Page:Lyrics of Lowly Life Dunbar (1896).djvu/230



Hit 'ad fiah in it, mind you; well, I thought my soul I 'd bust,

Tried my best to keep fom laffin', but hit seemed like die I must!

Y' ought to seen dat man a-scramblin' f'om de ashes an' de grime.

Did it bu'n him! Sich a question, why he did n't give it time;

Th'ow'd dem ashes and dem cindahs evah which-a-way I guess,

An' you nevah did, I reckon, clap yo' eyes on sich a mess;

Fu' he sholy made a picter an' a funny one to boot,

Wif his clothes all full o' ashes an' his face all full o' soot.

Well, hit laked to stopped de pahty, an' I reckon lak ez not

Dat it would ef Tom's wife, Mandy, had n't happened on de spot,

To invite us out to suppah—well, we scrambled to de table,