Dey ’long ter Mars Matthew; his Gre’t Gran Pa, dey tell me, hope C’lumbus ter ’sciver Talbot County, an’ dat wuz befo’ de Petracks (Patriarchs) cum ober.
They stopped in Baltimore, where Noah Walker & Company fitted him out with two suits of brown livery with brass buttons. He was given a new hat, as he expressed it, “Wid uh burr on one side de hat;” but his new boots particularly charmed him, as the best servants got boots, and the others shoes. From Baltimore, Ezra was sent direct to Memphis, and his Mars Matthew joined, in Richmond, Col. John Ware, of Virginia, who bred Cotswold sheep and exhibited in Memphis.
At the Memphis show, three of Ezra’s sheep took blue ribbons, one a red ribbon. He was standing in front of his sheep cot, two days after arriving—standing as though he was going to have his picture taken, delighted with himself and the blue ribbons. A man came along and said:
“Has your Marster many sheep like these?”
“Many? Erbout ten thousan’; dey jes’ run an’ tuck de fus’ dey kotch.”
Another man said, “Whose sheep are these?”
“Dey ’long ter Mars Matthew; his gre’t granpa, dey tell me, holp C’lumbus ’sciver Talbot County, an’ dat wuz befo’ de Petracks cum ober.”
Presently a neat, likely looking mulatto girl came along, looked admiringly at Ezra, leaned over the rail of the sheep cot and said demurely, “Kin I pat one ub yo’ sheep?”
“Sut’ny, honey; dey won’ bite,” Ezra said. “Do you lib ’roun’ heah?”