nds
knew me and passed me in. I was seeing a high-priced show for nothing.
But when it came nine o'clock, I went home. I told my mother that I had
walked out of the most gorgeous minstrel show. She asked me why and I
told her because she wanted me to be in bed by nine o'clock.

"Why, Jimmy," she said, "I wanted you to be in bed so you wouldn't be in
bad company. It would have been all right for you to have stayed at the
minstrel show. All I want to know is that you are in good company."

I guess mother thought I was a bit soft, but I had seen the best part of
the show, as in those days the curtain rose at seven forty-five.

Minstrel shows were the greatest delight of my youth. I learned to dance
and could sing all the songs and get off the jokes. Dupree & Benedict's
were the first minstrels I ever saw. I marched in their parade and
carried the drum. George Evans (Honey Boy) was a life-long friend. We
were born within three miles of each other in Wales and came to this
country at about the same time.

CHAPTER XI. KEEPING OPEN HOUSE

Our little four-room company-house in Sharon had its doors open to the
wayfarer. There was always some newcomer from Wales, looking for a stake
in America, who had left his family in Wales. Usually he was a distant
kinsman, but whether a blood relation or not, we regarded all Welshmen
as belonging to our clan. Our house was small, but we crowded into the
corners and made room for another. His food and bed were free as long
as he stayed. We helped him find a job, and then he thanked us for our
hospitality and went out of our house with our blessings upon him. This
form of community life was the social law in all the cottages of the
Welsh.

It was like the law of tobacco among Americans. Tobacco has always been
"nationalized" in America, and so have matches. Your pipe is your own,
but your tobacco and matches belong to everybody. So it was with food
and shelter in the Welsh colony at Sharon. Each newcomer from the Old
Country was entitled to free bed and board until he could get a job in
the mills. When he found a job his money was his; we never expected him
to pay for the food he had eaten any more than you would expect pay for
the tobacco and matches you furnish your friends.

These sojourners in our family were heroes to us kids. They brought us
news from the Old World, and each one had tricks or tales that were new
to us. One man showed us that we could put our hand on the bott