The Mississippi Creole

In Robeson county, in the State of North Carolina, there lived in times past, a man of the name of Brooks, who kept a grocery for a number of years, and so had accumulated a lot of the land around him. This was in the barren of small value, but nevertheless Brooks was looked up to as a great land owner and big man in the neighborhood.

Among the tract, however, belonging to one man, that "jammed in so strong," and withal, better in quality than the average of his own domain, that Brooks had long desired to add to his other broad acres. At length he looked around him, and employed, as he expressed it, "the smartest man in the hood," one Angus McAlpin, to go to Charleston and negotiate with Col. Lamar, for the purchase of this also. Being provided pretty well with bread, meat and a bottle of pale ale, which were stowed away in a pair of saddle-bags, and like all other great diplomatists, being provided with suitable instructions, Mac mounted a piney woods pony named Rosum, and hied him off to Charleston.

The road was rather longer than supposed, or his agent was less expeditious than was expected, or "some bad luck had happened to him," as Brooks expressed it; something was the matter, and so Angus did not get back until long after the day which had been fixed on for his return. Brooks in the meantime had got himself into a very unpleasant state of suspense. He kept his eyes fixed on the road—he was crusty towards his wife and children—scarcely ate or slept for several days, for he had set his whole soul upon the Lamar land. One day, however, as he was sitting at the door, described slowly and silently wending his way to the long stretch of sandy land that led to the grocery. Brooks went out and without further ceremony, thus addressed him: "Ha! have you got the land?"

The agent, in whose face was anything but a satisfied expression, replied, somewhat gruffly, that "he hadn't;" and ordered everybody to get down from his horse, before he would tell him anything about the business. Brooks was in a fever of anxiety, and replied to the question. "Brooks, don't press upon a body always. It is a long story and I have suffered much."

Brooks urged, and Mac still parried the question until they got into the house. "Now," thought Brooks, "he will tell me;" but he was not quite ready. "Have you anything to drink?" he asked. "I have," said the other, and produced some of his best forthcoming. After he had filled his clay, Mac took a seat opposite his employer. Mac gave a sigh. He then turned suddenly and looked him straight in the face, slapped him on the thigh, and said: "Say, was you ever in Charleston?"

"No, I never was," replied the other.

"Well, you ought to go there. The greatest place upon the face of the earth! They've got houses there on both sides of the road for five miles at a stretch, and d--n the horse track the whole way through! Brooks, I think I met five thousand people in a minute and not a chap would look at me. They have got houses there on wheels. Brooks! I saw one with six horses hitched to it, and a big driver with a long whip going it like a whirlwind. I followed it down the road for a mile and a half, and when it stopt I looked and what do you think there was? Nothing in it but a little woman setting up in one corner. Well, Brooks, I turned back up the road, and as I was riding along I sees a fancy chap with long curly hair hanging down his back, and his boots as shiny as the face of an up country nigger. I called him into the middle of the road and asked him a civil question—and a civil question, you know, Brooks, calls for a civil answer all over the world. I says, says I, 'Stranger, can you tell me where Col. Lamar lives?' and what do you think was the answer—'Go to h--l, you fool.'"

Well, Brooks, I knocks along up and down and about, until at last I finds out where Col. Lamar lived. I gets down and bangs away at the door. Presently the door was opened by as pretty, fine-looking, well dressed a woman as ever you seed in your born days, Brooks. Says I, "Mrs. Lamar, I presume madam," says I. "I am Mrs. Lamar, Sir." "Well, Madame," says I, 'I have come all the way from N. Carolina to see Col. Lamar—to see about buying a tract of land of him that's up in our parts.' Then she says: "Col. Lamar has rode out in the country but will be back shortly. Come in, sir, and wait awhile. I've no doubt the Col. will soon return,' and she had a smile upon that pretty face of her's that reminded a body of a spring morning. Well, Brooks, I hitched my horse to a brass thing on the door, and walked in. Well, when I got in, I sees the floor all covered over with the nicest-looking thing! nicer than any patched-worked bed quilt you ever seed in your life, Brooks. I was trying to edge along around it, but presently I sees a big nigger come stepping right over it. Thinks I if that nigger can go it, I can go it too! So right over it I goes, and takes my seat right before a picture, which, at first, I thought was a little man looking out at a window.

Well, Brooks, there I sot, waiting and waiting for Col. Lamar, and at last—he did'nt come, but they began to bring in dinner. Thinks I to myself, here's a scrape, but I made up my mind to tell her—if she axed me to eat—with a genteel bow, that I had no occasion to eat. But Brooks she did'nt axe me to eat—she ax'd me if I'd be so good as to carve that turkey for her, and she did it with one of those loving smiles that makes the cold streaks run down the small of a feller's back. "Certainly, madam," says I, and I walks up to the table—there was on one side of the turkey a great big knife, as big as a bowie knife, and a fork with a trigger to it on the other side. Well, I falls to work and in the first effort I slashed the gravy about two yards over the whitest table cloth you ever seed in your life, Brooks. Well, I felt the hot steam begin to gather about my cheeks and eyes. But I'm not a man to back out for trifles: and so I makes another effort, and the darned thing took a flight and lit right in Mrs. Lamar's lap! Well, you see, Brooks, then I was taken with a blindness, and the next thing I remember, I was upon the floor a kicking.

Well, by this time, I began to think of navigating. So I goes out and mounts Rosum, and puts for North Carolina! Now, Brooks, you don't blame me! Do you.—Spirit of the Times.