Only to hear of this wickedness made me sick, and I could say nothing for some minutes.
"Tell me, Matthew," says I, when I had got over my qualm, "why you risked such a fearful punishment to liberate a man you had never seen?"
"Because you was an Englishman," says he stoutly. "Lord love you, master, I knew I should find you a true man and a kind friend."
"But," says I, "couldn't you as well have made your escape without me as with me?"
"No," says he, "for I'd as leave hang myself on a tree ere I started as be brought to that end by the misery of wandering alone in the woods. Look you, master, afore you go any further," stopping me, "there's time to get back to the station, and return to the guardhouse, while the Portugals are still in a log-sleep, and I would have you understand what escape means. It means hardships, and suffering, and solitude. We daren't go near a town, for fear of the Portugals; and we daren't go near the Indian villages, for every white man is hated by them, with a very good reason. There's fleaing on one hand, and death on the other; and we've got to live betwixt 'em as best we may. Take time for reflection and choose without concern for me."
"Nay," says I, "it needs no reflection to choose between freedom and slavery"; and taking him by the hand, I drew him onwards.
"You are an Englishman, master, and I love you," says he, "and I shall love you still more when your hair grows a bit, and you look less like a Portugal; for I do loathe the very resemblance of those accursed men."
"Surely," says I, "there must be some good men amongst them?"
"Not to my knowledge," says he. "There was one that I thought a decent sort of a fellow; and he grumbling every day to me of his estate, which was little better than a slave's, I opened to him a design for escaping together. He betrayed me; for he was naught but a spy set to that purpose by our factor, who would test me. And so I got fleaed for trusting a Portugal; but I trust none henceforth. As for that," adds he, "we shall have no need to trust 'em, for we two shall be company enough for each other, I warrant."
"We two?" says I; "nay, we shall be three."