E-text prepared by David Garcia, Mary Meehan, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Kentuckiana Digital Library (http://kdl.kyvl.org) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 36283-h.htm or 36283-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/36283/pg36283-images.html) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/files/36283/36283-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Kentuckiana Digital Library. See http://kdl.kyvl.org/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=kyetexts;cc=kyetexts;view=toc;idno=b92-126-29177664 THE TOBACCO TILLER A Tale of the Kentucky Tobacco Fields by SARAH BELL HACKLEY The C. M. Clark Publishing Company Boston, Massachusetts 1909 Copyright, 1909. By the C. M. Clark Publishing Co., Boston, Massachusetts, U. S. A. All Rights Reserved. [Illustration: "I dunno but what we'd better move to Texas."] CONTENTS I--MR. DOGGETT AT HOME II--THE MYRTLE BUDS IN MISS LUCY'S GARDEN III--AT THE STRIPPING-HOUSE IV--A COMPACT V--A VISIT TO THE SEERESS VI--A NEIGHBORLY CALL VII--RIVALS VIII--AT THE TOBACCO BARN IX--"SURE SOME DISASTER HAS BEFELL" X--NIGHT RIDERS XI--MORE NIGHT RIDERS XII--THE MAD COW XIII--MR. DOGGETT'S ACQUISITION XIV--MR. DOGGETT LENDS A HAND XV--"WEEP NO MORE, MY LADY" LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS _"I dunno but what we'd better move to Texas"_ _"Hit's Jeremiah, my pet," she explained soothingly_ _"Mistu Linney, is 'oo lovin' Miss Luty?"_ _"Here's a letter, Lucy Ann," he sneered_ FOREWORD Behold, friend, a multitude traversing a road shaded at its edge by mighty plants whose leaves are thick, broad, and rank in their odor,--the nicotiana tabacum. Who are they of the multitude? They are those who have had to do with the making of the history of the weed whose cousins are the thorn-apple, and the night-shade, from the time its existence came to be known to the civilized nations. Listen, friend, to the roll-call. Ye whose bread was the banana,--whose garb was the sunshine,--whose gods were worshiped in the smoke-cloud from the burning leaf of the Petun,--whose weapons of war were arrows, poison-tipped in the oil of tobacco,--ye red barbarians of Central America, of the off lying islands, and of the farther northward country; ye from whom the world learned to use tobacco,--answer to your names! Sir of the silken robe and waving plume,--dizzy with visions of the wealth of the Montezumas to be conquered,--you who in the beginning of the sixteenth century, presented the Indian weed to your Sovereign at Madrid,--Fernando Cortez--answer to your name!