He would say to the man:
"Do yo' want this woman?" and to the girl, "Do yo' want this boy?" Then
he would call the ol' mistress to fetch the broom an ol' master would
hold one end an ol' mistress the other an tell the boy and girl to jump
dis broom and he would say: "Dat's yo' wife." Dey called marryin' like
that jumpin the broom.
Now chile I can't 'member everything I done in them days but we didn'
have ter worry bout nothin. Ol' mistress was the one to worry. Twasn't
then like it is now, no twasn't. We had such a good time an ev'ybody
cried when the Yankees cried out: "Free." Tother niggers say dey had a
hard time 'fo' dey was free but twas then like tis now. If you had a
hard time we don it ourselves.
Ol' master didn' want to part with his niggers an the niggers didn' wan'
to part with ol' master so they thought by comin to Arkansas they would
have a chance to keep 'em. So they got on their way. We loaded up our
wagons an put up our wagon sheet an we had plenty to eat an plenty of
horse feed. We traveled bout 15 or 20 miles a day an would stop an camp
at night. We would cook enough in the morning to las' all day. The cows
was drove t'gether. Some was gentle an some was not an did dey have a
time.
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