sed to have
some fun after work and us young folks would skip rope and play ring
games. Durin' week days the field hands would work till the sun was jus'
goin' down and then the overseer would holler 'all right' and that was
the signal to quit. All hands knocked off Sat'day noon.

"We didn' have no schoolin' or preachin'. Only the white folks had them,
but sometimes on Sundays we'd go up to the house and listen to the white
folks singin'.

"Iffen any of the slave hands wanted to git married, Massa Lewis would
git them up to the house after supper time, have the man and woman jine
hands and then read to them outen a book. I guess it was the Scriptures.
Then he'd tell 'em they was married but to be ready for work in the
mornin'. Massa Lewis married us 'cordin' to Gospel.

"Massa used to feed us good, too, and we had plenty clothes. Iffen we
got took sick, we had doctor treatment, too. Iffen a hand took sick in
the field with a misery, they was carried to their quarters and Massa or
Miss Mary would give them a dose of epecac and make them vomit and would
sen' for the doctor. They wouldn' fool none iffen one of us took sick,
but would clean us out and take care of us till we was well.

"There was mighty little whippin' goin' on at our place, 'cause Massa
Lewis and Miss Mary treated us good. They wasn't no overseer goin' to
whip, 'cause Massa wouldn' 'low him to. Le's see, I don' rec'lec' more
than two whippin's I see anyone git from Massa, and that has been so
long ago I don' rec'lec' what they was for.

"When the War done come 'long it sho' changed things, and we heerd this
and that, but we didn' know much what it was about. Then one day Massa
Lewis had all the wagons loaded with food and chairs and beds and other
things from the house and our quarters, and I heerd him say we was
movin' to Polk County, way over in Texas. I know it took us a long time
to git there, and when we did I never see so much woods. It sho' was
diff'rent from the plantation.

"I had to work in the fields, same as the res', and we stayed there
three years and made three crops of cotton, but not so much as on our
old place, 'cause there wasn't so much clearin'. Then one day Massa
Lewis tol' us we was free, jus' as free as he was--jus' like you take
the bridle offen a hoss and turn him loose. We jus' looked 'roun as
iffen we hadn' good sense. We didn' have nothin' nor nowhere to go, and
Massa Lewis say iffen we finish makin' de crop, he would tak