THE COUNTRY HIS DEBTOR.

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my duties are harsh and painful to some one, so that I rejoice at an opportunity, however rare, of combining duty with kindly offices."

It remains to be seen what further services, if any, Mr. Stanton will render to his country in a public capacity. Should he again be a public servant, it will be as it has been, the United States, and not he, who will be the obliged party.

CHAPTER XII.

FREDERICK DOUGLASS.

The Opportunity for Every Man in a Republic-The Depth Below a White Man's Poverty-The Starting Point whence Fred Douglass Raised HimselfHis Mother-Her Noble Traits-Her Self-Denial for the sake of Seeing himShe Defends him against Aunt Katy-Her Death-Col. Loyd's PlantationThe Luxury of his own Mansion-The Organization of his Estate-" Old Master"-How they Punished the Women-How Young Douglass Philosophized on Being a Slave-Plantation Life-The Allowance of Food-The Clothes-An Average Plantation Day-Mr. Douglass' Experience as a Slave Child-The Slave Children's Trough-The Slave Child's Thoughts-The Melancholy of Slave Songs-He Becomes a House Servant-A Kind Mistress Teaches him to Read-How he completed his Education-Effects of Learning to Read-Experiences Religion and Prays for Liberty-Learns to Write-Hires his Time, and Absconds-Becomes a Free Working-Man in New Bedford— Marries-Mr. Douglass on Garrison-Mr. Douglass' Literary Career.

THE reader will perceive, in reading the memoirs which we have collected in the present volume, that although they give a few instances of men who have risen to distinction from comfortable worldly circumstances, by making a good use of the provision afforded them by early competence and leisure, yet by far the greater number have raised themselves by their own unaided efforts, in spite of every disadvantage which circumstances could throw in their way.

It is the pride and the boast of truly republican institutions that they give to every human being an opportunity of thus demonstrating what is in him. If a man is a man, no matter in what rank of society he is born, no matter how tied down and weighted by poverty and all its attendant disadvantages, there is nothing in our American institutions to prevent his rising

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to the very highest offices in the gift of the country. So, though a man like Charles Sumner, coming of an old Boston family, with every advantage of Boston schools and of Cambridge college, becomes distinguished through the country, yet side by side with him we see Abraham Lincoln, the rail splitter, Henry Wilson, from the shoemaker's bench, and Chase, from a New Hampshire farm. But there have been in our country some three or four million of human beings who were born to a depth of poverty below what Henry Wilson or Abraham Lincoln ever dreamed of. Wilson and Lincoln, to begin with, owned nothing but their bare hands, but there have been in this country four or five million men and women who did not own even their bare hands. Wilson and Lincoln, and other brave men like them, owned their own souls and wills-they were free to say, "Thus and thus I will do I will be educated, I will be intelligent, I will be Christian, I will by honest industry amass property to serve me in my upward aims." But there were four million men and women in America who were decreed by the laws of this country not to own even their own souls. The law said of them-They shall be taken and held as chattels personal to all intents. and purposes. This hapless class of human beings might be sold for debt, might be mortgaged for real estate, nay, the unborn babe might be pledged or mortgaged for the debts of a master. There were among these unfortunate millions, in the eye of the law, neither husbands nor wives, nor fathers nor mothers; they were only chattels personal. They could no more contract a legal marriage than a bedstead can