“To find somebody to take them in; but they say there will be no room for me.” “Stay with me then; but nobody will be safe under a roof to-night, I think.” “Where shall we stay then?” “Here, unless God calls us away. Many may be called before morning.” The little girl stood trembling, afraid of she scarcely knew what, till a tremendous clap of thunder burst near, and then she clung to Cassius, and hid her face. In a few moments the gong was heard, sounding in the hurried irregular manner which betokens an alarm. “Aha!” cried Cassius. “The white man’s house shakes and he is afraid.” “What does he call us for?” said the terrified child. “We can do him no good.” “No; but his house is stronger than ours; and if his shakes, ours may tumble down, and then he would lose his slaves and their houses too. So let us go into the field where we are called, and then we shall see how pale white men can look.” All the way as they went, Hester held one hand before her eyes, for the lightning flashes came thick and fast. Still there was neither wind nor rain; but the roar of the distant sea rose louder in the intervals of the thunder. Cassius suddenly stopt short, and pulled the little girl’s hand from before her face, crying, “Look, look, there is a sight!” Hester shrieked when she saw a whole field of sugar-canes whirled in the air. Before they had time to fall, the loftiest trees of the forest were carried up in like manner. The mill disappeared, a hundred huts were levelled; there was a stunning roar, a rumbling beneath, a rushing above. The hurricane was upon them in all its fury. Cassius clasped the child round the waist, and carried rather than led her at his utmost speed beyond the verge of the groves, lest they also should be borne down and crush all beneath them. When he had arrived with his charge in the field whither the gong had summoned him, slaves were arriving from all parts of the plantation to seek safety in an open place. Their black forms flitting in the mixed light,—now in the glare of the lightning, and now in the rapid gleams which the full moon cast as the clouds were swept away for a moment, might have seemed to a stranger like imps of the storm, collecting to give tidings of its ravages. Like such imps they spoke and acted. “The mill is down!” cried one. “No crop next year, for the canes are blown away!” shouted another. “The hills are bare as a rock,—no coffee, no spice, no cotton! Hurra!” “But our huts are gone: our plantation-grounds are buried,” cried the wailing voice of a woman. “Hurra! for the white man’s are gone too!” answered many mingled tones. Just then a burst of moonlight showed to each the exulting countenances of the rest, and there went up a shout louder than the thunder,—“Hurra hurra! how ugly is the land!”