‘Well, perhaps he might; it’s true I would not injure you.’  Saying that, I turned away, though my curiosity was greatly excited to hear more.

I wandered farther into the woods, and a half-hour found me near one of the turpentine distilleries.  Seating myself on a rosin barrel, I quietly finished my cigar, and was about lighting another, when Jim made his appearance.

‘Beg pardon, Massa K——­,’ said the negro, bowing very low, ’but I wants to ax you one or two tings, ef you please, sar.’

‘Well,’ I replied, ‘I’ll answer any thing that I ought to.’

‘Der yer tink, den, massa, dat dey’ll git to fightin’ at Charls’on?’

’Yes, judging by the tone of the Charleston papers you’ve read to-day, I think they will.’

’And der yer tink dat de rest ob de Souf will jine wid Souf Car’lina, if she go at it fust?’

‘Yes, Jim, I’m inclined to think so.’

’I hard you say to massa, dat ef dey goes to war,’twill free all de niggers—­der you raily b’lieve dat, sar?’

‘You heard me say that; how did you hear it?’ I exclaimed, in surprise.

’Why, sar, de front winder ob de carriage war down jess a crack, and I hard all you said.’

‘Did you let it down on purpose?’

‘P’r’aps so, massa.  Whot’s de use ob habin’ ears, ef you don’t h’ar?’

’Well, I suppose not much; and you tell all you hear to the other negroes?’

‘I reckon so, massa,’ said the darky, looking very demure.

‘That’s the use of having a tongue, eh?’ I replied, laughing.

’Dat’s it ‘zaxly, massa.’

’Well, Jim, I do think the slaves will be finally freed; but it will cost more white blood to do it than all the niggers in creation are worth.  Do you think the darkies would fight for their freedom?’

‘Fight, sar!’ exclaimed the negro, straightening up his fine form, while his usual good-natured look—­passed from his face and gave way to an expression that made him seem more like an incarnate fiend than a human being; ‘FIGHT, sar; gib dem de chance, and den see.’

’Why are you discontented?  You have been at the North, and you know the blacks are as well off as the majority of the poor laboring men there.’

’You say dat to me, Massa K——­; you don’t say it to de Cunnel.  We are not so well off as de pore man at de Norf!  You knows dat, sar.  He hab his wife and children, and his own home; what hab we, sar?  No wife, no children, no home; all am de white man’s.  Der yer tink we wouldn’t fight to be free?’ and he pressed his teeth together, and there passed again over his face the same look it wore the moment before.

’Come, come, Jim, this may be true of your race; but it don’t apply to yourself.  Your master is kind and indulgent to you.’

‘He am kind to me, sar; he orter be,’ said the negro, the savage expression coming again into his eyes.  For a moment he hesitated; then, taking a step toward me, he placed his face down to mine, and hissed out these words, every syllable seeming to come from the very bottom of his being.  ‘I tell you he orter be, sar, FUR I AM HIS OWN FATHER’S SON!’