“But,” sez Col. Seybert, “they don’t want to go.”
Thomas J. leaned back in his chair in deep enjoyment of his Ma’s talk, as I could see plain; and he says to Col. Seybert:
“How do you know they don’t want to go?”
“SET DOWN IN OUR SWAMP.”
“Because I do know it,” sez he. “They say they are not Africans now, but Americans; they have a right here; they have just as good right here now as we have.”
“Wall, I don’t dispute that idee,” sez I.
“I have got a right to go and set down in our swamp and set there; but I should be dretful apt to get all covered with mud and mire, I couldn’t see nuthin’ but dirt and slosh; the bad, nasty air would make me deathly sick, to say nuthin’ of my bein’ bit to death by muskeeters and run over by snakes and toads, etc.
“It hain’t a question of right—nobody could dispute that I would have a right to stay there if I wuz a minter; but the question is, would it be as well for me as it would to move up on the higher ground out of the filth, and darkness, and sickly, deathly air and influences, etc., etc., etc.?”
Col. Seybert waved off these noble and convincin’ remarks of mine, and kep’ on a sayin’ his former say. And he spoke the words in the axent of one who has settled the matter and put on the final argument.