to read the Bible for her. She would listen for hours and too, she would
sing such songs as, "Roll, Jordan Roll."

Saturdays were mill days and I had to take the corn on my shoulder and
go to the mill, which was four or five miles away. It always took me
from four to five hours to make this trip, as I had to stop by the way
several times to rest.

By this time my brother and sister were large enough to do good work on
the farm. My grandfather and grandmother for whom they were working, now
desired to take them wholly from my old grandmother. The Justice of the
Peace said that the children might decide the matter. My brother chose
to go to my grandfather's but my sister came back home with the
grandmother who had reared us from infants. Of course, I did not go to
court, because they all knew that there was no chance of my leaving my
grandmother.

In the early spring of 1880 while on one of my trips to the mill the
thought dawned upon me that my grandmother was very old and must soon
die. I cried all the way to the mill and back. I could not see how I
would live after she was gone. I did not tell anybody why I was crying.
On a June night, she became severely ill and died. All she said to us
during her illness was: "Children, I have been waiting for this hour a
long time."

After the death of my grandmother, her daughter Marina Rivers, who was
herself a widow and well on in years, came to live with us that year. I
soon learned to love her as I had my grandmother and never once thought
of leaving her for my mother's people. We gathered the crop that fall
and when all was over, my father, whom I had not seen for five or six
years, came to carry my sister and myself to Selma, where he was
staying. The thought of going to the city filled me with joy and the
time to go could not come too soon for me.

CHAPTER 2.

SHADOWS.

We arrived in Selma several days before Christmas. Here everything was
strange to me, as I had never been in a city before. I did not know any
one and it was not long before I was crying to return to Snow Hill. My
father gave me to understand then, that Selma was my home now and that I
should not be permitted to return to Snow Hill. He said that he was
going to put me in school when the New Year came, but when the time came
nothing was said about school. He gave us little care and often we were
in need of food and clothes.

After spending a few weeks doing nothing, I went out one day to hu