I was not
eavesdropping, but could not help hearing what they said. My name was
mentioned.
"O yes," said Uncle Joe; "I knowed Massa Fitchjarals back dar in
Virginny. I use ter hear 'im preach dar when I was a boy."
There was a silence. Aunt Tishy couldn't swallow that. Uncle Joe's
statement, if true, would have made me more than a hundred years old, or
brought him down to less than forty. The latter was his object; he
wanted to impress Aunt Tishy with the idea that he was young-enough to
be an eligible gallant to any lady. But it failed. That unfortunate
remark ruined Uncle Joe's prospects: Aunt Tishy positively refused to go
with him to church, and just as soon as he had left she went into the
sitting-room in high disgust, saying:
"What made dat nigger tell me a lie like dat? Tut, tut, tut!"
She cut him ever after, saying she would n't keep company with a liar,
"even if he was from de Souf." Aunt Tishy was a good woman, and had some
old-time notions. As a cook, she was discounted a little by the fact
that she used tobacco, and when it got into the gravy it was not
improving to its flavor.
Uncle Joe was in his glory at a dinner-party, where he could wait on the
guests, give droll answers to the remarks made to call him out, and
enliven the feast by his inimitable and "catching" laugh.
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