If so, and he had lived at the North, instead of
branding-iron and stripes, he might have had parti-colored pants, and
manacles, and a record of ten or twenty years in the state's prison. But
because he ran away from the South, he straightway became, as a matter
of course, a martyr and a saint. Perhaps he was, truly, a saint; and
perhaps he was not.
Looking out of the window in a hotel the other day, we saw two white
men leading up a black man with a leather bridle around his neck.
"Here, Hattie," said your Uncle, "here is slavery; now you have it in
full bloom."
The poor fellow was crying and protesting and begging to be released.
Your Uncle stepped out and spoke to a very respectable gentleman whom he
met on the piazza. He could not refrain from expressing some feeling at
the sight of a fellow-creature so literally "reduced to the level of the
brutes." I did not hear the whole of the conversation, for my attention
was diverted by two roosters who just then flew at each other and were
assailed by a troop of black urchins who tried to scare them apart,
pulling their tail-feathers and uttering ludicrous cries.
"You are from the North, sir, I take it," said the gentleman, in reply
to your Uncle.
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