On the following Sunday during our travels, probably it would seem better to say wanderings, we met an old colored gentleman who very kindly took us to his home, a distance of about half a mile. Our feet at this time had become very much swollen and painful; and we were exceedingly tired. He proved to be “a friend in need as well as a friend indeed.” He fed us sumptuously, and took special care of us. It was our happy lot to remain under his kind hospitality until the following Sunday morning. As was his custom, he went to church and should have us accompany him to the place of worship. After the service was ended, he announced in the church that he had with him three travelers, and wanted some of the brethren to care for them. A woman by the name of Mary Jackson arose and said that her employers wanted a man, and if one of them could go home with her, she thought she could get him a place. The opportunity was too good to be lost, and there was no time to be spent in thought. There was three of us, and one place presented, and it may well be imagined I hastened to speak up quickly, and said I would go. When she got ready we started, leaving my old companions in sorrow. We had to go a distance of five miles. The week’s rest and good care, with the expectation of obtaining work afforded strength and cheer for the journey. This place proved to be Doe Run, in Chester County, and the man’s name was James Pile, a farmer. When I saw him he told me he could give me work with a compensation of four dollars a month, board, lodging and washing. I accepted his terms, and made a bargain to work for him until the first of the coming April. One of the boys (my former associate) procured a situation similar to mine, and the other went to live with a colored family to cut wood for the winter. Just two weeks from the time we started from the land of slavery for that of freedom, we were settled down, independently working for our own bread, and choosing our own employers. I remained in the employ of James Pile for nearly three months, and then renewed the agreement for an indefinite time, for eight dollars a month. I must mention something here with regard to a daughter of Mr. Pile’s. It was a sight unseen by me in my southern home; and that was the daughter of a farmer or planter standing by the side of her father’s workmen with a hay-fork in her hand, not idly standing by to see the work done properly, or that the men did not idle away their time, but to share in the labor of spreading and stacking the hay. When the time came to take it to the barn, she could do her part in pitching it on the cart. I continued to work on this farm until September.