Subject:Blinded
Entries
Entry 13091
(Yes, how the quarrel started.)
De first thing, he had a mule named Julia. When ah wuz a boy dey used to have gin house whut dey pull mill round tuh gin cotton. See. Dey didn't have dese steam gins den. Out in de country dey had eight mules to it [etc.], have de first mule heah, one on dat end, one ovah heah and one ovah dere, and den dey have two mules heah and two mules ovah dere an' ah used to dirve de mules. So his mule would bite cha an' so ah wouldn't carry his mule, so he whupped me be- cause ah wouldn't carry it fo' him. Him an' I - his boy an' I got in a fight - so ah whupped him. An' so he whupped me again.
(The father?)
Yassuh, de father - ole man Spencer whupped me. So we boys met him [son] one night an' - ah didn't hit him but ah mean de other boys [did]. An' so ah left mah cap at his house. An' mah uncle Winston tole me he'd taken dis [capl de shed of a rattlesnake and rubbed de band of mah hat [capl. An' when ah sweated...an when ah put it on mah haid, my eyes went an' ah ain't saw no mo' since.
(When did this happen?)
1904.
(And this happened up in Perry county?)
Dat's Perry County, Alabama, Scott Station.
(Got it dry and took this dust and put it in your hatband and made you blind?)
Yes.
Entry 13092
I have heard they take the toenail, or either the fingerail, but the only thing I have heard, they have took the fingernail. People have took their fingernails, you under- stand, and done used that by parching it, 'cause I have a sister, she got that on her face now. Well, this girl, she had took her fingernail. Well, her fingernail was long, and she got rattlesnake dust and she had it up under her fingernail and she was talking to my sister. And she just done thataway [demonstrates] and my sister is blind today for hit.
(She just flicked it into her eye.)
She just slipped it right into her eye and she is blind and the doctor couldn't do her no good. She's blind today and all in her she's dark and all in her [eyes?] look like heavy lipstick - all where that dust hit her in her face.