Diddie, Dumps, and Tot

TO MY DEAR FATHER
DR. RICHARD CLARKE
OF SELMA, ALABAMA
MY HERO AND MY BEAU IDEAL OF A GENTLEMAN
I DEDICATE THIS BOOK
WITH THE LOVE OF HIS
DAUGHTER

PREFACE

In writing this little volume, I had for my primary object the idea of keepingalive many of the old stories, legends, traditions, games, hymns, andsuperstitions of the Southern slaves, which, with this generation of negroes,will pass away. There are now no more dear old “Mammies” and“Aunties” in our nurseries, no more good old “Uncles”in the workshops, to tell the children those old tales that have been told toour mothers and grandmothers for generations—the stories that kept ourfathers and grandfathers quiet at night, and induced them to go early to bedthat they might hear them the sooner.

Nor does my little book pretend to be any defence of slavery. I know notwhether it was right or wrong (there are many pros and cons on the subject);but it was the law of the land, made by statesmen from the North as well as theSouth, long before my day, or my father’s or grandfather’s day;and, born under that law a slave-holder, and the descendant of slave-holders,raised in the heart of the cotton section, surrounded by negroes from myearliest infancy, “I KNOW whereof I do speak”; and it is to tel

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