r meeting-day"--over a
hundred are to be baptized and they want some bread to carry, as they
will have to stay all day. I ride back through the overseer's yard,
stop at her door to speak to Judy, then have a talk with Abel, who
wants to know how I find Rose, says he knows character is better than
all the riches of this world, and that he was taught and teaches his
children not to lay hand on anything that does not belong to them. I
took her partly because I knew it was a good family. Demus[100]
attends me, and I ride home followed by half a dozen little boys who
are coming up to school and run races by my side. The wind has turned
east, and a thick fog is driving in visible clouds over the dreary
cotton-fields, raw, chilly, and disagreeable enough. I come out of
school wondering what I am going to have for dinner and what for
Sunday, knowing that Uncle Sam, whose daughter Katrine is "going in
the water," will probably be away all day and that the R.'s are coming
to spend Sunday. You know there was trouble last summer about the
superintendents who were not Baptists remaining to the Communion
Service--there has been more since, and the negro elders have become
so excited about it that they will not allow them to stay, so the R.'s
did not wish to go to church, and planned when we were there at New
Year's to come down here to spend that Sunday. They told me when they
were here Thursday that they were coming, so I ought to have been
ready, but except my three loaves of bread I had made no preparation,
and was expecting them momentarily. The Fates were propitious,
however, for Minda sent me a piece of fresh pork, and a note from Mr.
Philbrick said he would send us a piece of fresh beef for our rations
Sunday. I had just time to wash my hands when my guests arrived. That
is a process, by the way, which I have to go through with, at the
least, twice in an hour--sometimes oftener than that in fifteen
minutes--with sand-soap and brush!

There was a great church-going from this place, as fourteen people
were to be baptized, and Sam when he was rigged was a sight, with his
beaver over his head-hankercher. Carts were in requisition to bring
home the wet clothes--Louisa told C. that she couldn't wear hoops into
the water and should be so cold she should wear eight coats (they drop
the petti-) and she couldn't bring them all home. It was foggy and
chilly, though the sun came out at noon when the proceedings must have
been at their he