dying his
lessons in Goldsmith's Abridgment of Geography; in which I noticed he
read these words:--"The United States are celebrated for the excellence
of their constitution, which provides for political liberty and
individual security. _The inhabitants are justly famed for their ardent
love of freedom._" Immediately after reading those paragraphs, he
addressed me, without knowing on what subject I was occupied, thus:
"Why, how can it be said that the inhabitants of the United States love
LIBERTY, _while they hold almost a whole nation of people in a state of
bondage and ignorance_?" I endeavoured to explain to him this puzzling
problem, by replying, that "by _the inhabitants_ was meant the _white_
population of the United States, and the liberty which they ardently
love is probably their _own_ liberty, which they appear to care more
about than they do about the liberty of _black_ men."

56. I mention this minute circumstance more particularly, because it
forms one of the links to a chain of incidents which conducted to the
development of some very important facts; such as I then had no
conception or suspicion of the existence of, on this side the Atlantic
ocean. I then supposed the instances of the streets of the city
consecrated to freedom, being paraded with people led in captivity, were
rare. But I soon ascertained that they were quite frequent, that several
hundred people, including not legal slaves only, but many kidnapped
freemen and youth bound to service for a term of years, and unlawfully
sold as slaves for life, are annually collected at Washington (as if it
were an emporium of slavery,) for transportation to the slave regions.
The United States' jail is frequently occupied as a storehouse for the
slave merchants, and some of the rooms in a tavern devoted chiefly to
that use, are occasionally so crowded that the occupants hardly have
sufficient space to extend themselves upon the floor to sleep.[18]

[Illustration: Paragraphs 57.

"... But I did not want to go, and I jump'd out of the window."]

57. A short time after having completed the memorandums above alluded
to, the youth just mentioned, having learned the subject on which I had
been occupied, and being prompt to communicate whatever he might meet
with relative to it, informed me on returning from school, in the
evening of the 19th December 1815, that a black woman, destined for
transportation to Georgia with a coffle, which was about to start,
atte