Chapter 18 - Page 2

was the oldest and Tom next -- tall, beautiful
men with very broad shoulders and brown faces, and
long black hair and black eyes. They dressed in white
linen from head to foot, like the old gentleman, and
wore broad Panama hats.

Then there was Miss Charlotte; she was twenty-
five, and tall and proud and grand, but as good as she
could be when she warn't stirred up; but when she
was she had a look that would make you wilt in your
tracks, like her father. She was beautiful.

So was her sister, Miss Sophia, but it was a different
kind. She was gentle and sweet like a dove, and she
was only twenty.

Each person had their own nigger to wait on them --
Buck too. My nigger had a monstrous easy time, be-
cause I warn't used to having anybody do anything
for me, but Buck's was on the jump most of the time.

This was all there was of the family now, but there
used to be more -- three sons; they got killed; and
Emmeline that died.

The old gentleman owned a lot of farms and over a
hundred niggers. Sometimes a stack of people would
come there, horseback, from ten or fifteen mile around,
and stay five or six days, and have such junketings
round about and on the river, and dances and picnics
in the woods daytimes, and balls at the house nights.
These people was mostly kinfolks of the family. The
men brought their guns with them. It was a hand-
some lot of quality, I tell you.

There was another clan of aristocracy around there
-- five or six families -- mostly of the name of Shep-
herdson. They was as high-toned and well born and
rich and grand as the tribe of Grangerfords. The
Shepherdsons and Grangerfords used the same steam-
boat landing, which was about two mile above our
house; so sometimes when I went up there with a lot
of our folks I used to see a lot of the Shepherdsons
there on their fine horses.

One day Buck and me was away out in the woods
hunting, and heard a horse coming. We was crossing
the road. Buck says:

"Quick! Jump for the woods!"

We done it, and then peeped down the woods
through the leaves. Pretty soon a splendid young
man come galloping down the road, setting his horse
easy and looking like a soldier. He had his gun across
his pommel. I had seen him before. It was young
Harney Shepherdson. I heard Buck's gun go off at
my ear, and Harney's hat tumbled off from his head.
He grabbed his gun and rode straight to the place
where we was hid. But we didn't wait. We started
through the woods on a run. The woods warn't thick,
so I looked over my shoulder to dodge the bullet, and
twice I seen Harney cover Buck with his gun; and
then he rode away the way he come -- to get his hat,
I