ridge, they beheld three men slowly approaching from the Virginia
side. They immediately called to them to arrest the fugitive,
proclaiming her a runaway slave. True to their Virginia instincts, as
she came near, they formed a line across the narrow bridge to intercept
her. Seeing that escape was impossible in that quarter, she stopped
suddenly, and turned upon her pursuers.

On came the profane and ribald crew faster than ever, already exulting
in her capture, and threatening punishment for her flight. For a moment
she looked wildly and anxiously around to see if there was no hope of
escape. On either hand, far down below, rolled the deep, foaming waters
of the Potomac, and before and behind were the rapidly approaching
steps and noisy voices of her pursuers. Seeing how vain would be any
further effort to escape, her resolution was instantly taken. She
clasped her hands convulsively together, raised her tearful and
imploring eyes toward heaven, and begged for the mercy and compassion
there which was unjustly denied her on earth; then, exclaiming, "Henry,
Clotelle, I die for thee!" with a single bound, vaulted over, the
railing of the bridge, and sank forever beneath the angry and foaming
waters of the river!

Such was the life, and such the death, of a woman whose virtues and
goodness of heart would have done honor to one in a higher station of
life, and who, had she been born in any other land but that of slavery,
would have been respected and beloved. What would have been her
feelings if she could have known that the child for whose rescue she
had sacrificed herself would one day be free, honored, and loved in
another land?

CHAPTER XVII

CLOTELLE.

The curtain rises seven years after the death of Isabella. During that
interval, Henry, finding that nothing could induce his mother-in-law to
relinquish her hold on poor little Clotelle, and not liking to contend
with one on whom a future fortune depended, gradually lost all interest
in the child, and left her to her fate.

Although Mrs. Miller treated Clotelle with a degree of harshness
scarcely equalled, when applied to one so tender in years, still the
child grew every day more beautiful, and her hair, though kept closely
cut, seemed to have improved in its soft, silk-like appearance. Now
twelve years of age, and more than usually well-developed, her harsh
old mistress began to view her with a jealous eye.

Henry and Gertrude had just returned from Washin