he would shoot me if I didn’t stop.  Knowing that his gun was not loaded, I paid no attention to him, but ran across the road into a cotton field where there was a great gang of slaves working.  The man with the gun followed, and called to the two colored drivers who were on horseback, to ride after me and stop me.  I saw a large piece of woodland at some distance ahead, and directed my course towards it.  Just as I reached it, I looked back, and saw my pursuer far behind me; and found, to my great joy, that the two drivers had not followed me.  I got behind a tree, and soon heard the man enter the woods and pass me.  After all had been still for more than an hour, I crept into a low place in the depth of the woods and laid down amidst a bed of reeds, where I again fell asleep.  Towards evening, on awaking, I found the sky beginning to be cloudy, and before night set in it was completely overcast.  Having lost my hat, I tied an old handkerchief over my head, and prepared to resume my journey.  It was foggy and very dark, and involved as I was in the mazes of the forest, I did not know in what direction I was going.  I wandered on until I reached a road, which I supposed to be the same one which I had left.  The next day the weather was still dark and rainy, and continued so for several days.  During this time I slept only by leaning against the body of a tree, as the ground was soaked with rain.  On the fifth night after my adventure near Washington, the clouds broke away, and the clear moonlight and the stars shone down upon me.

I looked up to see the North Star, which I supposed still before me.  But I sought it in vain in all that quarter of the heavens.  A dreadful thought came over me that I had been travelling out of my way.  I turned round and saw the North Star, which had been shining directly upon my back.  I then knew that I had been travelling away from freedom, and towards the place of my captivity ever since I left the woods into which I had been pursued on the 21st, five days before.  Oh, the keen and bitter agony of that moment!  I sat down on the decaying trunk of a fallen tree, and wept like a child.  Exhausted in mind and body, nature came at last to my relief, and I fell asleep upon the log.  When I awoke it was still dark.  I rose and nerved myself for another effort for freedom.  Taking the North Star for my guide, I turned upon my track, and left once more the dreaded frontiers of Alabama behind me.  The next night, after crossing the one on which I travelled, and which seemed to lead more directly towards the North.  I took this road, and the next night after, I came to a large village.  Passing through the main street, I saw a large hotel which I at once recollected.  I was in Augusta, and this was the hotel at which my master had spent several days when I was with him, on one of his southern visits.  I heard the guards patrolling the town cry the hour of twelve; and fearful of being taken up, I turned out of the main street, and got upon the road leading to Petersburg.  On reaching the latter place, I swam over the Savannah river into South Carolina, and from thence passed into North Carolina.