He had
indulged, it is true, in vague yearnings for freedom, but these
had been checked by hearing that liberty meant "working for
Yankees"--appalling news to an indolent soul. He was house-servant
and man-of-all-work in a family whose means had always been
limited, and whose men were in the Confederate army. His "missus"
evinced a sort of weary content when he had been scolded or
threatened into the completion of his tasks by nightfall. He then
gave her and her daughters some compensation for their trials with
him by producing his fiddle and making the warm summer evening
resonant with a kind of music which the negro only can evoke. Jeff
was an artist, and had a complacent consciousness of the fact. He
was a living instance of the truth that artists are born, not
made. No knowledge of this gifted class had ever suggested
kinship; he did not even know what the word meant, but when his
cheek rested lovingly against his violin he felt that he was made
of different clay from other "niggahs." During the day he indulged
in moods by the divine right and impulse of genius, imitating his
gifted brothers unconsciously.
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