nse, child! You know what I mean. People will talk: such
unpleasant things will be said! I wouldn't have had it happen for
anything. And when you were under my charge too! Do hand me my salts."

"If people are going to say unpleasant things because I pass a night
alone with Mr. Lombard," remarked Jennie with a mischievous smile, "you
must prepare yourself to hear a good deal said, my dear, for I presume
this won't be the last time it will happen. We're engaged to be
married."

EDWARD BELLAMY.

RAMBLING TALK ABOUT THE NEGRO.

What guides the bee when, turning from the "suck," he wheels in air and
strikes his wonderful line for the "gum"? Heaven knows. And by what
process does the negro calculate the shortest distance between the point
he occupies and the place he would be? That also is a mystery, yet the
least observant person familiar with the negro cannot have failed to
note his wonderful--we had almost said his preternatural--power to
discover, without guide or compass, the shortest possible distance
between two given places--to make, as he calls it, a "near cut."

To the right of us lay a berry and wild-fruit tract, on our left was a
large village, and our farm was in a certain portion skirted by an old
field, through which the negroes had discovered the most direct path to
market. At dawn they could be seen winding around the brow of the hill,
men, women and children, with baskets on their heads and buckets on
their arms, singly and in couples, sometimes three, four or a half dozen
together. And how they stole from us! It seemed impossible to prevent,
or even limit, their depredations.

One evening Mr. Smith said to me, "The man Tony is sentenced to be
hung."

Tony was a village negro accused of murder, and as he had been confined
in the village jail and tried at the village court-house, the case
naturally created some excitement in our quiet neighborhood.

"Oh, I am so sorry!" I exclaimed.

"Yes, poor devil!" said Mr. Smith. "But it was a clear case. He belonged
to Mr. Lamkin before the surrender, and the old man made every effort to
get him off--employed the very best counsel. I am sorry for him, but the
wind which is so ill for him will blow us good. He is to be hung in the
old field that edges our farm, and after the execution takes place we
shall have no more negro trespassers in that quarter. I very much doubt
whether I shall be able to obtain hands to work that portion of the
land."

It