Naturally much of the conversation of the white people
turned upon the subject of freedom and the war, and I absorbed a good
deal of it. I remember that at one time I saw two of my young
mistresses and some lady visitors eating ginger-cakes, in the yard.
At that time those cakes seemed to me to be absolutely the most
tempting and desirable things that I had ever seen; and I then and
there resolved that, if I ever got free, the height of my ambition
would be reached if I could get to the point where I could secure and
eat ginger-cakes in the way that I saw those ladies doing.
Of course as the war was prolonged the white people, in many
cases, often found it difficult to secure food for themselves. I
think the slaves felt the deprivation less than the whites, because
the usual diet for slaves was corn bread and pork, and these could be
raised on the plantation; but coffee, tea, sugar, and other articles
which the whites had been accustomed to use could not be raised on the
plantation, and the conditions brought about by the war frequently
made it impossible to secure these things. The whites were often in
great straits. Parched corn was used for coffee, and a kind of black
molasses was used instead of sugar. Many times nothing was used to
sweeten the so-called tea and coffee.
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