rformance, even if not by
pedigree.

This Negro's father is represented by the sign _x_. By remaining in
obscurity the fond father threw away his one chance for immortality. We
do not even know his name, his social position, or his previous
condition of turpitude. We assume he was happily married and
respectable. Concerning him legend is silent and fable dumb. As for the
child, we are not certain whether he was born in Eighteen Hundred
Fifty-eight or Eighteen Hundred Fifty-nine, and we know not the day or
the month. There were no signs in the East.

The mother lived in a log cabin of one room, say ten by twelve. This
room was also a kitchen, for the mother was cook to the farmhands of her
owner. There were no windows and no floor in the cabin save the
hard-trodden clay. There were a table, a bench and a big fireplace.
There were no beds, and the children at night simply huddled and cuddled
in a pile of straw and rags in the corner. Doubtless they had enough
food, for they ate the crumbs that fell from the rich man's table--who,
by the way, wasn't so very rich.

One of the earliest recollections of Black Baby Booker was of being
awakened in the middle of the night by his mother to eat fried chicken.
Imagine the picture--it is past midnight. No light in the room save the
long, flickering streaks that dance on the rafters. Outside the wind
makes mournful, sighing melody. In the corner huddled the children,
creeping close together with intertwining arms to get the warmth of each
little half-naked body.

The dusky mother moves swiftly, deftly, half-frightened at her task.

She has come in from the night with a chicken! Where did she get it?
Hush! Where do you suppose oppressed colored people get chickens?

She picks the bird--prepares it for the skillet--fries it over the
coals. And then when it is done just right, Maryland style, this mother
full of mother-love, an ingredient which God never omits, shakes each
little piccaninny into wakefulness, and gives him the forbidden
dainty--drumstick, wishbone, gizzard, white meat, or the part that went
through the fence last--anything but the neck.

Feathers, bones, waste are thrown into the fireplace, and what the
village editor calls the "devouring element" hides all trace of the
crime. Then all lie down to sleep, until the faint flush of pink comes
into the East, and jocund day stands tiptoe on the mountain-tops.

* * * * *

This ex-slave