nts he had picked up a
trifling amount of book learning. To be brief, this man was born the
slave of old Major Christian, on the Glen Plantation, Charles City
county, Va. The Christians were wealthy and owned many slaves, and
belonged in reality to the F.F.V's. On the death of the old Major, James
fell into the hands of his son, Judge Christian, who was executor to his
father's estate. Subsequently he fell into the hands of one of the
Judge's sisters, Mrs. John Tyler (wife of Ex-President Tyler), and then
he became a member of the President's domestic household, was at the
White House, under the President, from 1841 to 1845. Though but very
young at that time, James was only fit for training in the arts,
science, and mystery of waiting, in which profession, much pains were
taken to qualify him completely for his calling.

After a lapse of time; his mistress died. According to her request,
after this event, James and his old mother were handed over to her
nephew, William H. Christian, Esq., a merchant of Richmond. From this
gentleman, James had the folly to flee.

Passing hurriedly over interesting details, received from him respecting
his remarkable history, two or three more incidents too good to omit
must suffice.

"How did you like Mr. Tyler?" said an inquisitive member of the
Vigilance Committee. "I didn't like Mr. Tyler much," was the reply.
"Why?" again inquired the member of the Committee. "Because Mr. Tyler
was a poor man. I never did like poor people. I didn't like his marrying
into our family, who were considered very far Tyler's superiors." "On
the plantation," he said, "Tyler was a very cross man, and treated the
servants very cruelly; but the house servants were treated much better,
owing to their having belonged to his wife, who protected them from
persecution, as they had been favorite servants in her father's family."
James estimated that "Tyler got about thirty-five thousand dollars and
twenty-nine slaves, young and old, by his wife."

What prompted James to leave such pleasant quarters? It was this: He had
become enamored of a young and respectable free girl in Richmond, with
whom he could not be united in marriage solely because he was a slave,
and did not own himself. The frequent sad separations of such married
couples (where one or the other was a slave) could not be overlooked;
consequently, the poor fellow concluded that he would stand a better
chance of gaining his object in Canada than by r