abstract question
puzzled her a little, too. How came Mas'r Henry to be free? Because he
was white; that explained itself. But Miss Emma--she was white, too, and
yet somehow she seemed to belong to Mas'r Henry. She wondered if Mas'r
Henry could sell Miss Emma; and then the thought occurred, and with the
thought the fear, that, possibly, some day, he might sell her, Flor
herself, away from Miss Emma and all these pleasant scenes. After such a
thought had once come, it did not go readily. Flor let it
linger,--turned it over in her mind; gradually familiarized with its
hurt, it seemed as if she had half said farewell to the place. Better
far to be a runaway than to be sold. But if it came to that, whither
should she run? what was this world beyond? who was there in this sad
wide world to take care of a little black image? And if she waited for
it to come to that, could she get away at all? It was no wonder that in
the midst of such new and grave speculations the girl's dance grew
languid and her sharp tongue still. The earth was just as beautiful as
ever, the skies were as deep, the flowers as intense in tint, the
evening air laden with jasmine-scents as delicious as of old; but in
these few weeks Flor had reached another standpoint. It seemed as if a
film had fallen from her eyes, and she saw a blight on every blossom.

It was about this time, spring being at its flush, that some passing
guest mentioned the march of a regiment, the next day, from Cotesworth
Court-House to the first railroad-station, on its way to the seat of
war. The idea of the thing filled Miss Emma with enthusiasm. How they
would look, so many together, in the beautiful gray uniform too, to any
one standing on Longfer Hill! She longed to see the faces of men when
they took their lives in their hand for a principle. She had practised
the Bonny Blue Flag till there was nothing left of it; but if a band
played it in the open air, with the rising and falling of the wind, and
under waving banners and glittering guidons all the men with their pale
faces and shining eyes went marching by----

The end of it was, that, as her father would never have listened to
anything of the kind, Flor privately informed her of a short cut down
the river-bank and round the edge of the swamp to the foot of Longfer
Hill,--a walk they could easily take in a couple of hours. And as nobody
was in the habit of missing Flor much, and her young mistress would be
supposed, after her