“From Massachusetts,” said Gilman.
“S’that another langidge fuh some name a knows?”
“No—it’s the real name of another State.”
“Well, hit’s ’nuff tuh twis’ a body’s tongue, fuh life, so a done blame yuh s’much fuh yo’ funny talk. Mawnin’.” And she began to swing herself upon a great lichen-crested boulder by the roadside. . . . . .
Gilman was naturally curious as to the type of the young barbarian whom he had met on his drive to Black Creek, and, during a pause in his work, he told a young fellow named Watkins of his adventure, and asked him to what class the girl belonged.
“I reckon, sir, she was a sang-digger,” said Watkins, laughing. “They’re a awful wild lot, mostly bad as they make ’em, with no more idea of right an’ wrong than a lot o’ ground-horgs.”
“But what is a ‘sang-digger’?” asked Gilman, more and more curious.
“Well, sir, sang, or ginseng, ez the real name is, is a sorter root that grows thick in the mountains about here. They make some sorter medicine outer it. I’ve chawed it myself for heartburn. It’s right paying, too—sang-digging is, sir; you ken git at least a dollar a pound for it, an’ sometimes you ken dig ten pounds in a day, but that’s right seldom. Two or three pounds a day is doin’ well. They’re a awful low set, sir, sang-diggers is. We call ’em ‘snakes’ hereabouts, ’cause they don’t have no place to live cep’in’ in winter, and then they go off somewhere or ruther, to their huts. But in the summer and early autumn they stop where night ketches ’em, an’ light a fire an’ sleep ’round it. They cert’n’y are a bad lot, sir. They’ll steal a sheep or a horse ez quick ez winkin’. Why, t’want a year ago that they stole a mighty pretty mare o’ mine, that I set a heap by, an’ rid off her tail an’ mane a-tearin’ through the brush with her. She got loose somehow an’ come back to me. But they stole two horses for ole Mr. Hawkins, down near Fallin’ Springs, an’ he a’in’t been able to git ’em back. There’s awful murders an’ villainies done by ’em. But some o’ them sang-digger gals is awful pretty. . . . Yes, sir, I reckon she was a sang-digger, sure enough.”
[This wild creature of the woods was treated kindly by Gilman and his wife, and she finally sacrificed herself to save Mrs. Gilman.]