“I ‘members one time when dey all went off an’ lef’ me wid a old black woman call Aunt Ca’line what done de cookin’ ‘round de place some o’ de time.  When dey lef’ de house I went in de kitchen an’ asked her for a piece o’ white bread lak de white folks eat.  She haul off an’ slap me down an’ call me all kin’ o’ names dat I didn’ know what dey meant.  My nose bled an’ ruint de nice clean dress I had on.  When de Mistis come back Marse George was wid ’er.  She asked me what on earth happen to me an’ I tol’ ‘er.  Dey call Ca’line in de room an’ asked her if what I say was de truf.  She tell ’em it was, an’ dey sent ’er away.  I hear tell dat dey whup her so hard dat she couldn’ walk no mo’.

“Us never had no big fun’als or weddin’s on de place.  Didn’ have no marryin’ o’ any kin’.  Folks in dem days jus’ sorter hitched up together an’ call deyse’ves man an’ wife.  All de cullud folks was buried on what dey called Platnum Hill.  Dey didn’ have no markers nor nothin’ at de graves.  Dey was jus’ sunk in places.  My brother Frank showed me once where my mammy was buried.  Us didn’ have no preachin’, or singin’, or nothin’, neither.  Us didn’ even git to have meetin’s on Sund’y less us slip off an’ go to some other plantation.  Course, I got to go wid de white folks sometime an’ set in de back, or on de steps.  Dat was whan I was little.

“Lots o’ Niggers would slip off from one plantation to de other to see some other Niggers.  Dey would always manage to git back’ fore daybreak.  De wors’ thing I ever heard ’bout dat was once when my Uncle Alf run off to ‘jump de broom.’  Dat was what dey called goin’ to see a woman.  He didn’ come back by daylight, so dey put de Nigger hounds after him.  Dey smelled his trail down in de swamp an’ foun’ where he was hidin’.

“Now, he was one of da biggest Niggers on de place an’ a powerful fas’ worker.  But dey took an’ give him 100 lashes wid de cat o’ ninety-nine tails.  His back was somethin’ awful, but dey put him in de fiel’ to work while de blood was still a-runnin’.  He work right hard ’til dey lef’.  Den, when he got up to de end o’ de row nex’ to de swamp, he lit out ag’in.

“Dey never foun’ ‘im dat time.  Dey say he foun’ a cave an’ fix him up a room whar he could live.  At nights he would come out on de place an’ steal enough t’eat an’ cook it in his little dugout.  When de war was over an’ de slaves was freed, he come out.  When I saw him, he look lak a hairy ape, ‘thout no clothes on an’ hair growin’ all over his body.

“Dem was pretty good days back in slav’ry times.  My Marstar had a whole passal o’ Niggers on his place.  When any of ’em would git sick dey would go to de woods an’ git herbs an roots an’ make tea for ’em to drink.  Hogweed an’ May apples was de bes’ things I knowed of.  Sometimes old Mistis doctored ’em herse’f.  One time a bunch o’ us chillun was playin’ in de woods an foun’ some o’ dem May apples.  Us et a lot of ’em an’ got awful sick.  Dey dosed us up on grease an’ Samson snake root to clean us out.  An’ it sho’ done a good job.  I’se been a-usin’ dat snake root ever since.