ack from France, where he had been in the Y. M. C. A.
service; and it would upset _him_, they said. So instead of smoking
downstairs, by the fire, she had to do it up in her room; and also burn
Chinese incense after each smoke, by request.

This clergyman held family prayer-meetings, regularly, which everybody
was supposed to attend; but Elsie did not object. She is always
interested in ritual. And the singing was often of negro spirituals,
which she is collecting. She has a recording phonograph nowadays, that
she takes around with her, to get them.

This wasn't what she had come down for, however. It wasn't enough. And
not being able to explore without being "guarded" made the country no
use to her. The game was too shy to be stalked with a whole crowd of
whites. So in order to make a new entrance, she decided on a preliminary
retreat. She left the islands, went back to the mainland, and took a
room in a boarding-house.

There was a lady in the neighborhood who once had collected a few negro
tales, but who told Elsie that the colored folk around there didn't tell
them now. The lady wanted to be obliging, and called in her cook to make
sure; but the cook corroborated her statement: didn't know any, no
ma'am.

Elsie formed the opinion that the cook probably knew plenty of stories,
but would not talk freely to whites. Few or none of them will. She kept
on making inquiries, however, as to possible sources, and finally heard
about one old negro who was said to be chock-full of folk-lore. Elsie
got on his trail. She found him one day in the street, and she soon won
him over. He not only told her all he knew, but he stopped a one-armed
man going by,--a dirty man with a wheel-barrow full of old bottles--who,
the old man said, knew other stories, and who promptly made good,
telling several that Elsie took down, while she sat on the curb.

This negro's name was Mr. Jack--at least that is how Elsie speaks of
him. He had lost his other arm after a man had shot him up, he said,
skylarking. But he could do remarkable things with his remaining one:
open an umbrella, for instance. He said that on one of the islands there
were people who knew lots of old tales. So Elsie engaged Mr. Jack to go
there with her, as guide, and off they sailed, like the owl and the
pussy-cat, only with quite other intentions, and they ultimately landed
on the beach of the island he'd chosen. There was no wharf. The Sea
Islands are primitive. They had to