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Mam’ Lyddy’s Recognition
by
What Caesar possibly had to endure from Mam’ Lyddy, only those could imagine who knew her blistering tongue. From that time she took herself not only everything that she made, but every cent that old Caesar made.
“You keep ‘dis for me, Marse Cab. I ‘m never goin’ to trust dat Caesar wid a cent long as I live. A nigger ain’t got a bit o’ sense about money.”
But though Caesar would gladly have paid all he made to purchase immunity from her revilings, it is probable that he heard of his error at least three times a day during the rest of his natural life.
II
As long as the old people lived, the French place was kept up; but the exactions of hereditary hospitality ate deeply into what the war had left, and after the death of old Colonel French and Mrs. French, and the division of the estate, there was little left but the land, and that was encumbered.
Happily, Cabell Graeme was sufficiently successful as a lawyer, not only to keep his little family in comfort, but to receive an offer of a connection in the North, which made it clearly to his interest to go there. One of the main obstacles in the way of the move was Mam’ Lyddy. She would have gone with them, but for the combined influences of Old Caesar and a henhouse full of hens that were sitting. The old man was in his last illness, and a slow decline, and the chickens would soon be hatched. Since, however, it was apparent that old Caesar would soon be gone, as that the chickens would soon be hatched, Graeme having arranged for Caesar’s comfort, took his family with him when he moved.
He knew that the breaking-up would be a wrench; but it was worse than he had expected, for their roots were deep in the old soil. Old friends, when they said good-by, wrung his hand with the faces men wear when they take a last look at a friend’s face. The parting with the mammy was especially bitter. It brought the break-up home as few things had done. And when Mr. and Mrs. Graeme reached their new home with its strange surroundings, her absence made it all the stranger.
The change in the servants marked the change in the life. The family found it hard to reconcile themselves to it. Mrs. Graeme had always been accustomed to the old servants, who were like members of the family, and to find her domestics regarding her as an enemy or as their prey disturbed and distressed her.
“You are going to try colored servants?” asked one of her new friends in some surprise.
“Oh, yes, I am quite used to them.”
“Well.–Perhaps–but I doubt if you are used to these.”
Mrs. Graeme soon discovered her mistake. One after another was tried and discarded. Those who knew nothing remained until they had learned enough to be useful and then departed, while those who knew a little thought they knew everything and brooked no direction. And all were insolent. With or without notice the dusky procession passed through the house, each out-goer taking with her some memento of her transient stay.
“I do not know what is the matter,” sighed Mrs. Graeme. “I always thought I could get along with colored people; but somehow these are different. Why is it, Cabell!”
“Spoiled,” said her husband, laconically. “The mistake was in the emancipation proclamation. Domestic servants ought to have been excepted.”
His humor, however, did not appeal to his wife. The case was too serious.
“The last one I had told me, that if I did not like what she called coffee–and which I really thought was tea–I ‘d better cook for myself. And that other maid, after wearing one of my best dresses, walked off with a brand-new waist. I am only standing the present one till Mammy comes. She says she likes to be called ‘Miss Johnson.'”