When the little girls reached Aunt Nancy’s cabin, two big kettles of molasses were on the fire, and, to judge by the sputtering and simmering, the candy was getting on famously.  Uncle Sambo had brought his fiddle in, and some of the children were patting and singing and dancing, while others were shelling goobers and picking out scaly-barks to put in the candy; and when the pulling began, if you could have heard the laughing and joking you would have thought there was no fun like a candy stew.

As a special favor, the little girls were allowed to stay up and see Candace married; and very nice she looked when her mistress had finished dressing her:  her white Swiss was fresh and new, and the wreath and veil were very becoming, and she made quite a pretty bride; at least Jim thought so, and that was enough for her.

Jim was dressed in a new pepper-and-salt suit, his Christmas present from his master, and the bridesmaids and groomsmen all looked very fine.  Mamma arranged the bridal party in the back parlor, and the folding-doors were thrown open.  Both rooms and the large hall were full of negroes.  The ceremony was performed by old Uncle Daniel, the negro preacher on the place, and the children’s father gave the bride away.

After the marriage, the darkies adjourned to the barn to dance.  Diddie and Dumps begged to be allowed to go and look at them “just a little while,” but it was their bedtime, and Mammy marched hem off to the nursery.

About twelve o’clock supper was announced, and old and young repaired to the laundry.  The room was festooned with wreaths of holly and cedar, and very bright and pretty and tempting the table looked, spread out with meats and breads, and pickles and preserves, and home-made wine, and cakes of all sorts and sizes, iced and plain; large bowls of custard and jelly; and candies, and fruits and nuts.

In the centre of the table was a pyramid, beginning with a large cake at the bottom and ending with a “snowball” on top.

At the head of the table was the bride-cake, containing the “ring” and the “dime;” it was handsomely iced, and had a candy Cupid perched over it, on a holly bough which was stuck in a hole in the middle of the cake.  It was to be cut after a while by each of the bridesmaids and groomsmen in turns; and whoever should cut the slice containing the ring would be the next one to get married; but whoever should get the dime was to be an old maid or an old bachelor.

The supper was enjoyed hugely, particularly a big bowl of eggnog, which so enlivened them all that the dancing was entered into with renewed vigor, and kept up till the gray tints in the east warned them that another day had dawned, and that Christmas was over.

But you may be sure that in all Christendom it had been welcomed in and ushered out by no merrier, lighter hearts than those of the happy, contented folks on the old plantation.

CHAPTER III