As has been said, Harriet can neither read nor write; her letters are all written by an amanuensis, and she seems to have an idea that by laying her hand on this person, her feelings may be transmitted to the one to whom she is writing. These feelings are sometimes very poetically expressed. I have by me some of those letters; in one of them she says: "I lay my hand on the shoulder of the writer of this letter, and I wish for you, and all your offsprings, a through ticket in the Gospel train to Glory."
In another letter she has dictated this sentence:
"I ask of my Heavenly Father, that when the last trump sounds, and my name is called, I may stand close by your side, to answer to the call." Probably many of her friends and correspondents might contribute facts and incidents in Harriet's life quite as interesting as any I have mentioned, but I have no way of getting at them.
Harriet had long cherished the idea of having her hospital incorporated, and placed in charge of the Zion African Methodist Church of Auburn, and she was particularly anxious to come into possession of a lot of twenty-five acres of land, near her own home, to present to it as a little farm. This lot was to be sold at auction, and on the day of the sale Harriet appeared with a very little money, and a determination to have the land, cost what it might.
"Dey was all white folks but me dere, Missus, and dere I was like a blackberry in a pail ob milk, but I hid down in a corner, and no one know'd who was biddin'. De man began down pretty low, and I kept goin' up by fifties; he got up to twelve hundred, thirteen hundred, fourteen hundred, and still dat voice in the corner kept goin' up by fifties. At last it got up to fourteen hundred and fifty, an' den oders stopped biddin', an' de man said, 'All done! who is de buyer?' 'Harriet Tubman,' I shouted. 'What! dat ole nigger?' dey said. 'Old woman, how you ebber gwine to pay fer dat lot ob land?' 'I'm gwine home to tell de Lawd Jesus all about it,' I said."
After telling the Lord Jesus all about it, Harriet went down to a bank, obtained the money by mortgaging the land, and then requested to have a deed made out, making the land over to the Zion African Methodist Church. And her mind is easy about her hospital, though with many persons the trouble would be but just beginning, as there is interest on the mortgage to be paid.
Though the hospital is no longer on her hands, you will never find her without several poor creatures under her care. When I last saw her she was providing for five sick and injured ones. A blind woman came one day to her door, led by four little children—her husband had turned her out of his house, and like all other poor distressed black people, who could get there, she made her way to Harriet. Before the next morning a fifth was added to the group. As soon as it was possible Harriet dressed the whole six in white and took them to a Methodist church and had them baptized.
A little account of this was sent to the "Evangelist," and the almost immediate response was seventy-five dollars, which was of great benefit in providing for the needs of the growing family.
This faithful creature will probably not live much longer, and her like will not be seen again. But through the sale of the last edition of her "Memoir," and some other sources of income, her wants will be abundantly supplied.
Harriet's friends will be glad to learn that she has lately been for some time in Boston, where a surgical operation was performed upon her head, the skull (which was crushed by a weight thrown by her master more than seventy years before) being successfully raised. Harriet's account of this operation is rather amusing.