Genieve stayed and rendered all the assistance she could. She stayed as long as she wuz needed.
But as soon as the news got out that Aunt Clo wuz dead, a crowd of her relations, near and distant, come in and took possession of the cottage and begun preparations for an elaborate funeral.
A colored minister wuz sent for, and he preached a long sermon in which her virtues wuz held up as a pattern, and her sudden death as a warnin’ for ’em all to be ready for “de Master’s call, which might come in de night time, or in de heat and burden of de day, but wuz shuah to come. Shuah, young, careless girl; shuah, gay, happefyin’ young man, for de trumpet must sound, and de dead must go at de bugle call of de Reapeh.
“He reaps de flowehs of de gahden,” sez he, pintin’ to the grave of Belle Fanchon, which wuz not fur from the cabin-door.
“He reaps de flowehs in all deir beauty, an’ de ripe grain an’ de wheat. Dis wheat we lay in de grave to-day, knowin’ dat de incorruption will rise up incorruptible, an’ de glory will come up glorious, an’ we shall all see it in de twinklin’ of de eye—an’ wherefoah, bredren, let us pray.”
And he knelt down and offered up a prayer full of faith, and pathos, and the wise ignorance of his childlike race.
Rising up from his knees, he directed the mourners to pass in front of the coffin and view the remains, which they did with loud groanings and many tears and exclamations of grief.
Then the coffin wuz closed, and the minister stood up in front of it and sez: