The manner of taking
our meals at old master's, indicated but little refinement. Our
corn-meal mush, when sufficiently cooled, was placed in a large
wooden tray, or trough, like those used in making maple sugar
here in the north. This tray was set down, either on the floor
of the kitchen, or out of doors on the ground; and the children
were called, like so many pigs; and like so many pigs they would
come, and literally devour the mush--some with oyster shells,
some with pieces of shingles, and none with spoons. He that eat
fastest got most, and he that was strongest got the best place;
and few left the trough really satisfied. I was the most unlucky
of any, for Aunt Katy had no good feeling for me; and if I pushed
any of the other children, or if they told her anything
unfavorable of me, she always believed the worst, and was sure to
whip me.
As I grew older and more thoughtful, I was more and more filled
with a sense of my wretchedness. The cruelty of Aunt Katy, the
hunger and cold I suffered, and the terrible reports of wrong and
outrage which came to my ear, together with what I almost daily
witnessed, led me, when yet but eight or nine years old, to wish
I had never been born.
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