WHILE we were at boarding-school we had not gone into the country for the short Christmas holidays; but now we went a week before Christmas with all the household, and did not return till about the 10th of January. Oh, the joy of the Christmas on the plantation! We had to have presents for so many—fruit and candy and dolls and nuts and handkerchiefs and stockings and head-handkerchiefs. Rejoicing and festivities everywhere! All busy preparing and selecting Christmas presents, and decorating the house with holly. Christmas Eve, making egg-nog, and going round with little children helping them hang up stockings and, later, going round with grown-ups and filling stockings. Christmas morning very early, “Merry Christmas!” echoing all over the house; all the house-servants stealing in softly to “ketch yu,” that is, say the magic words “Merry Christmas!” before you did. Then joyful sounds, “I ketch yu!” and you must produce your gift, whereupon they bring{151} from the ample bosom or pocket, as the case may be, eggs tied in a handkerchief—two, three, six, perhaps a dozen, according to the worldly position of the donor. Such jolly, gay, laughing visitors, a stream coming all the time. As fast as one party left another came, always making great plans to walk softly so as to catch you, so that dressing was a prolonged and difficult matter, for you must respond and open the door when “Merry Christmas, I ketch yu!” sounded. Breakfast was apt to be late, because cook and all the servants had to creep up softly to each door and “ketch” each member and receive their presents, and open them, and exhibit them, and compare them, and see the children’s presents, and do an immense deal of unnecessary talking and joking. So that it was hard for them to settle down and come to prayers, which papa had always in the library, and then bring in the breakfast and resume the attitude of respectful and well-trained servants.

Such delicious breakfast—sausage, and hogshead cheese, and hominy, and buckwheat cakes, and honey and waffles, and marmalade, which mamma made from the oranges which grew all round the piazza. And before we got up from table, the dancing began in the piazza, a fiddle playing the{152} gayest jigs, with two heavy sticks knocking to mark the time, and a triangle and bones rattling in the most exciting syncopated time; and all the young negroes on the plantation, and many from the other plantations belonging to papa, dancing, dancing, dancing. Oh, it was gay! They never stopped from the time they began in the morning, except while we were at meals, until ten o’clock at night. The dancers would change, one set go home and get their dinner, while another took the floor. Fiddler, stick-knocker, all would change; but the dance went on with the new set just as gaily as with the first. And this went on more or less for three days, for not a stroke of work was done during that holiday except feeding the cattle, pigs, and sheep, and horses—just three days of pure enjoyment and fun. Christmas night papa always set off beautiful fireworks with Nelson’s help. This was a grand entertainment for all, white and black. There was much feasting at Christmas, for a beef and several hogs were always killed and extra rations of sugar, coffee, molasses, and flour were given out, and great quantities of sweet potatoes. Altogether, it was a joyful time.

There were three days at New Year too, and then the clothes were given out. Maum Mary{153} began early in the morning after New Year’s Day to bring out and pile in log-cabin fashion in the piazza rolls of red flannel, rolls of white homespun (unbleached muslin), and of thick homespun, and of calico for the women. Then, for the men, rolls of jeans, dark-colored, and rolls of white for shirts, and then rolls of the most beautiful white stuff like the material of which blankets are made. This was called plains, and with the jeans was imported from England, as being stronger and warmer than any to be got in this country. There were buttons and threads and needles in each roll of stuff, suitable for that thickness of material. All these little piles made of rolls filled up the very big piazza, and it took nearly all day for the long lists to be read out and each individual to come up and get their stuffs. Each woman had a red flannel roll, two white homespun rolls, two colored homespun, and two calico. The men had one red flannel, two white homespun, two jeans, and one white plains. Then came the blankets. Every year some one got new blankets, very strong, warm wool blankets. One year the men got them, the next the women, the next the children; so every household had some new ones every year.

The children’s clothing was given out the next{154} day. This took longer. Each child came up to Maum Mary where she sat surrounded by whole bales of stuff, and stood in front of her. She took the end of the homespun, held it on top of the child’s head and brought the material down to the floor and then up again to the head. This would make one full garment for the child, and was the way to assure there being enough, with no waste. The red flannel was handled the same way, and the colored homespun for every-day frocks, and the calico for Sunday frocks. It was an interesting thing to watch: a name was read out by mamma, papa, or my sister from the book, and up the step came the little girl, dropped a courtesy to each of us and then to Maum Mary, and stood before her to be measured. Maum Mary was sometimes inclined to be very impatient and cross, but she dared not give way to the inclination openly, with us all watching her............