large black sheep gambol at their pleasure about that imposing mahogany catafalque? And why did the loss of a brass key at least three feet long, and which seemed to belong to his hat-box, occasion him such acute mortification when called upon by a very old woman in blue kid low-shoes to explain its whereabouts? And why did--and why didn’t--and what on earth made them all? Roden had not slept so soundly since leaving British soil. He was awakened by a vigorous rapping at the door. He sat up and rolled himself more tightly in the big green silk quilt. “Who is it?” he said. “’Tis yo’ clo’es,” replied a solemn voice. “An’ please, sur, ter dress ez quick ez you kin, ’case supper soon be rade-y.” Roden admitted his once more dry outfit through a small aperture in the door, after having inquired as to the time, and finding that he had slept two hours. “Miss Faginia she say ez how she ben think you’d rayther eat yo’ supper jiss so, ’thout sp’ilin’ it with er sorter dinner,” chanted the monotonous voice without. Roden admitted that “Miss Faginia” had been quite right in her conjecture. In half an hour he went out into the big hall, which, divided by three arches, ran through the centre of the house. Over the first was a fine moose-head. There were skins of many beasts here and there on the slippery oak floor, and straight-backed chairs set against the panelled wall, which some barbarian had painted white. A much-carved oak table on one side supported a large silver flagon and two old-fashioned tankards. On the other was an old-fashioned hat-rack, filled mostly with feminine head-gear of various makes and sizes. A pair of branchy antlers supported riding-canes of all descriptions. Guided by the sounds of a piano softly played, Roden opened a door on his left, and found himself in a large firelit room, whose walls were absolutely covered with pictures large and small, all in old Italian frames, all more or less stiff and ill painted, all hung, regardless of size or shape, as close to one another as they could possibly be placed. The effect of the thus concentrated colors was, in spite of the defects of the pictures themselves, quaint and jewel-like. Over the mantle of carved oak reached upward to the ceiling an enormous square mirror in the style of the First Empire. On one side of the room was hung its mate, also in lonely grandeur, and facing the portrait of a very rosy dame in a still rosier tulle dress, the whole suggesting in color the presence of the all-pervading Virginian soil. Just under this second mirror was a piano, and at this piano was standing the overseer’s daughter, striking idle chords with her left hand. She had taken off her Rosalind costume, and appeared in a blue homespun dress, neat and scant of make, and with her two big braids hanging over her shoulders.