living in the one-room log
cabin in which I had left them four and a half years before. Their
condition was much the same as when I left them. My first work was to
build another end, a log pen, to the one room cabin; this gave us two
rooms, something we never had before. As it was too late for me to pitch
a crop, I worked with them until their crop was clean of weeds and then
I went from farm to farm in the neighborhood, helping all the farmers
that I could. The only pay I received was three meals a day wherever I
worked. I usually worked from one to three days on each farm. All the
while I was making a close study of the people's condition. I continued
working in this way until I was convinced that I had a thorough
knowledge of their condition. I then ventured to carry the investigation
into other sections of Wilcox County and the adjoining counties. I
visited most of the places in the counties of Monroe, Butler, Dallas and
Lowndes. These constitute most of the Black Belt counties of the State.
I made the entire journey on foot.

It was a bright beautiful morning in July when I started from my home,
a log cabin. More than two hundred Negroes were in the nearby fields
plowing corn, hoeing cotton and singing those beautiful songs often
referred to as plantation melodies: "I am going to roll in my Jesus'
arms," "O, Freedom," and "Before I'd be a Slave, I'd be carried to my
Grave." With the beautiful fields of corn and cotton outstretched before
me, and the shimmering brook like a silver thread twining its way
through the golden meadows, and then through verdant fields, giving
water to thousands of creatures as it passed, I felt that the earth was
truly clothed in His beauty and the fulness of His glory.

But I had scarcely gone beyond the limits of the field when I came to a
thick undergrowth of pines. Here we saw old pieces of timber and two
posts. "This marks the old cotton-gin house," said Uncle Jim, my
companion, and then his countenance grew sad; after a sigh, he said: "I
have seen many a Negro whipped within an inch of his life at these
posts. I have seen them whipped so badly that they had to be carried
away in wagons. Many never did recover."

From this our road led first up-hill, then down, and finally through a
stretch of woods until we reached Carlowville. This was once the most
aristocratic village of the Southern part of Dallas County. Perhaps no
one who owned less than a hundred slaves was able to secure