"Oh, missis, is that you? Berry glad to see you," said the negress, with a not ungraceful courtesy, as she tried to keep out of the way of the lady's prancing horses.
"Whose lovely baby is that?" asked the old lady, putting on her glasses, "hand him to me, Chloe."
The old lady seemed to be strangely moved as Chloe sat him on her knee, and tears chased each other down her face.
"He is so like, Chloe, so like my poor dear boy at his age; just such eyes, just such a forehead, just such beautiful shoulders—poor Vincent! Whose child is it, Chloe?" asked the old lady, as she untied the baby's cap, and pushed back the curls from his forehead.
"He belongs to a northern lady I have been nursing, missis. She is berry handsome, too."
"I can't spare him, yet," said the old lady, as Chloe held out her arms for him. "I can not let him go; see, he likes me," said she, delightedly, as Charley, with one of his caressing little ways, laid his head down on her shoulder. "He is my dear Vincent back again. Get in, Chloe, I'll drive you where you want to go. I can not give up the child yet."
The gay, prancing horses, with their flowing tails and manes, the silver-mounted harness, and the bright buttons of the liveried coachman, sent a brighter sparkle to the baby's eyes, and a richer glow to his cheeks. He crowed, and laughed, and clapped his little hands, till wearied with pleasure, and lulled by the rapid motion of the carriage, his little limbs relaxed, and he fell asleep.
What is so lovely as a sleeping babe?
The evening star gemming the edge of a sunset cloud? the bent lily too heavy with dew to chime its silver bells to the night wind? the closed rose-bud whose fragrant heart waits for the warm sun-ray to kiss open its loveliness?
Unable to account for the powerful magnetism by which she was drawn to the beautiful child, the old lady sat, without speaking, passing her fingers over his ivory arm, and gazing upon the rich glow of his cheek, the perfect outline of his limbs, and the shining curls of his clustering hair.