Covey. I was bare-footed and bare-headed, and in <177 BEARING OFMASTER THOMAS>my shirt sleeves. The way was through bogs and briers, and I tore my feet often during the journey. I was full five hours in going the seven or eight miles; partly, because of the difficulties of the way, and partly, because of the feebleness induced by my illness, bruises and loss of blood. On gaining my master's store, I presented an appearance of wretchedness and woe, fitted to move any but a heart of stone.
From the crown of my head to the sole of my feet, there were marks of blood. My hair was all clotted with dust and blood, and the back of my shirt was literally stiff with the same. Briers and thorns had scarred and torn my feet and legs, leaving blood marks there. Had I escaped from a den of tigers, I could not have looked worse than I did on reaching St. Michael's. In this unhappy plight, I appeared before my professedly _Christian_master, humbly to invoke the interposition of his power and authority, to protect me from further abuse and violence. I had begun to hope, during the latter part of my tedious journey toward St. Michael's, that Capt. Auld would now show himself in a nobler light than I had ever before seen him. I was disappointed. I had jumped from a sinking ship into the sea; Ihad fled from the tiger to something worse. I told him all the circumstances, as well as I could; how I was endeavoring to please Covey; how hard I was at work in the present instance; how unwilling I sunk down under the heat, toil and pain; the brutal manner in which Covey had kicked me in the side; the gash cut in my head; my hesitation about troubling him (Capt. Auld) with complaints; but, that now I felt it would not be best longer to conceal from him the outrages committed on me from time to time by Covey. At first, master Thomas seemed somewhat affected by the story of my wrongs, but he soon repressed his feelings and became cold as iron. It was impossible--as I stood before him at the first--for him to seem indifferent. I distinctly saw his human nature asserting its conviction against the slave system, which made cases like mine _possible;_ but, as I have said, humanity fell before the systematic tyranny of slavery. He first walked <178>the floor, apparently much agitated by my story, and the sad spectacle I presented; but, presently, it was _his_ turn to talk. He began moderately, by finding excuses for Covey, and ending with a full justification of him, and a passionate condemnation of me. "He had no doubt I deserved the flogging.
He did not believe I was sick; I was only endeavoring to get rid of work. My dizziness was laziness, and Covey did right to flog me, as he had done." After thus fairly annihilating me, and rousing himself by his own eloquence, he fiercely demanded what Iwished _him_ to do in the case!
With such a complete knock-down to all my hopes, as he had given me, and feeling, as I did, my entire subjection to his power, Ihad very little heart to reply. I must not affirm my innocence of the allegations which he had piled up against me; for that would be impudence, and would probably call down fresh violence as well as wrath upon me. The guilt of a slave is always, and everywhere, presumed; and the innocence of the slaveholder or the slave employer, is always asserted. The word of the slave, against this presumption, is generally treated as impudence, worthy of punishment. "Do you contradict me, you rascal?" is a final silencer of counter statements from the lips of a slave.
Calming down a little in view of my silence and hesitation, and, perhaps, from a rapid glance at the picture of misery Ipresented, he inquired again, "what I would have him do?" Thus invited a second time, I told Master Thomas I wished him to allow me to get a new home and to find a new master; that, as sure as Iwent back to live with Mr. Covey again, I should be killed by him; that he would never forgive my coming to him (Capt. Auld)with a complaint against him (Covey); that, since I had lived with him, he almost crushed my spirit, and I believed that he would ruin me for future service; that my life was not safe in his hands. This, Master Thomas _(my brother in the church)_regarded as "nonsence{sic}." "There was no danger of Mr. Covey's killing me; he was a good man, industrious and religious, and he would not think of <179 THE SLAVE IS NEVER SICK>removing me from that home; "besides," said he and this I found was the most distressing thought of all to him--"if you should leave Covey now, that your year has but half expired, I should lose your wages for the entire year. You belong to Mr. Covey for one year, and you _must go back_ to him, come what will. You must not trouble me with any more stories about Mr. Covey; and if you do not go immediately home, I will get hold of you myself." This was just what I expected, when I found he had _prejudged_ the case against me. "But, Sir," I said, "I am sick and tired, and Icannot get home to-night." At this, he again relented, and finally he allowed me to remain all night at St. Michael's; but said I must be off early in the morning, and concluded his directions by making me swallow a huge dose of _epsom salts_--about the only medicine ever administered to slaves.
It was quite natural for Master Thomas to presume I was feigning sickness to escape work, for he probably thought that were _he_in the place of a slave with no wages for his work, no praise for well doing, no motive for toil but the lash--he would try every possible scheme by which to escape labor. I say I have no doubt of this; the reason is, that there are not, under the whole heavens, a set of men who cultivate such an intense dread of labor as do the slaveholders. The charge of laziness against the slave is ever on their lips, and is the standing apology for every species of cruelty and brutality. These men literally "bind heavy burdens, grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they, themselves, will not move them with one of their fingers."My kind readers shall have, in the next chapter--what they were led, perhaps, to expect to find in this--namely: an account of my partial disenthrallment from the tyranny of Covey, and the marked change which it brought about.
