ld
be the birthright of every child. Even the spectre of slavery, which had
shadowed his thoughts, as it had those of many a generous mind around him,
faded abruptly before the very majesty of the problem that faced him now.
In his sympathy for the slave, whose bondage he and his race had striven to
make easy, he had overlooked the white sharer of the negro's wrong. To men
like Pinetop, slavery, stern or mild, could be but an equal menace, and yet
these were the men who, when Virginia called, came from their little cabins
in the mountains, who tied the flint-locks upon their muskets and fought
uncomplainingly until the end. Not the need to protect a decaying
institution, but the instinct in every free man to defend the soil, had
brought Pinetop, as it had brought Dan, into the army of the South.

"Look here, old man, you haven't been quite fair to me," said Dan, after
the long silence. "Why didn't you ask me to help you with this stuff?"

"Wall, I thought you'd joke," replied Pinetop blushing, "and I knew yo'
nigger would."

"Joke? Good Lord!" exclaimed Dan. "Do you think I was born with so short a
memory, you scamp? Where are those nights on the way to Romney when you
covered me with your overcoat to keep me from freezing in the snow? Where,
for that matter, is that march in Maryland when Big Abel and you carried me
three miles in your arms after I had dropped delirious by the roadside? If
you thought I'd joke you about this, Pinetop, all I can say is that you've
turned into a confounded fool."

Pinetop came back to the fire and seated himself upon the flour barrel in
the corner. "'Twas this way, you see," he said, breaking, for the first
time, through his strong mountain reserve. "I al'ays thought I'd like to
read a bit, 'specially on winter evenings at home, when the nights are long
and you don't have to git up so powerful early in the mornings, but when I
was leetle thar warn't nobody to teach me how to begin; maw she didn't know
nothin' an' paw he was dead, though he never got beyond the first reader
when he was 'live."

He looked up and Dan nodded gravely over his pipe.

"Then when I got bigger I had to work mighty hard to keep things goin'--an'
it seemed to me every time I took out that thar leetle book at night I got
so dead sleepy I couldn't tell one letter from another; A looked jest like
Z."

"I see," said Dan quietly. "Well, there's time enough here anyhow. It will
be a good way to pass the evenings."