Daisy
"No, not in anything," said my aunt. "I dare say she wants a good deal
of it."
"We will try," said Miss Pinshon.
It all comes back to me as I write, that beginning of my Magnolia
life. I remember how dazed and disheartened I sat at the tea-table,
yet letting nobody see it; how Preston made violent efforts to change
the character of the evening; and did keep up a stir that at another
time would have amused me. And when I was dismissed to bed, Preston
came after me to the upper gallery and almost broke up my power of
keeping quiet. He gathered me in his arms, kissed me and lamented me,
and denounced ferocious threats against "Medusa;" while I in vain
tried to stop him. He would not be sent away, till he had come into my
room and seen that the fire was burning and the room warm, and
Margaret ready for me.
With Margaret there was also an old coloured woman, dark and wrinkled,
my faithful old friend Mammy Theresa! but indeed I could scarcely see
her just then, for my eyes were full of big tears when Preston left
me; and I had to stand still before the fire for some minutes before
I could fight down the fresh tears that were welling up and let those
which veiled my eyesight scatter away. I was conscious how silently
the two women waited upon me. I had a sense even then of the sympathy
they were giving. I knew they served me with a respect which would
have done for an Eastern princess; but I said nothing hardly, nor
they, that night.
If the tears came when I was alone, so did sleep too at last; and I
waked up the next morning a little revived. It was a cool morning, and
my eyes opened to see Margaret on her knees making my fire. Two good
oak sticks were on the fire dogs, and a heap of light wood on the
floor. I watched her piling and preparing, and then kindling the wood
with a splinter of light wood which she lit in the candle. It was all
very strange to me. The bare painted and varnished floor; the rugs
laid down here and there; the old cupboards in the wall; the unwonted
furniture. It did not feel like home. I lay still, until the fire
blazed up and Margaret rose to her feet, and seeing my eyes open
dropped her curtsey.
"Please, missis, may I be Miss Daisy's girl?"
"I will ask Aunt Gary," I answered, a good deal surprised.
"Miss Daisy is the mistress. We all belong to Miss Daisy. It will be
as she say."
I thought to myself that very little was going to be "as I said." I
got out of bed, feeling terribly slim-hearted, and stood in my
nightgown before the fire, trying to let the blaze warm me. Margaret
did her duties with a zeal of devotion that reminded me of my old
June.
"I will ask Aunt Gary," I said; "and I think she will let you build my
fire, Margaret."
"Thank'e, ma'am. First-rate fires. I'll make, Miss Daisy. We'se all so
glad Miss Daisy come to Magnoly."
Were they? I thought, and what did she mean by their all "belonging to
me?" I was not accustomed to quite so much deference. However, I
improved my opportunity by asking Margaret my question of the day
before about church. The girl half laughed.
"Ain't any church big enough to hold all de people," she said. "Guess
we coloured folks has to go widout."
"But where _is_ the church?" I said.
"Ain't none, Miss Daisy. People enough to make a church full all
himselves."
"And don't you want to go?"
"Reckon it's o' no consequence, missis. It's a right smart chance of a
way to Bo'mbroke, where de white folks' church is. Guess they don't
have none for poor folks nor niggers in dese parts."
"But Jesus died for poor people," I said, turning round upon my
attendant. She met me with a gaze I did not understand, and said
nothing. Margaret was not like my old June. She was a clear mulatto,
with a fresh colour and rather a handsome face; and her eyes, unlike
June's little anxious, restless, almond-shaped eyes, were liquid and
full. She went on carefully with the toilet duties which busied her;
and I was puzzled.
"Did you never hear of Jesus?" I said presently. "Don't you know that
He loves poor people?"
"Reckon He loves rich people de best, Miss Daisy," the girl said, in a
dry tone.
I faced about to deny this, and to explain how the Lord had a special
love and care for the poor. I saw that my hearer did not believe me.
"She had heerd so," she said.
The dressing-bell sounded long and loud, and I was obliged to let
Margaret go on with my dressing; but in the midst of my puzzled state
of mind, I felt childishly sure of the power of that truth, of the
Lord's love, to break down any hardness and overcome any coldness.
Yet, "how shall they hear without a preacher?" and I had so little
chance to speak.
"Then, Margaret," said I at last, "is there no place where you can go
to hear about the things in the Bible?"
"No, missis; I never goes."
"And does not anybody, except Darry when he goes with the carriage?"
"Can't, Miss Daisy; it's miles and miles; and no place for niggers
neither."
"Can you read the Bible, Margaret?"
"Guess not, missis; we's too stupid; ain't good for coloured folks to
read."
"Does _nobody_, among all the people, read the Bible?" said I, once
more stopping Margaret in my dismay.
"Uncle Darry--he does," said the girl; "and he do 'spoun some; but I
don't make no count of his 'spoundations."
I did not know quite what she meant; but I had no time for anything
more. I let her go, locked my door and kneeled down; with the burden
on my heart of this new revelation; that there were hundreds of people
under the care of my father and mother who were living without church
and without Bible, in desperate ignorance of everything worth knowing.
If papa had only been at Magnolia with me! I thought I could have
persuaded him to build a church and let somebody come and teach the
people. But now--what could I do? And I asked the Lord, what could I
do? but I did not see the answer.
Feeling the question on my two shoulders, I went downstairs. To my
astonishment, I found the family all gathered in solemn order; the
house servants at one end of the room, my aunt, Miss Pinshon and
Preston at the other, and before my aunt a little table with books. I
got a seat as soon as I could, for it was plain that something was
waiting for me. Then my aunt opened the Bible and read a chapter, and
followed it with prayer read out of another book. I was greatly amazed
at the whole proceeding. No such ceremony was ever gone through at
Melbourne; and certainly nothing had ever given me the notion that my
Aunt Gary was any more fond of sacred things than the rest of the
family.
"An excellent plan," said Miss Pinshon, when we had risen from our
knees and the servants had filed off.
"Yes," my aunt said, somewhat as if it needed an apology;--"it was the
custom in my father's and grandfather's time; and we always keep it
up. I think old customs always should be kept up."
"And do you have the same sort of thing on Sundays, for the
out-of-door hands?"
"What?" said my aunt. It was somewhat more abrupt than polite; but she
probably felt that Miss Pinshon was a governess.
"There were only the house servants gathered this morning."
"Of course; part of them."
"Have you any similar system of teaching for those who are outside? I
think you told me they have no church to go to."
"I should like to know what 'system' you would adopt," said my aunt,
"to reach seven hundred people."
"A church and a minister would not be a bad thing."
"Or we might all turn missionaries," said Preston; "and go among them
with bags of Bibles round our necks. We might all turn missionaries."
"Colporteurs," said Miss Pinshon.
Then I said in my heart, "I will be one." But I went on eating my
breakfast and did not look at anybody; only I listened with all my
might.
"I don't know about that," said my aunt. "I doubt whether a church and
a minister would be beneficial."
"Then you have a nation of heathen at your doors," said Miss Pinshon.
"I don't know but they are just as well off," said my aunt. "I doubt
if more light would do them any good. They would not understand it."
"They must be very dark if they could not understand light," said my
governess.
"Just as people that are very light cannot understand darkness," said
Preston.
"I think so," my aunt went on. "Our neighbour Colonel Joram, down
below here at Crofts, will not allow such a thing as preaching or
teaching on his plantation. He says it is bad for them. We always
allowed it; but I don't know."
"Colonel Joram is a heathen himself, you know, mother," said Preston.
"Don't hold _him_ up."
"I will hold him up for a gentleman, and a very successful planter,"
said Mrs. Gary. "No place is better worked or managed than Crofts. If
the estate of Magnolia were worked and kept as well, it would be worth
half as much again as it ever has been. But there is the difference of
the master's eye. My brother-in-law never could be induced to settle
at Magnolia, nor at his own estates either. He likes it better in the
cold North."
Miss Pinshon made no remark whatever in answer to this statement; and
the rest of the talk at the breakfast-table was about rice.
After breakfast my school life at Magnolia began. It seemed as if all
the threads of my life there were in a hurry to get into my hand. Ah!
I had a handful soon! But this was the fashion of my first day with my
governess. All the days were not quite so bad; however, it gave the
key of them all.
Miss Pinshon bade me come with her to the room she and my aunt had agreed
should be the schoolroom. It was the back room of the house, though it
had hardly books enough to be called a library. It had been the study or
private room of my grandfather; there was a leather-covered table with an
old bronze standish; some plain bookcases; a large escritoire; a
terrestrial globe; a thermometer and a barometer; and the rest of the
furniture was an abundance of chintz-covered chairs and lounges. These
were very easy and pleasant for use; and long windows opening on the
verandah looked off among the evergreen oaks and their floating grey
drapery; the light in the room and the whole aspect of it was agreeable.
If Miss Pinshon had not been there! But she was there, with a terrible
air of business; setting one or two chairs in certain positions by a
window, and handing one or two books on the table. I stood meek and
helpless, expectant.
"Have you read any history, Daisy?"
I said no; then I said yes, I had; a little.
"What?"
"A little of the history of England last summer."
"Not of your own country?"
"No, ma'am."
"And no ancient history?"
"No, ma'am."
"You know nothing of the division of the nations, of course?"
I answered, nothing. I had no idea what she meant; except that
England, and America, and France, were different, and of course
divided. Of Peleg the son of Eber and the brother of Joktan, I then
knew nothing.
"And arithmetic is something you do not understand," pursued Miss
Pinshon. "Come here, and let me see how you can write."
With trembling, stiff little fingers--I feel them yet--I wrote some
lines under my governess's eye.
"Very unformed," was her comment. "And now, Daisy, you may sit down
there in the window and study the multiplication table. See how much
of it you can get this morning."
Was it to be a morning's work? My heart was heavy as lead. At this hour,
at Melbourne, my task would have been to get my flat hat and rush out
among the beds of flowers; and a little later, to have up Loupe and go
driving whither I would, among the meadows and cornfields. Ah, yes; and
there was Molly who might be taught, and Juanita who might be visited;
and Dr. Sandford who might come like a pleasant gale of wind into the
midst of whatever I was about. I did not stop to think of them now,