which supported a dozen or so of dark green
bottles--depended from the walls; and that was all. The floor upon
which I lay was simply the bare earth, rammed hard, thick with dust and
swarming with fleas,--as I quickly discovered,--and the whole place
reeked of that hot, stale smell that seems to pervade the abodes of
people of uncleanly habits.

The two negroes smoked silently and gravely for a full half-hour, about
the end of which time my captor slowly and with due deliberation knocked
the ashes from his pipe, and, rising to his feet, yawned and stretched
himself. In so doing his eye fell upon the shelf upon which stood the
bottles, and, sauntering lazily across the room, he laid his hand upon
one of the bottles and placed it on the centre table. Then, lifting up
the cloth which covered the packing-case, he revealed a shelf within the
interior, from which he withdrew a water monkey, two earthenware mugs,
and a dish containing a most uninviting-looking mixture, which I
presently guessed, from its odour, to be composed of salt fish and
boiled yams mashed together, cold. These he placed upon the table, and,
still without speaking, the pair drew chairs up to the table and,
seating themselves opposite each other, proceeded to make a hearty meal,
helping themselves alternately, with their fingers, from the central
dish, and washing down the mixture with a mug of rum and water each.

They were still thus agreeably engaged when the distant sound of
rumbling wheels and clattering hoofs became audible, rapidly drawing
nearer, and accompanied by the persuasive shouts and ejaculations of a
negro driver.

"Dat am de boy Moses wid de cart, I 'spects," remarked the negro whose
name I had not yet learned. "What a drefful row de young rascal makes!
Dat nigger won't nebber learn discreshun," he continued, wiping his
fingers carefully on a flaming red handkerchief which he drew from his
breeches pocket.

Peter grunted an unintelligible reply, and the next moment the vehicle
pulled up sharply at the door; the cessation of its clatter being
immediately followed by the entrance of a negro lad, some eighteen years
of age.

"I'se brought de cart, as you tole me, Caesar," he remarked. "Am it all
right?"

"It am, sar," remarked Caesar--the hitherto unnamed negro--loftily;
"when did you ebber know me to fail in what I undertooken, eh, sar?"

"Nebber, sah, nebber," answered Moses appreciatively. "An' so dat am de
gebberlum, am i