University of Virginia Library

Uncle Sam's Emancipation.

A SKETCH.

It may be gratifying to those who desire to
think well of human nature, to know that the leading
incidents of the subjoined sketch are literal
matters of fact, occurring in the city of Cincinnati,
which have come within the scope of the
writer's personal knowledge—the incidents have
merely been clothed in a dramatic form, to present
them more vividly to the reader.

In one of the hotel parlors of our queen city, a
young gentleman, apparently in no very easy
frame of mind, was pacing up and down the room,
looking alternately at his watch and out of the
window, as if expecting somebody. At last he
rang the bell violently, and a hotel servant soon
appeared.

“Has my man Sam come in yet?” he inquired.

The polished yellow gentleman to whom this
was addressed, answered with a polite, but somewhat

sinister smirk, that nothing had been seen
of him since early that morning.

“Lazy dog! full three hours since I sent him
off to B— street, and I have seen nothing of
him since.”

The yellow gentleman remarked with consolatory
politeness, that “he hoped Sam had not run
away,” adding, with an ill-concealed grin, that
“them boys was mighty apt to show the clean
heel when they come into a free State.”

“Oh, no; I'm quite easy as to that,” returned
the young gentleman; “I'll risk Sam's ever being
willing to part from me. I brought him because
I was sure of him.”

“Don't you be too sure,” remarked a gentleman
from behind, who had been listening to the conversation.
“There are plenty of mischief-making
busybodies on the trail of every southern gentleman,
to interfere with his family matters, and decoy
off his servants.”

“Didn't I see Sam talking at the corner with
the Quaker Simmons?” said another servant, who
meanwhile had entered.

“Talking with Simmons, was he?” remarked
the last speaker, with irritation; “that rascal

Simmons does nothing else, I believe, but tote
away gentlemen's servants. Well, if Simmons
has got him, you may as well be quiet; you'll not
see your fellow again in a hurry.”

“And who the deuce is this Simmons?” said
our young gentleman, who, though evidently of a
good natured mould, was now beginning to wax
wroth; “and what business has he to interfere
with other people's affairs?”

“You had better have asked those questions a
few days ago, and then you would have kept a
closer eye on your fellow; a meddlesome, canting,
Quaker rascal, that all these black hounds run to,
to be helped into Canada, and nobody knows
where all.”

The young gentleman jerked out his watch with
increasing energy, and then walking fiercely up
to the coloured waiter, who was setting the dinner
table with an air of provoking satisfaction, he
thundered at him, “You rascal, you understand
this matter; I see it in your eyes.”

Our gentleman of colour bowed, and with an
air of mischievous intelligence, protested that he
never interfered with other gentlemen's matters,
while sundry of his brethren in office looked unutterable
things out of the corners of their eyes.

“There is some cursed plot hatched up among
you,” said the young man. “You have talked
Sam into it; I know he never would have
thought of leaving me unless he was put up to it.
Tell me now,” he resumed, “have you heard Sam
say anything about it? Come, he reasonable,” he
added, in a milder tone, “you shall find your account
in it.”

Thus adjured, the waiter protested he would be
happy to give the gentleman any satisfaction in
his power. The fact was, Sam had been pretty
full of notions lately, and had been to see Simmons,
and in short, he should not wonder if he
never saw any more of him.

And as hour after hour passed, the whole day,
the whole night, and no Sam was forthcoming, the
truth of the surmise became increasingly evident.
Our young hero, Mr. Alfred B—, was a good
deal provoked, and strange as the fact may seem,
a good deal grieved too, for he really loved the
fellow. “Loved him!” says some scornful zealot;
“a slaveholder love his slave!” Yes, brother;
why not? A warm-hearted man will love his
dog, his horse, even to grieving bitterly for their
loss, and why not credit the fact that such a one

may love the human creature whom custom has
placed on the same level. The fact was, Alfred
B— did love this young man; he had been appropriated
to him in childhood; and Alfred had
always redressed his grievances, fought his battles,
got him out of scrapes, and purchased for him,
with liberal hand, indulgences to which his comrades
were strangers. He had taken pride to
dress him smartly, and as for hardship and want,
they had never come near him.

“The poor, silly, ungrateful puppy!” soliloquized
he, “what can he do with himself? Confound
that Quaker, and all his meddlesome tribe—
been at him with their bloody-bone stories, I suppose—Sam
knows better, the scamp—halloa,
there,” he called to one of the waiters, “where
does this Simpkins—Simon—Simmons, or what
d'ye call him, live?”

“His shop is No. 5, on G. street.”

“Well, I'll go at him, and see what business he
has with my affairs.”

The Quaker was sitting at the door of his shop,
with a round, rosy, good-humoured face, so expressive
of placidity and satisfaction, that it was
difficult to approach in ireful feeling.

“Is your name Simmons?” demanded Alfred,
in a voice whose natural urbanity was somewhat
sharpened by vexation.

“Yes, friend; what dost thou wish?”

“I wish to inquire whether you have seen anything
of my coloured fellow, Sam; a man of
twenty-five, or thereabouts, lodging at the Pearl
street House?”

“I rather suspect that I have,” said the Quaker,
in a quiet, meditative tone, as if thinking the matter
over with himself.

“And is it true, sir, that you have encouraged
and assisted him in his efforts to get out of my
service?”

“Such, truly, is the fact, my friend.”

Losing patience at this provoking equanimity,
our young friend poured forth his sentiments
with no inconsiderable energy, and in terms not
the most select or pacific, all which our Quaker
received with that placid, full-orbed tranquillity of
countenance, which seemed to say, “Pray, sir, relieve
your mind; don't be particular, scold as hard
as you like.” The singularity of this expression
struck the young man, and as his wrath became
gradually spent, he could hardly help laughing at

the tranquillity of his opponent, and he gradually
changed his tone for one of expostulation. “What
motive could induce you, sir, thus to incommode a
stranger, and one who never injured you at all?”

“I am sorry thou art incommoded,” rejoined
the Quaker. “Thy servant, as thee calls him,
came to me, and I helped him, as I would any
other poor fellow in distress.”

“Poor fellow!” said Alfred, angrily; “that's
the story of the whole of you. I tell you there
is not a free negro in your city so well off as my
Sam is, and always has been, and he'll find it out
before long.”

“But tell me, friend, thou mayest die as well as
another man; thy establishment may fall into
debt, as well as another man's; and thy Sam may
be sold by the Sheriff for debt, or change hands
in dividing the estate, and so, though he was bred
easily, and well cared for, he may come to be a
field hand, under hard masters, starved, beaten,
overworked—such things do happen sometimes, do
they not?”

“Sometimes, perhaps they do,” replied the
young man.

“Well, look you, by our laws in Ohio, thy Sam

is now a free man; as free as I or thou; he hath
a strong back, good hands, good courage, can earn
his ten or twelve dollars a month—or do better.
Now taking all things into account, if thee were
in his place, what would thee do—would thee go
back a slave, or try thy luck as a free man?”

Alfred said nothing in reply to this, only after
a while he murmured half to himself, “I thought
the fellow had more gratitude, after all my kindness.”

“Thee talks of gratitude,” said the Quaker,
“now how does that account stand? Thou hast
fed, and clothed, and protected this man; thou
hast not starved, beaten, or abused him—that
would have been unworthy of thee; thou hast
shown him special kindness, and in return he has
given thee faithful service for fifteen or twenty
years; all his time, all his strength, all he could
do or be, he has given thee, and ye are about
even.” The young man looked thoughtful, but
made no reply.

“Sir,” said he at last, “I will take no unfair
advantage of you; I wish to get my servant once
more; can I do so?”

“Certainly. I will bring him to thy lodgings

this evening, if thee wish it. I know thee will do
what is fair,” said the Quaker.

It were difficult to define the thoughts of the
young man, as he returned to his lodgings. Naturally
generous and humane, he had never dreamed
that he had rendered injustice to the human beings
he claimed as his own. Injustice and oppression
he had sometimes seen with detestation, in
other establishments; but it had been his pride
that they were excluded from his own. It had
been his pride to think that his indulgence and
liberality made a situation of dependence on him
preferable even to liberty.

The dark picture of possible reverses which the
slave system hangs over the lot of the most favoured
slaves, never occurred to him. Accordingly,
at six o'clock that evening, a light tap at
the door of Mr. B.'s parlor, announced the Quaker,
and hanging back behind him, the reluctant Sam,
who, with all his newly-acquired love of liberty,
felt almost as if he were treating his old master
rather shabbily, in deserting him.

“So, Sam,” said Alfred, “how is this? they
say you want to leave me.”

“Yes, master.”

“Why, what's the matter, Sam? haven't I always
been good to you; and has not my father
always been good to you?”

“Oh yes, master; very good.”

“Have you not always had good food, good
clothes, and lived easy?”

“Yes, master.”

“And nobody has ever abused you?”

“No, master.”

“Well, then, why do you wish to leave me?”

“Oh, massa, I want to be a free man.”

“Why, Sam, ain't you well enough off now?”

“Oh, massa may die; then nobody knows who
get me; some dreadful folks, you know, master,
might get me, as they did Jim Sanford, and nobody
to take my part. No, master, I rather be
free man.”

Alfred turned to the window, and thought a few
moments, and then said, turning about, “Well,
Sam, I believe you are right. I think, on the
whole, I'd like best to be a free man myself, and I
must not wonder that you do. So, for ought I
see, you must go; but then, Sam, there's your
wife and child.” Sam's countenance fell.

“Never mind, Sam. I will send them up to
you.”

“Oh, master!”

“I will; ut you must remember now, Sam,
you have got both yourself and them to take care
of, and have no master to look after you; be
steady, sober, and industrious, and then if ever
you get into distress, send word to me, and I'll
help you.” Lest any accuse us of over-colouring
our story, we will close it by extracting a passage
or two from the letter which the generous young
man the next day left in the hands of the Quaker,
for his emancipated servant. We can assure our
readers that we copy from the original document,
which now lies before us:

That dispositions as ingenuous and noble as that
of this young man, are commonly to be found
either in slave States or free, is more than we dare
to assert. But when we see such found, even
among those who are born and bred slaveholders,

we cannot but feel that there is encouragement
for a fair, and mild, and brotherly presentation
of truth, and every reason to lament hasty and
wholesale denunciations. The great error of controversy
is, that it is ever ready to assail persons
rather than principles. The slave system, as a
system, perhaps concentrates more wrong than
any other now existing, and yet those who live
under and in it may be, as we see, enlightened,
generous, and amenable to reason. If the system
alone is attacked, such minds will be the first
to perceive its evils, and to turn against it; but
if the system be attacked through individuals,
self-love, wounded pride, and a thousand natural
feelings, will be at once enlisted for its preservation.
We therefore subjoin it as the moral of our
story, that a man who has had the misfortune to
be born and bred a slaveholder, may be enlightened,
generous, humane, and capable of the most
disinterested regard to the welfare of his slave.