very way, but they
retained him as long as it was possible to do so, and bore with him
patiently, as no one else would have him. Mrs. Weld frequently allowed
him to hire out for four or five hours a day to husk corn, etc., and
was glad to give him this opportunity to earn something extra while
she did his work at home. In short, wherever and whenever they could
testify to their convictions of duty on this point, it was done
unhesitatingly and zealously, without fear or favor of any man. We
might consider the incidents I have related, and a dozen similar ones
I could give, as evidence only of a desire to perform a religious
duty, to manifest obedience to the command to do as they would be done
by, while beneath still lay the bias of early training sustained by
the almost universal feeling concerning the inferiority of the negro
race. With people of such pure religious dedication, and such exalted
views, it was perhaps not difficult to treat their ex-slaves as human
beings, and the fact that they did so may not excite much wonder. But
there came a time, then far in their future, when the sincerity of
their convictions upon this matter of prejudice was most triumphantly
vindicated.

Such a vindication even they, with all their knowledge of the hidden
evils of slavery, never dreamed could ever be required of _them_, but
the manner in which they met the tremendous test was the crowning
glory of their lives. In all the biographies I have read, such a
manifestation of the spirit of Jesus Christ does not appear. This will
be narrated in its proper place.

Happy as the sisters were in their home, it must not be supposed that
they had settled down to a life of ease and contented privacy,
abandoning altogether the great work of their lives. Far from it. The
time economized from household duties was devoted chiefly to private
labor for the cause, from the public advocacy of which they felt they
had only stepped aside for a time. Neither had any idea that this
public work was over. Angelina writes to her friend in England soon
after her marriage:--

"I cannot tell thee how I love this private life--how I have thanked
my heavenly Father for this respite from public labor, or how
earnestly I have prayed that whilst I am thus dwelling at ease I may
not forget the captives of my land, or be unwilling to go forth again
on the high places of the field, to combat the giant sin of Slavery
with the smooth stones of the river of Truth, if