After I've eaten my breakfast, I am going to visit a friend, and I want you to accompany me; don't be long." "Can't I eat mine first, Mrs.Bird ?" he asked, in reply.
"I thought you had had yours, long ago," rejoined she.
"The others hadn't finished theirs when you called me, and I don't get mine until they have done," said Charlie.
"Until they have done; how happens that ?" asked Mrs.Bird.
"I think they don't like to eat with me, because I'm coloured," was Charlie's hesitating reply.
"That is too much," exclaimed Mrs.Bird; "if it were not so very ridiculous, I should be angry.

It remains for me, then," continued she, "to set them an example.

I've not eaten my breakfast yet--come, sit down with me, and we'll have it together." Charlie followed Mrs.Bird into the breakfast-room, and took the seat pointed out by her.

Eliza, when she entered with the tea-urn, opened her eyes wide with astonishment at the singular spectacle she beheld.

Her mistress sitting down to breakfast _vis-a-vis_ to a little coloured boy! Depositing the urn upon the table, she hastened back to the kitchen to report upon the startling events that were occurring in the breakfast-room.
"Well, I never," said she; "that beats anything I ever did see; why, Mrs.
Bird must have turned abolitionist.