rs and panthers and
coons. We have bear dawgs, fox dawg and rabbit dawg that mostly jus' go
by the name of houn' dawg. Then they have a dawg to run niggers.

"I never tried the conjure, but they would take hair and brass nails and
thimbles and needles and mix them up in a conjure bag. But I knows one
thing. They was a old gin between Wilbarger and Colorado and it was
hanted with spirits of kilt niggers. Us used to hear that old mill
hummin' when dark come and we slip up easy, but it stop, then when you
slip away it start up.

"I 'member when the stars fell. We runs and prays, 'cause we thinks it
jedgment day. It sure dumb old Debbil Hill, them stars was over his
power.

"On Sundays we put shoes on our feet and they was brass toed. They was
so hard and stiff they go 'tump, tump, tump,' when we walk. That's the
only day we got 'cept Christmas and we jus' got somethin' extry to eat.
All them women sho' knowed how to cook! I often tell my wife how glad I
was one mornin' when my missy give me a hot, butter biscuit. I goes down
and shows it to all the other boys. We didn't git them hot, butter
biscuits in them days.

"I used to dance the pigeon wing and swing my partners 'round. Was them
womenfolks knock-kneed? You sho' couldn't tell, even when you swung 'em
'round, 'cause they dresses was so long.

"I's been all 'round the mountain and up on top of it in my day. Durin'
slave time I been so cold I mos' turn white and they sot me 'fore the
fire and poultice me with sliced turnips. Come a norther and it blow
with snow and sleet and I didn't have 'nough clothes to keep me warm.

"When a nigger marry, he slick up his lowers and put on his brass-toed
shoes, then the preacher marry him out of the Bible. My pappy have a
pass to visit my mammy and if he don't have one, the paddle roller conk
him on the head. My grandma and grandpa come here in a steamboat. The
man come to Africa and say, 'Man and woman, does you want a job?' So
they gits on the boat and then he has the 'vantage.

"When I was 21 and some more, I don't know jus' how old, I was a free
man. That the day I shouted. We niggers scattered like partridges. I had
a fiddle and I'd play for the white folks wherever I went, when they has
the balls. I marries after 'while, but I don't know what year, 'cause we
never done paid no 'tention to years. My first wife died after a long
time, I think 'bout 34 year and I married another and she died this very
year. Jus' three month