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my service without leave, I think you ought to make me some compensation for your time.
Autumn is now coming on, and as that is always a busy season for wood-sawyers, perhaps you can make me a small payment at that time.’
This insidious conversation threw James completely off his guard, and he promised to make an effort to raise some money for his master.
As soon as he had said enough to prove that he was his bondsman, the slaveholder threw off the mask of kindness, and ordered the constables to seize and hand-cuff him. His wife and children shrieked aloud, and Isaac T. Hopper, who happened to be walking through the street at the time, hastened to ascertain the cause of such alarming sounds.
Entering the house, he found the colored man hand-cuffed, and his wife and children making the loud lamentations, which had arrested his attention.
The poor woman told how her husband had been duped by friendly words, and now he was to be torn from his family and carried off into slavery.
Friend Hopper's feelings were deeply affected at witnessing such a heartrending scene, and he exerted his utmost eloquence to turn the master from his cruel purpose.
The wife and children wept and entreated also; but it was all in vain.
He replied to their expostulations by ridicule, and proceeded to hurry his victim off to prison.
The children clung round Friend Hopper's knees,
Boston, J. P. Jewett and Company; Cleveland, Ohio: Jewett, Proctor and Worthington; London; Low and Company, 1854.
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