Quick as thought, the first speaker turned, and confronting his companion, exclaimed in a voice trembling with passion,—“Ay, there _is_ a way to rouse the sleeping devil, even in my _coward_ frame; but your threats fall regardless on my ear, while I have this good blade to protect me,”—and a long glittering Bowie-knife flashed beneath the soft rays of the harvest moon. “By Heavens! I believe you both to be mad! Put up your knife, Bradley, and you, Layton, keep your infernal tongue within your teeth, unless you want to have this goodly town about our ears.” This soothing speech was spoken by the third, and hitherto silent companion; and while the altercation is progressing in lower tones, you, my gentle reader, shall have a Daguerreotype sketch of at least one of the party. Bradley Spencer was the son of one of the most wealthy and aristocratic planters in Louisiana, but maternal affection he never knew, at least was not conscious of it, his mother having been snatched away in his childhood, by one of the fearful epidemics peculiar to that portion of the South. His father, a high-principled, noble-minded man, richly endowed with the warm blood and chivalrous feelings of the Southerner, having thus lost that which he considered as the better part of life, gave his undivided heart to this “sole scion of his stock,” and for his boy’s sake, no second lady darkened his halls, or cast a shadow over the golden sunlight of the young heir’s youthful existence. Thus fondly nurtured and cherished, every wish indulged to the utmost, the young Bradley grew apace; but, with all his paternal prejudice, the elder Spencer could not but note the wavering acts and vacillating mind of his darling boy, betokening, even in youth, the indecision of the man. With prophetic sorrow, he saw the consequences entailed on one, who, ever willing to follow, had no projects to offer, or will of his own, to oppose those of others. To eradicate this “crying evil,” the boy was sent, at the age of fifteen, to college. There, at least, argued the parent, he will learn independence of thought and expression. But how widely was he mistaken! An universal favorite among his class-mates, winning “golden opinions” from all, by his pliant disposition, and suavity of manners, and being allowed an unlimited sum for his passing expenditures, he bore the palm, and reigned any thing but a despot, over his more firmly-minded companions. It is not our intention to follow him through the mazes of college life, and we pass in silence over the four succeeding years, when at the age of nineteen, he was re-called, to receive the last blessing and injunctions of a dying father. Still true to his erroneous system of indulgence, Mr. Spencer left his property to the undivided control of his son, fondly imagining, that unlimited sway would overcome the imbecile principles of youth, and teach him that firmness of mind, and stability of purpose, so essential to manhood.