ith a drollery that at
times formed part of his manner, "till we get on the wool."

"He worse than ebber now," cried the discontented African. "A t'ink
colored man like a sheep! I nevver see sich a lip, Harvey; he most as
big as a sausage!"

"There is but one man in the American army who could detect you,
Captain Wharton," said the peddler.

"And who is he?"

"The man who made you prisoner. He would see your white skin through a
plank. But strip, both of you; your clothes must be exchanged from
head to foot."

Caesar, who had received minute instructions from the peddler in their
morning interview, immediately commenced throwing aside his coarse
garments, which the youth took up and prepared to invest himself with.

In the manner of the peddler there was an odd mixture of care and
humor. "Here, captain," he said, taking up some loose wool, and
beginning to stuff the stockings of Caesar, which were already on the
legs of the prisoner; "some judgment is necessary in shaping this
limb. You will display it on horseback; and the southern dragoons are
so used to the brittle-shins that, should they notice your well-turned
calf, they'd know at once it never belonged to a black."

"Golly!" said Caesar, with a chuckle that exhibited a mouth open from
ear to ear, "Massa Harry breeches fit."

"Anything but your leg," said the peddler, coolly pursuing the toilet
of Henry. "Slip on the coat, captain, over all. And here, Caesar, place
this powdered wig over your curls, and be careful and look out of the
window whenever the door is open, and on no account speak, or you will
betray all."

"I s'pose Harvey t'ink a colored man has no tongue like oder folk,"
grumbled the black, as he took the station assigned him.

Everything was now ready for action, and the peddler very deliberately
went over the whole of his injunctions to the two actors in the scene.
The captain he conjured to dispense with his erect military carriage,
and for a season to adopt the humble paces of his father's negro; and
Caesar he enjoined to silence and disguise, so long as he could
possibly maintain them. Thus prepared, he opened the door and called
aloud to the sentinel, who had retired to the farthest end of the
passage.

"Let the woman of the house be called," said Harvey, in the solemn key
of the assumed character; "and let her come alone. The prisoner is in
a happy train of meditation, and must not be led from his devotions."

Caesar sank his fac