August, 1832, my master
attended a Methodist camp-meeting held in the Bay-side, Talbot county,
and there experienced religion. I indulged a faint hope that his
conversion would lead him to emancipate his slaves, and that, if he did
not do this, it would, at any rate, make him more kind and humane. I was
disappointed in both these respects. It neither made him to be humane
to his slaves, nor to emancipate them. If it had any effect on his
character, it made him more cruel and hateful in all his ways; for I
believe him to have been a much worse man after his conversion than
before. Prior to his conversion, he relied upon his own depravity
to shield and sustain him in his savage barbarity; but after his
conversion, he found religious sanction and support for his slaveholding
cruelty. He made the greatest pretensions to piety. His house was
the house of prayer. He prayed morning, noon, and night. He very
soon distinguished himself among his brethren, and was soon made a
class-leader and exhorter. His activity in revivals was great, and he
proved himself an instrument in the hands of the church in converting
many souls. His house was the preachers' home. They used to take great
pleasure in coming there to put up; for while he starved us, he stuffed
them. We have had three or four preachers there at a time. The names
of those who used to come most frequently while I lived there, were Mr.
Storks, Mr. Ewery, Mr. Humphry, and Mr. Hickey. I have also seen Mr.
George Cookman at our house. We slaves loved Mr. Cookman. We believed
him to be a good man. We thought him instrumental in getting Mr. Samuel
Harrison, a very rich slaveholder, to emancipate his slaves; and by some
means got the impression that he was laboring to effect the emancipation
of all the slaves. When he was at our house, we were sure to be called
in to prayers. When the others were there, we were sometimes called in
and sometimes not. Mr. Cookman took more notice of us than either of
the other ministers. He could not come among us without betraying his
sympathy for us, and, stupid as we were, we had the sagacity to see it.

While I lived with my master in St. Michael's, there was a white
young man, a Mr. Wilson, who proposed to keep a Sabbath school for the
instruction of such slaves as might be disposed to learn to read the New
Testament. We met but three times, when Mr. West and Mr. Fairbanks,
both class-leaders, with many others, came upon us with sticks and othe