"Yes, reckon I could. Yes, sah, I done travelled considerable; the onliest advantage I could conjure up in freedom was goen' wherever the fit took me to go--jes' runnen' roun' loose. My king! I got good an' tiahed runnen, I tell yo'. Went cleah out to the Mississippi river, I did--spent all my money, an' started back barefoot, deed I did, an' me worth three thousan' five hundred dollars! Nevah did know how little sense I got till I was free to get myself in trouble if I liked, an' didn't have no Mahs Duke to get me out again. More'n that, seem like I done lost my luck some way--lost races I had no right to lose, till seem like owners they got scary 'bout me, an' when I git far away from my own stamping groun', seem like I wasn't no sort o' use at all. Bye and bye I fell in with Judge Warner, who was a great friend o' Mahs Dukes, and I jes' up an' tells him I done been conjured along o' that freedom Mahs Duke done give me. My king!--how he did laugh. He offered me a good berth down on his place, but I say, 'no, sah; all I want is Mahs Duke an' old Calliny'; so he helps me to some races an' seems like the very notion o' goen' home done fetch me good luck right off, 'cause I made good winnen' on his bay filly, Creole, an' soon as I got some money I bid far'well to wanderen' an' made fo' home. "I alles spishuned Mahs Duke know mo' 'bout my travels than he let on, fo' he jes' laughed when he see me an' say: 'All right, Nelse, I been looken' fo' you some time. Now if yo' done got yo' fill o' seen' the world, 'spose yo' go down an' look at the new colt I got, an' take yo' ole place in the stable. Yo' jes' got back in time to spruce up the carriage team fo' my wedden'. "Well, sah, yo' could a' knocked me down with a feathah. Mahs Duke was thirty-five, an' ovah, an' had kep' his own bachelor place fo' ten yeah, loose an' free. Then all at once a new family come down heah from Marylan'. They was the Mastersons, an' a Miss Bar'bra Vaughn come to visit them, an' it was all ovah with Mahs Duke. She jest won in a walk--that little lady. "An' he done took her all the way to Orleans fo' wedden' trip. I didn't go 'long. I was done tired out with travel an' 'sides that, I'd been riden' ovah an' back to the Masterson plantation fo' Mahs Duke till I took up with a likely brown gal they fetched with them from up Nawth, an' of all niggahs, Nawthen niggahs is the off-scourins o' the yeath--copy aftah theh masters, I reckon, fo' all the real, double-distilled quality folks I met up with in all my travels were gentlemen o' the South, sah. Yes, sah, they may breed good quality somewheahs up theah, but all o' them sent down heah as samples ain't nowhars with the home-bred article, sah.