whole day at a time; he said a 'nigger and a mule hadn't any feeling.'"
He described his stature and circumstances somewhat thus: "Houston is a
very small man; for some time his affairs had been in a bad way; he had
been broke, some say he had bad luck for killing my brother. My brother
was sick, but master said he wasn't sick, and he took a chunk, and beat
on him, and he died a few days after." John firmly believed that his
brother had been the victim of a monstrous outrage, and that he too was
liable to the same treatment.

John was only nineteen years of age, spare built, chestnut color, and
represented the rising mind of the slaves of the South.

Henry was what might be termed a very smart young man, considering that
he had been deprived of a knowledge of reading. He was a brother of
John, and said that he also had been wrongfully enslaved by David
Houston, alluded to above. He fully corroborated the statement of his
brother, and declared, moreover, that his sister had not long since been
sold South, and that he had heard enough to fully convince him that he
and his brother were to be put up for sale soon.

Of their mistress John said that she was a "pretty easy kind of a woman,
only she didn't want to allow enough to eat, and wouldn't mend any
clothes for us."

Isaac was twenty-two, quite black, and belonged to the "rising" young
slaves of Delaware. He stated that he had been owned by a "blacksmith, a
very hard man, by the name of Thomas Carper." Isaac was disgusted with
his master's ignorance, and criticised him, in his crude way, to a
considerable extent. Isaac had learned blacksmithing under Carper. Both
master and mistress were Methodists. Isaac said that he "could not
recommend his mistress, as she was given to bad practices," so much so
that he could hardly endure her. He also charged the blacksmith with
being addicted to bad habits. Sometimes Isaac would be called upon to
receive correction from his master, which would generally be dealt out
with a "chunk of wood" over his "no feeling" head. On a late occasion,
when Isaac was being _chunked_ beyond measure, he resisted, but the
persistent blacksmith did not yield until he had so far disabled Isaac
that he was rendered helpless for the next two weeks. While in this
state he pledged himself to freedom and Canada, and resolved to win the
prize by crossing the Bay.

While these young passengers possessed brains and bravery of a rare
order, at the