“A forged bill of sale, all ready, which I gives to Till, and he puts his nags in-a pair what can take the road from anything about-and the way he drives, just to make the nigger forget where he’s going, and think he’s riding in a balloon on his way to glory.  Just afore Til. gets to the boat, ye see, he takes the headchains off-so the delicate-hearted passengers won’t let their feelins get kind-a out o’ sorts.  Once in a while the nigger makes a blubber about being free, to the captain,—­and if he’s fool enough t’ take any notice on’t then there’s a fuss; but that’s just the easiest thing to get over, if ye only know the squire, and how to manage him.  You must know the pintes of the law, and ye must do the clean thing in the ‘tin’ way with the squire; and then ye can cut ’em right off by makin’ t’other pintes make ’em mean nothing.  Once in a while t’ll do to make the nigger a criminal, and then there’s no trouble in’t, ‘cos ye can ollers git the swearin’ done cheap.  Old Captain Smith used to get himself into a scrape a heap o’ times by listenin’ to free nigger stories, till he gets sick and would kick every nigger what came to him about being free.  He takes the law in his hands with a nigger o’ mine once, and hands him over to a city policeman as soon as we lands.  He didn’t understand the thing, ye see, and I jist puts an Ten dollars into the pole’s hand, what he takes the hint at.  ’Now, ye’ll take good care on the feller,” says I, giving him a wink.  “And he just keeps broad off from the old hard-faced mayor, and runs up to the squire’s, who commits him on his own committimus.  Then I gets Bob Blanker to stand ‘all right’ with the squire, who’s got all the say in the matter, when it’s done so.  I cuts like lightenin’ on to far down Mississippi, and there gets Sam Slang, just one o’ the keenest fellers in that line, about.  Sam’s a hotel-keeper all at once, and I gets him up afore the Mississippi squire; and as Sam don’t think much about the swearin’ and the squire ain’t particular, so he makes a five:  we proves straight off how the crittur’s Sam’s runaway, gets the dockerment and sends to Bob Blanker, who puts a blinder on the squire’s eye, and gets an order to the old jailor, who must give him up, when he sees the squire’s order.  You see, it’s larnin’ the secret, that’s the thing, and the difference between common law and nigger law; and the way to work the matter so the squire will have it all in his own fingers, and don’t let the old judge get a pick.  Squire makes it square, hands the nigger over to Bob, Bob puts fifty cuts on his hide, makes him as clever as a kitten, and ships him off down south afore he has time to wink.  Then, ye sees, I goes back as independent as a senator from Arkansas, and sues Captain Smith for damages in detainin’ the property, and I makes him pay a right round sum, what larns him never to try that agin.”