The only answer to this pitiful appeal vouchsafed him by the captain of loyalists was a brutal oath, as he smote the document fiercely with his hand, and forbade all further inquiry. It may have been with some regard to the probability of his future marriage—in spite of all—with the old Dutchman’s daughter, that he permitted him, with his wife, to occupy an old log-house which stood upon the estate. He established himself within the dwelling-house, which he occupied as a garrisoned post with all his soldiers. Here he ruled as a sovereign. The proceeds of the farm were yielded to him, the miserable pittance excepted which he suffered to go to the support of the old couple. Sabb had a few slaves, who were now taught to recognise Dunbar as their master. They did not serve him long. Three of them escaped to the woods the night succeeding the tory’s usurpation, and but two remained in his keeping, rather, perhaps, through the vigilance of his sentinels, and their own fears, than because of any love which they entertained for their new custodian. Both of these were women, and one of them no less a person than the consort of Brough, the African. Mrs. Brough—or, as we had better call her, she will understand us better—_Mimy_, (the diminutive of Jemima,) was particularly watched, as through her it was hoped to get some clue to her husband, whose treachery it was the bitter resolution of our tory captain to punish, as soon as he had the power, with exemplary tortures. Brough had some suspicions of this design, which it was no part of his policy to assist; but this did not discourage him from an adventure which brought him again very nearly into contact with his enemy. He determined to visit his wife by stealth, relying upon his knowledge of the woods, his own caution, and the thousand little arts with which his race usually takes advantage of the carelessness, the indifference, or the ignorance of its superior. His wife, he well knew, conscious of his straits, would afford him assistance in various ways. He succeeded in seeing her just before the dawn of day one morning, and from her discovered the whole situation of affairs at the farmstead. This came to him with many exaggerations, particularly when Mimy described the treatment to which old Sabb and his wife had been subjected. It did not lose any of its facts or dimensions, when carried by Brough to the fugitives in the swamp forests of Edisto. The news was of a character to overwhelm the affectionate and dutiful heart of Frederica Sabb. She instantly felt the necessity before her, and prepared herself to encounter it. Nine days and nights had she spent in the forest retreats of her lover. Every tenderness and forbearance had been shown her. Nothing had taken place to outrage the delicacy of the female heart, and pure thoughts in her mind had kept her free from any annoying doubts about the propriety of her situation. A leafy screen from the sun, a