avely. "The whole North is stirred up and
bound to make trouble. These men seem to have taken the girl in
without hesitation. They don't intend to stand by any compromise,
at least. The question is, what are we going to do about it? We
can't stand here and see our property taken away by armed invaders,
in this way. And yet--"

"It looks," he added slowly, a moment later, "just as Thomas
Jefferson said long ago, as though this country had the wolf by the
ear, and could neither hold it nor let it go. For myself--and
setting aside this personal matter, which is at worst only the loss
of a worthless girl--I admit I fear that this slavery wolf is going
to mean trouble--big trouble--both for the South and the North,
before long."

"Douglas, over there in Illinois, hasn't brought up anything in
Congress yet that's stuck," broke in the ever-ready Jones. "Old
Caroliny and Mississip'--them's the ones! Their conventions show
where we're goin' to stand at. We'll let the wolf go, and take
holt in a brand new place, that's exactly what we'll do!"

Dunwody remained silent for a time. Doctor Jamieson took snuff,
and looked quietly from one to the other. "You can count me in,
gentlemen," said he.

Silence fell as he went on. "If they mean fight, let them have
fight. If we let in one army of abolitionists out here, to run off
our property, another will follow. As soon as the railroad gets as
far west as the Missouri River, they'll come out in swarms; and
they will take that new country away from us. That's what they
want.

"The South has been swindled all along the line," he exclaimed,
rising and smiting a fist into a palm. "We got Texas, yes, but it
had to be by war. We've been juggled out of California, which
ought to have been a southern state. We don't want these deserts
of Utah and New Mexico, for they won't raise cotton. When we try
to get into Cuba, the North and all the rest of the world protests.
We are cut off from growth to the south by Mexico. On the west we
have these Indians located. The whole upper West is air-tight
abolitionist by national law. Now, where shall we go? These
abolitionists are even wedging in west of us. This damned
compromise line ought to be cut off the map. We ought to have a
chance to grow!"

Strange enough such speech sounds to-day,--speech demanding growth
for a part of a country, denying it for the whole, speech ignoring
the nationalist tendency so soon to overwhel