"Make 'em pick your figs!" he shouted. "Make 'em pick your figs! They'll look handsome in the trees! Make 'em pick for you!"
The cry found favor, and the verdict became, "If yo' want to go free yo' got to pick de figs!"
When Captain Tony and the boss of the big farm approached the point, and saw a strange schooner anchored there, the Captain felt anxious. "I hope de boys not havin' troubl'," he said. "I don' see w'at dat boat wan' stop dere faw."
As they landed, Bascom met them and explained. "I've got the crew of that schooner pickin' figs for me, an' some of the boys from round here is watchin' that they do it lively. They was honin' for some cracked watermelons, an' I thought they'd better do a little work, seein' as they got out of temper."
The boss was a Northern man. He looked at Bascom's agile weather-beaten figure, and they all went round to see the force of overseers and the three men in the trees. "That's about the way I have to work it," he said. "More overseers than men; but how do yours manage to make the men work so lively?"
"Ho!" said Bascom, "easy enough. They're workin' by the job. Can't go till they're done."
But it was not until Patrice told why the strangers sat so glum and warm and active in the trees that the Captain and the boss understood.
"Yo' boy," said the Captain, as they went back to the melon-pile, "an' yo' nevah picked a fig yo'se'f?"
"Not a one," said Bascom, candidly. "The boys came along at first an' wanted to pick for cracked melons, an' then 'bout the time they was gettin' tired this schooner hove in sight. After I begun to have comp'ny, looked like it was best for me to watch the melons."
"And before?" laughed the boss.