"Ain't you a Newnan nigger?" Aunt Minervy Ann asked, with some asperity. "Yessum, I is," replied the cook, somewhat surprised. "Den 'tain't no need ter ax what you got in yo' pocket," was the dry remark. "Which pocket?" inquired the cook, slapping herself somewhat nervously. On one of her fingers was a large brass ring, and when she slapped her pocket, this ring struck against something which gave forth an unmistakable sound. It was a bottle. "Huh!" exclaimed Aunt Minervy Ann; "yo' han' kin tell de trufe quicker'n yo' tongue." "Well, I declare to gracious!" sighed the cook. "How did you know I was frum Newnan?" "Why, you got de look on you. De white er yo' eyes is blood red, you got yo' ha'r wrop de wrong way, an' dar's dat ar tickler in yo' pocket." "Well, I declare!" cried the cook; "you outdoes me!" There was a note of admiration in her voice calculated to propitiate her critic. "Come on in here, den, an' git ter work," said Aunt Minervy Ann. "Dey ain't nothin' ter do but ter cook de dinner. An' don't put so much wood in dat range. You kin cook dat dinner wid five mo' little sticks ef you put um in at de right time." With that, Aunt Minervy Ann transferred her attention to the house proper, and proceeded to give the beds a good shaking up. She went about the matter so deftly and with such earnestness that she quite won the admiration of the lady of the house, who had been used to an entirely different kind of service. In half an hour every bed had been put to rights, and, as Aunt Minervy Ann hit the piano the last lick with her feather duster, the whistle of the letter-carrier was heard at the gate. The delivery consisted of three letters and a postal-card. This postal-card caused the lady of the house to catch her breath. It was a notice from one of the city banks to the effect that a note of acceptance for $300 would fall due at such a date. "Oh, I hope you haven't been borrowing money!" she cried. "No; there is some mistake," I replied. The card was addressed to a Mr. Haines, and the carrier, hastily glancing at the name, had left it at the wrong place. "I 'speck dey got mo' banks up here dan what we got down yan' whar I come fum," said Aunt Minervy Ann, laughing. She laughed so heartily that we looked at her in some astonishment. "I know you all'll b'lieve I done los' what little sense I had, but when you say bank, it allers puts me in min' er de time when me an' Marse Tumlin frailed out de Gossett boys." "Frailed out the Gossett boys?" I exclaimed. "Yasser, frailed is de word." "But what has that to do with a bank?" I inquired.