Reader, if thou art an abolitionist (and, verily, I hope thou art not), thou wilt conceive the mingled wo and astonishment with which I listened to these words of the chief kidnapper—whose Christian name, by-the-way, was Joshua, though as for his surname, I must confess I never heard it—and appreciate, even to the cold creeping of the flesh, the terrible situation in which I was placed. I was an abolitionist—or, at least, my captors chose so to consider me, and they were now carrying me down south, to sell me on speculation. For this they had kidnapped me! for this they had fastened me up by the legs like a "wild baw!" for this—but it is vain to accumulate phrases expressive of their villany and my distresses. What mattered it to my captors if, after all, I was no abolitionist? (for, of a verity, though opposed in principle to the whole institution of slavery, my mind had been so fully occupied with other philanthropic considerations that I had had no time to play the liberator)—it was all one to my captors. The genius which could convert a hemlock-knot into a shoulder of bacon, a bundle of elder twigs into good Havana cigars, and bags of carpet-rags into Bologna sausages, could be at no fault when the demand was only to transform a peaceable follower of George Fox into a roaring lion of abolition. I felt that they had got me into a quandary more dreadful than any that had ever before afflicted my spirit. I knew we were already far south of Mason's and Dixon's.
The moment my vile kidnappers slackened their speed a little, having ridden hard to escape the negro-drivers, I called a parley, in the course of which two circumstances were brought to light, which greatly increased the afflictions of my spirit. I began by remonstrating with the villains upon the wickedness, cruelty, and injustice of their proceedings; to which Joshua made answer, that "times was hard—that a poor man was put to a hard shift to get a living—that, for his part, he was an honest man who turned his hand to any honest matter— that he knew what was lawful, and what was not—that he was agin all abolition, which was anti-constitutional, and clear for keeping the peace betwixt the North and South"—and twenty other things of a like nature, of which the most important was, a declaration that the good people of some parish or other in Louisiana had offered a reward of fifty thousand dollars for either of two individuals whose names I have forgotten, though they were very famous abolitionists, and although Joshua, to settle the matter at once, showed me their names in the advertisement, which he had cut from a newspaper.
"Friend," said I, "I don't see that these foolish people have offered any reward for me."
"Well, darn it, I know it," said Joshua; "but I rather estimate they'll give half price for you; and that will pay us right smart for the venture. For, you see, what they want is an abolitionist, and I rather estimate they're not over and above partickilar as to who he may be. Now I have heern tell of a heap of incendiary papers you sent down south to free the niggurs—"
"I never did any such thing!"
"Oh, well," said Joshua, "it's all one; them there sugar-growing fellers will think so; and so it's all right. And there's them runaway niggurs you Phil'delphy Quakers are always hiding away from their masters. I rather estimate we'll make a good venture out of you."
"What!" said I, "will you sell my life for money?"
"No," said the vile Joshua, "it's a mere trade in flesh and blood—wouldn't take a man's life on no consideration."
"Friend, thee shall have money if thee will permit me to escape."
"Well," said Joshua, with an indifferent drawl, "I estimate not. Abel Snipe told me you was cleaned out as clear as a gourd-shell."