“I cannot tell, Jesse; but I’m glad you are all here. If you stay here, you will not be hurt. But I didn’t think till now,——some of them may be straggling off here, and I had better go back to my store,” and the old man walked sadly away.
The night had set in, dark and moonless; and an hour’s brisk discharge of small arms was followed, (after an interval of respite), by the booming of cannon, which heightened the terror and direful forebodings of the listeners.
Uncle Jesse’s dwelling became a tabernacle to the Lord that night; for from it arose the ceaseless voice of true prayer—“the soul’s sincere desire,” through all those hours of darkness and terror, till just ere the dawn of the Sabbath morning, his neighbors departed to their several places of abode.
CHAPTER IX.
THE SITUATION.
“Peace fool!
I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not.”
Shakespere.
Uncle Jesse, as the reader is by this time aware, was a man of influence among his neighbors, few of whom, of either race, were capable of such just and comprehensive views of their political and social relations.