a great favorite on the place.

He was a tall, handsome black fellow, with white teeth and bright eyes,
and he could play the fiddle and pick the banjo, and knock the bones and
cut the pigeon-wing, and, besides all that, he was the best hoe-hand,
and could pick more cotton than any other negro on the plantation. He
had amused himself by courting and flirting with all of the negro girls;
but at last he had been caught himself by pretty Candace, one of the
house-maids, and a merry dance she had led him.

She had kept poor Jim six long months on the rack. First she'd say she'd
marry him, and then she'd say she wouldn't (not that she ever really
_meant_ that she wouldn't), for she just wanted to torment him; and she
succeeded so well that Jim became utterly wretched, and went to his
master to know "ef'n he couldn't make dat yaller gal 'have herse'f."

But his master assured him it was a matter that he had nothing on earth
to do with, and even told Jim that it was but fair that he, who had
enjoyed flirting so long, should now be flirted with.

However, one evening his mistress came upon the poor fellow sitting on
the creek bank looking very disconsolate, and overheard him talking to
himself.

"Yes, sar!" he was saying, as if arguing with somebody. "Yes, sar, by
rights dat nigger gal oughter be beat mos' ter deff, she clean bodder de
life out'n me, an' marster, he jes' oughter kill dat nigger. I dunno
w'at makes me kyar so much er bout'n her no way; dar's plenty er
likelier gals 'n her, an' I jes' b'lieve dat's er trick nigger; anyhow
she's tricked me, sho's yer born; an' ef'n I didn't b'long ter nobody,