1. Lyrics to the call-and-response slave work song “Shuck That Corn Before You Eat.”

2. One-eighth black; a term used at the time to describe a light-complexioned black.

3. First Families of Virginia.

4. Fortune; funds.

5. During the time that Hopkins was writing the story, she was in fierce disagreement with the black leader Booker T. Washington, whom she distrusted for his conciliatory relations with whites. She may have changed the name of the historical Madison Washington to Madison Monroe in order to excise the name of Washington, though ultimately her reason for making the name change is unclear.

6. Short-tailed wildcat, such as a lynx.

7. An echo of the 1775 revolutionary declaration attributed to the Virginia patriot Patrick Henry (1736–1799).