ises of the morning were over,
for there could certainly have been no more Sunday-school that day.

For the next two days the picnic was the all-absorbing topic of
conversation, and wonderful stories were told and circulated of the
quantities of goodies that were being made in the "Go Bang" kitchen.
Aunt Chloe was frequently interviewed, and begged to tell exactly how
much of these stories might be believed; but the old woman only shook
her gayly turbaned head, and answered,

"You's gwine see, chillun! you's gwine see; only jes' hab pashuns, an'
you's gwine be 'warded by sich a sight ob fixin's as make yo' tink ole
times back come, sho nuff."

At last the eagerly expected morning dawned, and though a thick fog hid
one bank of the river from the other, sounds of active stir and bustle
announced to each community that the other was making ready for the
great event.

By nine o'clock the fog had lifted, and the sun shone out bright and
warm. Before this Jan and the mules had made several trips between the
house and the mill, each time with a heavy wagon load of--something.
Mr. Elmer, Mr. March, and Mark had gone to the mill as soon as
breakfast was over, and had not been seen since.

Aunt Chloe had been bustling about her kitchen "sence de risin' ob de
mo'nin' star," and was, in her own estimation, the most important
person on the place that day. As for Bruce he was wild with excitement,
and dashed at full speed from the house to the mill, and back again,
barking furiously, and trying to tell volumes of, what seemed to him,
important news.

As soon as the fog lifted, the horn on the opposite side of the river
began to blow impatient summonses for the "superintendent of ferries,"
and busy times immediately began for Frank.

What funny loads of black people he brought over! Old gray-headed
uncles, leaning on canes, who told stories of "de good ole times long
befo' de wah"; middle-aged men and women who rejoiced in the present
good times of freedom, and comical little pickaninnies, who looked
forward with eagerness to the good times to come to them within an hour
or so.

And then the teams, the queer home-made carts, most of them drawn by a
single steer or cow hitched into shafts, in which the bushels of corn
were brought; for everybody who could obtain a bushel of corn had taken
Mr. Elmer at his word, and brought it along to be ground free of charge.

One of the men, after seeing his wife and numerous family of chi