When I joined Fate's orchestra I weighed only one hundred and forty pounds. One day after I had been dissipating a lot I caught a cold. I asked David Jones to recommend something to cure it.
"Just get a bottle of Scott's Emulsion, and take it regularly until it is gone."
That is what I did, and within a week's time I had gained a great deal. As a matter of fact, when I got back to New Orleans I had to buy a pair of fat man's trousers. From that time on I never got back to my old fighting weight again. Of course, I got rid of that cold.
A funny thing happened on the steamer Saint Paul during an all day excursion. The boat was packed and jammed to the rafters and the band was swinging like mad. Between Alton and Quincy a young white boy made a bet with one of his buddies that he would jump off. The boy jumped and the deck hands shouted: "Man overboard. Man overboard!" Everybody ran to the side of the boat which suddenly began to list dangerously. People did not quite realize what had happened and they rushed hollering and screaming all over the ship. It was a real panic. We musicians were on the stand blowing our heads off when the captain rushed up and shouted: "Keep playing. Keep playing." We played Tiger Rag until we were blue in the face and eventually most of the people quieted down.
The kid was a good swimmer, and he had almost reached the other side of the river when the captain sent a boat crew after him. He did not want to come back, and he put up a good fight before the boat crew could pull him in. Again the passengers rushed to the side to watch the excitement and again the boat started to list. "Keep on playing. Keep on playing/' the captain continued to shout. Finally the kid was brought back and locked up. The captain and some of the crew wanted to take a poke at him, but they realized he was only a child and had him arrested when the boat reached Saint Louis.
There were often fights on board during those trips, and almost everyone working on the ship would try to stop them. But the members of the band never did. We were colored, and we knew what that meant. We were not allowed to mingle with the white guests under any circumstances. We were there to play good music for them, and that was all. However, everybody loved us and our music and treated us royally. I and some of the other musicians in the band were from the South and we understood, so we never had any hard feelings. I have always loved my white folks, and they have always proved that they loved me and my music. I have never had anything to be depressed about in that respect, only respect and appreciation. Many a time white folks have invited me and my boys to the finest meals at their homes, with the best liquor you would want to smack your chops on – liquor I could not afford to buy.
I have been fortunate in working with musicians who did not drink too much when they were working. That can certainly cause a lot of trouble. I had my first experience when I started working in big time early in life. I had no idea how bad a guy can feel after a night of lushing. I was seventeen years old when my comrades carried me home to Mayann dead drunk. She was not bored with me at all, even though I was sick. After she had wrapped cold towels with ice in them around my head she put me to bed. Then she gave me a good physic and told the kids to go home.
"The physic will clean him out real good. After he has put one of my meals under his belt in the morn ing he'll be brand new."
Sure enough, that was just what happened.
My mother was always a quick thinker when she had to help people who were seriously sick. She came from a little town in Louisiana called Butte. Her parents had all been slaves, and she had been poor all her life. She had had to learn everything the hard way. My father was a common laborer who never had anything all his life. Mayann's parents could not afford doctors, and when any of the kids was sick they would gather herbs down by the railroad tracks. After these had been boiled down, the children drank them or rubbed their bodies with them. Believe me, the cure worked like magic. The sick kid was well in a jiffy and ready to start life over again.
I was so embarrassed to have Mayann see me drunk that I apologized again and again.
"Son," she told me, "you have to live your own life. Also you have to go out into this world all by your lone self. You need all the experiences you can get. Such as what's good and what's bad. I cannot tell you these things, you've got to see them for yourself. There's nobody in this world a better judge for what's good for your life than you. I would not dare scold you for taking a few nips. Your mother drinks all the liquor she wants. And I get pretty tight sometimes. Only I know how to carry my liquor to keep from getting sick."
Then she went on to explain to me what I should do if I got the urge again. She would not make me promise never to drink; I was too young to make such a resolution.
"Son," she added, "you don't know yourself yet. You don't know what you are going to want. I'll tell you what. Suppose you and I make all the honky-tonks one night? Then I can show you how to really enjoy good liquor."
"That would be fine, mama," I said. "That would be just grand, going out with my dear mother and hav ing lots of fun together."
I felt like a real man, escorting a lady out to the swellest places in our neighborhood, the honky-tonks. All that week at work I looked forward to my night off. Then I could take Mayann out and she would show me how to hold my liquor.
Finally the night came, and I was loaded with cash. Those prosperous prostitutes who came to our joint would give us lots of tips to play different tunes for them and their "Johns." Sometimes the girls used to make their tricks give us money on general principles. The chicks liked to see their boys spend money since they could not get it for themselves all at once. Besides the chicks liked us personally.
On the night my mother and I went out cabareting we went first to Savocas' honky-tonk at Saratoga and Poydras Streets. This was the headquarters and also the pay office for the men working on the banana boats down at the levee. Lots of times I had stood in line there after working on those boats. And many times I went right in to the gambling table and lost my whole pay. But I didn't care – I wanted to be around the older fellows, the good old hustlers, pimps and musicians. I liked their language somehow.
Savocas' was known as one of the toughest joints in the world, but I had been raised in the neighborhood and its reputation did not bother me at all. Everybody knew my mother and me. Mayann used to do washing and ironing for the hustling gals and the hustlers, and they paid well. On Saturday nights hustlers loved to wear their jumpers and overalls to hustle in. The jumper is like a blue coat; overalls were like what we call dungarees. The hustlers thought this outfit brought good luck to them and their whores.
When the girls were hustling they would wear real short dresses and the very best of silk stockings to show off their fine, big legs. They all liked me because I was little and cute and I could play the kind of blues they liked. Whenever the gals had done good business they would come into the honky-tonk in the wee hours of the morning and walk right up to the bandstand. As soon as I saw them out of the corner of my eye I would tell Boogus, my piano man, and Garbee, my drummer man, to get set for a good tip. Then Boogus would go into some good old blues and the gals would scream with delight.
As soon as we got off the bandstand for a short intermission the first gal I passed would say to me: "Come here, you cute little son of a bitch, and sit on my knee."
Hmmmm! You can imagine the effect that had on a youngster like me. I got awfully excited and hot un der the collar. "I am too young," I said to myself, "to even come near satisfying a hard woman like her. She always has the best of everything. Why does she pick on me? She has the best pimps." (I always felt inferior to the pimps.)