s quiet; it seemed to her the night
got brighter and brighter, and the heavens more crowded with stars than she
had ever seen them. She looked at her children to see if they all were
well, and then gave a glance at old Bacchus, who was snoring loud enough to
wake the dead. She shook him heartily and told him to hush his clatter, but
she might as well have told a twenty-four pounder to go off without making
a noise. Then she sat down again and looked at Alice's window, and could
not avoid seeing Aunt Peggy's house when she turned in that direction; thus
she was reminded of her saying, "Death was about and arter somefin."
Wondering what had come over her, she shut the door and laid down without
undressing herself.

She slept heavily for several hours, and waked with the thought of Aunt
Peggy's strange talk pressing upon her. She determined not to go to bed
again, but opened the door and fixed the old rush-bottomed chair within it.
Bacchus, always a very early riser, except on Sunday, was still asleep;
having had some sharp twinges of the rheumatism the day before, Phillis
hoped he might sleep them off; her own mind was still burdened with an
unaccountable weight. She was glad to see the dawning of "another blue
day."

Before her towered, in their majestic glory, Miss Janet's favorite
mountains, yet were the peaks alone distinctly visible; the twilight only
strong enough to disclose the mass of heavy fog that enveloped them. The
stars had nearly all disappeared, those that lingered were sadly paling
away. How solemn was the stillness! She thought of the words of Jacob,
"Surely God is here!"--the clouds were flying swiftly beneath the arch of
Heaven, as if from God's presence. Many thoughts were suggested to her by
the grandeur of the scene, for my reader must remember, that an admiration
of the glories of nature is not unfrequently a characteristic of an
uneducated mind. Many verses of Scripture occurred to her, "From the rising
of the sun, unto the going down of the same, the Lord's name be praised.
The Lord is high above all nations, and his glory above the heavens. Who is
like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high? Who humbleth himself to
behold the things that are in Heaven, and in the earth." The soul of the
slave-woman rejoiced in the Lord, her Maker and her Redeemer.

Gradually a soft light arose above the mountains; the fog became
transparent through its influence. A red hue gilded the top of the mist,
and