the negro will treat him as a negro, and will have a contempt for him.

In the Yazoo Delta, where there are five to twenty negroes to one white person, the colored race is most peaceable and best behaved. On large plantations, where the owners employ intelligent practical men as bosses, the negroes do best. The boss is generally kind and positive and allows no impudence, and if he understands the negro nature, they like him, honor him, and obey him, and he wields unbounded influence over them. But of course there is occasionally found a bad negro among them.

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In the days of slavery, the negro looked up to his master with the reverential respect with which a subject looks up to his king. He felt great fear of him and half worshiped him. He had an implied ownership in everything on the place, and always said our horses,' our cattle,' our land,' our crop, our black folks,' ""our white folks," and so on about everything on the place. He prided in "our things" being better than those of his neighbors. "Ole miss" stood above everything else, next to "ole master." They all had a respectful fear of these two personages; and looked to them for protection in everythingeven in times of storms, or lightnings, or Indian invasions. A regiment of them, well drilled and

under "ole master's" command, would have been a dangerous foe, and could have been led to charge the most formidable odds. Under a commander of their own race, they could have been easily panicked. A charge of fifty Indians would have routed a thousand of them.

To this day one will scarcely find an old negro who does not quote his old master as one of the highest authority and he always speaks of him with great respect. They even boast of what good and happy times they had in the days of slavery; still, rarely is one found who would like to be a slave under the same conditions he once served. The fable of the well-fattened dog and the hungry wolf illustrates the case. The dog asked the wolf to go and live with him and have plenty. The wolf spied the hair worn off the dog's neck, and asked, "Why that?" Why that?" The dog replied, "Oh, that is nothing. They put a collar on me in the daytime that I may be fiercer at night." "Goodbye," said the wolf, “I would rather be a hungry wolf than a fat slave."

The old plantation negro loved his "white folks" and all on the place as a man loves his country, and looked up to ole master as a man looks up to his king and the royal family, whether good or bad. About his highest idea of an independent government was one of these knights of

a big plantation. If there was a young lady in the family every negro on the place was delighted at her smiles and well-nigh worshiped her as their model and their queen. All the colored maids

about the house tried to be like her, to walk like and talk like her. If she was fractious and ill tempered, it was her right; if she was kind and good to them, she was their good angel.

The white boys and the colored boys usually played together and fought together, but by the time they were twelve to thirteen, the colored boy began to look to his white playmate as in some way heir to the kingdom. He would then fight for him more readily than he would for one of his own color. I remember when I was a small boy my older brother had a colored playmate of his size and age, but a little stouter and more active. My brother, then twelve years old, concluded he wanted to whip a certain negro in the neighborhood about his own age and size. We met him one day when our negro was present. My brother and this neighbor negro had the fight, a long and hard one, the negro getting a little the best of it. Finally seeing the negro was too much for him, my brother called his colored playmate to take up the fight for him. So my brother stood aside, and his colored playmate took up the fight. After a long, hard struggle, with oc

casional blowing spells interjected, neither one getting much the better of the other, my brother told them to quit, and they both were willing. During the fight my brother forbid any help to be given during his part of it, and he would not allow any to be given his colored playmate. None of this was told at the home of either party-except among the boys-for each side, of course, claimed the victory. Every negro boy would fight at any time for any white boy on his place. I always felt as safe among the negroes on our place as I did with my larger brothers. In fact, I felt that I would be well cared for among any of our neighbors' negroes.

This safety of white children among negroes seemed almost without exception. They were kind and attentive to white children on all occasions, and certainly too much so to be accounted for by fear. A small boy would sometimes get into a fight with the negro boy, but the larger negroes would not let them hurt one another.

One or more white women were often left at home during the day with a feeling of perfect safety, if only the cook or house-maid were present. This faithfulness of the negroes continued during the war. The women and children of the South were left to a great extent to the protection and support of the negroes, who proved faithful

beyond all expectation of the world and even beyond the expectation of their owners.

They were trusty in hiding stock and all valuables from the invaders. It is true that many of them, enticed by the idea of freedom, went to the Federal army. But it is a singular proof of their faithfulness that so few of them rode off their master's horse and saddle, or carried anything of value with them. Still more remarkable is it that these runaways never led the Yankees back to their old master's home, or to any of their neighbors, or gave any information concerning the property or politics of their old neighbors. It is strange that they did not tell harrowing tales of bad treatment and want the Yankees to hang their old masters. But if any runaway negro ever did, I have never heard of it, not even where the negroes had had hard masters.

In this respect they show a fine contrast when placed beside Southern Union men, many of whom deemed it the special business for which they were born to report the sayings and property of their neighbors and their political activity to the Federal officers, and induce them to send out squads of soldiers to pillage and burn out certain rebellious parties. I never heard of negroes doing any mischief of such character. I will say, however, that all Union men were not