ZEK’L PRATT’S HARRYCANE
’Twould make an ox curl up and die
To hear how Zek’l Pratt would lie.
—Why, that blamed Zeke
Could hardly speak
Without he’d let some whopper fly.
Come jest as natchrul to him, too,
—’Twas innocent, and them as knew
Zeke’s failin’s never took great stock,
But jest stood back and let him talk;
Jest let him thrash his peck o’ chart,
Then got behind his back to laugh.
Why, Zeke would—jest hold on and see
What that old liar told to me.
Last fall while gettin’ in his grain
He said he see’d a harrycane
—A cikerloon, as they say West—
A-boomin’ on like all possesst.
And Zekel see’d to his consarn
’Twas bound plumb straight for his new barn.
“’Twas crickitul,” says he. “Thinks I,
I’ve got to be almighty spry.
If somethin’ ain’t done kind o’ brash
That barn will get chawed inter hash.
It don’t take long for me to think,
And what I done was quicker’n wink.
Jest gafflin’ up a couple boards
I sashayed out deerectly to’ards
That howlin’, growlin’ harrycane
That come a-raisin’ merry Cain.
“When I’d got out as fur’s my wind
Would take me, I slacked up and shinned
That cob-piled monnyment o’ stones
Between my land and Bial Jones.
Though I don’t scare
I’ll own, I swear,
It sent a twitter through my bones
When I got where that I could see
The thing ’twas goin’ to tackle me.
’Twas big and round and blacker’n Zip,
—And powerful? My sakes, ’twould grip
A tree or bam or line o’ fence
And make ’em look like thirty cents.
While all the time it growled and chawed
And spit the slivers forty rod.
—As things looked then a bob-tailed darn
Was too much price for Pratt’s new barn.
“But let me tell ye this, my son,
Me’n them boards warn’t there for fun.
I held one underneath each arm;
The ends stuck out
In front about
Ten feet. I held ’em aidge to aidge
And made a fust-class kind of wedge.
I grit my teeth. There was a calm
For jest a minit, kind o’ ’s ef
That harrycane had stopped itse’f
And snickered, snorted, laughed, and yelled,
Then stopped again and sort o’ held
Its breath; then swellin’ up its breast
Swooped down to knock me galley-west.
“It grabbed them boards and then ’twas fight!
But scare me? Not a gol-durned mite!
It pulled and tugged and yanked and hauled
And tooted, howled, and squealed and squalled;
It picked up sculch and dirt, and threw,
And followed with a tree or two;
It hit me with a rotten squash,
And give me fits with Marm Jones’ wash.
But ’twarn’t no use, suh, Zek’l Pratt
Ain’t built to scare at things like that.
I jest let into that air tyke
And punched its innards reg’lar-like
With them ’ere boards, and honest true,
I split her square and plumb in two.
One half went yowlin’ by to right
And one to left—and out’ of sight.
While Zek’l Pratt was still on deck
With Marm Jones’ night-gown round his neck.”