Subject:Yellow
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Entry 726
Once a young man dat love a gurl an' anothah boy done love dis gurl too, an' de othah [first boy] wus, yo' see, hol'in [holding] de bes' han' wit de gurl, an' he [second boy] put down a root down to dis [first boy's] do'step. It wus a snake, somepin fixed like a snake in a sack [this is a hand] undahneat' de do'- step; it wus a root like a snake, it jis' wus a little long thing imitate a snake. An' dat wus in de mawnin' early dat de young man walk out, an' he walk ovah it an' a pain take 'im, you know, in his laig an' he couldn't walk. An' he try all doctahs on it an' no doctah couldn't do 'im no good. His laig wus start tuh swollen. An' dey went an' git a root doctor an' car'ed a woman [to him] an' de woman tole it, she say, "Ain't choo go wit a gurl?" De young man said, "Yes 'am." She says, "Well," she says, "you is fixed." She says, "Dey got a hand on yo' tuh keep yo' from walkin' tuh go tuh see dis gurl.' She says, "Now, yo' come on now an' I'm gon'a care [take] yo' tuh de very spot dis hand wus put down fer yo'." An' she tuk de hoe an' she went undahneat' de do'step an' she dig up, an' when she dig it wus somepin imitate a snake tied up in a sack. An' she tuk it out [the sack] an' show it to de family. Aftah dat de boy wus ease, he git bettah.
(What did they do with the root?)
Put it in a glass of watah. An' kep' it three days an' ever' time he looked at it - the watah turned yellah sometime, an' it turned green sometime, an' it turned red sometime. An' it keep on like dat until, yo' know, dey git tired of lookin' at it an' throw it out. "
Entry 2236
Git two rattlesnake marster.
(Get two rattlesnake masters?)
Uh-huh. Dey grow in de woods and you put one on one side of yo' do' and one on de other side, and jes' say, "In de Name of the Father, Son an' Holy Ghost, I hope dey won't come." An' he won't come either.
(That is if the law was coming or the rent man?)
Yes.
(Now what does rattlesnake master look like?)
It's a lily - looks kinda like a lily. It grows in de woods.
(Has a flower on it?)
Yes, suh, it has a yellah flow'r and when yo' see one it looks jes' like a snake's mouth.
Entry 8584
They get yore handwritin' wit yore proper name signed to it. They vill reverse it, see. They will take dat name what yo' signed to dat an' they will put it on de bottom of a wick in a lamp wit different colors. They won't take a plain lamp cause de party may visit they house an' they will see dat in there an' wants to know what for. Get a lamp wit a blue bottom, or yellow, or different colors, so it can't be seen through it - it won't be transparent no way yo' kin see it, see. An' they'll pin dat [hand- oriting] at de bottom of de wick, an' they'll burn it slow, slow, slow - con- tinually. Dat's if yo' away from home. Dat will draw yo' back. Ah have saw it plenty of time, fellows dat's been off dataway an' had position, not no job, an' they would just give up at once an' go on back home - not doing a thing. Burn continually and slowly. An' as it burn, yo' understan', yore mind will refer back home an' finally yo' jest get on back home.
Entry 181
Ah know dey say yo' could throw a brass pin in dere an' yo' see de devil - a lil' brass safety pin. Ah know yo' seen dese lil' yellow pins. (You throw it into the whirlwind and you'll see the devil.)
Entry 2807
Yo' takes 'em, yellah ones - yo' takes 'em an' burns 'em. An' in dose candles be's a number an' in dat number, might say 25 or 12 or 11, whatsomever it may be, why den they. takes dat an'. plays it on bolito game. All right, den de scent from dat, dat's luck in yore home. Dat keeps de officer - dere's something else yo' burn wlt it - whenever dey come in dey can't stand dat scent.
(Keeps officers away.)
Entry 3602
Now an' den wit 'er.
(What will that do?)
She be layin' down wit 'im an' she have her a piece of yellah cotton.
(Yellow cotton?)
Yes. An' when she go wit 'im, she wipe 'im, she wipe 'im wit it. She takes dis yellah cotton, make nine knots in it, an' put it in de cornah of 'er mat- tress - sew it up in de mattress. He can't git a heart fo' nobody.
Entry 10113
You get hold of a cat to do different things with. You can use a - take a cat, a black cat. You take a black cat and you kill the black cat. And you kill this black cat, you boil it. And you take a bone from him after you boil 'em. You boil 'em until every bit of the meat [here, having heard this much many times, I stopped recording. The words "round bone" restarted machine].
(You get that round bone, you say?)
Yes, sir. (Any kind of a - you mean a bone like the tip of your finger, or it's round that way?)
[Here I may have demonstrated a circle.]
Yes, sir.
(Then do you do anything with that bone?)
I'll cut four corners in it.
[Informant must have gone through motions of filing.]
(Then you file those?)
I'd file the sides, make it good and round. I don't want no rough edges, no corners on it at all. (Oh, I see, you round each end of that round bone?) Yes, sir. (I see.) Then I... [pauses]. (Then what do you do?) Then I'm going to cut it. You see, I cut it [demon- strates] thisaway; cut it like that, and then disaway. (Make four notches in it?) Four notches on each end. Now, when I get them four notches in this bone, I take - well, I get me a piece of silk thread. See, I get silk thread and I'm going to wrap that bone thisaway nine times into them notches. (Now, this bone is like the little stick that you wrap your fishing cord around?) Yes, sir.
(You have the notches - the notches don't run round the [thickness of the]
bone, but it [the notch] goes out to the end [the length] of the bone.) My notches come on the end, you see, and my notches set like this [demon- strates]. See, I got four notches on each end.
(I see, go ahead.)
See, the notches cut in the bone cross the two ends thisaway, see [demon- strates]. Well, I'm using this bone different. I'm going to wrap this bone thisaway [demonstrates]. (You only have two notches in that bone, in the end of that round - it's like a cross [+] on each end of the bone?) Yes, sir.
(0r like grooves, one groove across the other one.)
Yes, sir. They cross.
(That makes four grooves?)
Yeah, four grooves.
(All right.)
Well, I'll take and use silk thread; see, blue or pink. I take and I cross it this way for nine times. I wrap it for nine times thataway and then I come back nine times thisaway. I gets me [I interrupt to annote]. (You wrap the thread nine times around one of those notches at each end and you turn around like that and wrap it nine times through the other notches in the opposite end?) You see, I'm wrapping it by the straight...
(I understand that.)
Jest come down straight thisaway, not thisaway.
(I understand.)
Thisaway. And I get me - after I wrap it around that bone, I get the thread around the bone thataway, I go and I get me some of this war powder. I'll get me war powder and with this powder that I'll scrape off of this bone, I'm going to mix that together, see. I lay this bone into a piece of silk paper.
(What kind of paper?)
Silk.
(Silk paper.)
Silk paper, see. And I lay that bone in there and I gets me one of these small candles. Small candles. You know them little bit of yellow candles. They are about three for a nickel.
(How high are they?)
They little bit of candles about this [high].
(Oh, just small candles. All right.)
Little small candles, about little bit bigger than a match stick. They about that long. Get you one of those - three, I mean. And I'm going to lay two - one on each side of this thing - this bone, you see. But I'm going to lay it in a Way, I'm going to put it in a frame-like, but it ain't going to burn, and I'm going to light them candles. Light all three of them, but I'm going to light two here and I'm going to light one on the top.
(You have these candles in a triangular form, and the bone's inside the form?)
In the center. I lights those and now when I lights these, I let 'em burn. I light 'em at twelve o'clock in the day. Every day for twelve o'clock - no more, no less. I light 'em at twelve an' let 'em burn 'till about twelve-thirty, see. Twelve- thirty, if the work ain't done, I put 'em out, an' the next day I light 'em at twelve-thirty. And then for about three or six days, whatsomever I'm after, it's got to come in the six days. In the sixth day I get whatsomever I'm after. (Here's your - now, let me talk. Here's your cat bone - it's round like that. [I should have given description!] You file off both ends and you make the both ends round. Then you make a groove, you put a cross on top of the groove. At each end make a groove. Then you wrap the thread nine times around this way and nine times around that way - just like you wrap fishing tackle.) That's right.
(All right.)
Entry 9930
And then you kin take, ah - now this is self experience. Not for my- self but when I was a kid growing up; I guess round about fourteen, twelve, thir- teen, fourteen years. See, I was raised in the country and worked on a farm. My father died when I was small in 1903 and nothin' but a woman raised me. My mother and I didn't have anything, she and me had to work. Well, this was a ageable [elderly] nan and he was able to pay high wages for, you know, a full-grown man and he'd work lotsa children, you see. You see, where those large farmers didn't bother with we children, he'd work us in turnin' [sweet potato] vines and settin' out his potatoes like that. And this was a green frog. It's not a bullfrog. It's between a toadfrog and a bullfrog. I expect you've seen him. He's green and has those black specks on his back. It's long-legged though. Some say eventually after they get old they turn to a bullfrog. But he used to ketch those frogs and he'd tell we children to catch 'em. But if he didn't tell us to ketch, we could ketch 'em. But he'd tell us to ketch 'em and we would ketch 'em and he'd put it in his pocket and it wouldn't jump out. And he said you take those frogs and put it up in a bottle and make your wish. And set him on de stove and dry him out and take that and do anything you want to do with it. Well, of course, dis man I knew was pretty good and he always seemed to be lucky. He tolt another girl and I one day - we was pretty good in settin' out potatoes. So he asked us to ketch every one of those frogs that we could see. See, we'd have to go to the ditch to dip out water, you know, to water those sprouts that was planted there. So we come to him, we asked him. "Well, '' he says, "Well, I'll tell you-all something if you'll [not] tell." Ah says, "Well, What's that?" Ah says, "Never is a long time." He says, "Well, if you-all want those boys you going with," he say, "why go ahead and marry 'em, '' says, ''but I'll tell you, '' says, "Viola," says,"'this boy you going with, '' he says, ''he ain't goin' make you any good husband at all." Says, "They is fast, but you get these little spring frogs, you see, these little green frogs where you kin squeeze 'em and they goes way up into water." He says, "You catch every one of those you Kin find." He says, '"If you all have a fig bush, you kin get plenty of 'em in there." And he says, "And you get that frog," he says, "and put him in a box ad make your wish." And he says, "And set him in de stove or onto the back of the stove." He says, "In a small can like a five-cent or ten-cent baking-pouder box [can] where you kin close it up. Put him in there alive," he say and he Bys, "you doesn't open him in nine days," he says, "but each day make your wish for this man." He says, "When you open that frog, '' he says, "you have you a piece of yellow cotton. Go to the store and buy you five-cent piece of yellow Cotton, or you might buy two or three cents worth if you kin get it." Three oeats worth - that was during wartime [World War I] - was just about as wide as yoar chin[?]. He says, "And make you a little bag and make it four corners, ' be says, "jis' so it won't be anything but the form of the frog." He says, "Sew all that dust in there," he says, "and you'll always have good luck, and get any man you want and go anywhere you want to." And ah know hr made it for real. She really did it. An' she came there and she bought five dollars worth of figs when she got one of those frogs. We [man informant worked for] had a large fig orchard, and she come there and threw the money down. [Elizabeth City, N. Car., (438), 391:5+].
Entry 2904
If a person leave an' yo' want 'em back, yo' burn dat candle and yo' burn sulphur. Yo' take a bran'-new box, jes' a five-cent box of sulphur, and yo' take a little piece of newspaper and yo' light dat piece of newspaper. And yo' call de person name and jes' dip yore hand in dere [the box] three times; and call dere name and while de paper be burning, yo' put dat sulphur in dere [burning paper]. Yo' know sulphur flames up like yellah, makes a different color. Drop it down dere three times and call dere name. Make a wish and burn dat sulphur three time a day. An' when dat sulphur be burning on and dose candles continously burning, dat 11 bring 'em back toward yo'.