Among the attractions of the evening it was difficult to choose.  There was a lawn-party advertised at Battery Point (where a fine hotel has since been built) and we walked up to that round knob after dark.  It is a hill with a grove, which commands a charming view, and was fortified during the war.  We found it illuminated with Chinese lanterns; and little tables set about under the trees, laden with cake and ice-cream, offered a chance to the stranger to contribute money for the benefit of the Presbyterian Church.  I am afraid it was not a profitable entertainment, for the men seemed to have business elsewhere, but the ladies about the tables made charming groups in the lighted grove.  Man is a stupid animal at best, or he would not make it so difficult for the womenkind to scrape together a little money for charitable purposes.  But probably the women like this method of raising money better than the direct one.

The evening gayety of the town was well distributed.  When we descended to the Court-House Square, a great crowd had collected, black, white, and yellow, about a high platform, upon which four glaring torches lighted up the novel scene, and those who could read might decipher this legend on a standard at the back of the stage: 

           Happyjohn. 
      One of the slaves of wade Hampton. 
          Come and see him!

Happy John, who occupied the platform with Mary, a “bright” yellow girl, took the comical view of his race, which was greatly enjoyed by his audience.  His face was blackened to the proper color of the stage-darky, and he wore a flaming suit of calico, the trousers and coat striped longitudinally according to Punch’s idea of “Uncle Sam,” the coat a swallow-tail bound and faced with scarlet, and a bell-crowned white hat.  This conceit of a colored Yankee seemed to tickle all colors in the audience amazingly.  Mary, the “bright” woman (this is the universal designation of the light mulatto), was a pleasing but bold yellow girl, who wore a natty cap trimmed with scarlet, and had the assured or pert manner of all traveling sawdust performers.

“Oh, yes,” exclaimed a bright woman in the crowd, “Happy John was sure enough one of Wade Hampton’s slaves, and he’s right good looking when he’s not blackened up.”

Happy John sustained the promise of his name by spontaneous gayety and enjoyment of the fleeting moment; he had a glib tongue and a ready, rude wit, and talked to his audience with a delicious mingling of impudence, deference, and patronage, commenting upon them generally, administering advice and correction in a strain of humor that kept his hearers in a pleased excitement.  He handled the banjo and the guitar alternately, and talked all the time when he was not singing.  Mary (how much harder featured and brazen a woman is in such a position than a man of the same caliber!) sang, in an untutored treble, songs of sentiment, often risque, in solo and in company with John, but with a cold, indifferent air, in contrast to the rollicking enjoyment of her comrade.