Page:Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1892).djvu/575

Rh wharves of New Bedford, rolling oil casks, loading ships for whaling voyages, sawing wood, putting in coal, picking up a job here and there, wherever I could find one, and in the race for life and bread, holding my own with difficulty against gauntsided poverty. I never see one of my old companions of the lower strata, begrimed by toil, hard handed and dust covered, receiving for wages scarcely enough to keep the "wolf" at a respectful distance from his door and hearthstone, without a fellow feeling and the thought that I have been separated from him only by circumstances other than those of my own making. Much to be thankful for, I find here but little room for boasting. It was mine to take the "Tide at its flood." It was my good fortune to get out of slavery at the right time, and to be speedily brought into contact with that circle of highly cultivated men and women, banded together for the overthrow of slavery, of which Wm. Lloyd Garrison was the acknowledged leader. To these friends, earnest, courageous, inflexible, ready to own me as a man and brother, against all the scorn, contempt, and derision of a slavery-polluted atmosphere, I owe my success in life. The story is simple, and the truth plain. They thought that I possessed qualities that might be made useful to my race, and through them I was brought to the notice of the world, and gained a hold upon the attention of the American people, which I hope remains unbroken to this day. The list of these friends is too long certainly to be inserted here, but I cannot forbear to recall in this connection the names of Francis Jackson, Joseph Southwick, Samuel E. Sewell, Samuel J. May, John Pierpont, Henry I. Bowditch, Theodore Parker, Wendell Phillips, Edmund Quincy, Isaac T. Hopper, James N. Buffum, Ellis Gray Loring, Andrew Robeson, Seth Hunt, Arnold Buffum, Nathaniel B. Borden, Boone Spooner, William Thomas, John Milton Earle, John