"About a hundred years," he replied, "and I reckon they've had no paint nor fixin' since they was built, 'cept they have to give some of 'em new shingles now and then or they'd all fall to pieces like the old barns back yonder."
Percy examined the soil in several places on the Jones farm and on other farms in the neighborhood. They lunched on crackers and canned beans at a country store and made a more extended drive in the afternoon.
"It is a fine soil," Percy said to the driver, as they started for Leonardtown. "It contains enough sand for easy tillage and quick drainage, and enough clay to hold anything that might be applied to it."
"That's right," said the driver. "Where they put plenty of manure and fertilizer they raise tobacco three foot high and fifteen hundred pounds to the acre, but where they run the tobacco rows beyond the manured land so's to be sure and not lose any manure, why the stuff won't grow six inches high and it just turns yellow and seems to dry up, no matter if it rains every day. Say, Mister, would you mind telling me if you're a preacher?"
"Oh, no," replied Percy, "—I am not a preacher, any more than every
Christian must be loyal to the name."
"Well, anyway, I've learned a lesson I'll try to remember. I never thought before about how it might hurt other people when I swear. I don't mean nothing by it. It's just a habit; but your saying Christ is your friend makes me feel that I have no business talking about anybody's friend, any more than I'd like to hear anybody else use my mother's name as a by-word. I reckon nobody has any right to use Christ's name 'cept Christians or them as wants to be Christians. I reckon we'd never heard the name if it hadn't a been for the Christians.
"But I don't have so many bad habits. I don't drink, nor smoke, nor chew; and I don't want to. My father smoked some and chewed a lot, and I know the smell of tobacco used to make my mother about as sick as she could be; but she had to stand it, or at least she did stand it till father died; and now she lives with me, and I'm mighty glad she don't have to smell no more tobacco
"She often speaks of it—mother does; and she says she's so thankful she's got a boy that don't use tobacco. She says men that use tobacco don't know how bad it is for other folks to smell 'em. Why, sometimes I come home when I've just been driving a man some place in the country, riding along like you and I are now, and he a smoking or chewing, or at least his clothes soaked full of the vile odor; and when I get home mother says, 'My! but you must have had an old stink pot along with you to-day.' She can smell it on my clothes, and I just hang my coat out in the shed till the scent gets off from it.
"No, Sir, I don't want any tobacco for me, and I don't know as I'd care to raise the stuff for other folks to saturate themselves with either; and every kid is allowed to use it nowadays, or at least most of them get it. It's easy enough to get it. Why, a kid can't keep away from getting these cigarettes, if he tries. They're everywhere. Every kid has hip pockets full; and I know blamed well that some smoke so many cigarettes they get so they aren't more than half bright. It's a fact, Sir,—plenty of 'em too; and some old men, like Al Jones, are just so soaked in tobacco they seem about half dead. Course it ain't like whiskey, but I think it's worse than beer if beer didn't make one want whiskey later.
"But as I was saying, I feel that I have no business saying things about,—about anybody you call your friend, and I think I'll just swear off swearing, if I can."