this very party.  So I lay and heard them lay off all their plans.  This young man, they said, was to be sent back to Kentucky, to his master, who was going to make an example of him, to keep all niggers from running away; and his wife two of them were going to run down to New Orleans to sell, on their own account, and they calculated to get sixteen or eighteen hundred dollars for her; and the child, they said, was going to a trader, who had bought him; and then there was the boy, Jim, and his mother, they were to go back to their masters in Kentucky.  They said that there were two constables, in a town a little piece ahead, who would go in with ’em to get ’em taken up, and the young woman was to be taken before a judge; and one of the fellows, who is small and smooth-spoken, was to swear to her for his property, and get her delivered over to him to take south.  They’ve got a right notion of the track we are going tonight; and they’ll be down after us, six or eight strong.  So now, what’s to be done?”

The group that stood in various attitudes, after this communication, were worthy of a painter.  Rachel Halliday, who had taken her hands out of a batch of biscuit, to hear the news, stood with them upraised and floury, and with a face of the deepest concern.  Simeon looked profoundly thoughtful; Eliza had thrown her arms around her husband, and was looking up to him.  George stood with clenched hands and glowing eyes, and looking as any other man might look, whose wife was to be sold at auction, and son sent to a trader, all under the shelter of a Christian nation’s laws.

“What shall we do, George?” said Eliza faintly.

“I know what I shall do,” said George, as he stepped into the little room, and began examining pistols.

“Ay, ay,” said Phineas, nodding his head to Simeon; “thou seest, Simeon, how it will work.”

“I see,” said Simeon, sighing; “I pray it come not to that.”

“I don’t want to involve any one with or for me,” said George.  “If you will lend me your vehicle and direct me, I will drive alone to the next stand.  Jim is a giant in strength, and brave as death and despair, and so am I.”

“Ah, well, friend,” said Phineas, “but thee’ll need a driver, for all that.  Thee’s quite welcome to do all the fighting, thee knows; but I know a thing or two about the road, that thee doesn’t.”

“But I don’t want to involve you,” said George.

“Involve,” said Phineas, with a curious and keen expression of face, “When thee does involve me, please to let me know.”

“Phineas is a wise and skilful man,” said Simeon.  “Thee does well, George, to abide by his judgment; and,” he added, laying his hand kindly on George’s shoulder, and pointing to the pistols, “be not over hasty with these,—­young blood is hot.”

“I will attack no man,” said George.  “All I ask of this country is to be let alone, and I will go out peaceably; but,”—­he paused, and his brow darkened and his face worked,—­“I’ve had a sister sold in that New Orleans market.  I know what they are sold for; and am I going to stand by and see them take my wife and sell her, when God has given me a pair of strong arms to defend her?  No; God help me!  I’ll fight to the last breath, before they shall take my wife and son.  Can you blame me?”