of them, mock
at us who stand up against oppression.

You may not be aware, dear Aunty, that I have a habit, in walking, of
keeping my hands firmly clenched, and my thumbs laid flat and pressed
down over the knuckles of my forefingers. This, I am aware, gives the
thumbs a flattened look. One of our principal pro-slavery students
delights to laugh at me to my face. Perhaps I am wrong in connecting
everything with this all-absorbing theme, but, truly, my thoughts all
run in that direction. Mother and you were accustomed to send me on
errands when I was little, and you placed your money in my right hand
and mother hers in my left, because, on my return to our house, your
room was on the right hand of the entry. So I used to go along, holding
your respective moneys in my palms, with my thumbs stopping the
apertures. And now I am persecuted for the fidelity which led me to
acquire a habit that cleaves to me to this day. But little did I dream,
dear Aunty, when I padded along like a straight footed animal in the
water, instead of having the free use of my open palms to aid me in
walking, that I was acquiring a habit to be to me an inlet of torture in
behalf of our manacled four millions, whose hands feel the galling bonds
of slavery. I take it joyfully, because it is all for the slave.

The day that I came home from my two interviews and efforts just
related, a pro-slavery student, a Senior, invited me into his room. He
is exceedingly kind and generous, though, I am sorry to say it, a friend
of oppression. He gave me a splendid apple, the first which I had seen
for the season. He dusted my coat with his feather-duster, and he even
dusted my boots. He asked me how far I had been walking. I told him all
which I had said and done, thinking that it would profitably remind him
of the great subject. He roared with laughter. "Three cheers for
Gustavus;" "isn't that rich;"--waving, all the while, the
feather-duster, and breaking out with fresh peals, as I related one
thing after another. The noise which he made brought in several of the
students from neighboring rooms, and he related my stories to them as
they stood with their thumbs and fingers holding open their text-books
at the places where they were studying. They were a curious looking set,
in their dressing-gowns, slippers, and smoking-caps; and the most of
them, unfortunately, happened to be pro-slavery, and advocates of
oppression; by which I mean, not in favor of my mode