r ruined, for I would be sold, and in all probability have to end
my days on a cotton, rice, or sugar plantation." However, the thought of
freedom in the future outweighed this danger, and her resolve was taken.

Dressing herself in some of her best clothes, and placing her veiled
bonnet where she could get it without the knowledge of her mistress,
Clotelle awaited with a heart filled with the deepest emotions and
anxiety the moment when she was to take a step which seemed so rash, and
which would either make or ruin her forever.

The ships which Mobile for Europe lie about thirty miles down the
bay, and passengers are taken down from the city in small vessels. The
"Walk-in-the-Water" had just made her lines fast, and the passengers
were hurrying on shore, when a tall gentleman with a lady at his side
descended the stage-plank, and stepped on the wharf. This was Antoine
Devenant and Clotelle.

CHAPTER XXIV. THE LAW AND ITS VICTIM

THE death of Dr. Morton, on the third day of his illness, came like
a shock upon his wife and daughters. The corpse had scarcely been
committed to its mother earth before new and unforeseen difficulties
appeared to them. By the laws of the Slave States, the children follow
the condition of their mother. If the mother is free, the children are
free; if a slave, the children are slaves. Being unacquainted with the
Southern code, and no one presuming that Marion had any negro blood in
her veins, Dr. Morton had not given the subject a single thought. The
woman whom he loved and regarded as his wife was, after all, nothing
more than a slave by the laws of the State. What would have been his
feelings had he known that at his death his wife and children would
be considered as his property? Yet such was the case. Like most men of
means at that time, Dr. Morton was deeply engaged in speculation, and
though generally considered wealthy, was very much involved in his
business affairs.

After the disease with which Dr. Morton had so suddenly died had to some
extent subsided, Mr. James Morton, a brother of the deceased, went
to New Orleans to settle up the estate. On his arrival there, he was
pleased with and felt proud of his nieces, and invited them to return
with him to Vermont, little dreaming that his brother had married a
slave, and that his widow and daughters would be claimed as such. The
girls themselves had never heard that their mother had been a slave, and
therefore knew nothing of