“Now, I've heerd some o' these 'ere modern ministers that come down from Cambridge college, and are larnt about every thing in creation, they say there ain't no devil, and the reason on't is, 'cause there can't be none. These 'ere fellers is so sort o' green!--they don't mean no harm, but they don't know nothin' about nobody that does. If they'd ha' known old Black Hoss John, they'd ha' been putty sure there was a devil. He was jest the crossest, ugliest critter that ever ye see, and he was ugly jest for the sake o' ugliness. He couldn't bear to let the boys pick huckleberries in his paster lots, when he didn't pick 'em himself; and he was allers jawin' me 'cause I would go trout-fishin' in one o' his pasters. Jest ez if the trout that swims warn't, the Lord's, and jest ez much mine as his. He grudged every critter every thing; and if he'd ha' hed his will and way, every bird would ha' fell down dead that picked up a worm on his grounds. He was jest as nippin' as a black frost. Old Black Hoss didn't git drunk in a regerlar way, like Uncle Eph and Toddy Whitney, and the rest o' them boys. But he jest sot at home, a-soakin' on cider, till he was crosser'n a bear with a sore head. Old Black Hoss hed a special spite agin old Sarah. He said she was an old witch and an old thief, and that she stole things off'n his grounds, when everybody knew that she was a regerlar church-member, and as decent an old critter as there was goin'. As to her stealin', she didn't do nothin' but pick huckleberries and grapes, and git chesnuts and wannuts, and butternuts, and them 'ere wild things that's the Lord's, grow on whose land they will, and is free to all. I've hearn 'em tell that, over in the old country, the poor was kept under so, that they couldn't shoot a bird, nor ketch a fish, nor gather no nuts, nor do nothin' to keep from starvin', 'cause the quality folks they thought they owned every thing, 'way-down to the middle of the earth and clear up to the stars. We never hed no sech doin's this side of the water, thank the Lord! We've allers been free to have the chesnuts and the wannuts and the grapes and the huckleberries and the strawberries, ef we could git 'em, and ketch fish when and where we was a mind to. Lordy massy! your grandthur's old Cesar, he used to call the pond his pork-pot. He'd jest go down and throw in a line and ketch his dinner. Wal, Old Black Hoss he know'd the law was so, and he couldn't do nothin' agin her by law; but he sarved her out every mean trick he could think of. He used to go and stan' and lean over her garden-gate and jaw at her an hour at a time; but old Sarah she had the Injun in her; she didn't run to talk much: she used to jest keep on with her weedin and her work, jest's if he warn't there, and that made Old Black Hoss madder'n ever; and he thought he'd try and frighten her off'n the ground, by makin' on her believe he was the Devil. So one time, when he'd been killin' a beef critter, they took off the