The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1881-11-12
the bittor cud of patience and compose
an addenda to the Lamentations of Jor
emiah which out-herods Herod.

JHe DltLCI Ctlu VI pdlicuCo ttHu CoLupOoo
an addenda to the Lamentations of Jor-
emiah which out-herods Herod.
We can boast of centenarian on this
plantation, who, if she never had the
honor of nursing the "Father of his
country" might have had if Fate had
been kinder and he had been less abun-
dantly supplied with the necessary arti-
Gle of nurse. This old creature, "Aunt
Binah" by name, looks old enough and
withered enough to have nursed Noah
himself, had black mammies" been
fashionable in his day, which, supposing
the tradition Of Ham to he correct, we
may reasonably imagine they were not.
But, to return to our muttons, or rather,
our centenarian. She is undoubtedly
over hundred years old, and, to mo, a
living curiosity. When am in her
presence l have exactly the sensation
one would experience were q mummy,
dried and swathed and hung up in some
museum of curiosities, to open its time
and death-locked jaws to discourse upon
the topics current in Pharaoh's or Ptole-
my's day; q creepy feeling as if tho ghost
of past ages stood before me. In the
same house with her live her descendants
to the .tVtA generation; just think of it !!
truly, $50 near aud yet SO far" Unlike
the generality Of centenarians I have
heard or read Of, this old woman is both
blind and bed-ridden she livos on-if,
in our short-sighted wisdom, not discern
ing His All-wise plans, we may say it
cumberer upon earth while SO many
good and noble lives are cut short in their
strength. It appears almost as if Death
had forgotten her, and Time had spared
her to "point a moral" whereby we may
see how vain u thing is life WHOM the
"days of darkness have come. She
still retains possession of her mental
faculties, although to a limited degree.
Tho present, it's daily cares and trials,
seems to have no power to attract her
thoughts; her mind constantly reverts
back to the past, the days of her youth,
when wo may be sure light-hearted hap
piness was the Negroes portion, ere he had
to solve tho knotty problem Of self-sns-
tenanoe. This old creature delights to
talk shout "Old Muster and .Mietns -
4 pair whose great grandchildren were
grown long since. Age, though, has an
initiated time for her, and toher fancy
her kind old owners, whose bones 70,
generations have moul.lered away, arc
still "lIaster and Nistus."
This old womans daughter, an octo
genarian, is still active. She can rcndily
recall all the trials and privations that
attended the earlier settlers Of Louisiana
aud Mississippi III those primitive days
when hardships were the rule and not
the exception; when there were no con.
| veniences mud but few comforts; when
but little cotton was raised, and that
little picked out pound by pound from
tho seed by the hands, generally, too, q
, night by the tlickering blaze Of resin
torches or tallowdips. Many strange
tales of pioneer life and its dangers arc
still fresh in her memory. Like all old
Negroes, she recoll ects we'll when "Jack-
son ft" and the "stars fell, and hor con-
versation, although in the uncoutll
language of plantation dialect, carries
one back forcibly to those early days
whose only record is upon the pages OF
biographical history.
"They whom the gods love die young!'
Our noble hearted Governor is no more
So short life and yet SO brilliant a
one! Did some premonition of early,
coming doom force him to crowd in the
space Of his short life those luminous
achievements which louger-lived mortals
are content to carry over their three.
score and ten years:
80, weep for Adonais-hc is dead
Yet whcrcfo1e? Qucnch within their burn
ing bed
| Thy fiery tears and let thy loud heart keeI
| Like his. mute anu accomplishing sleep
| For he has gone, whore all things wise and
fair descend"
He has out-soar1 the shadow of our
night;
Envy and calumny and hate and pain.
| And that unrest which men miscall delight
Can touch him not and torture not again
From the contagion Of tho worlds slow
stain
| He is secure and now can never mourn
A heart grown cold, . head grown gray in
vain;
Nor. when the spirits self has ceased to burn
With sparkless aches load an unlamentct
urn"
VILLETTE.
RED LIPS AND ROSY CHEEKS.
WHEELING, w. VA, May 30, 1881.