“She’s gwineter eat it, Miss Annie,” he replied, “w’en she gits outer sight.”

“Ugh!” said my wife with a grimace, “you don’t mean she’s going to eat that great lump of clay?”

“Yas’m I does; dat’s jes’ w’at I means—­gwineter eat eve’y bit un it, an’ den come back bimeby fer mo’.”

“I should think it would make them sick,” she said.

“Dey gits use’ ter it,” said Julius.  “Howsomeber, ef dey eats too much it does make ’em sick; an’ I knows w’at I’m ertalkin’ erbout.  I doan min’ w’at dem kinder folks does,” he added, looking contemptuously after the retreating figure of the poor-white woman, “but w’eneber I sees black folks eat’n’ clay of’n dat partic’lar clay-bank, it alluz sets me ter studyin’ ‘bout po’ lonesome Ben.”

“What was the matter with Ben?” asked my wife.  “You can tell us while we’re waiting for Mabel.”

Old Julius often beguiled our leisure with stories of plantation life, some of them folk-lore stories, which we found to be in general circulation among the colored people; some of them tales of real life as Julius had seen it in the old slave days; but the most striking were, we suspected, purely imaginary, or so colored by old Julius’s fancy as to make us speculate at times upon how many original minds, which might have added to the world’s wealth of literature and art, had been buried in the ocean of slavery.

“W’en ole Mars Marrabo McSwayne owned dat place ober de branch dere, w’at Kunnel Pembe’ton owns now,” the old man began, “he useter hab a nigger man name’ Ben.  Ben wuz one er dese yer big black niggers—­he was mo’d’n six foot high an’ black ez coal.  He wuz a fiel’-han’ an’ a good wukker, but he had one little failin’—­he would take a drap er so oncet in a w’ile.  Co’se eve’ybody laks a drap now an’ den, but it ’peared ter ‘fec’ Ben mo’d’n it did yuther folks.  He didn’ hab much chance dat-a-way, but eve’y now an’ den he’d git holt er sump’n’ somewahr, an’ sho’s he did, he’d git out’n de narrer road.  Mars Marrabo kep’ on wa’nin’ ’m ‘bout it, an’ fin’lly he tol’ ’im ef he eber ketch ’im in dat shape ag’in he ’uz gwineter gib ’im fo’ty.  Ben knowed ole Mars Marrabo had a good ‘memb’ance an’ alluz done w’at he said, so he wuz monst’us keerful not ter gib ’m no ’casion fer ter use his ‘memb’ance on him.  An’ so fer mos’ a whole yeah Ben ‘nied hisse’f an’ nebber teched a drap er nuffin’.

“But it’s h’ad wuk ter larn a ole dog new tricks, er ter make him fergit de ole uns, an’ po’ Ben’s time come bimeby, jes’ lak ev’ybody e’se’s does.  Mars Marrabo sent ’im ober ter dis yer plantation one day wid a bundle er cotton-sacks fer Mars Dugal,’ an’ wiles he wuz ober yere, de ole Debbil sent a’ ‘oman w’at had cas’ her eyes on ‘im an’ knowed his weakness, fer ter temp’ po’ Ben wid some licker.  Mars Whiskey wuz right dere an’ Mars Marrabo wuz a mile erway, an’ so Ben minded Mars Whiskey an’ fergot ‘bout Mars Marrabo.  W’en he got back home he couldn’ skasely tell Mars Marrabo de message w’at Mars Dugal’ had sent back ter ’im.