eggs dis mornin'?"

"Fust rate, fust rate," said Tom Anderson. "Bob's got it down fine."

"I thought so; mighty long faces at de pos'-office dis mornin'; but I'd
better move 'long," and with a bright smile lighting up his face he
passed on with a quickened tread.

There seemed to be an unusual interest manifested by these men in the
state of the produce market, and a unanimous report of its good
condition. Surely there was nothing in the primeness of the butter or
the freshness of the eggs to change careless looking faces into such
expressions of gratification, or to light dull eyes with such gladness.
What did it mean?

During the dark days of the Rebellion, when the bondman was turning his
eyes to the American flag, and learning to hail it as an ensign of
deliverance, some of the shrewder slaves, coming in contact with their
masters and overhearing their conversations, invented a phraseology to
convey in the most unsuspected manner news to each other from the
battle-field. Fragile women and helpless children were left on the
plantations while their natural protectors were at the front, and yet
these bondmen refrained from violence. Freedom was coming in the wake of
the Union army, and while numbers deserted to join their forces, others
remained at home, slept in their cabins by night and attended to their
work by day; but under this apparently careless exterior there was an
undercurrent of thought which escaped the cognizance of their masters.
In conveying tidings of the war, if they wished to announce a victory of
the Union army, they said the butter was fresh, or that the fish and
eggs were in good condition. If defeat befell them, then the butter and