Chapter 2

_Removed from My First Home_

THE NAME "OLD MASTER" A TERROR--COLONEL LLOYD'S PLANTATION--WYE
RIVER--WHENCE ITS NAME--POSITION OF THE LLOYDS--HOME ATTRACTION--
MEET OFFERING--JOURNEY FROM TUCKAHOE TO WYE RIVER--SCENE ON
REACHING OLD MASTER'S--DEPARTURE OF GRANDMOTHER--STRANGE MEETING
OF SISTERS AND BROTHERS--REFUSAL TO BE COMFORTED--SWEET SLEEP.

That mysterious individual referred to in the first chapter as an
object of terror among the inhabitants of our little cabin, under
the ominous title of "old master," was really a man of some
consequence. He owned several farms in Tuckahoe; was the chief
clerk and butler on the home plantation of Col. Edward Lloyd; had
overseers on his own farms; and gave directions to overseers on
the farms belonging to Col. Lloyd. This plantation is situated
on Wye river--the river receiving its name, doubtless, from
Wales, where the Lloyds originated. They (the Lloyds) are an old
and honored family in Maryland, exceedingly wealthy. The home
plantation, where they have resided, perhaps for a century or
more, is one of the largest, most fertile, and best appointed, in
the state.

About this plantation, and about that queer old master--who must
be something more than a man, and something worse than an angel--
the reader will easily imagine that I was not only curious, but
eager, to know all that could be known. Unhappily for me,
however, all the information I could get concerning him increased
my great dread of being carried thither--of being separated
from and deprived of the protection of my grandmother and
grandfather. It was, evidently, a great thing to go to Col.
Lloyd's; and I was not without a little curiosity to see the
place; but no amount of coaxing could induce in me the wish to
remain there. The fact is, such was my dread of leaving the
little cabin, that I wished to remain little forever, for I knew
the taller I grew the shorter my stay. The old cabin, with its
rail floor and rail bedsteads upstairs, and its clay floor
downstairs, and its dirt chimney, and windowless sides, and that
most curious piece of workmanship dug in front of the fireplace,
beneath which grandmammy placed the sweet potatoes to keep them
from the frost, was MY HOME--the only home I ever had; and I
loved it, and all connected with it. The old fences around it,
and the stumps in the edge of the woods near it, and the
squirrels that ran, skipped, and played upon them, were objects
of interest and affection. There, too, right at the side of the
hut, stood the old well, with its stately and skyward-pointing
beam, so aptly placed between the limbs of what had once been a
tree, and so nicely balanced that I could move it up and down
with only one hand, and could get a