if we brung it to
her. Durin' de last years 'fo de surrender, we didn' have much to eat
tho'; an' made out de best we could.

[HW: Religion]

"De mos' fun we had was at our meetin's. We had dem mos' ever' Sunday
an' dey lasted way into de night. De preacher I laked de bes' was name
Mathew Ewing. He was a comely nigger, black as night, an' he sho' could
read out of his han'. He neber larned no real readin' an' writin' but
he sho' knowed his Bible an' would hol' his han' out an' mek lak he was
readin' an' preach de purtiest preachin' you ever heered. De meetin's
last frum early in de mawnin' 'til late at night. When dark come, de men
folks would hang up a wash pot, bottom up'ards, in de little brush
church-house us had, so's it would catch de noise an' de oberseer
wouldn' hear us singin' an' shoutin'. Dey didn' min' us meetin' in de
day time, but dey thought iffen we stayed up ha'f de night we wouldn'
work so hard de nex' day--an' dat was de truf.

"You should'a seen some of de niggers get 'ligion. De best way was to
carry 'em to de cemetery an' let 'em stand ober a grave. Dey would start
singin' an' shoutin' 'bout sein' fire an' brimstone; den dey would sing
some mo' an' look plum sanctified.

"When us had our big meetin's, dere would allus be some darkies frum de
plantations aroun' to come. Dey would have to slip off 'cause dey
marsters was afraid dey would git hitched up wid some other black boy er
gal on de other plantation an' den dey would either have to buy er sell
a nigger 'fo you could git any work out of him.

"We neber knowed much bout de War, 'cept dat we didn' have as much to
eat er wear, an' de white men folks was all gone. Den, too, Old Miss
cried a lot of de time.

[HW: Reconstruction]

"De Yankees come 'roun' afte' de War an' tol' us we's frea an' we
shouted an' sang, an' had a big celebration fer a few days. Den we got
to wonderin' 'bout what good it did us. It didn' feel no diffrunt; we
all loved our marster an' missus an' stayed on wid 'em jes' lak nothin'
had happened. De Yankees tried to git some of de men to vote, too, but
not many did 'cause dey was scared of de Ku Kluxers. Dey would come at
night all dressed up lak ghosts an' scare us all. We didn' lak de
Yankees anyway. Dey wa'nt good to us; when dey lef' we would allus sing
dat leetle song what go lak dis:

[HW: Song]

'Old Mister Yankee, think he is so grand,
Wid his blue coat tail a draggin' on de ground!'

"I stayed o