The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1901-05-16

been on that line ever since these out
RACES began. 1 rejoice over every
lynching of brute and our woods are
full of good citizens of the same mind.
Governor Gambler may purge his
own record about lynching and de-
nounce that Philadelphia editor who
lied on him, but 1 am not governor
and am not target to be shot at and
l am free to say that man who would
wait for the slow, uncertain process Of
the law and the courts to avenge our
wives and daughters is no man at all
and has my scorn and contempt. L
think [ had better read psalm or go
out and plant some more beans, for my
wife says she wants q succession Of
crops OF all these leguminous vegeta.
bles. I think that is what she called
them.
1t is that same puritanical set Of
preachers who brought on the war and
we thought the next generation would
have more sense and let us alone since
slavery was abolished, but like fathers
like sons and they eyet miserable as
long as Mordecai is sitting at the gate.
Some Of our writers and orators de-
clare that peace and brotherly love
now prevails, but it is like the game OF
three card monte" now you see it
and now you don't see it. Henry
Grady made O great speech in Boston
and fairly captured his audience, but
in less than two weeks the Boston
preachers were belittling his effort
and bowling at the south for its bad
faith to the fifteenth amendment. The
race problem is still their capital stock
and it has spread from New England
to Chicago and the great west. The
G. A. Rs. have appointed commit
tee to write up tt history of the civil
war, and the next thing will be to
force it into the public schools.
The G.. A. RS arc power
in the land and teeir creed is to
draw more pensions and bigger ones.
but I can't understand how they can
loo}; a confederate soldier in the face
and boast of anything. If it took four
Of US to whip one of them I'd never
brag about it nor ask for pension, and
if it was given me 1 would conscien-
tiously pour it back in the jug.
When God created Adam He planted
a garden for him and put him in ii to
keep it and dress it and that was limo.
cent and manly, and SC L will go out
and dig same and turn the hydrant
loose, for it is awful dry. Wish I
could turn it loose on those preachers.
Since Bishop Gambler exclaimed in
big head lines, ooh, for one more breath
of Puritanismr I've been perusihG
history. OF course he dident mean those
Puritans who came to New England
and went to importing negroes and
robbing the Indians and burning
witches.
Mr.. Stedman and Miss Hutchinson
have eleven volumes of American lit,
erature and the second is devoted to
those horrible witchcraft times when
Increase Mather and Cotton Mather
and Samuel Sewall and other savants
had helpless women arrested and tried
and hung for witchcraft. The whole
procedure is in this volume and ii
N axes the heart sick to read how
the poor creatures begged for their
lives and in their last moments on the
gallows denied their guilt. How as
many as eight were hung at one time
and many more at various times and
how old Judge Sewall afterwards re.
pented and the twelve jurymen repent
ed and published their repentance and
asked God to forgive their great sin,
etc.
One woman, Mary Watkins, who
was hired servant, q white woman,
was tried, but the evidence was not
quite sufficient to convict, and so they
did not hang her, but sent her off to
Virginia to be sold as slave. This is
only little scrap of New England
history, and if any of their descend
ants is ashamed of it they have never
said so to me. Those northern breth.
rem are awful slow on apologies. But
l must go and stick the sweet peas and
hurry up the flowers for the June we'd
ding. Our neighbours pretty daugh-
ter is to be married and they are sing
ing to me
Bring flowers, bring flowers, for the bride
to wear,
They are born to blush in her shining
hair"
BILL ARP in Allan ia Constitution.