to pass the time away, and that all the surroundings must be
congenial and familiar.

In the introduction to the first volume of "Uncle Remus"[i_3] occurs this
statement: "Curiously enough, I have found few negroes who will
acknowledge to a stranger that they know anything of these legends; and
yet to relate one is the surest road to their confidence and esteem."

This statement was scarcely emphatic enough. The thirty-four legends in
the first volume were comparatively easy to verify, for the reason that
they were the most popular among the negroes, and were easily
remembered. This is also true of many stories in the present volume; but
some of them appear to be known only to the negroes who have the gift of
story-telling,--a gift that is as rare among the blacks as among the
whites. There is good reason to suppose, too, that many of the negroes
born near the close of the war or since, are unfamiliar with the great
body of their own folk-lore. They have heard such legends as the "Tar
Baby" story and "The Moon in the Mill-Pond," and some others equally as
graphic; but, in the tumult and confusion incident to their changed
condition, they have had few opportunities to become acquainted with
that wonderful collection of tales which their ancestors told in the
kitchens and cabins of the Old Plantation. The older negroes are as fond
of the legends as ever, but the occasion, or the excuse, for telling
them becomes less frequent year by year.

With a fair knowledge of the negro character, and long familiarity with
the manifold peculiarities of the negro mind and temperament, the writer
has, nevertheless, found it a difficult task to verify such legends as
he had not already heard in some shape or other. But, as their
importance depended upon such verification, he has spared neither pains
nor patience to make it complete. The difficulties in the way of this
verification would undoubtedly have been fewer if the writer could have
had an opportunity to pursue his investigations in the plantation
districts of Middle Georgia; but circumstances prevented, and he has
been compelled to depend upon such opportunities as casually or
unexpectedly presented themselves.

One of these opportunities occurred in the summer of 1882, at Norcross,
a little railroad station, twenty miles northeast of Atlanta. The writer
was waiting to take the train to Atlanta, and this train, as it
fortunately happened, was delayed. At the station were a num