Having, by speculation and mismanagement, lost the most of his property, Dr. Young resumed the practice of medicine in Missouri, and soon obtained a lucrative run of custom. Here, as in Kentucky, the doctor took great interest in matters of religion, and was considered one of the pillars in the church. Being sent one Sabbath morning to carry the sacramental wine to the church, about a mile distant, I could not withstand the temptation it presented of tasting it. Having had one swallow, I was tempted further on, till the beverage disappeared out of the neck of the bottle, so that I felt afraid that if noticed by master, I should be flogged. It occurred to me that I might fill up the bottle from one of the sap tubs, as I passed through the sugar camp; for it was the spring of the year, and we were making maple sugar. I tried to pour the sap into the bottle, but it flared over the top, leaving the wine still some inches down the neck. After ransacking my inventive faculties, I fortunately hit upon a plan and filled it up. Placing the bottle on the ground, and sucking my mouth full of the juice, I stood directly over the bottle and let it stream in until it was full. Putting the stopple in, I started off towards the church, feeling that I had got the advantage of master once more. My fair complexion was a great obstacle to my happiness, both with whites and blacks, in and about the great house. Often mistaken by strangers for a white boy, it annoyed my mistress very much. On one occasion, a visitor came to the place in the absence of the doctor. While Mrs. Young was entertaining the major (for he was a military man), I passed through the room, and going near the stranger, he put out his hand and said to me, "How do you do, bub?" and turning to the lady, he exclaimed, "Madam, I would have known that he was the doctor's son, if I had met him in California, for he is so much like his papa." Mistress ordered me out of the room, and remarked that I was one of the servants, when the major begged pardon for the mistake. After the stranger was gone, I was flogged for his blunder. Dr. Young sold his large farm, which was situated in the central part of the state, and removed to St. Louis, where a number of the servants were let out. I was put to work tending upon the hands in the office of the "St. Louis Times," a newspaper owned and published by Lovejoy & Miller, and edited by Elijah P. Lovejoy. Here my young heart began to feel more longings for liberty. The love of freedom is a sentiment natural to the human heart, and the want of it is felt by him who does not possess it. He feels it a reproach; and with this sting, this wounded pride, hating degradation, and looking forward to the cravings of the heart, the enslaved is always on the alert for an opportunity to escape from his oppressors and to avenge his wrongs. What greater injury and indignity can be offered to man, than to make him the bond-slave of his fellow-man?