In the brush

by Hamilton W. Pierson

CHAPTER IV.

OLD-TIME HOSPITALITY IN THE SOUTHWEST.

The hospitality extended to ministers of the gospel by the people who lived in the Brush was generous and large-hearted to a degree that I have never known among any other class of people. They obeyed the Scripture injunction, "Use hospitality without grudging." They were "not forgetful to entertain strangers." I found their tables, their beds, their stables, and indeed all the comforts of their rude homes, always open for the rest and refreshment of myself and my indispensable horse. We were as welcome to all these as to the water that bubbled from their springs and "ran among the hills."

At the commencement of my itinerant life, on leaving the families where I had spent a night or taken a meal, I used to propose to pay them, and ask for my bill; but I found this gave offense. Many seemed to regard it as a reflection on their generosity for me to intimate or suppose that they would take pay for entertaining a preacher. I therefore adopted a formula that saved me from all danger of wounding their feelings, and relieved my character from all suspicion of a disposition to avoid the payment of my bills. It was as follows: When about to leave a family, I said to them, "I am indebted to you for a night's entertainment," to which the general response was: "Not at all, sir. Come and stay with us again, whenever you pass this way."

It was a very rare occurrence that I was permitted to cancel my indebtedness by paying for what I had received.

In thanking them for their hospitality, as of course I always did on leaving them, they made me feel that I had conferred a favor rather than incurred an obligation by staying with them.

For years it was my custom to apply for entertainment at any house wherever night overtook me, and I invariably received a cordial welcome. This application for entertainment was always made according to the custom of the people, and in their own vernacular, which I will illustrate by an example.

In my horseback-journeyings I had reached the tall, dense, heavy forests of the bottom-lands of the Mississippi River, about a dozen miles from the Father of Waters. As the sun was about setting, I came upon a large "dead'ning," where the underbrush had been cut out and burned off, the large trees had been girdled and had died, and a crop of corn had been raised among the dead forest-trees, before the new-comer in this wilderness had been able to completely clear a field around his newly-erected log-cabin. Turning off from the corduroy-road upon which I had been traveling, I took a footpath, and, following that, was soon as near the cabin as a high rail-fence would allow me to approach on horseback. A short distance from this log-cabin was a still smaller one occupied by a colored aunty and her family, and used for a kitchen; and not far off still another log-building, used for a barn and stable.

The most of my readers in the older sections of the country will suppose that I had now only to dismount, hitch my horse, climb the fence, rap at the door, and so gain admittance to my resting-place for the night. Far otherwise. Only the most untraveled and inexperienced in the Brush would undertake so rash an experiment.

Sitting upon my horse, I called out in a loud voice, "Hello there!" That call was for the same purpose that the city pastor mounts the stone steps and rings the bell at the door of his parishioner. It was rather more effective.

A large pack of hounds and various other kinds of dogs responded with a barking chorus, a group of black pickaninnies rushed from the adjacent kitchen, followed to the door by their sable mother, with arms a-kimbo and hands fresh from mixing the pone or corn-dodger for the family supper; all, with distended eyes and mouth, and shining ivory, staring at the stranger with excited and pleased curiosity. At almost the same instant, the mistress of the incipient plantation approached the door of her cabin, stockingless and shoeless, with a dress of woolsey woven in her own loom by her own hands, and cut and made by her own skill, with face not less pleased and excited than the others, and her cordial greeting of "How d'y, stranger—how d'y, sir? 'Light, sir! [alight]—'light, sir!"

Remaining upon my horse, I replied: "I am a stranger in these parts, madam. I have ridden about fifty miles since morning and am very tired. Can I get to stay with you to-night, madam?"

"Oh, yes," she replied, promptly, "if you can put up with our rough fare. We never turn anybody away."

I told her I should be very glad to stay with her, and dismounted. The dogs, who would otherwise have resisted my approach to the door by a combined attack, obeyed their instructions not to harm me, and granted me a safe entrance as a recognized friend.

Such was the universal training of the dogs, and such the uniform method of approaching and gaining admittance to the houses of the people in the Brush. My hostess informed me that her husband was at work in the "dead'ning," but that he would soon be at home and take care of my horse.

I told her that I could do that myself, and she sent her little son along with me to the stable, where I bestowed that kind and, I may say, affectionate care that one who journeys for years on horseback learns to bestow upon his faithful horse. I then entered the cabin, and received that warm welcome that awaits the traveler in our Western wilds.

Shall I describe my home for the night? It was a new log-house, less than twenty feet square, and advanced to a state of completeness beyond many in which I had lodged, inasmuch as the large openings between the logs had been filled with "chink and daubing." The chimney, built upon the outside of the house, was made of split sticks, laid up in the proper form, and thoroughly "daubed" with mud, so as to prevent them from taking fire. A large opening cut through the logs communicated with this chimney, and formed the ample fireplace. The roof was made of "shakes"—pieces of timber rived out very much in the form of staves, but not shaved at all. These were laid upon the roof like shingles, except that they were not nailed on, but "weighted on"—kept in their places by small timbers laid across each row of "shakes" over the entire roof. These timbers were kept in their places by shorter ones placed between them, transversely, up and down the roof. In this manner the pioneer constructs a roof for his cabin, by his own labor, without the expenditure of a dime for nails. With wooden hinges and a wooden latch for his door, he needs to purchase little but glass for his windows, to provide a comfortable home for his family. His latch-string, made of hemp or flax that he has raised, or from the skin of the deer which he has pursued and slain in the chase, which, as the old song has it—

"Hangs outside the door,"

symbolizes the cordial welcome and abounding hospitality to be found within.

At the end of the room opposite the fireplace there was a bed in each corner, under one of which there was a "trundle-bed" for the children. There was no chamber-floor or chamber above to obstruct the view of the roof. There was no division into apartments, not even by hanging up blankets, a device I have seen resorted to in less primitive regions. From floor to roof, from wall to wall, all was a single "family" room, which was evidently to be occupied by the family and myself in common. A rough board table, some plain chairs, and a very few other articles completed the inventory of household furniture of the pioneer's home to which I had been welcomed.

Such a home was the birthplace of Lincoln, and many other of the greatest, wisest, and best men that have ever blessed our country. Such homes have been crowned with abundance, and have been the scenes of as much real comfort and joy as any others in our land.

I have found that curiosity is a trait that is not monopolized by any one section of country or class of people. It belongs to all localities, and to all grades and kinds of people. I therefore, in accordance with what a pretty wide experience had taught me was the best course to pursue, proceeded at once to gratify the curiosity of my hostess as to who her guest was, and what business had brought him to this wild region. I told her my name, and that I was a Presbyterian preacher, and an agent of the American Bible Society. This not only satisfied her curiosity, but was very gratifying information to her, and I received a renewed and cordial welcome to her home as a minister of the gospel.

In the course of the ordinary conversation and questions that attend such a meeting of strangers in the Brush, I learned that she and her husband had emigrated from a county some hundreds of miles east, which I had several times visited in the prosecution of my mission, and I was able to give her a great deal of information in regard to her old neighbors and friends. We were in the midst of an earnest conversation in regard to these people, when her husband came in from his labors. On being introduced to me, and informed in regard to my mission, he repeated the welcome his wife had already given me to the hospitality of their cabin.

Our supper was such as is almost universally spread in the wilds of the Southwest. It consisted of an abundance of hot corn-bread, fried bacon, potatoes, and coffee. A hard day's labor and a long day's ride prepared us to do it equal justice.

The evening wore rapidly away in conversation. Such pioneers are not dull, stupid men. Their peculiar life gives activity to mind as well as body. My host was anxious and glad to hear from the great outside active world, with which I had more recently mingled, and had questions to ask and views to give as to what was going on in the political and religious world.

At length our wearied bodies made a plea for rest that could not be refused, and I was invited to conduct their family worship. This invitation was extended in the language and manner peculiar to the Southern and Southwestern sections of the country. This is universally as follows:

The Bible and hymn-book are brought forward by the host, and laid upon the table or stand, when he turns to the preacher and says, "Will you take the books, sir?"

That is the invitation to lead the devotions of the family in singing and prayer. It has been my happy lot to receive and respond to that invitation—as I did that night—in many hundreds of families and in some of the wildest portions of our land.

The method of extending an invitation to "ask a blessing" before a meal is quite as peculiar. Being seated at the table, the host, turning to the preacher, says, "Will you make a beginning, sir?"—all at table reverently bowing their heads as he extends the invitation, and while the blessing is being asked.

So, too, I have "made a beginning" at many a hospitable board in many different States. I did not that night make the mistake that is reported of an inexperienced home-missionary explorer, in similar circumstances, who, laboring under the impression that "to retire" and "to go to bed" were synonymous terms, said, "Madam, I will retire, if you please."

"Retire!" she rejoined; "we never retires, stranger. We just goes to bed."

Sitting with the family before the large fireplace, I said, "Madam, I have ridden a long distance to-day, and am very tired."

"You can go to bed at any time you wish, sir," said she. "Just take the left-hand bed."

I withdrew behind their backs to "lay my garments by," took the left-hand bed, turned my face to the left-hand wall, and slept soundly for the night.

When I awoke in the morning, husband and wife had arisen and left the room, he to feed his team, and she to attend to her household duties in the kitchen. After an early breakfast, and again leading their family devotions, I bade them good-by, with many thanks for their kindness, and with repeated invitations on their part to be sure to spend the night with them should I ever come that way again. But I have never seen them since.

I have very often recalled a hospitable reception in the Brush, of a very different character, the recollection of which has always been exceedingly pleasant to me. Wishing to visit a rough, wild, remote region, at a season of the year when the roads were almost impassable on account of the spring rains and the mud, I concluded to go the greater part of the distance by steamboats, down one river and up another, and then ride about fifty miles in a stage or mail-wagon. The roads would scarcely be called roads at all in most parts of the country, and I shall not be able to give to many of my readers any true idea of the exceeding roughness of that ride. A considerable part of the way was through the bottom-lands of one of the smaller Southwestern rivers that swell the volume of the Mississippi. A recent freshet had left the high-water mark upon the trees several feet higher than the backs of our horses; and as we jolted over the small stumps and great roots of the trees, from which the earth had been washed away by the freshet, I was wearied, exceedingly wearied, by the rough road and comfortless vehicle in which I traveled.

At length we came upon a very pleasant plantation, with a comfortable house and surroundings, where the driver, a boy about fifteen years old, told me he would feed his team, and we would get our dinner. It was not an hotel. Mail-contractors in this region often make such arrangements to procure feed for their horses and meals for the few passengers that they carry, at private houses. As I entered the house I was greeted with one of those calm, mild, sweet faces that one never forgets. I should think that my hostess was between thirty-five and forty years old. I was too weary to engage in much conversation, and she was quiet, and said very little to me. As I observed her movements about the room in preparing the dinner, I thought I had never seen a face that presented a more perfect picture of contentment and peace. I felt perfectly sure that she was a Christian—that her face bespoke "the peace of God that passeth all understanding." When she invited the driver and myself to take seats at the table, I said, "Shall I ask a blessing, madam?"

With a smile she bowed assent, and, as I concluded and looked up, her face was all radiant with joy, and she said excitedly, "You are a preacher, sir!"

I replied, "Yes, madam."

"Well," she responded, "I am glad to see you. I love to see preachers. I love to cook for them, and take care of them. I love to have them in my house."

I told her who I was, explained the character of my mission, and expressed, I trust with becoming warmth, my gratification at the cordiality of her welcome.

"Oh," said she, "if I was a man, I know what I would do. I would do nothing but preach. I'd go, and go, and go; and preach, and preach, and preach. I wouldn't have anything to pester me. I wouldn't marry nary woman in the world. I'd go, and go, and go—and preach, and preach, and preach, until I could preach no longer; and then I'd lie down—close my eyes—and—go on."

Was there ever a more graphic and truthful description of an earnest, apostolic life? Was there ever a more simple, beautiful description of a peaceful Christian death? They recall the statement of Paul, "This one thing I do"; and the story of Stephen, "And when he had said this, he fell asleep."

The people who have spent their lives deep in the Brush, as this good woman had, have no other idea of a preacher of the gospel but one whose duty and mission it is to "go" and "preach." They have been accustomed to hearing but one message, or at most a few messages, from their lips, and then hear their farewell words, listen to their farewell songs, shake hands with them, and see them take their departure to "go" and "preach" to others who, like them, dwell in lone and solitary wilds. Meetings and partings like these have originated and given their peculiar power to such refrains as—

"Say, brothers, will you meet us—
Say, brothers, will you meet us—
Say, brothers, will you meet us
On Canaan's happy shore?
"By the grace of God we'll meet you—
By the grace of God we'll meet you—
By the grace of God we'll meet you
On Canaan's happy shore."

This woman knew little of the great world—had little that it calls culture; her language was that of the people among whom she lived, and was such as she had always been accustomed to hear; but her thoughts were deep and pure, her "peace flowed like a river," and her communion with God lifted her to companionship with the noblest and best of earth. Though I spent but little more than an hour in her presence, and many years have passed since that transient meeting, her picture still hangs in the chamber of my memory, calm, pure, and saintly, and breathing upon my spirit a perpetual benediction.