thereafter the mothers of the so-called bride and groom, widowed
by the inexorable demands of the master's interests, left husband
and children, and those fair fields which represented all that they
knew of the paradise which we call home, and with tears and groans
started for that living tomb, the ever-devouring and insatiable
"far South."



CHAPTER IV.

MARS MEDDLES.


LOUISBURG, January 10, 1864.

MR. SILAS WARE:

DEAR SIR: In ten days I have to furnish twenty hands to work on
fortifications for the Confederate Government. I have tried every
plan I could devise to avoid doing so, but can put it off no longer.
I anticipated this long ago, and exchanged all the men I could
possibly spare for women, thinking that would relieve me, but it
makes no difference. They apportion the levy upon the number of
slaves. I shall have to furnish more pretty soon. The trouble is
to know who to send. I am afraid every devil of them will run away,
but have concluded that if I send Nimbus as a sort of headman of the
gang, he may be able to bring them through. He is a very faithful
fellow, with none of the fool-notions niggers sometimes get, I
think. In fact, he is too dull to have such notions. At the same