obtained from Pringle Blowers, in exchange for his valuable discovery, a promise of the original reward.  Shudder not, reader, while we tell it!  It was not many days ere the notorious Blowers set out for Memphis, recovered his lost property, who, like a lamb panting in the grasp of a pursuing wolf, was, with her young child, dragged back, a wretch, into the melancholy waste of slavery.  Long and loudly was the grand discovery resounded through the little world of Memphis; not in sympathy for the slave, for many hearts were made glad with joy over what the fashionable were pleased to term a fortunate disclosure and a happy removal.  Many very grave gentlemen said the miscreant who dared impose a slave on society, well merited punishment at the hands of the venerable Lynch,—­a judge of that city whose celebrity is almost world wide.

CHAPTER LIII.

A familiar scene, in which Pringle Blowers has business.

Of a bright morning, not many days after Pringle Blowers returned with his fair slave to Charleston (which said slave he would not sell for gold), there sat on a little bench at the entrance gate of the “upper workhouse,” the brusque figure of a man, whose coarse and firmly knit frame, to which were added hard and weather-stained features, indicated his having seen some fifty summers.  But, if he was brusque of figure and coarse of deportment, he had a good soft heart in the right place; nor did he fail to exercise its virtues while pursuing the duties of a repulsive profession; albeit, he was keeper of the establishment, and superintended all punishments.  Leisurely he smoked of a black pipe; and with shirt sleeves rolled up, a grey felt hat almost covering his dark, flashing eyes, and his arms easily folded, did he seem contemplating the calm loveliness of morning.  Now he exhaled the curling fume, then scanned away over the bright landscape to the east, and again cast curious glances up and down the broad road stretching in front of his prison to the north and south.  It was not long before a carriage and pair appeared on the hill to the south, advancing at a slow pace towards the city.  The keeper’s keen eye rested upon it intently, as it neared, bearing in a back seat what seemed to be a lady fine of figure and deportment; while on the front drove a figure of great rotundity, the broad, full face shining out like a ripe pumpkin in a sun shower.  “It’s Pringle Blowers, I do believe in my soul! but it’s seeming strange how he’s got a lady to ride with him,” mused the man, who, still watching the approach, had quite forgotten the escape of the fair slave.  The man was not mistaken, for as he touched his hat, on the carriage arriving opposite the gate, it halted, and there, sure enough, was our valiant democrat, who, placing his whip in the socket, crooked his finger and beckoned the keeper.  “Broadman!” said he, (for that was the man’s name) “I’ze