An' have you heerd what the ol' nigger Proph' says? Of co'se he's all unhinged in the top story ez anybody would be thet lived in the woods an' e't sca'cely anything but herbs an' berries. But, anyhow, he's got a sort o' gift o' prophecy an' insight, ez we all know. Well, Proph', he sez that while the weddin' march was bein' played in the church the night o' Sonny's weddin' thet he couldn't hear his own ears for the racket among all the live things in the woods. An' he says thet they wasn't a frog, or a cricket, or katydid, or nothin', but up an' played on its little instrument, an' thet every note they sounded fitted into the church music--even to the mockin'-bird an' the screech-owl. Of co'se, I don't say it's so, but the ol' nigger swears to it, an' ef you dispute it with him an' ask him how it come thet nobody else didn't hear it, why he says that's because them thet live in houses an' eat flesh ain't got the love o' Grod in their hearts, an' can't expect to hear the songs of the songless an' speech of the speechless. That's a toler'ble high-falutin figgur o' speech for a nigger, but it's thess the way he expresses it. You know he's been seen holdin' conversation with dumb brutes, more 'n once-t--in broad daylight. Of co'se, we can't be shore thet they was rejoicin' expressed in the underbrush an' the forests, ez he says, but I do say, ez I said before, thet Sonny an' the little girl has had the purtiest an' joyfulest weddin' I ever see in this county, an' a good time was had by everybody present. An' it has made me mighty happy--it an' its results. They say a son is a son till he gets him a wife, but 't ain't so in this case, shore. I've gained thess ez sweet a daughter ez I could 'a' picked out ef I'd 'a' had the whole world to select from. Little Mary Elizabeth has been mighty dear to our hearts for a long time, an' when wife passed away, although the weddin' hadn't took place yet, she bestowed a mother's partin' blessin' on her, an' give Sonny a lot o' private advice about her disposition, an' how he ought to reg'late hisself to deal with it. You see, Mary Elizabeth stayed along with us so much durin' the seasons he was away in New York, thet we got to know all her crotchets an' quavers, an' she ain't got a mean one, neither. But _they're there_. An' they have to be dealt with, lovin'. Fact is, th' ain't no other proper way to deal with nothin', in my opinion. We was ruther glad to find out some little twists in her disposition, wife an' me was, 'cause ef we hadn't discovered none, why we'd 'a' felt shore she had some in'ard deceit or somethin'. No person can't be perfec', an' when I see people always outwardly serene, I mistrust their insides. But little Mary Elizabeth, why, she ain't none too angelic to git a good healthy spell o' the pouts once-t in a while, but ef she's handled kind an' tender, why, she'll come thoo without havin' to humble herself with apologies.