"He claims to be, or rather it is claimed for him," I answered. "His mother was a native African, a king's daughter, those who came with her said; and she bore, by all accounts, the stamp of primitive royalty as clearly impressed as her son does. Her title was never questioned either in the cabin or at the great house. She was a slave on the Westlake plantation,--but only for a few weeks, as I have heard." "Did you ever see her?" the Doctor asked. "No, she died long ago; but her story is still told on the plantation and in the neighborhood. Old Westlake bought her with four others, all native Africans, at Perara. The rest throve and made themselves at home. She, stately and still, endured until she had received her son into the world, and then, having consigned him to a foster-mother of her choice, passed tranquilly out of it. During her short abode on the plantation, she was an object of general homage, and when she died, the purple descended to her son." "And the son has his story?" said the Doctor. "A short one." The Doctor and Harry both turned to me with expectation. They knew the Westlake plantation and its master; but you do not. If Senator's story has not the interest for you that it had for them, that must be the reason. The prestige of rank was the only inheritance of the little foreign orphan. The very name his mother gave him, and which she impressed, by frequent, though faint repetition, upon those about her, was lost in the surprise of her sudden departure. The good souls to whom it had been committed strove faithfully to recover it. They were sure it was no proper Christian name, but a title of dignity; and, comparing their recollections of the sound, and their intuitions of the meaning, agreed among themselves that its nearest equivalent must be "Senator." Senator was born on Christmas day; and this was regarded as all the greater distinction that it had been enjoyed before him by the young master,--the then heir and now owner, our present Westlake. As he grew up, he took, as of course, and held, the place assigned to him in advance. At the age of sixteen he was already in authority over men, and exercised it with an ease and acceptance which proved that he was obeyed as instinctively as he commanded.