e into her cabin. Then he saw the shoat and venison put in the
wagon, and a barrel of spring-water, crowded with darting fishes. After
breakfast, he dressed-up in his best clothes, and stuck two
cotton-blooms--one white, the other red--in his button-hole. He did not
wear these for ornaments, as the cotton-blossom, which opens white and
then quickly turns crimson, is as large and coarse as a hollyhock, which
it somewhat resembles; but among the planters it is considered an honor
to display the first cotton-blooms.

He was early on the barbecue ground, located near a fine clear spring,
about which were hung a score of gourd dippers. He found the campers
already humming like a hive. There were coaches and buggies and
lumber-wagons, and scores upon scores of tethered horses and mules,
which had brought people to the scene; and other carriages and
riding-horses were momently dashing in. Whole families came on
horseback,--not infrequently three riders to a mule or horse. Streams of
negroes were pouring in, usually on foot. There were well-dressed
gentlemen and gay ladies, and a fair sprinkling of shabby people; and
Marley wondered where they all came from. In a short time after his
arrival, he caught sight of Aunt Silvy; he knew her by the faded pink
satin bonnet which she had worn ever since he could remember. She had
Sukey on her shoulder, and was tugging up the hill from the spring.
Boston had failed to bring over "pacing Jinny" for his wife to ride, so
the faithful negro had brought Sukey all the way on her shoulder. Marley
was quite touched when he realized this, and he made up his mind that
he'd take Sukey back behind him, if Mandy Bradshaw should giggle her
head off about it. Why should he care for her mocking more than for the
comfort of Aunt Silvy, his life-long friend? He went over, and offered
to escort Sukey around to see the sights, but she preferred to stay with
Aunt Silvy; so he felt free to wander where he pleased. And he pleased
to wander everywhere, and to see everything. He was greatly interested
in all the proceedings,--the spreading of the long, long tables under
the oaks and beeches; the unloading of the wagons; the clatter of
dishes; the great boiling kettles down by the spring, where negroes were
dressing shoats and sheep and great beeves--every animal being left
whole, but split to the back-bone.

[Illustration: GOING TO THE BARBECUE.]

Then there was a rostrum, covered with forest-boughs and decora