s
wont to say that these were the happiest days of his life.[9]

Toward the end of the year, he became dissatisfied with his employer
because he was forced to perform "some menial services in the
house."[10] He wished his employer to know that he was not a household
servant, but an apprentice. Further difficulties arose, which
terminated his apprenticeship in Middlebury. Returning to Brandon, he
entered the shop of Deacon Caleb Knowlton, also a cabinet-maker; but
in less than a year he quit this employer on the plea of
ill-health.[11] It is quite likely that the confinement and severe
manual labor may have overtaxed the strength of the growing boy; but
it is equally clear that he had lost his taste for cabinet work. He
never again expressed a wish to follow a trade. He again took up his
abode with his mother; and, the means now coming to hand from some
source, he enrolled as a student in Brandon Academy, with the avowed
purpose of preparing for a professional career.[12] It was a wise
choice. Vermont may have lost a skilled handworker--there are those
who vouch for the excellence of his handiwork[13]--but the Union
gained a joiner of first-rate ability.

Wedding bells rang in another change in his fortunes. The marriage of
his sister to a young New Yorker from Ontario County, was followed by
the marriage of his mother to the father, Gehazi Granger. Both couples
took up their residence on the Granger estate, and thither also went
Stephen, with perhaps a sense of loneliness in his boyish heart.[14]
He was then but seventeen. This removal to New York State proved to be
his first step along a path which Vermonters were wearing toward the
West.

Happily, his academic course was not long interrupted by this
migration, for Canandaigua Academy, which offered unusual advantages,
was within easy reach from his new home. Under the wise instruction of
Professor Henry Howe, he began the study of Latin and Greek; and by
his own account made "considerable improvement," though there is
little evidence in his later life of any acquaintance with the
classics. He took an active part in the doings of the literary
societies of the academy, distinguishing himself by his readiness in
debate. His Democratic proclivities were still strong; and he became
an ardent defender of Democracy against the rising tide of
Anti-Masonry, which was threatening to sweep New York from its
political moorings. Tradition says that young Douglass mingled much