, and darted into the wood.

The sun was now quite down behind the western horizon, and just at this
time a heavy dark curtain of clouds was let down, which seemed to usher in
haste the night shade. I have never before or since seen anything which
seemed to me to compare in sublimity with the spreading of the night
shades at the close of that day. My reflections upon the events of that
day, and upon the close of it, since I became acquainted with the Bible,
have frequently brought to my mind that beautiful passage in the Book of
Job, "He holdeth back the face of His throne, and spreadeth a cloud before
it."

Before I proceed to the critical events and final deliverance of the next
chapter, I cannot forbear to pause a moment here for reflection. The
reader may well imagine how the events of the past day affected my mind.
You have seen what was done to me; you have heard what was said to me--you
have also seen what I have done, and heard what I have said. If you ask me
whether I had expected before I left home, to gain my liberty by shedding
men's blood, or breaking their limbs? I answer, no! and as evidence of
this, I had provided no weapon whatever; not so much as a penknife--it
never once entered my mind. I cannot say that I expected to have the ill
fortune of meeting with any human being who would attempt to impede my
flight.

If you ask me if I expected when I left home to gain my liberty by
fabrications and untruths? I answer, no! my parents, slaves as they were,
had always taught me, when they could, that "truth may be blamed but
cannot be shamed;" so far as their example was concerned, I had no habits
of untruth. I was arrested, and the demand made upon me, "Who do you
belong to?" knowing the fatal use these men would make of _my_ truth, I at
once concluded that they had no more right to it than a highwayman has to
a traveller's purse.

If you ask me whether I now really believe that I gained my liberty by
those lies? I answer, no! I now believe that I should be free, had I told
the truth; but, at that moment, I could not see any other way to baffle my
enemies, and escape their clutches.

The history of that day has never ceased to inspire me with a deeper
hatred of slavery; I never recur to it but with the most intense horror at
a system which can put a man not only in peril of liberty, limb, and life
itself, but which may even send him in haste to the bar of God with a lie
upon his lips.

Whatever my read