"At de las' it stingeth like a laddah."
But I jest contended on that, sez I, "Why, ladders can't sting; it hain't their nater."
Sez he, "Dey can, for my book sez so."
"Why," sez I, "how can anything sting that hain't got any stingers?"
But he contended till I wuz wore out and thought I would put down things jest as he told me, but I spelt it onbeknown to him a-d-d-e-r, I would. That letter wuz the moralist letter that I ever see, but the curiousest, every word of it wuz took from the school book he had learnt by heart, and it ended up with "Go to the ant, thou sluggard." The curiousest love letter I ever see or expect to. But it suited Pompey, and if a bo, black or white, is suited with the letter he sends his girl, that is all that can be expected or desired. He told me to direct it to
"Priscilla Dinah Bones,
"Ole Foginnia."
And I hope it got there. I tried hard to have him tell me where in Virginia Miss Bones lived.
But he said everybody would know her, ole Foginnia wuz the place she lived in, and he wouldn't direct it anywhere else.
So I directed it Virginia, but I left off the Old, I would.
