I asked, "What do the slaves eat?"
"Everything: corn-bread, that's the most." Papa said, "It is a great
shame making Missouri a slave state."
_Woman._ "Ah yes; keeps it back."
_Self._ "Have you good health?"--many parts being said to be unhealthy.
_Woman._ A quick nod. "First-rate."
_Self._ "Did your mother give you the hickory stick?"
_Woman._ "No: the switch:--raised me on the rod of correction."
_Self._ "Had your husband the farm before you married?"
_Woman._ "His father had 'entered it,' and he gave my husband money, and
my mother gave me money, and then we married and 'entered it'
ourselves."
All these answers came out with the utmost quickness and intelligence.
She is an Irish Roman Catholic, her mother having brought her as a baby
from Ireland, her husband is also Irish; but they are now Americans of
the Far West in their manner and singular intelligence, beating even the
clever Irish in this respect.
I said: "Do you pray much to the Virgin Mary in your part of America?"
_Woman._ "No: don't notice her much."
_Self._ "I am glad of that."
_Woman._ "We respect her as the mother of God."
She said the corn on the road-side we were then passing was far inferior
to western produce, that it ought to be much taller, and that if it were
so, the ear would be much larger and fuller.
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