origin of dese dem dose in NYCE

[George Thompson]

Here's a tidbit you won't find on pushcarts:

     [a dandy is jostled into an "old fat black woman;" she says:] Wat de
debbel you mean by dat, hey; why'nt you knock agin your own color, hey?
mus'nt tink to bang gin me wen you like; I'll give you jab side de head nex
time you doot.  (21)

[a mutton-pie man, with a German (Jewish?) accent:] Shentlemens, I peg your
pardon, but dish plame crowd won't shtir a pit.  (29)
*Sports of New-York.  By Simon Snipe.  Containing An Evening at the African
Theatre.  Also A Trip to the Races!  With Two Appropriate Songs*.  New
York, 1823, pp. 17-32

The only known copy of this gem is at the N-Y Historical Society.  The
scene is, first, on the ferryboat from the city to Long Island, then on the
road to the racetrack.

GAT

--
George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much since then.

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