Antislavery movements -- United States; Slavery -- United States
I fear, however, that I shall be unable to be more particular in my
description of the servant; It is said, “like master, like man,” and,
indeed, leaving out the expressions above, which show the relationship
of the master to the community and the church, the description of
temper and of general, moral, and religious principle, would answer to
be repeated now. Suffice it to say, the man was not bad; that is, not
thoroughly bad. He cherished no secret desire for liberty. His master
had no real fear of his attempting to escape. He loved his master; and
some thought, who did not wholly know him, that never slave loved a
master with more fondness and devotion. Yet I know that he was often
disobedient. Passages,--not of arms,--but of ill-temper, of reproach,
and of insolence, not unfrequently occurred between them. High words
were used, hard looks and moody oftener still, perhaps, yet the master
never struck his servant, nor did the servant ever offer violence
towards his master. But at times, they would have been very glad to
part company, if the one could have easily escaped, or the other could
have made out to do without him. Much of the disobedience which gave
serious offence to the master, was the result of inadvertence. Lessons,
the most frequently enjoined, were forgotten; they were not always
listened to with an obedient mind. Years long the master required this
or that service from day to day, and yet the command was not once a
year, I may say, attended to. Always the master was saying,--“to-morrow
I shall turn over a new leaf with him;” but he had not energy enough to
carry his purpose into effect. He intended to give his servant at least
some moral education, to teach him self-control, to prevent his bursts
of passion, not by the infliction of punishment, but by a true moral
discipline; yet the work was always delayed, and never accomplished.
You will say, the master had himself some idle fancies that he ought
not to have indulged, and that a severer course would have been more
successful. But he was one of those who doubt the advantages and shrink
from the application of severity, and he would have been no more prompt
and resolute and persevering with his servant than with himself.
At the commencement, I seemed to promise a story. But all my narrative
is closed with a word more. The master was at the age of twenty-one,
when he came into possession of his man. The connection will never be
dissolved, except, at least, by death. Indeed, reader, if you have not
already seen it, master and man were but one and the same person.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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