Figger was necessary because his superb voice added to the others, completed the most melodious male quartette in Louisiana. Hitch Diamond as a prize-fighter, Vinegar Atts as an ex-pugilist who had been called to preach, each possessed the physical strength of a forty-horse-power mule. Skeeter needed them to lift his automobile out of the mud and to push it through the sand. Was not that a thoughtful selection of first-aids to the helpless? Truly, that outfit was a fearful and wonderful thing. When those four negroes climbed into that car and began to sing to the accompaniment of a mechanism which sounded like a saw-mill, a cotton-gin, and a boiler factory loaded upon a log-train chasing a herd of bleating billy-goats along the public highway, the effect produced made the pious cross themselves, the ungodly “cuss,” and the little children run to their mothers, whimpering with fright. A white man might think a thousand years and never think up an arrangement like that. Then to show that his mental incubator was still capable of hatching out little fuzzy, two-legged chicken-headed thoughts, Skeeter bought a steamboat! “Whar is Hitch Diamond at, Kunnel?” Skeeter asked of a handsome, white-haired gentleman standing in front of the Tickfall post-office. “He’s up at my house, unloading fireworks from a dray,” Colonel Gaitskill answered. “Hitch don’t go back to wuck to-day, do he?” Skeeter inquired in a shocked tone. “Certainly not,” Gaitskill smiled. “This is a national holiday. I imagine Hitch has finished that little job now. Are you folks going off to make a day of it?” “Yes, suh, us is fixin’ to cel’brate, too!” Skeeter chuckled. “Do you know why we celebrate the Fourth of July, Skeeter?” Gaitskill asked with a smile. Skeeter knew. He also knew that “Fighting Tom” Gaitskill stood before him, and this old soldier had not fought with the heroes of ’76. He tempered his answer to a hero of the Lost Cause. “Shore, Marse Tom!” he chuckled. “Dis is de day dat our white marsters kilt all de dam-yanks!” Gaitskill laughed. “Your answer is a credit to your tact and diplomacy, Skeeter, but it certainly upsets the records of history. Where are you going?” “We’s gwine down to de river.” “I want you and Hitch Diamond to help me with the fire-works to-night,” Gaitskill said. “You get back by dark.” “Shore, Marse Tom!” Skeeter cackled. “We ain’t gwine miss no free show. I’ll go git Hitch an’ de rest of de bunch now!” The seven-mile road to the Mississippi River was smooth and level and was a favorite with Vinegar and Hitch, who preferred riding to climbing out to lift or push. So, one hour later, the automobile quartette stood beside a stump on the banks of that majestic stream and sang of the time “when de water’s so low, de bullfrog roll up his pants jes’ so, and wade acrost from sho’ to sho’; while over in de channel de catfish say: ‘We’s gittin’ plum’ freckle-faced down our way.’”