I thought I missed somebody--where is
my boy?"

"We have put him out to live at Mrs. Thomas's," answered Mrs. Ellis,
hesitatingly, for she knew Mr. Walters' feelings respecting the common
practice of sending little coloured boys to service. "It is a very good
place for him," continued she--"a most excellent place."

"That is too bad," rejoined Mr. Walters--"too bad; it is a shame to make a
servant of a bright clever boy like that. Why, Ellis, man, how came you to
consent to his going? The boy should be at school. It really does seem to
me that you people who have good and smart boys take the very course to
ruin them. The worst thing you can do with a boy of his age is to put him
at service. Once get a boy into the habit of working for a stipend, and,
depend upon it, when he arrives at manhood, he will think that if he can
secure so much a month for the rest of his life he will be perfectly happy.
How would you like him to be a subservient old numskull, like that old
Robberts of theirs?"

Here Esther interrupted Mr. Walters by saying, "I am very glad to hear you
express yourself in that manner, Mr. Walters--very glad. Charlie is such a
bright, active little fellow; I hate to have him living there as a servant.
And he dislikes it, too, as much as any one can. I do wish mother would
take him away."

"Hush, Esther," said her mother, sharply; "your mother lived at service,
and no one ever thought the worse of her for it."

Esther looked abashed, and did not attempt to say anything farther.

"Now, look here, Ellen," said Mr. Walters. (He called her Ellen, for he had
been long intimate with the family.) "If you can't get on without the boy's
earning something, why don't you do as white women and men do? Do you ever
find them sending their boys out as servants? No; they rather give them a
stock of matches, blacking, newspapers, or apples, and start them out to
sell them. What is the result? The boy that learns to sell matches soon
learns to sell other things; he learns to make bargains; he becomes a small
trader, then a merchant, then a millionaire. Did you ever hear of any one
who had made a fortune at service? Where would I or Ellis have been had we
been hired out all our lives at so much a month? It begets a feeling of
dependence to place a boy in such a situation; and, rely upon it, if he
stays there long, it will spoil him for anything better all his days."

Mrs. Ellis was here compelled to add, by way of justifying