babies' necks when dey teethin', to make dem
have easy time. She used a dry frog or piece nutmeg, too.

"Mammy allus tell me to keep from bein' cunjure, I sing:

"'Keep 'way from me, hoodoo and witch,
Lend my path from de porehouse gate;
I pines for golden harps and sich,
Lawd, I'll jes' set down and wait.
Old Satan am a liar and cunjurer, too--
If you don't watch out, he'll cunjure you.'

"Dem cunjuremen sho' bad. Dey make you have pneumony and boils and bad
luck. I carries me a jack all de time. It em de charm wrop in red
flannel. Don't know what am in it. A bossman, he fix it for me.

"I sho' can find water for de well. I got a li'l tree limb what am like
a V. I driv de nail in de end of each branch and in de crotch. I takes
hold of each branch and iffen I walks over water in de ground, dat limb
gwine turn over in my hand till it points to de ground. Iffen money am
buried, you can find it de same way.

"Iffen you fills a shoe with salt and burns it, dat call luck to you. I
wears a dime on a string round de neck and one round de ankle. Dat to
keep any conjureman from sottin' de trick on ma. Dat dime be bright
iffen my friends am true. It sho' gwine git dark iffen dey does me
wrong.

"For to make a jack dat am sho' good, git snakeroot and sassafras and a
li'l lodestone and brimstone and asafoetida and resin and bluestone and
gum arabic and a pod or two red pepper. Put dis in de red flannel bag,
at midnight on de dark of de moon, and it sho' do de work.

"I knowed a ghost house, I sho' did. Everybody knowed it, a red brick
house in Waco, on Thirteenth and Washington St. Dey calls it de Bell
house. It sho' a fine, big house, but folks couldn't use it. De white
folks what owns it, dey gits one nigger and 'nother to stay round and
look after things. De white folks wants me to stay dere. I goes. Every
Friday night dere am a rustlin' sound, like murmur of treetops, all
through dat house. De shutters rattles--only dere ain't no shutters on
dem windows. Jes' plain as anything, I hears a chair, rockin', rockin'.
Footsteps, soft as de breath, you could hear dem plain. But I stays and
hunts and can't find nobody nor nothin' none of dem Friday nights.

"Den come de Friday night on de las' quarter de moon. Long 'bout
midnight, something lift me out de cot. I heared a li'l child sobbin',
and dat rocker git started, and de shutters dey rattle softlike, and dat
rustlin', mournin' sound all through dat house. I take