most profitable plantation in Jasper County. All the old people said that if her father, Judge Walthall, could have returned to life, he would have been proud of the success of his daughter, which was in that day and still remains the most remarkable event in the annals of Jasper County.
The main dependence of Mrs. Rivers, even after her boys grew up, was a negro man named Shadrach. He grew old with his mistress and imbibed many of her matter-of-fact ways and methods. At first he was known as Uncle Shed, but the negro pronunciation lengthened this to Shade, and he was known by everybody in the counties round as Uncle Shade.
Uncle Shade knew how important his services were to his mistress and what store she set by his energy and faithfulness, and the knowledge made him more independent in his attitude and temper than the average negro. The truth is, he was not an average negro, and he knew it. He knew it by the fact that the rest of the negroes obeyed his most exacting orders with as much alacrity as they obeyed those of white men, and were quite as anxious to please him. He
