"O carry me back to old Virginy,
To old Virginy's shore,"
was the refrain of a song that was very popular in those days, and
which was much affected by what were called "negro minstrels." It was
assumed to express the feelings of colored fugitives from bondage when
they had time to realize what freedom meant in their cases, but I
never heard the words from the lips of a man who had lived in a state
of servitude.
I have elsewhere referred to the fact that women were often the most
bitter in their denunciations of the Abolitionists. In the
neighborhood in which I passed my early days was a lady who was born
and raised in the North, and who probably had no decided sentiment,
one way or the other, on the slavery question; but who about this time
spent several months in a visit to one of the slave States. She came
back thoroughly imbued with admiration for "the institution." She
could not find words to describe the good times that were enjoyed by
the wives and daughters of the slave-owners. They had nothing to do
except to take the world easy, and that, according to her account,
they did with great unanimity.
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