In this solitary place, on a quiet Sabbath evening of October, 1839, there was heard just as the last faint twilight trembled on the western horizon a low, distinct whistle. Immediately there arose from among the growth of bushes and from behind already reclining headstones five dusky forms, actuated evidently by the same impulse. The whistle was repeated, and the forms cautiously approached the point whence it proceeded, and there gathered in presence of a stranger to them all, but with no previous knowledge of each other’s intent, though all of them were the property of the same man, Colonel Hardy, a tobacco planter of the District of Columbia, as previously stated in the “Introduction” to these “Romances and Realities.” The first exclamations of surprise over, their unknown companion proceeded to give them the instructions for the night, after allaying their superstitious fears, that they were to sink into the earth for a time, and be under the conduct of invisible personages. Indeed, so far from that being the case they soon found very much depended upon their own physical exertion. No sinking down into the ground among the dead, no sojourn among spooks and ghosts, impressions that had almost gotten the better of their thirst for freedom, was to be theirs. On the contrary they were to take at once to the pike and follow it until they came to the said road, which was then to be their pathway, only turning out to pass around villages and stations until they came to a man standing in the track who should signal them by the simple name “Ben.” To him they were to yield themselves implicitly. Seeing the little company once fairly started, the stranger returned to the city, and as he passed the post-office deposited therein a letter addressed, “_JOHN JONES, Esq._, _Albany_, _N. Y._” Leaving this missive and the fugitives to pursue their respective journeys, we pause to inquire into the personalities of the latter. They were named, respectively, Nancy, Kate, Robert, Harry and Jo, or more complete, Jo Norton. As has been said, they were the property of one man, and when not needed on the plantation, were hired out in the city. Harry was recognized among his fellows as a man of spirit and ability; but the latter quality never saved him from the frequent “buckings” engendered by the too free play of the former. Nancy, an octaroon, was well formed, about twenty years of age, and according to Kate, who had a spontaneous gift of gossip, a special favorite of the “Kunnel.”