THE FEEDING AND CLOTHING OF THE SLAVES IN THE PART OF MARYLAND WHERE I
LIVED, &C.
The slaves are generally fed upon salt pork, herrings and Indian corn.
The manner of dealing it out to them is as follows:--Each working man, on
Monday morning, goes to the cellar of the master where the provisions are
kept, and where the overseer takes his stand with some one to assist him,
when he, with a pair of steel-yards, weighs out to every man the amount of
three-and-a-half pounds, to last him till the ensuing Monday--allowing him
just half-a-pound per day. Once in a few weeks there is a change made, by
which, instead of the three-and-a-half pounds of pork, each man receives
twelve herrings, allowing two a-day. The only bread kind the slaves have
is that made of Indian meal. In some of the lower counties, the masters
usually give their slaves the corn in the ear; and they have to grind it
for themselves by night at hand-mills. But my master had a quantity sent
to the grist mill at a time, to be ground into coarse meal, and kept it in
a large chest in his cellar, where the woman who cooked for the boys could
get it daily. This was baked in large loaves, called "steel poun bread."
Sometimes as a change it was made into "Johnny Cake," and then at others
into mush.
The slaves had no butter, coffee, tea, or sugar; occasionally they were
allowed milk, but not statedly; the only exception to this statement was
the "harvest provisions." In harvest, when cutting the grain, which lasted
from two to three weeks in the heat of summer, they were allowed some
fresh meat, rice, sugar, and coffee; and also their allowance of whiskey.
At the beginning of winter, each slave had one pair of coarse shoes and
stockings, one pair of pantaloons, and a jacket.
At the beginning of summer, he had two pair of coarse linen pantaloons and
two shirts.
Once in a number of years, each slave, or each man and his wife, had one
coarse blanket and enough coarse linen for a "bed-tick." He never had any
bedstead or other furniture kind. The men had no hats, waistcoats or
handkerchiefs given them, or the women any bonnets. These they had to
contrive for themselves. Each labouring man had a small "patch" of ground
allowed him; from this he was expected to furnish himself and his boys
hats, &c. These patches they had to work by night; from these, also, they
had to raise their own provisions, as no potatoes, cabbage, &c., were
allowed them from the plantation. Years ago the slaves were in the habit
of raising broom-corn, and making brooms to supply the market in the
towns; but now of later years great quantities of these and other
articles, such as scrubbing-brushes, wooden trays, mats, baskets, and
straw hats which the slaves made, are furnished by the shakers and other
small manufacturers, from the free states of the north.
Neither my master or any other master, within my acquaintance, made any
provisions for the religious instruction of his slaves. They were not
worked on the Sabbath. One of the "boys" was required to stay at home and
"feed," that is, take care of the stock, every Sabbath; the rest went to
see their friends. Those men whose families were on other plantations
usually spent the Sabbath with them; some would lie about at home and rest
themselves.
When it was pleasant weather my master would ride "into town" to church,
but I never knew him to say a word to one of us about going to church, or
about our obligations to God, or a future state. But there were a number
of pious slaves in our neighbourhood, and several of these my master
owned; one of these was an exhorter. He was not connected with a religious
body, but used to speak every Sabbath in some part of the neighbourhood.
When slaves died, their remains were usually consigned to the grave
without any ceremony; but this old gentleman, wherever he heard of a slave
having been buried in that way, would send notice from plantation to
plantation, calling the slaves together at the grave on the Sabbath, where
he'd sing, pray, and exhort. I have known him to go ten or fifteen miles
voluntarily to attend these services. He could not read, and I never heard
him refer to any Scripture, and state and discourse upon any fundamental
doctrine of the gospel; but he knew a number of "spiritual songs by
heart," of these he would give two lines at a time very exact, set and
lead the tune himself; he would pray with great fervour, and his
exhortations were amongst the most impressive I have heard.
The Methodists at one time attempted to evangelize the slaves in our
neighbourhod, but the effort was sternly resisted by the masters. They
held a Camp Meeting in the neighbourhood, where many of the slaves
attended. But one of their preachers for addressing words of comfort to
the slaves, was arrested and tried for his life.
My master was very active in this disgraceful affair, but the excellent
man, Rev. Mr. G., was acquitted and escaped out of their hands. Still, it
was deemed by his brethren to be imprudent for him to preach any more in
the place, as some of the more reckless masters swore violence against
him. This good man's name is remembered dearly, till this day, by slaves
in that county. I met with a fugitive about a year ago, who remembered
distinctly the words spoken by Mr. G., and by which his own mind was
awakened to a sense of the value of his soul. He said, in the course of
his preaching, addressing himself to the slaves, "You have precious
immortal souls, that are worth far more to you than your bodies are to
your masters;" or words to that effect. But while these words interested
many slaves, they also made many masters exceedingly angry, and they
tortured his words into an attempt to excite the slaves to rebellion.
Some of my master's slaves who had families, were regularly married, and
others were not; the law makes no provision for such marriages, and the
only provision made by the master was, that they should obtain his leave.
In some cases, after obtaining leave to take his wife, the slave would ask
further leave to go to a minister and be married. I never knew him to deny
such a request, and yet, in those cases where the slave did not ask it, he
never required him to be married by a minister. Of course, no Bibles,
Tracts, or religious books of any kind, were ever given to the slaves; and
no ministers or religious instructors were ever known to visit our
plantation at any time, either in sickness or in health. When a slave was
sick, my master being himself a physician, sometimes attended, and
sometimes he called other physicians. Slaves frequently sickened and died,
but I never knew any provision made to administer to them the comforts, or
to offer to them the hopes of the gospel, or to their friends after their
death.
* * * * *
_There is no one feature of slavery to which the mind recurs with more
gloomy impressions, than to its disastrous influence upon the families of
the masters, physically, pecuniarily, and mentally._
It seems to destroy families as by a powerful blight, large and opulent
slave-holding families, often vanish like a group of shadows at the third
or fourth generation. This fact arrested my attention some years before I
escaped from slavery, and of course before I had any enlightened views of
the moral character of the system. As far back as I can recollect, indeed,
it was a remark among slaves, that every generation of slaveholders are
more and more inferior. There were several large and powerful families in
our county, including that of my master, which affords to my mind a
melancholy illustration of this remark. One of the wealthiest slaveholders
in the county, was General R., a brother-in-law to my master. This man
owned a large and highly valuable tract of land, called R.'s Manor. I do
not know how many slaves he owned, but the number was large. He lived in a
splendid mansion, and drove his coach and four. He was for some years a
member of Congress. He had a numerous family of children.
The family showed no particular signs of decay until he had married a
second time, and had considerably increased his number of children. It
then became evident that his older children were not educated for active
business, and were only destined to be a charge. Of sons, (seven or
eight,) not one of them reached the eminence once occupied by the father.
The only one that approached to it, was the eldest, who became an officer
in the navy, and obtained the doubtful glory of being killed in the
Mexican war.
General R. himself ran through his vast estate, died intemperate, and left
a widow and large number of daughters, some minors, destitute, and none of
his sons fitted for any employment but in the army and navy.
Slaves have a superstitious dread of passing the dilapidated dwelling of a
man who has been guilty of great cruelties to his slaves, and who is dead,
or moved away. I never felt this dread deeply but once, and that was one
Sabbath about sunset, as I crossed the yard of General R.'s residence,
which was about two miles from us, after he had been compelled to leave
it.
To see the once fine smooth gravel walks, overgrown with grass--the
redundances of the shrubbery neglected--the once finely painted pricket
fences, rusted and fallen down--a fine garden in splendid ruins--the lofty
ceiling of the mansion thickly curtained with cobwebs--the spacious
apartments abandoned, while the only music heard within as a substitute
for the voices of family glee that once filled it, was the crying cricket
and cockroaches! Ignorant slave as I was at that time, I could but pause
for a moment, and recur in silent horror to the fact that, a strange
reverse of fortune, had lately driven from that proud mansion, a large
and once opulent family. What advantage was it now to the members of that
family, that the father and head had for near half a century stood high in
the counsels of the state, and had the benefit of the unrequited toil of
hundreds of his fellowmen, when they were already grappling with the
annoyances of that poverty, which he had entailed upon others.
My master's family, in wealth and influence, was not inferior to General
R.'s originally. His father was a member of the convention that framed the
present constitution of the state; he was, also, for some years chief
justice of the state.
My master was never equal to his father, although he stood high at one
time. He once lacked but a few votes of being elected Governor of the
state: he once sat in the Assembly, and was generally a leading man in his
own county. His influence was found to be greatest when exerted in favour
of any measure in regard to the control of slaves. He was the first mover
in several cruel and rigid municipal regulations in the county, which
prohibited slaves from going over a certain number of miles from their
master's places on the Sabbath, and from being seen about the town. He
once instigated the authorities of the town where he attended service, to
break up a Sabbath-school some humane members of the Methodist and
Lutheran denominations had set up to teach the free negroes, lest the
slaves should get some benefit of it.
But there was a still wider contrast between my master and his own
children, eight in number, when I left him. His eldest daughter, the
flower of the family, married a miserable and reckless gambler. His
eldest son was kind-hearted, and rather a favourite with the slaves on
that account; but he had no strength of mind or weight of character. His
education was limited, and he had no disposition or tact for business of
any kind. He died at thirty-six, intestate; leaving his second-wife (a
sister to his father's second wife) with several orphan children, a widow
with a small estate deeply embarrassed. The second son was once sent to
West Point to fit for an officer. After being there a short time, however,
he became unsteady, and commenced the study of medicine, but he soon gave
that up and preferred to live at home and flog the slaves; and by them was
cordially dreaded and disliked, and among themselves he was vulgarly
nicknamed on account of his cruel and filthy habits.
These two families will afford a fair illustration of the gloomy history
of many others that I could name. This decline of slaveholding families is
a subject of observation and daily remark among slaves; they are led to
observe every change in the pecuniary, moral, and social state of the
families they belong to, from the fact, that as the old master declines,
or as his children are married off, they are expecting to fall into their
hands, or in case of insolvency on the part of the old master, they expect
to be sold; in either case, it involves a change of master--a subject to
which they cannot be indifferent. And it is very rarely the case that a
slave's condition is benefited by passing from the old master into the
hands of one of his children. Owing to the causes I have mentioned, the
decline is so rapid and marked, in almost every point of view, that the
children of slaveholders are universally inferior to themselves, mentally,
morally, physically, as well as pecuniarily, especially so in the latter
point of view; and this is a matter of most vital concern to the slaves.
The young master not being able to own as many slaves as his father,
usually works what he has more severely, and being more liable to
embarrassment, the slaves' liability to be sold at an early day is much
greater. For the same reason, slaves have a deep interest, generally, in
the marriage of a young mistress. Very generally the daughters of
slaveholders marry inferior men; men who seek to better their own
condition by a wealthy connection. The slaves who pass into the hands of
the young master has had some chance to become acquainted with his
character, bad as it may be; but the young mistress brings her slaves a
new, and sometimes an unknown master. Sometimes these are the sons of
already broken down slaveholders. In other cases they are adventurers from
the north who remove to the south, and who readily become the most cruel
masters.
APPENDIX.
These two letters are simply introduced to show what the state of my
feelings was with reference to slavery at the time they were written. I
had just heard several facts with regard to my parents, which had awakened
my mind to great excitement.
TO MY FATHER, MOTHER, BROTHERS, AND SISTERS.
_The following was written in 1844:_
DEARLY BELOVED IN BONDS,
About seventeen long years have now rolled away, since in the Providence
of Almighty God, I left your embraces, and set out upon a daring
adventure in search of freedom. Since that time, I have felt most
severely the loss of the sun and moon and eleven stars from my social
sky. Many, many a thick cloud of anguish has pressed my brow and sent
deep down into my soul the bitter waters of sorrow in consequence. And
you have doubtless had your troubles and anxious seasons also about your
fugitive star.
I have learned that some of you have been sold, and again taken back by
Colonel ----. How many of you are living and together, I cannot tell. My
great grief is, lest you should have suffered this or some additional
punishment on account of my _Exodus_.
I indulge the hope that it will afford you some consolation to know that
your son and brother is yet alive. That God has dealt wonderfully and
kindly with me in all my way. He has made me a Christian, and a
Christian Minister, and thus I have drawn my support and comfort from
that blessed Saviour, who came _to preach good tidings unto the meek, to
bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the
opening of the prison to them, that are bound. To proclaim the
acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God; to
comfort all that mourn. To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give
unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of
praise for the spirit of heaviness, that they might be called trees of
righteousness, the planting of the Lord that he might be glorified._
If the course I took in leaving a condition which had become intolerable
to me, has been made the occasion of making that condition worse to you
in any way, I do most heartily regret such a change for the worse on
your part. As I have no means, however, of knowing if such be the fact,
so I have no means of making atonement, but by sincere prayer to
Almighty God in your behalf, and also by taking this method of offering
to you these consolations of the gospel to which I have just referred,
and which I have found to be pre-eminently my own stay and support. My
dear father and mother; I have very often wished, while administering
the Holy Ordinance of Baptism to some scores of children brought forward
by doting parents, that I could see you with yours among the number. And
you, my brothers and sisters, while teaching hundreds of children and
youths in schools over which I have been placed, what unspeakable
delight I should have had in having you among the number; you may all
judge of my feeling for these past years, when while preaching from
Sabbath to Sabbath to congregations, I have not been so fortunate as
even to see father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, nephew,
niece, or cousin in my congregations. While visiting the sick, going to
the house of mourning, and burying the dead, I have been a constant
mourner for you. My sorrow has been that I know you are not in
possession of those hallowed means of grace. I am thankful to you for
those mild and gentle traits of character which you took such care to
enforce upon me in my youthful days. As an evidence that I prize both
you and them, I may say that at the age of thirty-seven, I find them as
valuable as any lessons I have learned, nor am I ashamed to let it be
known to the world, that I am the son of a bond man and a bond woman.
Let me urge upon you the fundamental truths of the Gospel of the Son of
God. Let repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ have
their perfect work in you, I beseech you. Do not be prejudiced against
the gospel because it may be seemingly twisted into a support of
slavery. The gospel rightly understood, taught, received, felt and
practised, is anti-slavery as it is anti-sin. Just so far and so fast as
the true spirit of the gospel obtains in the land, and especially in the
lives of the oppressed, will the spirit of slavery sicken and become
powerless like the serpent with his head pressed beneath the fresh
leaves of the prickly ash of the forest.
There is not a solitary decree of the immaculate God that has been
concerned in the ordination of slavery, nor does any possible
development of his holy will sanctify it.
He has permitted us to be enslaved according to the invention of wicked
men, instigated by the devil, with intention to bring good out of the
evil, but He does not, He cannot approve of it. He has no need to
approve of it, even on account of the good which He will bring out of
it, for He could have brought about that very good in some other way.
God is never straitened; He is never at a loss for means to work. Could
He not have made this a great and wealthy nation without making its
riches to consist in our blood, bones, and souls? And could He not also
have given the gospel to us without making us slaves?
My friends, let us then, in our afflictions, embrace and hold fast the
gospel. The gospel is the fulness of God. We have the glorious and total
weight of God's moral character in our side of the scale.
The wonderful purple stream which flowed for the healing of the nations,
has a branch for us. Nay, is Christ divided? "The grace of God that
bringeth salvation hath appeared to (for) all men, teaching us that
denying ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly,
righteously, and godly in this present world, looking for that blessed
hope and glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus
Christ, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all
iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good
works."--Titus ii. 11-14.
But you say you have not the privilege of hearing of this gospel of
which I speak. I know it; and this is my great grief. But you shall have
it; I will send it to you by my humble prayer; I can do it; I will beg
our heavenly Father, and he will preach this gospel to you in his holy
providence.
You, dear father and mother cannot have much longer to live in this
troublesome and oppressive world; you cannot bear the yoke much longer.
And as you approach another world, how desirable it is that you should
have the prospect of a different destiny from what you have been called
to endure in this world during a long life.
But it is the gospel that sets before you the hope of such a blessed
rest as is spoken of in the word of God, Job iii. 17, 19. "There the
wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary be at rest; there the
prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressors. The
small and great are there; and the servant is free from his master."
Father, I know thy eyes are dim with age and weary with weeping, but
look, dear father, yet a little while toward that haven. Look unto
Jesus, "the author and finisher of thy faith," for the moment of thy
happy deliverance is at hand.
Mother, dear mother, I know, I feel, mother, the pangs of thy bleeding
heart, that thou hast endured, during so many years of vexation. Thy
agonies are by a genuine son-like sympathy mine; I will, I must, I do
share daily in those agonies of thine. But I sincerely hope that with me
you bear your agonies to Christ who carries our sorrows.
O come then with me, my beloved family, of weary heart-broken and
care-worn ones, to Jesus Christ, "casting all your care upon him, for he
careth for you."--2 Peter v. 7.
With these words of earnest exhortation, joined with fervent prayer to
God that He may smooth your rugged way, lighten your burden, and give a
happy issue out of all your troubles, I must bid you adieu.
Your son and brother,
JAS. P.
_Alias_ J.W.C. PENNINGTON.
TO COLONEL F---- T----, OF H----, WASHINGTON COUNTY, MD. 1844.
DEAR SIR,
It is now, as you are aware, about seventeen years since I left your
house and service, at the age of twenty. Up to that time, I was,
according to your rule and claim, your slave. Till the age of seven
years, I was, of course, of little or no service to you. At that age,
however, you hired me out, and for three years I earned my support; at
the age of ten years, you took me to your place again, and in a short
time after you put me to work at the blacksmith's trade, at which,
together with the carpentering trade, &c, I served you peaceably until
the day I left you, with exception of the short time you had sold me to
S---- H----, Esq., for seven hundred dollars. It is important for me to
say to you, that I have no consciousness of having done you any wrong. I
called you master when I was with you from the mere force of
circumstances; but I never regarded you as my master. The nature which
God gave me did not allow me to believe that you had any more right to
me than I had to you, and that was just none at all. And from an early
age, I had intentions to free myself from your claim. I never consulted
any one about it; I had no advisers or instigators; I kept my own
counsel entirely concealed in my own bosom. I never meditated any evil
to your person or property, but I regarded you as my oppressor, and I
deemed it my duty to get out of your hands by peaceable means.
I was always obedient to your commands. I laboured for you diligently at
all times. I acted with fidelity in any matter which you entrusted me.
As you sometimes saw fit to entrust me with considerable money, to buy
tools or materials, not a cent was ever coveted or kept.
During the time I served you in the capacity of blacksmith, your
materials were used economically, your work was done expeditiously, and
in the very best style, a style second to no smith in your
neighbourhood. In short, sir, you well know that my habits from early
life were advantageous to you. Drinking, gambling, fighting, &c., were
not my habits. On Sabbaths, holidays, &c., I was frequently at your
service, when not even your body-servant was at home.
Times and times again, I have gone on Sunday afternoon to H----, six
miles, after your letters and papers, when it was as much my privilege
to be _"out of the way,"_ as it was C----.
But what treatment did you see fit to return me for all this? You, in
the most unfeeling manner, abused my father for no cause but speaking a
word to you, as a man would speak to his fellow-man, for the sake simply
of a better understanding.
You vexed my mother, and because she, as a tender mother would do,
showed solicitude for the virtue of her daughters, you threatened her in
an insulting brutal manner.
You abused my brother and sister without cause, and in like manner you
did to myself; you surmised evil against me. You struck me with your
walking-cane, called me insulting names, threatened me, swore at me, and
became more and more wrathy in your conduct, and at the time I quitted
your place, I had good reason to believe that you were meditating
serious evil against me.
Since I have been out of your hands, I have been signally favoured of
God, whence I infer that in leaving you, I acted strictly in accordance
with his holy will. I have a conscience void of offence towards God and
towards all men, yourself not excepted. And I verily believe that I have
performed a sacred duty to God and myself, and a kindness to you, in
taking the blood of my soul peaceably off your soul. And now, dear sir,
having spoken somewhat pointedly, I would, to convince you of my perfect
good will towards you, in the most kind and respectful terms, remind you
of your coming destiny. You are now over seventy years of age, pressing
on to eternity with the weight of these seventy years upon you. Is not
this enough without the blood of some half-score of souls?
You are aware that your right to property in man is now disputed by the
civilized world. You are fully aware, also, that the question, whether
the Bible sanctions slavery, has distinctly divided this nation in
sentiment. On the side of Biblical Anti-slavery, we have many of the
most learned, wise and holy men in the land. If the Bible affords no
sanction to slavery, (and I claim that it cannot,) then it must be a sin
of the deepest dye; and can you, sir, think to go to God in hope with a
sin of such magnitude upon your soul?
But admitting that the question is yet doubtful, (which I do only for
the sake of argument,) still, sir, you will have the critical hazard of
this doubt pressing, in no very doubtful way, upon your declining years,
as you descend the long and tedious hill of life.
Would it not seem to be exceedingly undesirable to close an eventful
probation of seventy or eighty years, and leave your reputation among
posterity suspended upon so doubtful an issue? But what, my dear sir,
is a reputation among posterity, who are but worms, compared with a
destiny in the world of spirits? And it is in light of that destiny that
I would now have you look at this subject. You and I, and all that you
claim as your slaves, are in a state of probation; our great business is
to serve God under His righteous moral government. Master and slave are
the subjects of that government, bound by its immutable requirements,
and liable to its sanctions in the next world, though enjoying its
forbearance in this. You will pardon me then for pressing this point in
earnest good faith. You should, at this stage, review your life without
political bias, or adherence to long cherished prejudices, and remember
that you are soon to meet those whom you have held, and do hold in
slavery, at the awful bar of the impartial Judge of all who doeth right.
Then what will become of your own doubtful claims? What will be done
with those doubts that agitated your mind years ago; will you answer for
threatening, swearing, and using the cowhide among your slaves?
What will become of those long groans and unsatisfied complaints of your
slaves, for vexing them with insulting words, placing them in the power
of dogish and abusive overseers, or under your stripling, misguided,
hot-headed son, to drive and whip at pleasure, and for selling parts or
whole families to Georgia? They will all meet you at that bar. Uncle
James True, Charles Cooper, Aunt Jenny, and the native Africans;
Jeremiah, London, and Donmore, have already gone a-head, and only wait
your arrival--Sir, I shall meet you there. The account between us for
the first twenty years of my life, will have a definite character upon
which one or the other will be able to make out a case.
Upon such a review as this, sir, you will, I am quite sure, see the need
of seriousness. I assure you that the thought of meeting you in
eternity, and before the dread tribunal of God, with a complaint in my
mouth against you, is to me of most weighty and solemn character. And
you will see that the circumstances from which this thought arises are
of equal moment to yourself. Can the pride of leaving your children
possessed of long slave states, or the policy of sustaining in the state
the institution of slavery, justify you in overlooking a point of moment
to your future happiness?
What excuse could you offer at the bar of God, favoured as you have been
with the benefits of a refined education, and through a long life with
the gospel of love, should you, when arraigned there, find that you
have, all your life long, laboured under a great mistake in regard to
slavery, and that in this mistake you had died, and only lifted up your
eyes in the light of eternity to be corrected, when it was too late to
be corrected in any other way.
_I could wish to address you_ (being bred, born, and raised in your
family) _as a father in Israel, or as an elder brother in Christ, but I
cannot; mockery is a sin._ I can only say then, dear sir, farewell, till
I meet you at the bar of God, where Jesus, who died for us, will judge
between us. Now his blood can wash out our stain, break down the middle
wall of partition, and reconcile us not only to God but to each other,
then the word of his mouth, the sentence will set us at one. As for
myself, I am quite ready to meet you face to face at the bar of God. I
have done you no wrong; I have nothing to fear when we both fall into
the hands of the just God.
I beseech you, dear sir, to look well and consider this matter soundly.
In yonder world you can have no slaves--you can be no man's master--you
can neither sell, buy, or whip, or drive. Are you then, by sustaining
the relation of a slaveholder, forming a character to dwell with God in
peace?
With kind regards,
I am, sir, yours respectfully,
J.W.C. PENNINGTON.
LIBERTY'S CHAMPION.
BY A FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR'S.
On the wings of the wind he comes, he comes!
With the rolling billow's speed;
On his breast are the signs of peace and love,
And his soul is nerved with strength from above:
While his eyes flash fire,
He burns with desire
To achieve the noble deed.
To the shores of the free he goes, he goes!
And smiles as he passes on;
He hears the glad notes of Liberty's song,
And bids the brave sons of freedom be strong.
While his heart bounds high
To his crown in the sky,
He triumphs o'er conquests won.
To the homes of the slave he flies, he flies!
Where manacled mourners cry;
The bursting groan of the mind's o'erflow,
Transfixed on the dark and speaking brow:
With a murmuring sound,
Ascends from the ground,
To the God that reigns on high.
To his loved Father's throne he hastes, he hastes!
And pours forth his soul in grief:
Uprising he finds his strength renewed,
And his heart with fervent love is imbued;
While the heaving sigh,
And the deep-toned cry,
Appeal for instant relief.
To the hard oppressor he cries, he cries,
And points to the bleeding slave;
He tells of the rights of the human soul,
And his eyes with full indignation roll:
While his heart is moved,
And the truth is proved,
He seeks the captive to save.
Again to the foeman he speaks, he speaks,
But utters his cry in vain;
He breathes no curse, no vengeance seeks,--
For the broken hearts or the anguished shrieks,
For the mother's pains,
Or the father's gains,--
Upon the oppressor's name.
To nations of freemen once more he comes,
To raise Liberty's banner high;
He tells of the wrongs of the bonded slave,
And cries aloud, 'mid throngs of the brave,
"O freemen, arise!
Be faithful and wise,
And answer the mourner's cry.
In melting strains of love he calls, he calls,
To the great and good from afar;
Till sympathy wakes to the truthful tale,
And the prayer of the faith, which cannot fail,
Ascends to heaven,
And grace is given,
To nerve for the bloodless war.
The truth with a magic power prevails:
All hearts are moved to the strife;
In a holy phalanx, and with deathless aim,
They seek a peaceful triumph to gain
O'er the tyrant's sway,
In his onward way,
To raise the fallen to life.
At the mighty voice of the glorious free
The chain of the oppressor breaks;
The slave from his bondage springs forth to love,
And, standing erect, his eye fixed above,
He honours his race,
And in the world's face,
The language of liberty speaks.
The oppressor no longer owns a right,
Or property claims in the slave,
But the world, in the glory of freedom's light,
Beams out from the darkness of wide-spread night;
Throughout its length,
In greatness and strength,
The honour of the free and brave.
* * * * *
Printed for CHARLES GILPIN, 5, Bishopgate Street Without.
The Fugitive Blacksmith, or Events in the History of JAMES W.C.
PENNINGTON, Pastor of a Presbyterian Church, New York. Foolscap 8vo.,
sewed, price 1s.
"This entrancing narrative * * * We trust that thousands of our readers
will procure the volume, which is published by Mr. Gilpin at a mere
trifle--much too cheap to accomplish the purpose for which, in part or
mainly, it has been published--the raising a fund to remove the pecuniary
burdens which press on the author's flock. NOTHING SHORT OF THE SALE OF
FIFTY THOUSAND OR SIXTY THOUSAND COPIES could be at all availing for this
object. * * * We very cordially recommend him and his narrative to the
kind consideration of our readers. Let them load him with English
hospitality, fill his purse, and send him back as fast as possible to the
land of his early bondage, of his matured freedom, and to the people to
whose character and capabilities he does so much honour."--_Christian
Witness_, October, 1849.
"The principal portion of the 'Tract,' as Mr. Pennington modestly styles
his book, consists of an autobiography of his early life as a slave, and
of his escape from bondage, and final settlement in New York as a
Presbyterian Minister. His adventures and hair-breadth escapes invest the
narrative with startling interest, and excite the deepest sympathies of
the reader."--_Nonconformist_, September, 26th, 1849.
"Believing that by the purchase of this little book our readers will
confer a benefit on the writer, at the same time that they become
possessed of a narrative of deep interest, we give it our most cordial
recommendation."--_Teetotal Times_, October, 1849.
* * * * *
London: CHARLES GILPIN, 5, Bishopsgate Street Without.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Fugitive Blacksmith, by James W. C. Pennington