The "Gran'mammy Stories"[10] reveal with force and beauty the characteristics of the old Southern "mammy," who deserves a modest place with "The chaste and sage Dame Eurycleia" and fair Juliet's nurse; and Sherwood Bonner has made posterity her debtor by preserving the lineaments of this picturesque personage whose place formerly was of so much consequence in the Southern home. But let the author unfold her character: "In our Southern home we were very fond of our old colored mammy, who had petted and scolded and nursed and coddled, ---- yes, and spanked us,--from the time we were born." She was not a 'black mammy,' for her complexion was the color of clear coffee; and we did not call her 'mammy' but 'gran'mammy' because she had nursed our mother when a delicate baby,--loving her foster child, I believe, more than her own, and loving us for our dear mother's sake. She was all tenderness when we were wee toddlers, not more than able to clutch at the great gold hoops in her ears, or cling to her ample skirts like little burrs; but she showed a sharper side as we grew old enough to 'bother round the kitchen' with inquisitive eyes and fingers and tongues. I regret to say that she sometimes called us 'limbs' and would wonder with many a groan and shake of her head, how we contrived to hold so much of the Evil One in our small frames. "'I never seed sich chillern in all my born days,' she cried one day, when Ruth interrupted her in the midst of custard making, to beg leave to get into the kettle of boiling soap that she might be clean once for all, and never need another bath; while Sam, on the other side, entreated that she would make three 'points' of gravy with the fried chicken for dinner. (Sam always came out strong on pronunciation; his very errors leaned to virtue's side.) "'I 'clar to gracious,' said poor gran'mammy, 'you'll drive all de sense clean outen my head. How Miss Mary 'xpec's me ter git a dinner fitten fur white folks ter eat, wid you little onruly sinners _furever_ under foot, is mo' dan I kin say. An' here's Leah an' Rachel, my own gran-chillern, a no mo' use ter me dan two tar babies.' * * * * * "As gran'mammy grew older, her manner softened; her love was less fluctuating. It was she to whom we ran to tell of triumphs and sorrows; she whose sympathy, ash-cakes and turnover pies never failed us. It was she who hung over our sickbeds; who told us stories more beautiful than we read in any books; who sang to us old-fashioned hymns of praise and faith; and who talked to us with childlike simplicity of the God whom she loved.