“O, call back yesterday; bid time return.”
He had a local reputation for his original sayings and deserved it. For example: “You kyant eat uh hoecake but once;” “All moufs mus’ eat, but all moufs kyant eat gravel;” “Ev’y man’s mouf ain’ uh prayer book;” “Uh case orntried is hyard ter justify;” etc., but from being chaffed by the young men at the “Royal Oak” and St. Michaels, towns near by, where he sold his crabs and fish, and bought fishhooks and tobacco, had become somewhat shy and reticent.
One cold and windy day in December I started for Wild Goose Marsh, famous as snipe ground, with the view of burning the same. So to fully enjoy Ezra’s confidence and to get him to talk freely, I put a half-dollar in his hand, invited him to stop shucking oysters and go with me to the marsh and assist in burning the same. His young Marster’s pointers, “Rob Roy” and “Rose,” whom he had adopted and who had adopted him, were lying in his boat. He expatiated a few moments upon the “quaresomeness ub snipe an’ jack-uh-ma-lanterns,” and then got in my carriage. Meantime I was taking in his raiment. He said, “I’m not dress up, kase I’m shuckin’ oysters.” He wore an old dressing gown some one had given him in the long ago. It must have had twenty patches from the size of a blacking box up to a tin plate. His vest, from patches, was of many colors; it was fastened with seven buttons, and no two of them alike. One foot was shod, and the other wrapped in an old piece of carpet. “Meh cawns hu’t me so,” he said. He was smaller and more bent than ever, and extremely interesting. A drink of applejack and a good lunch, the brilliancy of the burning marsh and my interest in him made him very loquacious. With apparent earnestness I said, “Uncle Ezra, how long have you lived on this estate?”
“Who, me! Bawn heah erboutin uh hunard year ago. I cum outin de Hollyday fambly. Ole Mars’ grabe is ober dar wha you see dem willows weepin’. Dar’s uh gre’t big slab ober de grabe, an’ on hit is uh passel ub A. B. C.’s an’ uh anker, wid stars an’ eagles an’ little grapevines all erroun’ ’em. Mars Pinckney say, ‘Dat’s what dey call in dem days de coat ub mail.’ His wuz uh gre’t fambly, an’ Mars Thormas wuz uh cap’n an’ fit an’ wuz kilt in de Resolutionary Wah.”