Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-07-09

s UTIIy
school, was brought one day dead and man
gled to the little door by the yellow roses;
and Jack gave up his dreams, moved out,
and was lost to his old patrons among the
black fotSam and jetsam that tossed about
in the suburbs of the town on the tidal
waves of house-moving.
VIII mother give herself for her chill
dren? l see now Kate, who used to keep
watch over my infantile goingS and COM
ings. She once was buxom and comedy, but
hard work and a brood of eleven irrespon-
sible pickaninnies have taken her youth.
kind-hearted blarneytongued, slow-mov-
ing Kate. Her employers call her lazy;
but | wonder If any of them stop to think
that for the very small wages they give
her she is gradually killing herself over
the wash tub? For this constant bending
over the tub is what induces the cOnSump
ton to which negro women are such ready
victims If one points this out to Kate,
she replies: Il wants my niggers to have
good clo'es and eddication."
Two of Hates children are really beau
ties. Their big, soft black eyes roll about
under long, silken lashes. When they open
their thick red lips to smile-and they will
do so for nod-they show shining, fault
less rows of pearls Their skin is a warm
reddish-b brown hue that has the sheen of
satin These two children, if they were in
Italy would be artists delight In a south
ern town they are but hardy wild flowers,
unnoticed by the wayside-merely pickann-
MES.
Faithful Uncle Ike.
AS hero of fidelity l recall unkempt
Uncle he. The son of Uncle Ike's old mas
ter had squandered his estates, had sunk
lower and lower had become drunken
sot. In his native town there was none
of his kind to befrlend him: even his rela-
tives closed their doors to him. And Uncle
Ike, too, felt a righteous contempt for the
outcast. With a sad quaver in his voice
he told me one day how he had been con-
strained to deal with his young master. Il
look outen my window one day an / seed
Marse Temp comm agin'-drunk as ever.
| lowed to myself that ! want goin' to let
him into carry on like he alters did. So
i jes' slipped right easy an bolted the doc
on the inside. MarSe Temp was still a
comm | heerd the gate latch after him.
/ knowed he wuZ gitten' nearder. Then 1
thought. Marse Temp is son of OF narse.
or marse wuz powful good to me, an
Marse Temp good to when we wuz
boys. / jes' had that doc unbolted anG
opened befo' Marse Temp got to it. 1
'vited him in and give him a pone of con
bread an some bacon for his dinner-an'
he wuZ hongry, too. Then | put him to bed
not on jes a common bed nuther; l put
him on my compny bed. Fur you see 1t
dean mattah wat Marse Temp do, he Is or
narses son. an OF marSe was pow full
good to me-"
How often do unknowingly humliate
that personal pride that burns beneath even
the ragged garments of the black folk.
now remember with remorse an old slave
whose deepest degradation | Witnessed
must l confess it?-unmoved. Uncle Prince
styled himself DR.. Prince Cook. In &C
cordance with his title he always wore an
ancient silk hat and a faded Prince Albert
and carried bundle of YARDS under his
arm. Uncle Princes old master had passed
into the other world; but the old slave lin
eeIed year after year. growing feebler as
the cracks in his cabin grew larger. The
nelghboring white people became tired OF
looking after him and of harboring the
fear of finding him some winter morning
cold and dead in his open hut. So they
forced upon his proud soul what was worse
than death-the poor house. Bot Uncle
Princes dignity succumbed not to even
this humiliation. Holding himself erect in
his tall hat and long coat, with his bundle
of herbs under his arm he babe me good
bye In his usual cheerful. courtly manner.
Not word of complaint; only proul sub
terfuge about them sick folks at Smiths
Grove that want me to come up an doctor
en-"
A broken spirit Is more fatal than crack
ed walls and draughts Uncle Princes So
tourn in the poor house was short.
Music and the Darkey.
l had never before stopped to think about
how much music the negro had brought
into southern life. Their soft, melodious
voices were caroling and chanting all about
us-in the kitchen, in the fields, upon the
byways. We took II a matter of course
that they should have the gift of melody
and that we should sometimes stop, per-
force, and listen, and at other times go on
and heed it not, just as We accept the boon
of the birds warbling in the trees about
us. l remember how Tidy used to deluge
our kitchen with such floods of melody
| that even the Sorrow songs as she sang
| them became paeans of victory:
Have you come, o good Iprdf
Sometimes up an sometimes down,
Sometimes level with the ground,
a. Ia
| But now Tidy is weakened by disease and
| hard work. Very rarely do the songs seek
| her lips.
There is a wealth of Imagination going to
waste among the black folk Some day one
of themselves will collect their folklore.
Has any child ever had such delightful and
| various kinds of creeps as the one who has