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News Group: REC.ARTS.PROSE
The bird life of the tidewater of Virginia flourished unhampered. it was during the month of April, my father, Easton Bailey, spoke to me, "Charley, get the axe, the crows are about to eat us out of house and home." The crow or raven that Poe made famous in his poem "Nevermore" is a destructive fowl, not so much on account of the food he eats, but the sprouting corn, beans or peanuts he pulls up by its tiny roots and leaves the plant to wither in the sun. The crow has many traits unknown to other fowls, one is - if the mother crow should perish, the young crows would be fed by any other crow that might chance to find the nest or fly by and hear the call of the little ones.
Father and I set out to chop down the trees that contained crow nests and destroy the young. Now the woods they used for breeding purposes were scrub pines standing very thick about seventy feet high and about eighteen inches in diameter. The reason for this was evident as we walked through the thick trees which covered hundreds of acres, ridged in the earth were corn rows which had not been tilled since slavery time. We walked through the thicket and after several hours were able to find only one crow's nest hidden in a thick top pine, my father at once set to work chopping the pine down, this work is an art in itself as the pine selected was surrounded by many other pine trees. As the tree hit the ground, three crows scrambled out of the nest, papa caught two and killed them with the axe I caught the other on the thick branches of the tree, my father said, "Charley, why don't you kill that crow?" I told him I would kill him later after showing him to my brothers and sisters. This I did and then turned him loose in the yard to eat corn with the chickens. All the hens were afraid of him but the rooster would peck at him sometimes.
The crow being almost grown, I was afraid, would start flying pretty soon so I decided to clip the ends of the feathers on one of his wings. Ever so often papa would ask when I was going to kill the crow, my answer was always the same, very soon. A month or more went by, and one Sunday I looked at my crow and discovered that the feathers I had clipped off had almost grown back. I wished the crow would leave the farm before I had to kill him, so I took him upstairs and got the scissors and clipped just a little off his other wing and threw him out the window, prior to this the crow had never been airborne. He almost hit the ground before he got airborne, and as he discovered he could fly he took circle after circle around the plantation, over the tree tops, chimney tops, and for ten minutes he was riding his horse as the old saying goes. I was very happy and hoping he would take off to the wild blue yonder and never return, when right on my windowsill he pitched; words I am sure could not express the sentiments or ecstasy now passing through this bird at his moment of triumph, some of it ruffed off on me for I am sure that the height of ambition in every boy is to fly, and wonder why nature did not equip him with some means to defy the pull of gravity. My crow did not leave and continued to eat corn with the chickens, but changed his roosting place to the back of one of the mules we kept in a stable, maybe the mule's back was warm, I know of no other reason. One day, a week or so later, the crow sat on the mule's back as my father and I watered our mule and when he hooked up the plow, the crow rode on the plowbeam. I am sure my father's patience was reaching the end of its endurance, when about fifty crows as usual invaded the opposite side of the field from which we were plowing, old Jim hopped off the plow beam and struck out about a yard above the ground in the direction of the flock of crows which was about a half mile away. My father said "Whoa" and stopped his mule and watched, Jim was to that flock of crows as a ghost would be to a crowd of boys; thry flew in all directions cawing, and left the field. When they were all gone, Jim came back and perched on papa's plowbeam. My father spoke no words, but I knew for the first time olf Jim was welcome. Every working day after this Jim would follow us to the field and not a single crow could enter it without old Jim chasing him out. One day after a rain, when there was no work in the field, my mother went out to the garden to set out some sweet potato plants which she pushed into the ground with her hand, the crow followed her and began to pull them up, she got a broom and ran old Jim out of the garden. That night at supper table, she asked my father to kill the crow, for long minute all was quiet, then papa spoke "Rosa, I wish you would change your mind, that crow is worth more to us now than one of my mules." Nothing more was ever said bout killing the crow.
On Sundays when we were not in church, Jim would follow us into the woods and hunt crawfish. One day my mother asked father to move the large bureau which was set diagonal in a croner of the bedroom as she wanted to clean behind it. To their surprise behind the bureau was broken glass, a shiny rock, a spoon, two finger rings, part of a watchband, and many other items. There were many hot days and Jim had used the window to invade the bedroom and made his treasure chest in the corner behind the bureau, no one had ever caught him in the act of bringing anything in.
One Sunday as we were preparing to go to church, old Jim flew into the kitchen and pitched on the lid of a lard stand, the lid tilted and Jim fell into the soft grease, he got it on his feathers so I took him out to the woodshed and dried him off. Then we went to church, on our return we missed Jim and started a search, we found him under the house, all that was left of him was a piece of skin and a few feathers, and the ducks were fighting over this. I was very angry with my ten ducks and the next day took them over to a neighbor's house and traded them for a puppy. The small children of our family wanted to name the puppy. One wanted to call him Nick, another, Jennings, and the third wanted to call him Brown, so we named him Nickson Jennings Brown, this puppy grew to be a fine woods dog and many interesting storuies could be written about him but he is only mentioned here as a connection the past.
I left home very soon after this and got a job in Panama. I had been out of the country for nine years and on my return was drafted into the army and ordered to Europe.
It was the winter of 1945 and ice was floating around the harbor of New York, we were getting ready to board the ship "Sea Porpus" bound for Le Havre, france. The Sergeant-in-charge ordered us to wait for mail call before going aboard ship. I had a letter from my sister but it was too cold and windy on the wharf to read it so I tucked it in the breast pocket of my coveralls and in the excitement of going aboard, forgot it. Eight days later we reached Le Harve and docked alongside of one of the many sunken ships and went ashore. We marched up a trail to a large pine woods, there were small patches of snow and a light rain was falling. After a little slum gullion cooked openly in the woods, we were allowed to go out and sleep under any tree we chose or any place we could find shelter. The only shelter with a roof were a few latrines. I chose a pine tree quite away from the rest of the soldiers, as I sat there with my back to the tree I discovered the letter from my sister, I tore it open and read its contents. Dear Charley, the weather turned very cold last night and your dog, Nick, died under the house, we buried him today. I threw the letter out in front of me, lit my pipe, and watched the rain beat down on it. The ripple old Jim Crow had started and spanned fifteen years was dying with that letter, as my thoughts turned back, I thought - had there been no crow, there would have been no dog. Many people have died during that fateful period and many would not leave a ripple that would reach into the future for fifteen years.
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News Group: REC.ARTS.PROSE
