life and the old plantation quarters system. But now all this was
forgotten, and there were only grief and anxiety that they must leave
the place and in such a way.

Fannie went out with little hope in her heart, and a short while after
she was gone Joe decided to follow her and make an attempt to get work.

"I 'll go an' see what I kin do, anyway, Kit. 'T ain't much use, I
reckon, trying to get into a bahbah shop where they shave white folks,
because all the white folks are down on us. I 'll try one of the
coloured shops."

This was something of a condescension for Berry Hamilton's son. He had
never yet shaved a black chin or put shears to what he termed "naps,"
and he was proud of it. He thought, though, that after the training he
had received from the superior "Tonsorial Parlours" where he had been
employed, he had but to ask for a place and he would be gladly
accepted.

It is strange how all the foolish little vaunting things that a man says
in days of prosperity wax a giant crop around him in the days of his
adversity. Berry Hamilton's son found this out almost as soon as he had
applied at the first of the coloured shops for work.

"Oh, no, suh," said the proprietor, "I don't think we got anything fu'
you to do; you 're a white man's bahbah. We don't shave nothin' but
niggahs hyeah, an' we shave 'em in de light o' day an' on de groun'
flo'."

"W'y, I hyeah you say dat you could n't git a paih of sheahs thoo a