Free Joe and Other Georgian SketchesHarris, Joel Chandler
General
Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches
Harris, Joel Chandler
Georgia -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
I was reminded of this some years ago by a paragraph in one of the
county newspapers that sometimes come under my observation. It was a
very commonplace paragraph; indeed, it was in the nature of an
advertisement--an announcement of the fact that orders for "gilt-edged
butter" from the Jersey farm on the Tomlinson Place should be left at
the drugstore in Rockville, where the first that came would be the first
served. This businesslike notice was signed by Ferris Trunion. The name
was not only peculiar, but new to me; but this was of no importance at
all. The fact that struck me was the bald and bold announcement that the
Tomlinson Place was the site and centre of trading and other commercial
transactions in butter. I can only imagine what effect this announcement
would have had on my grandmother, who died years ago, and on some other
old people I used to know. Certainly they would have been horrified; and
no wonder, for when they were in their prime the Tomlinson Place was the
seat of all that was high, and mighty, and grand, in the social world in
the neighborhood of Rockville. I remember that everybody stood in awe of
the Tomlinsons. Just why this was so, I never could make out. They were
very rich; the Place embraced several thousand acres; but if the
impressions made on me when a child are worth anything, they were
extremely simple in their ways. Though, no doubt, they could be formal
and conventional enough when occasion required.
I have no distinct recollection of Judge Addison Tomlinson, except that
he was a very tall old gentleman, much older than his wife, who went
about the streets of Rockville carrying a tremendous gold-headed cane
carved in a curious manner. In those days I knew more of Mrs. Tomlinson
than I did of the judge, mainly because I heard a great deal more about
her. Some of the women called her Mrs. Judge Tomlinson; but my
grandmother never called her anything else but Harriet Bledsoe, which
was her maiden name. It was a name, too, that seemed to suit her, so
that when you once heard her called Harriet Bledsoe, you never forgot it
afterward. I do not know now, any more than I did when a child, why this
particular name should fit her so exactly; but, as I have been told, a
lack of knowledge does not alter facts.
I think my grandmother used to go to church to see what kind of clothes
Harriet Bledsoe wore; for I have often heard her say, after the sermon
was over, that Harriet's bonnet, or Harriet's dress, was perfectly
charming. Certainly Mrs. Tomlinson was always dressed in the height of
fashion, though it was a very simple fashion when compared with the
flounces and furbelows of her neighbors. I remember this distinctly,
that she seemed to be perfectly cool the hottest Sunday in summer, and
comfortably warm the coldest Sunday in winter; and I am convinced that
this impression, made on the mind of a child, must bear some definite
relation to Mrs. Tomlinson's good taste.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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