August 27.
Dear old Daddy Ancrum came dressed in his Sunday best to tell me all he
could remember of his past life. I had asked him some time ago to come
some day when he felt quite well—but I was quite touched at his dressing
in his very best for the occasion. It was most interesting to me and
I wrote it all down. According to the dates he gave me he is 91 years
old—with all his faculties and in good health.
Next Sunday there is to be a "funeral sarmint," preached for Chloe's
aunt, a person of distinction in the colored world, and Chloe and Patty
both want to go. I will keep Goliah, so as to have some one in the yard.
As we drove to-day I asked him if he could cook rice; that if he could
cook I might have him do so Sunday. He said he could, but as he would
answer that to any question asked as to his powers I asked him to tell
me how he did it. He began:—
"Fust t'ing yo' roll up yo' sleeve es high as yo' kin, en yo' tak soap
en yo' wash yo' han' clean. Den you wash yo' pot clean, fill um wid col'
wata en put on de fia. Now w'ile yo' wata de bile, yo' put yo' rice een
a piggin en yo' wash um well, den when yo' dun put salt een yo' pot, en
'e bile high, yo' put yo' rice een, en le' um bile till 'e swell, den
yo' pour off de wata, en put yo' pot back o' de stove, for steam."
I was so impressed with the opening sentences that I determined at once
to let him cook my Sunday dinner instead of eating it cold, but when I
told Chloe she was filled with indignation.
"Miss Pashuns, if I neber eat rice again I won't eat rice Goliah cook!
But den I'se bery scornful!"
[Illustration: Fanning and pounding rice for household use.]
August 29.
Chloe and Patty went to the funeral "sarmint," and it was grand. The
eulogies of the departed were satisfactory to all. They left in the
buckboard at 10 o'clock and returned at dusk, the church being six miles
away. When I asked what the preacher said about Elsa, Chloe answered:—
"'E set um high, but eberybody groan an' say amen to ebery wud. Fust
t'ing 'e say she wus a fair'oman; what 'e had to say 'e say to yo'
face. She wusn't tale bearer, she wusn't 'struction maker. She wus a
stewardness of de chutch en always fait'ful. She house wus a place fo'
de preecher en de elda' to fin' a home w'en eber dey kum. En de feebla'
en de olda' she husband git, de mo' she was 'evoted to him; nobody neber
hear um say she tyad, nite en day she nuss um; she was a wirtue to im,
en a sample to de yung womens."
I could not help thinking Solomon could not say more for the woman whose
value he set above rubies.
I have had a very peaceful day. I did not feel strong enough to go to
church. Goliah boiled the rice beautifully, and I made my dinner of rice
and milk and rested. The heat has been fierce lately and I feel wilted,
but the first autumn month will soon be here.
September 1.
The papers tell of floods everywhere, but they have not yet reached us.
The Pee Dee is reported higher at Cheraw than it has ever been. It takes
its rise in a spring under Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina, and
so a rainy season in the mountains or melting snows always give us a
disastrous freshet, now that the banks have been stripped of trees, the
whole of its long and winding course.
[Illustration: Pounding rice.]
September 3.
Bonaparte sent me word last night that the water had made a great
rise during the day and I had better come down early. I could not get
breakfast in time, so I took a glass of cold coffee and a piece of
bread, and went.
The barn with my rice, a very large two story building, was surrounded
by water about fifty feet. With the aid of a boat Bonaparte made a very
swaying bridge and I went in with all the empty sacks which could be
gathered, and measured and bagged the rice, removed a plank from the
flooring of the barn above, and had the seventy-five bushels taken up.
There was no time to call hands, as the water was rising rapidly to the
floor where the rice was piled, so Gibbie and Dab with Bonaparte did it
all. We had an active and very dusty morning, but unless the foundations
of the barn give way the rice is safe.
I was perfectly charmed to find I had so much, for I have been eating
it and paying for my work with it and trading it for two years; it has
been a perfect widow's cruse.
Coming home the clay gully was so high that the water came into the
buckboard. Ruth didn't like it and pulled until she broke the harness,
but we got out safely.
September 4.
All the roads we usually travel are impassable, the bridges under water
or floating. The men go through a cart path which avoids the bridges,
but it is a roundabout way and does not help me a bit, so I just plunge
through the clay gully every day.
All the men are in despair. The entire rice crop is about four feet
under water and there is very little hope of saving any. I have been
so unhappy because I had not planted any rice and accused myself of
supineness because I was afraid of going into debt to plant any, and
now I am so filled with thanksgiving that I didn't, and feel that I was
specially guided not to do it.
September 5.
Poor Gibbie is so determined not to work that he has broken the plough.
I was very anxious to have land for turnips and rape prepared and Gibbie
could only get out of it by breaking all three of the ploughs. Then I
got him to mowing the hay, and he promptly broke the mowing machine.
The cause of these mishaps is Gibbie's sporting tastes. All the men on
the place, who will not pay their rent, are over the river with guns
making large bags of game of different sorts. The poor rabbits and other
things having taken refuge on any knoll or stump and are easily shot as
the water recedes.
I might as well give up any effort to have work done until the waters
have entirely subsided. The damage from the freshet is wide-spread, but
thank God! no loss of life or cattle.
September 6.
In the corn-field all day. We never gather and house corn as early as
this, but the stealing is so much worse than usual that it is either
now or never. I could only get the women out, so I made Goliah do the
hauling. I rode Romola, and she was very disagreeable and restless.
September 7.
In the corn-field yesterday and to-day. A perfect day, and the air crisp
and not too hot. Oh, the beauty of the sky and air and trees and the
black-eyed Susans and goldenrod everywhere! Oh, the mercy and goodness
of God in making all this beauty and showering it on us unsatisfactory,
discontented, grumbling mortals!
As I sit under a tree and drink in all this beauty and wonder, I resolve
never to think myself hardly used, never to long after the yellow gold
which greases the wheels of the world and makes life so easy, while I
have all this golden glory of beauty and sunshine, and the power to see
it and enjoy it to the full.
The week's stay in the field has rewarded me. I have in the barn 550
bushels of corn and about two tons of sweet, dry hay—only the first
cutting and not a drop of rain on it.
Last Wednesday Gibbie asked me to lend him my canoe. I hesitated, for
it is a very nice white boat. He said:—
"Miss, ef you'll len' me I'll be keerful wid um en I'll gi'e you some
bud fo' pay fo' um ebry day."
I at once consented to let him have it if he would give me a dozen birds
as rent.
The next morning I went down to the plantation with the pleasant
expectation of having a nice dinner; the rice birds are tiny, but
delicious. When I was leaving I asked Gibbie where my birds were, he
brought out three and said they had had a poor night's sport.
The next day he said there were none, as there was no dew and they could
not get them when there was no dew. Friday night there was too much
wind, he said.
On Monday, when I asked him, he said he didn't go out Saturday night, as
it was too close to Sunday and he had to prepare for church. I thought
that quite proper and only said incidentally, as it were:—
"And you did not go last night?"
"Oh, no, ma'am; not Sunday night. I wouldn't do sich a t'ing."
I thought how careful Gibbie was to observe the Fourth Commandment, as
they begin their operations about 2 A.M., but I said nothing and left
the garden where he was working. As I left he turned to Goliah and took
out of his pocket a five-dollar bill and said:—
"Look w'at I make Saturday en Sunday night!"
Goliah told Chloe how Gibbie had showed him the money and told him that
no night since he had the boat had he made less than $2. This evening I
told him I could not let him have the boat any more, as he had been so
unsuccessful.
He raised his voice and declared solemnly he hadn't been out but the
one night and had given me three birds, which he intimated was handsome,
and talked on in an injured voice. I only laughed and said I was sorry
he was so unlucky; that I could not lend my boat any more.
They take lightwood torches and thresh the bushes with a long rod or
switch and kill the birds, often getting two or three bushels in a
night, which they sell to men waiting on the banks for 35 cents a dozen.
I have made another effort to get the men to pay their house rent now
that they are making so much money so easily, but in vain. As some one
said to me the other day: "I never realized the power of a lie until
recently! Any one who can make a plausible lie and stick to it, seems
impregnable."
It is an awful thought, for we know who is the father of lies, the
Prince of Darkness. There is no shaking my faith, however, in the
ultimate triumph in that never ending, to-the-death struggle between
the powers of darkness and light,—that the light will conquer every
stronghold of darkness until the perfect day reigns the world over.