the head for that generation of an old, exceedingly
wealthy, and highly honored family in Maryland, the possessor of a
stately mansion and one of the largest and most fertile plantations in
the State. Captain Anthony, though only the satellite of this great
man, himself owned several farms and a number of slaves. At the age of
seven Douglass was taken from the cabin of his grandmother at Tuckahoe
to his masters residence on Colonel Lloyd's plantation.

Up to this time he had never, to his recollection, seen his mother.
All his impressions of her were derived from a few brief visits made
to him at Colonel Lloyd's plantation, most of them at night. These
fleeting visits of the mother were important events in the life of the
child, now no longer under the care of his grandmother, but turned
over to the tender mercies of his master's cook, with whom he does not
seem to have been a favorite. His mother died when he was eight or
nine years old. Her son did not see her during her illness, nor learn
of it until after her death. It was always a matter of grief to him
that he did not know her better, and that he could not was one of the
sins of slavery that he never forgave.

On Colonel Lloyd's plantation Douglass spent four years of the slave
life of which his graphic description on the platform stirred humane
hearts to righteous judgment of an unrighteous institution. It is
enough to say that this lad, with keen eyes and susceptible feelings,
was an eye-witness of all the evils to which slavery gave birth. Its
extremes of luxury and misery could be found within the limits of one
estate. He saw the field hand driven forth at dawn to labor until
dark. He beheld every natural affection crushed when inconsistent with
slavery, or warped and distorted to fit the necessities and promote
the interests of the institution. He heard the unmerited strokes of
the lash on the backs of others, and felt them on his own. In the wild
songs of the slaves he read, beneath their senseless jargon or their
fulsome praise of "old master," the often unconscious note of grief
and despair. He perceived, too, the debasing effects of slavery upon
master and slave alike, crushing all semblance of manhood in the
one, and in the other substituting passion for judgment, caprice for
justice, and indolence and effeminacy for the more virile virtues of
freemen. Doubtless the gentle hand of time will some time spread
the veil of silence over this painful past; bu