The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1888-10-27
Select Story.
THE LAST TOURNAMENT.

IHh LASl lUU URNAMlN 1s
Elizabeth NJ Giln,er in N. O. Bieqgupe.
All my life it has seemed to me that
there never was so delightful room as the
big dining room at Woodstock. 1t was a
long. narrow room, with narrow Sits of
windows, so shaded on one side by the black
green cedar trees that grew up against it
that the room was always half in shadow,
but on the other side you had view of
the gray tops of the race stables, and just
beyond rolling sweep of blue grass fields,
with cool, clear pond lying in the midst
like shield of FURNISHED silver. Within
the whole end of the room almost was
taken up by huge fireplace, with broad,
tagged hearth and a mantel shelf set high
above all possible depredations Of childish
curiosity. Into this great fire logs OF
hickory and maple would be piled, and it
was the delight of my childhood to sit in
the corner, verItable Cinderella, and catch
the sweet, pungent, smoke-favored juice
that the fire stewed out of the wood. Over
against the opposite wall stood long, low
mahogany sideboard, black with age, in
the dusky mirror of whose polished wood
the flames reflected themselves with strange
and grotesque variations, now dying down
to tremulous glow in the black panel of
door, now catching silvery radiance
from the long lines of racing cups on the
upper shelf or giving out prismatic CLEANS
from the heavy glass decanters.
Oh, it was pleasant enough room to
sit in, especially in the twilight, when the
cleaning peopled the room with the fan
tastic shadows that dreams are made of.
Likely as not, Just as the fire died down
and the flames began to flicker into un-
steady light, there would be a shutting of
feet in the doorway, and an old negro man,
with kindly, whimsical face, would come
in, smiling above the heavy ''turn" of wood
he was bringing to replenish' the fire. 1t
would be jeff, who had been born on the
place, and to whom it belonged as much as
to any of its ostensible white owners, not
by right of title deeds, but by right of pride
and love in it.
jeff s place in the family had long been
a sinecure. He had ridden the famous
horses raised on the place when he was a
light weight jockey, and in after years,
when he grew too heavy for that, he was
head groom and undisputed authority on
turf matters; but above all, he had been
Marse Phirs friend and companion in child
hood and youth. He had helped Marse
Phil trap rabbits and train colts; he went
off with Marse Phil to the war, and when
he fell in that awful rush of cavalry at
Fort Donelson it was JEFF who walked home
all the way, leading Black Bess by the
bridle-the horse on which Marse Phil was
killed was sacred to him, and he would not
ride it.
Well, ole Miss never thought of that
without dropping an extra lump of sugar
into his '!toddy," or little more "sperrits, y
for JEFF belongs to the old regime and has
no opinion Of the new tangled temperance
notions.
"Dey aint't no sense in hit" he always
argues, ''for what does the good book say
Take little for de stomach's sake en- I
say folks is built des de same way now dey
wuz den Deys got de ve'y same kind Of
stomachs, en- dey need eOmfortin' power
fully sometimes.
1t was fast growing dark one winter
evening, 1 remember, when JEFF came in
with his armful of wood, which he depos-
tied in the woodbox, and then stood leaning
against the mantel, negro fashion, with his
foot on the burning logs. Somehow his
ragged clothes with their incongruous
patches fell about him picturesquely, his
knotty old black hands hung idly by his
side, and the flames leaping up showed his
face sharply outlined against the white wall
as still and immovable as if it was carved
in bronze. But the face was full of the
wistful longings and memories of old age
the pathetic look that comes to those who
dwell in the past, and for whom the future
has neither hope nor promise.
Presently he went over to the sideboard
and began touching, one by one, the long
rows of silver cups and goblets-the tro
phies he had helped to win. They were
his fetiches, the visible idols that repre-
sented all the happy past, and he did moi
need the inscriptions, at best meaningless
scrawls 10 him, to tell him on what race
course or at what fair Fraxinella, or Miss
Wilkins, or Autocrat, or Surprise had won
one or another of them, and he knew well
enough that the time had been when each
of these silver cups represented fortunes
staked on the speed and endurance of {
horse. 1t was something worth remem
bering, those races when they ran foul
mile heats, and it took all the nerve ant
endurance of rider and horse to win
There was the cup that was given wher
Fraxinella won the race at Nachez, wheI
she ran twenty miles at one race-the bes
two out of three-with two dead heats.
And then there were the Crevasse an(
Wagner cups-Jeff chuckled softly to him
self as he touched them:
ave won dem at Nashville, honey" ht
said aloud; "we'd done entered Creyass
and Wagner for de three mile race, en- de
ez me and Marse Phil wuz startin' oil
marster call out; Boys, win race or xii
hoss.' Well, Marthy Dunn en- Invincibl
wuz de fus favrites, and we run our hose
agin 'em, me a ridin', en- we won bof races
but Wagner drapped under me jess ez
got under de string. You know dat hos
know whuts 'spected of him, en- he ain
gwine to 'spint. nobody. Des den Mars
Phil come up en- say: Fore Cord, Mars
Phil, what you reckon ole marster's gwin
to say?' En- he spon: Hes bleedged t.
say we 'beyed him. We'se won race ei
} killed hoss'
After bit JEFF turned, SO that the igh
might fall little fuller on it-a slender
{ ewerlike pitcher, that, with its attendan
goblets, always stood in the center of tn
sideboard, and that no one ever moved
Ole miss busted them herself, with hand
that never ceased to tremble at their task
and no one else, not even JEFF, dared t
touch them. Oh, 1 knew very well wha
the Horid inscription said, that was hal
hidden under the mass Of scrolls and ars
besques carved on them. 1t was the prt
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