many and what interesting changes may
take place during the few years of one's life. The first eleven years
of my life I spent as a slave, but I have lived to see these glorious
days of freedom. I was born upon my master's plantation in Monroe
County, Ala., where I lived till 1865, when I was set at liberty with
the rest of my unfortunate brethren.

While living upon that plantation I saw many of the horrors of
slavery with my own eyes. One of the mean and degrading things I
remember was the way the slaves had to live, crowded together in one
house. There were three or four different families, consisting of
twelve or fifteen persons, all living in the same room. There was
only one house for colored people, and it had only one room.

Although my master did not have so many slaves and was not so mean as
some other slave-holders about him, still, the treatment which his
slaves received was shockingly cruel. I remember very distinctly the
paddling block, the paddle, and the great whip used upon that place.
There comes very vividly before my mind the whipping of a hired man.
I know just how every rag of clothes was taken off, and how he was
tied down in the front yard between the gate and the house, so that
he could not move hand or foot, and how the master would whip him a
while and walk about and smoke his pipe a while, as the poor hired
slave lay upon the ground and cried for mercy, but there was none to
help him.

Whenever my thoughts go back to those dark days, I recollect the time
when my own brother ran away because he was not willing to take the
whipping which the master wanted to give him late one afternoon. I
think of how the bloodhounds came, and how they chased him, while
mother, brothers, and fellow-slaves stood trembling, and how glad all
were when we learned that the dogs could not catch him.

If I could forget all other heart-rending scenes of those dark days,
I could not erase from my memory the cruel treatment which I saw my
own mother receive. Though I was small, I think of how I used to see
her work hard, and how she was scolded and cursed as she was driven
about like a dog. I saw her laid upon that paddling-block, and I
heard her distressing cries, but, like the rest of her children, I
could do nothing.

I love to contrast my present condition with what it was a few years
ago, and as I do so I do not forget the A. M. A., whose workers found
me in the lowest depths of ignorance and helped me up. Wh