Page:The White Slave, or Memoirs of a Fugitive.djvu/45

 other virtues. Some few choice spirits indeed, will still rise superior to their condition, and when cut off from every other support, will find within their own hearts, the means of resisting the deadly and demoralizing influences of servitude. In the same manner, the baleful poison of the plague or yellow fever — innocent indeed and powerless in comparison! — while it rages through an infected city, and sweeps its thousands and tens of thousands to the grave, finds, here and there, an iron constitution, which defies its, total malignity, and sustains itself by the sole aid of nature's health-preserving power.

On the Friday before the Sunday which had been fixed upon for our marriage, colonel Moore returned to SpringMeadow. His arrival was unexpected; and by me, at least, very much unwished for. To the other servants who hastened to welcome him home, he spoke with his usual kindness and good nature; but though I had come forward with the rest, all the notice he took of me, was a single stare of dissatisfaction. He appeared to be surprised, and that too not agreeably, to see me again in the House.

The next day, I was discharged from my duties of house servant, and put again under the control of Mr Stubbs. This touched me to the quick; but it was nothing to what I felt the day following, when I went to the House to claim my bride. I was told that she was gone in the carriage with colonel Moore and his daughter, who had ridden out to call upon some of the neighbors; and that I need not take the trouble of coming again to see her, for Miss Caroline did not choose that her maid should marry a field hand.

It is impossible for me to describe the paroxysm of grief and passion, which I now experienced. Those of the same ardent temperament with myself will easily conceive my feelings; and to persons of a cooler temper, no description can convey an adequate idea. My promised wife snatched from me, and myself again exposed to the hateful tyranny of a brutal overseer! — and all so sudden too — and with such studied marks of insult and oppression!

I now felt afresh the ill effects of my foolish pride in keeping myself separate and aloof from my fellow servants. Instead of sympathizing with me, many of them openly rejoiced at