One by one the negroes came forward and bared themselves to the waist--children, strong men and old women. And then there was shrieking and wailing, begging and praying: it was like a leaf out of hell. Little Lizay was among the first of the condemned to present herself, for she felt an intolerable suspense as to what awaited her. The vague terror in her face was discerned by the dim light. As she stepped forward Mr. Buck called out, "Als'on!" "Yes, moster," Alston answered. "What yer sneakin' in that thar' corner fer? Come up yere, you--" but his vile sentence shall not be finished here. Alston came forward with a statuesque face. "Take this rawhide," was the order he received. He put out his hand, and then, suddenly realizing the requisition that was to be made on him, realizing that he was to flog Little Lizay, his confidante and sympathizing friend, his hand dropped cold and limp. "Yerdar' ter dis'bey me?" Mr. Buck bellowed. "I'll brain yer: I'll--" "I didn't go ter do it, moster," Alston said, reaching for the whip. "I'll whip her tell yer tells me ter stop." "He didn't go ter do it, Mos' Buck," pleaded Little Lizay, frightened for Alston. "He'll whip me ef yer'll give 'im the whip.--I's ready, Als'on." She crossed her arms over her bare bosom and shook her long hair forward: then dropped her face low and stood with her back partly turned to Alston, who now had the whip. "Fire away!" said the overseer. Alston was not a refined gentleman, whose youth had been hedged from the coarse and degrading, whose good instincts had been cherished, whose faculties had been harmoniously trained. He was not a hero: he was not prepared to espouse to the death Little Lizay's cause--to risk everything for the shrinking, helpless woman and for his own manhood--to die rather than strike her. He was only a slave, used from his cradle to the low and cruel and brutalizing. But he had the making of a man in him: his nature was one that could never become utterly base. But there was no help, no hope, for either of them in anything he could do. He might knock Mr. Buck senseless, sure of the sympathy of every slave on the plantation. There would be a brief triumph, but he and Little Lizay would have to pay for it: bloodhounds, scourgings, chains, cruelty that never slept and could never be placated, were sure as fate. Resistance was inevitable disaster. Alston did not need to stand there undetermined while he went over this: it was familiar ground. Over and over again he had settled it: it was madness for the slave to oppose himself to the dominant white man. So, after his first unreasoning recoil, his mind was decided to adminster the flogging. Would it not be a mercy to Little Lizay for him to do this rather than that other hand, energized by hate, revenge and cruelty?