ONE OF THE DEACONS.
BY MRS. JULIA E. NELSON.
"A short, heavy-set, black man," "A good carpenter," "A man who can turn his hand to 'most anything," "None of your trifling fellows; somebody you can depend on every time." Such are the descriptions given of Deacon Jeremiah Edwards by the people among whom the chief part of his fifty years have been passed.
"The pump is out of kilter." "So? Well, tell Jeremiah Edwards to come and doctor it up."
"There's a leak in the roof, and the tinners can't seem to find it." "I'll send Jerry 'round to attend to it."
"Can't find the key of my bureau drawer; reckon Bud or the baby has lost it; drawer locked, and not a key can I find to fit in either of the hardware stores. I never saw such a place." "Don't fret about it, Carrie, I'll send Uncle Jerry up to file off one of these keys or make a new one; and while he's here, have him repair the organ and mend the picket-fence, and set the glass in the chamber window and the back bedroom. Better let him take the umbrella to his shop and mend it, and is there anything else? Oh! those shears and the butcher-knife you've been complaining about so long; let him take them along and sharpen them up." "Do you suppose, Harry, he could do anything with the cooking-stove? There's something broken about it; I reckon it's broken, but the cook says it's burnt out. Likely she broke it, though; niggers are so careless and good-for-nothing." "Certainly, certainly. Jerry used to work in an iron-foundry; he's a regular Tubal Cain. If he can't fix anything that's made of iron or brass or wood, it can't be fixed, that's flat."
Now what would the residents of a town like Jonesboro, a town over one hundred years old, and very small of its age—what could they do in an emergency if, instead of a missing key, there should be a missing Jerry? The probabilities are that it will take something mightier than the Western fever and more powerful than Colonization projects to carry Jerry Edwards away from the snug little home that he has made for himself, his good wife Patsey, and his little granddaughter. Many a millionaire finds less satisfaction in his palatial mansion than the proprietor of that little white cottage among the trees, as he gathers fruit from his own well-kept orchard, vegetables from his prolific garden, and corn from his own field. How much sweeter music is the cackling of hens to one who has brought them up from downy chickenhood! That and the robins' songs give more pleasure at the cottage than would the notes of imprisoned canaries.
A horse that "knows more than some people," cows that show generous keeping, and the "prettiest pigs you ever saw" are some of the adjuncts of the Edwards establishment. A pig is not pretty? Own the pig—own the pig and watch him as he grows ripe for the pork barrel. Everybody's pig, like everybody's baby, is prettier than anybody's.
"Let everybody go West that wants to," says Jerry Edwards, "and let them that want to be Africans go to Africa. I'm an American, and I shall stay right here the balance of my days. If I couldn't make a living here, I should be striking out after work, but I don't need to go anywhere to hunt work; work is hunting for me all the time." And so it is.