"De birds and critters sho is good comp’ny. I done made frens wid up all but de owl and de hawk. Dey is jes natchally bad an de other critters hates ’em. A ole red-breast’ hawk come an lit in a daid pine tree. I seen him so plain til I knowed what he was thinkin’ about. He was jes mad clean down in his craw and was cussin’ ever’thin’. A little pewee bird seen him an begin to fuss. A crow fly over and hear de pewee, den fly down close an take a good look at mister hawk den he fly up and start callin’ de other crows. In a little while a whole drove of crows is flyin’ ’roun dat pine tree. Den de jay birds come an dey is callin’ for a fight, but de ole hawk never move. Den de mocking birds come an dey sair right in and starts pecking at de hawk until he dove into de woods and gets away, an all de birds begin to talkin’ ’bout bugs an things."
The old man was wound up for an interminable talk on his favorite theme, the talk of critters, and to change the subject I asked: "Uncle Louis, ain’t you afraid of ghosts?"
"Lor’, chile, I ain’t feared of no ghos’ or spook, as I’s seed lots of both. All a ghos’ do is jes show hise’f. You never hear of one doin’ nothin’ to nobody. Dey is sociable an wants to be near livin’ people. When folks gets scared it hurts de ha’nt’s feelin’s an dey goes somewhere else. Dey has all de feelin’s dey had when dey was livin’. You wouldn’t stay by wid folks dat’s fear’d of you an want to run away from where you is.
"Las’ night, when I was up in my nes’, an my fire had died out, all 'sept one little chunk, an de moon was shinin’ like day, I lay down, I did, an I take a li’l nap o’ sleep. Den I wakes up sudden an looks ’roun ag’in. Well, sir, de norf side of de hill was covered wid ghoses an spooks; dey was layin’ down, standin’ up and leanin’ agin trees, but mos’ly dey was jes sittin’ on de groun’, all lookin’ at me hard as dey could, widout battin’ an eye.
"De neares’ one to me was a little white ooman. She war sittin’ flat on de groun’, holdin’ a baby in her lap. She look mighty pitiful an I say 'please Missis, can I ho’p you an yo’ baby? I’d be ’bleeged if you tell me.’ Her lips move but I couldn’t hear no sound. Den I lay me down an drap off to sleep agin. When I wakes up de ghosses is all dere an de little white ooman look lak she want to say somethin’, but can’t, an I say, ’I ain’ nothin’ but a poor runaway nigger, but my Marster is a mighty kin’ man, he’ll sholy he’p you; but she didn’t say nothin’ an I goes back to sleep. De next time I wakes up de sun was risin’ an I jes lays dere an watches de ghosses an spooks get thin, an fade away like a fog."