Bridges, Fidelia. Pink Roses. Watercolor on wove paper, 1875. Public Domain.
Hid in a close and lowly nook,
In a city yard where no grass grows—
Wherein nor sun, nor stars may look
Full faced—are planted three short rows
Of pansies, geraniums, and a rose.
A little girl with quiet, wide eyes,
Slender figured, in tattered gown,
Whose pallored face no country skies
Have quickened to a healthy brown,
Made this garden in the barren town.
Poor little flowers, your life is hard;
No sun, nor wind, nor evening dew.
Poor little maid, whose city yard
Is a world of happy dreams to you—
God grant some day your dreams come true.
BRAITHWHITE, WILLIAM STANLEY. “A CITY GARDEN,” IN THE DUNBAR SPEAKER AND ENTERTAINER, ED. ALICE MOORE DUNBAR-NELSON, 28. NAPERVILLE, ILL: J. L. NICHOLS & CO., 1920.
Contexts
The Dunbar Speaker and Entertainer‘s dedication reads: “To the children of the race which is herein celebrated, this book is dedicated, that they may read and learn about their own people.” In the foreword, Leslie Pinckney Hill, an African American educator, writer, and community leader who graduated from Harvard University in 1903, criticizes the one-sidedness of prevailing reading courses: “In vain may you search their pages—those pages upon which all our reading has been founded—for anything other than a patronizing view of that vast, brooding world of colored folk—yellow, black and brown—which comprises by far the largest portion of the human family.” Hill further writes that Alice Dunbar-Nelson’s book seeks to prove “that the white man has no fine quality, either by heart or mind, which is not shared by his black brother.”
Think of reading this poem out loud. Elocution (or public speaking) was a highly valued and widely taught skill in nineteenth-century America. In her introduction to the Dunbar Speaker, Alice Dunbar-Nelson offers some advice: “Before you begin to learn anything to recite, first read it over and find out if it fires you with enthusiasm. If it does, make it a part of yourself, put yourself in the place of the speaker whose words you are memorizing, get on fire with the thought, the sentiment, the emotion-then throw yourself into it in your endeavor to make others feel as you feel, see as you see, understand what you understand. Lose yourself, free yourself from physical consciousness, forget that those in front of you are a part of an audience, think of them as some persons whom you must make understand what is thrilling you–and you will be a great speaker.”
Before appearing in The Dunbar Speaker and Entertainer, “A City Garden” was included in Braithwhite’s Lyrics of Life and Love (1904), fully available on Google Books.
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
pallor: Paleness or pallidness, especially of the face.
tattered: Clad in jagged or slashed garments.
Resources for Further Study
In the early 1900s, Americans started to concentrate in cities, lured by the promise of better jobs and higher wages. However, the lives those who worked in the city factories (mainly former rural families and immigrants) was harsh. The Library of Congress offers information on American cities during the Progressive Era (1896-1920).
Smithsonian Gardens offers a comprehensive timeline of American Garden History.
Bauscher’s Seed & Plant Guide. Chromolithograph, 1899, Library of Congress.
As a quiet little seedling,
Lay within its darksome bed,
To itself it fell a-talking,[1]
And this is what it said:
"I am not so very robust,
But I'll do the best I can,"
And the seedling from that moment,
Its work of life began.
So it pushed a little leaflet,
Up into the light of day,
To examine the surroundings,
And show the rest the way.
The leaflet liked the prospect,
So it called its brother, Stem,
Then two other leaflets heard it.
And quickly followed them.
To be sure, the haste and hurry,
Made the seedling sweat and pant;
But almost before it knew it,
It found itself a plant.
The sunshine poured upon it,
And the clouds, they gave a shower;
And the little plant kept growing,
Till it found itself a flower.
Little folks, be like the seedling,
Always do the best you can,
Every child must share life's labor,
Just as well as every man.
And the sun and showers will help you,
Through the lonesome, struggling hours,
Till you raise to light and beauty,
Virtue's fair, unfading flowers.
Roger Williams University, Nashville, Tennessee, Academic Class. Photograph, 1899, Library of Congress.
DUNBAR, PAUL LAURENCE. “THE SEEDLING,” IN THE DUNBAR SPEAKER AND ENTERTAINER, ED. ALICE MOORE DUNBAR-NELSON, 19-20. NAPERVILLE, ILL: J. L. NICHOLS & CO., 1920.
[1] A-prefixing is a distinctive feature of Southern American White English, particularly Appalachian English. Scholars argue that it may have originated among settlers from southern England.
Contexts
The Dunbar Speaker and Entertainer‘s dedication reads: “To the children of the race which is herein celebrated, this book is dedicated, that they may read and learn about their own people.” In the foreword, Leslie Pinckney Hill, an African American educator, writer, and community leader who graduated from Harvard University in 1903, criticizes the one-sidedness of prevailing reading courses: “In vain may you search their pages—those pages upon which all our reading has been founded—for anything other than a patronizing view of that vast, brooding world of colored folk—yellow, black and brown—which comprises by far the largest portion of the human family.” Hill further writes that Alice Dunbar-Nelson’s book seeks to prove “that the white man has no fine quality, either by heart or mind, which is not shared by his black brother.”
Think of reading this poem out loud. Elocution (or public speaking) was a highly valued and widely taught skill in nineteenth-century America. In her introduction to the Dunbar Speaker, Alice Dunbar-Nelson offers some advice: “Before you begin to learn anything to recite, first read it over and find out if it fires you with enthusiasm. If it does, make it a part of yourself, put yourself in the place of the speaker whose words you are memorizing, get on fire with the thought, the sentiment, the emotion-then throw yourself into it in your endeavor to make others feel as you feel, see as you see, understand what you understand. Lose yourself, free yourself from physical consciousness, forget that those in front of you are a part of an audience, think of them as some persons whom you must make understand what is thrilling you–and you will be a great speaker.”
Resources for Further Study
The Library of Congress offers a set of primary sources that illustrate the reality of American children’s lives at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Blue Jay, from the Birds of America Series (N4) for Allen & Ginter Cigarettes Brands. Commercial color lithograph, 1888, The Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, Gift of Jefferson R. Burdick. Public Domain.
It was a hot, sultry day in May and the children in the little school in Virginia were wearily waiting for the gong to free them from lessons for the day. Furtive glances were directed towards the clock. The call of the birds and fields was becoming more and more insistent. Would the hour never strike!
“The Planting of the Apple-tree” had no interest for them. Little attention was given the boy as he read in a sing-song, spiritless manner:
"What plant we in this apple-tree?
Buds, which the breath of summer days
Shall lengthen into leafy sprays;
Boughs where the thrush, with crimson breast,
Shall haunt and sing and hide her nest."[1]
The teacher, who had long since stopped trying to make the lesson interesting, found herself saying mechanically, “What other birds have their nests in the apple-tree?”
The boy shifted lazily from one foot to the other as he began, “The sparrow, the robin, and wrens, and—the snow-birds and blue-jays—”
“No, they don’t, blue-jays don’t have nests,” came the excited outburst from some of the children, much to the surprise of the teacher.[2]
When order was restored some of these brown-skinned children, who came from the heart of the Virginian mountains, told this legend of the blue-jay.
Long, long years ago, the devil came to buy the blue-jay’s soul, for which he first offered a beautiful golden ear of corn. This the blue-jay liked and wanted badly, but said, “No, I cannot take it in exchange for my soul.” Then the devil came again, this time with a bright red ear of corn which was even more lovely than the golden one.
This, too, the blue-jay refused. At last the devil came to offer him a wonderful blue ear. This one the blue-jay liked best of all, but still was unwilling to part with his soul. Then the devil hung it up in the nest, and the blue-jay found that it exactly matched his own brilliant feathers, and knew at once that he must have it. The bargain was quickly made. And now in payment for that one blue ear of corn each Friday the blue-jay must carry one grain of sand to the devil, and sometimes he gets back on Sunday, but oftener not until Monday.[3]
Very seriously the children added, “And all the bad people are going to burn until the blue-jays have carried all the grains of sand in the ocean to the devil.”
The teacher must have smiled a little at the legend, for the children cried out again, “It is so. ’Deed it is, for doesn’t the black spot on the blue-jay come because he gets his wings scorched, and he doesn’t have a nest like other birds.”
Then, to dispel any further doubts the teacher might have, they asked triumphantly, “You never saw a blue-jay on Friday, did you?”
There was no need to answer, for just then the gong sounded and the children trooped happily out to play.
School Children Before a Log Schoolhouse. Photograph, circa 1895, Library of Virginia Special Collections.
Fisher, Ruth Anna. “A Legend of the Blue Jay,” IN THE UPWARD PATH: A READER FOR COLORED CHILDREN, ED. MYRON T. PRITCHARD AND MARY WHITE OVINGTON, 218-19. HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, 1920.
[1] American nature poet and journalist William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) wrote “The Planting of the Apple-Tree,” a poem included in school readers like The Rand-McNally List of Selections in School Readers (1896) and Constructive English for the Higher Grades of the Grammar School (1915).
[2] Blue jays do build nests. However, according to the Audubon Society‘s website, they are very quiet and inconspicuous when around them.
Job, Herbert Keightley. Blue Jay Nesting, Kent, Connecticut. Lantern Slide, 1900, Trinity College Watkinson Library: Ornithology Lantern Slides.
[3] According to folktales and fables that circulated within enslaved communities in the antebellum American South, the blue jay was never seen on Fridays because on those days he was carrying sticks to the devil to pay his debt. In other stories, the bird acted as the devil’s helper or messenger. Some of these accounts appear in Ernest Ingersoll’s Birds in Legend, Fable and Folklore (1923), Martha Young’s Plantation Legends (1902), and others.
Contexts
This short story was included in The Upward Path: A Reader for Colored Children, published in 1920 and compiled by Myron T. Pritchard and Mary White Ovington. The volume’s foreword states that, “[t]o the present time, there has been no collection of stories and poems by Negro writers, which colored children could read with interest and pleasure and in which they could find a mirror of the traditions and aspirations of their race.”
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
sing-song: To utter or express in a monotonous chant.
Resources for Further Study
Brief essay posted in The Conversation about the role of African American folklore in the preservation of history and cultural memory.
An overview of education in Virginia from 1869 to the present helps contextualize the school where Fisher’s story takes place. For example, under the Jim Crow system of education, “[o]ften transportation was provided to white schools but not to black ones. White teachers earned more money than black teachers, and male teachers were paid more than female teachers.”
A defense of the blue jay, a bird that “birders love to hate.”
Bullard, William. Portrait of a Boy Sitting on the Grass. Photograph, c. 1904, courtesy of Frank Morrill, Clark University and the Worcester Art Museum. Public Domain.
Once upon a time a Mule, a Hog, a Snake, and a Boy met. Said the Mule: “I eat and labor that I may grow strong in the heels. It is fine to have heels so gifted. My heels make people cultivate distance.”
Said the Hog: “I eat and labor that I may grow strong in the snout. It is fine to have a fine snout. I keep people watching for my snout.”
“No exchanging heels for snouts,” broke in the Mule.
“No’” answered the Hog; “snouts are naturally above heels.”
Said the Snake: “I eat to live, and live and cultivate my sting. The way people shun me shows my greatness. Beget stings, comrades, and stings will beget glory.”
Said the Boy: “There is a star in my life like unto a star in the sky. I eat and labor that I may think aright and feel aright. These rounds will conduct me to my star. Oh, inviting star!”
“I am not so certain of that,” said the Mule. “I have noticed your kind and ever see some of myself in them. Your star is in the distance.”
The Boy answered by smelling a flower and listening to the song of a bird. The Mule looked at him and said: “He is all tenderness and care. The true and the beautiful have robbed me of a kinsman. His star is near.”
Said the Boy: “I approach my star.”
“I am not so certain of that,” interrupted the Hog. “I have noticed your kind and I ever see some of myself in them. Your star is a delusion.”
The Boy answered by painting the flower and setting the notes of the bird’s song to music.
The Hog looked at the boy and said: “His soul is attuned by nature. The meddler in him is slain.”
“I can all but touch my star,” cried the Boy.
“I am not so certain of that,” remarked the Snake. “I have watched your kind and ever see some of myself in them. Stings are nearer than stars.”
The Boy answered by meditating upon the picture and music. The Snake departed, saying that stings and stars cannot keep company.
The Boy journeyed on, ever led by the star. Some distance away the Mule was bemoaning the presence of his heels and trying to rid himself of them by kicking a tree. The Hog was dividing his time between looking into a brook and rubbing his snout on a rock to shorten it. The Snake lay dead of its own bite. The Boy journeyed on, led by an ever inviting star.
Bridges, Fidelia. Bird on a Stalk, Singing. Chromolitograph, 1883, Library of Congress.
cotter, joseph s, sr. “the boy and the ideal,” in negro tales, 141-43. the cosmopolitan press, new york, 1912.
Contexts
This short story was also included in The Upward Path: A Reader for Colored Children, compiled by Myron T. Pritchard and Mary White Ovington, and published in 1920.
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
beget: To get, obtain, acquire; to win, gain; to procure (something) for someone, furnish, provide. Also: to take hold of, seize.
kinsman: A man of one’s own kin.
meddler: A person who meddles or interferes in something; a nuisance, a troublemaker.
In the peer-reviewed article “Animals as People in Children’s Literature,” Carolyn L. Burke and Joby G. Copenhaver argue that using animals as people in children’s literature allows both children and supervising adults “to become reflective and critical concerning life problems and life choices” by creating a safe emotional distance. Other authors, however, alert about the risks of anthropocentric portrayals of animals in children’s books.
Mule Barometer. Color zinc engraving and fiber, 1906, Library of Congress.
Now if you wish to travel fast
I beg you not to fool
With locomotion that's procured
Behind a Georgia mule.[1]
When I was teaching school in the backwoods of Georgia I had, one day, to attend to some business in Mudville, an embryo city about eleven miles from my school. Now you must know that a country school teacher can do nothing without first consulting his Board of Trustees; so I notified that honorable body that there was some business of vast importance to be attended to, and asked them to meet me on Friday afternoon; they all promised to be on hand “two hours b’sun.”[2] Friday afternoon, after school was dismissed, they came in one by one until they had all gathered.
As the chairman called the meeting to order, he said: “Bredren, de objick ob dis meeting is to consider de ways ob pervidin de means ob transposing de ‘fessar to Mudville.”[3] Now, by the way, the chairman of the Board was undoubtedly intended by nature for a smart man. He had a very strong weakness for using big words in the wrong place, and thought it his special duty to impress the “’fessar” at all times with his knowledge of the dictionary. Well, after much debate it was finally decided that “Brudder” Whitesides would “furnish the mule” and “Brudder Jinks de buggy” and that I should start early the next morning.
The next morning I was up quite early, because I wished to start as soon as possible in order to avoid the heat of the day. I ate breakfast and waited—six o’clock, seven o’clock, eight o’clock—and still that promised beast had not put in appearance. Knowing the proclivity of the mule to meander along as his own sweet will dictates, especially when the sun shines hot, I began to despair of reaching Mudville at all that day; but “Brudder” Jinks, with whom I boarded, seeing my melancholy state of mind, offered to hitch up Gypsy, an antiquated specimen of the mule, whose general appearance was that of the skeleton of some prehistoric animal one sees in a museum.
I accepted this proposition with haste, and repented at leisure.
I could see a weary, long-suffering look in that mule’s eye, and I could imagine how his heart must have sought the vicinity of his tail, when they disturbed his dreams of green fields and pleasant pastures, and hitched him to an old buggy, to encounter the stern realities of a dusty road. “Verily, verily,” I soliloquized, “the way of the mule is hard.” But, putting aside all tender feelings, I jumped into the buggy and grasping a stick of quite ample proportions began to urge his muleship on his way.
Nothing of much consequence hampered our onward journey except the breaking down of three wheels and the excessive heat of the sun, which great luminary seemed not more than ninety-five miles away.
I arrived at Mudville sometime between 12 [P.?]M. and 6 P.M. After having finished my business and having bountifully fed my mule on water and what grass he could nibble from around his hitching post, I bought a large watermelon and started for home. Before I was out of sight of the town, I began to have serious misgivings about reaching home before a very late hour. In the morning by various admonitions and applications of the hickory, I had been able to get my mule into a jog trot, but on the homeward journey he would not even get up to a respectable walk. Well, we trudged on for two hours or more, when to my dismay he stopped,—stopped still. As the hour was getting late and it was growing dark, I began advising him—with the hickory—that it was best to proceed, but he seemed to have hardened his heart, and his back also, and paid me no heed. There I sat—all was as still as the grave, save for the dismal hoot of the screech-owl.[4] There I was, five and a half miles from home with no prospect of getting there.
I began to coax my mule with some words which perhaps are not in the Sabbath School books, and to emphasize them with the rising and falling inflection of the stick across his back; but still he moved not. Then all at once my conscience smote me. I thought perhaps the faithful beast might be sick. My mind reverted to Balaam, whose beast spoke to him when he had smitten him but three times and here I had smitten my beast about 3,333 times. I listened almost in expectation of hearing say, “Johnson, Johnson, why smites thou me 3,333 times?”[5]
I got out of the buggy and looked at the mule; he gazed at me with a sad far-away expression in his eye, which sent pangs of remorse to my heart. I thought of the cruel treatment I had given him, and on the impulse of the moment I went to the buggy, got out my large, luscious melon, burst it open and laid it on the ground before the poor animal; and I firmly resolved to be a friend of the mule ever after, and to join the Humane Society as soon as I reached Atlanta.[6]
As I watched that mule slowly munching away at my melon, I began to wonder if I had not acted a little too hastily in giving it to him, but I smothered that thought when I remembered the pledge I had just taken. When he had finished he looked around with a satisfied air which encouraged me; so I took hold of his bridle and after stroking him gently for a moment, attempted to lead him off. But he refused to be led. He looked at me from under his shabby eyebrows, but the sad, far-away expression had vanished and in its stead was a mischievous gleam, born of malice afore-thought.[7] I remonstrated with him, but it only seemed to confirm his convictions that it was right for him to stand there. I thought of my melon he had just devoured; then I grew wrathy, and right there and then renounce all my Humane Society resolutions, and began to shower down on that mule torrents of abuse and hickory also, but all to no effect. Instead of advancing he began to “revance.” I pulled on the bridle until my hands and arms were sore, but he only continued to back and pull me along with him. When I stopped pulling he stopped backing, and so things went on for the space of about half an hour.
I wondered what time was. Just then the moon began to rise, from which I knew it was about 9 o’clock. My physical exertion began to tell on me and I hungered. Oh, how I hungered for a piece of that watermelon! And I hit the mule an extra blow as a result of those longings.
I was now desperate. I sat down on the side of the road and groaned; that groan came from the depths of my soul, and I know that I presented a perfect picture of despair. However, I determined to gather all my remaining strength for one final effort; so I caressed him up and down the backbone two or three times as a sort of persuader, then grasping the bridle with both hands, I began to pull, pull as hard as I had never pulled before and as I never hope to pull again. And he began to back. I continued to pull and he continued to back.
How long this order of things might have gone on I do not know, but just then a brilliant idea struck me so forcibly as to come near knocking me down. I took the mule out, and by various tying, buckling and tangling, I hitched him up again, upside down, or wrong side out, or, well, I can’t exactly explain, but anyhow when I got through his tail pointed in the direction I wanted him to go. Then I got back in the buggy and taking hold of the bridle began to pull, and he began to back; and I continued to pull, and he continued to back; and will you believe me, that mule backed all the way home! It is true we did not travel very fast but every time he would slow down, I would put a little extra force into my pull and he would put a little extra speed into his back. Ever and anon he would glance at me with that mischievous, malicious twinkle, which seemed to say “I’ve got you tonight,” and I would smile back a quiet, self-satisfied smile and give an extra pull.
But when we got home, that mischievous, malicious twinkle changed, and he looked at me in a dazed sort of way and I smiled back quite audibly. And do you know, that mule has been in a dark brown study ever since.[8] He is trying to get through his slow brain how I managed to make him pull me home that night.
As I jumped out of the buggy the clock struck twelve. And there at that solemn hour of the night, as the pale moon shed her silvery beams all around and as the bright stars peeped down upon me from the ethereal blue, and the gentle zephyrs wafted to me the odor of a hog-pen in the near distance, I vowed a vow, an awful vow, that so long as I breathed the vital air, never, no, never again, would I attempt to drive a Georgia mule.
Muybridge, Eadweard. Animal Locomotion: Mule. Photograph, c1887, Library of Congress.
Johnson, James weldon. “behind A Georgia mule,” in the upward path: a reader for colored children, ed. myron t. pritchard and mary white ovington, 66-72. harcourt, brace and howe, 1920.
[1] Mules are the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse. They are mostly infertile.
[2] Perhaps “before sundown.”
[3] ‘fessar: i.e. professor.
[4] The Eastern Screech Owl is Georgia’s most common owl. This strictly nocturnal bird is often more heard than seen.
[5] Balaam is a non-Israelite prophet featured in the Bible’s Old Testament’s Book of Numbers. While riding his donkey on his way to Moab (modern Jordan), an angel that only his donkey could see blocked their way. When the animal refused to continue, Balaam beat it three times with a staff until the donkey addressed him and asked him why.
Anderson, Alexander. Balaam. Wood Engraving, 19th century, Davison Art Center, Wesleyan University, CT. Public Domain.
[6] Probably a reference to the American Humane Society, founded in 1877 to promote the humane treatment of children and animals.
[7] Premeditated; deliberate.
[8] A state of deep reverie or intense thought. The term “brown study” seems to have appeared first in the sixteenth century and came into regular usage in the nineteenth century.
Contexts
Weldon Johnson wrote this autobiographical piece during the Jim Crow Era, when Southern schools were racially segregated and extremely unequal. In addition to being a writer and an educator, Weldon Johnson was a civil rights activist and a leader of the NAACP.
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
coax: To influence or persuade by caresses, flattery, or blandishment.
ever and anon: Ever and again, every now and then; continually at intervals.
hamper: To obstruct the free movement of (a person or animal), by fastening something on, or by material obstacles or entanglements.
hickory: The wood of a North America hickory tree. Also, a stick or switch made of hickory (or sometimes another wood).
wrathy: Feeling, or inclined to, wrath; wrathful, very angry, incensed.
Mazell, Peter. The Hedgehog from the Book The British Zoology by Thomas Pennant. Etching with Hand Coloring, 1766, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco.
Ain't nobody nevah tol' you not a wo'd a-tall,
'Bout de time dat all de critters gin dey fancy ball?
Some folks tell it in a sto'y, some folks sing de rhyme,
'Peahs to me you ought to hyeahed it, case hit's ol' ez time.
Well, de critters all was p'osp'ous, now would be de chance
Fu' to tease ol' Pa'son Hedgehog, givin' of a dance;[1]
Case, you know, de critter's preachah was de stric'est kin',
An' he nevah made no 'lowance fu' de frisky min'.
So dey sont dey inbitations, Racoon writ 'em all,
"Dis hyeah note is to inbite you to de Fancy Ball;
Come erlong an' bring yo' ladies, bring yo' chillun too,
Put on all yo' bibs and tuckahs, show whut you kin do."
W'en de night come, dey all gathahed in a place dey knowed,
Fu' enough erway f'om people, nigh enough de road,
All de critters had ersponded, Hop-Toad up to Baih,
An' I's hyeah to tell you, Pa'son Hedgehog too, was daih.
Well, dey talked an' made dey 'bejunce, des lak critters do,
An' dey walked an' p'omenaded 'roun' an' thoo an' thoo;[2]
Jealous ol' Mis' Fox, she whispah, "See Mis' Wildcat daih,
Ain't hit scan'lous, huh a'comin' wid huh shouldahs baih?"
Ol' man T'utle was n't honin' fu' no dancin' tricks,
So he stayed by ol' Mis' Tu'tle, talkin' politics;
Den de ban' hit 'mence a-playin' critters all to place,
Fou' ercross, an' fou' stan' sideways, smilin' face to face.
'Fessah Frog, he play de co'net, Cricket play de fife,
Slews o' Grasshoppers a-fiddlin' lak to save dey life;
Mistah Crow, 'he call de figgers, settin' in a tree,
Huh, uh! how does critters sasshayed was a sight to see.
Mistah Possom swing Mis' Rabbit up an' down de flo',
Ol' man Baih, he ain't so nimble, an' it mek him blow;
Raccoon dancin' wid Mis Squ'il squeeze huh little han',
She say, "Oh, now ain't you awful, quit it, goodness lan'!"
Pa'son Hedgehog groanin' awful at his converts' shines,
'Dough he peepin' thoo his fingahs at dem movin' lines,
'Twell he cain't set still no longah w'en de fiddles sing,
Up he jump, an' bless you, honey, cut de pigeon-wing.[3]
Well, de critters lak to fainted jes' wid dey su'prise,
Sistah Fox, she vowed she was n't gwine to b'lieve huh eyes;
But dey could n't be no 'spurtin' 'bout it any mo':
Pa'son Hedgehog was a-cape'in' all erroun' de flo'.
Den dey all jes' capahed scan'lous case dey did n't doubt,
Dat dey still could go to meetin'; who could tu'n 'em out?
So wid dancin' an' uligion, dey was in de fol',
Fu' a-dancin' wid de Pa'son could n't hu't de soul.
Crane, Walter. Tailpiece with Dancing Foxes. Wood Engraving, 1914, in Household Stories from the Collection of the Bros. Grimm. Public Domain.
DuNBAR, Paul Laurence. “de critters’ dance.” The southern Workman, VOL. XXIX, NO. 11 (November 1900): 608-09.
[3] According to the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Dictionary of American Regional English, to cut the pigeon’s wing is to execute intricate dance steps gracefully.
Contexts
Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poem appeared in The Southern Workman magazine, an American journal “devoted to the interests of the black and red races,” according to its cover page. The magazine included sections on education and suggestions for school lessons. Dunbar received international acclaim for his dialect verse, but he also wrote many poems in standard English. Although the dialect may appear challenging, reading “De Critters’ Dance” aloud helps make the meanings clear.
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
fiddle: A stringed instrument of music, usually the violin.
fife: A small shrill-toned instrument of the flute kind, used chiefly to accompany the drum in military music.
parson: A vicar or any other beneficed member of the clergy of the Church of England; a chaplain, curate, or any Anglican clergyman; a minister or preacher of any Christian denomination, a clergyman. Sometimes with pejorative connotation.
meeting: An assembly of people for worship.
sashay: To perform a chassé, especially in square dancing.
Original illustration by Hilda Rue Wilkinson from The Brownies’ Book, p. 131.
I’m sick and tired of hearing about it, that’s what,” said Carl Gray wearily. “Every time I pick up a newspaper or magazine there’s a whole lot in it about psychical research.[1] Talk about something else.”
“Well you’re foolish and behind the times, that’s all I’ve got to say,” retorted Ray Fulton, hotly. The leading men of the world are taken up with it, and it’s a good thing to know about.
“Why is it a good thing to know about?” sneered Carl.
“Well because it is, that’s why. And if you don’t buy a ticket from me you’re a cheap skate and not my buddy. Work all the week after school at the drug store and then won’t even buy a twenty-five cent ticket!”
Carl assumed an air of indifference he was far from feeling.
“I don’t care how much I work, or what kind of a skate I am; I’m not going to buy any ticket to any lecture.[2] See?”
And without further parley he walked off, complacently jingling his week’s wages in his pocket. Four of these silver dollars were to swell the fund he was saving to pay his expenses at the State University two years hence. The remaining dollar was his spending money for the week. And when one has only a dollar to spend, it behooves one to be as saving as possible, especially when one has a healthy appetite for caramel sodas.
If it had been a lecture on foreign travel now, Carl would not have minded buying a ticket. Of course Ray was his chum, his sworn and chosen buddy and he’d help him in any way he could. But it wasn’t Carl’s fault that Ray had been such a boob as to let some old professor foist a lot of tickets off on him with the promise of a dollar if he sold them all. Let Ray earn his spending money by the honest sweat of his brow as became any sober-minded high school sophomore.
The next morning on his way to school he met Ray again and girded himself for a renewal of hostilities.
“Well, Arbaces,”[3] he said insolently (his class was reading the ‘Last Days of Pompeii’), “how many tickets have you sold now?” As he spoke he tossed his silver dollar high in the air.
“That’s all right about my tickets,” returned Ray with a forced laugh. He saw that Carl had money and was to be treated civilly, at least until he had treated him to one or two sodas. “You know, Carl, I’m just seeing how many tickets I can sell for the money that’s in it. I don’t believe in that rot any more than you do.”
Original illustration by Hilda Rue Wilkinson from The Brownies’ Book, p. 132.
Here both boys turned as one and walked backward nine steps. A black cat had crossed their path. They turned around again, spat, and then looked at each other sheepishly.
“There’s nothing in it that it’s bad luck to have a black cat cross your path,” said Carl the materialist, “I just walked backward because you did.” [4]
“Yes you did not,” jeered Ray. “But I’ll tell you what’s a true fact: If you boil a black cat alive and then chew a certain bone that comes out of its head you’ll be able to do anything in this world that you want to, no matter what it is.” [5]
Carl shouted aloud in derision, “It’s a wonder you wouldn’t chew ten black cat bones then so you could get your geometry lessons,” he shouted. (Carl was the fifteen year old head of his mathematics class.)
“Laugh if you want to but it’s true,” said Ray sullenly. He really didn’t half believe it himself, but he wasn’t going to admit that Carl Gray knew everything.
“Rats,” said Carl. “If that was the truth, there wouldn’t be a black cat left in this town. Everybody would be boiling them alive and eating their bones.”
“It’s not their bones, smarty. It’s just one bone. And everybody don’t know that certain bone, and that’s why everybody can’t do the trick.”
“Well, do you know what certain bone it is?”
“Sure I do.”
“What bone is it, then?”
“It’s a bone in the cat’s head I told you.”
“Yes I know you told me it was a bone in the cat’s head. But a cat’s got more than one bone in its head, and you said it was a certain one. Now which one is it?”
“Well, after school we’ll get a black cat.”
“Where’ll we get one? Besides, it has to be boiled alive. You get me a black cat and boil it alive, and I’ll show you the bone all right.”
“If you want any black cat boiled alive you’ll boil it yourself. It’s bad luck to kill a cat.”
“Well, I can’t show you if I don’t have a cat, that’s all there is to it.”
Conversation languished until the boys reached school. Carl was plunged into thought. He told himself that he didn’t believe in Ray’s silly trick for a moment; he was just betting that the bone couldn’t be found that was all.
That evening when he had finished his work at the drug store he sought Ray’s house. “I say, Ray,” he began, “if we could find a black cat that was dead already couldn’t you boil it and show me that bone?”
“Well, I guess maybe I could. Of course it wouldn’t do you any good to chew the bone of a dead cat but I could show it to you.”
“All right. Tomorrow’s Saturday and I’ll be off at three o’clock. You meet me at the drugstore and we’ll find a cat.”
But next day their search was unavailing, although they looked through alleys and creeks and even went to the edge of the river where the city dumping grounds were. They were just about to give it up when they met the city scavenger, driving his team of fat horses.
“Hey, Mr. Miller, let us look in your wagon, will you? Let us look and see if you’ve got a black cat there,” called Carl, seized with a bright idea. Mr. Miller, always on the alert against just such boyish pranks as this, scanned the pair with a fishy eye and rode off without replying.
Original illustration by Hilda Rue Wilkinson from The Brownies’ Book, p. 133.
“Well, I don’t care,” said Ray with an air of relief, “Let’s go on home, I’m hungry.”
So the boys moved off at a run, and taking a short cut towards home were quite unexpectedly rewarded, for, in an old unused pasture, among tin cans, old buckets and other débris they came upon a defunct feline, black as ebony and swollen to the proportions of a small dog.
With an exultant whoop the boys seized their prize and hurried on. “Now I’ll have to go back to work. But I’ll take this cat and hide it in my woodshed and Monday non when we come home to dinner we’ll boil her then. Mother’ll be away all day and we’ll have the house to ourselves. Say, you carry it a while. It doesn’t smell exactly like cologne, does it?”
It did not and both boys were glad when they had deposited their noisome burden in Carl’s woodshed. By Monday noon Carl’s interest in psychical research had diminished considerably. He had passed a very uncomfortable Sabbath trying to keep his parents from finding out just what caused that peculiarly offensive odor about the premises. But now Ray was on hand and so was the dead cat, so there was nothing to do but go on with the experiment.
Carl lighted the gasoline stove and filled the clothes boiler with water. “We’ll boil it in that and while it’s boiling we’ll eat our dinner,” he told Ray.
Ray nodded and put the cat into the boiler trying not to mind the horrible odor. Then the boys washed their hands and Carl started to place lunch on the table. But the aroma from the boiler became more and more pronounced and Carl began to have serious doubts as to the wisdom of the step they had taken. Visions of an irate mother passed through his mind and he wondered if he would ever be able to get that awful scent out of the clothes boiler.
He looked at Ray. Ray looked sick and said he didn’t believe he wanted any lunch. Carl did not urge him; his own appetite had vanished. For a few terrible minutes they sat still and then the boiler boiled over.
That was the end.
“For the love of the queen,” shuddered Carl, “Help me throw that rotten thing out of here.”
Choking, gasping, and staggering the boys carried the boiler far down the alley and emptied it.
“Shall—shall I show you that bone now?” quavered Ray, forcin ghimself to gaze on the repulsive mass at their feet.
Carl turned savagely. “You shut up that foolishness, right now,” he snapped. “I’ve made a big enough boob of myself hiding a dead cat, let alone messing through it looking for a bone. Don’t you ever come to me with that tale again. D’you hear?”
And he marched off, leaving Ray standing in the alley, a dejected and misunderstood disciple of black cat magic.
Harrold, edna m. “black cat magic.” The Brownies’ Book 2, no. 5 (May 1921): 131-33.
[1] The effort to use scientific procedures and principles to explain psychic experiences, including hypnotism, séances, hauntings, and telepathy (Sommer).
[2] In the early 1900s, professors commonly sold tickets to their scientific lectures, surgeries, or dissection demonstrations (Kirschke and Sintiere 163-64).
[3] The Last Days of Pompeii is a novel by Edward Bulwer-Lytton about the lives of Romans in the city of Pompeii before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. Arbaces, the character to which Carl compares Ray, is the villainous sorcerer who murders the heroine’s brother.
[4] Superstitions surrounding black cats are inconsistent. While black cats are associated with witches in England and the United States, some places hold that the appearance of a black cat is lucky. For example, in Yorkshire (England), fishermen kept black cats as pets to ensure the safety of sailors (Radford and Radford).
[5] According to Zora Neale Hurston, an American anthropologist and novelist, the black cat bone ritual Carl and Ray attempt will make the spell-caster invisible. Successful completion of the ritual involves fasting for twenty-four hours, catching and boiling a black cat alive, cursing the cat as it dies, and testing the cat’s bones until one tastes bitter.
Contexts
The American Society for Psychical Research (ASPR) was founded in 1885 after the British physicist and parapsychologist Sir William Fletcher Barrett visited the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1884 (Fichman). Among the society’s founding members were Edward Charles Pickering, Alpheus Hyatt, Henry Pickering Bowditch, and William James. The first president, Simon Newcomb, was a skeptic who “hoped to convince others that, on methodological grounds, psychical research was a scientific dead end” (Moyer 92). However, others in the society had more belief in the possible veracity of phenomena like telepathy and psychological automatisms. The ASPR struggled to maintain funding and interest, and membership fluctuated throughout the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In 1920, after the death of psychologist and ASPR secretary James Hyslop, the society splintered due to differences in belief (Mauskopf).
Resources for Further Study
Fichman, Martin. An Elusive Victorian: The Evolution of Alfred Russel Wallace. University of Chicago Press, 2004.
Hurston, Zora Neale. Mules and Men. Harper Perennial, 1990.
Kirschke, Amy Helene and Phillip Luke Sintiere, eds. Protest and Propaganda : W. E. B. Du Bois, the CRISIS, and American History. University of Missouri Press, 2019.
Mauskopf, Seymour. “Psychical Research in America.” Psychical Research: A Guide to Its History, Principles & Practices, ed. Ivor Grattan-Guinness. Aquarian Press, 1982.
Musser, Judith, ed. “Girl, Colored” and Other Stories: A Complete Short Fiction Anthology of African American Women Writers in The Crisis Magazine, 1910-2010. McFarland, 2010.
Radford Edwin, and Mona A. Radford. Encyclopedia of Superstitions. Philosophical Library, 2007.
“The School Girl.” Portrait of Charlotte Elizabeth Crawford. 1920. From the cover of the ninth volume of The Brownies’ Book. W. E. B. Du Bois, ed., http://www.loc.gov/item/22001351/.
O HAPPY little grasshopper [1]
In shirt of lettuce-green,
With wings as thin as isinglass [2]
And sprightly legs and lean!
O little leaping grasshopper,
I watched you spring and pass,
And found that though your name sounds so,
You don't just jump on grass.
You sped right by Parnassus grass [3]
To land on daddy's knee;
Then made my tie a boulevard,
As we sat by the tree.
I saw you pass some fox grass once [4]
And light––snap!––on a rose:
So, after all, one's not known by
The name one's parents chose.
Lee, Mary Effie. “The Grasshopper.” The Brownies’ Book, ed. W. E. B. Du Bois, vol. 1, no. 9, New York, N.Y.: DuBois and Dill, September 1920. 286. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/22001351/>.
[1] Grasshopper: any of a group of jumping insects (suborder Caelifera) that are found in a variety of habitats. Grasshoppers occur in greatest numbers in lowland tropical forests, semiarid regions, and grasslands. They range in color from green to olive or brown and may have yellow or red markings.
[2] Isinglass: a semitransparent whitish very pure gelatin prepared from the air bladders of fishes (such as sturgeons) and used especially as a clarifying agent and in jellies and glue.
[3] Parnassus grass: this perennial herbaceous wildflower consists of a tuft of basal leaves, from which one or more flowering stalks develop. The blades of the basal leaves are oval in shape and entire (toothless) along their margins.
[4] Likely fox grass: foxtail weed (Setaria) has wide leaf blades, much like the turf grass in which it may grow. The base of the leaves has fine hairs and the stem rises from a collar at the base of the leaf.
Contexts
Later known as Effie Lee Newsome, Mary Effie Lee was born in Philadelphia and was famous for writing nature and children’s poems during the Harlem Renaissance. Lee worked for The Crisis Magazine, the monthly publication of the NAACP, where W. E. B. Du Bois worked as her editor. From 1925 until 1929, Lee edited a column in The Crisis called “The Little Page”. In her column, it was Lee’s job to carry out Du Bois’s goal for The Brownies’ Book: to encourage young Black children to feel pride for their race.
See Wonders: the Best Children’s Poems of Effie Lee Newsome (Wordsong/Boyds Mills Press, 1999) and Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers (The Associated Publishers, 1940) for other works by Mary Effie Lee.
Resources for Further Study
Biology of Grasshoppers. Eds. R. F. Chapman and Anthony Joern. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: Canada, 1990.
Wheeler, Laura. Decorations for “The Silver Shell.” 1920. From the sixth volume of The Brownies’ Book, 185. W. E. B. Du Bois, ed., http://www.loc.gov/item/22001351/.
Dreamy-eyed, the fisher maid
Slowly down the long beach strayed;
“Gardens, palaces entrancing,
Knights and ladies gayly dancing,–
If I, an unknown maid, might be
One of that happy company!–”
Thus she mused – then nearly fell
O’er a gleaming silver shell.
As she raised it to her ear
Fell a voice, deep, tender, clear.
“Prince am I of a noble land
Who at the touch of a witch’s wand
Enchanted was, and doomed to know
But fruitless search, where’er I go.
The seven seas, I’ve sailed them o’er.
I’ve seen far lands and barren shore.”–
Wheeler, Laura. Decorations for “The Silver Shell.” 1920. From the sixth volume of The Brownies’ Book, 185. W. E. B. Du Bois, ed., http://www.loc.gov/item/22001351/.
“What art thou seeking, noble friend?
Why does thy questing know no end?”
“A maid who with nothing to acquire,
Would forsake her heart’s desire;
Who at the call of a simple shell
Would sound to her fondest hopes a knell. [1]
This purging flame of sacrifice
The witch demands – it is her price.
Then would I haste to my father’s home
To love and joy, no more to roam.”–
“O noble one, I’ll set thee free,
To seek thy home across the sea.
The dreams I’ve had are idle, vain;
‘Tis meet that I should bear the pain.”–
A golden mist illumes the land– [2]
A prince is kneeling on the sand!
A prince of courtly mien and carriage, [3]
Who seeks the maiden’s hand in marriage.
Spence, Eulalie. “The Silver Shell.” The Brownies’ Book, ed. W. E. B. Du Bois, vol. 1, no. 6, New York, N.Y.: DuBois and Dill, June 1920. 185. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/22001351/>.
[1] Knell: the sound of a bell, especially when rung solemnly for a death or funeral.
[2] Though it is more common to use “illuminate,” “illume” conveys the same meaning.
[3] Mien: a person’s look or manner, especially one of a particular kind indicating their character or mood.
Contexts
Eulalie Spence would have been around 25 years old when this poem was published in the sixth volume of The Brownies’ Book. From the West Indies, Spence was a Black writer, director, teacher, and playwright during the Harlem Renaissance. Eventually known as one of the most experienced Black female playwrights of the time, she also won several playwright competitions. Spence worked with W. E. B. Du Bois’s Krigwa Players from 1926 to 1928, helping make the guild more known. However, she and Du Bois disagreed artistically, which eventually led to the disbanding of the Krigwa Players. For more information about the Krigwa Players, see Wintz and Finkelman (full citation below). For more information about Spence and Du Bois’s disagreement, see Hill’s dissertation (full citation below).
Hill, Caroline Roberta. Art Versus Propaganda: Georgia Douglas Johnson and Eulalie Spence as Figures who Fostered Community in the Midst of Debate. Ohio State University, 2019.
Though Spence’s work has been overshadowed by more famous counterparts of her day, her plays are still being presented in contemporary theatre. Hot Stuffwas presented in 2007 by The American Century Theater of Arlington, Virginia. In 2015, The Hunch was presented by The Xoregos Performing Company in New York City, Yonkers, and Newburgh. The Starteralso premiered the same year at The Xoregos Performing Company.
A volvelle showing the movement of the moon throughout the calendar year. 1474. Print: woodcut. Library of Congress Rare Book and Special Collections Division Washington, D.C. https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2007681105/.
I SAW the moon shining one night,
I looked at her with all my might; [2]
A big, round ball, with eyes and nose––
Where she came from, or where she goes,
I wonder!
In the dark, blue sky she gives us light
Each night when she is shining bright;
And, like a lamp, the way she shows,
(As many a weary traveler knows)
Till day.
And, like the moon, I’ll do my share
To make life’s night more bright and fair;
And some one who was lost awhile,
I know will thank me with his smile
At dawn.
McKinney, Marjorie. “The Moon.” The Brownies’ Book, ed. W. E. B. Du Bois, vol. 1, no. 5, New York, N.Y.: DuBois and Dill, May 1920. 158. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/22001351/>.
[1] Though we know little about the author, The Brownies’ Book lists her as being nine years old.
[2] The speaker both personifies and feminizes the moon here.
Contexts
Astronomy was revolutionized in the twentieth century, which inspired much fascination. For a detailed explanation of the twentieth century’s astronomical breakthroughs, see Hughes and de Grijs’s article (full citation below).
Resources for Further Study
Hughes, David W. and Richard de Grijs. “The Top Ten Astronomical ‘Breakthroughs’ of the 20th Century.” CAP 1, 1 (2007): 11-17. https://www.capjournal.org/issues/01/11_17.pdf.
Gilrain, Jane. “Homer to Hip-Hop: Teaching Writing through Painting, Performance, and Poetry.” Language Arts 92, no. 5 (2015): 328-42. Accessed November 9, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24577590.
Linaberger, Mara. “Poetry Top 10: A Foolproof Formula for Teaching Poetry.” The Reading Teacher 58, no. 4 (2004): 366-72. Accessed November 9, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20205490.
McNair, Jonda C. “Poems about Sandwich Cookies, Jelly, and Chocolate: Poetry in K—3 Classrooms.” YC Young Children 67, no. 4 (2012): 94-100. Accessed November 9, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/42731232.
Pedagogy
This poem would be great to teach to young students, as it is concise and offers many literary devices to discuss. You may consider focusing on the following if teaching this poem:
Personification: Personification is when you give an animal or object qualities or abilities that only a human can have. This creative literary tool adds interest and fun to poems or stories. Personification is what writers use to bring non-human things to life. It helps us better understand the writer’s message. (Focus on stanzas one and two for examples of personification.)
Simile: A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two different things. The simile is usually in a phrase that begins with the words “as” or “like.” This is different from a metaphor, which is also a comparison but one says something is something else. (Focus on stanza two for an example of simile.)
Tone: We consider tone to be the attitude the author has or takes towards the reader or the subject/theme of a piece of writing or literature. We pick up the tone, or the attitude, from the words used or the description being given.
Theme: Theme is an underlying message or the big idea of a story. This message could tell more about human nature or life in general. Many stories have more than one theme.
