From the dairy window, a few minutes later, she saw Uncle Henry put the gear on a mule, and, with a heavy plow-stock on his shoulder, start for the wheat-field beyond the meadow. “He ’ll do two men’s work over thar, jest to show what he kin do when he’s let alone,” she said to Miss Molly. “I hate to see ’im whipped. He’s too old an’ sensible in most things, an’ it would jest break Lucinda’s heart. Mr. Pelham had ruther cut off his right arm, too; but he ’ll do it, an’ do it good, after havin’ to come so far.” Mr. Pelham was a week in reaching the plantation. He wrote that it would take several days to arrange his affairs so that he could leave. He admitted that there was nothing left to do except to whip Uncle Henry soundly, and that they were right in thinking that Henry would not let any one do it but himself. After the whipping he was sure that the negro would obey Cobb, and that matters would then move along smoothly. When Mr. Pelham arrived, he left the stage at the cross-roads, half a mile from his house, and carpet-bag in hand, walked home through his own fields. He was a short, thick-set man of about sixty, round-faced, blue-eyed, and gray-haired. He wore a sack-coat, top-boots, and baggy trousers. He had a good-natured, kindly face, and walked with the quick step and general air of a busy man. He had traveled three hundred miles, slept on the hard seat of a jolting train, eaten railroad pies and peanuts, and was covered with the grime of a dusty journey, all to whip one disobedient negro. Still, he was not out of humor, and after the whipping and lecture to his old servant he would travel back over the tiresome route and resume his business where he had left it. His wife and sister-in-law were in the kitchen when they heard his step in the long hall. They went into the sitting-room, where he had put down his carpet-bag, and in the center of the floor stood swinging his hat and mopping his brow with his red handkerchief. He shook hands with the two women, and then sat down in his old seat in the chimney-corner. “You want a bite to eat, an’ a cup of coffee, I reckon,” said Mrs. Pelham, solicitously. “No, I kin wait till dinner. Whar’s Cobb?” “I seed ’im at the wagon-shed a minute ago,” spoke up Miss Molly; “he was expectin’ you, an’ didn’t go to the field with the balance.” “Tell ’im I want to see ‘im.” Both of the women went out, and the overseer came in. “Bad state of affairs, Brother Cobb,” said the planter, as he shook hands. They both sat down with their knees to the embers. “That it is, Brother Pelham, an’ I take it you didn’t count on it any more ’n I did.” “Never dreamt of it. Has he been doin’ any better since he heerd I was comin’ to--whip ‘im?”