Oh, it would have been a goodly sight for our American eagle, proud emblem of liberty, to have witnessed this midnight scene we have been describin’; methinks such a spectacle would almost have magnetism to draw him from his lofty lair on Capitol Hill to swoop down into this cypress swamp, and perchin’ upon some lofty tree-top, look down and witness this administration of justice and equal rights, to mark how these beneficent free laws enwrap all the people and protect them from foreign invasion and home foes, to see how this nation loves its children, its black children, who dumbly endured generations of unexampled wrongs and indignities at its hands, and then in its peril bared their patient breasts and risked their lives to save it.
How this bird of freedom must laugh in a parrot-like glee, if so grave and dignified a fowl wuz ever known to indulge in unseemly mirth, to see the play go on, the masquerade of Folly and Brutality in the garb of Wisdom and Order, holding such high carnival.
After thus sendin’ Felix half dead from his brutal usage adrift on the turbid river waves that they felt assured would float him down to a sure and swift death, the gang of ruffians returned to the cottage to complete their night’s work.
Col. Seybert had dealt out plenty of bad whiskey to them to keep up their courage; and Nick Burley, besides satisfying his own vengeance upon Felix, had been offered a very handsome reward by his master for gettin’ him out of the way and takin’ Hester to a lonely old cabin of his in the depths of the big forest.
But they found the pretty cottage empty, and they could only show their disapprobation of the fact by despoilin’ and ruinin’ the cozy nest from which the bird had flown.
Hester had recovered from her faintin’ fit jest as they wuz takin’ Felix to the river; she discovered by their shouts which way they had gone, followed them at a safe distance, and when they had disappeared she by almost a miracle swam out to the boat which had drifted into a bayou, brought it to shore, and nursed him back to life agin.
And for weeks they remained in hidin’, not darin’ to return to their dear old home that they had earned so hardly, and Felix not dreamin’ of claimin’ his honest rights as a duly elected Justice of the Peace.
No, he felt that he had had enough of political honors and preferments—if he could only escape with his life and keep his wife and boy wuz all he asked.
At last he got a note to Victor, who aided him in his flight to another State, where he patiently commenced life agin with what courage and ambition he might bring to bear on it, with his mind forever dwellin’ on his bitter wrongs and humiliation, and on memories of the old home left forever behind him—that pretty home with the few acres of orchard and garden about it. And remembered how he and Hester delighted in every dollar they paid towards it, and how they had a little feast, and invited in their friends that sunny June day when the last dollar wuz paid, and it wuz their own.