At the time of which I write, I was eight years old, the younger of two brothers, and Horace's favorite. He used to say that my rosy, chubby face, black, saucy eyes, and laughing, rollicking, topsy-turvy ways, were "better comp'ny" for him than the more thoughtful, quiet, sober bearing of my brother Walter.
Walter went to school in the village, which was about a mile from our house, over the hill; but I said my little lessons to my mother, at home, an hour every morning and afternoon.
When it was not lesson-time, Horace and I were nearly always together; no matter what he might be at work on, he could usually contrive to find something to please me and keep me near him.
One morning, while I was saying my lesson, my father had given Horace a severe scolding for his forgetfulness, which was the only fault he had, I believe, but it was a most grievous one, and often led to serious trouble. After I had finished my lesson, without knowing anything about the scolding he had had, I went out into the garden, where Horace was working, and asked him to fasten a wheel on my little wagon, and help me to gear up my dog, Branch, to it.
"No! go 'long--I'se busy!" said he, without looking at me, and puffing out his great lips. Then he added, in a muttering way, to himself, "Nebber did see sich a bother as dese yer boys is!"
I was rather a passionate boy, and this roused me at once. I said something saucy back to him; then he said something else; then I said something in return, ending by calling him "an old nigger," and went back to the house.
Nothing could have offended Horace more than that "old nigger," which had slipped off my tongue in the heat of my passion, and for which I was heartily sorry a moment after--for, like a great many other negroes I have known, although he frequently called himself so, he would suffer no one else to.
All day long he did not speak to me, nor look at me, though I made a pretence of having several errands to the garden and went right by him--and at night I went to bed quite unhappy about it.
The next morning, I moped about the house, and tried to amuse myself with my humming-top, but it would not spin to suit me, and I threw it aside pettishly and went down to the kitchen, to ask old Wangie, the cook, to tell me a story, while she washed the breakfast things.