were; for they were the lights of the Saviour’s hands, stretched forth from east to west, even as they were extended on the cross on Calvary, for the redemption of sinners.”  He saw drops of blood on the corn:  this was Christ’s blood, shed for man.  He saw on the leaves in the woods letters and numbers and figures of men,—­the same symbols which he had seen in the skies.  On May 12, 1828, the Holy Spirit appeared to him and proclaimed that the yoke of Jesus must fall on him, and he must fight against the Serpent when the sign appeared.  Then came an eclipse of the sun in February, 1831:  this was the sign; then he must arise and prepare himself, and slay his enemies with their own weapons; then also the seal was removed from his lips, and then he confided his plans to four associates.

When he came, therefore, to the barbecue on the appointed Sunday, and found, not these four only, but two others, his first question to the intruders was, How they came thither.  To this Will answered manfully, that his life was worth no more than the others, and “his liberty was as dear to him.”  This admitted him to confidence, and as Jack was known to be entirely under Hark’s influence, the strangers were no bar to their discussion.  Eleven hours they remained there, in anxious consultation:  one can imagine those terrible dusky faces, beneath the funereal woods, and amid the flickering of pine-knot torches, preparing that stern revenge whose shuddering echoes should ring through the land so long.  Two things were at last decided:  to begin their work that night, and to begin it with a massacre so swift and irresistible as to create in a few days more terror than many battles, and so spare the need of future bloodshed.  “It was agreed that we should commence at home on that night, and, until we had armed and equipped ourselves and gained sufficient force, neither age nor sex was to be spared:  which was invariably adhered to.”

John Brown invaded Virginia with nineteen men, and with the avowed resolution to take no life but in self-defence.  Nat Turner attacked Virginia from within, with six men, and with the determination to spare no life until his power was established.  John Brown intended to pass rapidly through Virginia, and then retreat to the mountains.  Nat Turner intended to “conquer Southampton County as the white men did in the Revolution, and then retreat, if necessary, to the Dismal Swamp.”  Each plan was deliberately matured; each was in its way practicable; but each was defeated by a single false step, as will soon appear.

We must pass over the details of horror, as they occurred during the next twenty-four hours.  Swift and stealthy as Indians, the black men passed from house to house,—­not pausing, not hesitating, as their terrible work went on.  In one thing they were humaner than Indians or than white men fighting against Indians,—­there was no gratuitous outrage beyond the death-blow itself, no insult, no mutilation; but in every house they entered, that