He appeared to be pleased at that, but cautioned me to tell him the
truth, and asked me how long I stayed away, when I run off?

I told him that I was gone a month.

He assented to this by a bow of his head, and making a long grunt
saying, "That's right, tell me the truth like a good boy."

The whole truth was that I had been off in the state of Ohio, and
other free states, and even to Canada; besides this I was notorious
for running away, from my boyhood.

I never told him that I had been a runaway longer than one
month--neither did I tell him that I had not run away more than once
in my life; for these questions he never asked me.

I afterwards found him to be one of the basest hypocrites that I ever
saw. He looked like a saint--talked like the best of slave holding
Christians, and acted at home like the devil.

When he saw my wife and child, he concluded to buy us. He paid for me
twelve hundred dollars, and one thousand for my wife and child. He
also bought several other slaves at the same time, and took home with
him. His residence was in the parish of Claiborn, fifty miles up from
the mouth of Red River.

When we arrived there, we found his slaves poor, ragged, stupid, and
half-starved. The food he allowed them per week, was one peck of corn
for each grown person, one pound of pork, and sometimes a quart of
molasses. This was all that they were allowed, and if they got more
they stole it.

He had one of the most cruel overseers to be found in that section of
country. He weighed and measured out to them, their week's allowance
of food every Sabbath morning. The overseer's horn was sounded two
hours before daylight for them in the morning, in order that they
should be ready for work before daylight. They were worked from
daylight until after dark, without stopping but one half hour to eat
or rest, which was at noon. And at the busy season of the year, they
were compelled to work just as hard on the Sabbath, as on any other
day.

CHAPTER X.

_Cruel treatment on Whitfield's farm--Exposure of the children--Mode
of extorting extra labor--Neglect of the sick--Strange medicine
used--Death of our second child._

My first impressions when I arrived on the Deacon's farm, were that he
was far more like what the people call the devil, than he was like a
deacon. Not many days after my arrival there, I heard the Deacon tell
one of the slave girls, that he had bought her for a wife for his boy
Stephen, whi