The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1851-10-09

childish, unsystematc and improyident it was
not TO be expected that servants trained under
her care should not be so likewise and she had
very Justly described to Miss 0phelia the state
of confusion she would find in the family.
though she had not ascribed il to the proper
cause.
The first morning of her regency, Miss 0phe-
liza was up at four o'clock, and having attended
to all the adjustments of her own chamber, as
lie had done ever since she came there, to the
great ar.a,azement of the chambermaid, she pre-
pared for a vigorous onslaught on the cup
boards and closets of the establishment of which
she had the keys.
The store-room, the linen-presses, TIE -chlpa,
closet, the kitchen and cellar that day all went
under an awful review. Hidden things of dark
ness were brought TO light TO an extent that
alarmed all the principalities and powers of
kitchen and chamber, and caused many won
behring's and murmurings about " desc yer
Northern ladies from the domestic cabinet
Old Dinah, the head cook, and principal Of
all rule and authority in the kitchen depart
ment, was filed with wrath at what she con-
sidered an Invasion Of privilege. No feudai
baron in Magma ChGHd times could have more
thoroughly resented some incursion of the
Crown
Dnah was a character in her own way, and
it would be injustice to her memory not to give
the reader little idea of her. She was a ma
tive and essential cook, as much as Aunt
Chloe-cooking being an indigenous talent of
the African race but Chloe was a trained and
methodical one, who moved in an orderly do
nestle harness while Dinah was a selEtaught
genius, and, like geniuses in general, was posi-
tive, opinonated, and erratic to the last degree.
Like certain class of modern philosophers,
Dinah perfectly scorned logic and reason in
every shape and always took refuge in intui
tive certainty; and here she was perfectly i'm
pregnable No POSSIBLE amount of talent or
authority or explanation sould ever make her
believe that any other way was better than her
own or that the course she pursued I'm rne
| smallest matter could be in the least modified
| This had been conceded point with her old
| mistress, Marle's mother; and Miss Marie"
as Dinah always called her young mistress,
even after her marriage, found it easier to submit
| than contend; and SO Dinah had ruled supreme.
This was the easier, in that she was perfect mis-
tress of that diplomatic art which unites the
| utmost subservience of manner with the utmost
infexibility az to measures
Dinah was mistress of the whole art and
mystery of excuse-making in all its branches
Indeed it was an axiom with her that the cook
can do no wrong and cook in Southern
kitchen finds abundance of heads and shoulders
on which to lay off every sin and frailty, so as
to maintain her own immaculateness entire IL
any part of the dinner was failure, there were
fifty indisputaby good reasons for it. and it Vas
the fault undeniably of fifty other people, whom
Dinah berated with msparing zeal.
But it was very seldom that there was any
failure in Dinah's last results. Though her
mode of doing everything was peculiarly mean
dering and crcuitous and without any sort of
calculation rs to time and place-though her
kitchen generally looked as If it had been ar
ranged by a hurricane blowing through il, and
she had about US many places for each cooking
utensil Us there We're days in the year-yet il
one would have patience to wait her own good
| time, up would come her dinner in perfect or
der and in a style of preparation with which
an epioure could find no fault
| II was now the season of incipient prepara-
ton for dinner. Dinah, who required large in
tervals Of reflection and repnse, and was studi-
Gus of ease in all her arrangements was seated
OH tho kftchen fioor, smoking short sturnpy
pipe, to which she was much addicted, and
which she always kindled up as a sort of cen
SER whenever she felt the need of an inspira
|
of invoking the domestic muses.
Seated around her were various members o
that rising race with which Southern house
hold abounds engaged in Smelling peas peelinI
potatoes, picking pin feathers out of fowls AM
other preparatory rrangements-Dinah ever,
once in a while interruptng her meditations B,
give poke or rap on the head to some Of tn
young operators, with the pudding stick that la,
by her side. In fact Dinah ruled over tn,
woody heads of the younger members with
rod Of IRON and seemed to consider them borr
for no earthly purpose but to "save her steps,
as she phrased it 1t was the spirit of the sys
tenn under which she had grown up and sh'
carried it out to its full extent.
Miss Ophelia, after passing on her reforma
tory tour through all the other parts of the es
tablishment now entered the kitchen. Dnal
had heard from various sources what was going
on, and resolved to stand on defensive and con
sentative ground-mentally determined to OPP
pose and ignore every new measure, without any
actual and observable contest
| The kitchen was large brick-foored apart
ment with great old-fashioned fireplace
stretching along one side of it--an arrangement
which St Clare had vainly tried to persuade
Dinah to exchange for the convenience of n
modern cook stove Not she. No Puseyite or
conservative of any school was ever more infiex-
IDLY attached to time-honored inconvenience
than Dinah
When st. Clare had first returned from the
North, impressed with the system and order Of
his uncle's kitchen arrangements, he had large
ly provided his own with an arrayo Of cupboards,
drawers, and various apparatus to induce sys-
tematic regulation under the sanguine illusion
that it would be of any possible assistance TO
Dinah in her arrangements He might as well
have provided them for n squirrel or maybe.
The more drawers and closets there were, the
more hiding-holes could Dinah make for the
| accommodation of old rags, hair-combs, old
shoes, ribbands, cast-of artificial flowers, and
other articles of vertu, wherein her soul delight
cd
When Miss Ophelia entered the kitchen, Di-
nah did not rise, but smoked on in sublime tran
quillity, regarding her movements obliquely out
Of the corner Of her eye, but apparently intent
only on the operations around her
Miss Ophelia commenced opening set Of
drawers.
"What il this drawer Cor Dnah 90 she said.
dts handy for most anything, misais" said
Dinah. SO it appeared 10 be- From the variety
it contained, Miss Ophelia pulled out first q fine
damask table-cloth stained with blood, having
evidently been used 10 envelop some raw meat
Whats this, Dinah You don't wrap up
meat in your mistresss best tablc-cloths ?" y
ooh Lor, missis, no the towels was all a miss
in--so Jest did it, laid out to wash that ar
that's why put 1t thar
"Shif'lessl" said Miss Ophelia to herself
proceeding TO tumble over the drawer, where
she found nutmeg Crater and two or three
nutmegs-a Methodist hymn book-a couple Of
soiled Madras handkerchicfs-som yarn and
knitting work-apaper Of tobacco and pipe
n few crackcrs-one or two gilded china saucers,
with some pomade in them--onc or two thin old
shoes--a peice Of flannel carefully pinnedup en-
closing some small white onions-scveral dam
ask table-napkins-som coarse crash towels
some Irvine and darning needles--and several