hurch,--and as
handsome as my poor mother had been. She was well brought up, and had
good manners. At first, I was glad she was bought, for I had one friend
near me. I was soon sorry for it. Sir, I have stood at the door and
heard her whipped, when it seemed as if every blow cut into my naked
heart, and I couldn't do anything to help her; and she was whipped, sir,
for wanting to live a decent Christian life, such as your laws give
no slave girl a right to live; and at last I saw her chained with a
trader's gang, to be sent to market in Orleans,--sent there for
nothing else but that,--and that's the last I know of her. Well, I
grew up,--long years and years,--no father, no mother, no sister, not
a living soul that cared for me more than a dog; nothing but whipping,
scolding, starving. Why, sir, I've been so hungry that I have been glad
to take the bones they threw to their dogs; and yet, when I was a little
fellow, and laid awake whole nights and cried, it wasn't the hunger, it
wasn't the whipping, I cried for. No, sir, it was for _my mother_ and
_my sisters_,--it was because I hadn't a friend to love me on earth. I
never knew what peace or comfort was. I never had a kind word spoken to
me till I came to work in your factory. Mr. Wilson, you treated me well;
you encouraged me to do well, and to learn to read and write, and to
try to make something of myself; and God knows how grateful I am for it.
Then, sir, I found my wife; you've seen her,--you know how beautiful
she is. When I found she loved me, when I married her, I scarcely could
believe I was alive, I was so happy; and, sir, she is as good as she is
beautiful. But now what? Why, now comes my master, takes me right away
from my work, and my friends, and all I like, and grinds me down into
the very dirt! And why? Because, he says, I forgot who I was; he says,
to teach me that I am only a nigger! After all, and last of all, he
comes between me and my wife, and says I shall give her up, and live
with another woman. And all this your laws give him power to do, in
spite of God or man. Mr. Wilson, look at it! There isn't _one_ of all
these things, that have broken the hearts of my mother and my sister,
and my wife and myself, but your laws allow, and give every man power to
do, in Kentucky, and none can say to him nay! Do you call these the laws
of _my_ country? Sir, I haven't any country, anymore than I have any
father. But I'm going to have one. I don't want anything of