The Conjure Woman

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Conjure Woman, The

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Title: The Conjure Woman
Author: Charles W. Chesnutt
Release Date: March 22, 2004 [EBook #11666]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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THE CONJURE WOMAN
BY

CHARLES W. CHESNUTT
First published in 1899 by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

CONTENTS
THE GOOPHERED GRAPEVINE PO' SANDY MARS JEEMS'S
NIGHTMARE THE CONJURER'S REVENGE SIS' BECKY'S
PICKANINNY THE GRAY WOLF'S HA'NT HOT-FOOT
HANNIBAL
"The Conjurer's Revenge" is reprinted from The Overland Monthly by
permission of the publishers.
APPENDIX
Uncollected Uncle Julius Stories Dave's Neckliss (1889) A Deep
Sleeper (1893) Lonesome Ben (1900) Essay Superstitions and
Folk-Lore of the South (1901)

THE CONJURE WOMAN
* * * * *
THE GOOPHERED GRAPEVINE
Some years ago my wife was in poor health, and our family doctor, in
whose skill and honesty I had implicit confidence, advised a change of
climate. I shared, from an unprofessional standpoint, his opinion that
the raw winds, the chill rains, and the violent changes of temperature
that characterized the winters in the region of the Great Lakes tended to
aggravate my wife's difficulty, and would undoubtedly shorten her life
if she remained exposed to them. The doctor's advice was that we seek,
not a temporary place of sojourn, but a permanent residence, in a
warmer and more equable climate. I was engaged at the time in
grape-culture in northern Ohio, and, as I liked the business and had

given it much study, I decided to look for some other locality suitable
for carrying it on. I thought of sunny France, of sleepy Spain, of
Southern California, but there were objections to them all. It occurred
to me that I might find what I wanted in some one of our own Southern
States. It was a sufficient time after the war for conditions in the South
to have become somewhat settled; and I was enough of a pioneer to
start a new industry, if I could not find a place where grape-culture had
been tried. I wrote to a cousin who had gone into the turpentine
business in central North Carolina. He assured me, in response to my
inquiries, that no better place could be found in the South than the State
and neighborhood where he lived; the climate was perfect for health,
and, in conjunction with the soil, ideal for grape-culture; labor was
cheap, and land could be bought for a mere song. He gave us a cordial
invitation to come and visit him while we looked into the matter. We
accepted the invitation, and after several days of leisurely travel, the
last hundred miles of which were up a river on a sidewheel steamer, we
reached our destination, a quaint old town, which I shall call Patesville,
because, for one reason, that is not its name. There was a red brick
market-house in the public square, with a tall tower, which held a
four-faced clock that struck the hours, and from which there pealed out
a curfew at nine o'clock. There were two or three hotels, a court-house,
a jail, stores, offices, and all the appurtenances of a county seat and a
commercial emporium; for while Patesville numbered only four or five
thousand inhabitants, of all shades of complexion, it was one of the
principal towns in North Carolina, and had a considerable trade in
cotton and naval stores. This business activity was not immediately
apparent to my unaccustomed eyes. Indeed, when I first saw the town,
there brooded over it a calm that seemed almost sabbatic in its
restfulness, though I learned later on that underneath its somnolent
exterior the deeper currents of life--love and hatred, joy and despair,
ambition and avarice, faith and friendship--flowed not less steadily than
in livelier latitudes.
We found the weather delightful at that season, the end of summer, and
were hospitably entertained. Our host was a man of means and
evidently regarded our visit as a pleasure, and we were therefore
correspondingly at our ease, and in a position to act with the coolness

of judgment desirable in making so radical a change in our lives. My
cousin placed a horse and buggy at our disposal, and himself acted as
our guide until I became somewhat familiar with the country.
I found that grape-culture, while it had never been carried