"Why, it's an iron collar to wear on the neck."
"But you are certainly mistaken," said I, picking it up; "you see these joints are riveted with iron as large as my finger, and it could never be taken off over one's head."
"But we knows; dat's Uncle Tim's collar. An' he crawled off in dat fence-corner," pointing to the spot, "an' died thar, an' Massa George had his head cut off to get de iron off."
"Is it possible for a human being to become so brutal as to cut a man's head off when he is dead?"
She looked as if she thought I doubted her word, and said: "It didn't hurt Uncle Tim when he was dead as it did when de iron wore big sores way down to de bone, and da got full o' worms afore he died. His neck an' head all swell up, an' he prayed many, many prayers to God to come and take him out his misery."
"How long did he wear it?"
"'Bout two years."
"Two years! It is impossible for any one to live that length of time with this rough heavy iron."
[Illustration: SLAVE IRONS IN POSSESSION OF THE AUTHOR]
"We work two seasons, any how, over in dat cotton-fiel'," pointing to the two-hundred-acre cotton-field at our right.