LETTER I.

Pineville, May 28th, 1842. Dear Sir,

Ever sense you was down to Pineville, it’s been on my mind to rite you a letter, but the boys lowed I’d better not, ’cause you mought take me off ’bout my spellin’ and dictionary. But something happened to me t’other night, so monstrous provokin’, that I can’t help tellin’ you about it. It all came of snuffing ashes over a soft wood fire, and I reckon I’ve wished there was no sich plaguy stuff, as soft wood, more’n five hundred times sense it happened. You know the Stallinses lives on the plantation in the summer, and goes to town in the winter. Well, Miss Mary Stallins, who you know is the darlinest gal in the county, came home t’other day to see her folks. You know she’s been to the Female College, down to Macon, for most a year now. Before she went, she used to be as plain as an old shoe, and used to go fishin’ and huckelberryin’ with us, with nothin’ but a calico sun-bonnet on, and was the wildest thing you ever saw. Well, I always used to have a sort of sneakin’ notion of Mary Stallins, and so when she come, I brushed up, and was ’termined to have a rite serious talk with her ’bout old matters; not knowin’ but she might be captivated by some of them Macon fellers.

So, sure enough, off I started, unbeknowin’ to anybody, and rode rite over to the plantation, (you know ours is rite jinin’ the widder Stallinses.) Well, when I got thar, I felt a little sort of sheepish; but I soon got over that, when Miss Carline said, (but she didn’t mean me to hear her)—

“There Pinny, (that’s Miss Mary’s nick-name, you know,) there’s your bo come.”

Miss Mary looked mighty sort o’ redish when I shuck her hand and told her howdy; and she made a sort of a stoop over and a dodge back, like the little gals does to the school-marm, and said:

“Good evenin’, Mr. Jones,” (she used to always call me jest Joe.)

“Take a chair, Joseph,” said Miss Carline; and we sot down in the parlor, and I begun talkin’ to Miss Mary ’bout Macon, and the long ride she had, and the bad roads, and the monstrous hot weather, and the like.

She didn’t say much, but was in a mighty good humor and laughed a heap. I told her, I never seed sich a change in anybody. Nor I never did. Why she didn’t look like the same gal—good gracious! she looked so nice and trim, with her hair all komed down long side of her face, so slick and shiny as a mahogany burow. When she laughed she didn’t open her mouth like she used to; and she set up strait and still in her chair, and looked so different, but so monstrous pretty! I ax’d her a heap of questions, ’bout how she liked Macon, and the Female College, and so forth; and she told me a heap ’bout ’em. But old Miss Stallins and Miss Carline and Miss Kesiah, and all of ’em, kep all the time interruptin’ us, axin’ ’bout mother; if she was well, and if she was gwine to the Spring church next Sunday, and what luck she had with her crap, and all sich stuff, and I do believe I told the old women more’n twenty times that mother’s old turkey hen was settin’ on fourteen eggs.

Well, I wasn’t to be backed out that-a-way—so I kept it a goin’ the best I could, ’til bimeby old Miss Stallins let her knittin’ fall three or four times, and then begun to nod and snap back like a fishin’-pole that was all the time gitin’ bites. I seed the galls lookin’ at one another, and pinchin’ one another’s elbows, and Miss Mary said, she wondered what time it was, and said the college disciplines, or somethin’ like that, didn’t ’low late hours. I seed how the game was gwine—but howsumever, I kep talkin’ to her like a cotton gin in packin’ time, as hard as I could clip it, ’til bimeby the old lady went to bed, and arter a bit the gals all cleared, and left Miss Mary to herself. That was jest the thing I wanted.

“Well, she sot on one side of the fire-place, and I sot on t’other, snuffin’ ashes, war there was nothin’ but a lighted chunk burnin’ to give light. Well, we talked, and I know you would like to hear all we talked about, but that would be too long. When I’m very interested in anything, or git bothered ’bout anything, I always leans forred and pokes the fire, if there be any. Well, we sot thar and talked, ’bout everything a’most. I axed her if she had any bos down to Macon.

“‘Oh, yes,’ she said, and then she went on and named over Matthew Matin, Nat Filosophy, and a whole heap of fellers with foreign, outlandish names, that she’d been kepin’ company with ’most all her time.

“‘Well,’ says I, ‘I s’pose they’re ’mazin’ poplar with you, ain’t they, Miss Mary?’ for I felt mighty oneasy, and dug away at the fire like anything.

“‘Yes,’ ses she, ‘they’re the most interestin’ companions I ever had, and I am anxious to resume their pleasant society.’

“I tell you what, that sort o’ stumped me, and I poked up the fire and made it ‘flicker and flare’ like the mischief; it was a good thing it did, for I blushed as blue as a Ginny squash.

“‘Then I s’pose you’r gwine to forget old acquaintances,’ ses I, ‘sense you’s been to Macon, ’mong them lawyers and doctors; is you, Miss Mary? You thinks more of them than you does of anybody else, I s’pose?’

“‘Oh!’ ses she, ‘I’m devoted to them—I think of them day and night!’

“That was too much—it shot me right up, and I sot as still as could be for more’n a minute. I never felt so warm behind the ears afore in all my life. Thunder! how my blood did bile up all over me, and I felt like I could knock Matthew Matin into a squash if he’d only been thar. Miss Mary sot with her handkerchief up to her face, and I looked rite into the fire-place. The blue blazes was runnin’ round over the chunk, ketchin’ hold here and lettin’ go thar, sometimes gwine ’most out, and then blazin’ up a little. I couldn’t speak—and was makin’ up my mind for tellin’ her the siteation of my heart, when I gave the soft wood chunk a desperate poke, and slap it went right over, and out it went spang!

“I swar I never did feel so in all my born days. I didn’t know what to do.

“‘My Lord, Miss Mary,’ ses I, ‘I didn’t go to do it; jest tell me the way to the kitchen, and I’ll go and git a light.’

“But she never said nothin’, so I sot down agin, thinkin’ she’d gone to git one herself, for it was pitch dark, and I couldn’t see my hand afore my face.

“Well, I sot thar and ruminated, and waited a long time, but she didn’t come, so I begun to think maybe she wasn’t gone. I couldn’t hear nothin’, nor I couldn’t see nothin’; so bimeby ses I, very low, for I didn’t want to wake up the family, ses I:

“‘Miss Mary! Miss Mary!’ but nobody answered.

“Thinks I, what’s to be done? I tryed agin.

“‘Miss Mary! Miss Mary!’ ses I, but it was no use.

“Then I heard the gals snickerin’ and laughin’ in the next room, and I begun to see how it was; Miss Mary was gone, and left me thar alone.

“‘Whar’s my hat?’ ses I, pretty loud, so somebody might tell me; but they only laughed worse.

“I begun to feel about the room, and the fust thing I knew, spang! goes my head agin a dore that was standin’ open. The fire flew, and I couldn’t help but swar a little.

“‘Drot the dore,’ ses I, ‘whar’s my hat?’

“But nobody said nothin’, so I begun to think it war best to git out the best way I could, and never mind my hat. Well, I got through the parlor dor, after rakin’ my shins three or four times agin the chairs, and was falin’ along through the entry for the frunt dore; but somehow I was so flustrated that I tuk the rong way, and bimeby, kerslash I went, rite over Miss Stallinses spinnin’-wheel onto the floor! I hurt myself a good deal; but that didn’t make me half so mad as to hear then confounded gals a gigglin’ and laughin’ at me.

“Oh!” said one of them, (it was Mis Kesiak, for I knowed her voice) “there goes mother’s wheel! My Lord!”

I tried to set the thing up, but it seemed to have more’n twenty legs, and wouldn’t stand up nohow—maybe it was broke. I went out of the dore, but I hadn’t got down the steps, when bow! wow! wow! comes four or five infurnal grate big coon-dogs rite at me.

“Git out! git out! hellow Cato! call off your dogs,” ses I, as loud as I could.

But Cato was sound asleep, and if I hadn’t a run back into the hall, and got out of the frunt way as quick as I could, them devils would o’ chawed my bones for true.

When I got to my horse, I felt like a feller just out of a hornet’s nest; and I reckon I went home a little of the quickest. Next mornin’ old Miss Stallins sent my hat by a little nigger; but I hain’t seed Mary Stallins sense. Now you see what comes of snuffin’ ashes over a soft wood fire. No more from

Your frend, till deth, Jos. Jones.