Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. I.djvu/311

 meals, when she assists her servants to arrange the table; or when meals are over and removed, and all is in order which needs looking after, (for the negroes are naturally careless,) she will be busy cutting out and making clothes for them, or in dressing and smartening up the little negroes of the house; then she is in the garden, planting flowers or tying up one that has fallen down, training and bringing into order the wild shoots of trailing plants; or she is receiving guests, sending off messengers, &c., and all this with that calm comprehension, with that dignity, which at the same time is so full of kindness, and which is so beautiful in the mistress of a family, which makes her bear the whole house, and be its stay as well as its ornament. In the evening, in particular —— but I will give you a circumstantial history of my day.

Early in the morning comes Lettis, the black-brown servant, and brings me a cup of coffee. An hour afterwards little Willie knocks at my door, and takes me down to breakfast, leaning on my little cavalier's shoulder,—sometimes I am conducted both by him and Laura,—to the lowest story, where is the eating-room. There when the family is assembled, good Mrs. Howland dispenses tea and coffee and many good things, for here, as in the North, the breakfasts are only too abundant. One of the principal dishes here is rice (the principal product of Carolina) boiled in water in such a manner as to swell the grains considerably, yet still are they soft, and eat very pulpy. I always eat from this dish of rice at breakfast, because I know it to be very wholesome. People generally eat it with fresh butter, and many mix with it also a soft-boiled egg. For the rest they have boiled meat and fish: sweet potatoes, hommony, maize-bread, eggs, milk cooled with ice; all which are really a superabundance of good things. During the whole meal-time one of the black boys or girls stands with a besom of peacocks' feathers to drive away the flies.