The Law of the Land

House, rested calm and self-confident in the middle of a wide sweep of cleared lands, surrounded immediately by dark evergreens and the occasional primeval oaks spared in the original felling o

e. White-coated, with wide, cool, green blinds, with ample and wide-doored halls and deep, low windows, the Big House, here in the heart of the warm South-land, was above all things suited to its environment. It was a home taking firm hold upon the soil, its wide roots reaching into traditions of more tha

o now, answering the plantation bell, slowly crawled down the lane to the outlying fields, might still have been slaves. This lazy plow, tickling the opulent earth, might have been handled by a slave rather than by this hired servitor, whose quavering, plaintive song, broken mid-bar betimes, now came back across the warm distances which lay trembling in the rays of the advancing sun. These other dark-skinned servants, dawdling along the galleries, or passing here and yonder from the detached quarters of kitchen, and cook-room, an

ng about the yard. Across the lawn a mother swine led her brood of squeaking and squealing young. A half-hundred puppies, toddlers or half-grown, romped about, unused fragments of the great hunting pack of the owner of this kingdom. Life, perhaps short, perhaps rude, perhaps swiftly done, yet after all life-this was the message of it all. The trees grew vast and tall. The corn, where the stalks could still be seen, grew stiff and strong as little trees. The cotto

fire-blackened at its foot, stood, even in fields long cultivated, showing how laborious and slow had been the whittling away of this jungle, which even now continually encroached and claimed its own. The rim of the woods, marked white by the deadened trees where the axes of the laborers were reclaiming yet other acres as the years rolled by, now showed i

e wilderness; a kingdom fit for a bold man to govern, a man such as might have ruled in days long gone by. And indeed the Big House and its scarcely measured acres kept well their master as they had for many years. The table of this Delta baron was almost exclusively fed from these acres; scarce any item needful in his life required to be imported

straight as the flight of a bird across the clearing and vanished keenly in the forest wall? This was the road of the iron rails, the white man's perpetual path across the land. It clung close to the ground, at times almost sinking into the embankment now grown scarcely discernible among the concealing grass and weeds, although the track itself

they plodded up the railway track toward the Big House. Presently these might have been discovered to be a man and a woman; the former tall, thin, dark and stooped; his companion, tall as himself, quite as thin, and almost as bent. The garb of the man

ey came on up toward the squat little station-house. Thence they turned aside into the plantation path and, still stumbling and zigzagging, ambled up toward the house. They did not step to the gallery, did not knock at the door, or, indeed, give any evidences of their intentions, but seated themselves deliberately upon a pile of boards that lay near in the broad expanse of the front yard. Here they remained, silent and at rest, fit

ud enough to be heard, and not turning t

the girl, and s

melk, Jinny," s

out o' melk

isappeared leisurely, to be

other, but staring out at nothing, his lower lip drooping laxly. When the servant finally brought back the milk-pail and placed it beside him, he gave no word of thanks. T

yo' place, Mistah Bowl

ht w

hen fell until Jinn

oright dawg, you-all know, she don

at

he's off down o

-h-

'im. We goin' to have b'ah meat no

isitor. "When's Cunnel

he gets a b'ah. If you-all could wait a while, yon

nitely, forgetful of the pail of milk, toward which the sun was now creeping ominously close. The way back

length she leaned a bit to one side, reached into a pocket and, taking out a snuff-stick and a parcel of its attendant compound, began to take a dip of snuff, after the habit

, "this heah is a sham

d. He seemed to feel the focus of the sunbonnet boring into his system. The voi

shame," said Mr

at length, uneasily. "That is, about us h

whut I do mean,

make the nigger stop wu'k. That ain't reasonable. Besides, you don't t

nation greeted t

melk heah as long as we want to, o' co'se; but who wants to

help it, an' that's all about it. My God, woman!" this with sudden energy, "do you think I

ley to life," said Sarah

nd come heah after melk, I reckon, if you want it. You ought to be mighty glad I come along to keep you comp

yo' f

I kain't get no otheh cow right now, an' I done

on bu

t they comes

for n

nel Blount'll give us melk as long as we want. I reckon he would give us a cow, too, if I ast him. I s'pose I could pay him out o' the next

very mawnin' she was kilt-two quo'ts. I reckon we didn't have to walk no three mile that mawnin', did we? An' she that kin'

, a trifle easier now that the sunbonnet was for the moment tur

llin' folks! Why, Bud Sowers said just the other week he heard of three darkies gittin' kilt in one bunch down to Allenville. They standin' on t

cane, an' stan' thah in the sun on the track, to sort o' look aroun' whah she could se

mb d

mb d

teen yeahs! It don't look exactly

at's whut it is," s

ailroad," said her

through ouah farm, an' scares ouah mewel, an' it kills ouah cow; an' it's got me so's I'm afeared to set foot outsid'n ouah do', lessen it's goin' to kill

rity. "It ain't time fer the train yit-leastwise

up behin' you, then, biff! Thah's Jim Bowles! Whut use is the railroad, I'd like to know? I wouldn'

d her husband, "mayb

his seat and took refuge upon another board at the other end of the board-pile, out of range, albeit directly in the ardent sunlight, which, w

to me, that railroad is goin' to ruin this country. Thah ain't a woman in these heah bottoms but would be skeered to have a baby grow up in her house. Supposin' you got a baby; nice little baby, never di

red up, and even her less imaginative consort became visib

e more. "But, then, whut you goin' to do?

you whut they'd do. They'd git out and tear up every foot of this heah cuss

uld you?" sai

ot to do it if things

right, you know. The Cunnel was the friend of the road th

a hot mornin' to git a pail o' melk to make up some co'hn bread. You call that a help, do you, Jim Bo

wn side of the board-pile, whither it seemed his wife coul

cane an' all that, that any sort of critters like to git out where it's open, so's they kin sort o' look around like, you know. Why, I done seen four deer trails whils' we was a-comin' up thi

t from the railroad? Why don't you

to talk about buildin' the railroad, he done said, like I tol' you Cunnel Blount said, that we might git some stock kilt fer a little while,

idn't notice no money layin' on the track where we come along this mawnin', did you? Yes, I reckon it's goin' to pay you, a whole hea

such an extent that she flounced suddenly around to get a better gaze upon her master. In th

called out,

Jinny, from some p

s. "Git me another pail o' m

and presently returned

edge of the shade line of the evergreens, "I heard that thah was a man come down through heah a f

Sarah Ann, som

d ast Cunnel Blount 'bout that sometime. 0'

ginal position. "And our little Sim, he just love

Sim might be a-playin' out thah in front of ouah house, on to that railroad track, at this very minute? S'pose, s'posen-along comes that thah railroad

he far-off sound of a whistle, deadened by the heavy intervening vegetation; and presently, there puffed into view one of the railroad trains still new upon this region. Iconoclastic, modern, strenuous, it wabbled unevenly over the new-laid rails up to the s

house! It kain't miss it! An' little Sim, he's sho' to be playin' ou

es. He stepped on the faster, tripped upon a clod

"Thah hit goes ag'in

ck to the house now fe

playin' on

Sarah Ann, scornfully.

ly, "why, Sar' Ann, from whut I done notice about

the two saw approaching them across the lawn, evidently coming from the little railway station, and doubtless descended from this very train, the alert, quick-s

ine day, isn't it? Can you tell me whether o

home, o' co'se; that is, he hain't gone away no whah, to co'te er nothin'. But then ag

t any

to have you stop down to my house, but it's three mile down the track, an' we hatter walk. You'd be mo' comfo'table heah, I reckon. Walk on

ured Mrs. Bowles, "

you, indeed. I believe I will wait here for just a little

ir log cabin, with its yard full of pigs and chickens. Eagerly they scanned the sides of the railway embankment as they drew near, looking for signs of what they feared to see. One need not describe the fierce joy with which Sarah Ann Bowles fell upon little

ould be kilt,"

r married life there seemed to be no possible way in which she might cont

tle Sim, whom she alternately chastened and embraced, to the great and grieved surprise of the latter, who remained