"Ah, Nat, Nat," said Jenny, "I did not think you would have done such terrible things as you have done--you, who always seemed kind and good, and to be a God-fearing man." "Woman, I did God's bidding!" answered Nat Turner, with a sharp, angry look; "and I will do it still, but more wisely." He then fell into a fit of deep thought, fixing his eyes upon the floor, and remaining on his feet, though his two companions had seated themselves on the ground. Every two or three minutes the lightning continued to flash, and the thunder to roar, and the rain still poured down in torrents. "I wish, dearest Bessy," I said, in a low voice, "you would go into the other room and rest. This man will keep his word with us. There is no danger." "I will stay by your side, Richard," she answered in a whisper; "this is my place." A long pause ensued; and certainly curious sensations arose--sensations not very pleasant, when I reflected that before me were three men whose hands, within the last eight-and-forty hours, had been steeped in the blood of nearly eighty human beings, most of them women and children. At length, Nat Turner broke silence, saying abruptly, and in a gloomy tone,-- "What was that you told me about the sign I saw in the sun--an eclipse you called it?" I gave him the same explanation I had done before, telling him that it was a mere natural phenomenon, which occurred at periods easy to be calculated, in consequence of the regular movements of the planets. "Can I have been mistaken?" he muttered between his teeth. "No, no!" he added in a louder tone; "the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord! It was the sign, it was the sign! The vision and the prophecy cannot be mistaken. I saw him stand on my right side with a rod in his hand, and he pointed to the sky, and he told me to be up and doing. It shall be fulfilled even yet. But the wheat must first be winnowed from the chaff, and the tares rooted out, that it be the work of the husbandman. What though there be few left, others shall rise up. Hands more meet hearts more firm, to do the mighty and terrible work of the Lord." His two companions fixed their eyes on his face, evidently regarding him as one inspired; and I watched with no slight anxiety, knowing well that one can never calculate what turn superstition may take. But he fell quietly into another reverie, which lasted nearly half an hour, and his mood seemed to be soothed by his own reflections. I fancy the truth was, that irritating doubts had suggested themselves as to the truth of his fancied revelations; but that now, by his own arguments, he had satisfied his own mind again, and that his heart felt lighter in consequence.