the dead. Soon, Junius, holding his weeping wife by the hand, approached
the smaller of the two boxes, which held all that was left of their
first-born. The mother, kneeling by its side, kissed again and again the
cold, shrunken lips, and sobbed as if her heart would break; and the
strong frame of the father shook convulsively, as he choked down the
great sorrow which welled up in his throat, and turned away from his boy
forever. As he did so, old Pompey said:

"Don't grebe, June, he'm whar de wicked cease from trubling, whar de
weary am at rest."

"I knows it; I knows it, Uncle. I knows de Lord am bery good to take
'im 'way; but why did he take de young chile, and leab de ole man har?"

"De little sapling dat grow in de shade may die while it'm young; de
great tree dat grow in de sun must lib till he'm rotted down."

These words were the one drop wanting to make the great grief which was
swelling in the negro's heart overflow. Giving one low, wild cry, he
folded his wife in his arms, and burst into a paroxysm of tears.

"Come now, my chil'ren," said the old preacher, kneeling down, "let us
pray."

The whole assemblage then knelt on the cold ground, while the old man
prayed, and a more sincere, heart-touching prayer never went up from
human lips to that God "who hath made of one blood all nations that
dwell on the face of the earth." Though clothed in rags, and in feeble
age at the mercy of a cruel taskmaster, that old slave was richer far
than his master. His simple faith, which saw through the darkness around
him into the clear and radiant light of the unseen day, was of far more
worth than all the wealth and glory of this world. I know not why it
was, but as I looked at him in the dim red light, which fell on his bent
form and cast a strange halo around his upturned face, I thought of
Stephen, as he gazed upward and behold heaven open, and "the Son of Man
seated at the right hand of the throne of God."

Rising from his knees, the old preacher turned slowly to the black mass
that encircled him, and said:

"My dear brederin and sisters, de Lord say dat 'de dust shill return to
de earth as it war, and de spirit to Him who gabe it,' and now, 'cordin'
to dat text, my friends, we'm gwine to put dis dust (pointing to the two
coffins) in de groun' whar it cum from, and whar it shill lay till de
bressed Lord blow de great trumpet on de resumrection mornin'. De
spirits of our brudders har de Lord hub already took to h