Page:My Bondage and My Freedom (1855).djvu/314

 

CHAPTER XX.

APPRENTICESHIP LIFE.

NOTHING LOST BY THE ATTEMPT TO RUN AWAY—COMRADES IN THEIR OLD HOMES—REASONS FOR SENDING AUTHOR AWAY—RETURN TO BALTIMORE—CONTRAST BETWEEN "TOMMY" AND THAT OF HIS COLORED COMPANION—TRIALS IN GARDINER'S SHIP YARD—DESPERATE FIGHT—ITS CAUSES CONFLICT BETWEEN WHITE AND BLACK LABOR—DESCRIPTION OF THE OUTRAGE—COLORED TESTIMONY NOTHING—CONDUCT OF MASTER HUGH—SPIRIT OF SLAVERY IN BALTIMORE—AUTHOR'S CONDITION IMPROVES—NEW ASSOCIATIONS—SLAVEHOLDERS' RIGHT TO TAKE HIS WAGES—HOW TO MAKE A CONTENTED SLAVE.

Well! dear reader, I am not, as you may have already inferred, a loser by the general upstir, described in the foregoing chapter. The little domestic revolution, notwithstanding the sudden snub it got by the treachery of somebody—I dare not say or think who—did not, after all, end so disastrously, as, when in the iron cage at Easton, I conceived it would. The prospect, from that point, did look about as dark as any that ever cast its gloom over the vision of the anxious, out-looking, human spirit. "All is well that ends well." My affectionate comrades, Henry and John Harris, are still with Mr. William Freeland. Charles Roberts and Henry Baily are safe at their homes. I have not, therefore, any thing to regret on their account. Their masters have mercifully forgiven them, probably on the ground suggested in the spirited little speech of Mrs. Freeland, made tome just before leav-