To know, also, that I was never to consult my own will, but was,
while I lived, to be entirely under the control of another, was another
state of mind hard for me to bear. Indeed all things now made me _feel_,
what I had before known only in words, that _I was a slave_. Deep was this
feeling, and it preyed upon my heart like a never-dying worm. I saw no
prospect that my condition would ever be changed. Yet I used to plan in my
mind from day to day, and from night to night, how I might be free.
One day, while I was in this state of mind, my father gave me a small
basket of peaches. I sold them for thirty cents, which was the first money
I ever had in my life. Afterwards I won some marbles, and sold them for
sixty cents, and some weeks after Mr. Hog from Fayetteville, came to visit
my master, and on leaving gave me one dollar. After that Mr. Bennahan from
Orange county gave me a dollar, and a son of my master fifty cents. These
sums, and the hope that then entered my mind of purchasing at some future
time my freedom, made me long for money; and plans for money-making took
the principal possession of my thoughts.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25