The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1856-04-03


Eighteen months had passed since the muir
der of Oswald Waring, and yet the murderer
had not been apprehended. Though, upon the
night of that fatal catastrophe, both the regular
and the volunteer police had turned out in
great numbers, and scattered themselves over
though trained death hounds had been made to
smell his clothing, and had been set upon his
scents though, thus with men and dogs, the
authorities had hunted him throughout the
State, and had offered the largest rewards for
his betrayal or apprehension, this length of
time had passed. and he had not been arrested
Mr.. Waring having died intestate, his prop.
erty, according to the laws of that Common.
wealth, fell to the next of kin. His childless
widow inherited none of her late husbands
wealth. but returned to New Orleans, and
thence retired to the country, to live upon her
own reserved patrimony. The plantation fell
into other hands, and the planter passed out OF
memory. Valentine, with his crime and his
fate, overlaid by newer exctements, in region
full of social vicissitudes, was already sinking
into oblivion. He was supposed to have es-
capped from the State. But there were three
the miserable young man had never left the
neighborhood, or wandered FIVE miles from the
blood-st floor of his crime.
Ph@dra was at last Knocked with the shadow
of freedom. The quadroons and meztizzas,
with all their fiery vehemence of temperament,
bo1 rbar IF fol OF <1ox
any other race. They cannot bear up under
any great mental or physical pressure. Phe-
dra, by the terrible blow that had fallen upon
her, was crushed into premature age and de-
crepitude. And, as q useless old crone, she
was suffered, by her new master, to retire to a
press swamp, and, without being required to
work, was supplied with rations of food and
clothing upon an equal footing with the planta-
ton laborers.
But this poor Naomi, in her desolation, had
also her Ruth.
Fannie had almost miracplously recovered
from the yellow fever; and, in the mental in.-
bicility that had attended her convalescence,
she had been long shielded from the knowledge
of the calamity that had fallen upon them all !;
and at last 80 gradually did the facts of the
catastrophe enter her mind, that she could
never after say when or hoy she first learned
the sum of their misery; and thus she was
spared the sudden shock that must certainly
have proved fatal to her. No one could look
upon that fragile form, and thin face, with its
fair transparent pallor, and large, mournful eyes,
and not know her heart Fas breaking. What
kept her life.power goinga Something that
was not the love of her child, or of her poor
old mother Something that occasionally va
ried that look of hopeless, incurable sorrow,
with wild and startled expression of extreme
| terror, suggestive of insanity. Some people
thought it 'ods insanity; but they we're mista-
Ken her reason was sound, though her heart
was broken. Fannie kept little thread and
needle shop; she owed this little shop to the
benevolence of Mrs. Waring; for, to the honor
of that poor lady be it spoken, even in the
| midst of her own awful sorrow. she had remem
berea and succoured her humble sister in ad.
versity. Fannie's little shop thriyed moderate.
ly, and afforded herself and child a decent liv.
| ing, and the means of alleviating some of the
miseries and adding to the few comforts of her
poor mother. Early every Saturday evening.
| Fannie would close her little shop, and take
her child and walk out to Phsdra's cabin, to
remain until Monday morning. And these sea.
sons, spent in reading the Scriptures, ID prayer,