“Are we then on the borders of the desert of that name?” asked Dick Sand.

“Precisely, my young friend, and this desert extends far beyond the mountains which shut off the horizon.”

“The desert of Atacama?” repeated Dick Sand.

“Yes,” replied Harris.  “This desert is like a country by itself, in this vast South America, from which it differs in many respects.  It is, at the same time, the most curious and the least known portion of this continent.”

“And you travel alone?” asked Mrs. Weldon.

“Oh, it is not the first time that I have taken this journey!” replied the American.  “There is, two hundred miles from here, an important farm, the Farm of San Felice, which belongs to one of my brothers, and it is to his house that I am going for my trade.  If you wish to follow me you will be well received, and the means of transport to gain the town of Atacama will not fail you.  My brother will be happy to furnish, them.”

These offers, made freely, could only prepossess in favor of the American, who immediately continued, addressing Mrs. Weldon: 

“These blacks are your slaves?”

And he pointed to Tom and his companions.

“We have no longer any slaves in the United States,” replied Mrs. Weldon, quickly.  “The North abolished slavery long ago, and the South has been obliged to follow the example of the North!”

“Ah! that is so,” replied Harris.  “I had forgotten that the war of 1862 had decided that grave question.  I ask those honest men’s pardon for it,” added Harris, with that delicate irony which a Southerner must put into his language when speaking to blacks.  “But on seeing those gentlemen in your service, I believed——­”

“They are not, and have never been, in my service, sir,” replied Mrs. Weldon, gravely.

“We should be honored in serving you, Mrs. Weldon,” then said old Tom.  “But, as Mr. Harris knows, we do not belong to anybody.  I have been a slave myself, it is true, and sold as such in Africa, when I was only six years old; but my son Bat, here, was born of an enfranchised father, and, as to our companions, they were born of free parents.”

“I can only congratulate you about it,” replied Harris, in a tone which Mrs. Weldon did not find sufficiently serious.  “In this land of Bolivia, also, we have no slaves.  Then you have nothing to fear, and you can go about as freely here as in the New England States.”

At that moment little Jack, followed by Nan, came out of the grotto rubbing his eyes.  Then, perceiving his mother, he ran to her.  Mrs. Weldon embraced him tenderly.

“The charming little boy!” said the American, approaching Jack.

“It is my son,” replied Mrs. Weldon.

“Oh, Mrs. Weldon, you must have been doubly tried, because your child has been exposed to so many dangers.”

“God has brought him out of them safe and sound, as He has us, Mr. Harris,” replied Mrs. Weldon.