That he was a free man. What was the
consequence? It was not long before a young lady belonging to a
respectable family, was delivered of a mulatto child. On being
questioned as to the child's paternity, she stated that it was parson
Absalom's. Those interested, immediately called on him, and he frankly
confessed that he was the father of the child. Poor Absalom, he was
promoted by the church, set at liberty by his master; caressed and
eulogized by the white brethren--it was too much for him--he could not
bear it--until finally, he was "lifted up with pride," and "fell into
the condemnation of the devil." Then might the church mourn, "O
Absalom, my son! how art thou fallen." This is not an isolated case;
many similar ones fell under my observation, but I cannot stop here to
record them. In the city of Knoxville, East Tennessee, where I last
resided while in the South; there were several hundred free negroes,
and I could readily distinguish a free negro from a slave when I met
him in the street. The slaves, to use Southern parlance, looked fat,
saucy, happy and contented, while the free blacks, with a few
exceptions, had a miserable and dejected appearance. When slaves are
liberated in the South they immediately become stupid, indolent and
improvident, though they were previous to their liberation,
industrious and economical. If previous to their liberation they were
pious, they frequently become vicious; if temperate while slaves, they
often become drunkards, after they obtain their freedom; if honest,
thieves; if truthful, liars. There are exceptions, I admit, and they
are but few exceptions. These are undeniable facts--melancholy
truths--would to God that it had fallen to the lot of some one else to
record them.

I have endeavored, in the preceding pages, to show that the condition
of the slaves of the South; so far from being improved; is made worse
by emancipation under existing circumstances. Free negroes meet with
but little sympathy in the South, and with still less in the North. A
residence of a few years in the slave and also in the free States,
will satisfy anyone of the truth of this remark. Free negroes are more
odious to Northern than to Southern people. In all the varied and
multifarious relations of social life, they are told to stand aside.
Under no circumstances, social, civil or religious, can the white man
and the African, meet on terms of equality and reciprocity. They are
debarred from social inter