Birmingham age-herald., 1895-01-01
A MARYLAND HOME.
FAMOUS WYE MANSION, WITH ITS
 GRACIOUS MEMORIES.

"A stufuy Dolnlclie uuu US 0ubDuliulnsS
 and "Quartcrs"-A Land of Mint Juleps
 and winsome Maidens-Fred Douglass
 Visits His Boyhood,s Home.
 If one might be frisked by the mere magic of n wish away from the vulgar scrambling and the din and all the heart less impertinenee of this impatient time back to those ways of pleasantness and paths of peace which were tho familiar conditions of old Maryland, he might choose to find himself trundling in an an- tiquated gig through the long, dim stretch of woods and the doublc colonnade of To- custs and bcoches which formed the ap- pronch to the great houso'' and ended in the grnveled drive that belted the noblo lawn-from five to seven acres of close, clean sward, dotted with frs and cedars and tcrraced from end to end. Here stood tho sturdy domicile, broad and square, built of bricks brought over from England in tho ships that camo for tobacco. It was flanked on each hand with offices and strung out to the very edge of the woods with tbuildings-kitchen, dairy, ice house, oycrseers lodgo and the quarter for the dusky colony of slaves. This latter might Do either Q group of cabins or n single spacious tenement of logs or stone, affording one big sitting room below, 1oored with earth and rude dorinitories, bunked and blanketed above. On the ground floor tho negroes loved to lie around tho great hearth, with their feet to the fire, and to sleep that sleep of in- souciant beatitude which was broken only by the familiar cry of warning, "Somc fool niggor's heel a-burningl''
 In tho distance was tho clumsy wind rf, ,taI, was presently to find itself transformed and famous in coquetrics of johnny cake and pone, and flapjacks flattered with golden butter, and beyond, between tho willows by the creek, glimpscd and glanced the rippling silver of the bay, with its sleepy coyes and inlets dotted with canoes and barges, and with tho slender spars of pungies in among tho cuddling little isles, where Sambo tonged for "eycshetcrs" in the sun and tho larger fisher took his flnny treasures from tho weir.
 Hero was land flowing with mint ju- leps and blooming with delectable dam sels Mistress Rcbecca Lloyd, beautiful and gracious, greeted the newcomer with a winsomc courtesy on tho broad piazza, and tho grizzled butler, who had toted' his young missus. around so long that thoro wero still times when he forgot him. self and called her "honey,' brought you the beguiling beverage on silver salver engraved with the family arms and was distressed if your straw refused to draw. That broad piazza was burned, with the rest of the noble houso of Wye, on March IS, 17S1 when British marauding party footed the plantation and tho mansion and carried off plate, jewelry and watches, swords, spurs sashes and cooked beavers, Tiff fnr md fix,v,a broidercd waistcoasts, plumed hats and cardinals, the whole splendid plumber of brave apparel and dainty bedeckings. The fair Rebecca has long since been choircd among the angels, and the grizzled butler sleeps with his toes turned up to the mint, but when crossed the lawn one kindly day in Decembe was greeted as graciously by Rebecca's later kinswoman and conducted into the great hall, which never yet, whether in the parent house or in this, was big enough for the hospitalar ities it has harborcd. The grand old man. or house gave its body to the flames, but its soul survives in the later mansion, where its traditions of courtesy and kind ness arc piously cherished.
 Near tho site of the historic domicile, a fragment of which still remains, stands the beautiful structure, impressive by its proud simplicity, which invites the way farer today in the name of eight genera tions of Maryland worthies who have kept house thero since Edward Lloyd l. the Puritan, in 1868, set up his son Philemon to be lord of the manor of Wye and master of Wye House-incunabula majorum. The main building of two lofty stories, includ- ing the ball. drawing room, parlor din ing room and chambers, all of noble pro- portions, is connected by corridors with one storied wings, which are the library on one side and the domestic offices on the other, presenting pleasing facade of 200 feet looking out upon tho lawn and the4 leafy avenue, and over the woods to Wye river and the bay.
 In Governor Lloyd's time there was certain steward, or bailiff, at Wye, one Captain Anthony of St. Michael's, at one time master of bay craft in the service of the governor. This man was the owner of a likely negro boy who escaped from bond age, and by lis remarkable powers, ac- quirements and address became known to the world as Frederick Douglass. In 1881 Mr. Douglass being then marshal of the District of Columbia was moved to re- visit the scenes of his childhood and his thrall, and one day found himself on the porch of Wye House, where he was re- ceived by the sons of Colonel Lloyd, their father being absent, with that courtesy which is extended to every stranger who, finds his way thither When he had made known the motive of his visit, he was conducted over the estate, from spot to spot that he remembered and described with all their childish associations-here a spring, there a hedge, a lane, field, a tree. He called them by their names or recalled them by some simple incident, and all the glowing heart of the man seemed to go out to the place as he passed from ghost to ghost as in a dream. And then strange thing happened. Standing mute and musing for awhile, he said slow ly and low, as one who talks in his sleep, "Over in them woods was whar me and Mars Dan useter trap rabbits." Mars Dan" was the governors son. Was it the mans half playful, half pathetic sense of the grctesque incongruity of the situation,