ldliness of the
religion of his day,--that the very practice of it made him an
uncommon man.

As the overseer of General Jeremiah Travis's large estate before the
war, he proved by his success that even slaves work better for
kindness. Of infinite good sense, but little education, he had a mind
that went to the heart of things, and years ago the fame of his
homely but pithy sayings stuck in the community. In connection with
kindness to his negroes one of his sayings was, "Oh, kindness can't
be classified--it takes in the whole world or nothin'."

When General Travis got into dire financial straits once, he sent for
his overseer, and advised with him as to the expediency of giving up.
The overseer, who knew the world and its ways with all the good
judgment of his nature, dryly remarked: "That'll never do. Never let
the world know you've quit; an' let the undertaker that buries you be
the fust man to find out you're busted."

General Travis laughed, and that season one of his horses won the
Tennessee Valley Futurity, worth thirty-thousand dollars--and the
splendid estate was again free from debt.

There was not a negro on the place who did not love the overseer, not
one who did not carry that love to the extent of doing his best to
please him. He had never been known to punish one, and yet the work
done by the Travis hands was proverbial.

Among his duties as overseer, the entire charge of the Westmore
stable of thoroughbreds fell to his care. This was as much from love
as choice, for never was a man born with more innate love of all dumb
creatures than the preacher-overseer.

"I've allers contended that a man could love God an' raise horses, too,"
he would say; and it was ludicrous to see him when he went off to the
races, filling the tent trunk with religious tracts, which, after the
races, he would distribute to all who would read them. And when night
came he would regularly hold prayers in his tent--prayer-meetings in
which his auditors were touts, stable-boys and gamblers. And woe to the
stable-boy who uttered an oath in his presence or dared to strike or
maltreat any of his horses!

He preached constantly against gambling on the races. "That's the
Devil's end of it," he would say--"The Almighty lets us raise good
horses as a benefit to mankind, an' the best one wins the purse. It
was the Devil's idea that turned 'em into gambling machines."

No one ever doubted the honesty of his races. When the Travis hor