"A Night with the hants" and other Alabama folk experiences / collected and edited by Ray B. Browne ; notes by Carlos C. Drake.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Crying saddlebags -- Swinging doors -- Flying pegs -- Sheep hants -- Squalling baby -- Hant women -- Light in the house -- Casket in a light -- Ghost story -- Ringing telephone as omen -- Coffin in the road -- The alarm clock and the mule -- Changing suits -- Who wears the pants -- "You ain't no gentleman" -- The long, keen watermelon -- Naming a child -- Advantage of being cross-eyed -- Bashful courting -- Religious sects -- Backwoods music -- The fool who preferred the barn -- Jim and the roan horse -- The hawk and the buzzard

The preacher and the bear -- The preacher and the ferry -- The farmer and G.P.C. -- The frog that wanted to be big -- Jim and the warden -- The hard-headed ghost -- The Baptist and the "empire" -- The superfluous brains -- The littel boy and his papa -- Baptist vs. Methodist -- "Thank God for rabbit -- The follish prayer -- On church architecture -- Dangers of ventriloquism -- "Feuding, fighting and flirting" -- Ignorant Jews -- Danger of ignorance -- Cat fight -- Who's the dupe? -- A liar's remorse -- "Sally, Sally, oh Sally" -- Fishing for fools -- Preacher's profanity -- Thieving Baptist -- "A heap of holes -- The sel-duping liar -- Throwing the dog into the prayer meeting

Old Blue, the prize retriever -- The smart dog -- The indestructible cat I -- The indestructible cat II -- Death of Sally's husband -- Sure destination -- Mountain food -- Mountain medicine -- A matter of pronunciation -- Altering a prayer -- "Lord, please don't hit me so hard" -- Powerful fertilizer -- Irishman in the holy land -- The Irishman and the watch -- The tongue-tied girls -- New vocabulary -- Impressive vocabulary

Hair-tying at protracted meeting -- "Advance out of there backwards" -- Home-made bank -- Same old love story -- Oklahoma preacher -- With Bradford's scouts -- "Hell ain't more than half a mile away" -- Eating with the preacher -- Pulling cannon -- Caught stealing corn -- The sure cure first -- Mistake in sex -- The woman who knew everything -- Worried over future fashion -- The boy and the motorcycle -- The busted bank -- Stinging snakes sting in water -- power of the stinging snake -- The stinging snake's stinger -- Nature of the stinging snake

A true story -- The nearness of God -- The suspicious girl -- A mysterious traveler -- A trip to Texas -- "Blow the horn" -- The two fine oxen I -- Two fine oxen II -- The murrell man in 1818

Shortage of salt in Alabama in 1866-67 -- Unexplained flight -- Blood-stopper -- "Old Bob would never surrender" -- The evil son -- Music has power -- Tiger licking the children -- Disobeying the parents -- The quick-witted woman -- The bear and the baby -- Hot water and the bear -- The unfriendly neighbors -- The big alligator -- The panther -- Escaping the panther -- Escaping the mountain loin

Big fish -- Fish bait -- Ghostly sheep -- Lights as Hants -- Exploding fireball I -- Exploding fireball II -- Exploding fireball III -- Headless dog -- Light as hant -- The walking torch -- Floating ball of fire -- Light big as a hant -- Rabbit as light -- Hnat light ignored -- The murdered stepchild -- African food -- The bone-child -- Golden-haired ghost boy -- The child and the snake -- Hant reveals hidden money -- The hant with a lantern -- Hant of the Italian pedlar -- Headless man on headless horse -- The four o'clock hant -- The hanted hog pen -- "Hanta never bothered him" -- "I walked out of there pretty pyert" -- Hant looked like a blanket -- The scared ford -- The disappearing hant -- The chasing hant -- Supernatural events explained -- Phantom horses and wagon -- Four o'clock wagon -- The hant wagon -- Wagons and chains

The sitting-up corpse -- Too much fun -- The moving leg -- Gabriel and the wooer -- Gabriel and the preacher -- The devilish fiddler -- "You're going to see Jenny Jones" -- "Who are you?" -- Fun while moving coffins -- Hanted house -- The racing cat I == The racing cat II -- The race with the ghost -- The corpse potato -- In bed with a corpse -- The cured crippled boy -- The devil and the lord -- White and black ghosts -- "Run, big ghost" -- Monkey as ghost -- Witch cookings hog-eye -- The bigger cat -- "My, what a lot of cats" -- Dog on coffin -- Rabbit in a pumkin -- The soldier and the hearse driver -- "One of the little bastards flew away"

Ghost that was white and misty -- Making the ghost fall down -- Ghostly rosebushes and piano -- Hants play the piano -- Scared bu curious -- Big black booger -- Pickens county hant -- Sheep reveals hidden treasure -- Woman with the toothache -- The old sparta road -- Rising of the dead -- Negroes on Dr. Bartel's farm -- The bewitched mill -- Ghost story -- Ed Williams' experience with the ghost -- Story of a haunted house -- Story told by L and J -- "Andrew Jackson once slept in that house" -- Cats mutilate corpse -- Cat eating corpse -- The banging coffin -- Devil as black man -- Devil as dog I -- Devil as dog II

Fighting dogs as ghost -- Man as hant -- Chestnut tree as ghost -- Crazy woman as hant I -- Crazy woman as hant II -- Duck as hant -- Gander as ghost -- Goose as ghost -- Goat as ghost -- Loud noise as hant -- Mullein Bush as hant -- Rabbit tobacco as hant -- Snakes as ghost