"No questions! Obey my orders, and pull for home," replied Archy, as he adjusted his shirt sleeves and put on his coat. When he had arranged his dress, he threw himself upon the velvet cushions, and took no further notice of Dandy or the crew. His orders were, of course, obeyed. The bow oarsman pushed off the boat, and she was headed up the Crosscut. By this time, poor Dandy, who, notwithstanding the obliquities of his master's disposition, had a strong regard for him, reached the shore. "I am very sorry for what has happened, Master Archy, and I hope you will forgive me," said he, in humble tones. The imperious young lord made no reply to this supplicating petition. "Please to forgive me!" pleaded Dandy. "Silence! Don't speak to me again till I give you permission to do so," was the only reply he vouchsafed. Dandy knew his master well enough to obey, literally, the injunction imposed upon him. Seating himself upon the ground, he watched the receding boat, as the lusty oarsmen drove it rapidly through the water. The events of the morning were calculated to induce earnest and serious reflection. The consequences of the affair were yet to be developed, but Dandy had no strong misgivings. Archy, he hoped and expected, would recover his good nature in a few hours, at the most, and then he would be forgiven, as he had been before. It is true, he had never before given his master an angry blow; but he had been grievously provoked, and he hoped this would prove a sufficient excuse. Archy had lost his temper, sprung at him with the fury of a tiger, and struck him several severe blows. His face was even now covered with blood, and his nose ached from the flattening it had received. He could not feel that he had done a very wicked deed. He had only defended himself, which is the inborn right of man or boy when unjustly assailed. He had been invited, nay, pressed, to strike the blow which had caused the trouble. Then he thought of his condition, of the wrongs and insults which had been heaped upon him; and if the few drops of negro blood that flowed in his veins prompted him to patience and submission, the white blood, the Anglo-Saxon inspiration of his nature, which coursed through the same channels, counselled resistance, mad as it might seem. As he thought of his situation, the tears came into his eyes, and he wept bitterly. The future was dark and forbidding, as the past had been joyless and hopeless. They were tears of anger and resentment, rather than of sorrow. He almost envied the lot of the laborers, who toiled in the cane-fields. Though they were meanly clad and coarsely fed, they were not subjected to the whims and caprices of a wayward boy. They had nothing to fear but the lash of the driver, and this might be avoided by diligence and care. And then, with the tears coursing down his pale cheeks, he realized that the field-hands who labored beneath the eye of the overseer and the driver were better off and happier than he was.