"I member when they fit here a bum shell fell right in the yard. It was big around as this stovepipe and was all full of chains and things.
"After free time my folks stayed right here and worked on the shares. I was the baby chile and never done no work till I married when I was fifteen.
"After the War I went to school to white teachers from the North. I never went to nothin' but them. I went till I was in the fifth grade.
"My daddy learned me to spell 'lady' and 'baker' and 'shady' fore I went to school. I learned all my ABC's too. I got out of the first reader the second day. I could just read it right on through. I could spell and just stand at the head of the class till the teacher sent me to the foot all the time.
"My daddy was his old mistress' pet. He used to carry her to school all the time and I guess that's where he got his learnin'.
"After I was married I worked in the field. Rolled logs, cut brush, chopped and picked cotton.
"I member when they had that 'Bachelor' (Brooks-Baxter) War up here at Little Rock.
"After my chillun died, I never went to the field no more. I just stayed round mongst the white folks nussin'. All the chillun I nussed is married and grown now.
"All this younger generation—white and colored—I don't know what's gwine come of em. The poet says:
'Each gwine a different way
And all the downward road.'"