10 NOBTH CAROLINA 



saw it only from the main street on a muddy 

 afternoon, and was likely to do it but foul- 

 weather justice. Even its merits as a neces- 

 sary lodging station were lightly appreciated, 

 till on my return I made my exit from the 

 mountains on the other side of them, and 

 put up for the night in another village, and 

 especially at another hotel. Compared with 

 that, Walhalla was, in deed as in name, a 

 kind of heavenly place. Is it well, or not, 

 that what is worse makes us half contented 

 with what is simply bad ? I was more than 

 ready, at any rate, when a Walhalla boy 

 brought me word the next morning, " Your 

 carriage has done come." ^ 



The sky was fair, and shortly after seven 



1 " Do come " and " did come " are proper enough ; 

 why not ' ' done come " ? And in point of fact, this com- 

 mon Southern use of " done " with the past participle has 

 its warrant in at least two lines of Chaucer : in The 

 Knightes Tale (1055) : — 



" Hath Theseus doon wrought in noble wise," 

 and in The Tale of the Man of Lawe (171) : — 



" Thise marchants ban doon fraught her shippes newe." 

 If a ship is " done loaded," why may not a carriage have 

 " done come " ? Idiom is long-lived. As Lowell said 

 of the Yankee vernacular, so doubtless may we say of 

 the Carolinian, that it " often has antiquity and very 

 respectable literary authority on its side." 



