Clotilda must be with
me. Negro as she is by law, she is no less dear to me. Nor can I
yield to those feelings so prominent in southern breasts,--I cannot
disclaim her rights, leave her the mere chattel subject of brute
force, and then ask forgiveness of heaven!" This declaration, made
in a positive tone, at once disclosed her resolution. We need not
tell the reader with what surprise it took the household; nor, when
she as suddenly went into a violent paroxysm of hysterics, the alarm
it spread.
The quiet of the mansion has changed for uproar and confusion.
Servants are running here and there, getting in each other's way,
blocking the passages, and making the confusion more intense.
Colonel M'Carstrow is sent for, reaches the mansion in great
consternation, expects to find Franconia a corpse, for the negro
messenger told him such a crooked story, and seemed so frightened,
that he can't make anything straight of it-except that there is
something very alarming.
She has been carried to one of the ante-chambers, reclines on a
couch of softest tapestry, a physician at one side, and Alice,
bathing her temples with aromatic liquid, on the other. She presents
a ravishing picture of delicacy, modesty, and simplicity,--of all
that is calmly beautiful in woman. "I can scarcely account for it;
but, she's coming to," says the man of medicine, looking on
mechanically. Her white bosom swells gently, like a newly-waked
zephyr playing among virgin leaves; while her eyes, like melancholy
stars, glimmer with the lustre of her soul.
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