Page:The White Slave, or Memoirs of a Fugitive.djvu/253

 While he remained in America, however little encouragement his letters gave, still I could hope. But now, the last staff of consolation was plucked from under me. What availed it, that I had myself shaken off the chains, which were still hanging, and perhaps with a weight so much the heavier, to the friend of my heart, to the wife of my bosom, to the dear, dear infant, the child of my love? The curse of tyranny indeed is multifold; — nay, infinite! — It blasted me across the broad Atlantic; and when I thought of Gassy and my boy, I shrunk and trembled as if again the irons were upon me, and the bloody lash cracking about my head! — Almighty God! why hast thou created beings capable of so much misery!

I recovered slowly from the shock, which at first had quite unmanned me. But though I regained some degree of composure, it was in vain that I courted any thing like enjoyment. A worm was gnawing at my heart which would not be appeased. Never was there a bosom more inclined than mine to the gentle pleasures of domestic life. But I found only torture in the recollection that I was a husband and a father. Oh, had my wife and my dear boy been with me, in what a sweet retirement I could have spent my days, ever finding a new relish for present bliss in the recollection of ills endured, and miseries escaped!

The sense of loneliness which oppressed me, and the bitter thoughts and hateful images that were ever crowding on my mind, made my life an irksome burden, and drove me to seek relief in the excitements of travel. I visited every country in Europe, and sought occupation and amusement in examining their scheme of society, and studying their laws and manners. I traversed Turkey and the regions of the East, once the seats of art and opulence, but long since ruined by the heavy hand of tyranny, and the ever renewed extortions of military pillage. I crossed the Persian deserts, and saw in India a new and better civilization slowly rising upon the ruins of the old.

The interest I felt in the oppressed and unfortunate race, with which, upon the mother's side I am connected, carried me again across the ocean. I have climbed the lofty crests of the Andes, and wandered among the flowery forests of Brazil