“Boss, I nearly had a fit! Do you kno’ dat gal had de muthers of ebry one of her fus’ husbands dar an’ claimin’ dey wuz mighty nigh to her? “Dar wa’n’t nothin’ to do but to git a divorcement an’ as I wa’n’t quite ready fur dat yit, I made de bes’ of it an’ driv’ off; but I knowed if dar wuz ever a day when I needed sum brains now wuz de time. An’ de three sod muthers,—dat wuz de entitlement I gib to de three muthers of Sally’s dead husbands,—dey wuz jes’ plain ole grannies, wid de usual tongue an’ de perviserty fer huntin’ up trouble dat wuz natu’lly predistined fur sumbody else. “But Sally’s muther she wuz a fine lookin’ ’oman, jes a shade heftier an’ handsumer than Sally so I teched her mighty tenderly an’ gin her to onderstan’ dat I fully intended to fulfill to de letter de scrip’tul injunshuns of filial affecshuns. She wuz a hefty ’oman, boss, but she wuz es bossy es she wuz hansum, es I found out. De day she landed at home, sah, I seed she’d sot in to own de place an’ in two weeks, sah, sides ownin’ Sally an’ de sod-muthers, she owned de mules, de cow, de pigs an’ de farm, me an’ my ’ligious convicshuns an’ perlitical preferment. “But es I wuz sayin’, boss, she wuz a han’sum ’oman! “Now I’m allers willin’ to be bossed fur a while by a handsum ’oman, but when it comes to dat batch of ole sod-muthers dat looked like busted bags of dried apples, dat wuz a nurr thing. But I’ve noticed dar is allers a kin’ of communercashun ’mong women folks es to de bossin’ of a man. It jis’ travels by grapevine, or dis here wireless business in de air, to de end dat when one ’oman kin boss a man all of ’em think dey can do it. “An’ dey think right, only in dis case de thinkin’ hadn’t all ben dun yit. So dey all jes’ put me down as dead easy. “I let ’em hab free han’ till de honeymoon wuz over. I didn’ think I orter mix eny vinegar wid dat; but by dat time de whole tribe of ’em wuz needin’ sum of de salt dat Lot’s wife got, an’ mebbe sum of de fire an’ brimstone dat wuz de ’casion of her saltin’. Wal, sah, dey sot in fur infairs an’ didn’t do nuthin’ but eat fur two weeks. I had to give ’em three infairs myself an’ then they gin to nose aroun’ an’ git my naburs to have infairs. Fur two weeks mo’ dar wa’n’t nuffin but infairs fur de bride, an’ groom, fur my naburs wuz polite, all wucked up by dese sod-muthers, till dey wuzn’t a chicken or shote left in five miles of my home, an’ if dar had been a hard winter an’ de white folks’ chickens had-roosted high, we would a had a hard time of it. “Wal, I stood dat, ’caze dar wuz a honeymoon an’ good eatin’ gwine on wid it, but ’long ’bout de thud week when de sod-mammies gin to tell me how I orter roach my hair an’ run my farm I gin to lay my plans fur acshun.