“You mean pellagra?”
“I don’t know whut you call it.”
“I dismiss the pellagra, for I don’t know anything about it, but there’s nothing strange about the negro not having appendicitis, William,” said I. “You know what the vermiform appendix is, don’t you?”
“No, sir, ’ceptin’ dat it’s somefin’ dat you gut an’ don’t need, an’ it can’t stay in yer when it gets hot.”
“You know about Darwin’s theory of evolution?”
“No, sir, to tell you de truf, I ain’t seed Mr. Dargin in almos’ er year.”
“I don’t mean Jim Dargin, the traveling man, but Dr. Darwin, the great scientist, a learned man of the last century who contended that we all came from monkeys. You have heard of that theory?”
“Yes, sir, I’se heard it said dat we come fum monkeys, but I ain’t believin’ everything dat I hears.”
William cocked one eye up a little and prepared to listen. He did not catch on to the word “evolution,” but when I said that Mr. Darwin was the man that believed that a man came from a monkey he understood. He had heard of that claim.
“You have heard that, then, William?” I continued.