NEGRO LIFE IN AMERICA. 159

‘“ That I have,” said Phineas, “‘ and it shows the use of a man’s
always sleeping with one ear open, in certain places, as I’ve always
said. Last night I stopped ata little lone tavern, back on the
road. Thee remembers the place; Simeon, where we sold some
apples, last year, to that fat woman with the great ear-rings.
Well, I was tired with hard driving ; and after supper I stretched
myself down on a pile of bags in the corner, and pulled a buffalo
over me, to wait till my bed was ready; and what does I do, but
get fast asleep.”

‘With one ear open, Phineas?” said Simeon quietly.

“No! I slept, ears and all, for an hour or two, for I was
pretty well tired; but, when I came to myself a little, I found
that there were some men in the room, sitting round a table,
drinking and talking ; and I thought, before I made much mus-
ter, I’d just see what they were up to, especially as I heard them
say something about the Quakers. ‘So,’ says one, ‘ they are up
in the Quaker settlement, no doubt,’ says he. Then I listened
with both ears, and I found they were talking about this very party.
So I lay and heard them lay off all their plans. This young man,
they said, was to be sent back to Kentucky, to his master, who
was going to make an example of him, to keep all niggers from
running away; and his wife two of them were going to run down
to New Orleans to sell on their own account, and they calculated
to get sixteen or eighteen hundred dollars for her; and the child,
they said, was going to a trader who had bought him; and then
there was the boy Jim, and his mother, they were to go back to
their masters in Kentucky. They said there were two constables
in a town a little piece ahead, who would go in with ’em to get
‘em taken up, and the young woman was to be taken before a
judge: and one of the fellows, who is small and smooth-spoken,
was to swear to her for his property, and get her delivered over
to him to take south. They've got a right notion of the track we
are going to-night; and they'll be down after us, six or eight
strong. So, now, what's to be done?’

The group that stood in various attitudes, after this communi-
cation, were worthy of a painter. Rachel Halliday, who had
taken her hands out of a batch of biscuit, to hear the news,-.stood
with them upraised and floury, and with a face of the deepest con-
cern. Simeon looked profoundly thoughtful; Eliza had thrown
her arms around her husband, and was looking up to him. —
George stood with clenched hands and glowing eyes, and looking
as any other man might look whose wife was to be sold at auction
and son sent to a trader, all under the shelter of a Christian
nation’s laws.

‘‘ What shall we do, George ?” said Eliza faintly.

‘‘ I know what J shall do,” said George, as he stepped into the
fittle room, and began examining his pistols.

‘* Ay, ay,” said Phineas, nodding his head to Simeon ; “ thou
seest, Simeon, how it will work.”

_
se