In the case of our particular cabin I could never understand the
necessity for this convenience, since there were at least a half-dozen
other places in the cabin that would have accommodated the cats.
There was no wooden floor in our cabin, the naked earth being used as
a floor. In the centre of the earthen floor there was a large, deep
opening covered with boards, which was used as a place in which to
store sweet potatoes during the winter. An impression of this potato-
hole is very distinctly engraved upon my memory, because I recall that
during the process of putting the potatoes in or taking them out I
would often come into possession of one or two, which I roasted and
thoroughly enjoyed. There was no cooking-stove on our plantation, and
all the cooking for the whites and slaves my mother had to do over an
open fireplace, mostly in pots and "skillets." While the poorly built
cabin caused us to suffer with cold in the winter, the heat from the
open fireplace in summer was equally trying.
The early years of my life, which were spent in the little cabin,
were not very different from those of thousands of other slaves. My
mother, of course, had little time in which to give attention to the
training of her children during the day. She snatched a few moments
for our care in the early morning before her work began, and at night
after the day's work was done.
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