ESCAPING PRISONERS FED BY NEGROES IN THEIR MASTER'S BARN.

THE barn contained no fodder except damp husks. Burrowing into these, we wrapped our dripping coats about us, covered ourselves, faces and all, and shivered through the day, so weary that we drowsed a little, but too uncomfortable for any refreshing slumbers.

Rising at dark, with skins irritated by atoms of husk which had penetrated our clothing, we combed out our matted hair and beards-a very faint essay toward making our toilets. Hats, gloves, handkerchiefs, and haversacks, were hopelessly lost in the fodder. Hungry, cold, rheumatic, aching at every joint, we seemed to have exhausted our slender endurance.

But a walk of ten minutes took us to a slave-cabin, where, as usual, we found devoted friends. The old negro killed two chickens, and then stood outside, to watch and warn us of the patrols, should he hear the clattering hoofs of their approaching horses. His wife and daughter cooked supper, while we stood before the blazing logs of the wide-mouthed fireplace, to dry our steaming garments.

It was the first dwelling I had entered for nearly twenty months. It was rude almost to squalor; but it looked more palatial than the most elegant and luxurious saloon. There was a soft bed, with clean, snowy

442

SOUTHERNERS UNACQUAINTED WITH TEA. [1864.

sheets. How I envied those negroes, and longed to stretch my limbs upon it and sleep for a month! There were chairs, a table, plates, knives, and forks the commonest comforts of life, which, like sweet cold water, clean clothing, and pure air, we never appreciate until once deprived of them.

We eagerly devoured the chickens and hot cornbread, and drank steaming cups of green tea, which our ebony hostess, unfamiliar with the beverage that cheers, but not inebriates, prepared under my directions. Before starting I had taken the precaution to fill a pocket with tea, which I had been saving more than a year for that purpose. In commercial parlance, tea was tea in the Confederacy. The last pound we purchased, for daily use, cost us one hundred and twenty-seven dollars in Rebel currency, and we were compelled to send to Wilmington before we could obtain it even at that price.

It is an article little used by the Southerners, who are inveterate coffee-drinkers. All along our route we found the women, white and black, ignorant of the art of making tea without instructions. Captain Wolfe assured us that his father once attended a log-rolling in South Carolina, where, as a rare and costly luxury, the host regaled the workers with tea at the close of their labors. But, unacquainted with its use, they were only presented with the boiled leaves to eat! After this novel banquet, one old lady thus expressed the views of the rural assembly: "Well, I never tasted this before. It is pleasant enough; but except for the name of it, I don't consider tea a bit better than any other kind of greens!"

Experience on the great Plains and among the Rocky Mountains had taught me the superiority of tea over all stronger stimulants in severe, protracted hardships.

1864.]

WALKING TWELVE MILES FOR NOTHING.

Now it proved of inestimable service to us.
two-hours' halt, refreshed by food
seemed to have a new lease of life.

we felt equal to almost any labor.

443

After a

and dry clothing, we Elastic and vigorous,

"May God bless you," said the old woman, bidding us adieu, while earnest sympathy shone from her own and her daughter's eyes and illumined their dark faces. To us they were "black, and comely too." The husband led us to the railroad, and there parted from us.

At midnight we were twenty-three miles from Salisbury, and three from Statesville. We wished to avoid the latter village; and leaving the railway, which ran due west, turned farther northward. In two miles we expected to strike the Wilkesboro road, at Allison's Mill. We followed the old negro's directions as well as possible, but soon suspected that we must be off the route. It was bitterly cold, and to avoid suffering we walked on and on with great rapidity. Before daylight, at a large plantation, we wakened a slave, and learned that, since leaving the railway, we had traveled twelve miles circuitously and gained just one half-mile on the journey! There were two Allison's Mills, and our black friend had directed us to the wrong one.

"Can you conceal us here to-day?" we asked in a whisper of the negro who gave us this information from his bed, in a little cabin.

"I reckon so. Master is a terrible war-man, a Confederate officer, and would kill me if he were to find it out. But I kept a sick Yankee captain here last summer for five days, and then he went on. Go to the barn and hide, and I will see you when I come to fodder the horses."

We found the barn, groped our way up into a hayloft, under the eaves, and buried ourselves in the straw.