[Illustration: “Say, Boy! Do you want to hire out?” _Freed-Boy in Alabama._ Frontispiece. See page 5.] THE FREED BOY IN ALABAMA. BY ANNE M. MITCHELL, AUTHOR OF “MARTHA’S GIFT.” “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.” PHILADELPHIA: PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, 1334 CHESTNUT STREET. Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by WM. L. HILDEBURN, TREASURER, _in trust for the_ PRESBYTERIAN PUBLICATION COMMITTEE, In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. WESTCOTT & THOMSON, Stereotypers, Philada. THE FREED BOY IN ALABAMA. CHAPTER I. “New are the leaves on the oaken spray, New the blades of the silky grass; Flowers that were buds but yesterday Peep from the ground where’er I pass.” BRYANT. It was an April day in the South--not windy and blustering, with the remembrances of March still clinging about it, but warm and lovely, mild and balmy, with spring beauty and promise of good over everything. The grass was springing everywhere, and the buds on the trees were bursting into blossom, and one could gather tender leaves and delicate sprays of white and hold them with the tender, caressing touch which we give to all that heralds spring. It was a good day to breathe the soft, mild air, to be among the growing things and dismiss winter from the mind; and, above all, it was one of those days when the restless feeling we all have sometimes returns in full force, and the thought of coming life and energy in the natural world fills the mind with a longing to do something more than sit still and enjoy. All this--not exactly in this form, but the substance of this--with a restless, unsatisfied feeling, was possessing and fast getting control of Tom Alson, as he sat on a box in front of a store in Huntsville, idly tapping one foot after the other against its wooden sides. He had anything but an ambitious, energetic look, but then Tom never showed his feelings, and any one gazing at him would hardly have imagined that at this very moment he was longing to go out into the world and “do something.” Certainly the man who came up to him just then had very little idea of the lofty thought in which Tom was indulging, for he gave him only a hasty glance before he addressed him. “Say, boy, want to hire out?” asked the man. Tom started and roused himself: “I was not thinking of it, sir,” he replied. “Well, think of it now, then; I am trying to find boys to work for Mr. Sutherland on his plantation, about twenty miles out. They are growing corn and cotton. I’d be glad to have you go; give you six dollars a month and board.” “No, sir,” replied Tom; “I think I will not hire out this summer.” “Oh think again! Six dollars a month is no mean pay, and I’ve a lot of Huntsville niggers going along.”