mers, and he always made out that he was
afraid of the abolitionists--bobolitionists he used to call them--and
Mr. Le Grange just believed that Peter was in earnest, and somehow he
got Mrs. Le Grange to bring his wife North to wait on her. And when they
both got here, they both left; and Mrs. Le Grange had to wait on
herself, until she got another servant. She told me she had got enough
of the North, and never wanted to see it again so long as she lived;
that she wouldn't have taken three thousand dollars for them."

"Well, darling, they would have never left, if these meddlesome
abolitionists hadn't put it in their heads; but, darling, don't bother
your brain about such matters. See what I have bought you this morning,"
said he, handing her a necklace of the purest pearls; "here, darling, is
a birth-day present for you." Camilla took the necklace, and gazing
absently upon it said, "I can't understand it."

"What is it, my little philosopher, that you can't understand?"

"Pa, I can't understand slavery; that man made me think it was something
very bad. Do you think it can be right?"

Le Croix's face flushed suddenly, and he bit his lip, but said nothing,
and commenced reading the paper.

"Why don't you answer me, Pa?" Le Croix's brow grew darker, but he tried
to conceal his vexation, and quietly said, "Darling, never mind. Don't
puzzle your little head about matters you cannot understand, and which
our wisest statesmen cannot solve."

Camilla said no more, but a new train of thought had been awakened. She
had lived so much among the slaves, and had heard so many tales of
sorrow breathed confidentially into her ears, that she had unconsciously
imbibed their view of the matter; and without comprehending the
injustice of the system, she had learned to view it from their
standpoint of observation.

What she had seen of slavery in the South had awakened her sympathy and
compassion. What she had heard of it in the North had aroused her sense
of justice. She had seen the old system under a new light. The good seed
was planted, which was yet to yield its harvest of blessed deeds.

Chapter III

"What is the matter?" said St. Pierre Le Grange, as he entered suddenly
the sitting-room of his wife, Georgietta Le Grange, and saw her cutting
off the curls from the head of little girl about five years old, the
child of a favorite slave.

"Matter enough!" said the angry wife, her cheeks red with excitement and
her ey