you
couldn't have turned the poor wretch out to perish in that storm, no
matter what would have come of it after."

Phillis had gained confidence as she proceeded, and Mr. Weston heard her
without interruption.

"I can hardly blame you," he then said, "for what you have done; but,
Phillis, it must never be repeated. Jim is a great rascal, and if I were
his master I would be glad to be rid of him, but my plantation must not
shelter runaway slaves. I am responsible for what my servants do. I should
be inclined to hold other gentlemen responsible for the conduct of theirs.
The laws of Virginia require the rights of the master to be respected, and
though I shan't make a constable of myself, still I will not allow any such
thing to be repeated. Did Bacchus know it?"

"No, indeed, sir; he hates Jim, and no good, may be, would have come of his
knowing it; besides, he was asleep long after Jim went off, and there was
too much whiskey in him to depend on what he'd have to say."

"That will do, Phillis; and see that such a thing never happens again,"
said Mr. Weston.

Phillis went back to her ironing, assured her master was not angry with
her. Yet she sighed as she thought of his saying, "see that such a thing
never happens again." "If it had been a clear night," she thought within
herself, "he shouldn't have stayed there. But it was the Lord himself that
sent the storm, and I can't see that he never sends another. Anyway its
done, and can't be helped;" and Phillis busied herself with her work and
her children.

I have not given Phillis's cottage as a specimen of the cabins of the
negroes of the South. It is described from the house of a favorite servant.
Yet are their cabins generally, healthy and airy. Interest, as well as a
wish for the comfort and happiness of the slave, dictates an attention to
his wants and feelings. "Slavery," says Voltaire, "is as ancient as war;
war as human nature." It is to be wished that _truth_ had some such
intimate connection with human nature. Who, for instance, could read
without an indignant thought, the following description from the pen of
Mrs. Stowe: "They (their cabins) were rude shells, destitute of any pieces
of furniture, except a heap of straw, foul with dirt, spread confusedly
over the floor." "The small village was alive with no inviting sounds;
hoarse, guttural voices, contending at the handmills, where their morsel of
hard corn was yet to be ground into meal to fit it for the