The first long lances of light were just tipping the woods and the river when George came out and found his horse held by Billy Lee, a negro lad of about his own age, who was his body-servant and shadow.[A] Billy was a chocolate-colored youth, the son of Aunt Sukey the cook and Uncle Jasper the butler. He had but one idea and one ideal on earth, and that was “Marse George.” It was in vain that Madam Washington, the strictest of disciplinarians, might lay her commands on Billy. Until he had found out what “Marse George” wanted him to do, Billy seemed unconscious of having got any orders. Madam Washington, who could awe much older and wiser persons than Billy, had often sent for the boy, when he was regularly taken into the house, and after reasoning with him, kindly explaining to him that both “Marse George” and himself were merely boys, and under her authority, would give him a stern reproof, which Billy always received in an abstracted silence, as if he had not heard a word that was said to him. Finding that he acted throughout as if he had not heard, Madam Washington turned him over to Aunt Sukey, who, after the fashion of those days, with white boys as well as black, gave him a smart birching. Billy’s roars were like the trumpeting of an elephant; but within a week he went back to his old way of forgetting there was anybody in the world except “Marse George.” Then Madam Washington turned him over to Uncle Jasper, who “lay” that he would “meck dat little triflin’ nigger min’ missis.” A second and much more vigorous birching followed at the hands of Uncle Jasper, who triumphed over Aunt Sukey when Billy for two days actually seemed to realize that he had something else to do besides following George about and never taking his eyes off of him. Uncle Jasper’s victory was short-lived, though. Within a week Billy was as good-for-nothing as ever, except to George. Madam Washington then saw that it was not a case of discipline--that the boy was simply dominated by his devotion to George, and could neither be forced nor reasoned out of it. Therefore it was arranged that the care of the young master’s horse and everything pertaining to him should be confided to Billy, who would work all day with the utmost willingness for “Marse George.” By this means Billy was made of use. Nobody touched George’s clothes or books or belongings except Billy. He scrubbed and then dry-rubbed the floor of his young master’s room, scoured the windows, cut the wood and made the fires, attended to his horse, and when George was there personally to direct him, Billy would do whatever work he was ordered. But the instant he was left to himself he returned to idleness, or to some perfectly useless work for his young master--polishing up windows that were already bright, dry-rubbing a floor that shone like a mirror, or brushing George’s clothes which were quite spotless. His young master loved him with the strong affection that commonly existed between the masters and the body-servants in those days. Like Madam Washington, George was a natural disciplinarian, and, himself capable of great labor of mind and body, he exacted work from everybody. But Billy was an exception to this rule. It is not in the human heart to be altogether without weaknesses, and Billy was George’s weakness. When his mother would declare the boy to be the idlest servant about the place, George could not deny it; but he always left the room when there were any animadversions on his favorite, and could never be brought to acknowledge that Billy was not a much-injured boy. Serene in the consciousness that “Marse George” would stand by him, Billy troubled himself not at all about Madam Washington’s occasional cutting remarks as to his uselessness, nor his father’s and mother’s more outspoken complaints that he “warn’t no good ’scusin’ ’twas to walk arter Marse George, proud as a peacock ef he kin git a ole jacket or a p’yar o’ Marse George’s breeches fur ter go struttin’ roun’ in.” Aunt Sukey was very pious, and Uncle Jasper was a preacher, and held forth Sunday nights, in a disused corn-house on the place, to a large congregation of negroes from the neighboring places. But Billy showed no fondness whatever for these meetings, preferring to go to the Established Church with his young master every Sunday, sitting in a corner of the gallery, and going to sleep with much comfort and regularity as soon as he got there. Madam Washington always exacted of every one who went to church from her house that he or she should repeat the clergyman’s text on coming home, and Billy was no exception to the rule. On Sunday, therefore, instead of joining the gay procession of youths and young men, all handsomely mounted, who rode along the highway after church, George devoted his time on his way home to teaching Billy the text. The boy always repeated it very glibly when Madam Washington demanded it of him, and thereby won her favor, for a short time, once a week.