And the whole assembly, with great animation, poured out on the chorus:

"O, de North Carolina rose !
O, de North Carolina rose !

We wish good luck to mas'r,
With de North Carolina rose!"

This chorus was repeated with enthusiasm, clapping of hands, and laughing.

"I think the North Carolina rose ought to rise!" said Russel.

"O, hush!" said Anne;

"Dulcimer has n't done yet." Assuming an attitude, Dulcimer turned and sang to one of his associates in the quartet,

"O, I see two stars a rising,

Up in de shady skies!"

To which the other responded, with animation :

"No, boy, you are mistaken;

"T is de light of her fair eyes!"

"That's thorough, at any rate!" said Russel. While Dulcimer went on :

"And they are

'No, boy, you are mistaken;
Dem are her cheeks so red!"

getting redder!" said Anne, tapping "Dulcimer is evidently laying out his

Nina with her fan.
strength upon you, Nina!"
Dulcimer went on singing:

"O, I see a grape-vine running,
With its curly rings, up dere 1"

And the response,

"No, boy, you are mistaken;

'Tis her rings of curly hair!"

And the quartet here struck up:

"O, she walks on de veranda,

And she laughs out of de door,

And she dances like de sunshine
Across de parlor floor.

Her little feet, dey patter,

Like de rain upon de flowers;

And her laugh is like sweet waters,

Through all de summer hours!"

"Dulcimer has had help from some of the muses along there!" said Clayton, looking at Anne. "Hush!" said Anne; "hear the chorus."

"O, de North Carolina rose !

O, de North Carolina rose !
O, plant by our veranda

De North Carolina rose !"

This chorus was repeated with three times three, and the whole assembly broke into a general laugh, when the performers bowed and retired, and the white sheet, which was fastened by a pulley to the limb of a tree, was let down again.

'Come, now, Anne, confess that was n't all Dulcimer's work!" said Clayton.

"Well, to tell the truth," said Anne, "'t was got up between him and Lettice, who has a natural turn for versifying, quite extraordinary. If I chose to encourage and push her on, she might turn out a second Phillis Wheatly."

Dulcimer and his coadjutors now came round, bearing trays with lemonade, cake, sliced pine-apples, and some other fruits.

"Well, on my word," said Russel, "this is quite prettily got up!"

"O, I think," said Clayton, "the African race evidently

are made to excel in that department which lies between the sensuous and the intellectual - what we call the elegant arts. These require rich and abundant animal nature, such as they possess; and, if ever they become highly civilized, they will excel in music, dancing, and elocution."

I have often noticed," said Anne, "in my scholars, how readily they seize upon anything which pertains to the department of music and language. The negroes are sometimes laughed at for mispronouncing words, which they will do in a very droll manner; but it's only because they are so taken with the sounds of words that they will try to pronounce beyond the sphere of their understanding, like bright children."

"Some of these voices here are perfectly splendid,” said Russel.

"Yes," said Anne, we have one or two girls on the place who have that rich contralto voice which, I think, is oftener to be found among them than among whites."

"The Ethiopian race is a slow-growing plant, like the aloe," said Clayton; "but I hope, some of these days, they'll come into flower; and I think, if they ever do, the blossoming will be gorgeous."

"That will do for a poet's expectation," said Russel.

The performance now gave place to a regular dancingparty, which went on with great animation, yet decorum.

"Religious people," said Clayton, "who have instructed the negroes, I think have wasted a great deal of their energy in persuading them to give up dancing and singing songs. I try to regulate the propensity. There is no use in trying to make the negroes into Anglo-Saxons, any more than making a grape-vine into a pear-tree. I train the grape-vine."

"Behold," said Russel, "the successful champion of negro rights!"

"Not so very successful," said Clayton. "I suppose you've heard my case has been appealed; so that my victory is n't so certain, after all."

"O," said Nina, "yes, it must be! I'm sure no person of common sense would decide any other way; and your own father is one of the judges, too."

"That will only make him the more careful not to be influenced in my favor," said Clayton.

The dancing now broke up, and the servants dispersed in an orderly manner, and the company returned to the veranda, which lay pleasantly checkered with the light of the moon falling through trailing vines. The air was full of those occasional pulsations of fragrance which rise in the evening from flowers.

"O, how delightful," said Nina, "this fragrance of the honeysuckles! I have a perfect passion for perfumes! They seem to me like spirits in the air."

Yes," said Clayton, "Lord Bacon says, 'that the breath of flowers comes and goes in the air, like the warbling of music.'"

"Did Lord Bacon say that?" said Nina, in a tone of surprise.

"Yes; why not?" said Clayton.

"O, I thought he was one of those musty old philosophers, who never thought of anything pretty!"

66

Well," said Clayton, " then to-morrow let me read you his essay on gardens, and you'll find musty old philosophers often do think of pretty things.”

"It was Lord Bacon," said Anne, "who always wanted musicians playing in the next room while he was composing."

"He did?" said Nina. 'Why, how delightful of him! I think I should like to hear some of his essays."

"There are some minds," said Clayton, "large enough to take in everything. Such men can talk as prettily of a ring on a lady's finger, as they can wisely on the courses of the planets. Nothing escapes them."

"That's the kind of man you ought to have for a lover, Anne," said Nina, laughing; "you have weight enough to risk it. I'm such a little whisk of thistle-down that it

would annihilate me. Such a ponderous weight of wisdom attached to me would drag me under water, and drown me. I should let go my line, I think, if I felt such a fish bite."

"You are tolerably safe in our times," said Clayton. "Nature only sends such men once in a century or two. They are the road-makers for the rest of the world. They are quarry-masters, that quarry out marble enough for a generation to work up."

Well," said Nina, "I should n't want to be a quarrymaster's wife. I should be afraid that some of his blocks would fall on me."

66

Why, would n't you like it, if he were wholly your slave?" said Frank Russel. "It would be like having the

genius of the lamp at your feet."

"Ah," said Nina, "if I could keep him my slave; but I'm afraid he 'd outwit me at last. Such a man would soon put me up on a shelf for a book read through. I've seen some great men, I mean great for our times, and they did n't seem to care half as much for their wives as they did for a newspaper."

"O," said Anne, "that's past praying for, with any husband. The newspaper is the standing rival of the American lady. It must be a warm lover that can be attracted from that, even before he is secure of his prize." "You are severe, Miss Anne," said Russel.

"She only speaks the truth. You men are a bad set," said Nina. "You are a kind of necessary evil, half civilized at best. But if ever I set up an establishment, I shall insist upon taking precedence of the newspaper."