"Great news, massa--great news from Charls'on!"
(The darky, while we were in church, had gone to the post-office, some four miles away, and got the Colonel's mail, which consisted of letters from his New York and Charleston factors, the Charleston _Courier_ and _Mercury_ and the New York _Journal of Commerce_. The latter sheet, at the date of which I am writing, was in wide circulation at the South, its piety (!) and its politics being then calculated with mathematical precision for secession latitudes.)
"What is it, Jim?" shouted his master. "Give it to us."
The darky had somehow learned to read, but holding the paper at arm's length, and throwing himself into a theatrical attitude, he cried out, with any amount of gesticulation:
"De news am, massa, and gemmen and ladies, dat de ole fort fore Charls'on hab ben devacuated by Major Andersin and de sogers, and dey hab stole 'way in de dark night and gone to Sumter, whar dey can't be took; and dat de ole Gubner hab got out a procdemation dat all dat don't lub de Aberlishen Yankees shill cum up dar and clar 'em out; and de paper say dat lots ob sogers hab cum from Georgi and Al'bama, and 'way down Souf, to help 'em. Dis am w'at de _Currer_ say," he continued, holding the paper up to his eyes and reading: "Major Andersin, ob de United States army hab 'chieved de 'stinction ob op'ning cibil war 'tween American citizens; he hab desarted Moulfrie, and by false fretexts hab took dat ole Garrison and all his millinery stores to Fort Sumter."
"Get down, you d----d nigger," said the Colonel, laughing, and mounting the carriage-box beside him. "You can't read. Old Garrison isn't there--he's the d----d Northern Abolitionist."
"I knows dat, Cunnel, but see dar," replied Jim, holding the paper out to his master, "don't dat say he'm dar? It'm him dat make all de trubble. P'raps dis nig can't read, but ef dat aint readin' I'd like to know it!"
"Clear out," said the Colonel, now actually roaring with laughter; "it's the garrison of soldiers that the _Courier_ speaks of, not the Abolitionist."
"Read it yoursef, den, massa, I don't seed it dat way."
Jim was altogether wiser than he appeared, but while equally as well pleased with the news as his master, he was so for an entirely different reason. In the crisis which these tidings announced, he saw hope for his race.