afore, if she know anyting ’bout my young un, and she tells me dar hab been a sale ob a dozen young uns, on de plantation, and she sees massa, long afore day-broke, pack dem into a wagon, and dey carried off.  I knows den it no use to look for her any longer, and de more I grows to look down, ’pears like de more dey laughs at me, and dey calls me ‘dat moon-hit niggar.’  I gets so stupid after a while, dat massa threatens to sell me way down whar dey works de niggars up; and I gets so, I don’t care how much dey whips me, or anyting else, for I tinks I neber be mysef again, when one day massa takes me wid him down to de boats, to fotch de cotton, and I hears de captain ask, what ail dat fellow to look so blue, and massa tells him, I got a notion dat I hab a right to keep my wife and young uns, like I hab de feelin’s ob white folks.  Den de captain talk wid massa ‘bout buyin’ me, and I got to be such a torn-down critter, massa glad to let me go for most anyting, for de sake ob gettin’ rid ob me.  When de bargain struck, my new masa Grobener claps me on de shoulder, and says, ’now, my man, come wid me, and see if we can’t gib a better ‘plexion to matters.’  Dem was de first kind words I eber hears from de white man, and after dat I springs right up, like de wilted roses missy brought to life de oder day; and when de Sea-flower come to us, I tink she sent to smooth ober de rough places, dat hab been gathering trough de long years ob my life in slabery.”

“Yours is a sad history, Vingo, and I am happy if I have helped to make your pathway pleasanter; but do not look upon your life in slavery as having been unprofitably spent, for the very darkness through which you have come, serves to make brighter that glorious light which is now shed o’er your way.  Your sad tale has impressed me with renewed gratitude to our Father for his mercies towards me; and while I thank him for the many blessings which I have received from his hand, my heart shall also praise him that with these joys have been mingled,—­the purifying light of his chastening love.”

CHAPTER VII.

NATALIE.

  “If ever angels walked this weary earth
   In human likeness, thou wert one of them.”

        Anonymous.

  “’Mid pleasures and palaces, where’er we may roam,
   Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home;
   A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there
   Which, seek through the world, is ne’er met with elsewhere.”

        Moore.

“Sampson, Mr. Sampson! just step this way, and bring your eye to bear a little to the nothe-nothe-east, and tell me what you make.”

“Make, boy, make!” exclaimed Sampson, thrusting a huge piece of pigtail into his already overcharged, capacious mouth, “I suppose you would have me believe that you’d made the light of some sweet-heart’s eyes, outshining even old Sankoty itself.”