It was a long time before it dawned upon my mind there were places
and people different from these. The plantations we visited seemed
exactly like ours. The same hospitality everywhere, the same kindliness
existing between the white family and the blacks.
Confined exclusively to plantation scenes, the most trifling incidents
impressed themselves indelibly upon me.
One day while my mother was in the yard attending to the planting of
some shrubbery, we saw approaching an old, feeble negro man, leaning
upon his stick. His clothes were nearly worn out, and he, haggard and
thin.
"Good day, Mistess," said he.
"Who are you?" asked my mother.
"My name is John," he replied, "and I belonged to your husband's uncle.
He died a long time ago. Before he died he set me free and gave me
a good piece of land near Petersburg, and some money and stock. But
all--my money and land--all gone, and I was starving. So I come one
hundred miles to beg you and master please let me live and die on your
plantation. I don't want to be free no longer. Please don't let me be
free."
I wondered what was meant by being "free," and supposed from his
appearance it must be some very dreadful and unfortunate condition of
humanity. My mother heard him very kindly, and directed him to the
kitchen where "Aunt Christian" would give him a plenty to eat.
Although there were already a number of old negroes to be supported,
who no longer considered themselves young enough to work, this old man
was added to the number, and a cabin built for him. To the day of his
death he expressed gratitude to my mother for taking care of him, and
often entertained us with accounts of _his_ "old master's times," which
he said were the "grandest of all."
By way of apology for certain knotty excrescences on his feet, he
used to say: "You see these here knots. Well, they come from my being
a monstrous proud young nigger, and squeezin' my feet in de tightest
boots to drive my master's carriage 'bout Petersburg. I nuver was
so happy as when I was drivin' my coach-an'-four, and crackin' de
postillion over de head wid my whip."
These pleasant reminiscences were generally concluded with: "Ah! young
Misses, _you'll_ nuver see sich times. No more postillions! No more
coach-an'-four! And niggers drives _now_ widout they white gloves. Ah!
no, young Misses, _you'll_ nuver see nothin'! _Nuver_, in _your_ time."
With these melancholy predictions would he shake his head, and sigh
that the days of glory had departed.
Each generation of blacks vied with the other in extolling the virtues
of their particular mistress and master and "_their times_;" but
notwithstanding this mournful contrast between the past and present,
their reminiscences had a certain charm. Often by their cabin firesides
would we listen to the tales of the olden days about our forefathers,
of whom they could tell much, having belonged to our family since the
landing of the African fathers on the English slave ships, from which
their ancestors had been bought by ours. Among these traditions none
pleased us so much as that an unkind mistress or master had never been
known among our ancestors, which we have always considered a cause for
greater pride than the armorial bearings left on their tombstones.
We often listened with pleasure to the recollections of an old blind
man--the former faithful attendant of our grand-father--whose mind
was filled with vivid pictures of the past. He repeated verbatim
conversations and speeches heard sixty years before--from Mr. Madison,
Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Clay, and other statesmen, his master's special
friends.
"Yes," he used to say, "I staid with your grandpa ten years in
Congress, and all the time he was Secretary for President Jefferson. He
nuver give me a cross word, and I nuver saw your grandma the least out
of temper neither, but once, and that was at a dinner party 'we' give
in Washington, when the French Minister said something disrespectful
about the United States."
Often did he tell us: "The greatest pleasure I expect in heaven, is
seeing my old master." And sometimes, "I dream about my master and
mistress when I am sleep, and talk with them and see them so plain it
makes me so happy that I laugh out right loud."
This man was true and honest--a good Christian. Important trusts had
been confided to him. He frequently carried the carriage and horses to
Washington and Baltimore--a journey of two weeks--and sometimes sent to
carry a large sum of money to a distant county.
His wife, who had accompanied him in her youth to Washington, also
entertained us with gossip about the people of that day, and could
tell exactly the size and color of Mrs. Madison's slippers, how she
was dressed on certain occasions, "what beautiful manners she had,"
how Mr. Jefferson received master and mistress when "we" drove up to
Monticello, what room they occupied, &c.
Although my grand-father's death occurred thirty years before, the
negroes still remembered it with sorrow; and one of them, speaking of
it, said to me, "Ah, little mistess, 'twas a sorrowful day when de news
come from Washington dat our good, kind master was dead. A mighty wail
went up from dis plantation, for we know'd we had loss our bes friend."
The only negro on the place who did not evince an interest in the white
family was a man ninety years old, who, forty years before, announced
his intention of not working any longer--although still strong and
athletic--because, he said, "the estate had done come down so he hadn't
no heart to work no longer." He remembered, he said, "when thar was
three and four hundred black folks, but sence de British debt had to be
paid over by his old master, and de Macklenbug estate had to be sold,
he hadn't had no heart to do nothin' sence." And "he hadn't seen no
_real_ fine white folks--what _he_ called real fine white folks--sence
he come from Macklenbug." All his interest in life having expired with
an anterior generation; we were in his eyes but a poor set, and he
refused to have anything to do with us. Not being compelled to work,
he passed his life principally in the woods, wore a rabbit-skin cap
and a leather apron. Having lost interest in, and connection with the
white family, he gradually relapsed into a state of barbarism, refusing
towards the end of his life to sleep in his bed, preferring a hard
bench in his cabin, upon which he died.
Another very old man remembered something of his father, who had come
from Africa; and when we asked him to tell us what he remembered of his
father's narrations, would say:
"My father told us that his mother lived in a hole in the ground,
and when the English people come to Africa she sold him for a string
of beads. He said ''twas mighty hard for him, when he fus come to
dis country, to wear clothes.' Sometimes he would git so mad wid us
chillun, my mammy would have to run and hide us to keep him from
killin' us. Den sometimes at night he would say: 'He gwine sing he
country,' den he would dance and jump and howl and skeer us to death."
They spoke always of their forefathers as the "outlandish people."
On some plantations it was a custom to buy the wife when a negro
preferred to marry on another estate. And in this way we became
possessed of a famous termagant, who had married our grand-father's
gardener, quarrelled him to death in one year and survived to quarrel
forty years longer with the other negroes. She had no children--not
even a cat or dog could live with her. She had been offered her
freedom, but refused to accept it. Several times had been given away;
once to her son--a free man--and to others with whom she fancied
she might live, but, like the bad penny, was always returned to
us. She always returned in a cart, seated on top of her chest and
surrounded by her goods and chattels, dressed in a high hat, long black
plume--standing straight up--gay cloth spencer and short petticoat,
the costume of a hundred years ago. Although her return was a sore
affliction to the plantation, my sister and myself found much amusement
in witnessing it. The cold welcome she received seemed not to affect
her spirits, but re-establishing herself in her cabin she quickly
resumed the turbulent course of her career.
Finally one morning the news came that this woman, old Clara, was dead.
Two women went to sweep her cabin and perform the last sad offices.
They waited all day for the body to get cold. While sitting over the
fire in the evening, one of them happening to glance at a small mirror
inserted in the wall near the bed, exclaimed: "Old Clara's laughing!"
They went nearer and there was a horrible grin on the face of the
corpse! Old Clara sprang out of bed exclaiming, "Git me some meat and
bread. I'm most perish'd!"
"Old woman, what you mean by foolin' us so?" asked the nurses.
"I jes want see what you all gwine do wid my _things_ when I _was_
dead!" replied the old woman, whose "things" consisted of all sorts of
old and curious spencers, hats, plumes, necklaces, caps and dresses,
collected during her various wanderings and worn by a long past
generation.
Among these old cabin legends we sometimes collected bits of romance,
and were often told how, by the coquetry of a certain Richmond belle,
we had lost a handsome fortune, which impressed me even then with the
fatal consequences of coquetry.
This belle engaged herself to our great uncle--a handsome and
accomplished gentleman--who, to improve his health, went to Europe; but
before embarking made his will, leaving her his estate and negroes.
He died abroad, and the lady accepted his property, although she was
known to have been engaged to twelve others at the same time! The story
in Richmond ran that these twelve gentlemen--my grand-father among
them--had a wine party, and towards the close of the evening some of
them becoming communicative, began taking each other out to tell a
secret when it was discovered they all had the same secret--each was
engaged to Miss Betsy M----. This lady's name is still seen on fly
leaves of old books in our library--books used during her reign by
students at William and Mary College--showing that the young gentlemen,
even at that venerable Institution, allowed their classic thoughts
sometimes to wander.