They worked samplers, copied from their mothers, and regulated their behavior on this model, which wuz a eminently Christian one, and did much good in a modest, unassumin’ way with the wealth their father had heaped up. They wuz the children of their mother, and their cousin Reginald, true son of their father. But I am a eppisodin’, and to resoom. Col. Seybert, like all men of his class, had some choice spirits that copied his manners and carried out his plans. And among them all who toadied to him and carried out his base plans, the foremost one wuz Nick Burley, as we have said prior and before this. He hated Victor as much as Col. Seybert did. One of the causes of Burley’s dislike was what feeds enmity so often in base natures—Victor wuz so superior to him that Burley wuz always oncomfortable in his presence. To be with a young man who neither drank, swore, nor tore the characters of women to tatters, and boasted of great deeds in love and valor, wuz to Burley incomprehensible. What wuz mysterious must be wrong. And then Victor evidently shunned the society of Burley, and avoided him whenever he could. And as Burley wuz a white man and Victor “a damned nigger,” such a state of things wuz not to be borne. Col. Seybert had, we may be sure, fanned the coals of hatred to a still greater heat, till at last they wuz at a white glow, and Nick Burley wuz ready to do any act that Col. Seybert recommended, anything for vengeance and “to show that cussed black dog not to feel above a gentleman and a white man.” And Col. Seybert and Burley had subtly played upon the ignorance and superstition of the lower black element about them, so they had come to look upon Victor as their enemy and the enemy of his people. He who had all his life long sought only the good of his race, planned through long, wakeful nights for their advancement, and had labored early and late for an education, mainly for the reason that he could help them better—so ignorant wuz they that they could see nothin’ of this, and looked at him through the hate-prejudiced eyes of his enemies. His preachin’ to his people to be patient under their wrongs and to return good for evil; his warnings to them aginst their habits of lawlessness, and laziness, and theft; his pleadings with them to turn in their evil ways and try to become decent citizens; his admonitions that their future lay in their own hands, and they could become, by the grace of God and by hard work and education, whatever they chose to be, had been mistaken by these more ignorant ones. And subtly wrought upon by Col. Seybert and Burley, they looked upon Victor as one who, while he taught them lessons of patience, and meekness, and unselfishness, wuz himself carryin’ on a secret plan for their humiliation and his own personal wealth and ambition. Victor knew something of this secret antagonism towards him from the lower black element and his revengeful white enemies, but he hardly knew how strong it wuz.