The  bystanders  asked  him  why  he  didn't  wear  one.
"  Why,"  he  answered,  "  I've  got  a  dozen  biled  shirts  at
home,  but  I  hadn't  time  to  put  one  on."

Of  the  slaves  owned  in  Westborough,  none,  if  living,  seem
to  have  made  their  home  here,  after  the  beginning  of  the
century.  There  were  two  Southern  slaves  who  for  a  num-
ber of  years  lived  on  the  Blake  place,  now  in  the  possession
of  Miss  Fanny  Smith.  They  had  been  owned  in  the  South
by  a  brother  of  Eli  Whitney,  the  inventor.  When  he  sold
his  plantation,  he  sent  them  to  his  sister,  Mrs.  Blake,  prob-
ably first  giving  them  their  freedom.  They  were  called  "Old
Nanny  "  and  "  Paton  Shipworth."


SOCIAL    CUSTOMS.
193


Bathaba  was  owned  by  Mr.  John  Corbett,  of  Mendon ;
but  in  times  of  extra  work  she  was  often  lent  to  his  brother,
Mr.  Elijah  Corbett,  then  living  in  Westborough,  where  the
J.  A.  Parker  cider-mill  now  is.  She  is  still  remembered  here
as  "  Old  Bath."

Mr.  Parkman's  boy  Maro,  we  have  already  seen,  died  soon
after  coming  here

Mr.  Parkman,  in  his  journal,  speaks,  in  1726,  of  "  Mr.  O.
Ward's  Rocket  and  horse "  coming  over  to  help  his  hired
man  Robert  weed  the  corn.  Mr.  Oliver  Ward  lived  on  West
Main  street,  on  the  James  McTaggart  place.
