The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-09-04
DR.. WHITAKER'S REMINISCENT
PEN COMPLETES A CIRCLE
Year of Delightful RanbIes Among Quaint and
Curious Scenes and Folk Brought
to Close.

in the old States and carried them to
tbe cotton. rice and sugar States, and
sold them to the rich planters. The
reason / hated them was because the
negroes were so terrified when they
came about, for they had horrible
idea of being carried away from their
old homes and kindred to a far away
state where. @they were told. they
would be bought by rich men who
would put them on plantations under
cruel overSeerS. And, as child,
could not bear the idea of seeing any
of them sent away; and so, regarded
the sDeculator as a very cruel, hard-
hearted man; not only the enemy and
the prosecutor of the negro, but as
my enemy as we'll, because, as l
thought he was a dlSturDef OF the
peace of families and OF nelghDor-
hoods. Spectators used to come to
nv fathers house and go out into
the field to look at the negroes. They
were generally we'll dressed and wore
heavy gold watch chains and big
finger rings, and when talking to the
negroes, about going South with them,
To the land of cotton and sugar cane,
their words were as soft ana as sweet
as if they had been saints. pleading
with souls to go with them to heaV-
emily Canaan.
Ihe negroes were terribly alarmed,
and SO was l. when SPECTATOR
came, for, however unruly or unduu-
full one was, he or she belonged 10 our
family and l did not want him or her
to be sent away. An incident comes
to my mind that will bear telllng. we
had a woman who was not only un-
ruly. but a maker among the
negroes, and a great liar Wlthal. MY
father had threatened to sell her. ana,
on the occa sion to which now reIer,
the spectators visit was to look at
the woman. He felt OF her arms,
looked at her teeth, and. with ms
eyes, measured her height; in the
meantime telling her of the fine
country to which he said he carried
the negroes; and, from his description,
it was, indeed, a fairy land where one
had nothing to do but fry pancakes
and SOP them in molaSSes. me PIC
ture did not, however, satisfy the Wo-
man and in as insolent a manner as
she could say it, she replied: L don 1t
care for your fine country nor for
YOUR pancakes and molaSSeS. I'd
rather stay where | can get a plenty
of fat bacon. green's and corn bread
40" said the speculator, IF bacon's
what you love you can have all or
that you want. We don't even lock
the smoke house doors. down there;
and the bacon we've got has so much
grease in it that in less than month
You'll look as black and as slick as
a crow and shine like an angel in the
rice field AS quick as thought the
woman replied: eff you tell many
more like that you'll blaze in torment
like a fodder stack My father spake
sharply and threatened to whi2 her
for her insolence; but, / thought then.
and was confirmed of it afterward he
rather enjoyed her reply to what he
regarded as little less than blasphemy
in the jest of the Spectator.
Yes, | hated spectators, when
boy, and. even after l was older, L
did not have a very exalted opinion
of them. for / thought. and still think,
i'm my old age, it required heart that
was callous-perfectly Indifferent to
the sorrows and Sufferings of human
beings-tO be negro SPECTATOR.
Yankee spectators brought negroes
from the Northern States and sold
them in Virginia and the Carolinas
because they ceased to be profitable
up there; and. SO. when they were
needed in the cotton. rice and sugar
cane fields. of the extreme South
Southern spectators, in imitation of
their Yankee prototypes. went into the
business for what they could get out
of it. Isn't it a little strange, that,
after they had sold all tncir negroes
to the Southern people the Yankees
should have become SO righteous as to
abuse and villify sthe Southern people
for owning the negroes they sold to
them? The money the Southern peo-
pie paid the Yankees for their ne
groes made them rich and then they
couldn't rest until they had destroyed
what they had sold to the South. 1t
is false to say the North fought the
South to maintain the Union. They
fought us because they were jealous
Of %.
cially of cur great political leaders.
The "IrreDressible Conflict" did not
aspire to the dignity of preserving the
Union, but it was for the purpose,
and that only, of destroying a prop
erty which they had sold to us and
gotten our money for. John Browns
raid in Virginia meant even more and
worse than that: for his idea was to
kill the master as we'll as destroy his
property. And, yet, John Brown. the
murderer is. in the Northern mind,
saint to whose memory marble
shafts have been erected, not only
commemorative, but endorsing, his
murderous intent. I think it is about
time that Judas Iscariot had a monu-
ment erected to his memory, and l
can't think of any place more suitable
for it than along side of John Brown
monument. One the murderer of his
Lord; the other of his brethren and
kindred
BY the way, somebody ought to raise
rumDuS about the Indians. and
have a reckoning with our ancestors
who came to this country. and. with
no more right than might asserts,
drove the red men from the Atlantic
to the Pacific; confiscated their lands
and killed all those who dared stand
up for their rights. About the time
our Yankee forefathers were in the
Indian killing business, they were
shipping negroes from the jungles of
Africa; getting rid of one trouble but
bringing in another. 1 have never
been satisfied with the way the Indian
was treated. He might have been
savage, but, this country belonged to
him and he certainly had a right to
it. What pity our forefathers were
not as kind TO the Indians. who own
ed the country, as we have been to
the Africans that were imported. But
/ suppose the poor Indian had no
political value. If he had lived in
this our day he would have been a
political factor right: and wouldn't he
have made things lively as cam
palgner, with his bow and arrow and
tomahawk? AS a destroyer of fire
water he would have been a hum
ming success. The blockade stills
would soon have been drunk dry and
prohibition would have been the in