John Brown held his sons’ letter in his hands. He went outside and stood looking up at the Adirondacks, his hacked-out frame and wrinkled, yellow face hard against the sky. Then he strode to the barn and saddled his horse. “I’m going to Rochester,” he told his wife. “I want to talk this over with Douglass.” She stood in the narrow door and watched him riding down the trail. He did not look back. John Brown never looked back. * * * * * In Rochester people had already begun pointing out Frederick Douglass’ house to strangers. Until Douglass came and moved his family into the unpretentious two-story frame dwelling, Alexander Street had been one of many shady side-streets in a quiet section of the city. The dark-skinned new arrivals caused a lot of talk, but no open antagonism. Famous folk from Boston and New York and Philadelphia began appearing on Alexander Street. Somebody said he’d recognized Horace Greeley, editor of a newspaper in New York; and somebody else was sure he saw the great preacher, Wendell Phillips. The neighbors grew accustomed to seeing Mr. Daniel Anthony’s huge carryall drive up of a Sunday afternoon and stop in front of the house, while all the Douglass family piled in. Mr. Anthony’s big place with its rows of fruit trees was several miles out in the country. Evidently that was where they went. Then they talked about Mr. Anthony’s daughter, Susan B. Anthony. She was pretty famous herself--what with going around the country and getting her name in all the papers. Some of the men shook their heads over this. But the women bit off the threads of their sewing cotton with a snap and eyed each other significantly. They reminded their men folks that the Woman’s State Temperance Convention had been a pretty important affair. “Temperance conventions is one thing,” said the men, “but this talk about women voting is something else!” Then one lady spoke up and said she’d heard their neighbor Frederick Douglass make a speech about women voting. “And it was wonderful!” she added. “Seems like he’d have enough on his hands trying to free slaves!” grumbled one man, snapping his suspenders. Douglass did have a lot on his hands. The _North Star_ was a large sheet, published weekly, and it cost eighty dollars a week to issue. Everybody rejoiced when the circulation hit three thousand. There were many times when Douglass was hard pressed for money, and the mechanical work of getting out the paper was arduous. The entire family was drafted. Lewis and Frederick learned typesetting, and both boys delivered papers. The two little fellows soon became a familiar sight on Rochester streets, papers under their arms and school books strapped to their backs.