ON THE TRAIL OF NEGRO FOLK-SONGS

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	230	NEGRO FOLK-SONGS
	The Negro is not eager to work overtime, as a song heard by Professor W. H. Thomas, and included in a paper read before the Texas Folk-lore Society, will attest. Professor Thomas calls this the Skinner's Song. " Skinner is the vernacular for teamster. The Negro seldom carries a watch, but still uses the sun as a chronometer; a watch would be too suggestive of regularity. Picture to yourself several Negroes working on a levee as teamsters. About five o'clock you would hear this: SKINNER'S SONG "I looked at de sun and de sun looked high, I looked at de Cap'n and he wunk his eye; And he wunk his eye, and he wunk his eye, I looked at de Cap'n and he wunk his eye. "I looked at de sun and de sun looked red, I looked at de Cap'n and he turned his head; And he turned his head, and he turned his head, I looked at de Cap'n and he turned his head." The Cap'n here referred to is the boss, who must give the signal before the Negroes can stop work for the day. The Cap'n and the time element are brought together in another song heard by Professor Thomas, the title of which is touching in its suggestive anxiety: DonH Let Your Watch Run Down, Cafn! The struggle between love and the cruel necessities of enforced work are wailfully uttered in a song given by Evelyn Cary Williams, of Lynchburg, who took it down from the singing of Charles Calloway.