The freed boy in Alabama

“New are the leaves on the oaken spray, New the blades of the silky grass; Flowers that were buds but yesterday Peep from the ground where’er I pass.”

BRYANT.

It was an April day in the South--not windy and blustering, with the remembrances of March still clinging about it, but warm and lovely, mild and balmy, with spring beauty and promise of good over everything. The grass was springing everywhere, and the buds on the trees were bursting into blossom, and one could gather tender leaves and delicate sprays of white and hold them with the tender, caressing touch which we give to all that heralds spring. It was a good day to breathe the soft, mild air, to be among the growing things and dismiss winter from the mind; and, above all, it was one of those days when the restless feeling we all have sometimes returns in full force, and the thought of coming life and energy in the natural world fills the mind with a longing to do something more than sit still and enjoy.

All this--not exactly in this form, but the substance of this--with a restless, unsatisfied feeling, was possessing and fast getting control of Tom Alson, as he sat on a box in front of a store in Huntsville, idly tapping one foot after the other against its wooden sides. He had anything but an ambitious, energetic look, but then Tom never showed his feelings, and any one gazing at him would hardly have imagined that at this very moment he was longing to go out into the world and “do something.”

Certainly the man who came up to him just then had very little idea of the lofty thought in which Tom was indulging, for he gave him only a hasty glance before he addressed him.

“Say, boy, want to hire out?” asked the man.

Tom started and roused himself: “I was not thinking of it, sir,” he replied.

“Well, think of it now, then; I am trying to find boys to work for Mr. Sutherland on his plantation, about twenty miles out. They are growing corn and cotton. I’d be glad to have you go; give you six dollars a month and board.”

“No, sir,” replied Tom; “I think I will not hire out this summer.”

“Oh think again! Six dollars a month is no mean pay, and I’ve a lot of Huntsville niggers going along.”

“No, sir,” replied Tom again, decidedly, and rising as he spoke, as if not wishing to continue the conversation.

“What’s to hinder you?” asked the man.

“I am going to school, sir,” returned the boy, knowing that this would put a stop to the urging; and it was successful, for the man, with a few coarse words about “niggers and education,” turned suddenly and walked away, and Tom, with his hands in his pockets, sauntered off in an opposite direction, whistling.

He came up to his home by and by, and found his sister Martha in a chair outside the door, busied with some sewing. He sat down on a step near and watched her swift-moving hand in silence for some minutes, with his eyes on her work and his thoughts a long way off.

“Has mother come back?” he asked, at length.

“Yes, Tom,” replied Martha, with a little sigh, “but she didn’t succeed in getting any work. I do not see how we are going to get along. I think I shall try to see if I can get something to do.”

“I was thinking of that, too,” said Tom. “There’s a man here to-day who wants hands to go twenty miles out. He wanted me, but I told him ‘No.’”

Martha stitched away in silence.

“I’d go,” said Tom, suddenly, “but there’s the school; I could not give that up.”

“Not for Jesus, Tom?” asked Martha, looking round with a little smile.

“_Would_ it be for Jesus, Martha,” said Tom, earnestly, “to give up school and go to work, neglecting my education meanwhile?”

“Think about it, Tom, and remember what Paul did for Jesus.”

Tom did think. The conversation ceased between them entirely, and the fresh spring breezes came from the South, laden with the breath of flowers, and passed gently by the two seated before the cabin door, one of them so busy with his decision.

When Tom, at length, rose and moved off, Martha could not tell his thought, although she peered anxiously into his face to see if possible what lay there, but it was unmoved, and he did not meet her look of inquiry with any return, but passed out of the gate, swinging it after him, and walking off toward the quarter of the town where his father was at work. He looked very grave when the two came in together at dinner-time, and hurried off toward the school-room before his sister was ready. She watched him a little anxiously all the afternoon, but the grave, intent face did not once relax its gravity, and the lines of soberness remained even after the pleasant afternoon session came to a close. Martha waited for her brother some minutes, with the hope that she might have one of their customary talks on their way home, but he did not come away, so she went on alone.

It was not until an hour later, while she was busily weeding the little garden, that Tom came up and stopped at her side.

“Martha, I’m going,” he said, abruptly.

“Tom! why, Tom--going! when and what for,” she said, starting and turning round toward him.

“Going to-morrow, Martha, and for Jesus,” he replied, quietly.

Martha turned back again suddenly without remark, and industriously weeded the springing grass from around the young plants.

Tom waited several minutes, and then spoke again:

“Are you not glad of this, Martha?”

She dropped the shovel with which she had been working, turned toward him, and lifting her hands to her head in a nervous way, replied, with quivering lips:

“That I am glad, you know, but oh I shall lose my brother!”

Tom’s eyes fell and his mouth twitched.

“I’ve been to see Miss Mason,” he said, after a minute, “to bid her good-bye. She says I must send her a letter. That is a great blessing which we did not always have, Martha--we may write to each other. That is good.”

“Yes.” Martha knew it as well as Tom, and I think it was the thought of this more than almost anything else which served to keep them in some degree of cheerfulness during the remainder of his stay. It was not long, only so many short hours Martha almost counted the minutes. It was like Tom to act in a moment when the question of duty came home to him, and although Martha knew this, yet she had been surprised, after all, at his sudden acting upon her suggestion. What if Tom should sicken or be in any want so far from home?--for to Martha the distance seemed immense. Would she not then be sorry she had ever encouraged him? But those precious letters! How thankful she felt that she could write, and that though miles were between them, yet words could pass from one to the other!

How Tom felt no one knew. He hid his feelings always. Martha was the only one who ever had a glimpse, and she only now and then. He counted the cost at every step, yet still he had gone back to his acquaintance of the morning, and agreed with him to work on the plantation during the summer. His father had listened, too, when he proposed it, and although he would have liked to keep his boy at home, yet work was scarce, and he could not always find means to live; so Tom must go. He had taken leave of his teacher and the school-room quite calmly, to all appearance, and no one knew how hard the struggle was to give up all this for Jesus. Yet it was this thought which kept him up through it all, and watching Martha’s grave face as she bent over his box placing his things together, he longed to tell her his source of comfort. But perhaps he needed it himself more than she did, for to one of his disposition to go from home and mingle among strangers was very hard, very much against his will. Yet as he looked at it, he thought perhaps God had sent him just this trial to make him better, and that he might have something for him to do for his service in the country. And so his courage did not quite fail.

How his eyes lingered the next morning upon everything about his home, trying as he did to impress each little portion of the house-furnishing upon his memory! It seemed as if he could not lose sight of his sister Martha’s face. His eyes followed her everywhere. It was almost strange, the devoted affection which had sprung up between the two; and it was so hard, just as they were helping one another along the narrow way through the journey of life, to be obliged to part.

But it came, late in the afternoon--the parting--and was over, and Tom found himself in the car looking out at the country, green, and fresh, and beautiful, and trying to realize how long it would be before the familiar faces would be near him again. Of all Tom’s boy friends there was but one who was of this company, and he, although a school-mate, knew Tom only slightly. But he was alone too, and so after a while, seeing the empty seat beside Tom, he came and sat down.

“How do you think you’ll like it out there?” he asked, as Tom turned round.