"Who's her?" "whar she come from?" "when her gwyn away?" and such like expressions, escaped them, in stifled tones. "Come in, set down," said Aunt Polly to me, and, turning to the group of children, she levelled a poker at them. "Keep still dar, or I'll break your pates wid dis poker." Instantly they cowered down beside Amy, still peeping over her shoulder, to get a better view of me. With a very uneasy feeling I seated myself upon the broken stool, to which Aunt Polly pointed. One of the boldest of the children came up to me, and, slyly touching my dress, said, "tag," then darted off to her hiding-place, with quite the air of a victress. Amy made queer grimaces at me. Every now and then placing her thumb to her nose, and gyrating her finger towards me, she would drawl out, "you ka-n-t kum it." All this was perfect jargon to me; for at home, though we had been but imperfectly protected by clothing from the vicissitudes of seasons, and though our fare was simple, coarse, and frugal, had we been kindly treated, and our manners trained into something like the softness of humanity. There, as regularly as the Sunday dawned, were we summoned to the house to hear the Bible read, and join (though at a respectful distance) with the family in prayer. But this I subsequently learned was an unusual practice in the neighborhood, and was attributed to the fact, that my master's wife had been born in the State of Massachusetts, where the people were crazy and fanatical enough to believe that "niggers" had souls, and were by God held to be responsible beings. The loud blast of the horn was the signal for the "hands" to suspend their labor and come to breakfast. Two negro men and three women rushed in at the door, ravenous for their rations. I looked about for the table, but, seeing none, concluded it had yet to be arranged; for at home we always took our meals on a table. I was much surprised to see each one here take a slice of fat bacon and a pone of bread in his or her hand, and eat it standing. "Well," said one man, "I'd like to git a bit more bread." "You's had your sher," replied Aunt Polly. "Mister Jones ses one slice o' meat and a pone o' bread is to be the 'lowance." "I knows it, but if thar's any scraps left from the house table, you wimmin folks always gits it." "Who's got de bes' right? Sure, and arn't de one who cooks it got de bes' right to it?" asked Polly, with a triumphant voice. "Ha, ha!" cried Nace, "here comes de breakfust leavin's, now who's smartest shall have 'em;" whereupon Nace, his comrade, and the three women, seized a waiter of fragments of biscuit, broiled ham, coffee, &c., the remains of the breakfast prepared for the white family.