In Old Plantation Days
Silent Sam’el
Miss Angelina Brown was a young woman of many charms. Every one in Little Africa conceded that. No one who had seen her dash gracefully up the aisle of Mount Moriah Church to the collection-table with tossing head and rustling skirts; no one who had seen her move dreamily through the mazy dance at the hod-carriers’ picnics could fail to admit this much. She was a tall, fine-looking girl, with a carriage that indicated that she knew her own worth, as she did.
What added to the glamour that hung about the name of the brown damsel was that she was the only daughter of a very solid citizen—a man who was known to have both “propity” and money. There was no disputing the solidity of the paternal Brown, as there was no question of his utter simplicity and unaffectedness. He had imparted to Angelina a deal of his own good sense, and though she did not flaunt it, she did not, like many others born hitherside the war, disdain the fact that her father had learned on his master’s plantation the trade that supported them.
Under these circumstances it is easy to believe that the young woman had many suitors. There were many proper and stylish young men in the community who were willing to take the entrancing girl for herself in spite of the incubus of her riches. Indeed, there were frequent offers of such noble sacrifices; but Angelina was a shrewd high priestess, and she found it better to keep her victims in her train than to immolate them on the altar of matrimony. So it happened that there were few evenings when a light was not visible in the parlor of old Isaac Brown’s house, and one or another of the young men of Little Africa did not sit there with Angelina.
It was of a piece with the usual good sense that governed this house that slow-going, unpretentious Samuel Spencer—”Silent Sam’el,” they called him—made one of these evening sitters. Samuel was a steady-going, good-humored fellow, and a workman under the elder Brown. This may have accounted for Angelina’s graciousness to him. For even when he was in her company he had never a word to say for himself, but sat, looked at the lamp, twirled his hat, and smiled. This was certainly not very entertaining for the girl, but then, her father had a high opinion of Samuel’s ability. So she would make conversation, and endure his smiles, until old Isaac would call gruffly to him from the kitchen, and he would rise silently and go. Then Angelina was free to entertain whom she pleased for the rest of the evening, for the two men did not part until near midnight.
Once with his employer, Samuel would venture a remark now and then over the something like oily looking tea which they stirred round and round in their glasses. But usually he listened while the old man expounded his new plans and ideas, and every once in a while would shake his head in appreciation, or pat his knee in pure enjoyment. This happened every Wednesday, for that was Samuel’s particular evening. Isaac Brown l