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	Oklahoma Writers‘ Project	~‚2.. 66




did~ntt take no presents, but de patrollers was low white trashi We all knowed dat if a patroller jest rode right by and didn‘t

say nothing dat h~ was d~oing his honest job, but iffen he stopped his hoss and. talked to a nigger he was after some kind. of .•

	Dat other black boy was hoeing cotton way in de back of de field and. de patroller rid. up and. down de big road, saying nothing to nobody.

	De next day another white man was on de job ‚ ~ and long in de even~ ing a man come by and axed. de niggers about de fishing and. himtingl Dat black boy seen he was de same man what was riding de day befo1 and he lcnowed. it was a underground trick. But he didn‘t see all de trick, bless God!

	We found out aft erwards dat he told. his mamy about it • She worked at de big house and she stole something for him to give dat 1OW white trash I reckon, tcause de next day he played sick along in de evening and. de black overlooker — he was my uncle — sent him back to de quarters.

	He never did git there, but when dey started. de hunt dey found him about a mile away in de woods wid his head shot off, and old Master sold. his inan~ny to a trader right away. He never whipped hi s grown niggers.

	~	Dat w•s de way i t worked. Dey was all kinds of white folks j est like dey is now. One man in Sesesh clothes would shoot you if you tried. to run away. Maybe another Sesesh would help si.ip you out to the un~Gr~round. and. say “God bless you poor black devil~, and. some of dem dat was poor would. help you if you could bring tein s~umpin you stole, isk a silver dish or spoons or a couple big hams. I could.n~t blaxue them poor white folks, wid. the men

in the War and t he women and children hongry. The niggers cUdXLt t belong to ‚~„ ~ . tb~em nohow, and they had. t o live somehow. But now : ~j then they was a devil

	on earth, walking in the sight of‘ God. arid. spreading iniquity before him. He ;~ was de lo~—&own Sesesh dat would take what a poor runaway nigger had. to give