en of the Antilles I found Don Pedro
in no humor to accede to these philanthropic notions. The veteran
slaver regarded me, no doubt, as a sort of cross between a fool and
zealot. An American vessel had been recently chartered to carry a
freight to the coast; and, accordingly, instead of receiving a release
from servitude, I was ordered on board the craft as supercargo of the
enterprise! In fact, on the third day after my arrival at Havana, I
was forced to re-embark for the coast without a prospect of securing
my independence.

The reader may ask why I did not burst the bond, and free myself at a
word from a commerce with which I was disgusted? The question is
_natural_--but the reply is _human_. I had too large an unliquidated
interest at New Sestros, and while it remained so, I was not entitled
to demand from my employer a final settlement for my years of labor.
In other words _I was in his power_, so far as my means were
concerned, and my services were too valuable to be surrendered by him
voluntarily.

A voyage of forty-two days brought me once more to New Sestros,
accompanied by a couple of negro women, who paid their passage and
were lodged very comfortably in the steerage. The elder was about
forty and extremely corpulent, while her companion was younger as well
as more comely.

This respectable dame, after an absence of twenty-four years, returned
to her native Gallinas, on a visit to her father, king Shiakar. At the
age of fifteen, she had been taken prisoner and sent to Havana. A
Cuban confectioner purchased the likely girl, and, for many years,
employed her in hawking his cakes and pies. In time she became a
favorite among the townsfolk, and, by degrees, managed to accumulate
a sufficient amount to purchase her freedom. Years of frugality and
thrift made her proprietor of a house in the city and an egg-stall in
the market, when chance threw in her way a cousin, lately imported
from Africa, who gave her news of her father's family. A quarter of a
century had not extinguished the natural fire in this negro's heart,
and she immediately resolved to cross the Atlantic and behold once
more the savage to whom she owed her birth.

I sent these adventurous women to Gallinas by the earliest trader that
drifted past New Sestros, and learned that they were welcomed among
the islands with all the ceremony common among Africans on such
occasions. Several canoes were despatched to the vessel, with flags,
tom-toms, and