“No ma’am, I wasn’t born in Arkansas.  I was born in Georgia.  I sent there and got my license to show my age.  I was twenty years old when I married.

“George Jones was my old master.  But, Lawd, them folks is all dead now.  Old master and old missis, yes ma’am, all of ’em dead.

“Fight ’round us?  No, they didn’t fight there but they come through there.  Yes ma’am, they come through there.  Oh, chile, they got horses and mules.

“Used to give us the Confederate money.  Wasn’t no good though.  They got the silver and gold.  Confederate money was white on one side and green on the other.  Yes’m, they was Yankees.

“Oh, yes’am, old master was good to us.  He didn’t never marry.  My grandmother was the cook.

“My mother was born in Virginia.  I heerd her talk of the Nat Turner Rebellion but I never did see him.

“Our folks stayed right on after freedom and hired by the month.  And hired us children for our victuals and clothes.

“I stayed there till I was married.  Then I come to Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Had nine children and all dead but two.

“Me?  Oh, I done washin’ and ironin’ mostly, cooked and most anything I could get to do.  I’m all worked down now though.

“We emigrated from Georgia to Mississippi.  All my children born there.

“I ’member the soldiers had guns and we was scared of ’em.  We looked for ’em to come up the road but they come out of the woods and was around us right now.  They didn’t mind creeks or nothin’, ridin’ horseback or walkin’.  I know they said, ‘We ain’t gwine hurt you.’

“Old master’s mother and father was named Sally and Billy.  ’Member ’em?  ’Co’se I do—­many times as I waited on that table.  But they all dead ‘fore I even thought about bein’ grown.

“Oh, yes ma’am, we had a plenty to eat.  That’s the reason I misses it now.

“I went to school one year but I had to work so hard I done forgot nearly everything I learned.  I can read a little but my eyes ain’t no good.

“Dem Ku Klux—­you dassent be out after dark.  You better not be out on the street after dark.  But Sunday night they didn’t bother you when you went to church.

“I was raised up with two white girls and their mother didn’t ’low us to get out of the yard.

“I used to pick peas and cotton.  Yes ma’am, that was when we was with the same old man, George Jones.  I used to huddle (herd) cows for miles and miles.  My mother was the milk woman.  I don’t know how many she milked but she milked a heap of ’em.

“Used to climb up in trees and tear our clothes.  Then they’d whip us.  Old master say, ‘Don’t you tell me no lie.’  Then old Miss Sally would get a stick and make out she gwine kill us, but she wouldn’t touch us a lick.

“Younger generation?  Now you done asked me too soon.  I set here and look at ’em.  Sometimes I don’t know what gwine come of ’em.  When we was young we didn’t do nothin’ like they doin’ now.  Why we dassent raise our dresses.  If we see a man comin’ we pull down our skirts.  Yes, Lawd.”