Part 1

MARY JANE DOWN SOUTH

BY CLARA INGRAM JUDSON

AUTHOR OF

“MARY JANE--HER BOOK,” “MARY JANE--HER VISIT,” “MARY JANE’S KINDERGARTEN,” “MARY JANE’S CITY HOME,” “MARY JANE IN NEW ENGLAND,” ETC.

_ILLUSTRATED BY FRANCES WHITE_

PUBLISHERS BARSE & CO. NEW YORK, N. Y. NEWARK, N. J.

Copyright, 1919, by BARSE & CO.

PRINTED IN THE U. S. A.

TO ALICE

CONTENTS

PAGE

“ALL ABOARD FOR FLORIDA!” 11

THE DAY IN BIRMINGHAM 24

AT THE OSTRICH FARM 39

“THE BOAT’S A-FIRE!” 53

A BIT OF SUNNY SPAIN 68

“WHOA! PLEASE WHOA!” 81

LUNCHEON BY THE OLD WELL 94

A DAY ON THE BEACH 108

AT SEA IN A STORM 122

WALKING THE PLANK 135

CATCHING THE BOAT 146

ON THE OCKLAWAHA 159

“HELP YOURSELVES, CHILDREN! HELP YOURSELVES!” 172

PIGS BY THE WAY 185

HOME AGAIN 198

ILLUSTRATIONS

“They turned south, down the quiet, narrow street at the right” _Frontispiece_

PAGE

“This is the living room and here’s the dining room and here, where you can see the river bed, is the porch” 58

“The owner of the orchard let the girls pick fruit and take pictures” 80

“They went in wading after crawdads” 114

MARY JANE DOWN SOUTH

“ALL ABOARD FOR FLORIDA!”

The week between the time Mary Jane heard of the trip South and the time for starting seemed unusually short. So short that Mary Jane thought it surely must have had only three days in it--that is, she thought that till she counted up and found to her surprise that this very, very short week had had Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday and now a Tuesday just exactly as all other weeks have.

“But the days haven’t been the same, Alice, I just know they haven’t,” insisted the little girl.

“Yes they have,” laughed Alice, “only you’ve had so much to do and so much fun that you haven’t noticed how many hours have gone by--that’s the difference.”

“I should say we _have_ done lots,” said Mary Jane, “if that’s the matter. I never saw such lots to do--never!”

And indeed it had been a busy week in the Merrill household. On Wednesday of the week before Mr. Merrill had announced that business would take him on a two weeks’ trip South and that he would take all the family with him. It seemed such a good chance to give the two girls, Alice, a big girl of twelve, and Mary Jane, a busy kindergartner of five, a glimpse of the tropical part of their country and a better understanding of the geography Alice was already studying and Mary Jane would soon begin.

But a week gave very little time to make ready so everybody had to help. There were gingham dresses from last summer’s wardrobe to get out and let down; each little girl had to have a new bathing suit, for who wants to go South without a swim in the ocean? New hats must be purchased because the velvet hats Alice and Mary Jane were wearing would be very heavy in the warm southern sunshine. Then the house must be shut up for its two weeks’ vacation, and everything must be made snug so that cold weather would do no damage. Mary Jane was so busy helping do errands and getting things out of drawers and closets and helping to pack that it’s no wonder she thought the time went quickly.

“Better plan so you can get along without your trunk some days,” suggested Mr. Merrill as he came into the house Tuesday evening, “because when we’re on the jump as we will be you can’t always be sure of getting your trunk every time.”

“Then I think I’ll have to take another hand bag,” said Mrs. Merrill thoughtfully.

“Goody! Goody! Goody!” shouted Mary Jane. She was coming down the front stairs as she heard her father speak and she dashed back up again, hunted out the little black grip she was sure her mother meant to take and began packing.

“She’ll want pencils in it, and paper and my Marie Georgannamore ’cause I don’t ever have time to play with her when I’m in school,” said the little girl as she packed the things. “And rubbers, Mother always thinks about rubbers and--” but by that time Mary Jane was so excited, she piled everything from the top of her dresser pell-mell into the bag, and then hurried down stairs.

“Here it is, Mother,” she cried gayly, “you don’t have to pack it ’cause I’ve got it all done--every bit.” And she set the bag on the living room table.

Mrs. Merrill glanced at Mary Jane’s flushed face and saw how eager she was to help but that all the excitement and hustling were making her a little tired so she said, “That’s the grip I want, Mary Jane, and thank you for bringing it down to me. But before we pack it suppose you and Alice sit down by me and plan just what we want to take.”

“Yes, only I want to carry it,” said Mary Jane; “I’m plenty bigger ’nough to carry my own grip.”

“Why, Mother,” exclaimed Alice, “you wouldn’t let her carry a grip of her own, would you? She’s too little. I’ll be the one to carry it.”

“I thought you were going to carry your camera, Alice,” said Mrs. Merrill quietly, “and one thing for each girl is enough to look after. Suppose going down we pack yours and my things together in the suit case and let Mary Jane have her own toilet things and extra dress in the little grip. It isn’t too heavy for her to carry if she must. Then you can have your camera. Coming back you may not want to take so many pictures. We might pack your camera in the trunk and then you could have _your_ things in the grip and take your turn traveling like a lady all alone. How would that be?”

Both girls were pleased with that plan so Mrs. Merrill said she would get just the right things to put in the bags while the girls went to tell their best friends good-by.

Mary Jane’s little chum, Doris Dana, lived next door, so she didn’t have far to go. Doris was at home and half way expecting Mary Jane because she knew that the Merrills were to leave early in the morning. She pulled Mary Jane into the living room in a jiffy and showed her a big book of pictures she had been looking at. “Look at these, Mary Jane,” she cried, “and these and these and these! Mother says you’ll see them all down South. Oh, dear, but I wish I was going too!”

Mary Jane had never seen the big picture folder before (her father had promised that she should have one and he was to bring it to her that very evening) and she was as interested as Doris in the wonderful pictures it contained. They spread the folder out on the floor and looked at the big orange trees, the palm trees and the heavy Spanish moss that made every sort of tree look so queer. They looked at rivers and lakes and, most wonderful of all, a family of alligators.

“I like those best,” said Doris positively, “and why I like ’em is because they’re so awful. I wish I had one, I do.”

“Do they really grow that way?” asked Mary Jane of Doris’s mother.

“Indeed they do,” laughed Mrs. Dana. “I’ve seen hundreds of them just like that picture and you will too.”

“Oh, bring me one! Bring me one!” cried Doris; “will you, Mary Jane?”

Before Mary Jane had a chance to answer the telephone rang and Mrs. Dana took a message from Mrs. Merrill that Mary Jane was to come home at once. So, with a hasty promise whispered in Doris’s ear, that she would surely send an alligator, Mary Jane ran skipping across the snowy lawn to her home.

When dinner was over an hour later, Mr. Merrill went to the hall and took from his coat pocket a bundle of railway folders.

“There you are, girls,” he said as he laid them on the table; “there are the pictures I promised you. I think you’ll find something about every place you’re going to visit.”

Alice and Mary both grabbed for folders and in two minutes time they had spread them out on the floor in front of the cozy fireplace and were peering through them eagerly. Mr. and Mrs. Merrill, who had taken the same trip before, explained in just what order the pictures should be put and told stories of their trip.

“Can’t we take these along with us?” asked Mary Jane; “that would be fun.”

“It might be fun,” agreed Mr. Merrill, “but it would also be a nuisance because we’ll have plenty to carry as it is. Let’s fold them up--it’s bed time now you see, girls--and put them in the table drawer here. Then first thing when you come back you can get them out and see if you really saw all we think you are going to.”

Mary Jane thought of course she never, never, never would go to sleep because she kept thinking about riding on the train and what she would order in the dining car and her new hat and lunch at the hotel the next day (Mary Jane loved to eat at a hotel) and those queer looking alligators she had seen pictures of and everything. But she must have slept, for in about a minute (or so it seemed) she sat straight up in bed and there was the sun shining straight on to her out-of-door bed and father out at the garage was locking the door and saying, “There, I guess that’s all done!”

She dashed into the house and bathed and dressed in a jiffy. Mother had laid out her things so she put on everything she would wear on the trip except the dress. Of course she wouldn’t put on her new traveling dress till the last minute--an old frock would do till then. Just as she was going down the stairs she met Alice coming up.

“There you are,” said Alice, “I was just coming up to call you, breakfast’s ready!”

After breakfast each person helped and in short order the dishes were washed and put away, the living room tidied and the upstairs set in order. By half past nine, folks were dressed and ready to go. It surely seemed good to get out into the sunshine because with the furnace fire out so Father could be sure there was no danger of fire, the house was beginning to get pretty shivery.

“Think about the flowers you’ll see Saturday, girls,” said Mr. Merrill, “and dance around a bit to warm up. The car will be along in a minute.”

“Won’t we see flowers till Saturday?” asked Mary Jane. “I thought we were going to-day.”

“So we are,” laughed Mr. Merrill, “but going takes a while. We start South to-night. Then we ride all to-night and all to-morrow. To-morrow night we get to Birmingham. You remember we are going to stop a day with Uncle Will there. All day Friday you’ll be seeing wonderful things in that city. Then Friday night we’ll get on a sleeper train again and Saturday morning we’ll be in Jacksonville.”

“And there’s flowers,” added Mary Jane.

“Just so,” said Mr. Merrill.

“And alligators?” asked the little girl.

“Oh, lots of alligators they tell me,” laughed Mr. Merrill. But just then the traction came along so Mary Jane didn’t have a chance to explain her plan of bringing alligators home to Doris, which was perhaps just as well, for Mr. Merrill had plenty to think of as it was.

With buying hats and shoes and getting lunch and dinner the day went on wings and nine o’clock came before Mary Jane had had time to think of being tired.

The big train pulled in just on time, its lights all a-blazing and the observation car looking most inviting. The porter had the berths made up ready and, in spite of the fact that Mary Jane had just declared she was not tired a bit and could sit up for two hours yet, that soft white pillow and turned down cover looked very nice. She decided that the observation car could wait till morning for inspection.

The last thing she said, before Mrs. Merrill pulled the heavy curtains together for the night was, “Mother, may I have anything I want for breakfast? If I may, I’m going to have two orders of hashed brown potatoes and not anything else!”

THE DAY IN BIRMINGHAM

“Beg pardon, Miss?” The colored waiter in the dining car bent lower, the better to hear Mary Jane’s order.

“That’s all I want,” said Mary Jane in surprise; “just two orders of hashed brown potatoes and not anything else.”

“Oh, Mary Jane,” laughed Mrs. Merrill, “do have something else. And you must have a little fruit. Suppose you get an orange and then some cereal and then one order of potatoes--two would be too much.”

“Yes, it would if I had to eat all that first,” said Mary Jane sadly. “But I’ve been _counting_ on those potatoes, Mother! You remember the good ones we had on the diner coming home from Grandmother’s last summer? And you know I ate more than one order _then_.”

“So you did,” agreed Mrs. Merrill, “and I promised you that you should have all you wanted next time we ate in a diner. Very well, suppose we compromise. You eat the orange and you may skip the cereal this time. But I think she had better have only one order of potatoes at the time,” she added to the waiter, “for they will get cool.”

While Mary Jane was eating her orange she looked out of the window at the changing scene. All through the night when she had been soundly sleeping, the train had carried her south through the prairies she was used to seeing, south through the wooded stretches and dull brown fields. And now, early the next morning, she found herself riding through the edges of coal lands. Long strings of loaded coal cars stood upon the railroad sidings; groups of workers stood about the tiny stations the train flew past and the whole country seemed strange and different to the little girl.

But with all her watching out of the window, Mary Jane didn’t miss noticing the twinkle in the eye of the waiter and she whispered to her sister, “Alice! I think that waiter man thinks it’s funny to like potatoes and I think he’s making me some nice ones, I do.”

And so it proved, for when the orange was eaten, he set before Mary Jane the biggest platter of hashed brown potatoes she had ever seen. All brown and nice they were, with bits of parsley ’round the side and a pat of butter for her own particular use.

“Yumy-yum!” exclaimed Mary Jane as the platter was put before her, “I’m so glad I came!” And there was no watching scenery till every scrap of potato on the platter was eaten up.

“Want your other order now?” asked Mrs. Merrill, when she saw that nothing but parsley was left on the platter.

“Well--” replied Mary Jane doubtfully, “do you suppose they’ll have hashed brown potatoes for lunch? ’Cause if they will, I think I’ll save my other order till then. I’m not just as hungry as I was.”

“Good reason why,” laughed Alice, “come on, let’s not eat any more now. Let’s go into the observation car.”

The girls found riding in the observation car almost as much fun as eating in the diner. First they stood out on the “back porch” as Mary Jane called it and got good breaths of fresh air; then they came inside and settled themselves in big easy chairs and looked at all the “funny papers” they found in the car library--that took a long time because there were so many. Next they wrote letters, Mary Jane didn’t really write to be sure, but she drew a very good picture of the coal cars they passed on the way and of hills and valleys and put it in an envelope ready to send to Doris; and Alice wrote a nice long letter to her chum, Frances. And then, much to every one’s surprise, the dining car man came through the train calling, “First call for luncheon! Dining car third car in front!” and it was time to wash up ready to eat again.

In the afternoon the country they were passing proved so interesting that Mary Jane and Alice didn’t even try to look at books or magazines. For the mountains had grown higher and more interesting every mile of the way. Now they passed great holes in the ground out from which came little cars full of freshly mined coal, and Mr. Merrill explained to the girls all about how coal was dug out of the earth, loaded on those queer little cars and sent up to the sunshine ready to be loaded into railroad cars to take away for folks to use. And they passed mining villages tucked down in the valleys. Some had great, rough barracks where all the miners lived. Some, and those were the most interesting to the girls, had groups of tiny little shacks where the miners lived with their families. They saw children playing, women working at their house work, and here and there a miner, his lamp on his head, going off to the mine for his work. Mary Jane and Alice had never realized till they saw those funny little lamps, fastened to the miner’s cap, how queer it must seem to work hours down, down, down, deep in the darkness of the earth.

“I do believe,” said Alice thoughtfully, “that I’ll always notice more about coal now that I can guess better how hard it is to work down in the ground.”

As long as the daylight lasted, the girls strained their eyes to see all that might be seen of the coal country. And just after the sun set behind the iron mountains leaving the darkness of a winter evening behind, they noticed flashes of light off to the south-east.

“The steel furnaces of Birmingham,” said Mr. Merrill, “and you shall see them close too, to-morrow. But now it’s time to get our things on to meet Uncle Will.”

They hustled back to their own car to find that the porter had carefully picked up their things and that everything was ready for them to slip into their wraps and get off the train. So there was still time to watch out into the darkness and see more of those brilliant flashes of light that made the sky glow so mysteriously.

Mrs. Merrill’s uncle was at the station and hurried them into a big “boulevard bus” which would quickly take them home where aunt and cousins and a good dinner were waiting.

“There’s just one thing I don’t like about this city,” said Mary Jane later in the evening.

“So?” exclaimed Uncle Will, “why we think it’s a pretty nice sort of a place.”

“I ’spect it is,” agreed Mary Jane politely, “but what I don’t like is the dark--I can’t see anything!”

“We’ll soon fix that,” said Mrs. Merrill, “I’ll put my little girl to bed and then the time till daylight will vanish.”

And sure enough it did. It wasn’t any time at all till Mary Jane sat up in her sleeping porch couch and looked across the hills of the beautiful city.

“Oh!” she exclaimed delightedly, “I like having houses on hills, ’cause you can see so many of them!” Then she looked down at the street nearby and saw a little negro boy, not so very much bigger than herself, who was carrying on his head a great, big, heavy basket of washing.

“Boy! Boy! I don’t know your name but please wait a minute!” she called. “My sister wants to take a picture of a boy like you--she said she did!”

Fortunately Alice, who was in the house making the closer acquaintance of her cousins, was dressed so it didn’t take but a minute to get her camera and take the picture Mary Jane so hastily arranged for her. The poor little boy didn’t quite know what had happened to him, but he _did_ understand the quarter Mr. Merrill handed him. He went on his way with such a broad smile on his face that Alice wished she had another picture just to get that smile in.

While the picture was being taken, Mary Jane washed and dressed. She came down the front stairs just in time to hear the plans for the day discussed.

“Yes, I wish we could stay more than one day,” Mr. Merrill was saying, “but I have to be in Jacksonville to-morrow morning. So I think we’d better make up our minds to visit all we can to-day and let the girls see as much as may be of your city. Then perhaps on our next trip we won’t be so hurried.”

“If that’s the case,” said Uncle Will as they responded to the breakfast bell, “I believe we’d better plan to get right off. We’ll go way out to the steel plant first so as to be sure to get in there. Then if we get back in time, we can take our lunch at the Terrace Restaurant--I know the girls will like that--then we’ll have the afternoon for an auto ride.”

Mr. Merrill agreed that was a fine plan.

“Only I hope there isn’t any doubt about that lunch,” said Alice.

“Well-l,” said Uncle Will teasingly, “do you eat three times a day at your house?”

“My no!” retorted Alice promptly, “not if I can help it! We eat _four_ times!”

“Then you’d better have another helping of this fish,” laughed Aunt Mabel, “because with all that sight seeing to do, you’re not going to have time to eat any four meals this day--I know that!”

In a few minutes they were off for the steel mills and Mary Jane and Alice found it one of the most interesting rides they had ever taken. Through narrow streets they went and then along boulevards; through tiny villages and a larger “model village” where industrial workers by the thousands made their homes. And finally great piles as high as houses of grayish looking stuff that looked like cinders but which Uncle Will said was “slag,” told them that they were approaching the mills.

When they stepped off the car Alice exclaimed, “This looks exactly like a picture of a mining town that’s in my geography!”

“Of course it is,” laughed Uncle Will, “because this _is_ a mining town. All the mining isn’t done in the West you know. The iron ore and the coal for the furnaces are mined right here on the spot--that’s the reason these mills are just where they are, my dear.”

They walked along the narrow street where men, women and mule carts mingled together in busy confusion, till they came to the company’s office. There was some delay there because children were not usually allowed in the plant but on the firm assurance from Mr. Merrill and Uncle Will that each would take a girl under his especial care, permission was granted.

“But be sure you watch ’em, Mr. Cole,” warned the guard as they started and Uncle Will promised.

Mary Jane wondered at all this fuss because she and Alice had been through factories at home and didn’t think much of it. But half an hour later, when they were in the middle of the great plant, she stopped wondering and clung to her father’s hand without being told. For the noise and confusion and wonder of it all was beyond anything she had ever dreamed of. Engines tooting and screeching, whistles blowing orders, men shouting, great kettles of red hot iron sizzling and smoking, clanging hammers pounding on metal, the clatter of tumbling scrap iron and the clang and clank of the finished steel rails as they were loaded on waiting freight cars made it a wonderland of sights and sounds.

Mary Jane held tight to her father’s hand and bravely went everywhere the big folks did. But she wasn’t sorry when, an hour later, she found herself seated on a quiet terrace on the fifteenth floor of Birmingham’s biggest office building, ordering her lunch.

After luncheon they walked all around the terrace and looked at the rows of mountains and the long stretch of valley dotted with huge smoke stacks of the various steel mills.

“And there,” said Uncle Will, pointing off into the distance, “is the place you were this morning.”

“Well,” said Mary Jane looking at it gravely, “I think I like it better over there than when it’s right here--it isn’t so noisy, far away.”

Uncle Will laughed and suggested that if he and Mary Jane went down stairs ahead of the others, it was just possible, just possible of course, that they might have time to buy a box of candy before the auto came around. And that settled sightseeing from the terrace.

All through the long beautiful afternoon they drove, seeing the busy streets of the city, driving up the winding roadways lined with beautiful homes and leading toward the mountains, and spinning along the ridge roads that took them over the mountain crests.

It was almost dark when they stopped at Uncle Will’s for their bags and they had to drive fast to get to the station in time for their train.