"

"Are we to lose Dessalines?" asked Monsieur Pascal.

"I believe not. He is severely wounded, and, at this moment,
exasperated. He vows the death of Monsieur Papalier; and I vow his
safety while he is my guest."

"Papalier and Madame Dessalines cannot exist in one house."

"And therefore must this deputation be dismissed early in the morning,
if there were no other reasons. Notice must be carried to them with
their coffee, that I am awaiting them with my replies. Those delivered,
negotiation is at an end, and we must act. My foes have struck the blow
which unties my hands."

"What has Monsieur Papalier to do with the deputation?"

"Nothing, but that he uses its protection to attempt to resume his
estates. They are in commission; and he may have them; though not, as
he thinks, with men and women as part of his chattels. No more of him."

"Of whom next, then? Except Christophe, who is there worthy to be named
by you?" asked Monsieur Pascal, with emotion.

"Every one who has deserted us, except, perhaps, La Plume. He is
sordid; and I dismiss him. As for Clerveaux and his thousands, they
have been weak, but not, perhaps, wicked. They may be recovered. I
take the blame of their weakness upon myself. Would that I alone could
bear the consequences!"

"You take the blame of their weakness? Is not their former slavery the
cause of it? Is there anything in their act but the servility in which
they were reared?"

"There is much of that. But I have deepened the taint, in striving to
avoid the opposite corruption of revenge. I have the taint myself. The
stain of slavery exists in the First of the Blacks himself. Let all
others, then, be forgiven. They may thus be recovered. I gave them the
lesson of loving and trusting the whites. They have done so, to the
point of being treacherous to me. I must now give them another lesson,
and time to learn it; and they may possibly be redeemed."

"You will hold out in the mornes--conduct your resistance on a pinnacle,
where the eyes of the blacks may be raised to you--fixed upon you."

"Just so;--and where they may flock to me, when time shall have taught
them my principle and my policy, and revealed the temper and purpose of
our invaders. Now, then, to prepare!"

Before dawn, the despatches for the French, on the coast and at home,
were prepared; and messengers were dismissed, in every direction, with
orders by which the troops which remained faithful wo