a kind of cot, which was arranged to facilitate the punishment of the boys; but the old man loved me dearly and hesitated before striking me a blow, the first I should have received since I had been with the monks. He pleaded with me, 'If you will tell me what you know, no matter how little, I will let you off.' 'Well,' said I, I know who blew out the light.' promised to let me off for mation and I then said, 'I

one thing, I know The priest eagerly that piece of inforblew it out.' Of with a long talk

course I was let off, but which moved me to tears and prevented me from co-operating with the boys again in their schemes of mischief.

"I had been sent so young to school, and far from home, without my mother's knowledge or consent, that she became very impatient for my return. Neither then, nor in the many years of my life, have I ceased to cherish a tender memory of the loving care of that mother, in whom there was so much for me to admire and nothing to remember save good.

Charles B. Green, a young Mississippian, who was studying law in Kentucky, had acted as my guardian when I was at school there, and he returned with me to Mississippi. We left Bardstown to go home by steamer from Louisville; for, then, steam-boats had been put on the river.

"At that time, as well as I can remember, there were three steam-boats on the Mississippi-the Volcano, the Vesuvius, and the Etna. We embarked on the Etna. A steam-boat was then a matter of such great curiosity that many persons got on board to ride a few miles down the river, where they were to be landed, to return in carriages. The captain of the Etna, Robinson De Hart, had been a sailor in his earlier days, and he always used a speaking-trumpet and spy-glass when landing the boat to take wood. Our voyage was slow and uneventful, and we reached home in safety.

“I had been absent two years, and my brother Isaac accompanied me home, stopped at the village near my father's house, and told me to go on and conceal my identity to see if they would know me. I found my dear old mother sitting near the door, and, walking up with an assumed air to hide a throbbing heart, I asked her if there had been any stray horses round there. She said she had seen a stray boy, and clasped me in her

arms.

"After we had become somewhat calmer, I inquired for my father, and was told he was out in the field. I, impatient of the delay, went there to meet him. He was a man of deep feeling, though he sought to repress the

expression of it whenever practicable; but I came to him unexpectedly. Greatly moved he took me in his arms with more emotion than I had ever seen him exhibit, and kissed me repeatedly. I remember wondering why my father should have kissed so big a boy.

My father was a silent, undemonstrative man of action. He talked little, and never in general company, but what he said had great weight with the community in which he lived. His admonitions to his children were rather suggestive than dictatorial. I remember a case in point, which happened after my return from Kentucky, while I was at the County Academy.

"A task had been assigned me in excess of my power to memorize. I stated the case to the teacher, but he persisted in imposing the lesson. The next day it had not been mastered, and when punishment was threatened I took my books and went to my father. He said, 'Of course, it is for you to elect whether you will work with head or hands; my son could not be an idler. I want more cottonpickers and will give you work.'

"The next day, furnished with a bag, I went into the fields and worked all day and the day after. The heat of the sun and the physical labor, in conjunction with the implied equality with the other cotton-pickers, con