'Twas the crack of a rifle reverberating through the dewy, leafy stillness of the forest.

“Dat ar an't fur off,” said Tiff.

The children looked a little terrified.

"Don't you be 'fraid,” he said.

"I would n't wonder but

I knowed who dat ar was. Hark, now! 't is somebody coming dis yer way."

A clear, exultant voice sung, through the leafy distance,

"O, had I the wings of the morning,

I'd fly away to Canaan's shore."

"Yes," said Tiff, to himself, "dat ar 's his voice. Now, chil'en," he said, "dar's somebody coming; and you must n't be 'fraid on him, 'cause I spects he 'll get us to dat ar camp I's telling 'bout."

And Tiff, in a cracked and strained voice, which contrasted oddly enough with the bell-like tones of the distant singer, commenced singing a part of an old song, which might, perhaps, have been used as a signal:

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Hailing so stormily,

Cold, stormy weder;

I want my true love all de day.

Whar shall I find him? whar shall I find him?"

The distant singer stopped his song, apparently to listen, and, while Tiff kept on singing, they could hear the crackling of approaching footsteps. At last Dred emerged to view.

"So you 've fled to the wilderness?" he said.

Yes, yes," said Tiff, with a kind of giggle, we had to come to it, dat ar woman was so aggravating on de chil'en. Of all de pizin critturs dat I knows on, dese yer mean white women is de pizinest! Dey an't got no manners, and no bringing up. Dey does n't begin . know how tings ought fur to be done 'mong 'specable peop So we just tuck

to de bush."

"You might have taken to a worse place, said Dred. "The Lord God giveth grace and glory to the trees of the

wood. And the time will come when the Lord will make a covenant of peace, and cause the evil beast to cease out of the land; and they shall dwell safely in the wilderness, and shall sleep in the woods; and the tree of the field shall yield her fruit, and they shall be safe in the land, when the Lord hath broken the bands of their yoke, and delivered them out of the hands of those that serve themselves of them."

"And you tink dem good times coming, sure 'nough?" said Tiff.

"The Lord hath said it," said the other. "But first the day of vengeance must come."

"I don't want no sich," said Tiff. "I want to live peaceable."

Dred looked upon Tiff with an air of acquiescent pity, which had in it a slight shade of contempt, and said, as if in soliloquy,

"Issachar is a strong ass, couching down between two burdens; and he saw that rest was good, and the land that it was pleasant, and bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant unto tribute."

"As to rest," said Tiff, "de Lord knows I an't had much of dat ar, if I be an ass. If I had a good, strong packsaddle, I'd like to trot dese yer chil'en out in some good cleared place."

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Well," said Dred, "you have served him that was ready to perish, and not bewrayed him who wandered; therefore the Lord will open for you a fenced city in the wilderness."

"Jest so," said Tiff; "dat ar camp o' yourn is jest what I's arter. I's willin' to lend a hand to most anyting dat's good."

"Well," said ed, "the children are too tender to walk where we must go. We must bear them as an eagle beareth he young. Come, my little man!"

An, as Dred spoke, he stooped down and stretched out his hands to Teddy. His severe and gloomy counte

nance relaxed into a smile, and, to Tiff's surprise, the child went immediately to him, and allowed him to lift him in his

arms.

"Now, I'd tought he'd been skeered o' you!" said Tiff.

"Not he! I never saw child or dog that I could n't make come to me. Hold fast, now, my little man!" he said, seat

"Trees have long arms; Now, Tiff," he said, "you

ing the boy on his shoulder. don't let them rake you off. take the girl and come after, and when we come into the thick of the swamp, mind you step right in my tracks. Mind you don't set your foot on a tussock if I have n't set mine there before you; because the moccasons lie on the tussocks."

And thus saying, Dred and his companion began making their way towards the fugitive camp.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE CLERICAL CONFERENCE.

A FEW days found Clayton in the city of, guest of the Rev. Dr. Cushing. He was a man in middle life; of fine personal presence, urbane, courtly, gentlemanly. Dr. Cushing was a popular and much-admired clergyman, standing high among his brethren in the ministry, and almost the idol of a large and flourishing church. A man of warm feelings, humane impulses, and fine social qualities, his sermons, beautifully written, and delivered with great fervor, often drew tears from the eyes of the hearers. His pastoral ministrations, whether at wedding or funeral, had a peculiar tenderness and unction. None was more capable than he of celebrating the holy fervor and self-denying sufferings of apostles and martyrs; none more easily kindled by those devout hymns which describe the patience of the saints; but, with all this, for any practical emergency, Dr. Cushing was nothing of a soldier. There was a species of moral effeminacy about him, and the very luxuriant softness and richness of his nature unfitted him to endure hardness. He was known, in all his intercourse with his brethren, as a peace-maker, a modifier, and harmonizer. Nor did he scrupulously examine how much of the credit of this was due to a fastidious softness of nature, which made controversy disagreeable and wearisome. Nevertheless, Clayton was at first charmed with the sympathetic warmth with which he and his plans were received by his relative. He seemed perfectly to agree with Clayton in all his views of the terrible evils of the slave system, and was prompt with

anecdotes and instances to enforce everything that he said. "Clayton was just in time," he said; "a number of his ministerial brethren were coming to-morrow, some of them from the northern states. Clayton should present his views to them."

Dr. Cushing's establishment was conducted on the footing of the most liberal hospitality; and that very evening the domestic circle was made larger by the addition of four or five ministerial brethren. Among these Clayton was glad to meet, once more, father Dickson. The serene, good man, seemed to bring the blessing of the gospel of peace with him wherever he went.

Among others, was one whom we will more particularly introduce, as the Rev. Shubael Packthread. Dr. Shubael Packthread was a minister of a leading church, in one of the northern cities. Constitutionally, he was an amiable and kindly man, with very fair natural abilities, fairly improved by culture. Long habits, however, of theological and ecclesiastical controversy had cultivated a certain species of acuteness of mind into such disproportioned activity, that other parts of his intellectual and moral nature had been dwarfed and dwindled beside it. What might, under other circumstances, have been agreeable and useful tact, became in him a constant and life-long habit of stratagem. While other people look upon words as vehicles for conveying ideas, Dr. Packthread regarded them only as mediums for concealment. His constant study, on every controverted topic, was so to adjust language that; with the appearance of the utmost precision, it should always be capable of a double interpretation. He was a cunning master of all forms of indirection; of all phrases by which people appear to say what they do not say, and not to say what they do say.

He was an adept also in all the mechanism of ecclesiastical debate, of the intricate labyrinths of heresy-hunting, of every scheme by which more simple and less advised brethren, speaking with ignorant sincerity, could be entrapped