In my young days the negro minstrels were a great diversion. They were amusing because they were so typical. There are none left, but in the old times they were delightful, and it is a thousand pities that they have passed away. All the essence of slavery, and the efforts of the slaves to amuse themselves, were in their quaint performances. The banjo was almost unknown to us in the North, and when it found its way to New England it was a genuine novelty. I was simply fascinated by it as a little girl and used to go to all the minstrel shows, and sit and watch the men play. Their banjos had five strings only and were played with the back of the nail,--not like a guitar. This was the only way to get the real negro twang. There was no refinement about such playing, but I loved it. I said: "I believe I could play that if I had one!" My father, the dignified scholar, was horrified. "When a banjo comes in, I go out," said he. At last a friend gave me one, and I watched and studied the darkies until I had picked up the trick of playing it, and soon acquired a real negro touch. And I also acquired some genuine darky songs. One, of which I was particularly fond, was called: _Hottes' co'n y' ever eat_. I really believe I was the first American girl who ever played a banjo! In a few years along came Lotta, and made the banjo a great feature. Banjo music has natural syncopation, and its peculiarities undoubtedly originated the "rag-time" of our present-day imitations. There was one song that I learned from hearing a man sing it who had, in turn, caught it from a darky, that has never to my knowledge been published and is not to be found in any collection. It began: [Illustration: Musical notation; It'll set this dar-key cra-zy. I don't know what I'll do,] and remains with me in my _répertoire_ unto this day. I have been known to sing it with certain effect--for when I am asked, now, to sing it, my husband leaves the room! The last time I sang it was only a couple of years ago in Norfolk. Herbert Witherspoon said: "Listen to that high C!" "Ah," said I, "that is the last remnant--the very last!" But this chapter is to be about my first notes, not my last ones. In 1857, my father failed, the beautiful books were sold and we went to New York to live. Almost directly afterward occurred one of the most important events of my career. Although I was not being trained for a singer, but as a musician in general, I could no more help singing than I could held breathing, or sleeping, or eating; and, one day, Colonel Henry G. Stebbins, a well-known musical amateur, one of the directors of the Academy of Music, was calling on my father and heard me singing to myself in an adjoining room. Then and there he asked to be allowed to have my voice cultivated; and so, when I was fourteen, I began to study singing. The succeeding four years were the hardest worked years of my life.