Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 July 1890 — “SWOPPING WIVES. [ARTICLE]

“SWOPPING WIVES.

■A R«m»rk»M« Custom In tho Interior of North Carolina. A traveler through the wilds of ■North Carolina thus describe* his experiences at a “swopping match'' in one of the remote counties of the State: ▲ ride of aboat two hours over the mountains brought us to the scene of a “swopping” match. In the yard and under the trees there were about a -dozen horses and mules, two coons, and about ten or twenty sheep and a number of hounds. There were eight men and seven women, all clad in coarse homespun linen. Such women as wore any head-dress wore long poke or sun bonnets. One or two of the women were fairly good-looking, but the rest of them, like the men, were coarse, rawboned, and anything but handsome. We had not arrived a moment too soon to hear the preliminaries of the business for which the appointment had been made. Bill Suggs, the proprietor of the house, was the first to approach the subject, which he did in the following language: “Weuns hev met here to swop an’ trade. I hev been tryin’ to swap wimmin with Jake Long here fur some time. I hev got my woman here, an 1 so hez Jake, an’ I’m ready to trade. What d’ye say, JakeP” Jake, a big, gawky young fellow, said: “There’s my gal, Bill,” pointing to rawboned, dark-eyed woman of 45. ‘ ‘She ken dig more ’seng, chop more wood, and kin beat anythin’ shootin’ on the creek. I’ll take yer woman an’ yer ole mare to boot.” Suggs had led his wife—or woman—up to that of Long. The women seemed to be almost utterly indifferent, or if they did object they spoke no word or made no sign. “That’s mor’n I’ll give, Long; that woman,” pointing to his wile “is* a good cook and kin hoe as much corn as eny woman in the uaborhood, an’ she’s val’ble. I’le trade even up and no boot.” There was considerable talk and a dozen propositions, which finally ended in Suggs “swopping” for Long’s woman and giving a red cow with one horn and two sheep as a premium or “boot.” This settled, two others—a middleaged, red-whiskered fellow with a rather good-looking young woman for a wife, traded with a younger man for a woman who was old enough to be his mother, but who looked as though she could perform most any kind of manual labor. The young man turned over his property and took charge of the one he had bartered for. .He seemed somewhat pleased by bin bargain, and his new purchase certainly did not seem to have been sorry for the exchange. The name of the young fellow was Blodgett There were six bargains or .trades successfully .closed during the day—one of which was between an old fellow of 60 or more and a much younger man, in which they, had merely exchanged for the woman the other man had in possession at ,a former time. They both seemed pleased :to get their women back. There was no boot or premium in the trade. Having no other place to stop for the night I went home with Blodgett, who seemed a mild sort of a fellow, easy, good-natured but ignorant. His new spouse was a woman of 22 or 23, somewhat good-looking, as good-looks went in that section. Her face was more intelligent than any I had seen, and she seemed pleased over the result of the trade. With all my powers of penetration I failed to find any repugnance or horror over the affair 1 , either with her or any one connected with it. They seemed to take it as a legitimate transaction and I could only account for it on the ground of utter ignorance of the law, either statutory or moral. The custom of trading wives among these people seemed as old and wellfounded as is the every-day and everywhere habit of trading in ordinary articles of barter.