The old negress wore a black levantine gown, open in front, and gathered about the waist by a silken cord; a red and yellow turban, from underneath which escaped a few frosted locks, and a white cambric neckerchief that fell carelessly over her shoulders, and almost hid her withered, scrawny neck. She was upward of seventy, but so infirm that she appeared nearly a hundred. One of her lean, skinny arms, escaping from the loose sleeve of her dress, rested on her knee; and her bowed, bony frame leaned against the arm of her chair, as if incapable of sitting upright. Her features, with the exception of her nose, which curved slightly upward, were thin and regular; and her eyes were large, deep, and densely black, and seemed turned inward, as if gazing with a half-wondering stare at the strange mechanism which held together her queer frame-work of bones and gutta percha. She was the old woman who had greeted Preston so affectionately on our arrival. Turning to her as he tendered me a chair, Joe said: 'Mudder, dis am Mr. Kirke.' Making a feeble effort to rise, and reaching out her trembling hand she exclaimed, in a voice just above a whisper: 'You'm welcome yere, right welcome, sar.' 'Thank you, aunty. Pray keep your seat; don't rise on my account.' 'Tank _you_, massa Kirke, fur comin' yere. It'm bery good ob you. Ole missy lub you, sar; you'm so good ter massa Robert. He'm my own chile, sar!' This was undoubtedly a figure of speech, for the old woman's skin was altogether too black not to have given a trifle of its shading to the complexion of her children. It was not only black, but blue black, and of that peculiar hue which is seen only on the faces of native Africans. Seeing that she had relinquished smoking, I said: 'Never mind me, aunty; I smoke myself sometimes.' 'Tank you, sar,' she replied, resuming her pipe, and relapsing into her previous position; 'ole wimmin lub 'backer, sar.' The low tone in which this was said made me conclude that further conversation would be exhausting to her, so turning to Joe and Aggy--the latter had hurried through her domestic employments, and taken a seat near the fire--I entered into a general discussion of the old worthies that occupied Joe's book shelves. I found the negro had taxed them for house room. He had levied on their best thoughts, and I soon experienced the uneasy sensation which one feels when he encounters a man who can 'talk him dry' on almost any subject. On the single topic of the business to which I was educated, I might have displayed, had it not been Sunday night, a greater amount of information; but in the knowledge of every subject that was broached, the black was my superior.