In the black people of the town the strong influence of slavery was
still operative, and with one accord they turned away from one of their
own kind upon whom had been set the ban of the white people's
displeasure. If they had sympathy, they dared not show it. Their own
interests, the safety of their own positions and firesides, demanded
that they stand aloof from the criminal. Not then, not now, nor has it
ever been true, although it has been claimed, that negroes either
harbour or sympathise with the criminal of their kind. They did not dare
to do it before the sixties. They do not dare to do it now. They have
brought down as a heritage from the days of their bondage both fear and
disloyalty. So Berry was unbefriended while the storm raged around him.
The cell where they had placed him was kind to him, and he could not
hear the envious and sneering comments that went on about him. This was
kind, for the tongues of his enemies were not.

"Tell me, tell me," said one, "you need n't tell me dat a bird kin fly
so high dat he don' have to come down some time. An' w'en he do light,
honey, my Lawd, how he flop!"

"Mistah Rich Niggah," said another. "He wanted to dress his wife an'
chillen lak white folks, did he? Well, he foun' out, he foun' out. By de
time de jedge git thoo wid him he won't be hol'in' his haid so high."

"Wy, dat gal o' his'n," broke in old Isaac Brown indignantly, "w'y, she
would n' speak to my gal, Minty, when she met huh on de street. I reckon
she come down off'n huh high hoss now."

The fact of the matter was that Minty Brown was no better than she
should have been, and did not deserve to be spoken to. But none of this
was taken into account either by the speaker or the hearers. The man was