One peaceable old slave was killed by having his head split open with an ax.  He was found in the morning lying in the yard, with the bloody instrument of death by his side.  This occasioned some excitement among the slaves, but as the white people paid but little attention to it, it soon passed off, and the sorrowful slaves put the old man’s remains in a rough box, and conveyed them to their last resting-place.

After the sale was over, the slaves were allowed a holiday, with permission to go and visit their friends and relatives previous to their departure for their new home in a strange land.

The slaves generally on Capt.  Helm’s plantation looked upon this removal as the greatest hardship they had ever met; the severest trial they had ever endured; and the separation from our old home and fellow-slaves, from our relatives and the old State of Virginia, was to us a contemplation of sorrowful interest.  Those who remained, thought us the most unfortunate of human beings to be taken away off into the State of New York, and, as they believed, beyond the bounds of civilization, where we should in all probability be destroyed by wild beasts, devoured by cannibals, or scalped by the Indians.  We never expected to meet again in this life, hence our parting interviews were as solemn as though we were committing our friends to the grave.  But He whose tender mercies are over all his creatures, knew best what was for our good.

Little did Capt.  Helm think when bringing his slaves to New York that in a few short years, they would be singing the song of deliverance from Slavery’s thralldom; and as little thought he of the great and painful change, to be brought about in his own circumstances.  Could any one have looked into futurity and traced the difficult path, my master was to tread,—­could any one have foreseen the end to which he must soon come, and related it to him in the days of his greatness and prosperity, he would, I am certain, have turned from such a narrator of misfortune in a greater rage than did Namaan when the man of God told him “to go and dip seven times in the Jordan.”

He could not have believed, nor could I, that in a few years the powerful, wealthy slaveholder, living in luxury and extravagance, would be so reduced that the necessaries of life even, were beyond his means, and that he must be supported by the town!

But I anticipate.  Let us return to the old plantation which seems dearer than ever, now that we are about to leave it forever.

We thought Capt.  Helm’s prospects pretty fair, and yet we shuddered when we realized our condition as slaves.  This change in our circumstances was calculated to awaken all our fears that had been slumbering, and bring all the perilous changes to which we might be subjected most vividly to mind.