ollected poems of his
brother, John Howard Bryant. It was probably copied from a
newspaper or magazine.

The longest way must have its close,--the gloomiest night will wear on
to a morning. An eternal, inexorable lapse of moments is ever hurrying
the day of the evil to an eternal night, and the night of the just to
an eternal day. We have walked with our humble friend thus far in the
valley of slavery; first through flowery fields of ease and indulgence,
then through heart-breaking separations from all that man holds dear.
Again, we have waited with him in a sunny island, where generous hands
concealed his chains with flowers; and, lastly, we have followed him
when the last ray of earthly hope went out in night, and seen how,
in the blackness of earthly darkness, the firmament of the unseen has
blazed with stars of new and significant lustre.

The morning-star now stands over the tops of the mountains, and gales
and breezes, not of earth, show that the gates of day are unclosing.

The escape of Cassy and Emmeline irritated the before surly temper of
Legree to the last degree; and his fury, as was to be expected, fell
upon the defenceless head of Tom. When he hurriedly announced the
tidings among his hands, there was a sudden light in Tom's eye, a sudden
upraising of his hands, that did not escape him. He saw that he did not
join the muster of the pursuers. He thought of forcing him to do it;
but, having had, of old, experience of his inflexibility when commanded
to take part in any deed of inhumanity, he would not, in his hurry, stop
to enter into any conflict with him.

Tom, therefore, remained behind, with a few who had learned of him to
pray, and offered up prayers for the escape of the fugitives.

When Legree returned, baffled and disappointed, all the long-working
hatred of his soul towards his slave began to gather in a deadly and
desperate form. Had not this man braved him,--steadily, powerfully,
resistlessly,--ever since he bought him? Was there not a spirit in him
which, silent as it was, burned on him like the fires of perdition?

"I _hate_ him!" said Legree, that night, as he sat up in his bed; "I
_hate_ him! And isn't he MINE? Can't I do what I like with him? Who's to
hinder, I wonder?" And Legree clenched his fist, and shook it, as if he
had something in his hands that he could rend in pieces.

But, then, Tom was a faithful, valuable servant; and, although Legree
hated him the more for tha