Bricks Without Straw
by
Albion W. Tourgee
Part 1 out of 9
Charles Aldarondo, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team
BRICKS WITHOUT STRAW
_A Novel_
BY
ALBION W. TOURGEE, LL.D.,
LATE JUDGE OF THE SUPERIOR COURT OF NORTH CAROLINA
THIS VOLUME I GRATEFULLY DEDICATE TO
My Wife;
TO WHOSE UNFLINCHING COURAGE, UNFALTERING FAITH, UNFAILING CHEER,
AND STEADFAST LOVE, I OWE MORE THAN MANY VOLUMES MIGHT DECLARE.
TRANSLATION:
[_From an ancient Egyptian Papyrus-Roll, recently discovered._]
It came to pass that when Pharaoh had made an end of giving
commandment that the children of Israel should deliver the daily
tale of bricks, but should not be furnished with any straw wherewith
to make them, but should instead go into the fields and gather
such stubble as might be left therein, that Neoncapos, the king's
jester, laughed.
And when he was asked whereat he laughed, he answered, At the king's
order.
And thereupon he laughed the more.
Then was Pharaoh, the king, exceeding wroth, and he gave commandment
that an owl be given to Neoncapos, the king's jester, and that he
be set forth without the gate of the king's palace, and that he be
forbidden to return, or to speak to any in all the land, save only
unto the owl which had been given him, until such time as the bird
should answer and tell him what he should say.
Then they that stood about the king, and all who saw Neoncapos,
cried out, What a fool's errand is this! So that the saying remains
even unto this day.
Nevertheless, upon the next day came Neoncapos again into the
presence of Pharaoh, the king.
Then was Pharaoh greatly astonished, and he said, How is this? Hath
the bird spoken?
And Neoncapos, the king's jester, bowed himself unto the earth,
and said, He hath, my lord.
Then was Pharaoh, the king, filled with amazement, and said, Tell
me what he hath said unto thee.
And Neoncapos raised himself before the king, and answered him,
and said:
As I went out upon the errand whereunto thou hadst sent me forth,
I remembered thy commandment to obey it. And I spake only unto
the bird which thou gavest me, and said unto him:
There was a certain great king which held a people in bondage, and
set over them task-masters, and required of them all the bricks
that they could make, man for man, and day by day;
For the king was in great haste seeking to build a palace which
should be greater and nobler than any in the world, and should
remain to himself and his children a testimony of his glory forever.
And it came to pass, at length, that the king gave commandment that
no more straw should be given unto them that made the bricks, but
that they should still deliver the tale which had been aforetime
required of them.
And thereupon the king's jester laughed.
Because he said to himself, If the laborers have not straw wherewith
to attemper the clay, but only stubble and chaff gathered from
the fields, will not the bricks be ill-made and lack strength and
symmetry of form, so that the wall made thereof will not be true
and strong, or fitly joined together? For the lack of a little
straw it may be that the palace of the great king will fall upon
him and all his people that dwell therein. Thereupon the king was
wroth with his fool, and his countenance was changed, and he spake
harshly unto him, and--
It matters not what thou saidst unto the bird, said the king. What
did the bird say unto thee?
The bird, said Neoncapos, bowing himself low before the king, the
bird, my lord, looked at me in great amaze, and cried again and
again, in an exceeding loud voice: _Who! Who-o! Who-o-o!_
Then was Pharaoh exceeding wroth, and his anger burned within him,
and he commanded that the fool should be taken and bound with cords,
and cast into prison, while he should consider of a fit punishment
for his impudent words.
NOTE.-A script attached to this manuscript, evidently of later
date, informs us that the fool escaped the penalty of his folly by
the disaster at the Red Sea.
CONTENTS
I. TRI-NOMINATE
II. THE FONT
III. THE JUNONIAN RITE
IV. MARS MEDDLES
V. NUNC PRO TUNC
VI. THE TOGA VIRILIS
VII. DAMON AND PYTHIAS
VIII. A FRIENDLY PROLOGUE
IX. A BRUISED REED
X. AN EXPRESS TRUST
XI. RED WING
XII. ON THE WAY AY TO JERICHO
XIII. NEGOTIATING A TREATY
XIV. BORN OF THE STORM
XV. TO HIM AND HIS HEIRS FOREVER
XVI. A CHILD OF THE HILLS
XVII. GOOD-MORROW AND FAREWELL
XVIII. "PRIME WRAPPERS,"
XIX. THE SHADOW OF THE FLAG,
XX. PHANTASMAGORIA,
XXI. A CHILD-MAN
XXII. HOW THE FALLOW WAS SEEDED
XXIII. AN OFFERING OF FIRST-FRUITS
XXIV. A BLACK DBMOCRITUS
XXV. A DOUBLE-HEADED ARGUMENT
XXVI. TAKEN AT HIS WORD
XXVII. MOSES IN THE SUNSHINE
XXVIII. IN THE PATH OF THE STORM
XXIX. LIKE AND UNLIKE
XXX. AN UNBIDDEN GUEST
XXXI. A LIFE FOR A LIFE
XXXII. A VOICE FROM THE DARKNESS
XXXIII. A DIFFERENCE OF OPINION
XXXIV. THE MAJESTY OF THE LAW
XXXV. A PARTICULAR TENANCY LAPSES
XXXVI. THE BEACON-LIGHT OF LOVE
XXXVII. THE "BEST FRIENDS" REVEAL THEMSELVES
XXXVIII. "THE ROSE ABOVE THE MOULD,"
XXXIX. WHAT THE MIST HID
XL. DAWNING
XLI. Q. E. D.
XLII. THROUGH A CLOUD-RIFT
XLIII. A GLAD GOOD-BY
XLIV. PUTTING THIS AND THAT TOGETHER
XLV. ANOTHER OX GORED
XLVI. BACKWARD AND FORWARD
XLVII. BREASTING THE TORRENT
XLVIII. THE PRICE OF HONOR
XLIX. HIGHLY RESOLVED
L. FACE ANSWERETH UNTO FACE
LI. HOW SLEEP THE BRAVE?
LII. REDEEMED OUT OF THE HOUSE OF BONDAGE
LIII. IN THE CYCLONE
LIV. A BOLT OUT OF THE CLOUD
LV. AN UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER
LVI. SOME OLD LETTERS
LVII. A SWEET AND BITTER FRUITAGE
LVIII. COMING TO THE FRONT
LIX. THE SHUTTLECOCK OF FATE
LX. THE EXODIAN
LXI. WHAT SHALL THE END BE?
LXII. How?
BRICKS WITHOUT STRAW.
CHAPTER I.
TRI-NOMINATE.
"Wal, I 'clar, now, jes de quarest ting ob 'bout all dis matter
o' freedom is de way dat it sloshes roun' de names 'mong us cullud
folks. H'yer I lib ober on de Hyco twenty year er mo'--nobody but
ole Marse Potem an' de Lor', an' p'raps de Debble beside, know
'zackly how long it mout hev been--an' didn't hev but one name in
all dat yer time. An' I didn't hev no use for no mo' neither, kase
dat wuz de one ole Mahs'r gib me hisself, an' nobody on de libbin'
yairth nebber hed no sech name afo' an' nebber like to agin. Dat
wuz allers de way ub ole Mahs'r's names. Dey used ter say dat he
an' de Debble made 'em up togedder while he wuz dribin' roun' in dat
ole gig 'twixt de diff'ent plantations--on de Dan an' de Ro'noke,
an' all 'bout whar de ole cuss could fine a piece o' cheap lan",
dat would do ter raise niggers on an' pay for bringin' up, at de
same time. He was a powerful smart man in his day, wuz ole Kunnel
Potem Desmit; but he speshully did beat anythin' a findin' names
fer niggers. I reckon now, ef he'd 'a hed forty thousan' cullud
folks, men an' wimmen, dar wouldn't ha' been no two on 'em hevin'
de same name. Dat's what folks used ter say 'bout him, ennyhow.
Dey sed he used ter say ez how he wasn't gwine ter hey his niggers
mixed up wid nobody else's namin', an' he wouldn't no mo' 'low ob
one black feller callin' ob anudder by enny nickname ner nothin'
ub dat kine, on one o' his plantations, dan he would ob his takin'
a mule, nary bit. Dey du say dat when he used ter buy a boy er
gal de berry fust ting he wuz gwine ter du wuz jes ter hev 'em up
an' gib 'em a new name, out 'n out, an' a clean suit ob close ter
'member it by; an' den, jes by way ob a little 'freshment, he used
ter make de oberseer gib 'em ten er twenty good licks, jes ter make
sure ob der fergittin' de ole un dat dey'd hed afo'. Dat's what
my mammy sed, an' she allers 'clar'd dat tow'rd de las' she nebber
could 'member what she was at de fus' no more'n ef she hed'nt been
de same gal.
"All he wanted ter know 'bout a nigger wuz jes his name, an' dey
say he could tell straight away when an' whar he wuz born, whar
he'd done lived, an' all 'bout him. He war a powerful man in der
way ob names, shore. Some on 'em wuz right quare, but den agin
mos' all on 'em wuz right good, an' it war powerful handy hevin' no
two on 'em alike. I've heard tell dat a heap o' folks wuz a takin'
up wid his notion, an' I reckon dat ef de s'rrender hed only stood
off long 'nuff dar wouldn't 'a been nary two niggers in de whole
State hevin' de same names. Dat _would_ hev been handy, all
roun'!
"When dat come, though, old Mahs'r's plan warn't nowhar. Lor' bress
my soul, how de names did come a-brilin' roun'! I'd done got kinder
used ter mine, hevin' bed it so long an' nebber knowin' myself by
any udder, so't I didn't like ter change. 'Sides dat, I couldn't
see no use. I'd allers got 'long well 'nuff wid it--all on'y jes
once, an' dat ar wuz so long ago I'd nigh about forgot it. Dat
showed what a debblish cute plan dat uv ole Mahs'r's was, though.
"Lemme see, dat er wuz de fus er secon' year atter I wuz a plow-boy.
Hit wuz right in de height ob de season, an' Marse War'--dat was de
oberseer--he sent me to der Cou't House ob an ebenin' to do some
sort ob arrant for him. When I was a comin' home, jes about an hour
ob sun, I rides up wid a sort o' hard-favored man in a gig, an' he
looks at me an' at de hoss, when I goes ter ride by, mighty sharp
like; an' fust I knows he axes me my name; an' I tole him. An' den
he axes whar I lib; an' I tole him, "On de Knapp-o'-Reeds plantation."
Den he say,
"'Who you b'long to, ennyhow, boy?'
"An' I tole him 'Ole Marse Potem Desmit, sah'--jes so like.
"Den he sez 'Who's a oberseein' dar now?'
"An' I sez, 'Marse Si War', sah?'
"Den he sez, 'An' how do all de ban's on Knapp-o Reeds git 'long
wid ole Marse Potem an' Marse Si War'?'
"An' I sez, 'Oh, we gits 'long tol'able well wid Marse War', sah.'
"An' he sez, 'How yer likes old Marse Potem?'
"An' I sez, jes fool like, 'We don't like him at all, sah.'
"An' he sez, 'Why?'
"An' I sez, 'Dunno sah.'
"An' he sez, 'Don't he feed?'
"An' I sez, 'Tol'able, I spose.'
"An' he sez, 'Whip much?'
"An' I sez, 'Mighty little, sah.'
"An' he sez, 'Work hard?'
"An' I sez, 'Yes, moderate, sah.' "An' he sez, 'Eber seed him?'
"An' I sez, 'Not ez I knows on, sah.'
"An' he sez, 'What for don't yer like him, den?'
"An' I sez, 'Dunno, on'y jes' kase he's sech a gran' rascal.'
"Den he larf fit ter kill, an' say, 'Dat's so, dat's so, boy.' Den
he take out his pencil an' write a word er two on a slip o' paper
an' say,
"'H'yer, boy, yer gibs dat ter Marse Si War', soon ez yer gits
home. D'yer heah?'
"I tole him, 'Yes, sah,' an' comes on home an' gibs dat ter Marse
Si. Quick ez he look at it he say, 'Whar you git dat, boy? 'An' when
I tole him he sez, 'You know who dat is? Dat's old Potem Desmit!
What you say to him, you little fool?'
"Den I tell Marse War' all 'bout it, an' he lay down in de yard
an' larf fit ter kill. All de same he gib me twenty licks 'cordin'
ter de orders on dat little dam bit o' paper. An' I nebber tink o'
dat widout cussin', sence.
"Dat ar, now am de only time I ebber fault my name. Now what I
want ter change it fer, er what I want ob enny mo'? I don't want
'em. An' I tell 'em so, ebbery time too, but dey 'jes fo'ce em on
me like, an' what'll I do'bout it, I dunno. H'yer I'se got--lemme
see--one--two--tree! Fo' God, I don' know how many names I hez got!
I'm dod-dinged now ef I know who I be ennyhow. Ef ennybody ax me
I'd jes hev ter go back ter ole Mahs'r's name an' stop, kase I swar
I wouldn't know which ob de udders ter pick an' chuse from.
"I specs its all 'long o' freedom, though I can't see why a free
nigger needs enny mo' name dan the same one hed in ole slave times.
Mus' be, though. I mind now dat all de pore white folks hez got
some two tree names, but I allus thought dat wuz 'coz dey hedn't
nuffin' else ter call dere can. Must be a free feller needs mo'
name, somehow. Ef I keep on I reckon I'll git enuff atter a while.
H'yer it's gwine on two year only sence de s'rrender, an' I'se got
tree ob 'em sartain!"
The speaker was a colored man, standing before his log-house in
the evening of a day in June. His wife was the only listener to
the monologue. He had been examining a paper which was sealed and
stamped with official formality, and which had started him upon
the train of thought he had pursued. The question he was trying in
vain to answer was only the simplest and easiest of the thousand
strange queries which freedom had so recently propounded to him
and his race.
CHAPTER II.
THE FONT.
Knapp-of-reeds was the name of a plantation which was one of the
numerous possessions of P. Desmit, Colonel and Esquire, of the
county of Horsford, in the northernmost of those States which good
Queen Caroline was fortunate enough to have designated as memorials
of her existence. The plantation was just upon that wavy line which
separates the cotton region of the east from the tobacco belt that
sweeps down the pleasant ranges of the Piedmont region, east of
the Blue Appalachians. Or, to speak more correctly, the plantation
was in that indeterminate belt which neither of the great staples
could claim exclusively as its own--that delectable land where every
conceivable product of the temperate zone grows, if not in its
rankest luxuriance, at least in perfection and abundance. Tobacco
on the hillsides, corn upon the wide bottoms, cotton on the gray
uplands, and wheat, oats, fruits, and grasses everywhere. Five
hundred acres of hill and bottom, forest and field, with what was
termed the Island, consisting of a hundred more, which had never been
overflowed in the century of cultivation it had known, constituted
a snug and valuable plantation. It had been the seat of an old
family once, but extravagant living and neglect of its resources
had compelled its sale, and it had passed into the hands of its
present owner, of whose vast possessions it formed an insignificant
part.
Colonel Desmit was one of the men who applied purely business
principles to the opportunities which the South afforded in the
olden time, following everything to its logical conclusion, and
measuring every opportunity by its money value. He was not of an
ancient family. Indeed, the paternal line stopped short with his
own father, and the maternal one could only show one more link,
and then became lost in malodorous tradition which hung about an
old mud-daubed log-cabin on the most poverty-stricken portion of
Nubbin Ridge.
There was a rumor that the father had a left-handed kinship with
the Brutons, a family of great note in the public annals of the
State. He certainly showed qualities which tended to confirm this
tradition, and abilities which entitled him to be considered the
peer of the best of that family, whose later generations were by
no means the equals of former ones. Untiring and unscrupulous, Mr.
Peter Smith rose from the position of a nameless son of an unknown
father, to be as overseer for one of the wealthiest proprietors of
that region, and finally, by a not unusual turn of fortune's wheel,
became the owner of a large part of his employer's estates. Thrifty
in all things, he married in middle life, so well as nearly to
double the fortune then acquired, and before his death had become
one of the wealthiest men in his county. He was always hampered by
a lack of education. He could read little and write less. In his
later days he was appointed a Justice of the Peace, and was chosen
one of the County Court, or "Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions,"
as it was technically called. These honors were so pleasant to
him that he determined to give his only son a name which should
commemorate this event. The boy was, therefore, christened after the
opening words of his commission of the peace, and grew to manhood
bearing the name Potestatem Dedimus [Footnote: Potestatem dedimus:
"We give thee power, etc." The initial words of the clause conferring
jurisdiction upon officers, in the old forms of judicial commissions.
This name is fact, not fancy.] Smith. This son was educated
with care--the shrewd father feeling his own need--but was early
instilled with his father's greed for gain, and the necessity for
unusual exertion if he would achieve equal position with the old
families who were to be his rivals.
The young man proved a worthy disciple of his father. He married,
it is true, without enhancing his fortune; but he secured what was
worth almost as much for the promotion of his purposes as if he
had doubled his belongings. Aware of the ill-effects of so recent a
bar sinister in his armorial bearings, he sought in marriage Miss
Bertha Bellamy, of Belleville, in the State of Virginia, who
united in her azure veins at least a few drops of the blood of all
the first families of that fine-bred aristocracy, from Pocahontas's
days until her own. The _role_ of the gentleman had been
too much for the male line of the Bellamys to sustain. Horses and
hounds and cards and high living had gradually eaten down their
once magnificent patrimony, until pride and good blood and poverty
were the only dowry that the females could command. Miss Bertha,
having already arrived at the age of discretion, found that to match
this against the wealth of young Potestatem Dedimus Smith was as
well as she could hope to do, and accepted him upon condition that
the vulgar _Smith_ should be changed to some less democratic
name.
The one paternal and two maternal ancestors had not made the very
common surname peculiarly sacred to the young man, so the point was
yielded; and by considerable persistency on the part of the young
wife, "P. D. SMITH" was transformed without much trouble into "P.
DESMIT," before the administrator had concluded the settlement of
his father's estate.
The vigor with which the young man devoted himself to affairs and
the remarkable success which soon began to attend his exertions
diverted attention from the name, and before he had reached middle
life he was known over almost half the State as "Colonel Desmit,"
"Old Desmit," or "Potem Desmit," according to the degree of familiarity
or respect desired to be displayed. Hardly anybody remembered and
none alluded to the fact that the millionaire of Horsford was only
two removes from old Sal Smith of Nubbin Ridge. On the other hand
the rumor that he was in some mysterious manner remotely akin to
the Brutons was industriously circulated by the younger members of
that high-bred house, and even "the Judge," who was of about the
same age as Colonel Desmit, had been heard more than once to call
him "Cousin." These things affected Colonel Desmit but little. He
had set himself to improve his father's teachings and grow rich. He
seemed to have the true Midas touch. He added acre to acre, slave
to slave, business to business, until his possessions were scattered
from the mountains to the sea, and especially extended on both sides
the border line in the Piedmont region where he had been bred. It
embraced every form of business known to the community of which
he was a part, from the cattle ranges of the extreme west to the
fisheries of the farthest east. He made his possessions a sort of
self-supporting commonwealth in themselves. The cotton which he
grew on his eastern farms was manufactured at his own factory, and
distributed to his various plantations to be made into clothing
for his slaves. Wheat and corn and meat, raised upon some of his
plantations, supplied others devoted to non-edible staples. The
tobacco grown on the Hyco and other plantations in that belt was
manufactured at his own establishment, supplied his eastern laborers
and those which wrought in the pine woods to the southward at the
production of naval supplies. He had realized the dream of his own
life and the aspiration of his father, the overseer, and had become
one of the wealthiest men in the State. But he attended to all this
himself. Every overseer knew that he was liable any day or night
to receive a visit from the untiring owner of all this wealth, who
would require an instant accounting for every bit of the property
under his charge. Not only the presence and condition of every
slave, mule, horse or other piece of stock must be accounted for,
but the manner of its employment stated. He was an inflexible
disciplinarian, who gave few orders, hated instructions, and only
asked results. It was his custom to place an agent in charge of a
business without directions, except to make it pay. His only care
was to see that his property did not depreciate, and that the course
adopted by the agent was one likely to produce good results. So
long as this was the case he was satisfied. He never interfered,
made no suggestions, found no fault. As soon as he became dissatisfied
the agent was removed and another substituted. This was done without
words or controversy, and it was a well-known rule that a man once
discharged from such a trust could never enter his employ again.
For an overseer to be dismissed by Colonel Desmit was to forfeit
all chance for employment in that region, since it was looked upon
as a certificate either of incapacity or untrustworthiness.
Colonel Desmit was especially careful in regard to his slaves.
His father had early shown him that no branch of business was, or
could be, half so profitable as the rearing of slaves for market.
"A healthy slave woman," the thrifty father had been accustomed
to say, "will yield a thousand per cent upon her value, while
she needs less care and involves less risk than any other species
of property." The son, with a broader knowledge, had carried his
father's instructions to more accurate and scientific results. He
found that the segregation of large numbers of slaves upon a single
plantation was not favorable either to the most rapid multiplication
or economy of sustenance. He had carefully determined the fact
that plantations of moderate extent, upon the high, well-watered
uplands of the Piedmont belt, were the most advantageous locations
that could be found for the rearing of slaves. Such plantations,
largely worked by female slaves, could be made to return a small
profit on the entire investment, without at all taking into account
the increase of the human stock. This was, therefore, so much
added profit. From careful study and observation he had deduced
a specific formulary by which he measured the rate of gain. With
a well-selected force, two thirds of which should be females, he
calculated that with proper care such plantations could be made to
pay, year by year, an interest of five per cent on the first cost,
and, in addition, double the value of the working force every eight
years. This conclusion he had arrived at from scientific study of
the rates of mortality and increase, and in settling upon it he
had cautiously left a large margin for contingencies. He was not
accustomed to talk about his business, but when questioned as to
his uniform success and remarkable prosperity, always attributed it
to a system which he had inexorably followed, and which had never
failed to return to him at least twenty per cent. per annum upon
every dollar he had invested.
So confident was he in regard to the success of this plan that he
became a large but systematic borrower of money at the legal rate
of six per cent, taking care that his maturing liabilities should,
at no time, exceed a certain proportion of his available estate.
By this means his wealth increased with marvelous rapidity.
The success of his system depended, however, entirely upon the care
bestowed upon his slaves. They were never neglected. Though he had
so many that of hundreds of them he did not know even the faces, he
gave the closest attention to their hygienic condition, especially
that of the women, who were encouraged by every means to bear children.
It was a sure passport to favor with the master and the overseer:
tasks were lightened; more abundant food provided; greater liberty
enjoyed; and on the birth of a child a present of some sort was
certain to be given the mother.
The one book which Colonel Desmit never permitted anybody else to
keep or see was the register of his slaves. He had invented for
himself an elaborate system by which in a moment he could ascertain
every element of the value of each of his more than a thousand slaves
at the date of his last visitation or report. When an overseer was
put in charge of a plantation he was given a list of the slaves
assigned to it, by name and number, and was required to report
every month the condition of each slave during the month previous,
as to health and temper, and also the labor in which the same had
been employed each day. It was only as to the condition of the slaves
that the owner gave explicit directions to his head-men. "Mighty
few people know how to take care of a nigger," he was wont to say;
and as he made the race a study and looked to them for his profits,
he was attentive to their condition.
Among the requirements of his system was one that each slave born
upon his plantations should be named only by himself; and this was
done only on personal inspection. Upon a visit to a plantation,
therefore, one of his special duties always was to inspect, name,
and register all slave children who had been born to his estate
since his previous visitation.
It was in the summer of 1840 that a traveler drove into the grove
in front of the house at Knapp-of-Reeds, in the middle of a June
afternoon, and uttered the usual halloo. He was answered after a
moment's delay by a colored woman, who came out from the kitchen
and exclaimed,
"Who's dah?"
It was evident at once that visitors were not frequent at
Knapp-of-Reeds.
"Where's Mr. Ware?" asked the stranger.
"He's done gone out in de new-ground terbacker, long wid de han's,"
answered the woman.
"Where is the new-ground this year?" repeated the questioner.
"Jes' down on the p'int 'twixt de branch an' de Hyco," she replied.
"Anybody you can send for him?"
"Wal, thar mout be some shaver dat's big enough to go, but Marse
War's dat keerful ter please Marse Desmit dat he takes 'em all
outen de field afore dey can well toddle," said the woman doubtfully.
"Well, come and take my horse," said he, as he began to descend
from his gig, "and send for Mr. Ware to come up at once."
The woman came forward doubtfully and took the horse by the bit,
while the traveler alighted. No sooner did he turn fully toward
her than her face lighted up with a smile, and she said,
"Wal, dar, ef dat a'n't Marse Desmit hisself, I do believe! How
d'ye do, Mahs'r?" and the woman dropped a courtesy.
"I'm very well, thank ye, Lorency, an' glad to see you looking so
peart," he responded pleasantly. "How's Mr. Ware and the people?
All well, I hope."
"All tol'able, Mahs'r, thank ye."
"Well, tie the horse, and get me some dinner, gal. I haven't eaten
since I left home."
"La sakes!" said the woman in a tone of commiseration, though she
had no idea whether it was twenty or forty miles he had driven
since his breakfast.
The man who sat upon the porch and waited for the coming of
Mr. Silas Ware, his overseer, was in the prime of life, of florid
complexion, rugged habit, short stubbly hair--thick and bristling,
that stood close and even on his round, heavy head from a little
way above the beetling brows well down upon the bull-like neck which
joined but hardly separated the massive head and herculean trunk.
This hair, now almost white, had been a yellowish red, a hue which
still showed in the eyebrows and in the stiff beard which was allowed
to grow beneath the angle of his massive jaw, the rest of his face
being clean shaven. The eyes were deep-sunk and of a clear, cold
blue. His mouth broad, with firm, solid lips. Dogged resolution,
unconquerable will, cold-blooded selfishness, and a keen hog-cunning
showed in his face, while his short, stout form--massive but not
fleshy--betrayed a capacity to endure fatigue which few men could
rival.
"How d'ye, Mr. Ware?" he said as that worthy came striding in from
the new-ground nervously chewing a mouthful of home-made twist,
which he had replenished several times since leaving the field,
without taking the precaution to provide stowage for the quantity
he was taking aboard.
"How d'ye, Colonel?" said Ware uneasily.
"Reckon you hardly expected me to day?" continued Desmit, watching
him closely. "No, I dare say not. They hardly ever do. Fact is, I
rarely ever know myself long enough before to send word."
He laughed heartily, for his propensity for dropping in unawares
upon his agents was so well known that he enjoyed their confusion
almost as much as he valued the surprise as a means of ascertaining
their attention to his interests. Ware was one of his most trusted
lieutenants, however, and everything that he had ever seen or
heard satisfied him of the man's faithfulness. So he made haste to
relieve him from embarrassment, for the tall, awkward, shambling
fellow was perfectly overwhelmed.
"It's a long time since I've been to see you, Mr. Ware--almost
a year. There's mighty few men I'd let run a plantation that long
without looking after them. Your reports have been very correct,
and the returns of your work very satisfactory. I hope the stock
and hands are in good condition?"
"I must say, Colonel Desmit," responded Ware, gathering confidence,
"though perhaps I oughtn't ter say it myself, that I've never seen
'em lookin' better. 'Pears like everything hez been jest about ez
favorable fer hands an' stock ez one could wish. The spring's work
didn't seem ter worry the stock a mite, an' when the new feed come
on there was plenty on't, an' the very best quality. So they shed
off ez fine ez ever you see ennything in yer life, an' hev jest
been a doin' the work in the crop without turnin' a hair."
"Glad to hear it, Mr. Ware," said Desmit encouragingly.
"And the hands," continued Ware, "have jest been in prime condition.
We lost Horion, as I reported to you in--lemme see, February, I
reckon--along o' rheumatism which he done cotch a runnin' away from
that Navigation Company that you told me to send him to work for."
"Yes, I know. You told him to come home if they took him into
Virginia, as I directed, I suppose."
"Certainly, sir," said Ware; "an' ez near ez I can learn they took
him off way down below Weldon somewheres, an' he lit out to come
home jest at the time of the February 'fresh.' He had to steal
his way afoot, and was might'ly used up when he got here, and died
some little time afterward."
"Yes. The company will have to pay a good price for him. Wasn't a
better nor sounder nigger on the river," said Desmit.
"That ther warn't," replied Ware. "The rest has all been well.
Lorency had a bad time over her baby, but she's 'round again as
peart as ever." "So I see. And the crops?"
"The best I've ever seed sence I've been here, Colonel. Never had
such a stand of terbacker, and the corn looks prime. Knapp-of-Reeds
has been doin' better 'n' better ever sence I've knowed it; but
she's jest outdoin' herself this year."
"Haven't you got anything to drink, Ware?"
"I beg your _parding_, Colonel; I was that flustered I done
forgot my manners altogether," said Ware apologetically. "I hev
got a drap of apple that they say is right good for this region,
and a trifle of corn that ain't nothing to brag on, though it does
for the country right well."
Ware set out the liquor with a bowl of sugar from his sideboard as
he spoke, and called to the kitchen for a glass and water.
"That makes me think," said Desmit. "Here, you Lorency, bring me
that portmanty from the gig."
When it was brought he unlocked it and took out a bottle, which he
first held up to the light and gazed tenderly through, then drew
the cork and smelled of its contents, shook his head knowingly,
and then handed it to Ware, who went through the same performance
very solemnly.
"Here, gal," said Desmit sharply, "bring us another tumbler. Now,
Mr. Ware," said he unctuously when it had been brought, "allow me,
sir, to offer you some brandy which is thirty-five years old--pure
French brandy, sir. Put it in my portmanty specially for you, and
like to have forgot it at the last. Just try it, man."
Ware poured himself a dram, and swallowed it with a gravity which
would have done honor to a more solemn occasion, after bowing low
to his principal and saying earnestly, "Colonel, your very good
health."
"And now," said Desmit, "have the hands and stock brought up while
I eat my dinner, if you please. I have a smart bit of travel before
me yet to-day."
The overseer's horn was at Ware's lips in a moment, and before the
master had finished his dinner every man, woman, and child on the
plantation was in the yard, and every mule and horse was in the
barn-lot ready to be brought out for his inspection.
The great man sat on the back porch, and, calling up the slaves one
by one, addressed some remark to each, gave every elder a quarter
and every youngster a dime, until he came to the women. The first
of these was Lorency, the strapping cook, who had improved the time
since her master's coming to make herself gay with her newest gown
and a flaming new turban. She came forward pertly, with a young
babe upon her arm.
"Well, Lorency, Mr. Ware says you have made me a present since I
was here?"
"Yah! yah! Marse Desmit, dat I hab! Jes' de finest little nigger
boy yer ebber sot eyes on. Jes' you look at him now," she continued,
holding up her brighteyed pickaninny. "Ebber you see de beat ub
dat? Reg'lar ten pound, an' wuff two hundred dollars dis bressed
minnit."
"Is that it, Lorency?" said Desmit, pointing to the child. "Who
ever saw such a thunder-cloud?"
There was a boisterous laugh at the master's joke from the assembled
crowd. Nothing abashed, the good-natured mother replied, with ready
wit,
"Dat so, Marse Kunnel. He's _brack_, he is. None ob yer bleached
out yaller sort of coffee-cullud nigger 'bout _him_. De rale
ole giniwine kind, dat a coal make a white mark on. Yah I yah! what
yer gwine ter name him, Mahs'r? Gib him a good name, now, none o'
yer common mean ones, but jes' der bes' one yer got in yer book;"
for Colonel Desmit was writing in a heavy clasped book which rested
on a light stand beside him.
"What is it, Mahs'r?"
"Nimbus," replied the master.
"Wh--what?" asked the mother. "Say dat agin', won't yer, Mahs'r?"
"Nimbus--_Nimbus_," repeated Desmit.
"Wal, I swan ter gracious!" exclaimed the mother. "Ef dat don't
beat! H'yer! little--what's yer name? Jes' ax yer Mahs'r fer a
silver dollar ter pay yer fer hevin' ter tote dat er name 'roun'
ez long ez yer lives."
She held the child toward its godfather and owner as she spoke, amid
a roar of laughter from her fellow-servants. Desmit good-naturedly
threw a dollar into the child's lap, for which Lorency courtesied,
and then held out her hand.
"What do you want now, gal?" asked Desmit.
"Yer a'n't a gwine ter take sech a present ez dis from a pore cullud
gal an' not so much ez giv' her someting ter remember hit by, is
yer?" she asked with arch persistency.
"There, there," said he laughing, as he gave her another dollar.
"Go on, or I shan't have a cent left."
"All right, Marse Kunnel. Thank ye, Mahs'r," she said, as she walked
off in triumph.
"Oh, hold on," said Desmit; "how old is it, Lorency?"
"Jes' sebben weeks ole dis bressed day, Mahs'r," said the proud
mother as she vanished into the kitchen to boast of her good-fortune
in getting two silver dollars out of Marse Desmit instead of the one
customarily given by him on such occasions. And so the record
was made up in the brass-clasped book of Colonel Potestatem Desmit,
the only baptismal register of the colored man who twenty-six
years afterward was wondering at the names which were seeking him
against his will.
_697--Nimbus--of Lorency--Male--April 24th, 1840--Sound--Knapp-of-Reeds._
It was a queer baptismal entry, but a slave needed no more--indeed
did not need that. It was not given for his sake, but only for the
convenience of his godfather should the chattel ever seek to run
away, or should it become desirable to exchange him for some other
form of value. There was nothing harsh or brutal or degraded about
it. Mr. Desmit was doing, in a business way, what the law not only
allowed but encouraged him to do, and doing it because it paid.
CHAPTER III.
THE JUNONIAN RITE.
"Marse Desmit?"
"Well?"
"Ef yer please, Mahs'r, I wants ter marry?"
"The devil you do!"
"Yes, sah, if you please, sah."
"What's your name?"
"Nimbus."
"So: you're the curer at Knapp-of-Reeds, I believe?"
"Yes, sah." "That last crop was well done. Mr. Ware says you're
one of the best hands he has ever known."
"Thank ye, Mahs'r," with a bow and scrape.
"What's the gal's name?"
"Lugena, sah."
"Yes, Vicey's gal--smart gal, too. Well, as I've about concluded to
keep you both--if you behave yourselves, that is, as well as you've
been doing--I don't know as there's any reason why you shouldn't
take up with her."
"Thank ye, Mahs'r," very humbly, but very joyfully.
The speakers were the black baby whom Desmit had christened Nimbus,
grown straight and strong, and just turning his first score on the
scale of life, and Colonel Desmit, grown a little older, a little
grayer, a little fuller, and a great deal richer--if only the small
cloud of war just rising on the horizon would blow over and leave
his possessions intact. He believed it would, but he was a wise
man and a cautious one, and he did not mean to be caught napping
if it did not.
Nimbus had come from Knapp-of-Reeds to a plantation twenty miles
away, upon a pass from Mr. Ware, on the errand his conversation
disclosed. He was a fine figure of a man despite his ebon hue,
and the master, looking at him, very naturally noted his straight,
strong back, square shoulders, full, round neck, and shapely,
well-balanced head. His face was rather heavy--grave, it would
have been called if he had been white--and his whole figure and
appearance showed an earnest and thoughtful temperament. He was as
far from that volatile type which, through the mimicry of burnt-cork
minstrels and the exaggerations of caricaturists, as well as the
works of less disinterested portrayers of the race, have come to
represent the negro to the unfamiliar mind, as the typical Englishman
is from the Punch-and-Judy figures which amuse him. The slave Nimbus
in a white skin would have been considered a man of great physical
power and endurance, earnest purpose, and quiet, self-reliant
character. Such, in truth, he was. Except the whipping he had
received when but a lad, by his master's orders, no blow had ever
been struck him. Indeed, blows were rarely stricken on the plantations
of Colonel Desmit; for while he required work, obedience, and
discipline, he also fed well and clothed warmly, and allowed no
overseer to use the lash for his own gratification, or except for
good cause. It was well known that nothing would more surely secure
dismissal from his service than the free use of the whip. Not that
he thought there was anything wrong or inhuman about the whipping-post,
but it was entirely contrary to his policy. To keep a slave
comfortable, healthy, and good-natured, according to Colonel Desmit's
notion, was to increase his value, and thereby add to his owner's
wealth. He knew that Nimbus was a very valuable slave. He had
always been attentive to his tasks, was a prime favorite with his
overseer, and had already acquired the reputation of being one of the
most expert and trusty men that the whole region could furnish, for
a tobacco crop. Every step in the process of growing and curing--from
the preparation of the seed-bed to the burning of the coal-pit,
and gauging the heat required in the mud-daubed barn for different
kinds of leaf and in every stage of cure--was perfectly familiar
to him, and he could always be trusted to see that it was properly
and opportunely done. This fact, together with his quiet and contented
disposition, added very greatly to his value. The master regarded
him, therefore, with great satisfaction. He was willing to gratify
him in any reasonable way, and so, after some rough jokes at his
expense, wrote out his marriage-license in these words, in pencil,
on the blank leaf of a notebook:
MR. WARE: Nimbus and Lugena want to take up with each other. You
have a pretty full force now, but I have decided to keep them and
sell some of the old ones--say Vicey and Lorency. Neither have had
any children for several years, and are yet strong, healthy women,
who will bring nearly as much as the girl Lugena. I shall make
up a gang to go South in charge of Winburn next week. You may send
them over to Louisburg on Monday. You had better give Nimbus the
empty house near the tobacco-barn. We need a trusty man there.
Respectfully, P. DESMIT.
So Nimbus went home happy, and on the Saturday night following, in
accordance with this authority, with much mirth and clamor, and with
the half-barbarous and half-Christian ceremony--which the law did
not recognize; which bound neither parties, nor master nor stranger;
which gave Nimbus no rights and Lugena no privileges; which neither
sanctified the union nor protected its offspring--the slave "boy"
and "gal" "took up with each other," and began that farce which
the victims of slavery were allowed to call "marriage." The sole
purpose of permitting it was to raise children. The offspring were
sometimes called "families," even in grave legal works; but there
was no more of the family right of protection, duty of sustenance
and care, or any other of the sacred elements which make the family
a type of heaven, than attends the propagation of any other species
of animate property. When its purpose had been served, the voice
of the master effected instant divorce. So, on the Monday morning
thereafter the mothers of the so-called bride and groom, widowed
by the inexorable demands of the master's interests, left husband
and children, and those fair fields which represented all that they
knew of the paradise which we call home, and with tears and groans
started for that living tomb, the ever-devouring and insatiable
"far South."
CHAPTER IV.
MARS MEDDLES.
LOUISBURG, January 10, 1864.
MR. SILAS WARE:
DEAR SIR: In ten days I have to furnish twenty hands to work on
fortifications for the Confederate Government. I have tried every
plan I could devise to avoid doing so, but can put it off no longer.
I anticipated this long ago, and exchanged all the men I could
possibly spare for women, thinking that would relieve me, but it
makes no difference. They apportion the levy upon the number of
slaves. I shall have to furnish more pretty soon. The trouble is
to know who to send. I am afraid every devil of them will run away,
but have concluded that if I send Nimbus as a sort of headman of the
gang, he may be able to bring them through. He is a very faithful
fellow, with none of the fool-notions niggers sometimes get, I
think. In fact, he is too dull to have such notions. At the same
time he has a good deal of influence over the others. If you agree
with this idea, send him to me at once. Respectfully, P. DESMIT.
In accordance with this order Nimbus was sent on to have another
interview with his master. The latter's wishes were explained,
and he was asked if he could fulfil them. "Dunno," he answered
stolidly.
"Are you willing to try?"
"S'pect I hev ter, ennyhow, ef yer say so."
"Now, Nimbus, haven't I always been a good master to you?"
reproachfully.
No answer.
"Haven't I been kind to you always?"
"Yer made Marse War' gib me twenty licks once."
"Well, weren't you saucy, Nimbus? Wouldn't you have done that to
a nigger that called you a 'grand rascal' to your face?"
"S'pecs I would, Mahs'r."
"Of course you would. You know that very well. You've too much
sense to remember that against me now. Besides, if you are not
willing to do this I shall have to sell you South to keep you out
of the hands of the Yanks."
Mr, Desmit knew how to manage "niggers," and full well understood
the terrors of being "sold South." He saw his advantage in the
flush of apprehension which, before he had ceased speaking, made
the jetty face before him absolutely ashen with terror.
"Don't do dat, Marse Desmit, ef _you_ please! Don't do dat er
wid Nimbus! Mind now, Mahs'r, I'se got a wife an' babies."
"So you have, and I know you don't want to leave them."
"No more I don't, Mahs'r," earnestly.
"And you need not if you'll do as I want you to. See here, Nimbus,
if you'll do this I will promise that you and your family never
shall be separated, and I'll give you fifty dollars now and a
hundred dollars when you come back, if you'll just keep those other
fool-niggers from trying--mind' I say _trying_--to run away and
so getting shot. There's no such thing as getting to the Yankees,
and it would be a heap worse for them if they did, but you know
they _are_ such fools they might try it and get killed--which
would serve them right, only I should have to bear the loss."
"All right, Mahs'r, I do the best I can," said Nimbus.
"That's right," said the master.
"Here are fifty dollars," and he handed him a Confederate bill of
that denomination (gold value at that time, $3.21).
Mr. Desmit did not feel entirely satisfied when Nimbus and his
twenty fellow-servants went off upon the train to work for the
Confederacy. However, he had done all he could except to warn the
guards to be very careful, which he did not neglect to do.
Just forty days afterward a ragged, splashed and torn young ebony
Samson lifted the flap of a Federal officer's tent upon one of the
coast islands, stole silently in, and when he saw the officer's
eyes fixed upon him. asked,
"Want ary boy, Mahs'r?"
The tone, as well as the form of speech, showed a new-comer. The
officer knew that none of the colored men who had been upon the
island any length of time would have ventured into his presence
unannounced, or have made such an inquiry.
"Where did you come from?" he asked.
"Ober to der mainlan'," was the composed answer.
"How did you get here?"
"Come in a boat."
"Run away?"
"S'pose so."
"Where did you live?"
"Up de kentry--Horsford County."
"How did you come down here?" "Ben wukkin' on de bres'wuks."
"The dickens you have!"
"Yes, sah."
"How did you get a boat, then?"
"Jes' tuk it--dry so."
"Anybody with you?"
"No, Mahs'r."
"And you came across the Sound alone in an open boat?"
"Yes, Mahs'r; an' fru' de swamp widout any boat."
"I should say so," laughed the officer, glancing at his clothes.
"What did you come here for?"
"Jes'--_kase_."
"Didn't they tell you you'd be worse off with the Yankees than you
were with them?"
"Yes, sah."
"Didn't you believe them?"
"Dunno, sah."
"What do you want to do?"
"Anything."
"Fight the rebs?"
"Wal, I kin du it."
"What's your name?"
"Nimbus."
"Nimbus? Good name--ha! ha: what else?"
"Nuffin' else."
"Nothing else? What was your old master's name?"
"Desmit--Potem Desmit."
"Well, then, that's yours, ain't it--your surname--Nimbus Desmit?"
"Reckon not, Mahs'r."
"No? Why not?"
"Same reason his name ain't Nimbus, I s'pose."
"Well," said the officer, laughing, "there may be something in
that; but a soldier must have two names. Suppose I call you George
Nimbus?"
"Yer kin call me jes' what yer choose, sah; but my name's Nimbus
all the same. No Gawge Nimbus, nor ennything Nimbus, nor Nimbus
ennything--jes' Nimbus; so. Nigger got no use fer two names, nohow."
The officer, perceiving that it was useless to argue the matter
further, added his name to the muster-roll of a regiment, and
he was duly sworn into the service of the United States as George
Nimbus, of Company C, of the---Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry,
and was counted one of the quota which the town of Great Barringham,
in the valley of the Housatuck, was required to furnish to complete
the pending call for troops to put down rebellion. By virtue of
this fact, the said George Nimbus became entitled to the sum of
four hundred dollars bounty money offered by said town to such as
should give themselves to complete its quota of "the boys in blue,"
in addition to his pay and bounty from the Government. So, if it
forced on him a new name, the service of freedom was not altogether
without compensatory advantages.
Thus the slave Nimbus was transformed into the "contraband" George
Nimbus, and became not only a soldier of fortune, but also the
representative of a patriotic citizen of Great Barringham, who served
his country by proxy, in the person of said contraband, faithfully
and well until the end of the war, when the South fell--stricken
at last most fatally by the dark hands which she had manacled,
and overcome by their aid whose manhood she had refused to
acknowledge.
CHAPTER V.
NUNC PRO TUNC.
The first step in the progress from the prison-house of bondage
to the citadel of liberty was a strange one. The war was over. The
struggle for autonomy and the inviolability of slavery, on the part
of the South, was ended, and fate had decided against them. With
this arbitrament of war fell also the institution which had been
its cause. Slavery was abolished--by proclamation, by national
enactment, by constitutional amendment--ay, by the sterner logic
which forbade a nation to place shackles again upon hands which
had been raised in her defence, which had fought for her life and
at her request. So the slave was a slave no more. No other man
could claim his service or restrain his volition. He might go or
come, work or play, so far as his late master was concerned.
But that was all. He could not contract, testify, marry or give
in marriage. He had neither property, knowledge, right, or power.
The whole four millions did not possess that number of dollars
or of dollars' worth. Whatever they had acquired in slavery was
the master's, unless he had expressly made himself a trustee for
their benefit. Regarded from the legal standpoint it was, indeed,
a strange position in which they were. A race despised, degraded,
penniless, ignorant, houseless, homeless, fatherless, childless,
nameless. Husband or wife there was not one in four millions.
Not a child might call upon a father for aid, and no man of them
all might lift his hand in a daughter's defence. Uncle and aunt
and cousin, home, family--none of these words had any place in
the freedman's vocabulary. Right he had, in the abstract; in the
concrete, none. Justice would not hear his voice. The law was still
color-blinded by the past.
The fruit of slavery--its first ripe harvest, gathered with swords
and bloody bayonets, was before the nation which looked ignorantly
on the fruits of the deliverance it had wrought. The North did not
comprehend its work; the South could not comprehend its fate. The
unbound slave looked to the future in dull, wondering hope.
The first step in advance was taken neither by the nation nor by the
freedmen. It was prompted by the voice of conscience, long hushed
and hidden in the master's breast. It was the protest of Christianity
and morality against that which it had witnessed with complacency
for many a generation. All at once it was perceived to be a great
enormity that four millions of Christian people, in a Christian
land, should dwell together without marriage rite or family tie.
While they were slaves, the fact that they might be bought and sold
had hidden this evil from the eye of morality, which had looked
unabashed upon the unlicensed freedom of the quarters and the
enormities of the barracoon. Now all at once it was shocked beyond
expression at the domestic relations of the freedmen.
So they made haste in the first legislative assemblies that met in
the various States, after the turmoil of war had ceased, to provide
and enact:
I. That all those who had sustained to each other the relation of
husband and wife in the days of slavery, might, upon application
to an officer named in each county, be registered as such husband
and wife.
2. That all who did not so register within a certain time should
be liable to indictment, if the relation continued thereafter.
3. That the effect of such registration should be to constitute such
parties husband and wife, as of the date of their first assumption
of marital relations.
4. That for every such couple registered the officer should be
entitled to receive the sum of one half-dollar from the parties
registered.
There was a grim humor about this marriage of a race by wholesale,
millions at a time, and _nunc pro tunc;_ but especially quaint
was the idea of requiring each freed-man, who had just been torn,
as it were naked, from the master's arms, to pay a snug fee for
the simple privilege of entering upon that relation which the law
had rigorously withheld from him until that moment. It was a strange
remedy for a long-hidden and stubbornly denied disease, and many
strange scenes were enacted in accordance with the provisions of
this statute. Many an aged couple, whose children had been lost in
the obscure abysses of slavery, or had gone before them into the
spirit land, old and feeble and gray-haired, wrought with patience
day after day to earn at once their living and the money for this
fee, and when they had procured it walked a score of miles in order
that they might be "registered," and, for the brief period that
remained to them of life, know that the law had sanctioned the
relation which years of love and suffering had sanctified. It was
the first act of freedom, the first step of legal recognition or
manly responsibility! It was a proud hour and a proud fact for the
race which had so long been bowed in thralldom and forbidden even
the most common though the holiest of God's ordinances. What the
law had taken little by little, as the science of Christian slavery
grew up under the brutality of our legal progress, the law returned
in bulk. It was the first seal which was put on the slave's
manhood--the first step upward from the brutishness of another's
possession to the glory of independence. The race felt its importance
as did no one else at that time. By hundreds and thousands they
crowded the places appointed, to accept the honor offered to their
posterity, and thereby unwittingly conferred undying honor upon
themselves. Few indeed were the unworthy ones who evaded the sacred
responsibility thus laid upon them, and left their offspring to
remain under the badge of shame. When carefully looked at it was
but a scant cure, and threw the responsibility of illegitimacy
where it did not belong, but it was a mighty step nevertheless.
The distance from zero to unity is always infinity.
The county clerk in and for the county of Horsford sat behind
the low wooden railing which he had been compelled to put across
his office to protect him from the too near approach of those who
crowded to this fountain of rehabilitating honor that had recently
been opened therein. Unused to anything beyond the plantation on
which they had been reared, the temple of justice was as strange
to their feet, and the ways and forms of ordinary business as
marvelous to their minds as the etiquette of the king's palace to
a peasant who has only looked from afar upon its pinnacled roof.
The recent statute had imposed upon the clerk a labor of no little
difficulty because of this very ignorance on the part of those whom
he was required to serve; but he was well rewarded. The clerk was
a man of portly presence, given to his ease, who smoked a long-stemmed
pipe as he sat beside a table which, in addition to his papers and
writing materials, held a bucket of water on which floated a clean
gourd, in easy reach of his hand.
"Be you the clerk, sail?" said a straight young colored man, whose
clothing had a hint of the soldier in it, as well as his respectful
but unusually collected bearing.
"Yes," said the clerk, just glancing up, but not intermitting his
work; "what do you want?"
"If you please, sah, we wants to be married, Lugena and me."
"_Registered_, you mean, I suppose?"
"No, we don't, sah; we means _married_."
"I can't marry you. You'll have to get a license and be married by
a magistrate or a minister."
"But I heard der was a law---"
"Have you been living together as man and wife?"
"Oh, yes, sah; dat we hab, dis smart while."
"Then you want to be registered. This is the place. Got a
half-dollar?"
"Yes, sah?"
"Let's have it."
The colored man took out some bills, and with much difficulty
endeavored to make a selection; finally, handing one doubtfully
toward the clerk, he asked,
"Is dat a one-dollah, sah?"
"No, that is a five, but I can change it."
"No, I'se got it h'yer," said the other hastily, as he dove again
into his pockets, brought out some pieces of fractional currency and
handed them one by one to the officer until he said he had enough.
"Well," said the clerk as he took up his pen and prepared to fill
out the blank, "what is your name?"
"My name's Nimbus, sah."
"Nimbus what?"
"Nimbus nuffin', sah; jes' Nimbus." "But you must have another
name?"
"No I hain't. Jes' wore dat fer twenty-odd years, an' nebber hed
no udder."
"Who do you work for?"
"Wuk for myself, sah."
"Well, on whose land do you work?"
"Wuks on my own, sah. Oh, I libs at home an' boa'ds at de same
place, I does. An' my name's Nimbus, jes' straight along, widout
any tail ner handle."
"What was your old master's name?"
"Desmit--Colonel Potem Desmit."
"I might have known that," said the clerk laughingly, "from the
durned outlandish name. Well, Desmit is your surname, then, ain't
it?"
"No'taint, Mister. What right I got ter his name? He nebber gib
it ter me no more'n he did ter you er Lugena h'yer."
"Pshaw, I can't stop to argue with you. Here's your certificate."
"Will you please read it, sah? I hain't got no larnin'. Ef you
please, sah."
The clerk, knowing it to be the quickest way to get rid of them,
read rapidly over the certificate that Nimbus and Lugena Desmit had
been duly registered as husband and wife, under the provisions of
an ordinance of the Convention ratified on the---day of---, 1865.
"So you's done put in dat name--Desmit?"
"Oh, I just had to, Nimbus. The fact is, a man can't be married
according to law without two names."
"So hit appears; but ain't it quare dat I should hev ole Mahs'r's
name widout his gibbin' it ter me, ner my axin' fer it, Mister?"
"It may be, but that's the way, you see."
"So hit seems. 'Pears like I'm boun' ter hev mo' names 'n I knows
what ter do wid, jes' kase I's free. But de chillen--yer hain't
sed nary word about dem, Mister."
"Oh, I've nothing to do with them."
"But, see h'yer, Mister, ain't de law a doin dis ter make dem lawful
chillen?"
"Certainly."
"An' how's de law ter know which is de lawful chillen ef hit ain't
on dat ar paper?"
"Sure enough," said the clerk, with amusement. "That would have
been a good idea, but, you see, Nimbus, the law didn't go that
far."
"Wal, hit ought ter hev gone dat fur. Now, Mister Clerk, couldn't
you jes' put dat on dis yer paper, jes' ter "commodate me, yer
know."
"Perhaps so," good-naturedly, taking back the certificate; "what
do you want me to write?"
"Wal, yer see, dese yer is our chillen. Dis yer boy Lone--Axylone,
Marse Desmit called him, but we calls him Lone for short--he's
gwine on fo'; dis yer gal Wicey, she's two past; and dis little
brack cuss Lugena's a-holdin' on, we call Cap'n, kase he bosses
all on us--he's nigh 'bout a year; an' dat's all."
The clerk entered the names and ages of the children on the back
of the paper, with a short certificate that they were present,
and were acknowledged as the children, and the only ones, of the
parties named in the instrument.
And so the slave Nimbus was transformed, first into the "contraband"
and mercenary soldier _George Nimbus_, and then by marriage
into _Nimbus Desmit_.
CHAPTER VI.
THE TOGA VIRILIS.
But the transformations of the slave were not yet ended. The time
came when he was permitted to become a citizen. For two years he
had led an inchoate, nondescript sort of existence: free without
power or right; neither slave nor freeman; neither property nor
citizen. He had been, meanwhile, a bone of contention between the
Provisional Governments of the States and the military power which
controlled them. The so-called State Governments dragged him toward
the whipping-post and the Black Codes and serfdom. They denied
him his oath, fastened him to the land, compelled him to hire by
the year, required the respectfulness of the old slave "Mahs'r"
and "Missus," made his employer liable for his taxes, and allowed
recoupment therefor; limited his avocations and restricted his
opportunities. These would substitute serfdom for chattelism.
On the other hand the Freedman's Bureau acted as his guardian and
friend, looked after his interests in contracts, prohibited the
law's barbarity, and insisted stubbornly that the freedman was
a man, and must be treated as such. It needed only the robe of
citizenship, it was thought, to enable him safely to dispense with
the one of these agencies and defy the other. So the negro was
transformed into a citizen, a voter, a political factor, by act of
Congress, with the aid and assistance of the military power.
A great crowd had gathered at the little town of Melton, which was
one of the chief places of the county of Horsford, for the people
had been duly notified by official advertisement that on this day
the board of registration appointed by the commander of the military
district in which Horsford County was situated would convene there,
to take and record the names, and pass upon the qualifications,
of all who desired to become voters of the new body politic which
was to be erected therein, or of the old one which was to be
reconstructed and rehabilitated out of the ruins which war had
left.
The first provision of the law was that every member of such board
of registration should be able to take what was known in those
days as the "iron-clad oath," that is, an oath that he had never
engaged in, aided, or abetted any rebellion against the Government
of the United States. Men who could do this were exceedingly
difficult to find in some sections. Of course there were abundance
of colored men who could take this oath, but not one in a thousand
of them could read or write. The military commander determined,
however, to select in every registration district one of the most
intelligent of this class, in order that he might look after the
interests of his race, now for the first time to take part in any
public or political movement. This would greatly increase the
labors of the other members of the board, yet was thought not only
just but necessary. As the labor of recording the voters of a county
was no light one, especially as the lists had to be made out in
triplicate, it was necessary to have some clerical ability on the
board. These facts often made the composition of these boards
somewhat heterogeneous and peculiar. The one which was to register
the voters of Horsford consisted of a little old white man, who had
not enough of stamina or character to have done or said anything
in aid of rebellion, and who, if he had done the very best he knew,
ought yet to have been held guiltless of evil accomplished. In his
younger days he had been an overseer, but in his later years had
risen to the dignity of a landowner and the possession of one or
two slaves. He wrestled with the mysteries of the printed page with
a sad seriousness which made one regret his inability to remember
what was at the top until he had arrived at the bottom. Writing
was a still more solemn business with him, but he was a brave man
and would cheerfully undertake to transcribe a list of names, which
he well knew that anything less than eternity would be too short
to allow him to complete. He was a small, thin-haired, squeaky-voiced
bachelor of fifty, and as full of good intentions as the road to
perdition. If Tommy Glass ever did any evil it would not only be
without intent but from sheer accident.
With Tommy was associated an old colored man, one of those known
in that region as "old-issue free-niggers." Old Pharaoh Ray was a
venerable man. He had learned to read before the Constitution of
1835 deprived the free-negro of his vote, and had read a little
since. He wore an amazing pair of brass-mounted spectacles. His
head was surmounted by a mass of snowy hair, and he was of erect
and powerful figure despite the fact that he boasted a life of more
than eighty years. He read about as fast and committed to memory
more easily than his white associate, Glass. In writing they were
about a match; Pharaoh wrote his name much more legibly than Glass
could, but Glass accomplished the task in about three fourths of
the time required by Pharaoh.
The third member of the board was Captain Theron Pardee, a young
man who had served in the Federal army and afterward settled
in an adjoining county. He was the chairman. He did the writing,
questioning, and deciding, and as each voter had to be sworn he
utilized his two associates by requiring them to administer the
oaths and--look wise. The colored man in about two weeks learned
these oaths so that he could repeat them. The white man did not
commit the brief formulas in the four weeks they were on duty.
The good people of Melton were greatly outraged that this composite
board should presume to come and pass upon the qualifications of
its people as voters under the act of Congress, and indeed it was
a most ludicrous affair. The more they contemplated the outrage
that was being done to them, by decreeing that none should vote
who had once taken an oath to support the Government of the United
States and afterward aided the rebellion, the angrier they grew,
until finally they declared that the registration should not
be held. Then there were some sharp words between the ex-Federal
soldier and the objectors. As no house could be procured for the
purpose, he proposed to hold the registration on the porch of the
hotel where he stopped, but the landlord objected. Then he proposed to
hold it on the sidewalk under a big tree, but the town authorities
declared against it. However, he was proceeding there, when
an influential citizen kindly came forward and offered the use
of certain property under his control. There was some clamor, but
the gentleman did not flinch. Thither they adjourned, and the work
went busily on. Among others who came to be enrolled as citizens
was our old friend Nimbus.
"Where do you live?" asked the late Northern soldier sharply, as
Nimbus came up in. his turn in the long line of those waiting for
the same purpose.
"Down ter Red Wing, sah?"
"Where's that?"
"Oh, right down h'yer on Hyco, sah."
"In this county?"
"Oh, bless yer, yes, Mister, should tink hit was. Hit's not above
five or six miles out from h'yer."
"How old are you?"
"Wal, now, I don't know dat, not edzactly."
"How old do you think--twenty-one?"
"Oh, la, yes; more nor dat, Cap'."
"Born where?"
"Right h'yer in Horsford, sah."
"What is your name?"
"Nimbus."
"Nimbus what?" asked the officer, looking up.
"Nimbus nothin', sah; jes' straight along Nimbus."
"Well, but--" said the officer, looking puzzled, "you must have
some sort of surname."
"No, sah, jes' one; nigger no use for two names."
"Yah! yah! yah!" echoed the dusky crowd behind him. "You's jes'
right dah, you is! Niggah mighty little use fer heap o' names. Jes'
like a mule--one name does him, an' mighty well off ef he's 'lowed
ter keep dat."
"His name's Desmit," said a white man, the sheriff of the county,
who stood leaning over the railing; "used to belong to old Potem
Desmit, over to Louisburg. Mighty good nigger, too. I s'pec' ole
man Desmit felt about as bad at losing him as ary one he had."
"Powerful good hand in terbacker," said Mr. Glass, who was himself an
expert in "yaller leaf." "Ther' wasn't no better ennywhar' round."
"I knows all about him," said another. "Seed a man offer old Desmit
eighteen hundred dollars for him afore the war--State money--but
he wouldn't tech it. Reckon he wishes he had now."
"Yes," said the sheriff, "he's the best curer in the county. Commands
almost any price in the season, but is powerful independent, and
gittin' right sassy. Listen at him now?"
"They say your name is Desmit--Nimbus Desmit," said the officer;
"is that so?"
"No, tain't."
"Wasn't that your old master's name?" asked the sheriff roughly.
"Co'se it war," was the reply.
"Well, then, ain't it yours too?"
"No, it ain't."
"Well, you just ask the gentleman if that ain't so," said the
sheriff, motioning to the chairman of the board.
"Well," said that officer, with a peculiar smile, "I do not know
that there is any law compelling a freedman to adopt his former
master's name. He is without name in the law, a pure _nullius
filius_--nobody's son. As a slave he had but one name.
He _could_ have no surname, because he had no family. He
was arraigned, tried, and executed as 'Jim' or 'Bill' or 'Tom.'
The volumes of the reports are full of such cases, as The State
_vs._ 'Dick' or 'Sam.' The Roman custom was for the freedman
to take the name of some friend, benefactor, or patron. I do not
see why the American freedman has not a right to choose his own
surname."
"That is not the custom here," said the sheriff, with some chagrin,
he having begun the controversy.
"Very true," replied the chairman; "the custom--and a very proper
and almost necessary one it seems--is to call the freedman by a
former master's name. This distinguishes individuals. But when the
freedman refuses to acknowledge the master's name as his, who can
impose it on him? We are directed to register the names of parties,
and while we might have the right to refuse one whom we found
attempting to register under a false name, yet we have no power
to make names for those applying. Indeed, if this man insists that
he has but one name, we must, for what I can see, register him by
that alone."
His associates looked wise, and nodded acquiescence in the views
thus expressed.
"Den dat's what I chuse," said the would-be voter. "My name's
Nimbus--noffin' mo'."
"But I should advise you to take another name to save trouble
when you come to vote," said the chairman. His associates nodded
solemnly again.
"Wal, now, Marse Cap'n, you jes' see h'yer. I don't want ter carry
nobody's name widout his leave. S'pose I take ole Marse War's name
ober dar?"
"You can take any one you choose. I shall write down the one you
give me."
"Is you willin', Marse War'?"
"I've nothing to do with it, Nimbus," said Ware; "fix your own
name."
"Wal sah," said Nimbus, "I reckon I'll take dat ef I must hev enny
mo' name. Yer see he wuz my ole oberseer, Mahs'r, an' wuz powerful
good ter me, tu. I'd a heap ruther hev his name than Marse Desmit's;
but I don't _want_ no name but Nimbus, nohow.
"All right," said the chairman, as he made the entry. "Ware it is
then."
As there might be a poll held at Red Wing, where Nimbus lived, he
was given a certificate showing that _Nimbus Ware_ had been
duly registered as an elector of the county of Horsford and for
the precinct of Red Wing.
Then the newly-named Nimbus was solemnly sworn by the patriarchal
Pharaoh to bear true faith and allegiance to the government of the
United States, and to uphold its constitution and the laws passed
in conformity therewith; and thereby the recent slave became a
component factor of the national life, a full-fledged citizen of
the American Republic.
As he passed out, the sheriff said to those about him, in a low
tone,
"There'll be trouble with that nigger yet. He's too sassy. You'll
see."
"How so?" asked the chairman. "I thought you said he was industrious,
thrifty, and honest."
"Oh, yes," was the reply, "there ain't a nigger in the county got
a better character for honesty and hard work than he, but he's too
important--has got the big head, as we call it."
"I don't understand what you mean," said the chairman.
"Why he ain't respectful," said the other. "Talks as independent
as if he was a white man."
"Well, he has as much right to talk independently as a white man.
He is just as free," said the chairman sharply.
"Yes; but he ain't white," said the sheriff doggedly, "and our
people won't stand a nigger's puttin' on such airs. Why, Captain,"
he continued in a tone which showed that he felt that the fact he
was about to announce must carry conviction even to the incredulous
heart of the Yankee officer. "You just ought to see his place down
at Red Wing. Damned if he ain't better fixed up than lots of white
men in the county. He's got a good house, and a terbacker-barn,
and a church, and a nigger school-house, and stock, and one of
the finest crops of terbacker in the county. Oh, I tell you, he's
cutting a wide swath, he is." "You don't tell me," said the
chairman with interest. "I am glad to hear it. There appears to
be good stuff in the fellow. He seems to have his own ideas about
things, too."
"Yes, that's the trouble," responded the sheriff. "Our people
ain't used to that and won't stand it. He's putting on altogether
too much style for a nigger."
"Pshaw," said the chairman, "if there were more like him it would
be better for everybody. A man like him is worth something for
an example. If all the race were of his stamp there would be more
hope."
"The devil!" returned the sheriff, with a sneering laugh, "if they
were all like him, a white man couldn't live in the country. They'd
be so damned sassy and important that we'd have to kill the last
one of 'em to have any peace."
"Fie, sheriff," laughed the chairman good-naturedly; "you seem to
be vexed at the poor fellow for his thrift, and because he is doing
well."
"I am a white man, sir; and I don't like to see niggers gittin'
above us. Them's my sentiments," was the reply. "And that's the
way our people feel."
There was a half-suppressed murmur of applause among the group of
white men at this. The chairman responded,
"No doubt, and yet I believe you are wrong. Now, I can't help
liking the fellow for his sturdy manhood. He may be a trifle too
positive, but it is a good fault. I think he has the elements of
a good citizen, and I can't understand why you feel so toward him."
There were some appreciative and good-natured cries of "Dar now,"
"Listen at him," "Now you're talkin'," from the colored men at this
reply.
"Oh, that's because you're a Yankee," said the sheriff, with
commiserating scorn. "You don't think, now, that it's any harm to
talk that way before niggers and set them against the white people
either, I suppose?"
The chairman burst into a hearty laugh, as he replied,
"No, indeed, I don't. If you call that setting the blacks against
the whites, the sooner they are by the ears the better. If you
are so thin-skinned that you can't allow a colored man to think,
talk, act, and prosper like a man, the sooner you get over your
squeamishness the better. For me, I am interested in this Nimbus.
We have to go to Red Wing and report on it as a place for holding
a poll and I am bound to see more of him."
"Oh, you'll see enough of him if you go there, never fear," was
the reply.
There was a laugh from the white men about the sheriff, a sort
of cheer from the colored men in waiting, and the business of the
board went on without further reference to the new-made citizen.
The slave who had been transformed into a "contraband" and
mustered as a soldier under one name, married under another, and
now enfranchised under a third, returned to his home to meditate
upon his transformations--as we found him doing in our first chapter.
The reason for these metamorphoses, and their consequences, might
well puzzle a wiser head than that of the many-named but unlettered
Nimbus.
CHAPTER VII.
DAMON AND PYTHIAS.
After his soliloquy in regard to his numerous names, as given in our
first chapter, Nimbus turned away from the gate near which he had
been standing, crossed the yard in front of his house, and entered
a small cabin which stood near it.
"Dar! 'Liab," he said, as he entered and handed the paper which he
had been examining to the person addressed, "I reckon I'se free
now. I feel ez ef I wuz 'bout half free, ennyhow. I wuz a sojer,
an' fought fer freedom. I've got my house an' bit o' lan', wife,
chillen, crap, an' stock, an' it's all mine. An' now I'se done been
registered, an' when de 'lection comes off, kin vote jes' ez hard
an' ez well an' ez often ez ole Marse Desmit. I hain't felt free
afore--leastways I hain't felt right certain on't; but now I reckon
I'se all right, fact an' truth. What you tinks on't, 'Liab?"
The person addressed was sitting on a low seat under the one window
which was cut into the west side of the snugly-built log cabin. The
heavy wooden shutter swung back over the bench. On the other side
of the room was a low cot, and a single splint-bottomed chair stood
against the open door. The house contained no other furniture.
The bench which he occupied was a queer compound of table, desk,
and work-bench. It had the leathern seat of a shoemaker's bench,
except that it was larger and wider. As the occupant sat with his
back to the window, on his left were the shallow boxes of a shoemaker's
bench, and along its edge the awls and other tools of that craft
were stuck in leather loops secured by tacks, as is the custom of
the crispin the world over. On the right was a table whose edge
was several inches above the seat, and on which were some books,
writing materials, a slate, a bundle of letters tied together with
a piece of shoe-thread, and some newspapers and pamphlets scattered
about in a manner which showed at a glance that the owner was
unaccustomed to their care, but which is yet quite indescribable.
On the wall above this table, but within easy reach of the sitter's
hand, hung a couple of narrow hanging shelves, on which a few books
were neatly arranged. One lay open on the table, with a shoemaker's
last placed across it to prevent its closing.
Eliab was already busily engaged in reading the certificate which
Nimbus had given him. The sun, now near its setting, shone in at
the open door and fell upon him as he read. He was a man apparently
about the age of Nimbus--younger rather than older--having a fine
countenance, almost white, but with just enough of brown in its
sallow paleness to suggest the idea of colored blood, in a region
where all degrees of admixture were by no means rare. A splendid
head of black hair waved above his broad, full forehead, and an
intensely black silky beard and mustache framed the lower portion
of his face most fittingly. His eyes were soft and womanly, though
there was a patient boldness about their great brown pupils and a
directness of gaze which suited well the bearded face beneath. The
lines of suffering were deeply cut upon the thoughtful brow and
around the liquid eyes, and showed in the mobile workings of the
broad mouth, half shaded by the dark mustache. The face was not
a handsome one, but there was a serious and earnest calmness about
it which gave it an unmistakable nobility of expression and prompted
one to look more closely at the man and his surroundings.
The shoulders were broad and square, the chest was full, the figure
erect, and the head finely poised. He was dressed with unusual
neatness for one of his race and surroundings, at the time of which
we write. One comprehended at a glance that this worker and learner
was also deformed. There was that in his surroundings which showed
that he was not as other men. The individuality of weakness and
suffering had left its indelible stamp upon the habitation which
he occupied. Yet so erect and self-helping in appearance was the
figure on the cobbler's bench that one for a moment failed to note
in what the affliction consisted. Upon closer observation he saw
that the lower limbs were sharply flexed and drawn to the leftward,
so that the right foot rested on its side under the left thigh.
This inclined the body somewhat to the right, so that the right
arm rested naturally upon the table for support when not employed.
These limbs, especially below the knees, were shrunken and distorted.
The shoe of the right foot whose upturned sole rested on the left
leg just above the ankle, was many sizes too small for a development
harmonious with the trunk.
Nimbus sat down in the splint-bottomed chair by the door and fanned
himself with his dingy hat while the other read.
"How is dis, Nimbus? What does dis mean? _Nimbus Ware?_
Where did you get dat name?" he asked at length, raising his eyes
and looking in pained surprise toward the new voter.
"Now, Bre'er 'Liab, don't talk dat 'ere way ter Nimbus, ef
yo please. Don't do it now. Yer knows I can't help it. Ebberybody
want ter call me by ole Mahs'r's name, an' dat I can't abide nohow;
an' when I kicks 'bout it, dey jes gib me some odder one, Dey all
seems ter tink I'se boun' ter hev two names, though I hain't got
no manner o' right ter but one."
"But how did you come to have dis one--Ware?" persisted Eliab.
"Wal, you see, Bre'er 'Liab, de boss man at der registerin' he
ax me fer my las' name, an' I tell him I hadn't got none, jes so.
Den Sheriff Gleason, he put in his oar, jes ez he allus does, an'
he say my name wuz _Desmit,_ atter ole Mahs'r. Dat made me
mad, an' I 'spute him, an' sez I, 'I won't hev no sech name'. Den
de boss man, he shet up Marse Gleason purty smart like, and _he_
sed I'd a right ter enny name I chose ter carry, kase nobody hadn't
enny sort o' right ter fasten enny name at all on ter me 'cept
myself. But he sed I'd better hev two, kase most other folks hed
'em. So I axed Marse Si War' ef he'd lend me his name jes fer de
'casion, yer know, an' he sed he hadn't no 'jection ter it. So I
tole der boss man ter put it down, an' I reckon dar 'tis."
"Yes, here it is, sure 'nough, Nimbus; but didn't you promise me
you wouldn't have so many names?"
"Co'se I did; an' I did try, but they all 'llowed I got ter have
two names whe'er er no."
"Then why didn't you take your old mahs'r's name, like de rest,
and not have all dis trouble?"
"Now, 'Liab, yer knows thet I won't nebber do dat."
"But why not, Nimbus?"
"Kase I ain't a-gwine ter brand my chillen wid no sech slave-mark!
Nebber! You hear dat, 'Liab? I hain't got no ill-will gin Marse
Desmit, not a mite--only 'bout dat ar lickin, an' dat ain't nuffin
now; but I ain't gwine ter war his name ner giv it ter my chillen
ter mind 'em dat der daddy wuz jes anudder man's critter one time.
I tell you I can't do hit, nohow; an' I _won't,_ Bre'er 'Liab.
I don't hate Marse Desmit, but I does hate slavery--dat what made
me his--worse'n a pilot hates a rattlesnake; an' I hate everyting
dat 'minds me on't, I do!"
The black Samson had risen in his excitement and now sat down upon
the bench by the other.
"I don't blame you for dat, Nimbus, but--"
"I don't want to heah no 'buts' 'bout it, an' I won't."
"But the chillen, Nimbus. You don't want dem to be different from
others and have no surname?"
"Dat's a fac', 'Liab," said Nimbus, springing to his feet. "I
nebber t'ought o' dat. Dey must hev a name, an' I mus' hev one ter
gib 'em, but how's I gwine ter git one? Dar's nobody's got enny right
ter gib me one, an' ef I choose one dis week what's ter hender my
takin' ob anudder nex week?"
"Perhaps nothing," answered 'Liab, "but yourself. You must not do
it."
"Pshaw, now," said Nimbus, "' what sort o' way is dat ter hev
things? I tell ye what orter been done, 'Liab; when de law married
us all, jes out of han' like, it orter hev named us too. Hit mout
hev been done, jes ez well's not. Dar's old Mahs'r now, he'd hev
named all de niggas in de county in a week, easy. An' dey'd been
good names, too."
"But you'd have bucked at it ef he had," said 'Liab, good-naturedly.
"No I wouldn't, 'Liab. I hain't got nuffin 'gin ole Mahrs'r. He
war good enough ter me--good 'nuff. I only hate what _made_
him 'Old Mahs'r,' an' dat I does hate. Oh, my God, how I does hate
it, Liab! I hates de berry groun' dat a slave's wukked on! I do,
I swar! When I wuz a-comin' home to-day an' seed de gullies 'long
der way, hit jes made me cuss, kase dey wuz dar a-testifyin' ob de
ole time when a man war a critter--a dog--a nuffin!"
"Now you oughtn't to say dat, Nimbus. Just think of me. Warn't you
better off as a slave than I am free?"
"No, I warn't. I'd ruther be a hundred times wuss off ner you, an'
free, than ez strong as I am an' a slave."
"But think how much more freedom is worth to you. Here you are a
voter, and I--"
"Bre'er 'Liab," exclaimed Nimbus, starting suddenly up, "what for
you no speak 'bout dat afore. Swar to God I nebber tink on't--not
a word, till dis bressed minit. Why didn't yer say nuffin' 'bout
bein' registered yo'self, eh? Yer knowed I'd a tuk yer ef I hed
ter tote ye on my back, which I wouldn't. I wouldn't gone a step
widout yer ef I'd only a t'ought. Yer knows I wouldn't."
"Course I does, Nimbus, but I didn't want ter make ye no trouble,
nor take the mule out of the crap," answered 'Liab apologetically.
"Damn de crap!" said Nimbus impetuously.
"Don't; don't swear, Nimbus, if you please."
"Can't help it, 'Liab, when you turn fool an' treat me dat 'ere
way. I'd swar at ye ef yer wuz in de pulpit an' dat come ober me,
jes at de fust. Yer knows Nimbus better ner dat. Now see heah, 'Liab
Hill, yer's gwine ter go an' be registered termorrer, jes ez sure
ez termorrer comes. Here we thick-headed dunces hez been up dar
to-day a-takin' de oath an' makin' bleve we's full grown men, an'
here's you, dat knows more nor a ten-acre lot full on us, a lyin'
here an' habin' no chance at all."
"But you want to get de barn full, and can't afford to spend any
more time," protested 'Liab.
"Nebber you min' 'bout de barn. Dat's Nimbus' business, an" he'll
take keer on't. Let him alone fer dat. Yis, honey, I'se comin'
d'reckly!" he shouted, as his wife called him from his own cabin.
"Now Bre'er 'Liab, yer comes ter supper wid us. Lugena's jes' a
callin' on't."
"Oh, don't, Nimbus," said the other, shrinking away. "I can't! You
jes send one of the chillen in with it, as usual."
"No yer don't," said Nimbus; "yer's been a scoldin' an' abusin' me
all dis yer time, an' now I'se gwine ter hab my way fer a little
while."
He went to the door and called:
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