onaventure plantation, a servant entered and
informed him that the house was on fire. Whereupon the old thoroughbred,
instead of turning fireman, persisted in his role of host, ordering the
full dining-room equipment to be moved out upon the lawn, where the
company remained at dinner while the house burned down.

Most of the old houses of the plantations on the river have long since
been destroyed. That at Whitehall was burned by the negroes when
Sherman's army came by, but the old trees and gardens still endure,
including a tall hedge of holly which is remarkable even in this
florescent region. The old plantation house at the Hermitage, approached
by a handsome avenue of live-oaks, is, I believe, the only one of those
ancient mansions which still stands, and it does not stand very
strongly, for, beautiful though it is in its abandonment and decay, it
is like some noble old gentleman dying alone in an attic, of age,
poverty and starvation--dying proudly as poor Charles Gayarre did in New
Orleans.

The Hermitage has, I believe, no great history save what is written in
its old chipped walls of stucco-covered brick, and the slave-cabins
which still form a background for it. It is a story of baronial decay,
resulting, doubtless, from the termination of slavery. Hordes of negroes
of the "new issue" infest the old slave-cabins and on sight of visitors
rush out with almost violent demands for money, in return for which they
wish to sing. Their singing is, however, the poorest negro singing I
have ever heard. All the spontaneity, all the relish, all the vividness
which makes negro singing wonderful, has been removed, here, by the
fixed idea that singing is not a form of expression but a mere noise to
be given vent to for the purpose of extracting backsheesh. It is
saddening to witness the degradation, through what may be called
professionalism, of any great racial quality. These negroes, half
mendicant, half traders on the reputation of their race, express
professionalism in its lowest form. They are more pitiful than the
professional tarantella dancers who await the arrival of tourists, in
certain parts of southern Italy, as spiders await flies.

CHAPTER LII

MISS "JAX" AND SOME FLORIDA GOSSIP

"Or mebbe you 're intendin' of
Investments? Orange-plantin'? Pine?
Hotel? or Sanitarium? What above
This yea'th _can_ be your line?..."

SIDNEY LANIER ("A FLORIDA GHOST.")

It is the boast of Ja