But "The Merry Hearts" didn't discover Martha until long after their first visit to Grant's Town. What interested them most on that trip were the gardens and the pickaninnies. The latter, quickly perceiving that the party was well supplied with pennies, appeared in hordes as if by magic, and followed the white folks all through the colored town, not begging except with their great eyes, which looked so wistful that the girls invented all sorts of excuses for bestowing half-pennies.