Elsie has just got back from an expedition to the Sea Islands. She had
had her eye on those islands for a long time, she tells me. They lie off
the coast of South Carolina, out of the way of all traffic, and they
looked to her like a good hunting ground for African folk-lore. Her
ethnological field-work is always taking her off to such places. I
suppose that that Englishman, Selous, used to go around studying maps,
and questioning natives about the best jungles for lions, in much the
same way that Elsie constantly studies our continent, looking for some
corner of it that might interest an intelligent person. The parts that
are civilization to us, are mere jungle to her: the houses and street
cars are like underbrush that she must push through, to get to the
places where her quarry is, and where she really wakes up. In between,
she lives in New York with us,--she has to,--and conforms to our ways,
or to most of them anyhow, just as Stefansson does with the Eskimos: she
wears the usual tribal adornments, and beadwork, and skins; she's as
dazzling as any other beauty, in her box at the opera; and she sleeps
and eats in the family's big stone igloo near Fifth Avenue. An
unobservant citizen might almost suppose she was one of us. But every
now and then her neglect of some small ceremonial sets our whole tribe
to chattering about her, and eyeing her closely, and nodding their hairy
coiffures or their tall shiny hats, whispering around their lodge-fires,
evenings, that Elsie is queer.
When she went south this time, she first placed herself "in the hands of
the whites," as she detachedly puts it: that is to say, she became the
guest of a white family on one of the more civilized islands. This was a
mistake. They were interested in her plans, and they didn't in the least
mean to block them, but they felt it was necessary for them to go around
with her everywhere. They wanted to be sure nothing happened,--and Elsie
wanted to be sure something did. "They guarded me," she exclaimed, over
and over, when she told me this part of it. I got an impression of her
tramping off into the wilds, after breakfast, to look around for what
she was after, in her business-like way; and of worried hostesses
panting along, following her,--in spite of the cold looks they got.
There were also a number of small difficulties. Her smoking, for
instance. Her hostesses didn't mind--much; but they had a brother, a
clergyman, just back from France, where he had been in the Y. M. C. A.
service; and it would upset _him_, they said. So instead of smoking
downstairs, by the fire, she had to do it up in her room; and also burn
Chinese incense after each smoke, by request.
This clergyman held family prayer-meetings, regularly, which everybody
was supposed to attend; but Elsie did not object. She is always
interested in ritual. And the singing was often of negro spirituals,
which she is collecting. She has a recording phonograph nowadays, that
she takes around with her, to get them.
This wasn't what she had come down for, however. It wasn't enough. And
not being able to explore without being "guarded" made the country no
use to her. The game was too shy to be stalked with a whole crowd of
whites. So in order to make a new entrance, she decided on a preliminary
retreat. She left the islands, went back to the mainland, and took a
room in a boarding-house.
There was a lady in the neighborhood who once had collected a few negro
tales, but who told Elsie that the colored folk around there didn't tell
them now. The lady wanted to be obliging, and called in her cook to make
sure; but the cook corroborated her statement: didn't know any, no
ma'am.
Elsie formed the opinion that the cook probably knew plenty of stories,
but would not talk freely to whites. Few or none of them will. She kept
on making inquiries, however, as to possible sources, and finally heard
about one old negro who was said to be chock-full of folk-lore. Elsie
got on his trail. She found him one day in the street, and she soon won
him over. He not only told her all he knew, but he stopped a one-armed
man going by,--a dirty man with a wheel-barrow full of old bottles--who,
the old man said, knew other stories, and who promptly made good,
telling several that Elsie took down, while she sat on the curb.
This negro's name was Mr. Jack--at least that is how Elsie speaks of
him. He had lost his other arm after a man had shot him up, he said,
skylarking. But he could do remarkable things with his remaining one:
open an umbrella, for instance. He said that on one of the islands there
were people who knew lots of old tales. So Elsie engaged Mr. Jack to go
there with her, as guide, and off they sailed, like the owl and the
pussy-cat, only with quite other intentions, and they ultimately landed
on the beach of the island he'd chosen. There was no wharf. The Sea
Islands are primitive. They had to land in the surf. There were two or
three natives on the beach, just the way there were when Columbus
appeared, but they didn't fall down and worship Elsie--as I should have
done. They just stared, and shuffled away, and were lost in the bush.
So Elsie and Mr. Jack pushed on inland, and found a negro with a horse,
and Elsie gave him some sticks of tobacco and bright-colored cloth, or
whatever currency it is she uses, and added him to her expedition. His
name was James Bone, and he had a cart as well as a horse. They all got
in this cart and went cruising away into the interior.
It was raining like mad, I forgot to say, but they didn't much mind, and
besides it had a result in the end that was lucky for Elsie. There was a
store on this island, and James Bone was heading for it, with the idea
of depositing Elsie there so she could get shelter. But when they got
there, the white man who kept it said his wife was away, and probably
wouldn't be back that night because of the rain. Elsie wished to stay
anyhow, but he flatly declined to take her in unless his wife came.
After making a silent study of his moral ideas, which he expressed
loudly, and writing them down in her notebooks (I hope) for the Folkways
Society, Elsie quietly went out in the rain again to continue her
travels. It was now dark, however, and Mr. Jack and James Bone were
tired. The expedition conferred. James Bone said they could go to some
friends of his, named (I think) Peevie, who had a large house with five
rooms in it. So they steered for this landmark. But when they arrived,
very late, all the five rooms were found to be full. In addition to the
whole Peevie family, which was sufficiently numerous, there were several
Peevie relations and guests who had come on for a funeral. But James
Bone was insistent. He went indoors and stirred them up and made a lot
of talk and excitement, and never stopped until the funeral guests rose
and went away, in the rain; and with them all the relations except old
Aunt Justine and her nieces. These and the regular family somehow packed
themselves into three rooms, and gave up the two best to Elsie, who
promptly retired. I don't know where Mr. Jack slept. Maybe under the
cart.
This cabin was about the most comfortable place Elsie stayed. She could
smoke all she wished, she had a fireplace, and the cooking was good. Her
two rooms were only six by ten apiece, but all the more cozy. Old Aunt
Justine who at first had not liked it, thawed after a while, and sat
around with Elsie and smoked with her and told her old tales. She was a
picturesque ancient, Elsie says, and wore a large clean white turban.
Everybody came and told Elsie all the stories they knew. If any one
passed on the road, he was hailed to come in: "Hi, Numph, d'you wanter
make a quarter, telling this lady a story?"
"We wouldn't have told you any, though, if you had stayed at the store,"
James Bone said. "We don't have no traffic with the white folks, only
buying or selling. They keep to themselves, and we keep to ourselves,
'cept for that."
Elsie put it all down. "No nexus exists but the economic one between the
two groups," she wrote. Then, having exhausted this island, she packed
up her notebooks, and she and Mr. Jack put to sea again to visit one
other.
This other was an island where Mr. Jack said he had relatives, whom he
would love dearly to see again if they were alive. He had lived right
over on the mainland without visiting them for about twenty years, until
Elsie came along and roused his energies; but he now felt warmed up.
When they landed, however, none of his relatives were at all glad to see
him. He and Elsie wandered around for a while, getting a chilling
reception, until late in the day they met some women who were opening
oysters. One of these exclaimed at seeing Mr. Jack, and gave him a great
welcome. An old sweetheart, Elsie conjectured. Mr. Jack introduced her.
These women gave Elsie a handful of oysters to eat for her supper, and
she got out some of her own thick bran cookies which are so good for the
stomach, and they sat by the fire and talked together until it was
midnight. Then the oyster boat left for the mainland, with Elsie
aboard. And luckily there was a man on that boat who knew some valuable
stories, so Elsie sat up all night taking them down, by a ship's lamp,
as they sailed. The wind was light and it was five hours before they
reached port.
She parted with Mr. Jack, on the oyster-dock landing, at dawn. "I stayed
wid you to de en'," he said; and afterwards mailed her her rubbers.
There is more to this story, about her visiting the Cherokee Indians
down there. But I don't remember the Cherokee chapter as well as the old
Mr. Jack one. Still I hope this gives some kind of picture of Elsie's
real life.