University of Virginia Library

14. FOURTEENTH INSTALLMENT.

“Look h'yer, ole marster, ef you don't git off dat
hoss-block, you gwine freeze spang to it, and me and
little Billy will have to come and prize you off wid a crowbar.”

It was the voice of my cook, Aunt Polly Waddy, the

last slave-born woman living in America. She had belonged
to Colonel Bondurant.

“Go away, Aunt Polly,” said I; “I am concerned
about higher matters than these material particles you call
my body—go away.”

“I won't budge a inch twell you git up from dar. I
don't want to hear none of yo' foolosophy 'bout potticals
—git up from dar, ole marster; don't you hear me?
You's a pritty man—so old dat yo' bones rattles in yo'
skin like cinders in a tin-pan—to be settin' out here and
de frost gethrin' on you like dried rozum on a pine log—
git up from dar, day's breakin'—git up. Lemme heist you down.”

“Be it so, Aunt Polly,” said I, mournfully, coming
back from the stars with great anguish. “But what have
I to do with life?”

“Monsus little,” was her reply; “and darfo you mout
be mo' keerful.”

“Heish!” she cried suddenly; “heish! kelvery
comin'.”

Sure enough, the trampling of many hoofs was heard
in the distance. A squadron of imperial cuirassiers had
gone up some days before to suppress a disturbance at
Concord depot, and their return did not surprise me.
Presently the cavalcade halted under the gigantic oaks
that shaded the road in front of my house, and the officer
in command saluted me in a strangely quavering voice.

“Give you good-morrow, fair sir,” said he.

“Give it to me, then,” I replied gruffly, for I was in no
humor to receive visitors; “give it to me and pass on—
this ain't no tavern.”

“Fur de Lord's sake, ole marster, don't sen' um away.
We's had no comp'ny fur de longist, and my fingers farly
eeches to be doin' somethin'.”

“Methinks, most ancient codger,” said the officer,
“that your lingo is even more unclassical than inhospitable.”

“Ned Gregory,” said I, “if you and Jim Hope and
the rest of you have nothing better to do at your time of
death (I knew they were all dead), you'd better go back
to the graves where you belong.”

No man, no living man, would or could have believed
it; but besides E. S. Gregory and James Barron Hope,
there were Alex. McDonald, Jim Booker, Ham Chamberlayne,
[1] V. Dabney, Gordon McCabe, Phil. Haxall, John
Reeve, Legh Page, Nathan Clapp, John Meredith and
Mel. Cardoza, and a good many more, some twenty in
number, all on horseback except Mel, who was mounted
upon a little lame Shetland pony with big black eyes.
All had beards, white as the driven snow, hanging down
to their waists, except Gordon McCabe, who looked to be
about seventeen years of age till you got close to him and
saw that there were at least ten thousand wrinkles in his
face.

“Have you got any cold sperrits?” they cried.

“Did y'all know Woody Latham?” said I.

And they answered and said they did. “We desire
some pizen,” they added.

“Did y'all know Judge Semple?” said I.

They answered yes, and most of them lied.

“And did y'all know Jim McDonald and Bob Ridgway
and Chas. Irving and Marcellus Anderson and Philander
McCorkle and Gallatin Paxton and Bob Glass and Gray
and Bob Latham and Roger A. Pryor and Sam Paul and
Joe Mayo and A. D. Banks and Wm. E. Cameron and
George and Abe Venable and Chas. W. Button and Billy
Mosby and Nat Meade and Geo. Wedderburn and Nebuchadnezzar
and Peter Francisco and Dr. Henry C. Alexander
and old Mr. Osborne of Petersburg and Melchisedek
and Mr. J. P. Cowardin and Capt. O'Bannon and Uncle
Alex. Moseley and Cæsar and Maurice and Squire of the
Whig office and Heliogabalus and Bennett of the Enquirer
and Peter B. Prentis of Nansemond and Col. Walter
Taylor and the Dismal Swamp and the two Barhams of
Petersburg and Dr. Pleasants and the fourth book of
Euclid and Senator Ro. E. Withers?”

[In the original MS. the list embraces the names of
nearly half the population, male and female, of Lynchburg,
Farmville, Richmond, Petersburg, and Norfolk, a

large number of heathen gods, and old Virginia negroes
of good families.]

And they answered, and said they pintedly did—which
for the most part was a falsity on their part.

Then, turning to my handmaiden, I inquired:

“Aunt Polly, can you cook up a little something for
these gentlemen?”

The old woman was a Virginian to the interior of her
backbone. Her eyes literally flashed—

“Cook! Kin I cook? for dem few? I kin cook for
all creashun, ef you gimme de lard.”

“Well,” said I, “you've had the keys these ten years,
and I reckon you ought to know where the lard is.”

The old woman hurried off, overjoyed.

I, too, was overjoyed. My eyes filled with tears of unspeakable
thankfulness for the gift of friendship and human
sympathy that had come to me so unexpectedly on the very
edge of life. I felt that I could live ever so much longer.

“'Light, 'light, you blessed, blessed, blessed old hell-ions,”
I cried (no such relief for affection as an oath-edged
benediction), “and come in.”

The old, half-frozen fellows scrabbled down from their
horses as quickly as they could, shook me warmly by the
hand, and we hurried into the house, for it was very cold.

It always made the Commodore mad for company to
come. Scared as he had been by the horror that was in
the air during the night, he was not half so scared as I was
lest he should intrude upon my guests; but, luckily for us
all, he retired in the sulks to his room and there remained.
A grand, old-fashioned fire was soon set going in the wide
hearth of the dining-room—some of the logs were rammed
end-wise up the chimney—and we began to warm our
shrivelled hands; but before we could get comfortable the
demand for antifogmatics became vociferous.

“Boys,” said I (not one of them was a day under a
hundred), “boys, I've got here all the 'heimers, wassers,
cognacs, London docks, schnapps, rums, clarets, sherries,
madeiras, S. T. 1860 Xs, treble Xs, stouts, Bass's and
Bowler's pale ales, lagers, Kissingens, etc., etc.; also a
barrel or two of Ned Lafong's Clemmer and a few runlets
of Bob Burke's choice Hanger: what do you say?”

“Whisky! Whisky!” unanimously.

We took about a dozen four-finger slugs apiece and at
least eight bald-face gulgers, plumb to the brim every pop.
We were none of your tender-gizzarded spring chickens;
besides, the weather was deucedly cold.

By the time we were fairly warmed up inside and out,
Aunt Polly brought in breakfast.

We had in the first place a regular old-time Montrose
loaf, a high fellow, like a Martello tower. Gordon McCabe
got as mad as fire because he couldn't tip-toe and
shake his fist over it in the face of Phil Haxall—the boys
were all a good deal excited. Then we had spare-ribs,
broiled ham and eggs, beefsteak and onions, corned shad,
and chitlins on toast. We had also some batter-bread,
some batter-cakes, some buckwheat cakes, some flannel-cakes,
some hominy, some turn-overs, some griddle-cakes,
some beat-biscuit, some muffins, and some heavenly waffles.
Last, but not least, we had some coffee, some open fire-placed,
trivet-hotted coffee, just such coffee as Mrs. Chamberlayne's
Laura used to make—coffee that goes to the
soul—in a megatherial pot.

As we were about to sit down, in comes Col. Thomas
F. Owens,[2] who had been detained all night at Spout
Spring. He was received with a feu de joie, in decidedly
cracked accents, asked a Masonic blessing, and we all fell
to. When the Arabian elixir began to penetrate to their
remotest capillaries, and the gums (there wasn't the half
of a tooth in the whole crowd) of these old cocks began to
sink through the crisp, brown crust down into the very
marrow of the hot waffles, they sobbed aloud and with one
voice said, “This, this is Old Virginia!”

It did me good to hear them say so. I thought so myself.

Never did I see people eat so; never did I eat so in all
my life. It was eleven o'clock and after before breakfast
was over.

I had all sorts of all sorts of cigars in the known world; I
had every named pipe, with reed, reed-root, fig, cherry, and
other stems, also some noble cobs, wrought by the genius
of Franklin Mosby and handed down to me by Alexander
Mosely, together with a lot of long ti-ti stems, sloped
off at the tip like the mouth-piece of a clarionet. We
were smoking like twenty old tar-kilns, when an ominous
rumbling and rattling was heard upon the staircase. My
worst fears were realized; it was the Commodore, freshly
wound up and in a perfect frenzy at the intrusion of my.
guests. In an instant I had locked and bolted the parlor
door. As well have opposed so much pasteboard to his
progress; he smashed the door down with a single blow,
leaped into the crowd and laid about him with the staff
of old Terrill, of Bath, in a most alarming and indeed
dangerous style. The rattling of that staff upon our old
skulls reminded me of a hogshead full of gourds rolling
down a rocky hill. It was an awful state of affairs. We
were twenty-one in all, but no match for that terrible automaton
with his huge stick; black eyes, bloody noses, and
skinned sconces became the order of the day in less than
fifteen minutes. He soon cleared out the parlor, and such
a chase up-stairs and down-stairs ensued as was never seen
before. Of all the lively old men that ever were on this
planet we were the liveliest. I haven't a doubt that he
would have killed the last one of us if John Meredith, who
had learned the art in California, had not blinded him by
throwing a bed-quilt over his head, and then lassoed him;
after which it was comparatively an easy matter (not such
an easy matter either, for he fought like a demon to the
last) to bind him hand and foot. What to do with him,
was then the question. A violent discussion followed.
“To destroy such a marvelous bit of mechanism would
be a sin and a shame,” said some. “We will have no
peace of our lives—he may get loose at any moment—
until we put an end to him,” said the others. After two
hours' talk, interspersed with numerous nips, it was put to
the vote and decided by a large majority to burn him.
Accordingly, he was doubled up, tied with plow-lines, his
feet to his head and his arms around his legs, and thrown
upon the great brass andirons of the dining-room fire-place,

the only one large enough to receive him. We ought to
have known better; but, what with the various gulgers,
slugs and nips that we had taken, we did not. No sooner
were the plow-lines burnt through, than the old man came
out of the fire-place with a demoniac bound and scream,
scattering the coals in all directions, setting the house on
fire in a dozen different places, smashing half my crockery
(the table was set for dinner) and playing hob generally.
A stampede followed, of course. Ham Chamberlayne
tripped him up, seized one leg, old Kelley, of the Fredericksburg
Herald, seized the other, and away they both
went out of different windows, carrying the sashes with
them and landing twenty feet out in the yard. The Commodore,
leaping after them, gave chase to the first men
he saw, who chanced to be Bishop Gibbons and Dr. Erasmus
Powell, the greatest pile-ointmenter of the age. Off
they sped through the well-house, the Commodore not two
feet behind them. Blind with rage, the Commodore
missed the gate (a happy circumstance), and smash went
the well-house, down went the Commodore, kicking and
fighting as he fell, knocking out the stones and destroying
the well forever but entombing himself at the same
time. He kept kicking, though, and at least accounts was
gradually working his way through to the other side of
the earth, producing earthquakes, eclipses, tidal-waves,
and Asiatic cholera at various points as he went along.[3]

Order was soon restored, and dinner was served without
delay, for the sun was setting, and we were as hungry as
silkworms. As I entered the dining-room that capital
major-domo, Charley B. Oliver, came in with a big bowl
of superb egg-nog. John Dabney, through another door,
brought a bowl of apple-toddy (Tom Wynne's pattern),
and Gerot followed with some other delicious mixed
French something or other. In one corner Bishop Cummings
and Mr. Latane were discussing pedobaptism with
Innes Randolph and Jimmy Pegram (Jim was fat), while
in the other Mr. Sprigg and Dr. Staples were presenting

copies of the Bible to T. W. McMahon and Horace
Greeley. Just then Mosby, Wirt Harrison, Lorentz and
Kellam, of the Auditor's office, came in with four or five
scuttles (they were sweet and clean) of smoking Tom and
Jerry. Dr. Bastian, Huxley, and J. C. Southall, protested
that a cold protoplasmic smash was the thing, and Lubbock
(Sir John), a little tipsy I thought, called vociferously
for a prehistoric stone-fence, but their voices were
lost in the general uproar of talk. People continued to
come; some I knew intimately, others not so well, but all
were warmly welcomed. I could hear the clatter of the
swingletrees and the clink of the trace-chains of arriving
vehicles on all sides of the yard.

It was a dinner indeed—such a dinner—Aunt Polly's
supreme triumph. We had a Royal Bengal ashcake, as
big as the head of a flour-barrel, no collard leaf about it,
the print of the cook's fingers still there, and a few cinders
clinging to the crust in spite of careful washing. We
had a sublime turkey and a ham that quieted all longings
for immortality—all present longings, I mean. We had
some pot-liquor with dumplings, a cotopaxic Brunswick
stew, vegetables of various degrees, 'coon cutlets, some
bread—also forks—some eggs, many numerous eggs—and
knives—some eggs, and a joint of conic sections garnished
with Greek roots, for the benefit of Harry Estell
and Tom Price—and eggs, plenty of knives and gravy—
with the fif'-finest wuh, wuh, wuh-ine, wine (I said wine)
sent me from Oscar Jones's by Cha'—Charles Cranz—and
eggs.

A fine—good—elegant—fuf'—fine dinner.

I sat at the foot of the table, with my cousin Billy
Ivvins (when did he come?) and George Eliot on my
right, and E. S. Gregory and Bill M. Thackeray on my
left. Herbert Spencer sat at the head, with Tarquin the
Proud on one side and George Dabney Wooten on the
other—a supp'-lendid comp'ny. I could hear the swingletrees
of more a coming, and I was glad. I had plenty.

They toasted me. Everybody was kind, and toasted.
“Dear, good, generous old Moses—we'll never leave you
—we wo-won't go ho'.”

My dry old heart was suffused with bliss. At last I had

what I wanted—love, affection, good fellowship, people
that really cared for me and enjoyed being with me. I
was very happy.

I stood up to reply. The last rays of the setting sun
shone through the windows (we had pasted foolscap over
the broken panes) and shed a glory over the scene. The
room was warm and rather close—too much wood on the
fire. I stood up to respond. They were all dead men—
they could not fool me—and if there was one thing I
wanted to see in this world more than another it was a
dead man, and here they were by the score, and more
coming, kept coming. I could hear my big gate slamming
as they drove through.

And they all looked at me with the look I had seen in
the eyes of the friends of my childhood, and they had
promised to stay with me and look at me that way all the
time. It was great joy, exceeding great. I stood up to
second the—to reply. I was in heaven, a lowly corner or
sub-cellar of heaven it was true, but delightful, and I
knew that when this foolishness was past, friends still
nearer and dearer, male and female, were close at hand
without, waiting to welcome me. I was so happy.

As I rose up to reply and looked into the beaming and
affectionate eyes of my friends, a rosy mist filled the
room, the table (Spiro Zetelle, sitting on a piano-stool in
the middle in place of the pyramid of candied oranges,
directed the feast with a silver-mounted baton borrowed
from Ambold) the table stretched out, Herbert Spencer
and Dabney Wooton receded in the dim sweet distance,
I could hear my muffled voice following them as they vanished—and—I
pledge you my word (as William Waller
used to say in Lynchburg, with his coat sleeves pushed
back and showing his cuffs) I pledge you my word, I went
fast asleep standing up at my own table!

[Poor old Moses! Tight is not the word—it is too
harsh—much too harsh.—Ed. Whig.]