marster give us. We
didn't have no gardens ourselves, 'cause we wouldn't have time to work
in dem. We worked all day in de fields and den was so tired we couldn't
do nothin' more.

"My mammy doctored us when we was feelin' bad and she'd take dog-fenley,
a yaller lookin' weed, and brew tea, and it driv de chills and de fever
out of us. Sometimes she put horse mint on de pallet with us to make us
sweat and driv de fever 'way. For breakfast she'd make us sass' fras
tea, to clear our blood.

"My marstar and his two step-sons goes to de war. De marster was a big
gen'ral on de southern side. I didn't know what dey fightin' 'bout for a
long time, den I heered it 'bout freedom and I felt like it be Heaven
here on earth to git freedom, 'spite de fac' I allus had de good
marster. He sho' was good to us, but you knows dat ain't de same as
bein' free.

420124

[Illustration: Tempie Cummins]

TEMPIE CUMMINS was born at Brookeland, Texas, sometime before the
Civil War, but does not know her exact age. William Neyland owned
Tempie and her parents. She now lives alone in a small,
weather-beaten shack in the South Quarters, a section of Jasper,
Tex.

"They call me Tempie Cummins and I was born at Brookeland but I don'
know jus' the 'xact date. My father's name was Jim Starkins and my
mother's name was Charlotte Brooks and both of 'em come from Alabama. I
had jus' one brudder, Bill, and four sisters named Margaret and Hannah
and Mary and 'Liza. Life was good when I was with them and us play
round. Miss Fannie Neyland, she Mis' Phil Scarborough now, she raise me,
'cause I was give to them when I was eight year old.

"I slep' on a pallet on the floor. They give me a homespun dress onct a
year at Christmas time. When company come I had to run and slip on that
dress. At other time I wore white chillens' cast-off clothes so wore
they was ready to throw away. I had to pin them up with red horse thorns
to hide my nakedness. My dress was usually split from hem to neck and I
had to wear them till they was strings. Went barefoot summer and winter
till the feets crack open.

"I never seed my grandparents 'cause my mother she sold in Alabama when
she's 17 and they brung her to Texas and treat her rough. At mealtime
they hand me a piece of cornbread and tell me 'Run 'long.' Sometime I
git little piece of meat and biscuit, 'bout onct a month. I gathered up
scraps the white chillens lef'.

"Marster was