DOMESTIC DISCIPLINE. 71 years of discretion, strengthened by a devotion to their owners which seems instinctive, an affection and devotion which no others than their owners and their owners' family are ever lucky enough to share. Negro servants will wait upon visitors very well until the novelty has worn off; but they only continue to do so from compulsion; they will hover about strangers from curiosity, but their service is dictated by quite a different feeling from that which actuates the same towards their masters. Perhaps some share of fear is blended with their obedience, but this is a necessary influence upon an unreflecting nature. All this I soon discovered in the neglect of various matters in Flora's work. The same thing was daily recurring; but to say, "Be sure to do this every day," is as useless as hopeless. They must be told at the time and every time continually. It by no means follows that a prompt obedience is always rendered to their true masters and mistresses. Far from it. You now and then find old and trusty servants like Cassius and Ailsey, who do not require constantly watching; but old or young, no idle dunce was ever so ready to "shirk" his task as the genus negro; and no hypochondriac ever so ready to discover grievances and to imagine maladies as these poor timid slaves. CHAPTER VI. Post-Offices in the South.-Counties.-People of Virginia.Climate. The Domestic Institution.-Home Amusements.Botanical Rambles.-Field Hands. LIFE in the South, whether in one State or another, differs so little in essential points that a short description of customs in Virginia will initiate the reader at once, and make him feel as much at home in that State as in Carolina or Alabama. The great drawback and difficulties which the Confederate army has had to encounter will be better understood and appreciated, if the reader will allow me to guide him so far that he will be able to transport himself to the scene of action. On the Monday after my first arrival, I had carried some letters down stairs for the post, and meeting Dr. W. asked him how I should dispose of them. "If you lay them on that shelf, madam, I will see that they go. I shall be sending for the mail some time this week." "Sir? Excuse me I did not understand." POST-OFFICES IN THE SOUTH, 73 "We send for our mail on Saturday, madam; sometimes, if there is anything of any consequence, I send on Wednesdays too, otherwise our newspapers generally come on Saturday." "But I shall be very glad if my letters can be sent to the post-office as soon as possible. My friends may feel anxious to hear of the safe termination of my journey." "Certainly, Miss Jones, I will send a servant to Creek Landing on Wednesday. We have two postoffices. Creek Landing is nine miles from here, and Tappahannock is ten miles; but I will not fail to send a servant on Wednesday. The stage runs through to Fredericksburg twice a week, and we sometimes catch it at Mountford, which is only seven miles off, but it is quite uncertain at what time it passes." This quite accounted for our three months' correspondence. The post-offices, like the churches, are not confined to towns and villages, but are scattered over the country at cross roads and river landings. When it is remembered that the vast forests which originally covered the whole of that part of the American continent still flourish over more than three-fourths of the country, and that large estates of thousands of acres only under partial cultivation cause a very sparse population, these few-and-far-between essentials to civilized society will not create surprise. And from such circumstances results a mode of life which differs entirely from that prevailing in the Northern States, and indeed in any other part of the world. Notwithstanding the vast area of Virginia, comprising upwards of sixty-one thousand square miles, the whole State does not contain half-a-dozen towns whose population exceeds ten thousand inhabitants. The same may be said of the other Southern States, and from a similar reason. Virginia is the most populous excepting Kentucky and South Carolina. The population of Kentucky in 1850 was 26 to the square mile; that of Virginia and South Carolina each 23 to the square mile, and Tennessee 22 to the square mile. The following table is not according to the precise returns of the late census, but may be relied on as not far from the average:— CHARACTER OF THE POPULATION. 75 Virginia is divided into about 150 counties; the larger western ones being occasionally subdivided and changed as the population increases. Each of these counties, as in all the other States, has its "county seat," or court-house, which, like the postoffice, does not always imply a town, though it generally combines the advantages of both, with the addition of a country store, a tavern, probably a church of some denomination, and some half a score houses; and many whole counties have in them no larger nucleus of a town than this, which is nevertheless a place of general resort for news and business; especially on court-days," once a month, and "mail days," twice or thrice a week. 66 Every month a sitting of magistrates is held at the county seat, for petty offences, after the old English custom, and still retained in Virginia. County courts are held once a quarter, corresponding to our quarter sessions. Both Dr. W. and his brother the colonel were magistrates for the county. It will be presumed that a country so diversified by uncleared pine barrens, oak woods, swamps, a variety of soil, very little level, extensive ponds, and broad rapid rivers, is subject to other inconveniences besides the difficulty of obtaining at hand the requirements of polished life. Even our weekly mail was sometimes indefinitely delayed by the heavy rains which in a few hours would inundate the roads, and wash away the light wooden bridges thrown |