--nothing but that which, being already granted, requires
only to be cherished, and may best be cherished in peace--the manhood of
my race. To this must I henceforth be loyal."

"How can men be less slaves than the negroes of Saint Domingo of late?
No real change has taken place; and yet you, who wept that freedom as
rebellion, are now proposing to add your force to it."

"And was it not rebellion? Some rose for the plunder of their masters--
some from ambition--some from revenge--many to escape from a condition
they had not patience to endure. All this was corrupt; and the
corruption, though bred out of slavery, as the fever from the marshes,
grieved my soul as if I had not known the cause. But now, knowing the
cause, and others (knowing it also) having decreed that slavery is at an
end, and given the sanction of law and national sympathy to our
freedom--is not the case changed? Is it now a folly or a sin to desire
to realise and purify and elevate this freedom, that those who were
first slaves and then savages may at length become men--not in decrees
and proclamations only, but in their own souls? You do not answer,
father. Is it not so?"

"Open yourself further, my son. Declare what you propose. I fear you
are perplexing yourself."

"If I am deceived, father, I look for light from heaven through you."

"I fear--I fear, my son! I do not find in you to-night the tone of
humility and reliance upon religion in which you found comfort the first
time you opened the conflicts of your heart to me. You remember that
night, my son?"

"The first night of my freedom? Never shall I forget its agonies."

"I rejoice to hear it. Those agonies were safer, more acceptable to
God, than the comforts of self-will."

"My father, if my will ensnares me, lay open the snare--I say not for
the sake of my soul only--but for far, far more--for the sake of my
children, for the sake of my race, for the sake of the glory of God in
His dealings with men, bring me back if I stray."

"Well. Explain--explain what you propose."

"I cannot remain in an army opposed to what are now the legal rights of
the blacks."

"You will give up your command?"

"I shall."

"And your boys--what will you do with them?"

"Send them whence they came for the present. I shall dismiss them by
one road, while the resignation of my rank goes by another."

"And you yourself by a third."

"When I have declared myself to General Hermona."

"H