160 THE TIM BUNKEK PAPERS. 



. 48. TIM BUNKER ON SEED. 



&quot; Where you get de seed of dem big beets you raise last 

 year, Massa Bunker ? &quot; said Jim Baker to me this morn 

 ing. &quot; Never seed sich beets down South in all my life. 

 Reckon dey come from Africa, or somewhere dey git up 

 airly in de morning.&quot; 



&quot; No, Jim, I got them from New York, where they lie 

 abed badly in the morning, I am sorry to say. Half of 

 them don t get their breakfast till nine o clock.&quot; 



&quot; Can t be, Massa. Must have come from some place 

 close by sunrise, or dey never growed so big. I watch 

 em last summer, and I declare fur sartin, I th ot dey never 

 would stop growin.&quot; 



Jim Baker, though he has been with us but two or three 

 years, is one of the institutions of Hookertown, as much 

 so as Mr. Spooner, or the school-master. He was liberated 

 by his master, a few years ago, with all the rest of the 

 negroes upon the estate, and sent out to Liberia. He had 

 made himself useful upon the plantation as cooper, in pre 

 paring sugar and molasses casks. He went out to Liberia, 

 with rather elevated notions of that land of promise, and 

 of the freedom he was there to enjoy. Feeling rather 

 above digging for a living, and not finding much demand 

 for a cooper s labors in that new country, he became home 

 sick, and took the first vessel bound for the States. Some 

 of his shipmates hailed from this place, and Jim brought 

 up here, and considers himself settled for life. He takes 

 naturally to gardening, and often excites the envy of Jake 

 Frink, by beating him on garden sauce, and a rude kind 

 of joking, which Jake calls &quot;sassy&quot; Jim takes note of 

 all the best gardens, as he goes round doing odd jobs 

 among the villagers, and is an appreciative beggar of good 

 seeds. He turns up the white of his eyes at an extra sized 



