JANUARY 22.
While I was at dinner, a violent uproar was heard below stairs. On enquiry, it proved to be Cubina, quarrelling with his niece Phillis (a goodlooking black girl employed about the house), about a broken pitcher; and as her explanation did not appear satisfactory to him, he had thought proper to give her a few boxes on the ear. Upon hearing this, I read him such a lecture upon the baseness of a man’s striking a woman, and told him with so much severity that his heart must be a bad one to commit such an offence, that poor Cubina, having never heard a harsh word from me before, scarcely knew whether he stood upon his head or his heels. When he afterwards brought my coffee, he expressed his sorrow for having offended me, and begged my pardon in the most humble manner. I told him, that to obtain mine, he must first obtain that of Phillis, and he immediately declared himself ready to make her any apology that I might dictate. So the girl was called in; and her uncle going up to her, “I am very sorry, Phillis,” said he, “that I gave way to high passion, and called you hard names, and struck you: which I ought not to have done while massa was in the house;” (here I was going to interrupt him, but he was too clever not to perceive his blunder, and made haste to add) “nor if he had not been here, nor at all; so I hope you will have the kindness to forgive me this once, and I never will strike you again, and so I beg your pardon.” And he then put out his hand to her in the most frank and hearty manner imaginable; and on her accepting it, made her three or four of his very lowest and most graceful bows. I furnished him with a piece of money to give her as a peace-offering; they left the room thoroughly reconciled, and in five minutes after they and the rest of the servants were all chattering, laughing, and singing together, in the most perfect harmony and good-humour. I suppose, if I had desired an upper servant in England to make the same submission, he would have preferred quitting my service to doing what he would have called “humbling himself to an inferior;” or, if he had found himself compelled to give way, he would have been sulky with the girl, and found fault with every thing that she did in the house for a twelvemonth after.
On the other hand, there are some choice ungrateful scoundrels among the negroes: on the night of their first dance, a couple of sheep disappeared from the pen, although they could not have been taken from want of food, as on that very morning there had been an ample distribution of fresh beef; and last night another sheep and a quantity of poultry followed them. Yesterday, too, a young rascal of a boy called “massa Jackey,” who is in the frequent habit of running away for months at a time, and whom I had distinguished from the cleverness of his countenance and buffoonery of his manners, came to beg my permission to go and purchase food with some money which I had just given him, “because he was almost starving; his parents were dead, he had no provision-grounds, no allowance, and nobody ever gave him anything.” Upon this I sent Cubina with the boy to the storekeeper, when it appeared that he had always received a regular allowance of provisions twice a week, which he generally sold, as well as his clothes, at the Bay, for spirits; had received an additional portion only last Friday; and, into the bargain, during the whole of that week had been fed from the house. What he could propose to himself by telling a lie which must be so soon detected, I cannot conceive; but I am assured, that unless a negro has an interest in telling the truth, he always lies—in order to keep his tongue in practice.
One species of flattery (or of Congo-saw, as we call it here) amused me much this morning: an old woman who is in the hospital wanted to express her gratitude for some stewed fish which I had sent her for supper, and, instead of calling me “massa,” she always said—“Tank him, my husband.”