§ 84 The Simplest of Remedies
In Owen county, Ky., there formerly resided a self-ordained oracle on all questions pertaining to subjects of farming, horse raising and hog guessing. To him one day, as he sat on a horse block facing the public square at Owenton, came a pestered young husbandman from the knobs along the Kentucky River with this question:
“Uncle Hamp, how am I going to get shet of sassafras sprouts? The pesky dern things have jest about took an old field of mine. I’ve tried choppin’ em out and plowin’ ’em under and burnin’ ’em over, but they keep on gittin’ thicker and thicker all the time. It seems I can’t git rid of ’em noway. Whut would you advise?”
“My son,” said the wise man, “I don’t want to brag, but I reckon you ain’t made no mistake in comin’ to me—you’ve struck on to one man that’s fitten to advise you in this here matter ef anybody on this earth is. Man and boy, I’ve been givin’ the subject of sassafras sprouts my earnest attention fur goin’ on sixty years. And it’s my deliberatic judgment that when sassafras sprouts starts to takin’ a farm the only way you kin git rid of ’em is jest to pack up and move off and leave ’em.”