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The old fellow threw back his head and gave a loud “Whew!” actually removing his large spectacles in his desperation at Pulaski’s wickedness. Again there was a suppressed chuckle from his friends; so, seeing that some mystery attached to the matter, I put a question which started him.

“Well, I’ll tell you, suh,” he began. “Hit all growed out of a tunament, suh. You an’ I knows all discerning tunaments, ‘cuz we come f’om de ole county o’ Hanover, whar de raise tunaments”–(he referred to them as if they had been a species of vegetables)–“but we ‘ain’ nuver hearn de modification of a nigger ridin’ in a tunament?”

I admitted this, and, after first laying his hat carefully on the ground, he proceeded:

“Well, you know, suh, dat P’laski got de notionment in he haid dat he wuz to ride in a tunament. He got dat f’om dat ooman.” He turned and pointed a trembling finger at his uncomplaining spouse; and then slowly declared, “Lord! I wuz outdone dat day.”

I suggested that possibly he had not followed Solomon’s injunction as rigidly as Pulaski’s peculiar traits of character had demanded; but he said promptly:

“Yes, suh, I did. I whupped him faithful; but he took whuppin’ like a ole steer. Hickory didn’ ‘pear to have no ‘feck on him. He didn’ had no memory; he like a ole steer: got a thick skin an’ a short memory; he wuz what I call one o’ dese disorde’ly boys.”

He paused long enough to permit this term, taken from the police court reports, to make a lodgement, and then proceeded:

“He wuz so wuthless at home, I hired him out to ole Mis’ Twine for fo’ dollars an’ a half a mont’–an’ more’n he wuth, too!–to see ef po’ white ooman kin git any wuck out’n him. A po’ white ooman kin git wuck out a nigger ef anybody kin, an’ ‘twuz down dyah that he got had foolishness lodgicated in he haid. You see, ole Mis’ Twine warn’ so fur f’om Wash’n’n. Nigger think ef he kin git to Wash’n’n, he done got in heaven. Well, I hire him to ole Mis’ Twine, ‘cuz I think she’ll keep P’laski straight, an’ ef I don’ git but one fo’ dollars an’ a half f’om him, hit’s dat much; but ‘pear like he got to runnin’ an’ consortin’ wid some o’ dem urr free-issue niggers roun’ dyah, an’ dee larne him mo’ foolishness’n I think dee able; ‘cuz a full hawg cyarn drink no mo’.”

The old fellow launched out into diatribes against the “free issues,” who, he declared, expected to be “better than white folks, like white folks ain’ been free sense de wull begin.” He, however, shortly returned to his theme.

“Well, fust thing I knowed, one Sunday I wuz settin’ down in my house, an’ heah come P’laski all done fixed up wid a high collar on, mos’ high as ole master’s, an’ wid a better breeches on ‘n I uver wear in my life, an’ wid a creevat! an’ a cane! an’ wid a seegar! He comes in de do’ an’ hol’ he seegar in he han’, sort o’ so” (illustrating), “an’ he teck off he hat kine o’ flourishy ‘whurr,’ an’ say, ‘Good mornin’, pa an’ ma.’ He mammy–dat she–monsus pleaged wid dem manners; she ain’ know no better; but I ain’ nuver like nobody to gobble roun’ me, an’ I say, ‘Look heah, boy, don’ fool wid me; I ain’ feelin’ well to-day, an’ ef you fool wid me, when I git done wid you, you oon feel well you’self.’ Den he kine o’ let he feathers down; an’ presney he say he warn me to len’ him three dollars an’ a half. I ax him what he warn do wid it, ‘cuz I know I ain’ gwine len’ to him–jes well len’ money to a mus’-rat hole;–an’ he say he warn it for a tunament.