whipped.

With hope, and yet with some fearful misgivings, he went to the "dead oak," where the group who had been summoned to witness the punishment were already assembled. By the side of them stood Long Tom, with the whip in his hand. The strap by which he was to be fastened to the trunk was adjusted.

Dandy felt a cold chill creep through his frame, attended by a convulsive shudder, as he beheld these terrible preparations. The hope which had thus far animated him received a heavy shock, and he regretted that he had not improved the opportunity to run away before it was too late.

"Take off your coat!" said Colonel Raybone, sternly.

Dandy obeyed. His cheeks were white, and the color had deserted his lips. He was then directed, in the same cold and determined tones, to remove his shirt. His teeth chattered, and his knees smote each other; and he did not at once obey the order.

"If you please, master, what am I to be whipped for?" said Dandy, in trembling tones.

"What for, you young villain? How dare you ask such a question?" replied Colonel Raybone, angrily. "You know what you are to be whipped for. Look in Archy's face!"

He did look; it was, undoubtedly, a black eye which he had inflicted upon his young master.

"If you please, sir, Master Archy will explain how it happened," added Dandy, in soft and subdued tones, which contained a powerful appeal to the magnanimity of the young lord of the manor.

"Archy has explained how it happened. Do you think I will let one of my niggers strike my son such a blow as that? Off with your shirt!"

"I didn't want to strike him at all. I didn't want to take off the gloves, sir. He made me do it."

"Did he make you give him a black eye?" roared the planter. "Do you expect me to believe such a story as this?"

"Didn't you make me strike?" continued Dandy, turning to his young master.

"I didn't ask you to get mad, and fly at me like a madman," replied Archy, coldly, as he placed his handkerchief upon the injured eye.

"I didn't mean to strike him so hard, master. Forgive me this time, and I never will strike him again."

"I wanted you to strike, but not to get mad," added Archy.

"Forgive me this time, master," pleaded Dandy.

"Forgive you, you villain! I'll forgive you. I'll teach you to strike my son! Tear off his shirt, Tom!"

Long Tom was a slave. He had groaned and bled beneath the lash himself; but the trifling favors he had received had debauched his soul, and he was a willing servant, ready, for a smile from his master, to perform with barbarous fidelity the diabolical duties of his office. Seizing Dandy by the arm, he pulled off his shirt, and led him to the tree.

The last ray of hope had expired in the soul of Dandy. His blood rebelled at the thought of being whipped. He was not stirred by the emotions which disturb a free child with a whipping in prospect. He cringed not at the pain, he rebelled not at proper and wholesome punishment. This whipping was the scourging of the slave; it was the emblem of his servitude. The blows were the stripes which the master inflicts upon his bondman. His soul was free, while his body was in chains; and it was his soul rather than his body that was to be scourged.

The thought was madness. His blood boiled with indignation, with horror, and with loathing. The tide of despair surged in upon his spirit, and overwhelmed him. He resolved not to be whipped, and, when Long Tom turned away to adjust the strap, he sprang like an antelope through the group of spectators, and ran with all the speed he could command towards the river.

Perhaps it was a mistake on the part of Dandy, but it was the noblest impulse of his nature which prompted him to resist the unjust sentence that had been passed upon him. He ran, and desperation gave him the wings of the wind; but he had miscalculated his chances, if he had considered them at all, for the swift horse of the planter was tied to a stake near the dead oak. He had been riding over the estate when Archy returned from Green Point with the story of the blows which had been inflicted upon him.

Colonel Raybone leaped upon his horse the instant he realized the purpose of the culprit, and, before Dandy had accomplished half the distance to the river, the planter overtook him. He rode the horse directly upon him, and if the intelligent beast had not been kinder than his rider, the story of poor Dandy might have ended here. As it was, he was simply thrown down, and before he could rise and recover himself the planter had dismounted and seized him by the arm.

So deeply had the prejudices of his condition been implanted in his mind, that the thought of bestowing blows upon the sacred person of his master did not occur to him. If he had dared to fight, as he had the strength and the energy to fight, he might still have escaped. Colonel Raybone was an awful presence to him, and he yielded up his purpose without a struggle to carry it out.

The planter swore at him with a fury which chilled his blood, and struck him several smart blows with his riding-whip as the foretaste of what he was still to undergo.

"Now, back to the tree," said Colonel Raybone, as he mounted his horse again.

Dandy had given up all hope now, and he marched to the whipping-post, as the condemned criminal walks to the scaffold. He had advanced but a short distance before he met the other spectators to his doom, and Long Tom seized him by the wrist, and held him with an iron gripe till they reached the dead oak.

"Tie him up quick, Tom," said Colonel Raybone. "It has been more work to flog this young cub than a dozen full-grown niggers."

Long Tom fastened the straps around Dandy's wrists, and passed them through a band around the tree, about ten feet from the ground. He then pulled the victim up till his toes scarcely touched the earth.

"Now, lay them on well," said the planter, vindictively.

"How many, Massa Raybone?" asked Tom, as he unrolled the long lash of his whip.