you call him, told me. You are to stay here and act as driver of the
field hands. That was the order. So you may as well submit to it
at once."

I stood silent and horror-struck. Could it be that the man whom I had
served faithfully from our mutual boyhood, whose slightest wish had been
my law, to serve whom I would have laid down my life, while I had
confidence in his integrity--could it be that he had so cruelly and
wickedly deceived me? I looked at the overseer. He stood laughing at me
in my agony.

"Master George gave you no such orders," I exclaimed, maddened by the
overseer's look and manner.

The overseer looked at me with a fiendish grin. "None of your
insolence," said he, with a dreadful oath. "I never saw a Virginia
nigger that I couldn't manage, proud as they are. Your master has left
you in my hands, and you must obey my orders. If you don't, why I shall
have to make you '_hug the widow there_,'" pointing to a tree, to which I
afterwards found the slaves were tied when they were whipped.

That night was one of sleepless agony. Virginia--the hills and the
streams of my birth-place; the kind and hospitable home; the
gentle-hearted sisters, sweetening with their sympathy the sorrows of
the slave--my wife--my children--all that had thus far made up my
happiness, rose in contrast with my present condition. Deeply as he has
wronged me, may my master himself never endure such a night of misery!

At daybreak, Huckstep told me to dress myself, and attend to his
directions. I rose, subdued and wretched, and at his orders handed the