hen I peeped at you in your bridal
attire, I believed myself to be Mr. Fitzgerald's wife. Our marriage
had been kept strictly private, he always assuring me that it was only
for a time. But you need not look so alarmed. I was not his wife. I
learned the next morning that I had been deceived by a sham ceremony.
And even if it had been genuine, the marriage would not have been
valid by the laws of Louisiana, where it was performed; though I did
not know that fact at the time. No marriage with a slave is valid in
that State. My mother was a quadroon slave, and by the law that 'a
child follows the condition of the mother,' I also became a slave."

"_You_ a slave!" exclaimed Mrs. Fitzgerald, with unfeigned
astonishment. "That is incredible. That goes beyond any of the stories
Abolitionists make up to keep the country in agitation."

"Judging by my own experience," rejoined Mrs. King, "I should say that
the most fertile imagination could invent nothing more strange and
romantic than many of the incidents which grow out of slavery."

She then went on to repeat her story in detail; not accusing Mr.
Fitzgerald more than was absolutely necessary to explain the agonized
and frantic state of mind in which she had changed the children. Mrs.
Fitzgerald listened with increasing agitation as she went on; and when
it came to that avowal, she burst out with the passionate exclamation:
"Then Gerald is not my son! And I love him so!"

Mrs. King took her hand and pressed it gently as she said: "You can
love him still, dear lady, and he will love you. Doubtless you will
always seem to him like his own mother. If he takes an aversion to me,
it will give me acute pain; but I shall try to bear it meekly, as a
part of the punishment my fault deserves."

"If you don't intend to take him from me, what was the use of telling
me this dreadful story?" impatiently asked Mrs. Fitzgerald.

"I felt compelled to do it on Eulalia's account," responded Mrs. King.

"Ah, yes!" sighed the lady. "How disappointed he will be, poor
fellow!" After a brief pause, she added, vehemently: "But whatever you
may say, he is _my_ son. I never will give him up. He has slept in my
arms. I have sung him to sleep. I taught him all his little hymns and
songs. He loves me; and I will never consent to take a second place in
his affections."

"You shall not be asked to do so, dear lady," meekly replied Mrs.
King. "I will, as in duty bound, take any place you choose to ass