The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1896-1929, 1904-03-24
THAR is More In the Man Than
Thar Is in the Land"

| Progressive Farmer.
OF all our Southern poets, not one
save Edgar Allen Poe ranks 80 high as
Sidney Lanier. It is for his exquisite
serious productions, however, that he
is famous, while his dialect poems
many of them gems of their klnd-are |
little known. Here is one that We cop |
led from complete edition of his
works and reprinted in The Progressive
Farmer two or three years ago. 1t
strikes us that just now while plans for
a new crop year are being laid, this lit |
tie story of Mr.. Jones, of the county Of
Jones, is one that the average farmer
can study with profit
I knowed man, which he lived in
Jones,
Which Jones is county of red hills
and stones,
And he lived pretty much by gittin' OF
| loane,
And his mules was nothin' but skin
and bones,
And his hogs was as flat as his corn
bread pones,
And he had bout thousand acres Of
land.
This man-which bis name it was
also Jones
He swore that he'd leave them old red
hills and stones,
Fur he couldn't make nOthin' but yal-
lerish cotton,
And little o. that. and his fences was
rotten,
And what little corn he had hit was
/ boughton,
And dinged eff a livin' was in the land
And the more he ewore the madden he
got,
And he rfz and he walked to the
!: stable lot,
And he hollered to Tom to come thar
and hitch
Fur to emigrate somewhat whar land
i. was rich,
} And to quit raisin' cock-burrs, thist!es
and SIGH,
And a-wastin' Their time on the cussed
lan1.
So him and Tom they hitched up the
mules,
Pertestlng tina: folks was mighty big
+ fools
That 'ud stay In Georgy Their life
time out,
Just ecatchin' livin', when all OF
'em mought
+ Get places in Texas where cotton
n would sprout
Byka time you could plant 1t in the
land.
4 And he driv by house whar a man
named Brown,
Was alvin not far from the edge o.
town,
And he bantered Brown fer to buy
o his Ilace,
And he said that bein' as money was
scace,
= And helm as sheriffs was hard to face.
8 Two dollars an acre would git the land.
They closed at dollar and fifty cents,
And Jones he bought him q Vaughn
i and tents,
r And loaded his corn and wimmen and
q truck
n And moved to Texas, which it tuck
His entire pile with the best of luck,
To git thar and git little land.
/. And Brown moved out on the old
Q Jones farm,
Y And he rolled up his breeches and
barred his arm,
t And he picked all the rocks from off n
c the groun',
= And he rooted it up and he plowed il
n down,
Q Then he sowed his corn and his wheat
r in the land.
Five years Gid by, and Brown, one day
(Which he'd got so fat that he WOULDN'T
al weigh,
Was sittln' down sorter lazily,
To the bulliest dinner you ever did see
g When one of his children jumped or
his knee
: And says, "Yan's Jones, which yor
bought his land.''
And thar was Jones, standing out OF
the fence,
And he had no Vaughn, nor mules mol
tents,
!, Fur he had left Texas a-foot and cum
To Georgy to rec il he couldn't cit sun
& Employment and he was lookln as hum
S B Q rs if he had never owned any land
+, But Brown he asked him in and he so
= Him down to his vittles smokin' hot.
And when he had filled hisself and
the floor
/ Brown looked at him sharp and RI,
p and swore
That whether mems land was rich q,
poor
5 Thar was more in the man than tina,
{ was in the land"