speaker made a deep impression upon the minds of the audience; and
even Le Croix, who had been accustomed to slavery all his life, felt a
sense of guilt passing over him for his complicity in the system; whilst
Camilla grew red and pale by turns, and clutching her little hands
nervously together, said, "Father, let us go home."

Le Croix saw the deep emotion on his daughter's face, and the nervous
twitchings of her lips, and regretted that he had introduced her to such
an exciting scene.