"'What! you persist?' he said, kindling up. 'Let me tell you now, Pomp, once for all, you'll have to be contented with a good deal less; and never mention the word "freedom" to me again if you would keep that precious hide of yours whole!'
"I saw he meant it, and that there was no help for me. Despair and fury were in me. Then, for the only time in my life, I felt what it was to wish to murder a man. I could have smitten the life out of that smiling, handsome face of his! Thank God I was kept from that. I concealed what was burning within. Then first I learned to pray,—I learned to trust in God. And so better thoughts came to me; and I said, 'If he uses me well, I will serve him; if not, I will run for my life.'
"Well, he brought me here to Tennessee. Here he was managing his aunt's estate, which she, soon dying, bequeathed to him. Up to this time I had got on very well; but he never liked me; he often said I knew too much, and was too proud. He was determined to humiliate me; so one day he said to me, 'Pomp, that Nance has been acting ugly of late, and you permit her.' I was a sort of overseer, you see. 'Now I'll tell you what I am going to have done. Nance is going to be whipped, and you are the fellow that's going to whip her.'
"'Pardon, master,' said I, 'that's what I never did—to whip a woman.'
"'Then it's time for you to begin. I've had enough of your fine manners, Pomp, and now you have got to come down a little.'
"'I will do any thing you please to serve your interests, sir,' said I. 'But whip a woman I never can, and never will. That's so, master.'
"'You villain!' he shouted, seizing a riding whip, 'I'll teach you to defy my authority to my face!' And he sprang at me, furious with rage.
"'Take care, sir!' I said, stepping back. ''Twill be better for both of us for you not to strike me!'
"'What! you threaten, you villain?'
"'I do not threaten, sir; but I say what I say. It will be better for both of us. You will never strike me twice. I tell you that.'