This text was obtained via automated optical character recognition.
It has not been edited and may therefore contain several errors.

---

my daddy as he had sent for me and she said no; you can go, but you are not taking this baby out in this kind of weather and I said Mother, he'll be wrapped up good and will be in a covered buggy, but when she put her foot down that was it and if you went against the grain, she'd have some kind of spells when she'd get mad or excited, then you'd have to work with her for a time to bring her too. She'd fall where ever she was. Her back would draw her down and I've seen her pull the bars at the head of her bed double. It was iron beds. So sure enough the next night after Christmas Jahue and Emile came to the house at twelve o'clock and called at the gate and Willie went out and they told him that Mr. Daniels had just passed away. I already knew we were going to get some kind of bad news, the same as when they came and broke the news of Loyal's drowning. Because the rooster had already notified me. One rooster would let out a long crow; then another and another for goodness knows how long. That was a warning like when Christ was crucified. When any one dies, they have a different way of crowing. Mrs. Hover said when Mr. Hover was taken sick and almost died, the roosters came up on their back door steps two or three days before he taken ill and they'd crow so long and lonesome until it would make your hair stand on end.
Here's where I reneged, never noticed I had a few more lines, so just overlook me as I'm getting senile. Would say it was my age if I didn't know better.
Many many times I've noticed them when there was real illness or a death. Some folks say that's all superstition but I'm not sure.
I'll tell you now about Volney when he was a tiny baby. When Willie and I were married and lived with his parents they never had any screened windows or doors and the mosquitoes would eat you up especially at night. We'd have to burn rags, dry cow chips and build big fires outside for the cattle and horses. They'd build a fire and then put dirt on it to smother the fire out and have a smoke. So then people were having Malaria fever something terrible. So the whole time I was carrying Volney I had fever off and on during the whole nine months. One day when Volney was about a month old and we were still living on the Orr place it was real cold, in April too, so I decided while he was asleep I'd take the wheel barrow and go aways from the house and pick up
38