The reader, who has seen with what horror and fear I began the life of a slave, may ask if, after I found myself restored to health and strength, I sought no opportunity to give my master the slip, and make a bold push for freedom. I did not; a change had come over the spirit of my dream: I found myself, for the first time in my life, content, or very nearly so, with my condition, free from cares, far removed from disquiet, and, if not actually in love with my lot, so far from being dissatisfied, that I had not the least desire to exchange it for another. Methinks I see the reader throw up his hands at this, crying, "What! content with slavery!" I assure him, now I ponder the matter over, that I am as much surprised as himself, and that I consider my being content with a state of bondage a very singular and unaccountable circumstance. Nevertheless, such was the fact. I was no longer Sheppard Lee, Zachariah Longstraw, nor anybody else, except simply Tom, Thomas, or Tommy, the slave. I forgot that I once had been a freeman, or, to speak more strictly, I did not remember it, the act of remembering involving an effort of mind which it did not comport with my new habits of laziness and indifference to make, though perhaps I _might_ have done so, had I chosen. I had ceased to remember all my previous states of existence. I could not have been an African had I troubled myself with thoughts of any thing but the present. Perhaps this defect of memory will account for my being satisfied with my new condition. I had no recollection of the sweets of liberty to compare and contrast with the disgusts of servitude. Perhaps my mind was stupified--sunk beneath the ordinary level of the human understanding, and therefore incapable of realizing the evils of my condition. Or, perhaps, after all, considering the circumstances of my lot with reference to those of my mind and nature, such evils did not in reality exist. The reader may settle the difficulty for himself, which he can do when he has read a little more of my history. In the meanwhile, the fact is true: I was satisfied with my lot--I was satisfied even with _myself_. The first time I looked at my new face I was shocked at what I considered its ugliness. But having peeped at it a dozen times or more, my ideas began to alter, and, by-and-by, I thought it quite beautiful. I used to look at myself in aunt Phoebe's glass by the hour, and I well remember the satisfaction with which I listened to the following rebuke of my vanity from her, namely, "All you pritty young niggurs with handsome faces is good for nothin, not wuth so much as you cawn!" In short, I was something of a coxcomb; and nothing could equal the pride and happiness of my heart, when, of a Sabbath morning, dressed in one of my master's old coats well brushed up, a bran-new rabbit-fur hat, the gift of little Tommy, a ruffled shirt, and a white neckcloth, with a pair of leather gloves swinging in