s soon as possible. In
conversing with mother, I found her unwilling to make the attempt to
reach a land of liberty, but she counselled me to get my liberty if I
could. She said, as all her children were in slavery, she did not wish
to leave them. I could not bear the idea of leaving her among those
pirates, when there was a prospect of being able to get away from them.
After much persuasion, I succeeded in inducing her to make the attempt
to get away.

The time fixed for our departure was the next night. I had with me a
little money that I had received, from time to time, from gentlemen for
whom I had done errands. I took my scanty means and purchased some dried
beef, crackers and cheese, which I carried to mother, who had provided
herself with a bag to carry it in. I occasionally thought of my old
master, and of my mission to the city to find a new one. I waited with
the most intense anxiety for the appointed time to leave the land of
slavery, in search of a land of liberty.

The time at length arrived, and we left the city just as the clock
struck nine. We proceeded to the upper part of the city, where I had
been two or three times during the day, and selected a skiff to carry us
across the river. The boat was not mine, nor did I know to whom it did
belong; neither did I care. The boat was fastened with a small pole,
which, with the aid of a rail, I soon loosened from its moorings. After
hunting round and finding a board to use as an oar, I turned to the
city, and bidding it a long farewell, pushed off my boat. The current
running very swift, we had not reached the middle of the stream before
we were directly opposite the city.

We were soon upon the Illinois shore, and, leaping from the boat, turned
it adrift, and the last I saw of it, it was going down the river at good
speed. We took the main road to Alton, and passed through just at
daylight, when we made for the woods, where we remained during the day.
Our reason for going into the woods was, that we expected that Mr.
Mansfield (the man who owned my mother) would start in pursuit of her as
soon as he discovered that she was missing. He also knew that I had been
in the city looking for a new master, and we thought probably he would
go out to my master's to see if he could find my mother, and in so
doing, Dr. Young might be led to suspect that I had gone to Canada to
find a purchaser.

We remained in the woods during the day, and as soon as darkness
overshado