TORWOOD LAFITTE. _March 15th, 1852._ Emily turned white as marble over this insolent and horrible epistle, and, with her lips colorless, looked at Harrington, who took the letter from her hand. “Charles Sumner has been in the Senate for six months, silent,” remarked Harrington. “I have a mind to send him this letter.” “Now, John,” said Muriel, smiling, “I won’t tolerate any reflections on my neighbor. Every time I pass his house in Temple street, I think that he has not gone to Washington for nothing. Wait a little, and you shall hear the leap of the live thunder. In the meantime, as the knight Durindarte said to the weeping queen Belerma, ‘patience, and shuffle the cards.’” “You are right, Muriel,” returned Harrington, with a faint smile, “we talk of his silence now, but we shall yet talk of his speech. Yes, the heart lives that shook Faneuil Hall for liberty, and we must not be impatient. But sometimes I despond, for it seems the destiny of our best men to lose power and purpose when they get into Congress.” “No matter,” replied Muriel. “As King Pellinore said to Merlin, ‘God may foredo well destiny.’” Harrington bent his head abstractedly. “But to return,” said he. “You observe, Emily, that the only result of my letter was to bring torture upon poor Antony. In the letter was a bunch of the poor fellow’s hair, which this moral idiot tore from his head. You see, too, he flogged him in mere wantonness of cruelty. From all Roux tells me of the character of this man, I fear that he will end by killing Antony; and it is not too much to suppose, that with the opportunities the slave system gives him, he may even do it in the manner he suggests. Murders as dreadful take place on those obscure plantations, as escaped slaves tell us. Just see the infernal nature of a system which gives a fiend like this absolute, irresponsible control over his fellow creatures! Here is this pirate, with a pirate’s name and a pirate’s disposition; and the law of Louisiana, as of every Southern State in the Union, entrusts to his care as many men and women as he may choose to buy; and while it sanctions, by express statute, various degrees of cruelty toward them, makes it impossible to hold him to account for the most merciless torture and murder, by excluding the testimony of slaves.” Emily listened, with a countenance deathly pale. “I declare, Harrington,” she said, “when I read that letter I felt as if the earth had cracked and shown me a glimpse of hell. Is it possible that there can be such men as this? Are there many of them at the South?” Harrington did not reply for a moment, and sat sadly looking into vacancy.