This injunction was obeyed by Cato without
ceremony.

Here was a dilemma! I came with ten thousand pounds in my hands, to
bestow freely on these people, and such was the treatment I received. "I
must adopt," said I, "a new mode."

I lifted the latch, without a second warning, and, Cato having
disappeared, went into a room, the door of which chanced to be open, on
my right hand. I found within the two females whom I had accosted in the
portico. I now addressed myself to the younger:--"This intrusion, when I
have explained the reason of it, will, I hope, be forgiven. I come,
madam----"

"Yes," interrupted the other, with a countenance suffused by
indignation, "I know very well whom you come from, and what it is that
prompts this insolence; but your employer shall see that we have not
sunk so low as he imagines. Cato! Bob! I say."

"My employer, madam! I see you labour under some great mistake. I have
no employer. I come from a great distance. I come to bring intelligence
of the utmost importance to your family. I come to benefit and not to
injure you."

By this time, Bob and Cato, two sturdy blacks, entered the room. "Turn
this person," said the imperious lady, regardless of my explanations,
"out of the house. Don't you hear me?" she continued, observing that
they looked one upon the other and hesitated.

"Surely, madam," said I, "you are precipitate. You are treating like an
enemy one who will prove himself your mother's best friend."

"Will you leave the house?" she exclaimed, quite beside herself with
anger. "Villains! why don't you do as I bid you?"

The blacks looked upon each other, as if waiting for an example. Their
habitual deference for every thing _white_, no doubt, held their hands
from what they regarded as a profanation. At last Bob said, in a
whining, beseeching tone, "Why, missee, massa buckra wanna go for doo,
dan he winna go fo' wee."

The lady now burst into tears of rage. She held out her hand,
menacingly. "Will you leave the house?"

"Not willingly," said I, in a mild tone. "I came too far to return with
the business that brought me unperformed. I am persuaded, madam, you
mistake my character and my views. I have a message to deliver your
mother which deeply concerns her and your happiness, if you are her
daughter. I merely wished to see her, and leave with her a piece of
important news; news in which her fortune is deeply interested."

These words had a wonderful effect upon the young