she resented, preferring her bacon and greens, "pot-liquor" and "corn-meal-dumplin's" to the daintier food prescribed.
Her little twins, my foster sisters, Mary-Frances and Arabella, were placed in the care of the "orphan tenders," Mammy Dilsey and Ole-Granny-Aggie, the latter claiming to be more than a hundred years old. A cow was set aside for the especial use of the twins, who soon learned that the tinkle of the cow-bells meant for them a banquet of rich warm milk.
For awhile they were brought up twice a day to the "Gre't House" to see "dar Mammy" and sometimes were permitted to partake of the crumbs that fell from the "rich baby's table," which crumbs they soon disdainfully refused, showing their preference for the libations of "Spotty Sookey," that being the name of their barnyard cow.
III CHURCH VISITORS
My grandmother's old colonial home, Holiday's Point, so-called because of the many holidays that my grandfather had been accustomed to give his servants, was on the Nansemond River, in Nansemond County.
The county came into existence in 1639, being first called Upper Norfolk. Its name was soon changed to Nansemum, spelled by Captain John Smith "Nansemond." The Dismal Swamp extends along its edge. Its county-seat is Suffolk, the burning of which I, as a child, have often heard described by Ole-Granny-Aggie, an eye-witness, while we would listen with bated breath, hair on end and nerves aquiver.
"No, chillun," she would say, "jedgment day ain't agwine to be no mo' tur'ble to 'sperience dan de burnin' of we-all's county-town by dem furrin Britishers was, en de niggers en de white folks ain't agwine to be no skeerder den, needer."
Then she would describe in her picturesque lingo the firing of the barrels of tar, pitch and turpentine which had been brought from the Dismal Swamp and placed upon the wharf awaiting shipping. The flames carried by a strong wind caught the grass of the dry marshes and spread to the town and the surrounding country and, as Granny-Aggie said, "de ma'shes en de river for miles looked and soun' lak one gre't blazin'-kindle-lighted sheet er steadified thunder and lightnin'—de magazines a 'splodin'—de timbers a cracklin'—de barrels of tar, pitch en turkentine a bustin' en splungin' out dar fire—de sparks a flyin' en a lippin' lak de whole fundament had busted wide open en all de stars in de Heabens was a drappin' out, en ev'ybody runnin' lipperty-clip lak dey thunk de Debil was a movin' de Bad Place down to Nansemon'."
Thus my infancy was surrounded by historic tales and the more ancient traditions that had descended from father to son through generations of dusky retainers.
I was the idol of my dear grandmother and her household and many friends. My playmates were the children of the surrounding plantations—the old homes inherited from colonial days. I had never known any other way of living and experienced a shock of surprise on learning that a little new acquaintance did not reside in the home of her ancestors. I asked my grandmother if that little girl was respectable.
"Of course," she replied. "She is a very nice little girl. What makes you ask?"
"Because her pa and ma rent their home. She told me so herself. She can't be respectable."
My grandmother explained to me that though it was pleasant and desirable to live in the house of our fathers, the absence of that comfort did not necessarily place a person "beyond the pale." But I felt at that time that it was grandmother's charity that caused her to set forth that view, for I thought that people who did not live in their own houses could not be respectable.
Two members of my grandmother's household were "nominated" as "church visitors," Mrs. Mary Hutchins, who was deaf, and whose husband, a sea captain, had been lost in a wreck, and Miss Sophia Wilson who, through a vicious parrot, had lost her sight on the eve of her marriage and had, in consequence, been deserted by her fiancé.
There were poorhouses in those days but no homes for aged women and the members of the church took care of their homeless co-workers. As Mrs. Hutchins and Miss Sophia belonged to the old Glebe Church, they were invited as honored guests by fellow-members. Some years earlier the Episcopal Church had become almost extinct in Virginia and the membership was still very small, so that the visits were correspondingly extended. As my grandmother's home was especially pleasant the guests prolonged their stay indefinitely, suddenly falling too ill to be moved if there was any suggestion of their going elsewhere.
Mrs. Hutchins, or "Miss Mary," as we called her, could not hear, but she read the movements of the lips, a circumstance of which Miss Sophia would perversely take advantage by turning away as she spoke, whereupon her friend would thus reproach her:
"Turn your head this way, Sophia Wilson! You don't want me to hear what you are talking about. Begrudging me a little news and I interested in everything, and the Lord knows I haven't a bit of curiosity."
"How do you know what the Lord knows, Mary Hutchins? If you knew half what He knows you wouldn't make so many mistakes. No curiosity, indeed! You're chock full of it. You'd bore a gimlet hole through the earth to see what was on the other side."
"You wouldn't know what was on the other side if there was a tunnel through and somebody shouting it with a fog-horn, and you're so stingy you wouldn't tell me if you did know. Not that it makes any difference; you're not likely to known anything on any side of the earth."
"Humph," was the indignant retort, "if I don't know things why should you be so anxious to see me talk so you could find them out."
"Miss Mary" was saved from the embarrassment of a reply by the timely arrival of my grandmother, who could always apply oil to the waters when they were especially troubled.
A part of my youthful education consisted of the thrilling stories related to me by the captain's faithful relict, whose memory cherished the tales of "moving 'scapes by land and sea" told her in early days by the sailor. Thus I met the man-eaters of the South Seas, shuddered at the gruesome trophies that adorned the persons and huts of the head-hunters of Borneo, beheld the sea-serpent in the rippling waves of the river that flowed below the edge of my grandmother's lawn, and heard many a story of storm and wreck in which the departed sea-captain had performed wonders of skill and bravery.
"Well, Mary Hutchins!" exclaimed Miss Sophia in stern disapproval when I would be lost in rapt attention to these thrilling tales. "What do you mean by putting such notions into that innocent child's head? What do you suppose she will come to when she grows up? A lunatic asylum? Come out of one yourself most likely or you wouldn't get such crazy ideas. Just fancy people wearing other people's heads and hanging them on the wall when they can pick up beautiful shell necklaces right off their own beach and can get wax flowers to put around their houses that look natural and won't ever fade! And as for sea-serpents, you know there never were any."
"Now, Sophia Wilson," Mrs. Hutchins would answer, "the Bible tells us that there are more things in heaven and earth than philosophy ever dreamt of, and we know it's true, and if philosophy can't even dream of the things in heaven and earth, how in the name of common sense are you going to know what's in the waters under the earth? And doesn't it stand to reason that those who go down into the great deep know more about what's in the sea-waves than you do who would be afraid of the wave of a clothes-line on a wash-day?"
In romantic moments Mrs. Hutchins would tell me of the green-haired, flame-eyed, melodious-voiced mermaids that lie in wait to lure unwary seamen to destruction on the rocks, from which danger her sailor had been delivered by the memory of her. Unfortunately, Miss Sophia chanced to be present at one of these sentimental reminiscences.
"You never did have green hair, Mary Hutchins, not even at your prettiest, and that wouldn't be much, and as for flaming eyes, you couldn't scorch a potato, not if your dinner depended on it, and if you ever did sing it must have been worse than a flock of jaybirds. Talk about that old Greek who moved trees when he played! I should think your singing would be enough to make all the woodpiles in Virginia run away. The more you educate that child, Mary Hutchins, the less she knows. The Lord gave her more learning to begin with than she'll ever get from you,