h the other little slaves and with
the white boys near his age. He enjoyed most playing marbles, hunting
and fishing with the little Gresham boys. He never has had a punishment
of any kind in all his whole long life, and said with much pride--"An' I
ain't never been in no court scrape neither. No'm, my Marsters didn't
'low nobody ter 'buke dey han's. Ef a overseer got rough an' wanted to
beat a nigger, he had to go right den and dar." He added: "Dem overseer
fellows wuz rough anyhow, dey warn't our sort of folks. An' de owners
what wuz mean to dey niggers wuz looked down on by 'spectable white
folks lak dem what I belonged to."

"All us little niggers on the Booker plantation et in de white folks'
kitchen, a big old kitchen out in de yard. De grown slaves cooked and et
in dey cabins, but our Mistess wouldn't trust 'em to feed de little
ones. My Gramma wuz de cook an' we had plenty of good victuals, we'd all
set er round an' eat all we wanted three times er day."

Wheeler said that the Doctor who lived near by was always called in when
the negroes were sick and they had the best of care; their owners saw to
that. Of course there were simple home remedies like mullein tea for
colds, Jerusalem Oak seed crushed up and mixed with syrup, given to them
in the Springtime, and always that terrible "garlic warter" they so
despised to take.

When death came the slave was buried on the plantation in the negro
burial ground, a white preacher conducting the last rites. When a negro
couple wanted to marry the consent of the owners was ceremony enough and
they set up a home as man and wife and lived on "'thout all dis 'vocin'
lak dey has terday."

Christmas was a big time with three or four days holiday on the
plantations. Santa Claus found his way to the Quarters and left the
little negroes stick candy and "reisens", and "dar wuz er plenty of
pound cake fer everybody." Fourth of July was a big holiday and all the
little boys white and black went a-fishing together that day.

Sundays were kept holy--no work was done on the Sabbath. On "meetin'
days" everybody attended the neighborhood Church, white and black
worshiped together, the darkies in the gallery built for them. On all
other Sundays they went to Church, and everybody sat in one big Bible
Class. Wheeler said his Mistess called up all the little negroes on the
plantation on Sunday afternoons and taught them the catechism and told
them Bible stories.

There was plenty of fu