It is now, as you are aware, about seventeen years since I left your house and service, at the age of twenty.  Up to that time, I was, according to your rule and claim, your slave.  Till the age of seven years, I was, of course, of little or no service to you.  At that age, however, you hired me out, and for three years I earned my support; at the age of ten years, you took me to your place again, and in a short time after you put me to work at the blacksmith’s trade, at which, together with the carpentering trade, &c, I served you peaceably until the day I left you, with exception of the short time you had sold me to S——­ H——­, Esq., for seven hundred dollars.  It is important for me to say to you, that I have no consciousness of having done you any wrong.  I called you master when I was with you from the mere force of circumstances; but I never regarded you as my master.  The nature which God gave me did not allow me to believe that you had any more right to me than I had to you, and that was just none at all.  And from an early age, I had intentions to free myself from your claim.  I never consulted any one about it; I had no advisers or instigators; I kept my own counsel entirely concealed in my own bosom.  I never meditated any evil to your person or property, but I regarded you as my oppressor, and I deemed it my duty to get out of your hands by peaceable means.

I was always obedient to your commands.  I laboured for you diligently at all times.  I acted with fidelity in any matter which you entrusted me.  As you sometimes saw fit to entrust me with considerable money, to buy tools or materials, not a cent was ever coveted or kept.

During the time I served you in the capacity of blacksmith, your materials were used economically, your work was done expeditiously, and in the very best style, a style second to no smith in your neighbourhood.  In short, sir, you well know that my habits from early life were advantageous to you.  Drinking, gambling, fighting, &c., were not my habits.  On Sabbaths, holidays, &c., I was frequently at your service, when not even your body-servant was at home.

  Times and times again, I have gone on Sunday afternoon to H——­, six
  miles, after your letters and papers, when it was as much my privilege
  to be "out of the way," as it was C——.

But what treatment did you see fit to return me for all this?  You, in the most unfeeling manner, abused my father for no cause but speaking a word to you, as a man would speak to his fellow-man, for the sake simply of a better understanding.

  You vexed my mother, and because she, as a tender mother would do,
  showed solicitude for the virtue of her daughters, you threatened her in
  an insulting brutal manner.