Page:The White Slave, or Memoirs of a Fugitive.djvu/397

 whether it was aunt Dinah's dirt, or something more fatal, that she dreaded, Cassy could never clearly make out.

In the midst of all these tribulations, which, as she complained, were wearing her out by inches, and bringing her fast to the grave, aggravating the fever and ague by which she constantly suffered, poor Mrs Thomas had no confidant or consoler except only Cassy. The nearest neighbors were three or four miles off. The ladies of these establishments, where there were any, — for several of the neighboring planters preferred a slave housekeeper to a white wife, — were from Virginia and Kentucky, holding Yankees in almost as much contempt as aunt Dinah did — a prejudice which Mrs Thomas had too little force of character, or power of making herself either useful or agreeable, to be able to overcome. Her husband was pretty poor company at best. However it might have been in the days of his courtship, his wife had long since ceased to compete, in his affections, with his more favorite cigar, mint julep, and chaw of tobacco; and to get rid, as he said, of her eternal complaints about nothing, he kept out of her way as much as possible. Her step-daughter, a girl of fourteen, seemed to be in the conspiracy with aunt Dinah against her, as were the washerwoman, seamstress, and all the rest of the house servants; and such was the state of nervous uneasiness in which they kept her, breaking out occasionally into exhibitions by no means very lovely, that she expressed one day to Cassy her apprehensions lest these ugly black creatures would not only be the destruction of her health and good looks, which suffered a good deal under the effects of the ague, but the ruin of her soul also. She was sure that living on a plantation was no place to fit folks for heaven.;

Cassy was impressed with a strong feeling of gratitude towards her unfortunate mistress. She greatly pitied, as well the infirmities of her temper, soured by sickness and disappointment, and failure in every