CHAPTER VII.
WAR MEMORIES: THE STORY OF PATSY’S GARDEN.
Our vision of the outside world of human affairs was very narrow and circumscribed in those war-times, and my seminary of five young girls was often a victim to ennui. No weekly mail, no books, no music, no new gowns from one year’s end to another.
The only vital question was: “What is the war news?” There were also no coffee, no loaf-sugar, no lemons in the house. However, with plenty of milk, eggs and butter, fresh fruit and vegetables, to say nothing of fowls galore, we survived. The girls made cake and candy, so with the abundance of open-kettle brown sugar, we diversified our daily menu with many sweet compounds.
The one unfailing source of pleasure was the garden. True, the army at Morganza would send out a raid every fortnight, when fences were broken down and destroyed: then the cows and other cattle would get in and partake of our lettuce and cabbages. But we never gave up; the negroes would drive the marauding cattle out and rebuild the fences every time they were destroyed. On one of these occasions I heard Miss Emma Chalfant say to Uncle Primus: “I shall tell on you when your people come back here; I heard you curse and swear at Mrs. Merrick’s cows this morning—and you call yourself a preacher, too!” “Dese cows and dese Yankees is ’nuff to make ennybody cuss, Miss Emma,” said the negro, as he went along snapping his long whip as he drove the poor animals away from the garden.
Here I am tempted to give the true story of Martha Benton. This girl became positively exhilarated under the influence of perfume and flowers. The delectable odor of Sweet Olive—a mingled essence of peach, pineapple, and orange-flower—produced in her a frenzy of delight. She had been introduced to the exotic floral world by the proprietor of a fine garden where she frequently visited.
Her father could not understand his daughter’s delight in the contemplation of Nature’s beauty; for, as far as these things were concerned, he was afflicted with a total blindness worse than a loss of actual sight. Mr. Benton was fond of fruit but he never noticed or admired the flowers from which the fruit was formed. Nevertheless, he seemed pleased that his neighbor, Mr. Thornton, should be interested in his daughter, and take pleasure in talking with her about his rare plants.
“Miss Patsy,” said Mr. Thornton, “it requires tact and perseverance to grow a perfect lily.”
“I could do it if I had the bulbs,” said the girl.