Browse:Elder (Volume 1, entries 2474)
Elder
Volume 1, entries 2474. Source context: THE DOCTORS AT WORK: REPORTS FROM LAYMEN → BUSINESS AND CUSTOMERS. Entries listed under this heading in the source volume.
Entries
Entry 2474
(What was that?)
I know what I used to keep 'em away from my house. You ever saw any popgun elder? You've heard talk of that? (Popgun elder?) Yes.
(Yes.)
You go in your place - if there's four ways to come to your place, your house, or it's five or it ain't but three ways that it's possible that anybody can get there, you get you some popgun elder. And you cut it five inches long, and then you cut in it five notches on that popgun elder a half an inch apart.
(On each stick?)
On each stick, and you sharpen it on the end that goes in the ground.
(Make a peg of it?)
Yes, sir. You take a piece of John de Conker root.
(You take a piece of John de Conker?)
Yes, sir.
(All right.)
You take a piece of John de Conker and you make you another peg and make a hole for each one of these pegs in the pathway - say 50 or 75 feet from your house, or maybe less, and you puts John de Conker in there first and you drive your peg in on it down in the ground where nobody can't see it. The other pegs all the same way, but if it's four, the same way and turn all the notches north.
(Turn all these notches on the stick north.)
North - turn 'em all north, [the notches] in them sticks wherever you drive 'em and the law ain't coming in there over them sticks. He ain't coming. Don't skin that popgun elder - let the skin stay on there, you see. You just cut them notches and trim it at the bottom, cut it off square at the top and drive it in these holes on top of this John de Conker, and the law ain't coming there. And that - it'll draw customers, but they'll come all roads, from all roads. And the law will pass there. But I've tried this. I've experienced that my- self for nine long months and I never was bothered with the law. And the folks was pitying me all the time that I had whiskey and that I was there, but I never was worried about it. The law met me, and I was standing out on the street, you know, and he says, "Howareya? They tell you are selling whiskey?" Told him, "No, sir. You knows well what I got in my - I wish I knew where some was." He say, "I know you are lying: Hell, a nigger always lies." He was talking about the fellow that told me [him]. I know who told him. And I never was bothered with him.
(And he was standing here on one of these pegs at the time.)
[I am not suggesting anything to the informant. While machine was turned off he added this detail. See Introduction.] Just over it - just over de peg. He just drove up in his car and stopped. [I have known the elder (Sambucus canadensis) since 1902, but this is the only time it has been called popgun elder. The reason for the name is obvious. Remove the pith and you have a blowgun, add a strong rubber band, and a cylindrical wooden peg can be shot a fair distance.]