“Pretty well, so far. My crops are in pretty good condition.”
“Do they steal much?”
“They steal some, but not very much.”
“Well, then, Doctor, what have you to complain about?”
“O, General,” says the Doctor, dolefully, “you do not appreciate the dangers of our situation.”
“Now, Doctor, to cut the matter short, has a single act of violence been perpetrated in your neighborhood by a negro against a white man?”
“Yes, sir; and I will tell you of one that has happened right in my family. I have a negro girl, eighteen years old, whom I raised. For ten years she has been waiting upon my old mother-in-law, who lives with me. A few days ago the old lady was dissatisfied about something, and told the girl that she felt like giving her a whipping? Now, what do you think? The negro girl actually informed my old mother-in-law that she would not submit to a whipping, but would resist. My old father-in-law then got mad, and threatened her; and she told him the same thing. Now, this is an intolerable state of things.”
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
Mississippi Tavern Talks on National Politics—Scenes in the Interior.
From Selma to Mobile the best route is by the way of Meridian, Mississippi. Meridian boasts numerous hotels. Lusty porters, clad in Nature’s black and Rebellion’s gray, lustily chant their respective praises. “If a gemmen wants a gemmen’s accommodation he goes to de Henrie House.” “’Ere ye are for de Snagsby House; only place in town for a gemmen.” “All de gemmen in town go to de Jones House.” I went, at a venture, to the Snagsby. I am therefore well prepared to recommend any of the others to subsequent travelers. They cannot fare any worse, and they have a chance that inheres in all things sublunary, of possible improvement.
What I saw of Meridian was this: A frame one-story shanty, labeled, “Liquors for sale;” two straight railway tracks in the midst of a wide expanse of mud; a crowd of yelling negro porters; half-a-dozen houses that may have been used for storing cotton and whisky; the hotels aforesaid; some disconsolate looking negro huts; and a few shabby residences that differed only from the huts in the extent to which the disconsolate appearance was made possible with them by the larger scale of their construction. There may have been other things in Meridian last November, but, if so, they were buried in the mud.