"You know what dat
inqui'ance o' yone bring to my 'memb'ance? Dass ow ole Canaan hymn----

"'O I mus' climb de stony hill
Pas' many a sweet desiah,
De flow'ry road is not fo' me,
I follows cloud an' fiah.'"

After she was gone I lay trying so to contrive our next conversation
that it should not flow, as all before it had so irresistibly done,
into that one deep channel of her thoughts which took in everything
that fell upon her mind, as a great river drinks the rains of all its
valleys. Presently the open window gave me my cue: the stars! the
unvexed and unvexing stars, that shone before human wrongs ever began,
and that will be shining after all human wrongs are ended--our talk
should be of them.

V

At the supper-table on the following evening I became convinced of
something which I had felt coming for two or three days, wondering the
while whether Sidney did not feel the same thing. When we rose aunt
drew me aside and with caressing touches on my brow and temples said
she was sorry to be so slow in bringing me into social contact with the
young people of the neighboring plantations, but that uncle, on his
arrival at home, had found a letter whose information had kept him, and
her as well, busy every waking hour since. "And this evening," she
continued, "we can't even sit down with you around the parlor lamp.
Can you amuse yourself alone, dear, or with Sidney, while your uncle
and I go over some pressing matters together?"

Surely I could. "Auntie, was the information--bad news?"

"It wasn't good, my dear; I may tell you about it to-morrow."

"Hadn't I better go back to father at once?"

"Oh, my child, not for our sake; if you're not too lonesome we'd rather
keep you. Let me see; has Mingo ever danced for you? Why, tell Sidney
to make Mingo come dance for you."

Mingo came; his leaps, turns, postures, steps, and outcries were a most
laughable wonder, and I should have begged for more than I did, but I
saw that it was a part of Sidney's religion to disapprove the dance.

"Sidney," I said, "did you ever hear of the great clock in the sky?
Yes, there's one there; it's made all of stars." We were at the foot
of some veranda steps that faced the north, and as she and Mingo were
about to settle down at my feet I said if they would follow me to the
top of the flight I would tell this marvel: what the learned believed
those eternal lamps to be; why some were out of view three-fourths of