The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1907-02-20

the south among some OF 'the negrOS
the chief religious satisfaction is in the
devil. Throughout the great agricul-
tural regions, the Gotten fields of the
low groun's," and the tobacco patches
of new grOun'," remote from all touch
of progress. even the rural delivery
man. there are negroes who have
moulded to their own temperaments the
Christian religion as adopted genera
lions ago by their ancestors at the be-
hest of their masters, grating thereon
relics of African devil worship handed
down from parent to child by the dim
light of many a slave cabin fire.
No kindlier, gentler being exists than
the Southern negro of the back blocks:
but the beauties of the ethical abstrac-
lions in the sermon on the Mount are
as much over his head today as they
were in the years of his imported
fOrebears. Righteousness Off righteous
ness sake is beyond his ken He must
have something tangible, something he
can grasp and cling to emotionally,
cNcIl IL lie IcdI Il1uSll DIS tioSC say
age forefathers bowed down in an
ecstacy of terror before the grinning
image of Mumbo Jumbo, whose either
hand dripped woes and disaster, the
right to man. the left to woman.
Delight in Being Scared"
Like children, these negroes delight
in being friphtapod. tho Shu6der of faar
is as wine to them the belief in an ever
present fiend tonic. 1t is belief
among them that "eve'y time yer opens
er do, dar's de debble er standn' wait
in fer yer" thus bringing the terrible
person into intimate association with
their daily life. Like Black Care he
sits by him in the cart, behind him on
the mule.
Nothing can quiet romping child
So quickly as the black nurses fearful
ly fascinating tales of de debble," not
the abstract devil of the remOrse of
conscience type but a personal devil
Gas real to the child and the negro, too,
as fur wrapped Santa CLAUSE, all COW
cred with rafting scales and reckless
ly flashing about with fOrked tail, while
he vomits blue flames with every
breath
Small wonder the southern child COW
ers up its head in the bedclOtheh in fear
of this ardent and lowering fiend with
his accompanying legion of leather
winged devils conjured up in his hung
ry little imagination by the nurse
covers up his head and lies silent and
still. The devil is the popular soothing
syrup of the southern nursery
There are instances in every negro
settlement-well authenticated among
them of unregenerate ones caught UP
in darkness and borne swiftly away to
eternal flames by the batlike servants
of the arch tiend. Among them Tom
Walkers adventure is no more legend
Every darby before he can feel him
self free from this imminent CLUTCH
his form of the doctrine of original sin
must meet and personally "rassle
wild the great adversary. Not wrestle
hguratively in mental conflict with his
own weaknesses, but in fierce and actu-
al struggle with the fiend incarnate.
These contests, in which the devil al !
ways goes to the mat. form the expert
ences which the negro new released
by his own prowess from the thraldom
OF Satan loves to recount at the meet
ms amid sobs and calculations of
from the GREATNESS con-
aginative negro has caught the fancy
of his hearers with the tale of his I'M
canny duel the defeated devil refuses
to stay put and returns again to the
attack, thus affording new food for the
victor's eloquence
Dreams are Told as Real.
Formerly dreams entered largely in
10 these experiences, but de debble
peared TO me in err vision offered too
much latitude for doubt as to the reali
W OF the foe. SO of late all dreamland |
adventures are strictly barred.
The weapon used for defeating the
enemy of mankind is usually the i'm
plement of labor with which the batt
ling darby is most skilful. Cooks
thump him into insensibility with a
rolling pin, washerwomen testify how
they "des mash his haid in wild er flat
ron' and Joe, an expert at hacking
down cornstalks, told how "Ah met de
debble one dark night down by de
puryln groun' an All cut his th'oat