The Little Immigrant Part 2

"May I have your looking gla.s.s, then, Aunt Caroline?"

"Look out, chile, you'll cut yerself! No. I's got to lay dis up on de shelf for mahself. Dis no lookin' gla.s.s fer a white chile.

Now you come heah and get in my lap dis minute."

The child, tired from play and romping around, lifted her arms to be taken up into her dear old mammy's lap. With her curlv head pressed against Aunt Caroline's breast, she fell asleep in a little while and was resting there long after Aunt Caroline had stopped tilting her chair forward and backward--a way quite familiar to Southern nurses in lulling children to sleep. In a little while she had succ.u.mbed to the silent noon hour herself.

"Looka heah, n.i.g.g.e.r. What you mean holden dat chile in yer lap and you fast ter sleep? Wake up. Yer heah? Miss Tiny is comin!"

Josiah shoved his brogan over Aunt Caroline's thinly shod foot and she jerked her head up with a start.

"Bless mah soul!" She looked around with a frightened appearance at the chairs with the mosquito netting over them and two blue gray eyes were looking up into hers and a little fist was being devoured.

"Here you are with the children," said a low, sweet voice.

"I've wondered if Lola was with you. Has the baby been asleep a long time, Aunt Caroline?"

"Yes'm. She jest now waken up. Ain't she purty, Miss Tiny?

Just look at her little face looken like a cherub's. She sh.o.r.e is a buiful chile. Looks a hole lot like you wid her big eyes, on'y dey gray 'stead of black."

"Let me take Lola from you and you lift the baby and bring her to the house."

"Yes'm." Aunt Caroline didn't lose an opportunity, however, to turn around to remark to Josiah, who was hoeing not far away, "Yer, Josiah, you jes come heah, suh, and tote dis chile up to de house. She too hebby fer de Missus. You lubbering black n.i.g.g.e.r, you jes good fer nothin' nohow and doan you eber stamp on my foot agin! Go long, Miss Tiny, we will bring up de chillens!"

Jaffray was home for midday dinner. "I've bought a nurse girl for you, Renestine. Here is the bill of sale," he said, handing a light blue paper to her. Renestine read: "A copper colored girl," etc.

When they were seated at the table Jaffray said: "I felt like a mean creature when I paid the money for that girl, but I knew we needed a nurse girl. Aunt Caroline can't cook and care any longer for the children too, so what was to be done? This slavery system is frightful, and mark my words, Renestine, the day will come when the darkies will be free. Where I was born on the Rhine, no one would believe for a moment that I would buy a human being. They would hate me as I hate myself for bartering in human flesh."

"I know, I know, Jaffray. I remember when my sister used to send Josiah out in the morning to work, he would come back in the evening with his pay that he had earned in the blacksmith shop and give it to her, and Aunt Caroline would bring her money, too, that she had made by a hard day's, washing and ironing. Oh, yes, it is all wrong and dreadful, but we will treat them well and wait for the day to set them free!"

"It will not be long now. There are all sorts of rumors about Lincoln doing this 'and that."

"You mean about setting the negroes free?"

"Yes."

"But how? People will not just let them walk away!

"Walk away! Oh, little woman, if it could be brought around that way the threatening clouds would not be so dark ahead! 'Just walk away.' The President is offering to find a way out. One is to 'compensate' owners out of Government funds for the release of their slaves; another is sending them to some warm country for colonization.

Of course, he would ask Congress for an appropriation for this."

For long hours they sat reading the latest news in the day's paper and discussing the war reports with a very solemn foreboding of coming events.

CHAPTER V

WHEN the Civil War broke out the women of the South blanched with the terrible ordeal before them, but never for one moment doubted but that their beloved ones would come out of it all victorious. To them it was not conceivable that a cause so plainly one of individual rights could be lost. Sacrifice upon sacrifice was cheerfully made, even gloried in by these wonderful women of the South in 1861 and to the bitter end.

Delicately nurtured women denied themselves comforts, sleep, food and drink; they were reduced to personal hardships which were met and borne with a sublime fort.i.tude.

When it was all over those families which had possessed wealth and culture were in the grip of poverty, and it was then that the spirit of Southern womanhood showed its divine strength. Facing family troubles with the courage of n.o.ble resignation, those women who had been educated--some abroad--and accomplished, became school teachers at five dollars a month for a pupil, and many a woman to-day bears grat.i.tude in her heart for the sweet influence of these school teachers, which has gone with her into every clime, into every condition, and proved an unfailing guide to the uplands and the heights. Many became seamstresses, some governesses and others traveling companions. But wherever these gentlewoman went they carried refinement and ideals.

The heroism of the Southern women in the Civil War is an Epic in American History!

Renestine was the mother now of three little daughters.

Jaffray had gone to Mexico to buy up horses, saddles and commissaries for the army. Caroline and Josiah were her bodyguards and, faithful servants, they saved her little anxieties and looked after the welfare of the children.

Renestine made their little shoes by shaping cloth after their worn ones and sewing them together with pieces of soft cardboard for soles. She made coffee by drying beets, and flour by drying potatoes.

Her practical little head was resourceful for any emergency. She felt sad at the separation from her husband, and her large black eyes were mournful but not tearful. To be and doing was her spirit. In spare moments she sat down to her tambourine to do crewel work on a tapestry picture. It was a large subject--The bard Ossian playing his harp to Malvino. Ossian seated on the front of some brown rocks, Malvino seated before him, her hands folded across his knees, full of tender regard for the gentle musician. This work was her pastime and recreation. She selected the worsteds and worked her needle out and in, shading and coloring and outlining with the skill of an artist in paints. Three years she worked on this picture, almost to the end of the war, almost as long as Penelope worked on her task awaiting Ulysses' return.

In the meantime Jaftray paid short visits to his family and made them as comfortable for periods of his absence as he had it in his power to do. Texas was too far away to be the theatre of battles during the conflict, so that no real hara.s.sing of the families by the invading Northern soldiers took place, but her people suffered privations and danger just as much as her sister states and perhaps more after the war was over and the reconstruction period set in.

In 1870 the town of Jefferson was thrown into a panic by the murder one night of a "carpet-bagger." Carpet-bagger was a name given to those men who came into Southern towns after the war to stir up the people, and particularly the darkies, against the authorities. It was necessary for Washington to send troops to Jefferson to restore order.

A stockade was built up on the hill near the new home of Jaffray, for he had found his first little house too small for his growing family, and into this stockade some of Jefferson's prominent citizens were thrown and kept until they could prove their innocence of the charges brought against them, namely, that they had knowledge of the murder of the carpet-bagger. Those were trying days. Jaffray had returned from Mexico in impaired health, which had been caused by the impure drinking water in the country and also the intense heat there.

The doctors told him he had to take a long rest.

Things were going badly in the town, military law was established and all men found implicated in the disturbance were drastically punished. The war bad reduced the prosperous store holder to penury, there was little money left to circulate among the people and Jefferson was demoralized in its business, civic and social life.

General Buell, commanding the military occupation, asked as a favor to be put up at Jaffray's house, as it was one of the largest in the town and near the camp. Jaffray consented. So General Buell and his wife came to live with Renestine and Jaffray, and afterwards one or two other officers and their wives joined General Buell. This was a courageous thing for Jaffray to have done, for, with the spirit existing in the town at that critical time, not many residents would harbor the Yankees. It was so dangerous that one night, when the General wished to retire to his rooms across the broad hall, he turned to Jaffray and said:

"Jaffray, put out the lamps before I cross over."

Kerosene lamps were in use and Jaffray put out the light before the officer walked from the sitting room across to his own rooms. In politics Jaffray was a Republican and he had the courage to live up to his convictions in a community that was enraged against Lincoln and his party. But the Republicans stood for free men, whatever color or creed, and Jaffray championed their doctrines. For him humanity, justice and liberty was the breath of his nostrils. This pa.s.sion for men's rights he had inherited from a long line of ancestors reaching back into the mists of "In the beginning." He was an Israelite.

Renestine was glad to accept this change in their lives, as she realized that Jaffray's affairs were not prosperous and with the a.s.sistance of her servants she could help him very well, particularly as he was not in robust health. Whatever situation faced her she met it with high courage and a spirit to do. Their devotion was deep and with their little family they were happy and contented. Sorrow had not spared them, however, for their baby daughter bad contracted whooping cough and died a few months before. Jaffray grieved deeply for the little child and Renestine was almost overcome. But she straightened up herb beautiful head, like a flower after the storm has pa.s.sed, and comforted her husband.

CHAPTER VI

JAFFRAY was now Postmaster of Jefferson. he city had resumed its normal life and gained in population and wealth. The streets were filled with wagons loaded with bales of cotton brought from as far away as 250 miles by ox teams, which took three weeks.

Jefferson was at the head of navigation on an arm of the Red River. Steamboats came up once or twice a week and the cotton was shipped to New Orleans and from that city to the mills in the East.

When the boats arrived the scene on the levee was a very animated one.

Negroes would fix large bill hooks into the bagging around the cotton bales and load them into drays. Some of them worked singing, as sailors do when they haul and pull.

Sometimes the captains of the larger steamboats would issue invitations to the families for a soiree, when the excitement would fill society for days. The ladies would dress in their silks and laces and the men spruce up in their frock coats and flowered waistcoats and cross the gang plank into the kerosene-lighted steamboats and dance until morning. Those were red letter days for Jefferson. As a matter of etiquette, when the steamboat was loaded and about to start back, everybody would be at the levee to wave good-bye. The side paddle would turn and the hospitable captain would be up in the pilot house, waving his cap in return until the churning side-wheel carried him around the bend.

New houses were dotting the town here and there, some of them large and handsome with s.p.a.cious grounds. Kerosene oil lamps were put up to light the streets and an "Opera House" was built, where many a stock company came to play in tragedy or comedy. Shakespeare's plays were the favorites of the community and Jaffray and Renestine went often to the theatre, accompanied by their two daughters, who were in their advanced school-day years and able to appreciate it. There were two little sons added to their family circle; they remained asleep in their trundle beds with old Aunt Caroline watching over them, as she had watched over the little daughters. Josiah had died right after the war was over, but he lived to see his people freed and schools opened where they could be taught to read and write--a precious privilege. He had said to Aunt Caroline just before his last illness: "Thanks be to G.o.d that He has set the colored folks free, but thanks be to Him mosen for gibbin' me a good marsa and missus who gibs me my close, my vittles and my me'cine."

The relation of the household servants to the Southern family was that of trust and affection after their liberation. In advanced years, like old Aunt Caroline, the younger servants saved them unnecessary steps and their days were happy and peaceful.

Near the home which Renestine and Jaffrav occupied almost touching the porch was a huge oak tree spreading wide shade around it.

Here the children played; or, if it was a rainy day, they carried their precious dolls and drums into the latticed summer house built for ornamentation and use in very hot weather, where woodbine and honeysuckle ran along its diamond-shaped walls and hung thick and colorful in great waves. Jaffray loved his home and spared nothing that would make it comfortable and attractive.

His days were very arduous now, as he had to learn the methods of a government position. It appealed to him, though, for it was a pursuit which required reading up on rules, laws and regulations, and his bent was for books and instruction from them. While his days pa.s.sed in attending to the business of the Post Office, his nights were given to study and self-improvement. He was never satisfied with what he achieved; to learn and to know more and more was his ruling pa.s.sion.

Many citizens now called upon him for advice. He would be asked to speak when a new building was opened or a public movement was on foot.

They knew him to be generous and full of civic pride. He belonged to the Board of Aldermen and at one time was offered the office of Mayor.

He had the confidence and respect of all the inhabitants of the town and his politeness and gentleness were the qualifications which made them love him.