for a free man, yet he was taken forcibly out of our vessel.  He then asked to be carried ashore before the secretary or magistrates, and these infernal invaders of human rights promised him he should; but, instead of that, they carried him on board of the other vessel:  and the next day, without giving the poor man any hearing on shore, or suffering him even to see his wife or child, he was carried away, and probably doomed never more in this world to see them again.  Nor was this the only instance of this kind of barbarity I was a witness to.  I have since often seen in Jamaica and other islands free men, whom I have known in America, thus villainously trepanned and held in bondage.  I have heard of two similar practices even in Philadelphia:  and were it not for the benevolence of the quakers in that city many of the sable race, who now breathe the air of liberty, would, I believe, be groaning indeed under some planter’s chains.  These things opened my mind to a new scene of horror to which I had been before a stranger.  Hitherto I had thought only slavery dreadful; but the state of a free negro appeared to me now equally so at least, and in some respects even worse, for they live in constant alarm for their liberty; and even this is but nominal, for they are universally insulted and plundered without the possibility of redress; for such is the equity of the West Indian laws, that no free negro’s evidence will be admitted in their courts of justice.  In this situation is it surprising that slaves, when mildly treated, should prefer even the misery of slavery to such a mockery of freedom?  I was now completely disgusted with the West Indies, and thought I never should be entirely free until I had left them.

    “With thoughts like these my anxious boding mind
    Recall’d those pleasing scenes I left behind;
    Scenes where fair Liberty in bright array
    Makes darkness bright, and e’en illumines day;
    Where nor complexion, wealth, or station, can
    Protect the wretch who makes a slave of man.”

I determined to make every exertion to obtain my freedom, and to return to Old England.  For this purpose I thought a knowledge of navigation might be of use to me; for, though I did not intend to run away unless I should be ill used, yet, in such a case, if I understood navigation, I might attempt my escape in our sloop, which was one of the swiftest sailing vessels in the West Indies, and I could be at no loss for hands to join me:  and if I should make this attempt, I had intended to have gone for England; but this, as I said, was only to be in the event of my meeting with any ill usage.  I therefore employed the mate of our vessel to teach me navigation, for which I agreed to give him twenty-four dollars, and actually paid him part of the money down; though when the captain, some time after, came to know that the mate was to have such a sum for teaching me, he rebuked him, and said it was a shame for him to take any money from