cases of a violation of conscience being required; and for the sake of offspring, of friends and of one's country are not uncommon; but whose heroism and ability to contrive, united, have equalled our friend's whose story is now before you?[1]
A William and an Ellen Craft, indeed performed an almost equally hazardous undertaking, and one which, as a devoted admirer of human daring has said, far exceeded any thing recorded by Macaulay, and.will yet be made the ground-work for a future Scott to build a more intensely interesting tale upom than "the author of Waverly" ever put forth, but they had the benefit of their eyes and ears — they were not entirely helpless; enclosed in a moving tomb, and as utterly destitute of pewer to control your movements as if death had fastened its icy arm upon you, and yet possessing all the full tide of gushing sensibilities, and a complete knowledge of your existence, as was the case with our friend. We read with horror of the burial of persons before life has entirely fled from them, but here is a tan who yoluntarily assumed a condition in which he well knew all the chances were against him, and when his head seemed well-nigh severed from his body, on account of the coneussion occasioned by the rough handling to which he was subject, see the Spartan firmness of his soul. Not a groan escaped from his agonized heart, as the realities of his condition were so vividly presented before him. Death stared him in the face, but like Patrick Henry, only when the alternative was more a matter of fact than it was to that patriot, he exclaims, "Give me liberty or give me death;" and death seemed to say, as quickly as
- ↑ Hugo Grotius was, in the year 1620, sent from prison, confined in a small chest of drawers, by the affectionate hands of a faithful wife, but he was taken by friends on horseback and carried to the house of a friend, without undergoing much suffering or running the terrible risk which our friend ran.
