Page:Narrative of Henry Box Brown.pdf/55

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HENRY BOX BROWN.
53

a young man of my acquaintance to go to the prison, and sent by him, to my wife, some money and a message in reference to the cause of my failure to visit her. {t seems that it would have been useless for me to have ventured there, for as soon as this young man arrived, and inquired for my wifc, he was seized and put in prison, — the jailor mistaking him for me; but when he discovered his mistake, he was very angry, and vented his rage upon the innocent youth, by kicking him out of prison, I then repaired to my Christian master, and three several times, during the ensuing twenty-four hours, did I beseech and entreat him to purchase my wife; but no tears of mine made the least impression upon his obdurate heart. I laid my ease before him, and reminded him of the faithfulness with which I had served him, and of my utmost endeavors to please him, but this kind master — recollect reader — utterly refused to advance a small portion of the $5,600 I had paid him, in order to relieve my sufferings; and he was a member, in good and regular standing, of an Episcopal church in Richmond! His reply to me was worthy of the morality of Slavery, and shows just how much religion, the kindest and most pious of Southern slaveholders have. "You can get another wife," said he; but I told him the Bible said, "What God has joined together, let not man put asunder," and that I did not want any other wife but my own lawful one, whom I loved so much. At the mention of this passage of Scripture, he drove me from his house, saying, he did not wish to hear that!

I now endeavored to persuade two gentlemen of my acquaintance, to buy my wife; but they told me they