Page:My Bondage and My Freedom (1855).djvu/319

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DESPERATE FIGHT.
309

'Fred., bring that roller here.'—'Fred., go get a fresh can of water.'—'Fred., come help saw off the end of this timber.'—'Fred., go quick and get the crowbar.'—'Fred., hold on the end of this fall.'—'Fred., go the blacksmith's shop, and get a new 'punch.'—'Hurra, Fred.! run and bring me a cold chisel.'—'I say, Fred., bear a hand, and get up a fire as quick as lightning under that steam-box.'—'Halloo, nigger! come, turn this grindstone.'—'Come, come! move, move! and bowse this timber forward.'—'I say, darkey, blast your eyes, why don't you heat up some pitch?'—'Halloo! halloo! halloo!' (Three voices at the same time.) 'Come here!—Go there!—Hold on where you are! D—n you, if you move, I'll knock your brains out!"’

Such, dear reader, is a glance at the school which was mine, during the first eight months of my stay at Baltimore. At the end of eight months, Master Hugh refused longer to allow me to remain with Mr. Gardiner. The circumstance which led to his taking me away, was a brutal outrage, committed upon me by the white apprentices of the ship-yard. The fight was a desperate one, and I came out of it most shockingly mangled. I was cut and bruised in sundry places, and my left eye was nearly knocked out of its socket. The facts, leading to this barbarous outrage upon me, illustrate a phase of slavery destined to become an important element in the overthrow of the slave system, and I may, therefore state them with some minuteness. That phase is this: the conflict of slavery with the interests of the white mechanics and laborers of the south. In the country, this conflict is not so apparent; but, in cities, such as Baltimore, Richmond, New Orleans, Mobile, &c., it is seen pretty clearly. The slaveholders, with a craftiness peculiar