The Annotated African American Folktales

by Henry Louis Gates

  In the summer “Watermelon Feasts” would be the order of the day. On the plantations too far removed from the city to carry them to market to be sold, they were raised for home use only. In some portions of Hanover County, the large, luscious melons were raised in such numbers that quantities of them were fed to the hogs. Frequently, in the height of the season, permission would be granted the servants to have a grand feast to which the slaves for miles around were invited. These were glorious times, and the memory of those pleasant events still lingers fondly with many of our fathers and mothers.

  Dress did not play a conspicuous part in the enjoyment of the party of the past. The dress of the field hands was exceedingly monotonous, the linsey-woolsey dress and bed-ticking pantaloons being the chief styles. For days before the party the hair of the females was tightly wrapped with white strings to be unloosed on this momentous occasion, when it would show itself in the most beautiful “waves.”

  House servants were the observed of all observers. They would come attired in the cast-off finery of an indulgent mistress, and would be resplendent in ribbons representing all the hues of the rainbow. Sometimes an especially favored lady’s maid might be seen dressed in the cast-off silk that had done duty on many a “state occasion” for the lady of the “great house.” The extravagance would excite many a jealous pang in the breast of less-favored damsels. The swains would look askance at these expensively bedecked damsels until all would become cosmopolitan in the mazes of the country dance. Not infrequently the young master and mistresses would grace the occasion with their presence, which however was rather a check upon the exuberant spirits of the participants.

  Persons coming from a distance to these parties would be expected to have a pass. When the master did not feel disposed to supply this, it made but little difference to the party-goer, as he would go anyway and take the chances on not being found out. Some sharper than the rest would scratch a few marks on a piece of paper and feel secure, as the patrolmen, or “patter rollers” as they were called, would sometimes scarcely look at the pass and even if they did it was not an unusual occurrence to meet with one that could not read, and these crudely made marks could easily pass muster.

  These parties began late, since supper must be served, dishes washed, and the children tucked snugly in bed before the servants were free to get ready for this happy event.

  The party would start off with a general greeting and conversation. Telling tales, some of them calculated to “freeze the young blood, and cause each particular hair to stand on end like quills upon the fretful porcupine” was a common mode of entertaining. Next would come the guessing of riddles propounded by the more erudite portion of the company or “pulling handkerchiefs” for kisses. “Fruit in the Basket,” “Walking the Lonesome Road,” “I’m in the Well,” and “Fishing,” were devices for getting a kiss from some fair one. In the play “I’m in the Well,” a gentleman would make the startling announcement that he was in the well. Some sympathizing friend would ask, “How many feet deep?” and it is surprising how many feet a fellow could get in the well, if some pretty girl asked the question. He would then be asked, “Who will you have to pull you out?” He would answer, “Miss so and so,” and the lady mentioned would be expected to kiss him as many times as he was feet deep in the well. This was certainly a most pleasant way to be rescued from drowning. By this effort the lady would get into the well herself and have to be rescued in like manner. The plays I have mentioned, “Buff” and many others are similar in character. In lieu of what we call the Grand March there was a play known as “Walk Old John the Blind Man.” Now as to what this meant I must plead my entire ignorance, nor have I found a single old person able to enlighten me. The ladies and gentlemen would lock arms, march around the room and sing,

  “Walk old John the Blind Man, so long fare you well.

  Walk old John the Blind Man, so long fare you well.

  How you know he’s a blind man? so long fare you well.

  ’Cause he ain’t got but one eye, so long fare you well.”

  To make a variation in the march they would sometimes have one in front without a partner, form a line and sing,

  “Come all ye young men in your youthful days,

  Come look to the Lord in your sinful ways,

  You will be happy, you will be happy,

  While we are growing old.”

  At this each lady would “let go” the arm of her escort, and take that of the next gentleman in front. Thus the odd fellow would get a partner, and leave some other fellow odd to take his chances at the next go ’round.

  Strange to state while many of these plays by their wording show their historical connections, but few show any marks of the plays of our mother country.

  HAGS AND THEIR WAYS / THE CONQUEST OF A HAG

  Southern Workman 23 (1894), 26–27

  The Folk-Lore Society held a special session on dream signs and hag stories on January 8, 1894. For the column on “Folk-Lore and Ethnology,” a summary of the discussion was included with a story about how to defeat a hag.

  FOLK-LORE AND ETHNOLOGY

  Hags and Their Ways

  The regular meeting of the Folk-Lore Society was held on Monday evening, January 8th. The subject appointed for study and discussion was “Dream-Signs and Hag Stories,” although a few questions came up in regard to other matters. During the month preceding, an effort had been made to get hold of any strange words used in games or elsewhere, and “Hully gully,” “Oli ola” and “Coonjine” had been gathered as a nucleus for further study. Any person reading this report who can throw light upon the meaning or origin of these expressions, will be conferring a favor by writing to the Workman in regard to them. Comparison of notes among members of the society developed the information that “coonjine” is used on the Mississippi River for a peculiar motion of the body used apparently to lighten or hasten the labor of loading and unloading. “Hully-gully,” or “Hull da gull” as it appears in a report from Kentucky, is a phrase used in a game. The player holds up a handful of grain or parched corn, shakes it before his opponent and says “Hully gully how many?” A guess is then made by the player and in some cases, in the reply, the expression, “Oli ola” is used, though some members of the society had never heard it though familiar with the rest of the game. Another set of words used in playing the same game is as follows:

  1st. Player. “Jack in the bush.”

  2nd. Player. “Cut him down.”

  1st. Player. “How many licks?”

  to which the second player responds with a guess.

  Letters were received from Mr. Geo. W. Cable, Mrs. A. J. Cooper and Miss Mary Alicia Owen, all most encouraging to the infant society and after that the work of the evening began. Of dream signs, the following were brought in.

  To dream of the dead is a sign of rain.

  To dream of seeing a dead friend dressed in white is a sign that that friend is happy, but if he appears in black, he is unhappy.

  To dream of eggs is a sign of a quarrel.

  To dream of a wedding is a sign of death; of a funeral is a sign of a wedding.

  Friday night dream

  Sat’day morning told,

  Comes to behold

  Before nine days old.

  To dream of silver money is a sign of a quarrel, but it means good luck if you dream of paper money.

  To dream of your teeth’s falling out is a sign of death.

  The hag in Negro folk-lore is the very essence of nightmare, about whose personality gather all the morbid fancies of distempered dreams. She oozes in at your key hole, pervades your room with her malicious but invisible presence, rides you in your sleep, and is so persistent in her persecutions of her victims that they sometimes pine away and die after a year or two of her nightly visitations. Many devices are resorted to to keep her out of the house, or to catch her after she gets in. You may know of her presence by noticing the uneasy moaning and twitching of your dog as he sleeps before the fire. The hag
is riding him now, but will seek nobler prey when you have lain down for your night’s rest. Or you may hear her oozing in at your key-hole with a peculiar whizzing, gurgling sound that you can feel as well as hear as you lie in your bed, and you know that she has left her skin upon your doorstep and is moving in a semi-fluid and wholly horrible condition toward her seat upon your chest. There she will perch and ride the whole night through, unless by some means you can delay her progress or catch her and hold her till the morning dawns. But the hag has a weakness, and she may be detained from her evil work by anyone who knows her ways. She must pick over and count any small things she may find along her path as she moves through the house; corn scattered near the door by which she must enter will keep her at work; a sifter hung over the keyhole may detain her all night, for she must count the meshes before she leaves it. An open book placed at the head of the bed will surely keep her out of mischief, for she must count every letter in every word before making her attack upon her victim. A wool card or two will serve the same purpose, though not so effectively, for she must count the teeth and may be delayed until the approach of dawn warns her to flee lest she become visible and be recognized. There are also many ways of catching a hag, although when caught she may change her form, and is exceedingly hard to kill. There are ways by which she may be coaxed into a bottle with nine new needles and nine new pins, or her victim may gain possession of the tormentor’s skin and sprinkle it with pepper and salt, so that it can not be used. A story is told of a hag who finds her skin on the doorstep thus doctored, and after trying it on several times and finding it smart and burn, she dances wildly about crying “O Skinny, Skinny, Skinny, don’t you know me?” She may be caught in a sifter, when you can detect a sort of web clinging to it, cut this web and the hag will appear in her true shape. Other ways there are undoubtedly by which she may be trapped, and further information on this subject from any source will be most welcome. The following hag story, told in full at the Folk-Lore meeting, shows the midnight terror in all its uncanny habits. Hundreds of such stories are told about the cabin fires still, and we wish to get hold of as many of them as possible, for the hag is an interesting psychological development out of the mental and physical surroundings of the Negroes in the South.

  THE CONQUEST OF A HAG

  There was a poor woman who had been ridden by a hag night after night until she had grown thin and weak from the horror of her nightly visitations. Feeling that she must die as others had died before her, from the torment of this unseen enemy, she resolved to be rid of her at any cost. She went to a hag catcher, who told her how to trap and conquer her tormentor. That night, before she went to bed she stopped every keyhole in the house except one, for the hag enters only by keyholes. She can not come in by the window even if that is left open and the keyholes all stopped. Directly inside of the door with the open keyhole, the woman scattered a quantity of wheat. Then she went to bed, to lie awake and listen for the approach of her enemy. Soon she felt the hag coming and heard at the keyhole the peculiar whizzing sound that told her that dreadful visitor had laid her skin upon the doorstep and was oozing into the house. She lay still and listened. Soon the gurgling noise ceased and she heard the hag utter a strange imprecation when she saw the scattered wheat upon the floor. She might well be disappointed; for she must collect and count every grain of that wheat before she could begin her ride. The listener in the bed heard her pick and pick at the wheat as she laboriously counted it grain by grain. Once, when it was all counted and collected, the hag by an accidental kick, destroyed her own work and scattered the wheat far and wide, and so it happened that she was detained at the door until the day began to break. At dawn her victim arose and went out to see if she had caught the hag, but she saw only a white chicken picking at the wheat on the floor. The woman had been warned that the hag, if caught, would take the form of some animal, so she spoke to the chicken, saying “I know you, Aunt Jane, but I don’t know what harm I have ever done you, that you should torment me so.” The chicken made no reply nor did she turn back to her true shape.

  Then the woman caught the chicken and fastened it up in a coop, and ran around to the door-step to find the hag’s skin. There it lay on the step just where it had been left by its owner the night before. She took up the skin, peppered and salted it, and put it safely away, then went back to look for her chicken, but it had worked its way out of the coop and was gone. Then she knew that she had really caught a hag.

  Her next step was to go down and visit her neighbor, Aunt Jane, whom she had all along believed to be her persecutor. She found that Aunt Jane was very ill and would see no one, but kept herself so closely covered in bed that not even the top of her head was visible. Aunt Jane’s husband, the only person who had seen her that day, had made the horrible discovery in the early morning that his wife had lost her skin, but he had told no one of the fact.

  All that day the hag remained in bed, skinless and writhing in agony,—all day the skin, peppered and salted, remained in possession of her victim. When night fell, a reformed and penitent hag oozed through the keyhole of her conqueror’s door, solemnly promising that she would never ride again if she might only be given her skin. The promise given, the woman who had taken it, washed the skin carefully and thoroughly and returned it once more to its owner, who put it on, thenceforth cured of her trick of riding her neighbors.

  WHY THE CLAY IS RED

  Southern Workman 27 (1898), 36–37

  Masquerading as a pourquoi tale about origins, this story about grotesque maternal cruelty contains the motif of the magical flight often found in European fairy tales.

  WHY THE CLAY IS RED

  Once upon a time there lived an old lady who had two sons: one was named Jimbore, and the other was named John. One evening just at sunset she sent the boys to the spring with a sifter to get water for the night. They staid very long, because every time they dipped the water it ran out. They soon heard their mother calling, “You Jimbore! You John! Come here.” They replied, “Oh, Mother! Every time we dip the water it runs out.” She became very much vexed with them and ran to the spring with a long switch to whip them. At the first stroke the boys jumped into the well and turned into little ducks. She threw at them until they flew out and lit on a tree, but she soon cut the tree down and they flew into the river. She continued to follow them and when she came to the river she said, “Look out, river, I will swallow you,” and jumped into it with great speed. In the meantime the little ducks flew out and hid themselves in a thick cluster of briars. The mother did not drown, but she came out quite slowly and went to the cluster of briars and said, “Look out briars, I will eat you up,” and she jumped in with great speed, but reached her fate. She burst and the red clay that you see was stained by her blood.

  C. H. HERBERT

  FISH STORIES

  Southern Workman 26 (1897), 229–30

  We give this month two variants of the same story, brought in by two members of the Hampton Folk-Lore Society. The story is evidently manufactured with the high moral purpose of securing a careful observance of the Sabbath on the part of the younger people on the plantations.

  1. Our first version comes from Farmville, Va.

  There was once a slave who spent most of his Sundays on the river bank at a certain famous fishing hole, fishing. This was, of course, against the advice and wishes of his fellow slaves, who assured him that sooner or later, some very bad luck would befall him. First they told him that he could not catch any fish on Sunday, “ ’cause they wouldn’t bite.” This prediction, however, proved futile, for Sambo was a very successful fisherman and caught large quantities of fish every Sunday. Sambo’s friends then predicted that the fish would kill him if he ate them, but this prophecy failed also, and Sambo still found himself as strong and as healthy as any of his master’s slaves. After using every means of persuasion to prevent Sambo’s fishing on Sunday, his friends finally decided to apply to their master to stop him, but the master seemed rather indifferent, a
nd said that Sambo had a right to fish on Sunday if he so desired, and that that was Sambo’s own business.

  Finally the young people came to the conclusion that there was no such thing as bad luck, because Sambo was just as lucky as they were, if not more so, but the old people still clung to the idea that “bad luck would sure come to Sambo.” Time went on and Sambo’s wicked conduct continued. The old people would have nothing to do with such a sinner, while the young people, on the other hand, rather admired him, partly because he was daring, and partly because he had apparently proved that the various bad luck theories of the old people were “fogeyisms.”

  But one Sunday, when Sambo was fishing in his usual way, he sat for hours and hours and had not a single bite. He finally noticed a slight quiver of his cork and then he had a real bite. He pulled with all his might, and found it difficult to get the fish to the surface. When at last he pulled it out, he discovered that he had caught an animal such as he had never before seen. It had a head like a duck, wings like a bird, and tail like a fish, and worse than all, he had a voice like a human being, and sang the words it uttered. Sambo was frightened and dropped hook, lines, animal, and everything, and started for the house as fast as his legs could carry him. But the animal sang after him these words:

  “Come back, Sambo,

  Come back, Sambo,

  Domie ninky head, Sambo,”

  and Sambo came back.

  Then the animal sang:—

  “Pick me up, Sambo,