"Belong to some church back home?" I asked him.
"Folks do; Presbyterians," he replied.
"Like the old hymns?" I asked.
"Yes, it seems like home to sing 'em."
I didn't get to talk with him for a few minutes, for he had to stop
another truck. Then he came back.
"Folks at home, Sis and Bill and the kid, mother and father, used to
gather around the piano every Sunday evening and sing 'em. Didn't
think much of them then, but liked to sing. But they mean a lot to me
over here, especially when I'm on guard at nights on this 'Dead Man's
Curve.' Seems like they make me stronger." As I walked away I still
heard him humming "Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me."
One of the most vivid song silhouettes that I remember is that of a
great crowd of negroes singing in a Y. M. C. A. hut. There must have
been a thousand of them. I was to speak to them on "Lincoln Day." I
remember how their white teeth shone through the semidarkness of that
candle-lighted hut, and how their eyes gleamed, and how their bodies
swayed as they sang the old plantation melodies.
The first song startled me with the universality of its simple
expression. It was an adaptation of that old melody which the negroes
have sung for years, "It's the Old-Time Religion."
A boy down front led the singing. A curt "Sam, set up a tune," from
the Tuskegee colored secretary started it.
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