e!" The voice was now at the top of the stairs, for Mrs.
Anderson always carried the war into Africa if Cynthy did not wake
at once.

"Answer quick, Cynthy Ann, or she'll be in here!" said Julia, sliding
behind the bed.

"Ma'am!" said Cynthy Ann, starting toward the door, where she met Mrs.
Abigail. "I'm up," said Cynthy.

"Well, what makes you so long a-answerin' then? You make me climb the
steps, and you know I may drop down dead of heart-disease any day. I'll
go and wake Jule."

"Better let her lay awhile," said Cynthy, reproaching herself instantly
for the deception.

Mrs. Anderson hesitated at the top of the stairs.

"Jul-yee!" she called. Poor Jule shook from head to foot. "I guess I'll
let her lay awhile; but I'm afraid I've already spoiled the child by
indulgence," said the mother, descending the stairs. She relented only
because she believed Julia was conquered.

"I declare, child, it's a shame I should be helping you to disobey your
mother. I'm afeard the Lord'll bring some jedgment on us yet." For
Cynthy Ann had tied her conscience to her rather infirm logic. Better to
have married it to her generous heart. But before she had finished the
half-penitent lamentation, Jule was flying with swift and silent feet
down the hall. Arrived in her own room, she was so much relieved as to
be almost happy; and she was none too soon, for her industrious mother
had quickly repented her criminal leniency, and was again climbing the
stairs at the imminent risk of her precarious life, and calling
"Jul-yee!"

CHAPTER XVI.

JONAS EXPOUNDS THE SUBJECT.

"I 'lowed I'd ketch you here, my venerable and reliable feller-citizen!"
said Jonas as he entered the lower story of Andrew Anderson's castle and
greeted August, sitting by Andrew's loom. It was the next evening after
Julia's interview with Cynthy Ann. "When do you 'low to leave this
terry-firmy and climb a ash-saplin'? To-night, hey? Goin' to the Queen
City to take to steamboat life in hopes of havin' your sperrits raised
by bein' blowed up? Take my advice and don't make haste in the downward
road to destruction, nor the up-hill one nuther. A game a'n't never
through tell it's played out, an' the American eagle's a chicken with
steel spurs. That air sweet singer of Israel that is so hifalugeon he
has to anchor hisself to his boots, knows all the tricks, and is
intimately acquainted with the kyards, whether it's faro, poker, euchre,
or French monte. But blamed ef