ped
near their host.

Mr. Bright tossed his hat on a bush, and, leaning on his hoe, sang
in a stentorian voice: "I am an Abolitionist; I glory in the
name.--There," said he, laughing, "I let out _all_ my voice, that the
Deacon might hear. He can pray the loudest; but I reckon I can sing
the loudest. I'll tell you what first made me begin to think about
slavery. You see I was never easy without I could be doing something
in the musical way, so I undertook to teach singing. One winter, I
thought I should like to run away from Jack Frost, and I looked in the
Southern papers to see if any of 'em advertised for a singing-master.
The first thing my eye lighted on was this advertisement:--

"Ran away from the subscriber a stout mulatto slave, named Joe; has
light sandy hair, blue eyes, and ruddy complexion; is intelligent, and
will pass himself for a white man. I will give one hundred dollars'
reward to whoever will seize him and put him in jail.'

"'By George!' said I, 'that's a description of _me_. I didn't know
before that I was a mulatto. It'll never do for me to go _there_.'
So I went to Vermont to teach. I told 'em I was a runaway slave, and
showed 'em the advertisement that described me. Some of 'em believed
me, till I told 'em it was a joke. Well, it is just as bad for those
poor black fellows as it would have been for me; but that blue-eyed
Joe seemed to bring the matter home to me. It set me to thinking about
slavery, and I have kept thinking ever since."

"Not exactly such a silent thinking as the apothecary's famous owl, I
judge," said Mrs. Blumenthal.

"No," replied he, laughing. "I never had the Quaker gift of gathering
into the stillness, that's a fact. But I reckon even that 'pothecary's
owl wouldn't be silent if he could hear and understand all that Betsey
has told me about the goings-on down South. Before I married her, she
went there to teach; but she's a woman o' feeling, and she couldn't
stand it long. But, dear me, if I believed Deacon Steal'em's talk, I
should think it was just about the pleasantest thing in the world to
be sold; and that the niggers down South had nothing 'pon earth to do
but to lick treacle and swing on a gate. Then he proves it to be a
Divine institution from Scripture, chapter and verse. You may have
noticed, perhaps, that such chaps are always mighty well posted up
about the original designs of Providence; especially as to who's
foreordained to be kept down. He says God cussed