The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1893-01-13


dust of everything known to man; which
dust also covered their shoes and bare
feet, and made both appear the same.
When huddle went off the boat empty
handed they looked like so many big
rats. They loaded the Providence 6
lower deck inside and out; they loaded
her upper deck with the chairs for the
passengers had seemed to be supreme ;
and then they loaded the roof over that
deck and the side spaces until her sides
We're sunk W down near the rivers sur
face, and she bristled atevery point with
boxes, bales, agricultural implements,
brooms, carriages, bags, and as the cap
tain rem lrked, Heaven only know S
what she amt got aboard her." Tho
mates reared, the negroes talked all the
time, or sung to rest their mouths, the
boat kept settling in the water, and the
mountains of freight swelled at every
point 1t was we'll said that twenty or
binary freight trains on a railroad would
not carry as much freight as was slowed
aboard of her, and l did not doubt the
man who remarked to nae that when such
boat, so laden, discharged her cargo
loosely at one place, it often made pile
bigger than the boatitself
These roustaboats are nothing like as
forward us the lowest of their race that
we see in the North. Presumably they
are about what the field hands" of
slavery times were. They are dull-eyed,
stumbling men, dressed like perambulat-
ing rag bags; with rags at the sleeves,
up and down the trousers, at the hens
of their coats, and the rims Of their caps
and hats. A man wbo makes six
changes of his working attire every year
by contract with tailor would be sur
prised at how long these men keep their
clothes. Some wear coats and vests and
no. shirts; some wear oveTcoats and
shirts and no vests; some have only
shirts and trousers; shirts that have lost
their buttons, perhaps, and flare wide
open to the trousers band, showing
black trunk like oiled ebony. They earn
dollar day, but have not learned to
save it. They are very dissiapated, and
are given to carrying knives, which the
mates take from the most unruly ones.
The scars on many of their bodies show
to what use these knives are too often
put. "Who's dat talking bout cutting
out some sne's hearth" / heard one say
as he slouched along in the roustabout
line. 'Ef dar's going to be any cuttin'
l want to do some" Though they chant
at their work, l seldom saw them laugh
or heard them sing song, or knew one
of them to dance during the voyage.
The work is hard, and they are kept at
it, urged constantly by the mates on
shore and aboard, as the southern folks
say that negroes and mules always need
to be. But the roustabouts' faults are
excessively human after all, and the
consequence Of a sturdy belief that they
need sharper treatment than the rest of
us leads to their being urged to do more
work than a white man. There were
nights on the Providence when the land
ings ran close together, and the poor
wretches got little or no sleep. They
tote" all the freight aboard and back
to land again on their heads or shout
ders, and it is crushing work. Whenever
the old old barbaric instinct to loaf,
or to move by threes at one mans work,
would prompt them, one of the mates
was sure to spy the weakness and roar at
the culprits.
The mates showed no actual unkind-
ness or severity while was en- that boat.
But they all-on all the boats-have
fearsome voices, such as we credit to
pirate chiefs on Glow, rakish, black
boats in yellow clad novels. Any one
of them would break up an opera troupe.
The rasp at the darkies in their business
voices, run up the plank, nigger;" now,
then, "niggsr, get woodland then they
turn and speak to the passengers in a
Sunday shore-leave voice, as gentle as
any men can talk.
Mr.. Halloran, an up-river pilot of ce
lebIity who was studying the lower river,
to me that he remembered when it
was the custom for mates to hit lazy mig
gers on the head with billet of wood
land knock them stiff" Tle other ne
groes used to laugh presumably as the
sad faced man laughed when the photo
grapher clapped pistol to his head, and
said, ''Smile, - you, or I'll shoot
Your. When the felled negro come to,
the others would say, "Lep up quick an
git to work, Niger; de mates a-comin'."
They do not Erge the help with cord
wood nSw-so the mate of the Provi-
dence told me--because the negroes get
out warrants and delay the boat.
l have said that the blacks all call
themselves niggers. The rule has its e1-
ceptions. l went ashore at a plantation
called ''SunnySide," and saw cherry
old aunty standing near a cabin doorway,
from out of which pickaninnies were
tumbling like ants out of an ant-hill.
"How many children have you get,
auAtie?' asked.
81 amt got none yere," she said;
"mine's all out in de fell. These yere
two is my gran'chillen;. de Oders I'm
takin' car of fer some oder ladies'"
There was a fiue barber shop and