Page:A hairdresser's experience in high life.djvu/154

156 of a gentleman belonging to one of the best families of South Carolina. This occurred through the effects of alcohol. Several years ago a chambermaid was proved to be not respectable, and she was turned out from the hotel. She led an immoral life for some time, when Mr. married her. He could get no one to marry them, till at length he found out an old country parson, who performed the ceremony. There were great preparations for them to start to Charleston; but, I am told, at a certain station she was shoved off the cars, and they went on without her. Whether it was a compromise of his friends, I know not, but the apartments which he had engaged for the ensuing season were empty in Saratoga. There are a great many queer matches; one of them was a match of a gentleman of high rank and standing, with an Indian squaw. There was a camp of Indians near there, and many gentlemen chose their wives from among the squaws. This gentleman married her in the morning, and took her away with him. Several of these squaws have married men of high standing.

I knew a colored man who belonged to a family in Lexington, Ky. The children taught him to read and write, unknown to their parents. For some slight offense he was sold to a family in Bigbury; and the master found him writing passes for the servants to all parts of the city, and letters, when he was again sold, to a family living in Mississippi.

They put him to work in a cotton patch, but the head waiter in the house used to steal him newspapers to read, and at twelve o'clock they, the slaves, would go to their meals and return in a very short time, and they would lay in the grass around a tree, while he