The Tupelo journal., 1905-09-08
PEN-pICTURES OF THE OLDEN TIME
eY COL. w. I. CLAYTON.


J, neighborhood, near the Bigbet
river.
| While not advertising the Meth.
odist church it needs no adver
tisement-I desire to say right
| here, that my observation has
shown me that wherever a.schoo
house is built in any country,
/ don't care how remote it may be,
if there be no church house there,
you will find the Methodist itin-
Grant ready to preach the gospel
as soon as he can be admitted in
to the house; and when there are
no school houses nor churches
where they may preach, they
hold divine services in the houses
Of those who will receive them.
! know they came into our neigh
borhood and preached at my ia
ther's house before any church
houses or school houses were
built there. One Of these preach
ers who used to preach at my fa-
theirs house, when | was a little
white-headed boy, was Lock
Hankins, whom many of my
readers will remember as Circuit
Clerk of old Itawamba county
since the war.
What more shall | say Of Col.
Swepson Taylor? His body rests
in the old Taylor graveyard near
his old home, and | understand
the residents meet there annual
ly to clear away the weeds and
brushes and to spread fiowe4s on
the graves of the loved and lost.
No, not the lost, but the loved
and the waiting and the watch
ing ones. Col. Taylor selected a
place for his residence amid the
pines and the oaks, in a beautiful
grove, where the landscape gent
ly sloped to the front, and in ap-
preaching the house you walked
beneath the overnanging trees,
bordered by flowers planted by
the hand of civilization; but when
Col. Taylor first selected the
spot, it was covered with wild
violets and sweet williams. Man
goeth to his long home and the
mourners go about the streets, .
but oh! how soon is the mourning
hushed amid the bustle and tur-
moil Of life! Until your readers,
Mr., Editor, cast their eyes upon
these lines, how many for years
have thought of Col. Taylor, or
spoken of his good qualities?
And have you ever noticed when
a man dies, and they advertis J
his property for sale at his old
home, how they tramp over the
yard and crush the flowers, and
stamp through the rooms, as if
| it were a holiday and the dead
were living. Having witness e
such scenes a few years ago,
made me sick at heart, and when
I returned home from that sale,
| / told my wife that / wan ted no
such proceedings in relation to
what little / might leave when !
should be called away.
Another old resident, the old
est you may say, of that same
neighborhood, demands our at
| tention, and that is James Keys,
father of our townsman, w. Il.
Keys. | do not rene nber Jam
Keys as far back as | do C5l.
Taylor, and yet he sattlel in tn :
country something like a year
before Col. Taylor did, H came
from near, Mollton, Layrencs
county, Ala, in Nov. 1888, and
settled the place whece he lived
all the subsequent years
of his life, and where he died
and was buried in 1866. | re-
member James Keys very well
in my early manhood days, a man
of six feet, strait and stout built,
calm and dispassionate, a lover
of humanity, a friend to the
friendless, and peacemaker
in the neighborhooi in which he
lived. If any trouble originated
between two neighbors, then
James Keys was in the midst
with the olive branch Of peace
moving be fore them, and often