IT WAS LATE on a drizzly afternoon that a traveller came to the door of a small country hotel in a village in Kentucky. In the bar-room he found assembled quite a miscellaneous company, whom stress of weather had driven to harbor, and the place presented the usual scenery of such reunions. Great, tall, raw-boned Kentuckians, attired in hunting shirts, rifles stacked away in the corner, shot pouches, game bags, hunting dogs, and little negroes, all rolled together in the corners, were the characteristic features in the picture.

  Our traveller was an old gentleman, short, thick set, and carefully dressed, with a round, good-natured countenance, and something rather fussy and particular in his appearance.

  "What's that?" asked the old gentleman, observing that some of the company formed a group round a large handbill.

  "Nigger advertised!" said one of the company, briefly.

  Mr. Wilson, for that was the old gentleman's name, rose and read as follows:

Ran away from the subscriber, my mulatto boy, George. Said George is six feet in height, a very light mulatto, brown, curly hair; is very intelligent, speaks handsomely, can read and write; will probably try to pass for a white man; is deeply scarred on his back and shoulders, has been branded on his right hand with the letter H.

I will give four hundred dollars for him alive, and the same sum for satisfactory proof that he has been killed.

  The old gentleman read this advertisement from end to end, in a low voice, as if he were studying it.

  A long legged veteran walked up to the advertisement, and very deliberately spit a full discharge of tobacco juice on it.

  "There's my mind upon that!" said he, and sat down again.

  "Why, now, stranger, what's that for?" asked the hotel keeper.

  "I'd do it all the same to the writer of that ar paper, if he was here," said the long man. "Any man that owns a boy like that and can't find any better way o' treating on him, deserves to lose him. Such papers as these is a shame to Kentucky; that's my mind, if anybody wants to know it!"

  "I think you are altogether right, friend," said Mr. Wilson. "This boy described here is a fine fellow no mistake about that. He worked for me some half dozen years in my bagging factory, and he was my best hand. He is an ingenious fellow, too; he invented a machine for the cleaning of hemp*a really valuable affair; it's gone into use in several factories. His master holds the patent of it."

  "I'll warrant ye," said the tall man, "holds it and makes money out of it, and then turns round and brands the boy in his right hand. If I had a fair chance, I'd mark him, I reckon, so that he'd carry it one while."

  Here the conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a well dressed gentleman with a colored servant.

  He walked easily in among the company, and with a nod indicated to his waiter where to place his trunk, bowed to the company, and with his hat in his hand, walked up leisurely to the bar, and gave his name as Henry Butler, Oaklands, Shelby County. Turning with an indifferent air, he sauntered up to the advertisement and read it over.

  "Jim," said he to his man, "seems to me we met a man something like this up at Bernan's, didn't we?"

  "Yes, mas'r," said Jim, "only I ain't sure about the hand."

  "Well, I didn't look, of course," said the stranger, with a careless yawn. Then, walking up to the landlord, he desired him to furnish him with a private apartment, as he had some writing to do immediately.

  The manufacturer, Mr. Wilson, from the time of the entrance of the stranger, had regarded him with an air of uneasy curiosity. He stared at the stranger with such an air of blank amazement and alarm that he walked up to him, and extending his hand, said, in a tone of recognition, "Mr. Wilson, I think. I beg your pardon, I didn't recollect you before. I see you remember me—Mr. Butler, of Oaklands, Shelby County."

  "Ye—yes—yes, sir," replied Mr. Wilson.

  Just then a negro boy entered, and announced that mas'r's room was ready.

  "Jim, see to the trunks," said the gentleman, carelessly; then addressing himself to Mr. Wilson, he added: "I should like to have a few minutes' conversation with you in my room, if you please."

  Mr. Wilson followed him. When they reached the room, the young man faced about, and looked Mr. Wilson full in the face.

   "George!" said Mr Wilson.

  "Yes, George," said the young man.

  "O, George, but this is a dangerous game you are playing. I could not have advised you to do it."

  "I can do it on my own responsibility" said George, with a proud smile.

  Mr. Wilson, a good-natured, but extremely fidgety and cautious old gen-

  "I am going to Canada," George concluded, "where the laws will own me and protect me. That country shall be my country, and its laws will I obey. But if any man tries to stop me, let him take care; for I am desperate. I'll fight for my liberty to my last breath. You say your fathers did it; if it was right for them, it is right for me!"

  "Where is your wife, George?" asked Mr. Wilson.

  "Gone, sir, gone, with her child in her arms. The Lord only knows where or whether we shall ever meet again in this world."

  "Is it possible! Here, George," and taking out a roll of bills from his pocket-book, he offered them to George.

  "No, my kind, good sir!" said George. "I have money enough, I hope, to take me as far as I need it."

  "That's all right, but you must take this. Take it—do, my boy!"

  "On condition, sir, that I may repay it at some future time, I will," said George, taking the money. "Mr. Wilson, you have shown yourself a true Christian in your treatment of me—I want to ask one last deed of Christian kindness of you."

  "Well, George."

  "If you'd only contrive to send this little pin to my wife. She gave it to me for a Christmas present, poor child! Give it to her and tell her I loved her to the last. Will you?"

  "Yes, certainly, poor fellow," said the old gentlemen, taking the pin.

  Mr. Haley and Tom jogged onward in their wagon, each absorbed in his own reflections. The day wore on, and the evening saw them comfortably accommodated in a town called Washington—the one in a tavern, and the other in the jail.

  About eleven o'clock the next day, a mixed throng was gathered around the courthouse steps, waiting for a slave auction. At length a place was cleared, and the bidding began. The different men on the list were soon knocked off at prices which showed a pretty brisk demand in the market; two of them fell to Haley.

  "Come, now, young un," said the auctioneer, giving a boy a touch with his hammer, "be up and show your springs, now."

  "Put us two up togedder, togedder—do please, mas'r," said an old woman, holding fast to the boy.

  "Be off," said the man, gruffly, pushing the boy toward the block.

  His fine figure, alert limbs, and bright face, raised instant competition. Anxious, half-frightened, he looked from side to side as he heard the clatter

  "Buy me, too, mas'r, for de dear Lord's sake—buy me,—I shall die, if you don't!"

  "You'll die, if I do; that's the kink of it," said Haley-"no!" and he turned on his heel.

  "Now," said Haley, and pushing his three purchases together, he drove them before him to the jail.

  A few days later saw him with his possessions safely deposited on one of the Ohio boats. It was the commencement of his gang, to be augmented, as the boat moved on, by various other merchandise of the same sort, which he, or his agent, had stored for him at various points along the shore.

  The La Belle Riviere, as beautiful a boat as ever rode upon the waters of her namesake river, was floating gayly down the stream, under a brilliant sky, the stripes and stars of free America waving and fluttering overhead; the decks crowded with ladies and gentlemen, all enjoying the delightful day. All was full of life, buoyant and rejoicing—all but Haley's gang, who were stored with the freight on the lower deck.