The man who earns by the sweat of his brow or the cunning of his mind a
comfortable living for those dependent upon him should not complain but
consider the mean lot of others, less fortunate, and rejoice at his good
fate. There is not a day of my life that I do not see some wretch faring
worse than I; some poor person struggling desperately to keep body and
soul together.
Let us thank God for a sound mind and a sound body: that we do not think
side-whiskers are pretty and that we have not hair-lips.
One day not long ago, while hurrying from my work, I passed a Greek
peanut roaster, and wondered about his lot. Day after day I had seen him
with his little push-cart, but rarely had I observed any customers.
“How fares it to-day?” said I, as I hurried by.
“Fine, thank you: little mon, good book, good health, and heap of joy!”
“There is a philosopher,” thought I to myself. “He is a happy man. His
life seems to be sweet, although he has but little of the goods of this
world.”
That very day John, that son of Athens, had sold less than fifty cents
worth of truck, yet he was rejoicing as he sat on the curbing, reading
the life of Thomas Jefferson in Greek.
On a fine afternoon, in the spring of 1898, I walked from the Hotel
LaFayette, at Fayetteville, to the Cape Fear river. I had a purpose in
making the trip; I had been threatened with a fit of melancholia and
was trying to stave it off. I strolled down to the water’s edge, where
fishermen were wont to tie their boats at night, and stood there looking,
looking, studying the topography of the country and the people in their
labor for bread and meat.
I tarried on a pretty little hill, just above the river, where I had
a good view of the water and surrounding fields. The territory for a
hundred yards square in my immediate vicinity was bald and smooth from
the constant tread of fishermen’s feet. Back of that, early vegetables
and succulent grasses were springing up. Along the shore a dozen or more
batteaus, or small fishing boats, were chained to stakes, or anchored to
each other.
Far up and down the river I could see men in boats, gliding noiselessly
along the banks, setting hooks for the evening bite. It was past the
middle of the afternoon and the big fish, cats, carp and red horse, were
beginning to run. This the fishermen knew and were hurrying to place
their hooks, baited with mussels. At nine o’clock at night and early the
next morning the hooks were looked.
While standing there, gazing here and there, I saw a party of small
negro boys, wading to their waists in the water, graveling in the sand,
for mussels to sell to the fishermen. Silently and doggedly, the little
fellows hunted the slimy, shell-covered creatures, gathering them by the
hundred.
The longer I remained there on that knoll, in the midst of that
peculiarly fascinating life, the more interested I became. Every man,
every woman and every boy or girl appealed to me. Between five-thirty and
six o’clock the men who baited and placed the hooks came ashore, fastened
their boats, and went to their respective homes for supper and a moment
with their wives and children before starting out for the night fish. I
saw them go and come with their nets. From dark until about ten o’clock
they fished for shad, the most valuable fish in the Cape Fear at that
season of the year.
It is intensely fascinating to watch the movements and study the habits
and manners of the people who get their living from the water. They
belong to a certain class and are of a certain type, differing from their
brothers and sisters who till the soil. Loving the water and having
become so used to it, they would not quit it for the land.
As a rule, river people are strong and ruddy. Their faces are hard and
sunburned and their muscles well-knit and tough.
It is a wholesome life.
These be the sort of men I saw that afternoon. On the ground they were
awkward, ill at ease, and grouchy, but in their boats graceful, sturdy
and merry.
Soon after I went down to the river and settled myself, to look on and
learn what I could of the ways of the living things about me, I heard a
shuffling noise behind me, and when I turned to ascertain the cause, my
eyes fell upon the most pitiful creature it had ever been my fortune to
see. A woman, yes, a woman, one of God’s noblest creatures, stood and
gazed in wonderment at me. She had approached within a few feet of me
before she realized that I was a living being; I was hid from the view of
the path that leads from the town to the river by a thicket of weeds and
grass.
Once I began to look at the woman I could not keep from staring at her.
She was ragged, wrinkled and unwashed. The clothes that covered her back,
all bent and misshapen, were tattered and torn. Her leathery face was
deeply seamed and drawn. The queer sound that attracted my attention
as she came up, was made by her shoes, which were large, not mates, and
without strings. They slipped up and down upon her naked heels and made
the “slick-slack,” “slick-slack” noise, so familiar to the country boy
who has plowed in his father’s cast-off brogans, several numbers too
large for his feet.
The woman was pathetic-looking, her crestfallen face was partially hid
from me by an antiquated, dilapidated, weather-beaten split bonnet. Every
garment she wore was a misfit and threadbare.
I felt myself drawn to this poverty-stricken creature. In order that I
might find out something about her, I engaged her in conversation before
she could wheel and escape.
“Are you going fishing?” I asked.
“No,” she answered pleasantly; “I came down to see if I could see my old
man. He is fishing.”
“Do you live here?”
“Yes. We have lived in this town thirty-odd years; me and my old man.”
“What does he do for a living?”
“Well, he fishes now. He is getting so old and feeble that he cannot do
anything else. When young and strong, he worked on a freight boat on
the river, but his health failed about ten years ago, and we have had a
mighty hard time since. I have actually seed the time that we did not
have enough to eat. He is proud, and would not beg. He fishes, while I
tries to make a little money washing and sewing, but he will not let me
work much.”
“Have you any children?”
“No, sir, Mister; God never gave us any, and I expect it is best. We
are so poor they might have a hard time. Me and him are all of the two
families left. He is the only person that I have to look to and he is
good to me. He does his best, and God will not forget him for it.”
“Do you own a home?”
“No, sir. We have nothing but a little bit of furniture. We live in a
rented house and the man who owns it could put us out to-night, but he is
a Christian and would not do it. We have paid no rent in six years. We
just can’t; that’s the reason. But it won’t be long now, for my old man
is getting weak--weaker day by day. He can’t live much longer, and when
he goes I hope that I may go too. We have been together forty-odd years,
and in death I pray that God will not part us.
“The Lord has been good to us. We get comfort from the Bible.
“We don’t see anybody nowadays; we go nowhere, and nobody comes to see
us. The friends we had in more prosperous days have deserted us; there
is nothing about us to attract people. Some seem to shun us through fear
that we may beg, but never, never; we would starve first. My old man is
too proud to beg. I live in fear that he may get so feeble that he cannot
go and that we will have nothing. He often says that he hopes he will die
some night after fishing all day. If he does, I want to go too.”
“Do you ever go to church?”
“No, Mister; we haven’t been in goin’ on ten years. We have no fit
clothes. The churches look too fine inside for our old rags, but we read
our old Bible every Sunday. We can’t read much now; our eyes are bad; but
we get much comfort out of the Good Book.
“The Church folks don’t ever come to see us. They don’t need us, as we
ain’t got no money to give. I guess when we die some good preacher will
say a word over our graves; I don’t know.”
This said, the old woman moved on toward the river, craning her neck as
she went, so that she could see to the right of a clump of trees that
stood near the water, looking for her husband, but she must not have seen
him, for she soon passed back on her way home.
Becoming interested in what she said, I made up my mind to remain there
till the old gentleman arrived and look him over. I had a long wait, for
it was almost dark when his little boat hove in sight. His wife had been
back and looked up the river several times. She seemed lonely, restless
and uneasy.
I felt sorry for the old woman, but was afraid to say so. It was, as she
said, a bitter fight for existence. The aged pair had no associates, and
actually suffered from poverty.
The last time she came to the landing she carried in her arms a tiny,
toothless, starved dog.
“Is that your pet?” said I, anxious to reopen the conversation.
“Yes, he’s nearly twenty-two years old, and has been ours since a pup.”
“He is very old,” I declared, for the want of something better.
“Yes; and blind, and toothless.”
“Why do you keep him?”
“For what he has been. It would be cruel to kill him or desert him now,
when he cannot take care of himself. I shall keep him until he dies,
unless I go first. When he was younger he kept me company, and guarded
our little home, when my old man was down the river for days and nights
at a time, and now, if God spares me, I will see him through. I have to
make a sort of soup for him to eat, and guide his footsteps. I do not
think he is here for much longer; he is getting very thin and frail.”
She let him down on the ground by her side, and said: “Fido, do you love
your mistress?” and the grateful little brute shook his tail.
The wife was not there when the husband came; though I had never seen him
before I knew him when he landed. His face was haggard and worn, and his
body emaciated. Some disease preyed at his vitals. His constitution was
gone, but the blazing fire of pride still burned in his gray eyes. The
will and the spirit were there. He had a fair string of fish, and after
eating the smaller ones would have enough left to bring twenty-five cents.
Having tied his boat, he shouldered his tackle, took up his fish, and
climbed the hill past me. I did not see his eyes searching for the
faithful wife who had four times come to greet him; this lack of care I
did not like. He seemed too indifferent. Possibly he was disappointed
when his old companion was not there to meet him, not knowing that
she had come and gone time after time. He dragged his weary limbs over
the brow of the hill, and toward the city. As he went by, I had a good
opportunity to observe his clothes. He was not the one-gallus fellow
that the politicians so often refer to, but the no-gallus one. His
trousers were held up by sharp hip-bones and his shirt was decorated with
vari-colored patches.
I followed the old man, until he met his wife, who was coming in a
half-trot from their little cabin. The meeting was full of meaning. No
word was uttered; no time lost. He looked solemn, the least bit angry,
and she smiled, a bitter sad smile, and turned and followed him. Her eyes
were on the fish, giving them a cash valuation.
All of this passed without a sound from either.
That night, after I had enjoyed a good meal, to gratify my curiosity I
walked by the home of the lonely couple, and found them enjoying a pipe
of tobacco each. The little dog was there, on the top step between them,
and they were apparently happy.
As I moved on, I said to myself: “I wonder how it would feel to be
penniless, friendless, decrepit and old, but too proud to beg?”
May fortune smile on the old fisherman, his loyal helpmeet and their
little dog!