chains upon us before we are aware. Some one says, "Let me write the
songs for a nation, and I care not who makes her laws." So say I, Let me
write imperative advertisements on fences and buildings, and all
resistance to Southern encroachments and usurpation will soon be in
vain.

But to resume my narrative. I began to look round, as soon as my
excitement about the runaway horse would allow, for some one to whom I
could open my overburdened mind on the subject of freedom. I espied a
man with an immense load of chairs, from a factory in our neighborhood,
as I supposed, on his way to Boston. Four horses drew the load, which I
saw was very heavy; not so heavy, I thought with myself, as that which
four millions of my fellow-men are this moment laboring with, over the
gloomy hills of darkness in our Southern States. I felt impelled to
address the driver on this great theme. So, before he had reached the
top of the hill, I called out,--

"Driver!"

Perhaps there was more suddenness and zeal in my call than was
judicious, but the driver immediately said "Whoa!" to his horses, and he
ran hither and thither for stones to block the wheels to keep his load
from running back, down hill.

I felt encouraged, by this, to think that he was of a kind and pliable
disposition; and seeing the wheels fortified, and the horses at rest, I
felt more disposed to hold conversation with the man. "Who knows," I
said to myself, "but that I may now make one new friend for the slave?"

"A warm day," said I.

"Yes, sir," said he, a little impatiently, I thought, The sun was very
hot, an August morning, no air stirring, well suited to make one think
of toil and woe under our Southern skies.

"Have you ever been at the South?" said I, wiping my forehead.

"No, sir," said he, picking out a knot in the snapper of his whip,
evidently to hide his embarrassment while waiting to know the drift of
my question. The sight of his whip kindled in my soul new zeal for the
poor slaves, knowing as I did how many of them were at that moment
skipping in their tortures and striving to flee from the piercing lash.

"Your toil in the hot sun with your load, my dear sir," said I, "is well
fitted to impress you with the thought of the miseries under which four
millions of your fellow-men are every day groaning in our Southern
country. I make no doubt that you are grateful for the blessings of
freedom which we enjoy here at the North. I wish to ask whether you are