new comer on dis plantation, but some ob you's
bin here all ob your lives; did you eber know ob Uncle Dan'el gittin'
any ob you inter trouble?"

"No, no," exclaimed a chorus of voices, "but many's de time you've held
off de blows wen de oberseer got too mean, an' cruelized us too much,
wen Marse Robert war away. An' wen he got back, you made him settle de
oberseer's hash."

"Well, boys," said Uncle Daniel, with an air of mournful dignity, "I'se
de same Uncle Dan'el I eber war. Ef any ob you wants to go, I habben't a
word to say agin it. I specs dem Yankees be all right, but I knows Marse
Robert, an' I don't know dem, an' I ain't a gwine ter throw away dirty
water 'til I gits clean."

"Well, Uncle Ben," said Robert, addressing a stalwart man whose towering
form and darkly flashing eye told that slavery had failed to put the
crouch in his shoulders or general abjectness into his demeanor, "you
will go with us, for sure, won't you?"

"Yes," spoke up Tom Anderson, "'cause de trader's done took your wife,
an' got her for his'n now."

As Ben Tunnel looked at the speaker, a spasm of agony and anger darkened
his face and distorted his features, as if the blood of some strong
race were stirring with sudden vigor through his veins. He clutched his
hands together, as if he were struggling with an invisible foe, and for
a moment he remained silent. Then suddenly raising his head, he
exclaimed, "Boys, there's not one of you loves freedom more than I do,
but--"

"But what?" said Tom. "Do you think white folks is your bes' friends?"

"I'll think so when I lose my senses."

"Well, now, I don't belieb you're 'fraid, not de way I yeard you talkin'
to de oberseer wen he war threatnin' to hit your mudder. He saw you
meant business, an' he let her alone. But, what's to hinder you from
gwine wid us?"

"My mother," he replied, in a low, firm voice. "That is the only thing
that keeps me from going. If it had not been for her, I would have gone
long ago. She's all I've got, an' I'm all she's got."

It was touching to see the sorrow on the strong face, to detect the
pathos and indignation in his voice, as he said, "I used to love Mirandy
as I love my life. I thought the sun rose and set in her. I never saw a
handsomer woman than she was. But she fooled me all over the face and
eyes, and took up with that hell-hound of a trader, Lukens; an' he gave
her a chance to live easy, to wear fine clothes, an' be waited on like a
lady. I thou