"This is just a saying I've picked up somewhere in my travels. My name is Davies, and I am traveling through the country selling a few choice books, and picking up information as I go."
"I know a mighty heap of Davises," said Uncle Abner, "but I disremember of anybody named Davies."
"Well, sir," said Mr. Davies, "the name is not uncommon in my part of the country. I am from Vermont."
"Well, well!" said Uncle Abner, tapping the ground thoughtfully with his cane. "A mighty fur ways Vermont is, tooby shore. In my day an' time I've seed as many as three men folks from Vermont, an' one un 'em, he wuz a wheelwright, an' one wuz a tin-pedler, an' the yuther one wuz a clock-maker. But that wuz a long time ago. How is the abolishioners gittin' on up that away, an' when in the name er patience is they a-comin' arter my niggers? Lord! if them niggers wuz free, I wouldn't have to slave for 'em."
"Well, sir," said Mr. Davies, "I take little or no interest in those things. I have to make a humble living, and I leave political questions to the politicians."
The conversation was carried an at some length, the younger men joining in occasionally to ask questions; and nothing could have been friendlier than their attitude toward Mr. Davies. They treated him with the greatest consideration. His manner and speech were those of an educated man, and he seemed to make himself thoroughly agreeable. But that night, as Mr. Jack Walthall was about to go to bed, his body-servant, a negro named Jake, began to question him about the abolitionists.
"What do you know about abolitionists?" Mr. Walthall asked with some degree of severity.
"Nothin' 'tall, Marse Jack, 'cep'in' w'at dish yer new w'ite man down dar at de tavern say."
"And what did he say?" Mr. Walthall inquired.
"I ax 'im, I say, 'Marse Boss, is dese yer bobolitionists got horns en huffs?' en he 'low, he did, dat dey ain't no bobolitionists, kaze dey er babolitionists, an' dey ain't got needer horns ner huffs."