Oh, yes, he remembered the war; he was a slave,
twenty-one years old, when it broke out. To his mind, the present
generation of "niggers" were a pretty poor lot, for all their
"edication." He had seen them crowding folks off the sidewalk, and
puffing smoke in their faces. All of which was nothing new; I had found
that story more or less common among negroes of his age. He didn't
believe much in "edication;" but when I asked if he thought the blacks
were better off in slavery times, he answered quickly, "I'd rather be a
free man, _I_ had." He wasn't married; he had plenty to do to take care
of himself. We separated, he going one way and I the other; but he
turned to ask, with much seriousness (the reader must remember that this
was only three months after a national election), "Do you think they'll
get free trade?" "Truly," said I to myself, "'the world is too much with
us.' Even in the flat-woods there is no escaping the tariff question."
But I answered, in what was meant to be a reassuring tone, "Not yet
awhile. Some time." "I hope not," he said,--as if liberty to buy and
sell would be a dreadful blow to a man living in a shanty in a Florida
pine barren! He was taking the matter rather too much to heart, perhaps;
but surely it was encouraging to see such a man interested in broad
economical questions, and I realized as never before the truth of what
the newspapers so continually tell us, that political campaigns are
educational.
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