Candidates were chosen at a convention or mass-meeting of the
whites and the only figure that the blacks were able to cut in the matter
was by reason of a pretended, rather than a real, prejudice against them
which was used by the candidates (who are always white men) to further
their electioneering schemes, as will presently appear.
"Hit do beat all," Barnaby repeated, shaking his heavy head reflectively,
and making a grimace both comical and hideous. "Dat young man desput sma't
and cunnin', sho's yo' bo'n he is. He done been foolin' wid dem niggahs
a'ready."
The reader may as well be told at once that if a candidate could by any
means make the negroes support his opponent for the nomination it was the
best card he could possibly play; or, if he could not quite do this, but
make it appear that the other fellow was not unpopular in colored circles,
it served nearly the same turn.
Phyllis, when she ran crying up-stairs after the conversation with her
father, went to her room, and fell into a chair by the window. So it
chanced that she overheard the conference between Colonel Sommerton and
Barnaby, and long after it was ended she still sat there leaning on the
window-sill.
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