cabin. Aunt Arrie added "an' I did love to hear that old spinnin'
wheel. It made a low kind of a whirring sound that made me sleepy." She
said her mother, with all the other negro women on the place, had "a
task of spinnin' a spool at night", and they spun and wove on rainy days
too. "Ma made our clothes an' we had pretty dresses too. She dyed some
blue and brown striped. We growed the indigo she used fer the blue,
right dar on the plantation, and she used bark and leaves to make the
tan and brown colors."

Aunt Arrie said the Doctor was always called in when they were sick,
"but we never sont fer him lesse'n somebody wuz real sick. De old folks
doctored us jest fer little ailments. Dey give us lye tea fer colds.
(This was made by taking a few clean ashes from the fire place, putting
them in a little thin bag and pouring boiling water over them and let
set for a few minutes. This had to be given very weak or else it would
be harmful, Aunt Arrie explained.) Garlic and whiskey, and den, dar
ain't nothin' better fer the pneumony dan splinter tea. I've cured bad
cases with it." (That is made by pouring boiling water over lightwood
splinters.)

Aunt Arrie told of their life on the plantation and it was not unlike
that of other slaves who had good masters who looked after them. They
had plenty to eat and to wear. Their food was given them and they cooked
and ate their meals in the cabins in family groups. Santa Claus always
found his way to the Quarters and brought them stick candy and other
things to eat. She said for their Christmas dinner there was always a
big fat hen and a hog head.

In slavery days the negroes had quiltings, dances, picnics and everybody
had a good time, Aunt Arrie said, "an' I kin dance yit when I hears a
fiddle." They had their work to do in the week days, but when Sundays
came there was no work, everybody rested and on "preachin' days" went to
Church. Her father took them all to old Rehoboth, the neighborhood white
church, and they worshiped together, white and black, the negroes in
the gallery. That was back in the days when there was "no lookin'
neither to the right nor to the left" when in church; no matter what
happened, no one could even half way smile. This all was much harder
than having to listen to the long tiresome sermons of those days, Arrie
thinks, specially when she recalled on one occasion "when Mr. Sutton wuz
a preachin' a old goat [HW: got] up under the Church an' every time Mr.
S