Old Josh, in: Remembering Lick’Idy Luke Slim
(1903, Josh telling a story to Silas that took place just after the Civil War)
Old Josh, 100-years old, sat on his porch, laughing, and Silas comes up and stares at his old papa, wondering what the heck in going on, it is the spring of 1903, and because it’s spring, he remembers a girl down in shantytown, named Spring, says Josh,
“Sit on down son, be-fer the day gits on to bein’ sunset, eyes goin’ to tell yaw bout Lick’Idy Luke Sim (and in my better English, I shall tell it as Josh told it to Silas :)
●
It was back in ’46, Lick’Idy, as he was called, came up from the Florida swamps, those marshes you call the Everglades, he rode in on a mare to Ozark, then onto shantytown, I was there with Amos at the time, both of us fixing to sell our homemade moonshine, and here comes this stranger into our Alabama shantytown, I tell you I laughed a mile high when I saw him, he wore a rainbow colored weskit and pigeon-tailed coat and a fox-tailed hat that shined as if he were Davy Crockett himself, on his way to congress, oh we all thought he was mad for the moment, but he was more cleaver than mad.
He was white man in his lat 30s, had long wavy hair, a long picked nose, a big smile, and his teeth were large and white, a thin neck, and a tone to his muscles.
He looked pretty an a Christmas tree all let up on Christmas Day, or even prettier than a steamboat coming down the Mississippi, all decked out, tooting its horn.
He was looking for a wife to take back to the Everglades, down in Florida.
When he had stopped it the township of Ozark, it was just to freshen up a bit, before heading on to Shantytown. They say he blew into his harmonica all the way to Shantytown, some three miles outside the township.
Amos was standing there along side the dirt road, with his friend Josh, with four jugs of moonshine, they had been trying to sell for Granny Mae, and would keep half the profit. When Josh and Amos first caught sight of the stranger, they didn’t know if they should laugh, cry or ask how was business, thinking he was selling something also.
The tall thin white man, pulled out a horn from behind his saddle, said to Josh, “Fill it up with that corn whiskey, and let me know how much,” Josh pulled the cork off the jug, filled the horn up, and said, “Two bits stranger,” and he threw Josh a silver coin, said, “My name’s Lick’Idy Luke Slim, I’m aiming to find me a wife, if youall don’t mind?”
Josh and Amos were so stunned at the man, they just stood there mouth open, and silent, Josh putting the coin in his pocket. Then all of a sudden there was a crowd around him.
“Im goin’ to make youall a suggestion” said Lick’Idy Luke Slim, to the crowd about him, looking at a particular lovely Negress, I see a woman I wants for me wife…”
Said Josh before he could finish his sentence,
“You in the wrong place stranger, you best be headed back to Ozark—that away,” Josh pointed his arm and hand behind him.
There was twenty or more town’s folks standing about, said Lick’Idy with a happy grin,
“Im a bit, white, black and Cherokee Indian, and I wants a woman that is as brown as a dark mushroom, soft as a rabbit, and who was taught to cook well, from the day she waz born, and I give $200-dollars in gold fer her, and challenge anyone here to a cockfight over her…” and he pulled out a wild looking cock from his saddle bag, and he saw who he wanted, a young black girl, perhaps seventeen or eighteen, with a tall black man, twice her age…!
“I reckon I’ll take that one there, she looks like a pretty fox,” pointing at Asbury, but the tall bulky back man said,
“She’s my wife,” and someone behind him said, “And she is his second cousin, and they aint married, jes’ he like her so he support her, her mamma done left her long go,” the bulky man turned about, said, “Shut your mouth, put a lip-lock on that mouth, ole lady, you is nothin’ to her!”
“A cockfight you say, haw mister?” said Burly Sam.
“Well,” said Lick’Idy, “´We all can disburse that idea if these here coins will satisfy youall?” and he threw a pouch of gold coins on the ground near his feet, some fell out of the pouch.
“Whut den happened Pa!” said Silas to Old Josh,
“Whut you think happened?” said Josh, adding “he done grabbed the money up so fast, that he never noticed that little girl jumping up on Lick’Idy’s horse faster than a cat after a mouse and said,
“Git on a-goin’ be-fer he changes his mind,” and they were gone out of shantytown faster than a hundred bees after a bear.”
Note: written in the morning of 12-9-2008 “Old Josh, in: Lick’Idy Luke Slim” in my apartment in Huancayo, Peru.
(Episode 77, written the morning of December 9, 2008)
Old Josh, 100-years old, sat on his porch, laughing, and Silas comes up and stares at his old papa, wondering what the heck in going on, it is the spring of 1903, and because it’s spring, he remembers a girl down in shantytown, named Spring, says Josh,
“Sit on down son, be-fer the day gits on to bein’ sunset, eyes goin’ to tell yaw bout Lick’Idy Luke Sim (and in my better English, I shall tell it as Josh told it to Silas :)
●
It was back in ’46, Lick’Idy, as he was called, came up from the Florida swamps, those marshes you call the Everglades, he rode in on a mare to Ozark, then onto shantytown, I was there with Amos at the time, both of us fixing to sell our homemade moonshine, and here comes this stranger into our Alabama shantytown, I tell you I laughed a mile high when I saw him, he wore a rainbow colored weskit and pigeon-tailed coat and a fox-tailed hat that shined as if he were Davy Crockett himself, on his way to congress, oh we all thought he was mad for the moment, but he was more cleaver than mad.
He was white man in his lat 30s, had long wavy hair, a long picked nose, a big smile, and his teeth were large and white, a thin neck, and a tone to his muscles.
He looked pretty an a Christmas tree all let up on Christmas Day, or even prettier than a steamboat coming down the Mississippi, all decked out, tooting its horn.
He was looking for a wife to take back to the Everglades, down in Florida.
When he had stopped it the township of Ozark, it was just to freshen up a bit, before heading on to Shantytown. They say he blew into his harmonica all the way to Shantytown, some three miles outside the township.
Amos was standing there along side the dirt road, with his friend Josh, with four jugs of moonshine, they had been trying to sell for Granny Mae, and would keep half the profit. When Josh and Amos first caught sight of the stranger, they didn’t know if they should laugh, cry or ask how was business, thinking he was selling something also.
The tall thin white man, pulled out a horn from behind his saddle, said to Josh, “Fill it up with that corn whiskey, and let me know how much,” Josh pulled the cork off the jug, filled the horn up, and said, “Two bits stranger,” and he threw Josh a silver coin, said, “My name’s Lick’Idy Luke Slim, I’m aiming to find me a wife, if youall don’t mind?”
Josh and Amos were so stunned at the man, they just stood there mouth open, and silent, Josh putting the coin in his pocket. Then all of a sudden there was a crowd around him.
“Im goin’ to make youall a suggestion” said Lick’Idy Luke Slim, to the crowd about him, looking at a particular lovely Negress, I see a woman I wants for me wife…”
Said Josh before he could finish his sentence,
“You in the wrong place stranger, you best be headed back to Ozark—that away,” Josh pointed his arm and hand behind him.
There was twenty or more town’s folks standing about, said Lick’Idy with a happy grin,
“Im a bit, white, black and Cherokee Indian, and I wants a woman that is as brown as a dark mushroom, soft as a rabbit, and who was taught to cook well, from the day she waz born, and I give $200-dollars in gold fer her, and challenge anyone here to a cockfight over her…” and he pulled out a wild looking cock from his saddle bag, and he saw who he wanted, a young black girl, perhaps seventeen or eighteen, with a tall black man, twice her age…!
“I reckon I’ll take that one there, she looks like a pretty fox,” pointing at Asbury, but the tall bulky back man said,
“She’s my wife,” and someone behind him said, “And she is his second cousin, and they aint married, jes’ he like her so he support her, her mamma done left her long go,” the bulky man turned about, said, “Shut your mouth, put a lip-lock on that mouth, ole lady, you is nothin’ to her!”
“A cockfight you say, haw mister?” said Burly Sam.
“Well,” said Lick’Idy, “´We all can disburse that idea if these here coins will satisfy youall?” and he threw a pouch of gold coins on the ground near his feet, some fell out of the pouch.
“Whut den happened Pa!” said Silas to Old Josh,
“Whut you think happened?” said Josh, adding “he done grabbed the money up so fast, that he never noticed that little girl jumping up on Lick’Idy’s horse faster than a cat after a mouse and said,
“Git on a-goin’ be-fer he changes his mind,” and they were gone out of shantytown faster than a hundred bees after a bear.”
Note: written in the morning of 12-9-2008 “Old Josh, in: Lick’Idy Luke Slim” in my apartment in Huancayo, Peru.
(Episode 77, written the morning of December 9, 2008)
posted by Dennis and Rosa Siluk at 2:52 PM
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