Thirty Years a Slave eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 175 pages of information about Thirty Years a Slave.

Thirty Years a Slave eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 175 pages of information about Thirty Years a Slave.

When I arrived at New Orleans I found the levee filled with fruit.  Oranges and bananas were piled in masses like coal, and the scenes in this portion of the city were very different from anything one sees in the north.  Among the many places of interest in the city were the cemeteries.  Owing to the low level of the ground and its saturation with water, burials are seldom made in graves, but instead in tombs built of brick or marble or other stone, in which are constructed cells running back from the front and of a size and shape sufficient to admit a coffin.  Then, as soon as filled, they are sealed up.  These tombs contain from two to six or eight, or even more of these cells, and their general appearance from the front is not unlike that of a section of mail boxes in a postoffice.  Other places of interest were the old French market, the public squares and gardens, the old Catholic churches, and some of the relics of slavery days in the shape of pens where slaves were exposed for sale.  One of these was in the basement of the Hotel Royal, which would contain several hundred at once, and from which hundreds went to a bondage bitterer than death, and from which death was the only relief.

* * * * *

I make nursing my regular business.

I came back to Milwaukee with a new idea.  I liked nursing—­it was my choice from childhood.  Even though I had been deprived of a course of training, I felt that I was not too old to try, at least, to learn the art, or to add to what I already knew.  Dr. Douglas gave me a splendid recommendation, and had some cards printed, bearing my name and address.  These I distributed, and thus began the business which I have followed steadily since that time.  Dr. Marks very kindly recommended me to well known men needing the service of a nurse, and to his professional associates; and through this means, and through his continued kindness and interest, I have been almost constantly engaged in this work.  I am also indebted to Drs. Fox and Spearman and other prominent physicians for recommendations which have resulted in securing me employment which has proved remunerative to me, and which seemed to give entire satisfaction to the sick and their friends.  This is no small part of the compensation in the difficult, often wearing, and always delicate duties of the nurse in the sick room.  To every true man or woman it is one of the greatest satisfactions to have the consciousness of having been useful to his fellow beings.  My duties as nurse have taken me to different parts of the state, to Chicago, to California and to Florida; and I have thus gained no little experience, not only in my business, but in many other directions.

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Thirty Years a Slave from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.