The house overlooked garden and terrace; the slaves passed and repassed the open windows; Juba came and went; now and then Mistress Deborah herself would sally forth to receive instructions concerning this or that from the master of the house.

And every day, at noon, the slaves drew to all the shutters save those of the master's room, and the minister's wife and ward made their curtsies and went home.

The latter, like a child, counted the hours upon the clock until the next morning; but then she was not used to happiness, and the wine of it made her slightly drunken.
The master of Fair View told himself that there was infection in this lotus air of Virginia.

A fever ran in his veins that made him languid of will, somewhat sluggish of thought, willing to spend one day like another, and all in a long dream.

Sometimes, in the afternoons, when he was alone in the garden or upon the terrace, with the house blank and silent behind him, the slaves gone to the quarters, he tossed aside his book, and, with his chin upon his hand and his eyes upon the sweep of the river, first asked himself whither he was going, and then, finding no satisfactory answer, fell to brooding.