Chapter IV: Part 4

Madame Calico, now on the defensive, grew more amiable—rather, less hostile—, but again took refuge in “the mill” and its shutting down: “Sence the mill wuz shot down, the’ve mos’ly all went away; they’s hardly any ub ’em left now.”

The guest was growing impatient, as she could readily see. Not liking the outlook, he stopped, turned as if to descend, and once more demanded, “Well, Madam, will you tell me just how many or not?”

She was loath to lose her guest and his pay, “after a-bein’ drug out’n” her bed. So she at last came to the point, but in her own roundabout way: “Sence the mill ’uz shot down they hain’t nobody sca’cely sleeps up hyer—nobody but Sam Thompson, an’ Tim Turney, an’ Joe Alley, an’ Bob Redford, an’ Jack Johnson, an’ Bill Ed Jeckley—I b’lieve them’s all—oh, yes, an’ Less Wilson. You kin sleep with Bill Ed, but he won’t sleep nowhar exceptin’ the fore side uv the bed.”

“Well,” the traveler muttered to himself, “in an adventure, even a formidable certainty is better than a gloomy doubt.”

They had now reached the landing at the angle in the wall. Madame Calico handed the little lamp to the guest, and turned to go, saying, “You kin bunk up with Bill Ed.”

“But how shall I know Bill Ed from the others?” he asked.

“W’y, he’s in the empty bed by hisself; t’others is a-sleepin’ three an’ four tergether. Bill Ed won’t sleep ’ith none uv ’em, ’caze, he says, he ruther sleep ’ith a meal-sack uv augers an’ hammers then ’ith a man. Sometimes I jist have to slip a stranger like you in terhin’ him, an’ Bill Ed don’t know nothin’ about it tell mornin’.”

As she clambered down the gangway, hugging the wall, and the new guest crept up into the garret, he called out, “What time do we rise in the morning?”

“Oh, most any time,” she answered. “Sence the mill ’uz shot down, ever’ feller jist suits hisself about crawlin’ out.”

“About what hour?” he asked.

“Well, when the mill ’uz a-runnin’ we used to git up purty soon, but sence hit ’uz shot down we’re all sorter lazy-like, so we purty giner’ly al’ays have late eatin’.”

“But, Madam, please name the hour for breakfast,” he insisted.

“Well, you kin do purty much to suit yerself sence the mill ’uz shot down. Jest sleep ez late as yer please. We al’ays eat late when comp’ny’s hyer, sence the mill ’uz shot down. So you git yer hands an’ face washed an’ ready by four o’clock’ll do.”

No wonder the mill hands went to bed before nightfall! They had to, in order to get in in time to get out.

Till now, the sounds coming down from the garret had blended into something like harmony. When the new guest neared the top of the gangway, it seemed to him like poking his head into a den of infuriated wild beasts. The roaring, growling and groaning made “confusion dire and dreadful din.”

A glance around caused him to wonder how many slept in that one room before “the mill ’uz shot down.”

The bedsteads were made from pieces of undressed scantling, nailed together; not one of them had ever felt a plane or seen a chisel. The little forest of posts and frames looked like a railway trestle; and the groans and sighs issuing from it sounded as if an express train had just plunged over, mangling passengers and crew. The mill “hands” lay uncovered in that stifling atmosphere, tumbled and tangled into all shapes and attitudes, looking like a band of contortionists struck dead, each in the midst of his favorite trick. There lay Bill Ed—two hundred fifty pounds of mountaineer—spread along the front railing, his arm thrown out and hanging over, to keep him from rolling back and wedging himself under the rafters of the roof. His was the “empty bed”—fairly on the way to occupancy!

The new guest, lifting his lamp and peering over huge Bill Ed to the sleeping place beyond, observed to himself, “In the language of the sweet girl graduate, ‘Beyond the Alps lies Italy.’ The ‘valley’ is all right, if I can ever scale the mountain.”

But he found an easier way. He undressed, sneaked into the “valley” from the foot of the bed, and taking care not to thrust his nose against the roof, he stretched himself out, but not to sleep—to listen! His entrance had not disturbed the snorers. In fact, it had seemed to give them a new inspiration, for the expiration grew louder. They might have supplied steam enough to keep the mill from shutting down. They made up a whole band of wind instruments, each blowing a different horn. The listener now had time to analyze and classify them.

One sounded like a March gust whistling through the splinters on the end of a hickory rail. Another had the hiss of the air-brake under a passenger coach, when the train is about to start. There was one gasp like the continued tearing of brown domestic, and another that made you look around for a stream of broken stones pouring into a tin bucket. One long-winded horn, out of tune with all others, hissed like a jet of steam escaping from the steam-chest when a heavy freight engine is beginning to move. Bill Ed, evidently the sawyer of the mill, had a long-drawn snort like the sound of a circular saw ripping through a seasoned oak, closing with the confused ring of the steel as it clears the end of the log, combined with the clatter of the “carriage” rushing back for a fresh start.

To sleep amid such a din was a problem. By and by the traveler dozed off, but not out of reach of that roar—it lingered in the distance. At last it ceased—the snorers had risen and gone!

Just when well asleep—so it seemed to him—, a bell—it must have been first cousin to the little lamp—tinkled on the gangway. The traveler withdrew from the crevice between rafter and railing—where he had literally lodged,—and turned over.

By and by a cow-bell bellowed, not rang, in the lounging hall below. The traveler turned over once more, yawned, slumbered again.

After a time—the clock knew how long—, a conch-shell thrust up the gangway roared; and the sleeper, thinking it a through freight, pushed on, making for the next station.

Another silence. At last, behold, Madame Calico stood at the foot of the gangway, and shouted: “Air you a-gona git up to-day? Ur do ye want me to git yer breakfas’ and then drag ye out’n the bed, an’ put yer cloze on ye, an’ wash ye, an’ chaw yer victuals fur ye?”

“I’ll be down in a moment, Madam,” the traveler answered.

“Ever’body but you has eat an’ gone, an’ done furgot hit, by this time,” she replied. “You’ll fin’ the wash-pan a-settin’ on the porch.”

He arose, dressed hurriedly, made his way down, and by raking around on the “porch,” finally stumbled against the wash-pan. The morning was still dark, but a gray spot was in the eastern sky—daylight was on its way to “the finest hotel.”

Toilet finished, with the aid of his handkerchief in place of a towel, he began wondering where the dining-room could be. He heard no footsteps about the “hotel,” and search revealed neither kitchen nor fire. Peering around, he at last caught sight of smoke curling up from a stick-and-clay chimney some hundred yards away, beyond a bay of the weedy sea he had crossed the evening before. Parting the weeds overhanging the path was much like swimming across.

Breakfast—varied, wholesome, well-cooked—was on the table—had been for an hour or more. Madame Calico, first seeing him seated and busy, then remarked, “You’ll jist have to wait on yerself, but I reckin ye ain’t noways bashful. I’ll have to go back to the hotel to clean up atter ye. It’s a blessed thing the mill’s shot down, fur we couldn’t a-had no sich layin’ up in the bed a-soakin’ an’ a-sobbin’ this time o’ day, ’way hyer might’ nigh dinner.” He was not sorry to make his meal in silence, peace and the landlady’s absence.

Breakfast finished, the guest made his way back toward his lodging place. Turning the corner and confronting the entrance, he read, on a board over the shed, the name of “the finest hotel,” “Traveler’s Rest;” and immediately, by the law of contrast, his memory reverted to the garret, the snoring, Bill Ed and the “empty bed,”—to the hand-bell, the cow-bell and the conch-shell.

Just before he paid his bill and left, in quest of a turnout for the day’s drive, Madame Calico, still in the act of cleaning up, favored him with her views on affairs in and about Montvale, and divers and sundry bits of information—some of a startling kind. “No,” she said, “the hotel business don’t amount to nothin’ much sence the mill ’uz shot down. Wunst in a while some feller comes stragglin’ along way hyander in the night, when all honest white folks is asleep, but the trouble o’ waitin’ on ’im an’ cleanin’ up atter ’im’s more’n the pay.

“Them revenue men an’ marshals an’ sich rakin’s an’ scrapin’s uv the yearth has might nigh ruint Montvale. A passel uv ’em comes here t’other day—jist week afore last—an’ axes me ’bout Sam Ben Jeckley’s ’stillery, whar it wuz. Sam Ben is Bill Ed’s brother. An’ I up an’ tells ’em I don’t know nothin’ about it—hain’t never seed it, nur smelt it, nur tasted it, nur been about it, nur had nothin’ to do with it, in no shape, size, form, nur fashion.

“They said they knowed it ’uz around hyer somewhar. An’ sir, they rummaged over this lan’ an’ country a-s’archin’ fur that ’stillery—hit uz the mill the hands worked at. Atter cavortin’ aroun’ two ur three days, like a lot o’ male-cows a-tarrin’ up a paster, they afinally finds the mill—’stillery, as they called it—about two miles frum hyer.

“An’ they taken axes an’ smashed the whole thing tell they wuz nuther ha’r nur hide uv it left. An’ they spilt out three tanks o’ sour-mash byer, an’ we hain’t had none fur the table sence. It beats all uv yer sasafac tea, yer spicewood tea, an’ yer Californy byer.

“They poured out five barl’s uv the best whisky—’cordin’ to what’s said uv it—that ever went to town on ’lection day. They say jist one drink ’ould run a man wil’ enough fur the ’sylum, an’ one drap ’ould make a rabbit pick a qua’rl with a bull-dog, ef he had to spit in his face to do it.

“It’s all sech ez that has ruint the country—stark-nater’ly wiped business out’n Montvale. The dirty, low-flunged, lazy good-fur-nothin’ imps uv the devil, prowlin’ aroun’, ’stroyin’ what other people’s sweat has earnt!

“But still they wuzn’t satisfied! Then they went up above the mill—’stillery, as they called it—, an’ drawed the’r Winchesters an’ Smith & Westerns, an’ farred bullets all through the ruff, an’ poked the door ez full o’ holes ez a sifter. They jest blowed the whole thing bodyaciously all to flugens an’ flinderations, with the’r guns an’ pistols.

“An’ that’s how the mill come to be shot down,” she added, as her parting guest once more lifted the gate aside.

“Good day, Madam,” he said, as he lifted it back.

“Wush ye well,” she answered. “Ef ye’re ever hyer agin, come to see us—I _reckin_ we kin stand ye, an’ Bill Ed won’t know nothin’ about it tell he’s up an’ out. He may be gone by that time any way, fur he’s speenied to Feder’l Court up at Louisville purty soon, fur a witness ’gin the government, to swar Sam Ben an’ tother ’shiners out’n trouble.”

“Yes,” said the traveler to himself, “when I put up again at ‘the finest hotel,’ Bill Ed will be gone—to Federal Court, or some lower or higher tribunal.”

INDEFINITELY POSTPONED.

By Eva Williams Malone.

[During the period immediately following the Civil War, many
former slaves, after living in matrimonial harmony for years,
were “married over again.” The writer recalls several such
instances on her father’s plantation in Tennessee.]

Mr. Josiah Crabtree, gentleman of color, Grand Master of the Lodge of Colored Masons and holder of various other offices of emolument and trust, had, metaphorically speaking, run against a snag. Being a plain and simple man of direct methods, the ornate made small appeal to his mentality. However, Mr. Crabtree had consented to argue the matter; and, in differences matrimonial, the husband who argues is lost.

“But, Penelope,” he began—he always called his wife Penelope when they disagreed, possibly because she disliked the name—“Penelope, what’s de use ob it? Here we is been libin’ togedder, happy an’ contented wid de few words Uncle Jake said ober us dat ebenin’ in de cabin on de ol’ plantation. Dey tuk us all fro’ war times, an’ we ain’t nebber fit yit; an’ what in de name o’ peace you want t’ hop up an’ git mahried all ober agin at dis late day fur, beats my time! You ought t’ know by now dat I ain’t gwine quit you; an’ effen you ain’t pleased wid me, all you got t’ do is t’ say de word.”

Mrs. Crabtree tossed her comely black head, and said petulantly: “’Pears lak I can’t git no notion o’ style or keepin’ up wid de pussession in yo’ nigger haid! You don’t seem t’ hab no mo’ ambitions dan a mole! You t’ink jes’ ’case we-alls had suttin’ ways in slave times, dem ways gwine fit de presen’ suckumstances. In cose it were ’missible for us t’ g’long satisfied wid de few words from Uncle Jake den; but dat don’t prove it’s de propper t’ing _now_! We’se innerpennant ’Merican citterzens dese days; we’se got as good a right t’ go t’ de Cote house as de next un.”

“Fo’ de Lawd, Penelope! you ain’t gwine trot me t’ de Cote House effen I gib in t’ you ’bout dis mattah, is you?”

“You got t’ go t’ de Cote House fo’ de license, you po’ fool nigger you! All de ladies an’ gemmens in our S’ciety is bein’ mahried ober agin, wid a license an’ a ring, an’ a preacher, an’ flowers an’ sech! It make me feel reel slavish, it sho’ do, t’ go on libin’ lak we is been. I’m de Seccertary o’ de Good S’maritans, an’ Sist’ Hapgood ain’t nothin’ but a privit member; yit her an’ Brer Hapgood done been mahried agin las’ mont’ wid a gol’ ring an’ dat beutiful piece writ about ’em in de paper. It make me feel pintedly lef’ out in de col’—it suttinly do;” and a few self-pitying tears fell on the shirt bosom Mrs. Crabtree was ironing.

“I’m de Seccertary o’ de Good S’maritans.”
]

“But what you gwine do ’bout Orleeny an’ Cato?” asked Mr. Crabtree, referring to the ebon-hued pledges of their conjugal love.

“Do? Nothin’ ’tall; ain’t nothin’ t’ be did! Des let ’em come ’long t’ dere Ma’s an’ Pa’s weddin’, an’ unnerstan’ dat effen we wuz bawn in slavery, an’ got mahried by jumpin’ de broomstick, we’se keepin’ up wid de pussession now. Mis’ Hapgood had her Aleck as one o’ de ushers when her an’ he’s pa got mahried las’ mon’; so we’ll des let our Orleeny be de maid o’ honnah. Dat’s de berry lates’ style.”

So, despite his perfect content with matters as they were, Mr. Crabtree listened to the siren voice, and finally consented, after twenty years of apparent matrimony, to have the entire thing done over again according to post-bellum methods, and in a style befitting American citizens living in the full blaze of an amended constitution. Yes, Mr. and Mrs. Crabtree were to be married again; by a preacher, with a license, in a church, with a gold ring. Orleeny was to be maid of honor, and Cato, in all the glory of white cotton gloves and other festal accessories, was to be usher in chief. In his honest soul Mr. Crabtree thought the whole thing unmitigated nonsense; but, like many a man with a lighter skin, concluded that, if nothing else would make his wife happy and give her proper éclat before the members of her S’ciety, he would consent to be a reluctant victim on the altar of matrimonial precedent!

“Effen you gwine do the t’ing, you might ez well do it right”—was his conclusion, in which his progressive wife fully coincided. A tidy little sum that had gradually accumulated in the bank was drawn out; and preparations for the belated nuptials went on apace. It was to be not only a church wedding, but a S’ciety wedding likewise, where the various “Orders” with which Mr. and Mrs. Crabtree affiliated were to appear in full regalia and lend spectacular glory to the occasion.

A few self-pitying tears fell on the shirt bosom Mrs. Crabtree
was ironing.
]

“Dere ain’t nothin’ fitten to be bought in dis heah measly little town,” argued Mrs. Crabtree. “We’ll des git on de cyars an’ go ober t’ de county seat an’ lay in de trosso; you’ll hatter go dere for de license anyhow.”

By the time they had purchased a “trosso” befitting a sixteen-year-old bride, Mr. Crabtree’s arms were heavy-laden. The bride-to-be, radiant with visions of her coming loveliness, beamed upon him and insisted that an entire suit of black broadcloth for the groom was indispensable.

“Why, Pennie, it ’pears lak dat las’ blue suit dat ol’ Mas’ gin me ’ud do berry well. We could shine up de brass buttons an’ freshen it up wid benzine—” protested Mr. Crabtree, with prudent consideration for his fast diminishing exchequer.

“Now, honey,” insisted Mrs. Crabtree in her most coquettish manner, “you don’t ’spose I’m gwine ’low a good-lookin’ man lak you t’ ma’ch up de ile in dat ol’ blue suit, an’ me des ez fresh ez de mawnin’ jew in dat white swiss an ’dat long veil! An’ you de Master o’ de Lodge, too? It ’ud be scan’lous!”

So the broadcloth suit was added to the multitudinous bundles; and, at the suggestion of Mrs. Crabtree, deposited with their grocer for safe keeping. Then the bridal pair hastened towards the courthouse to procure the license. When this priceless document had been filled in with due solemnity, Mr. and Mrs. Crabtree felt their ante-nuptial arrangements were well-nigh perfected. As, arm in arm, and at peace with all the world they ambled towards the grocery store to reclaim their relinquished packages, Mrs. Crabtree exclaimed:

“Lawsee, Si! we done furgit de ring!”

The selection of the golden circlet that was to bind them in renewed wedded security was so momentous a question that the sun was slipping behind the hills before it was satisfactorily accomplished. At this juncture the absorbed bridal party recalled the fact that it must be nearly train time.

“We’ll des race ober t’ de grocery sto’ an’ grab up our bundles an’ scoot t’ de depo’—” urged Mr. Crabtree as he impelled his panting companion onward.

“Your bundles? Ah, yes; to be sure,” said the custodian of the “trosso;” “they’re all right. The colored man you sent after them carried them to the station some time ago.”

“De cullud man whot I sont atter em?” ejaculated Mr. Crabtree, with bulging eyes.

“Yes, he said you had been delayed, and would go straight to the train from the courthouse. Isn’t that all right?”

“Golly! I should say it wan’t all right!” cried the prospective groom, forgetting in the stress of the moment the dignity becoming the Master of the Lodge. “I ain’t never sont nobody atter dem bundles; I wouldn’ a trusted ’em wid de preacher hisse’f effen he’d a been a dark-complected genterman! What for looks was dat thievin’ nigger?”

The grocer’s face wore a look of puzzlement:

“Why, I couldn’t tell for my life. I didn’t notice him specially; I just supposed of course you sent him. Better go over to the station—maybe you’ll find your stuff there all right.”

But this cheerful prophecy failed of fulfillment, as no clue to the missing “trosso” or its mysterious purloiner could be gained.

“Dem Jingo mines closed down yistiddy, an’ dis heah town’s full o’ loafin’ thievin’ niggers—” Mr. Crabtree explained to his wife after two hours’ diligent search had failed to disclose any clue to thief or packages; “some ob ’em is hyerd us ’scussin’ our plans, an’ has followed us an’ swiped dat trosso.”

Which very plausible solution did credit to Mr. Crabtree’s powers of discernment.

Weary, footsore, with blighted hopes and flabby pocket-book, a disgruntled colored gentleman and lady boarded the midnight train for Ducktown. On the lady’s finger a golden circlet gleamed in mocking irony; from the gentleman’s coat pocket a superfluous marriage license protruded.

“What you gwine do about it?” the gentleman finally took heart of grace and demanded of his sulky spouse.

“Don’t ax me what I’m gwine do! Effen I tole you, you’d be sho’ t’ put in an’ do sumpin t’ spile de whole puffommance. You might a knowed sumpin gwine happen t’ dat trosso when you tuhn it loose.”

With true feminine logic Mrs. Crabtree entirely overlooked the fact that the relinguishment of the packages was her own suggestion.

“I can tell you one t’ing,” she resumed with asperity, “dere ain’t gwine be no weddin’ wid dat trosso gone a glimmerin’! You can des put dat in yo’ pipe an’ smoke it!”

Later, as Mr. Crabtree extinguished the candle before retiring, he observed that his wife took a vial labelled “_Ipecac_” and stealthily deposited it beneath her pillow. But for this timely observation, the violent illness with which Mrs. Crabtree aroused the household the next morning would doubtless have caused graver concern in Mr. Crabtree’s kindly soul.

For some days Orleeny, whose epistolary attainments were the pride of the Crabtree household, was closeted with her suffering parent; and later, each individual who had been bidden to the intercepted nuptials received the following announcement:

“Owing to the suddent illness of the Bride, the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Josiah Crabtree have been indeffanately bosboned.”

TO ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

BY ISABELLA HOWE FISK.

“Carry the lad that was born to be king over the sea to Skye.”

Thoughts wait upon me, grateful thoughts that throng
Prayer-wise and eager. To the master’s feet
I fain would speed them, offering tribute meet.
But, mute for very love, I cannot voice my song.
Dear chief of utterance, I have lingered long
As at deep wells in shimmering noons of heat,
And like dumb beasts that drain the waters sweet,
I, too, have quenched my thirst, and, silent have grown strong.
Dear Louis—best of kings to bear the name.
I think a smile still quivers on thy face
That oval-wise, soul-white and bravely strong,
Bears eyes, that look low loves and lives to shame.
Thou, unawares, hast learned new lore of upward ways,
And wondering taught the words—“The king can do no wrong.”

TRAINING SCHOOLS IN TENNESSEE AND THE SOUTH.

By James H. Kirkland, D.C.L., Ph.D.

Illustrated by views of the Campus, Vanderbilt University.

It is the purpose of this paper to describe an educational movement that has grown largely out of the influence of Vanderbilt University. In its relation toward secondary schools this institution has been impelled by the necessity of securing students. At the opening of the University there were two methods of procedure open. One was to put the requirements for admission at a point where they could easily be met even by untrained pupils; the other was to adopt a high standard, exclude unprepared students, and accept the burden of getting them ready to meet these requirements. It has been this latter policy that has brought about the vital connection between Vanderbilt University and a large number of preparatory schools.

Southern educational conditions are bad enough now, but they were far worse in 1875, the year Vanderbilt University opened its doors. At that time the public school systems of the South were striving to get under way and make some impression on the mass of illiterates. Nothing could be attempted outside a few favored cities in the way of public high schools. The common schools were running ninety-three days in the year, spending 81 cents per capita of population and meagerly educating 45 per cent of the school population. Clearly it was useless to await the coming of the public high school. The old antebellum academies for the most part had passed out of existence. Here and there a few survived, preserving charters that antedated the war and memories of happier and more prosperous existence. If the early copies of the reports of the Commissioner of Education are consulted there will be found few secondary schools having any historic background. The Episcopal High School near Alexandria, Va., has a charter dating from 1854. The Abingdon Male Academy was organized in 1822, and the Bingham School at Mebaneville, N. C., in 1793. These and quite a number of others opened again after the end of the Civil War, but most of them had a brief and uncertain career. In the report for 1877, the earliest one at hand as this is written, we find also mentioned the old Mt. Zion Institute of Winnsboro, S. C., then in charge of R. Means Davis, who was afterwards prominently known in the educational history of that state. Others are the Hanover Academy, Taylorsville, Va., the Yeates School, Belleville, Va.; Fletcher Institute, Thomasville, Ga.; Dawson Institute, White Plains, Ga. The Madison Academy, Rutledge, Tenn., has now become a public high school, the Sam Houston Academy at Jasper, Tenn., has given place to Pryor Institute, and Green River Academy at Elkton, Ky., to the Vanderbilt Training School at the same place. Of all those mentioned only two, the Episcopal High School and the Bingham School, seemed to be really taking up the task of preparing students for college. Each of these sent ten students to college from the class of 1877.

As an attempt to meet the educational needs of the South, quite a large number of new schools sprang into being between 1870 and 1880. These were generally considered academies or secondary schools, but undoubtedly most of their pupils were of an elementary age. In many cases the teachers were unprepared for their tasks. They were doing the best they could, trying to instruct according to the needs of their pupils and trying to make a living for themselves. Many an old soldier and many a good woman, whose property was gone and whose natural supporters had fallen on the battle field, took up these opportunities to earn a scant subsistence. From such schools, few if any students went to college. The preparation was insufficient, the atmosphere of school life was not such as to awaken a desire for a college education, and the colleges made no effort to get in touch with the schools. In the report just mentioned, of 1877, about forty such schools—male academies—are enumerated in Tennessee, yet it was a rare thing for one of their pupils to go to college.

In general the preparation for college was done by the colleges themselves. Practically all established preparatory departments; in many cases the college professors taught these departments, and frequently they contained more students than the college classes proper. As endowments had been swept away and state appropriations hardly begun, the faculty had to be supported from the fees alone. In 1877 East Tennessee University, now the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, Tenn., is credited with 195 preparatory students and 90 college students; the University of Mississippi with 257 preparatory and 174 college students; South Carolina College with 95 preparatory and 89 college students. Where some other institutions give no reports of preparatory students, we are inclined to believe it was because these had been fully incorporated with college students, under a most injudicious system of grouping, rather than that they were altogether lacking. From that system with all its faults we have not yet recovered. The best Southern colleges and universities have tried to eliminate this preparatory work, and where this could not be done, they have established independent academies, dissociated from all connection with the college proper. But quite a large number have not been able to take this step and still maintain the confused practice of reconstruction days.

Worse than the evils above enumerated was the creation of a number of chartered colleges and universities that were really nothing more than high schools, and in many cases did not furnish as good an education as an honest academy. Such institutions of course never sent students to college, but rewarded with baccalaureate and master degrees attainments insufficient to grace a freshman. Instead of being friends and fosterers of education, these institutions have often been its worst foes. They have served to transform ignorance into conceit, and make impossible true progress on a substantial basis. Boom towns have started universities as an advertisement; local high schools are called colleges in order to gratify local pride, and college degrees have become a farce. Thus we have in every Southern State colleges whose libraries contain less than a hundred volumes, whose scientific apparatus could be hauled away in a cart and cost less than $100, and whose endowment is nothing.

When Vanderbilt University opened its doors in 1875 it had no intention of receiving preparatory students; indeed, its first plan was to receive only such students as had completed half of their college course. Hence, preparation was made for two college classes and two university classes. But with the coming of the first class the ideals of the faculty were rudely shattered. A crowd of earnest but untrained students poured into the college halls. A large number of the courses that had been provided was found to be unsuitable and uncalled for, while there was an imperative demand for elementary classes in English, mathematics, Latin and Greek. In his report on the first year’s work Chancellor Garland stated that if the University had stood firmly by its rules it would have rejected fully two-thirds of those who had presented themselves for matriculation: “few had any power of fixed and prolonged attention or any practical knowledge of the modes of successful study.” In this way, then, Vanderbilt University found itself compelled to begin preparatory classes. These were continued for twelve years under protest. They were not advertised, no effort was made to secure students for them, but there were always enough candidates to make them a necessity. This continued until 1887 when they were finally abolished and the task of preparing students for the freshman class was boldly thrown upon the schools of Tennessee and the South. The immediate result of this step was alarming. Many prospective students saw it was needless to apply for admission, and of those that did apply a large per cent had to be rejected. The number of literary students fell to 112 in 1889-90; only 29 students finished the year in freshman English, and only 16 had been enrolled during the whole year in freshman Greek. But slowly the situation began to improve; schools arose to do the work demanded by the University and the number of students surpassed even the totals of former years. Gradually, too, it was seen that the University had not merely furthered its own interests, but had been the means of building up a whole system of training schools, thereby directly influencing for good the educational development of Tennessee and setting an example to the whole South. The results of this movement are worthy of special consideration.

Perhaps the University would not have dared to make the experiment it did if it had not felt sure of at least one strong school on which entire reliance could be placed from the very beginning. This was the Webb School, which had then been in operation seventeen years and which had recently been moved from Culleoka to Bell Buckle, Tenn. Shortly before Vanderbilt University was founded Mr. W. R. Webb came to Tennessee from North Carolina to engage in school work. Educated at Bingham School and the University of North Carolina, he had become familiar with the best methods of school work and realized the great need of such work in the South at that time. The establishment of a university in close reach of his school gave him an objective point for his labors, and his students were very promptly turned in that direction. So successful was the Culleoka school, from the very beginning, that in a few years Mr. John Webb, a younger brother, was brought in as partner. It would be hard to overstate the value of the work of these two men for Tennessee and the South. For thirty-five years they have labored, and have put their stamp for good on at least 2,500 Southern boys. Their patronage has come from every Southern State and the size of their school has been limited only by the number they were willing to receive. Their old students are scattered over all the world. A year ago when this writer was in Constantinople without an acquaintance, as he supposed, within a thousand miles, he was surprised to receive a call from the resident physician of Robert College, who was an old Webb boy, delighted at the chance of seeing some one he had known while at school. The Webb School has always been considered unique. Its buildings are plain and its furnishings are of the simplest kind. It has no scientific apparatus, for it is strictly a classical school. But it has a good library, the doors of which stand open winter and summer, day and night, and the books are used. Life is keyed to a high tone in the schoolroom, and the boys feel it. Form counts for little—perhaps too little—but substance counts for much. Professional students of pedagogy, visiting the school, go away surprised—and grieved, for they do not find much respect shown their pet theories. The whole school is wrapped up in the personality of the two men who have made it. Some of the Tennessee training schools could not have come into being or could not now continue without the support of Vanderbilt University, but the Webb School would have been a success under any circumstances. When the surroundings at Culleoka did not seem to be suited at one time to the success of school work, Messrs. Webb quietly informed the citizens that they would move the school, and they did. The success of the Webb School, as well as the demands of Vanderbilt University, have made it easy for other schools to come into being.

The Mooney School deserves mention next on our list. In 1886 Messrs. S. V. Wall and W. D. Mooney took charge of the school at Culleoka. After three years they removed to Franklin, Tenn., where they built up the well-known Battleground Academy. About eight years ago Mr. Wall removed to Honey Grove, Texas, where he still has a large school. Mr. Mooney continued the work at Franklin. In 1902 his school building was destroyed by fire, and he was induced to move to Murfreesboro, where handsome grounds and buildings had been provided for his use at an expense of about $30,000. The Mooney School has furnished many students to Vanderbilt University and they have frequently carried off the honors of the University for high scholarship. The Wallace University School was opened in Nashville, in 1886. The principal, Mr. C. B. Wallace, impressed himself so strongly on his pupils and patrons that a building was soon erected for his use in order to fix his school at Nashville. The Wallace School has sent more pupils to Vanderbilt University within the past ten years than any other school except Webb’s, and in proportion to its enrollment it is far ahead of any in University attendance. Fourteen of its graduates of June, 1904, entered Vanderbilt a few months later.

But it is necessary that our sketch proceed more rapidly. The popularity of the training school idea began to be manifest in many quarters. In McKenzie there had been established an institution known as McTyeire College—a college doing the work for an academy. Later this was transformed into McTyeire Institute, and Joshua H. Harrison, a Vanderbilt graduate, was put in charge. At present this school has for its principal James A. Robins and is growing in strength and influence every year. In 1892 the Louisville Methodist Conference established the Vanderbilt Training School at Elkton, Ky. This action was taken against the efforts of many who wanted a college, and is another proof of the recognition of sound educational values.

Quite a large number of other schools can be enumerated that owe their origin more or less directly to the policy of Vanderbilt University. Among these are the Branham and Hughes School, Spring Hill, Tenn.; the Peoples School, Franklin, Tenn.; the Morgan School, Fayetteville, Tenn.; the Smyrna Fitting School, Smyrna, Tenn.; Pryor Institute, Jasper, Tenn.; Union City Training School, Union City, Tenn.; Dresden Training School, Dresden, Tenn.; McFerrin School, Martin, Tenn.; Howard Institute, Mt. Pleasant, Tenn.; Jonesboro Training School, Jonesboro, Ark.; Fordyce Training School, Fordyce, Ark.; Bridgeport Training School, Bridgeport, Ala.; Luna Training School, Franklin, Ky.; Smith Grove Academy, Smith Grove, Ky.; Weatherford Training School, Weatherford, Texas; Hawkins School, Gallatin, Tenn.; Fitzgerald School, Trenton, Tenn.; Cornersville Training School, Cornersville, Tenn.; Training School, Anniston, Ala.; Bowen School, Nashville, Tenn.; Training School, Thomasville, Ala.; Culleoka Academy, Culleoka, Tenn. Not all of these schools have been equally successful; some of them, perhaps, have ceased to live, but the training school idea is stronger to-day than ever before. In some communities this kind of work finds little support or encouragement. Consequently, no training school can live or succeed there. Honesty and thoroughness are the qualities that have marked Vanderbilt training schools, and some people wish neither of these in educational work. Educational shams and fake universities and colleges still command the admiration and patronage of many.

Special attention should be called to the Branham and Hughes School at Spring Hill, Tenn. Though one of the youngest, this is now the largest and one of the most flourishing of the Tennessee training schools. Recently $15,000 has been spent for improvements of property. The enrollment for the present year is 316, and nine teachers are employed. The Peoples School at Franklin, Tenn., and the Morgan School at Fayetteville, Tenn., are also meeting with great success. Both of these have strong local support, having been provided with splendid new buildings, with dormitories and gymnasium; both have strong men at their head and more than 200 students apiece.

The result of this movement is that Vanderbilt University now receives a majority of its incoming class from the best schools in the South. In the fall of 1903 seventy-five students entered the University from schools more or less directly affiliated with Vanderbilt and imbued with Vanderbilt ideals. In September, 1904, four schools furnished the University fifty students. Within the past ten years ten schools have furnished the freshman class with more than five hundred students—that is, more than fifty every year.

Greater still is the result that has been accomplished for the general cause of education. While the Webb School has furnished the University about one hundred students in ten years, it has in that same time assisted in educating seven or eight hundred. Many of these did not finish their course at school, some finished and attended other universities, more finished and went to work. But on all the influence of those years of earnest, thorough school work will be an incalculable benefit. Similar is the record of all the other schools.

Still another outgrowth of this movement has been that training schools, owing no allegiance to any particular university, have sprung up in many points and are contributing largely to the intellectual development of our people. Excellent schools of this character may now be found in Memphis, Chattanooga, Atlanta, Birmingham, Montgomery, Mobile, and many small places.

Stimulated by Vanderbilt’s example, the Association of Colleges and Preparatory Schools of the Southern States has been formed, an organization that is devoting itself to the upbuilding of good preparatory schools, whether public or private, and the enforcement of a respectable standard of admission to college.

Finally, we may ask the question whether this work will be permanent. Will not these schools disappear before the advance of the public high school? Perhaps so, to some extent, but never entirely. The public high schools have made great progress in Mississippi and Texas, stimulated by the demands of the state universities, but elsewhere in the South their progress is still slow. A recent article by Commissioner Harris gave a most cheering account of the growth of public high schools in the South. In that he records one hundred public high schools for Tennessee, with more than 5,000 students. But the records of the Commissioner himself will show that not as many students go to college from all this number as from half a dozen Vanderbilt training schools. In fact, one is forced to doubt the accuracy of many returns. For example, twenty-five of these hundred schools report a four year high school course; but only three years are reported for the high schools at Nashville, Knoxville, Jackson, Murfreesboro, and Columbia. Only Chattanooga and Memphis, of the larger cities, claim to have a four year course. The twenty-three other superior high schools are in many of the most unexpected localities. White’s Store reports a four year course, with one teacher and twenty-five pupils; Piney Flats, a four year course, with one teacher and twenty-one pupils; Dancyville, with one woman teacher and twenty-two pupils; Chuckey City, with one woman teacher and six pupils. From statistics such as these it is dangerous to make hasty generalizations.

Let the public high school come as rapidly as possible. Vanderbilt University will be its friend and fosterer, as it has been in the city of Nashville. But in any event it will ever remain true that a great work for education has been accomplished in its relation to private secondary schools. It was truly said by President H. N. Snyder, of Wofford College, some years ago; “If ever Vanderbilt University has had a mission, and has fulfilled it greatly and even gloriously, it is in the way it has helped to form what we understand as training or fitting schools.”

THE FOREIGN WIFE.

By Claude M. Girardeau.

CHAPTER I.

It was the last of January, 1815. The harbor of the city of Charleston was enveloped in a cold gray fog, that rose above the ramparts of the sea wall and advanced its phantom cohorts upon the houses facing the Battery, capturing their outposts one by one, gradually submerging gable-end and piazza, surmounting tiled roof and overtopping chimney, until at nightfall the city, like a second Germe Ishausen, although resting upon the surface of one ocean, was buried in the impalpable profundity of another.

Invisible to the eye, even at the distance of a few yards, the street lamps were mere ineffectual points of light in the dense and watery atmosphere.

The solid wooden shutters of the Battery houses were tightly battened so that they presented an impenetrable front to the fog, which nevertheless insinuated itself beneath threshold and window-sill and made its ghostly presence felt upon the very hearths where fires of pitch-pine and seasoned ash were lighted to dispel the dampness.

At the conjunction of the South and the East Battery, the mansion of Governor Grantham occupied the right angle of the corner, its stone steps encroaching upon the narrow sidewalk. Overhanging them, at the second story, the iron balcony bore upon the middle panel of its rail the entwined “G. G.” of the eldest son of the house of Grantham from time immemorial.

A visitor admitted beyond the front door would have found himself in a dark and somewhat cramped hall, or entry, from the center of which mounted a flight of carefully waxed stairs, leading to an upper hall of dimensions more in keeping with the outward aspect of the building. Turning to the right and guiding one’s steps warily over its icy surface, converted into a mirror by the daily brush of the slave, one would have been ushered into the drawing room, an apartment high of ceiling, scant of furniture, also slippery of floor, extending perhaps fifty feet along the west side of the mansion. On this account it was easily convertible into a ball room.

Although it was half an hour since the conclusion of the last meal of the day, this room was unoccupied—at least at first glance. Then in its extreme end appeared a pleasing tableau in the blazing firelight—a tableau that in the fifty feet of polished perspective might have been mistaken for an oil-painting by a master-hand for mural decoration.

A divan of turquoise-blue damask had been rolled up to the chimney-piece and upon the soft white fur of an immense cloak thrown over one end of it, reclined a woman. Her white draperies were scarcely distinguishable against the fur, in which she sank luxuriously. Closer inspection would have remarked the rise and fall of her bosom but partially concealed—one might say almost entirely revealed—by the transparent material of her bodice; for she was attired _a la Grecque_, in an Indian muslin embroidered in silver lama, whose diaphanous skirt clung to her lower limbs as the wet sheet clings to the sculptor’s model.

The short puffed sleeves of her Josephine waist left her beautiful arms entirely naked save for the cameo medallion in white and rose-color, set in thin gold, at her wrists. Her figure so openly displayed was of sufficient elegance to excuse the frankness, but beautiful as were its proportions, attentive admiration would have been first bestowed upon her face, oval, ivory-tinted, under a superb quantity of pale red hair confined by a classic fillet of gold with a pendant of pearl upon her white forehead. Her elongated eyes, half closed in reverie, were apparently dark grey, with heavy lids whose lashes cast crescented shadows upon her cheeks.

Her full, red lips were slightly open, disclosing the even edges of milkwhite teeth, giving a luxurious, sensuous and somewhat cruel expression to her vivid countenance. Her languid head leaned upon one fair hand, whose long fingers were embedded in the thick mass of hair, the elbow supported by the curved shoulder of the divan. The other hand, dazzling with jewels, held in her lap an ivory-handled fan of flamingo feathers, rose-colored like her cameos and the knot of velvet ribbon at the depression between the soft elevations of her bosom.

Occasionally she surveyed the foot resting upon the blue damasked hassock; it was slim and arched, encased in a heelless white satin slip-shoe which barely covered the toes and was strapped about the ankle and visibly halfway up the leg by narrow white ribbons. The flesh-colored stockings met skin-tight silk under-garments of the same hue, conveying the impression of a body clad in a single dress, according to the fashion of the day for those whose perfection of figure permitted or excused it.

When the contemplation of the foot lost interest, the young woman—for she was hardly more than twenty-three—would draw from its hiding-place behind the rose-colored velvet loveknot a medallion set in brilliants attached to a slender gold chain of exquisite workmanship, whose fine thread fell upon her delicate shoulders from the necklace of spinel rubies which embraced her swan’s throat like linked pomegranate seeds or tiny drops of transparent blood.

An East Indian screen with numerous painted silk panels framed in ebony, stood in fantastic zigzags behind the divan, and the thick, blue-flowered damask curtains of the shuttered casements had been carefully drawn; nevertheless she shivered now and then and pulled up about her arms her yellow scarf of Canton crepe heavy with silk embroidery and fringe.

Wax candelabra in silver-gilt were reflected from the paneled mirrors and in the shining floor of polished rosewood, pervading the apartment with a light at once soft and lustrous.

Just above the mantelpiece, dominating the entire _mise en scène_, hung an oil painting, a portrait by Copley of the master and mistress of the mansion. The lady in becoming a Grantham could not forget that she had been a Vizard, and therefore closely related to the last of the Royal Governors of the Province.

The two figures were represented seated at a table engaged in a game of chess, the position of the pieces indicating a decided “check” on the part of the lady, whose haughty countenance appeared somewhat flushed with anticipated victory.

The motive of the composition had evidently been at her suggestion, for her husband’s face expressed polite resignation either to superiority of skill or the triumph of accidental good fortune, giving him a position of secondary importance more or less unmerited.

His daughter-in-law half asleep before the fire, glanced up at the two figures for the hundredth time and yawned as one—even a pretty woman—yawns in the freedom of solitude: that is to say, open-mouthed.

The tap, tap of a cane came across the desert of waxed rosewood.

“My dear Nadège, I sympathize most cordially with you,” said a voice at the young woman’s elbow.

Nadège turned her ruddy head languidly and opened her sleepy grey eyes upon the fantastic figure before them.

“Why do you sympathize with me, my dear cousin?” she inquired. Her English was perfect, with, perhaps, a slight foreign precision rather than accent.

The dear cousin sat down upon the divan beside her. She was an ancient dame whose much wrinkled face, surmounted by the mingled purple and yellow dyes of an extraordinary turban, was still alive with a pair of malicious, sparkling black eyes. She grasped a tall cane at arm’s length in her skinny left hand, confronted the yawning beauty sharply, pressing a pointed forefinger of her equally skinny right claw upon the middle of the loveknot.

“You were stretching your mouth in the very face of Madam and the Governor. I saw you. It was done openly, without so much as the interposition of fan or finger. How often have I done it myself!” She chuckled at the thought. “You are bitterly regretting that you ever left St. Petersburg to bury yourself alive in this provincial capital of a republican colony. Is it not so, _ma chère_?”

“Perhaps you are right,” admitted the accused, “but it is only because Geoffrey is away. I declare, you people are so amusing.”

“Amusing? Then why do you yawn at us?”

“Ah! If I were only in Paris! How I hate the English.”

“Sh!... Reflect! Madam Grantham is English” (with an upward glance of deviltry), “the Governor, my cousin, is English, I am English, Geoffrey is English, you are—”

“No, no! I am not. Not in the very least bone of me. That is why I find you so amusing. You cherish English blood, you boast loudly of your English connections, you cultivate English manners—which God knows thrive without much cultivation—! You emblazon your English coats of arms with their bastard French mottoes, on your carriage doors, your silver plate, your slaves—”

“One would think we branded them, to hear you,” interpolated the old lady, with amusement, “but go on—go on. Let us have the full extent of the indictment.”

“And where is Geoffrey now?” continued Geoffrey’s wife; “and where were the Granthams in 1719, in 1749, in 1775? Why, fighting the English for dear life.”

“That is more English than anything else,” retorted her cousin-in-law. “What would you have Geoffrey do? Stay at home?”

“By no means. I encouraged him to go. But then I thought he would take me with him since he was so absolute of victory.”

“Take you with him? On board a privateer?”

“There were other modes of transportation.”

“My dear child! He could not be willing to have you exposed to danger.”

“Ah!—so he said.”

“Surely you do not blame him for that? Why do you not amuse yourself in his absence?”

“With whom, pray?”

“If the gallants of the city could but hear you!”

“Perhaps I would endeavor to find amusement in any other place than this. Truly I am dazed with ennui.”

“I know, I know! I have not lived elsewhere myself for nothing. These ridiculous provincials forget that the Nevsky Prospekt and the Boulevards were ancient ways when King and Queen streets were Indian trails and the Battery a sandbank.”

She gazed into the glowing fire and fell into a retrospection; the path of memory led from the past to the present, so she said after a time:

“I heard something to-day that may interest you.”

“I thought there was scandal in the wag of your turban, and gossip in the tap of your cane.”

“Oh, you did? Well, you are an impudent baggage, madam. This is neither the one nor the other, yet, inasmuch as recounted to an indiscreet ear it might cause both, I think I should not repeat it.”

“I assure you, cousin, you may rely upon my discretion. Since Leonora’s absence there is no one but yourself to talk to.”