In half an hour Mrs. Pelham, wearing her gingham bonnet, came out to where Uncle Henry still sat sulking in the sun. As she approached him, she pushed back her bonnet till her gray hair and glasses showed beneath it. “Henry,” she said, sternly, “I’ve jest done a thing that I hated mightily to do.” “What’s that, Mis’ Liza?” He looked up as he asked the question, and then hung his head shamefacedly. He was about forty-five years of age. For one of his race he had a strong, intelligent face. Indeed, he possessed far more intelligence than the average negro. He was considered the most influential slave on any of the half-dozen plantations lying along that side of the river. He had learned to read, and by listening to the conversation of white people had (if he had acquired the colloquial speech of the middle-class whites) dropped almost every trace of the dialect current among his people. And on this he prided himself no little. He often led in prayer at the colored meeting-house on an adjoining plantation, and some of his prayers were more widely quoted and discussed than many of the sermons preached in the same church. “I have wrote to yore master, Henry,” answered Mrs. Pelham, “an’ I’ve tol’ ’im all yore doin’s, an’ tol’ him to come home an’ whip you fer disobeyin’ Brother Cobb. I hated to do it, as I’ve jest said; but I couldn’t see no other way out of the difficulty. Don’t you think you deserve a whippin’, Uncle Henry?” “I don’t know, Mis’ Liza.” He did not look up from the grass over which he swung his rag-covered leg and gaping brogan. “I don’t know myself, Mis’ Liza. I want to help Marse Jasper out all I can while he is off, but it seems like I jest can’t work fer that man. Huh, overseer! I say overseer! Why, Mis’ Liza, he ain’t as good as a nigger! Thar ain’t no pore white trash in all this valley country as low down as all his lay-out. He ain’t fittin’ fer a overseer of nothin’. He don’t do anything like master did, nohow. He’s too lazy to git in out of a rain. He--” “That will do, Henry. Mr. Pelham put him over you, an’ you’ve disobeyed. He ’ll be home in a few days, an’ you an’ him can settle it between you. He will surely give you a good whippin’ when he gits here. Are you goin’ to sit thar without layin’ yore hand to a thing till he comes?” “Now, you know me better ’n that, Mis’ Liza. I’ve done said I won’t mind that man, an’ I reckon I won’t; but the meadow-piece has obliged to be broke an’ sowed in wheat. I’m goin’ to do that jest as soon as the blacksmith fetches my bull-tongue plow.” Mrs. Pelham turned away silently. She had heard some talk of the government buying the negroes from their owners and setting them free. She ardently hoped this would be done, for she was sure they could then be hired cheaper than they could be owned and provided for. She disliked to see a negro whipped; but occasionally she could see no other way to make them do their duty.