am determined to devote my life, if need be, to
this poor creature whom I have so wronged. I must get him out of this
filthy hole into some cheerful place. I will atone for the past if I
can! Atone! What a word that is! With what stunning force its meaning
dawns upon me! How many times I have heard and uttered it without
comprehension. But somehow I now see in it a revelation of the sweetest
possibility of life. Oh! I am a changed man; I will make atonement!
Come, let us go. I am anxious to begin. But no, I must proceed with
caution. How do I know that this is his permanent home? He may be only
lodging for the night, and when you come to-morrow, he may be gone! Go
in, Mantel, and make sure that we shall find him here to-morrow. Go, and
while you find out all you can about him, I will begin to search for
such a place as I want to put him in. We will part for the present; but
when we meet to-night we shall have much to talk about. I will tell you
the whole of this long and bitter story. I am so happy, Mantel. You
can't understand! I have something to live for now. I will work, oh, you
do not know how I will work to make this atonement. What a word it is!
It is music to my ears. Atonement!"

And so in the lexicon of human experience he had at last discovered the
meaning of one of the great words of our language. After all, experience
is the only exhaustive dictionary, and the definitions it contains are
the only ones which really burn themselves into the mind or fully
interpret the significances of life.

To every man language is a kind of fossil poetry, until experience makes
those dry bones live! Words are mere faded metaphors, pressed like
dried flowers in old and musty volumes, until a blow upon our heads, a
pang in our hearts, a strain on our nerves, the whisper of a maid, the
voice of a little child, turns them into living blossoms of odorous
beauty.

CHAPTER XXVII.

IF THINE ENEMY HUNGER

"Whatever the number of a man's friends, there will be times in his
life when he has one too few; but if he has only one enemy, he is
lucky indeed if he has not one too many."

--Bulwer-Lytton.

The blow struck by David had stunned the doctor, but had not killed him.
He lay in the road until a slave, passing that way, picked him up and
carried him to a neighboring plantation, where he fell into the hands of
people who in the truest sense of the word were good Samaritans. Their
hospitality was te