In all this work Lily, late servant of Josephine St. Auban, assumed a certain prominence, this being given to her not wholly with wisdom.  Although but little negro blood remained in her veins, this former slave had not risen above the life that had surrounded her.  Ignorant, emotional, at times working herself into a frenzy of religious zeal, she was farthest of all from being a sober judge or a fair-minded agent for the views of others.  Yet in time her two guardians, Carlisle and Kammerer, unwisely allowed her more and more liberty.  She was even, in times of great hurry, furnished funds to go upon trips of investigation for herself, as one best fitted to judge of the conditions of her people.  As to these details, Josephine St. Auban knew little.  There was enough to occupy her mind at the center of these affairs, where labors grew rapidly and quite beyond her original plan.

As is always the case in such hopeless enterprises, the expenses multiplied beyond belief.  True, contributions came meagerly from the North, here and there some abolitionist appearing who would do something besides write and preach.  In all, more than a half million dollars was spent before the end of the year 1851.  Then, swiftly and without warning, there came the end.

One morning, almost a year after her return to Washington, Josephine St. Auban sat in her apartments, looking at a long document inscribed in a fine, foreign hand.  It was the report of the agent of her estates in Prance and Hungary.  As she read it the lines blurred before her eyes.  It demanded an effort even of her superb courage fairly to face and meet the meaning.  In fact, it was this:  The revolution of Louis Napoleon of 1851 had resulted in the confiscation of many estates in France, all her own included.  As though by concert among the monarchies of Europe, the heavy hand of confiscation fell, in this nation and in that.  The thrones of the Old World are not supported by revolutionists; nor are revolutionists supported by the occupants of thrones.  Her Hungarian lands had followed those which she had owned in France.  The rents of her estates no longer could be collected.  Her revenues were absolutely gone.  Moreover, she herself was an exile.

[Illustration:  She herself was an exile.]

Thus, then, had her high-blown hopes come to an end.  It was proof of the splendid courage of the woman that she shed not a tear.  Not a lash trembled as presently she turned to despatch a message for her lieutenant, Carlisle, to come to her.  The latter was absent at some western point, but within two days he appeared in Washington and presently made his call, as yet ignorant of what were his employer’s wishes.

He himself began eagerly, the fanatic fire still in his eye, on details of the work so near to his soul.  “My dear Countess,” he exclaimed, even as he grasped her hands, “we’re doing splendidly.  We’ll have the whole Mississippi Valley in an uproar before long.  All the lower Ohio is unsettled.  Missouri, Illinois, Indiana are muttering as loudly as New England.  I hear that Lily has led away a whole neighborhood over in Missouri.  A few months more like this, and we’ll have this whole country in a turmoil.  It’s bound to win—­the country’s bound to come to its senses—­if we keep on.”