“Hummuch you ax fuh him?”
“Five cents a pound.”
“Gimme ten cent’ wut.”
The flour and the salt would come within the encircling arms, fifteen cents be counted out, and all transactions suspended until the two cents change was returned to her.
“Wuh kinduh tubackuh you got?”
Two or three samples of plug tobacco, the only sort in common use, would be offered for inspection, and perhaps the advice of a colored sister asked before deciding upon a selection.
By the time the dollar was expended, the clerk had walked a hundred yards or so, had used up lots of brown paper and paper twine and had had his patience sorely tried, but he charged liberally for his time and trouble, and the poor darkey got far less than she paid for.
In the funny columns of Northern periodicals, and in the immemorial minstrel jokes and songs, the negro not only steals chickens, but eats them. The low-country negroes, however, while all of them keep chickens, seldom, if ever, eat them, the coarsest fat bacon being far more to the negro’s taste than the juiciest broiler. Then, too, eggs and chickens are currency in most negro communities and can always be converted into cash at the country store or at the back door of the nearest white family.
The country negroes on the coast still speak of “fo’punce” chickens and “seb’npunce” chickens, meaning the sizes that were sold for four pence and seven pence respectively before the Revolution, when British coinage was the currency of the country.
“Gal, ketch da’ seb’npunce chickin en’ dem t’ree fo’punce chickin’ en tek dese’yuh six aig’, en’ tek’um to de Cross Road’, en’ buy de six aig’ wut’uh tubackuh en’ de seb’npunce chickin wut’uh flour, en’ one de fo’punce chickin’ wut’uh sugar, en’ norruh one uh de fo’punce chickin’ wut’uh side meat, en’ de todduh fo’punce chickin wut’uh muhlassis, en’ tek dish’yuh bucket fuh fetch’um een, en’ don’ ’low de buckruh fuh cheat you, en’ tie de aig’ een yo’ hengkitchuh, en’ tie all fo’ de fowl’ foot so dem cyan’ git’way, en’ hol’um een yo’ ap’un, en’ don’ stay duh sto’ too long, en’ w’en you tek de chickin’ out de ap’un, hol’um by ’e two foot fuh mek ’e head heng down, so ’e wing’ kin ’pread out fuh mek’um look big so de buckruh t’ink suh de fo’punce chickin’ duh seb’npunce chickin’, en’ w’en de buckruh po’ out de muhlassis, mek’um fuh po’rum ’tell de muhlassis stop run out de medjuh, ’cause ef you ent watch’um ’e sho’ fuh lef’ some een de quawt cup, en’ w’en you come back duh night’time, walk middle’uh de paat’, ’cause ’e rain’ teday en’ toadfrog does jump ’bout w’en de ground en’ t’ing wet, en’ moccasin does folluhr’um fuh ketch’um, en’ uh yent wan’ you fuh git ’structed by no snake duh paat’.”