UNCLE TOM'S CABIN

"
Legree
"
you'd
then
couldn't
" Lord
going
thingsthat
and
no
140 UNCLE TOM S CABIN I OR
for thee,and was used by a mightierpower to said Cassy. " He 's learned his trade well,
bind thy cruel hands from inflicting uttermost among the piratesin the West Indies. You
evil on the helpless !
would n't sleepmuch, if I should tell you things
"
I say,"said Legree ștamping and whistling I've seen,
"
he tells of,sometimes,
to the dogs, " wake up, some of you, and keep me for good jokes. I 've heard screams here that I
company !" but the dogsonlyopenedone eye at haven't been able to get out of my head for
him, sleepily, and closed it again.
weeks and weeks. There 's a placeAvay out
"
I '11have Sambo and Quimbo up here,to singdown
by the quarters, where you can see a black,
and dance on" of their hell dances,and keep off blasted tree,and the groundall covered with
these horrid notions,"said Legree; and,puttingblack ashes. Ask any one what was done there,
on his hat,he went on to the veranda,and blew and see if they will dare to tell you."
"
a horn,with which he commonly summoned his 0 ! what do you mean?"
two
sable drivers.
was often wont, when in a graciousI tell you, the Lord only knowTs what we may see
humor, to get these two worthies into his sittingroom,
and, after warming them up with whiskey, begun."
to-morrow, if that poor fellow holds out as he 's
amuse himself by setting them to singing, danc-
"
Horrid !" said Emmeline, every dropof blood
or fighting, as the humor took him.
receding from her cheeks. "
0, Cassy,do tell
It was between one and two o'clock at night, me what I shall do ! "
as Cassy was returningfrom her ministrations to
she said to herself.
She turned hurriedly away,
and,passing round
to a back door,glidedup stairs, and tapped at
Emmeline's
door.
CHAPTER
XXXVI.
i:\lMM.I\E AND CASSY.
Cassy entered the room, and found Emmeline
pale with fear,in the furthest corner of
"
I wish I 'd never been born !" said Emmeline,
sitting,
wringingher hands.
it. As she came in,the girl started up nervously ;
"
That 's an old wish with said me," Cassy.
but,on seeingwho it was, rushed forward,and "I've got used to wishing that. I'd die,if I
catchingher arm, said,"0, Cassy,is it you? dared to," she said,lookingout into the darkness,
I 'm so gladyou 've 3ome ! I was afraid itwas .
with that still, fixed despairwhich was the
O, you don't know what a horrid noise there has habitual expression of her face when at rest.
been, down stairs,all this evening !"
"
It would be wicked to kill one's self,"said
"
I ought to know," said Cassy,dryly. " I 've
heard
it often enough."
"0 Cassy! do tell me,
"
we get
away from this place? I don't care where,"
into the swamp among the snakes," anywhere !
Couldn't we getsomewhere away from here ?"
"
Nowhere, but into our graves,"said Cassy.
"
Did you
nver try?"
"
I 've seet enough of trying, and what comes
of it,"said Ca*sy
"
I 'd be Milling to live in the swamps, and
" What would he do?" said the girl,looking,
with breathless ii."rest,into her face.
"What would ri: he dc, you'd bet.^r ask,"
"
I won't tell you. I hate to think of it. And
"
What I 've done. Do the best you
"
can, do
poor Tom, that she heard the sound of wild what "
you must, make it up in hating and
shrieking,whooping,hallooing,and singing, cursing."
from the sitting-room, mingledwith the "
barking He wanted to make me drink some of his hateful
of dogs,and other symptoms of generaluproar. brandy," said Emmeline ; " "
and I hate it so "
She came up
on the veranda steps, and looked
"
You 'dbetter drink," said Cassy. " I hated
in. Legree and both the drivers, in a state of it,too ; and now I can't live without it. One
furious
"
intoxication, were singing,whooping, must have something ; thingsdon't look so
upsettingchairs,and making all manner of dreadful,when you take that."
ludicrous and horrid
' '
grimaces at each other.
Mother used to tell me never to touch any
She rested her small,slender hand on the window-blind,
such thing," said Emmeline.
and looked "
fixedly at them; there '"'"Mother told you!" said Cassy,with a thrilling
was a world of anguish,scorn, and fierce bitterness,
and bitter emphasis on the word mother.
in
"
her black eyes,
as she did so. Would "What use is it for mothers to say anything?
it be a sin to rid the world of such a wretch?" You are all to be bought and paidfor,and your
souls belongto whoever getsyou. That's the
"
way it goes. I say, drink brandy; drink all ycu
can, and it '11make thingscome easier."
"
0, Cassy ! do pityme !"
"
Pityyou ! don't I ? Have n't I a daughter,
knows where she is,and whose she is
"
now% the way her mother wTent,before*
her,I suppose, and that her children must go,
after her ! There 's no end to "
the curse forever
!"
Emmeline.
"
I don't know why,
"
wickeder than things
we live and do, day after day. Eut the sisters
told me things, when I was in the convent, that
make me afraidto die. If it would onlybe the
"
end of us, why, then
"
Emmeline turned away, and hid her face m
her hands.
While this conversation was passingin the
chamber,Legree,overcome with his carouse, had
sunk to sleep in the
gnaw
the bark from room below. Legreewas
trees. I an't afraid of not an habitual drunkard. His coarse, strong
snakes ! I 'd rather have one near me than nature craved, and could endure, a continual
him," said Emmeline,eagerly .
stimulationțhat would have utterlywrecked
"
There have been a good many here of your and crazed a finer one. But a deep,underlying
opinion," said Cassy; " but you could n't stay in spirit of cautiousness preventedhis often
yielding
the swamps,
be tracked by the dogs, to appetite in such measure as to lose control of
"
"
and broughtback,and then "
himself.
This night,however,in his feverish effortsto
banish from his mind those fearful elements of
woe and remorse which woke within him, he had