sting on them all day long, whittling them with their
Barlow knives; and chawing tobacco, and gaping and yawning and
stretching--a mighty ornery lot. They generly had on yellow straw hats
most as wide as an umbrella, but didn't wear no coats nor waistcoats;
they called one another Bill, and Buck, and Hank, and Joe, and Andy,
and talked lazy and drawly, and used considerable many cuss-words.
There was as many as one loafer leaning up against every awning-post,
and he most always had his hands in his britches pockets, except when
he fetched them out to lend a chaw of tobacco or scratch. What a body
was hearing amongst them all the time was:

"Gimme a chaw 'v tobacker, Hank."

"Cain't; I hain't got but one chaw left. Ask Bill."

Maybe Bill he gives him a chaw; maybe he lies and says he ain't got
none. Some of them kinds of loafers never has a cent in the world, nor
a chaw of tobacco of their own. They get all their chawing by
borrowing; they say to a fellow, "I wisht you'd len' me a chaw, Jack,
I jist this minute give Ben Thompson the last chaw I had"--which is a
lie pretty much every time; it don't fool nobody but a stranger; but
Jack ain't no stranger, so he says:

"_You_ give him a chaw, did you? So did your sister's cat's
grandmother. You pay me back the chaws you've awready borry'd off'n
me, Lafe Buckner, then I'll loan you one or two ton of it, and won't
charge you no back intrust, nuther."

"Well, I _did_ pay you back some of it wunst."

"Yes, you did--'bout six chaws. You borry'd store tobacker and paid
back nigger-head."

Store tobacco is flat black plug, but these fellows mostly chaws the
natural leaf twisted. When they borrow a chaw they don't generly cut
it off with a knife, but set the plug in between their teeth, and gnaw
with their teeth and tug at the plug with their hands till they get it
in two; then sometimes the one that owns the tobacco looks mournful at
it when it's handed back, and says, sarcastic:

"Here, gimme the _chaw_, and you take the _plug_."

[Illustration:"'GIMME A CHAW'"]

All the streets and lanes was just mud; they warn't nothing else _but_
mud--mud as black as tar and nigh about a foot deep in some places,
and two or three inches deep in _all_ the places. The hogs loafed and
grunted around everywheres. You'd see a muddy sow and a litter of
pigs come lazying along the street and whollop herself right down in
the way, where folks had to walk around her, and she'd stretch out a