"I wuz in a plumb muck o' sweat when I got through, hit bein' a warm night, and me awful tired to begin with. They put up a head and foot-stone, and writ somepin' on 'em about this hole a bein' the only fitten place fer a man that wuz a goin' ag'in his neighbors fer the trust.
"The naixt bed we come to, them fellers salted. Yes, sir! The man carryin' the salt sack says: 'Clover seed and hemp seed is too high fer me to waste,—I jest brought the salt whar I had salted my hog meat down!'
"After we had rid over about feefteen miles o' ground, the ring-leader, he says: 'We've been fur enough tonight, hain't we, boys? Less 'tend to the pris'ner and go home.'
"I'd been turrible warm up to this time, but when he said that, Mr. Lindsay, I got as cold as a frog.
"'Did we onderstand you to say you were a goin' to raise a crop o' terbaccer this year?' he says.
"'Yes, sir,' I says, and I own I wuz a shakin' so, Mr. Lindsay, my voice wuzn't natural, 'I wuz a expectin' to!'
"'He wuz expectin' to!' a man back in the crowd that hadn't done no talkin', put in. 'Tie him up to that thar ellum thar, boys, and give him about forty-nine!'
"They drug me, a pullin' back like a hoss, and diggin' my feet in the dirt worse'n a cat, to the tree, and while they wuz a tyin' me up, one of 'em cut some long ellum switches. I seed I wuz in fer hit, and I says: 'Boys, in my County, thar hain't nobody never had no orders not to raise terbaccer.'
"'Whar is your County?' the feller that advised whoopin' me, says.
"'Hain't that you, Bud Baker, and don't you live in this County?'