James Redpath, The Roving Editor: or, Talks with Slaves in the Southern States.

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[88] know how old he himself was; didn't know how many acres there were in his master's farm; did n't know what land was worth, or how mules, horses and other farm stock sold; could not read nor write; had never been at City Point, which was only three miles distant, according to his own account, although, in point of fact, it was nearer six; did not know how many slaves his owner had, or the name of the county we were in!

One item of information, however, not generally known by slaves, nor always by whites, he did possess: he did know who his father was! So he was a wise boy after all — or the proverb is rather too liberal in its scope.

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Farming Utensils.

Mr. S. walked down his farm with me in the morning. I noticed a hoe, which was heavier, at least, than half a dozen Northern ones, and asked why he made them so clumsy.

He said they were obliged to make everything heavy that negroes handled. If you gave a slave a Northern hoe or cradle in the morning, he would be sure to break it before night, and probably in less than two hours. You couldn't make them careful. Besides, he said, they preferred heavy implements; you could not get them to use an axe that was less than six pounds weight. They said that it tired them more to use a light axe or hoe.

I remembered, somewhere, to have heard of a slave who objected to the use of a light hoe, “‘kase” he grumbled, “you has to put out your strength every time you puts it down, and in a ‘Ginny hoe it goes into the ground, jest so, by its own weight.”