78 



at my elbow, " Massa no give you all that if 

 massa know you so bad girl ! she run away from 

 me, massa! " Psyche gave him a kind of pouting 

 look, half kind, and half reproachful, and turned 

 away. And then he told me that Psyche had 

 been his wife {one of his wives he should have 

 said) ; that he had had a child by her, and then 

 she had left him for one of my " white people" 

 (as they call the book-keepers), because he had 

 a good salary, and could afford to give her more 

 presents than a slave could. " Was there not an- 

 other reason for your quarrelling ? " said my agent. 

 " Was there not a shade of colour too much ? " — 

 "Oh, massa!" answered Nicholas, " the child is 

 not my own, that is certain ; it is a black man's 

 child. But still I will always take care of the 

 child because it have no friends, and me wish 

 make it good neger for massa — and she take 

 good care of it too," he added, throwing his arm 

 round the waist of a sickly-looking woman rather 

 in years ; " she my wife, too, massa, long ago ; old 

 now and sick, but always good to me, so I still 

 live with her, and will never leave her, never, 

 massa; she Polly's mother, sir." Polly is a pretty, 

 delicate-looking girl, nursing a young child ; she 

 belongs to the mansion-house, and seems to think 

 it as necessary a part of her duty to nurse me as 

 the child. To be sure she has not as yet insisted 

 upon suckling me ; but if I open a jalousie in the 

 evening, Polly walks in and shuts it without saying 



