“No, of course not, but all the black folks do, except you.”
“Mastah, ain’t you foun’ out yit dat niggas is bawn fools? When my mastah wants de hogs changed from one piece o’ woods to annuder, he don’t go to makin’ blin’ signs to me, but he comes an’ tells me what he wants; an’ de good Lord what made de wuld, he ain’t a-goin’ to make no blin’ signs, nuther. He’s done tole us in de good book an’ in all de wuld aroun’ us what to do. He’s put sense in our heads to un’erstan’ what he means, an’ he ain’t gwine to govern de univarse wid a lot o’ luck signs, like a nigga would do it. ’Sides, Ise done all de unlucky things heaps o’ times, an’ ain’t never had no bad luck yit.”
When the war came, Phil was a stanch Southerner in all his feeling, and firmly held to his faith in the success of his side, even to the end. The end crushed him completely. When his master explained to the colored people their new condition of freedom, and proposed to engage them for wages, Phil stoutly refused.
“De odder folks may do as dey pleases, mastah, but Phil’s gwine to be your nigga jes’ as he always was. I ain’t gwine to be free nohow. I ain’t got no free nigga blood in me. I never saw no free nigga what wasn’t hungry; an’ I don’t know no free nigga what won’t steal; more’n dat, I never know’d a free nigga what wouldn’t sneak up on birds an’ shoot ’em on de groun’. I tell you, I ain’t gwine to be no sich folks as dem. Ise your nigga, an’ Ise gwine to be jes’ dat. I’ll do my wuk, an’ I ain’t goin’ to take no wages, an’ you’ll take car’ o’ me jes’ as you always did, on’y don’t never call me no free nigga. Ise a slave, I is, an’ Ise got de bes’ mastah in ole Virginy, an’ I ain’t fool ’nough to want to change de sitiwation.”
His master explained to him the necessity of the case, and showed him how impossible it was, by any mutual agreement, to alter the fact of freedom, or to escape its consequences.
“You must accept wages, Phil, for I may die or go into bankruptcy, and you may grow old or get ill; and if I should be poor or dead, then there would be nobody to take care of you. You must work for wages and take care of your money, so that it may take care of you.”
“Mastah, do you mean to tell Phil dat de law makes me a free nigga whedder or no?”
“Yes, Phil.”
“Den stick yo’ fingers in yo’ years, mastah, ’cause Ise gwine to swear. Damn de law. Dat’s what I say about dat. An’ now Ise jus’ gwine to die, an’ dat’s all about it.”
The poor fellow walked away with bowed head and tear-stained face. The broad, stalwart shoulders were bent beneath the weight of responsibility for himself. He was a strong man, physically, but the merest child in character, and the feeling that he no longer had any one but himself to lean upon, was more than he could bear. The light of cheerfulness and good humor went out of his face. The joyousness of his nature disappeared, and before the summer had ripened into autumn, poor Phil lay down and died of a broken heart.