orchard, there were a number of cabins, old, but not deserted, for negro
children were playing about the doors and from somewhere within came the
low drone of a half-religious, half-cornshucking melody. An old dog got
up from under a tree, but, repenting of the exertion, lay down again; a
turkey loudly gobbled, a peacock croaked, and a tall, bulky, old man
came out upon the porch.

"Walk right in," he called, and shouting back into the hallway he
commanded some one to bring out three chairs. And even before we had
ascended the stone steps the command had been obeyed by a negro boy.
"Glad to meet you, sir," he said when Alf had introduced me. "You have
come to teach the school, I believe. Old man Perdue was over and told me
about it. Sit down. What's your father doing, Alf?"

"Can't do anything to-day," Alf answered, glancing at me.

"I suppose not. All the folks well? Glad to hear it," he added before
Alf could answer him. "It's been pretty wet, but it's drying up all
right."

He wore a dressing gown, befigured with purple gourds, was bare-headed
and I thought that he wore a wig, for his hair was thick and was curled
under at the back of his neck. His face, closely shaved, was full and
red; his lips were thick and his mouth was large. I could see that he
was of immense importance, a dominant spirit of the Old South, and my
reading told me that his leading ancestor had come to America as the
master of a Virginia plantation.

"Henry!" the old General called. "Fetch me my pipe. Henry!"

"Comin'," a voice cried from within. His pipe was brought and when it
had been lighted with a coal which Henry carried in the palm of his
hand, rolling it about from side to side, the General puffed for a few
moments and then, looking at me, asked if I found school-teaching to be
a very profitable employment.

"The money part of it has been but of minor consideration," I answered.
"My aim is to become a lawyer, and I am teaching school to help me
toward that end."

He cleared his throat with a loud rasp. "I remember," said he, "that a
man came here once from the North with pretty much the same idea. It was
before the war. We got him up a school, and by the black ooze in the
veins of old Satan, it wasn't long before he was trying to persuade the
negroes to run away from us. I had a feather bed that wasn't in use at
the time, and old Mills over here had a first-rate article of tar on
hand, and when we got through with the gentleman