reside delights, and attempt to wrest them
from us?

Suppose Providence had cast our lot under a despotic government, which
we will suppose to be for the most part kind and paternal, but having
this peculiarity,--every now and then, finding its finances embarrassed,
it should be in the habit of selling some of its subjects to a foreign
power to strengthen its exchequer, and should arbitrarily select its
victims from this family and that;--how should you feel were the doomed
family your own? What would have been your emotions this morning, had
some one come to your room and told you that that bright-eyed boy,
"Willie," who last night sat upon your knee and amused you with his
innocent prattle, showed you his toys, examined your pockets, played
with your hair and features, and finally clasped his little arms around
your neck and impressed the "good-night" kiss upon your lips, had been
seized by an officer, and sold from your sight forever to you know not
whom, and to be carried you know not whither? Nay, more;--suppose that
while he was yet speaking, there came also another with the tidings that
the same fate had befallen your first-born,--your daughter, just budding
into womanhood,--the affectionate, joyous, light-hearted "Kate," whose
voice to your ear is sweeter than the music of flowing waters, whose
feet are swifter than those of the light gazelle, as with open arms she
bounds to meet you on your return from a temporary absence, to welcome
you home with a tear of joy in her eye and a kiss upon her lips,--that
she too had been by the officials of the government clandestinely
abducted from your dwelling, and sold, literally sold, for a valuation
put upon her person in dollars and cents, to a hopeless captivity, to
spend her days in unrequited toil, or, not unlikely, in ministering to
the caprices and brutal passions of a stranger?

And while he was yet speaking, and as your _wife_, half frantic with
grief and terror, was entwining her arms around you, and you were
striving to ease your bursting heart, to crown the whole, suppose
another official and his posse had entered your apartment, and by force
of arms had torn her from your embrace, and with thongs upon her hands,
and a bandage over her mouth, hurried her away to greet your sight no
more? What a scene! There go in one direction the children of your body,
"bone of your bone, and flesh of your flesh," to an unknown but fearful
destiny! In another is ruthlessly bor