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Black gal sweet, Same like goodies w'at de w'ite folks eat; Ho my Riley! don't you take'n tell 'er name, En den ef sumpin' happen you won't ketch de blame; Hi my rinktum! better take'n hide yo' plum; Joree don't holler eve'y time he fine a wum. Den it's hi my rinktum! Don't git no udder man; En it's ho my Riley! Fetch out Miss Dilsey Ann! Ho my Riley!
For a week Aunt Dilsey was unusually crusty, and all her attempts at cookery invariably failed, plainly showing her mind to be in a disturbed state. "I don’t keer," she would say, "if the cakes is all dough and the ’sarves all froth. They’s good enough for her, any day."
"I do b'lieve we've been out hyear er hun-der-d hours," said Dumps, yawning wearily; and just then Dilsey and Chris came running towards the gate, waving their arms and crying, "Hyear dey come! hyear dey come!" and, sure enough, the great white-covered wagons came slowly down the road, and Major Waldron on Prince, his black horse, riding in advance.
In vain did Dilsey apologize, and say she thought it was a 'possum; Riar would listen to no excuse; and as soon as Dilsey reached the ground they had a rough-and-tumble fight, in which both parties got considerably worsted in the way of losing valuable hair, and of having their eyes filled with dirt and their clean dresses all muddied; but Tot was so much afraid Riar, her little nurse and maid, would get hurt that she screamed and cried, and refused to be comforted until the combatants suspended active hostilities, though they kept up quarrelling for some time, even after they had recommenced their search for 'possums.
Gilcrest, the mistress was frail of health and unassertive by nature, the black mammy's authority became almost paramount. And such was the nature of Dilsey's authority. Silas Gilcrest, Hiram's father, had bought Dilsey from a Massachusetts slave-ship when she was a child of twelve years. She was just from Africa, and could not speak a word of English.
The children were very much awed at Daddy's forebodings, and Dumps insisted on shaking hands with him, as she felt that she would probably never see him again, and they all bade him good-night, and started for the house "Miss Diddie, did you know ole Daddy wuz er trick nigger?" asked Dilsey, as they left the old man's cabin. "What's er trick nigger?" asked Dumps. "Wy, don't yer know, Miss Dumps?
"Dilsey don't know how to tree no 'possums," said Riar, contemptuously, after they had walked for some time, and anxiously looked up into every tree they passed. "Yes I kin," retorted Dilsey; "I kin tree 'em jes ez same ez er dog, ef'n dar's any 'possums fur ter tree; but I can't make 'possums, do; an' ef dey ain't no 'possums, den I can't tree 'em, dat's all."
Thenceforward, the unreasoning, self-sacrificing devotion which in former days Dilsey had lavished upon Hiram was transferred to his daughter. As time went on, and her cares and responsibilities multiplied with the advent of each new baby to her master and mistress, Mammy Dilsey, though still faithful and devoted, became more and more self-important and dictatorial.
"Rantin' 'roun' 'mong fine folks doan seem to 'gree wid you, honey," old Aunt Dilsey said one morning when she found Betsy in the parlor, her hands folded listlessly on the unheeded sewing in her lap, as she gazed dreamily before her. "You'se all onsettled sence you'se come home.
But the niggers said, ’It’s Miss Fanny,’ and next I heard ’twas all as still in the room, and marster was huggin’ and kissin’ her and cryin’ over her. Then, when I tried to get nearer and see more, they crowded me into such a little spot that I didn’t breathe again for a week." "Why didn’t you get out of the crowd then?" asked Dilsey. "How could I?" answered Rondeau.
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