A Childs Anti-Slavery Book | Page 4

his head against the side of the house, he groaned out, "My mother, O my mother! If you ain't dead, why don't you come to me?"
By degrees he calmed down, and half asleep there in the sunshine, he dreamed of the home that he once had. His mother was a noble woman, so he thought. Nobody else ever looked so kindly into his face; he was sure nobody else ever loved him as she did, and he remembered when she was gay and cheerful, and would go all day singing about her work. And his father, he could just remember him as a very pleasant man that he used to run to meet, sometimes, when he saw him coming home away down the road; but that was long ago. He had not seen him now for years, and he had heard his mother say that his father's master had moved away out of the state and taken him with him, and maybe he would never return. Then Lewis's mother grew sad, and stopped her singing, though she worked as hard as ever, and kept her children all neat and clean.
And those dear brothers and sisters, what had become of them? There was Tom, the eldest, the very best fellow in the world, so Lewis thought. He would sit by the half hour making tops, and whistles, and all sorts of pretty playthings. And Sam, too! he was always so full of fun and singing songs. What a singer he was! and it was right cheerful when Sam would borrow some neighbor's banjo and play to them. But they were all gone; and his sad, sweet-faced, lady-like sister Nelly, too, they were all taken off in one day by one of the ugliest negro-drivers that ever scared a little slave-boy's dreams. And it was while his mother was away from home too. How she did cry and take on when she came back and found them all gone, and she hadn't even the chance to bid them good-by! She said she knew her master sent her off that morning because he was going to sell her children.
Lewis shuddered as he thought of that dreadful night. It was hardly two years ago, and the fearful things he heard then burned into his soul with terrible distinctness. It seemed as if their little cabin was deserted after that, for Tom, and Sam, and Nelly were almost grown up, and the rest were all little ones. The next winter his other sister, Fanny, died; but that wasn't half so sad. She was about twelve years old, and a blithesome, cheerful creature, just as her mother had been. He remembered how his master came to their cabin to comfort them, as he said; but his mother told him plainly that she did not want any such comfort. She wished Nelly was dead too. She wished she had never had any children to grow up and suffer what she had. It was in vain her master tried to soothe her. He talked like a minister, as he was; but she had grown almost raving, and she talked to him as she never dared to do before. She wanted to know why he didn't come to console her when she lost her other children; "three all at once" she said, "and they're ten times worse than dead. You never consoled me then at all. Religion? Pooh! I don't want none of your religion."
And now she, too, was gone. She had been gone more than a year. It was said that she was hired out to work in another family; but it wasn't so. They only told her that story to get her away from the children peaceably. She was sold quite a distance away to a very bad man, who used her cruelly.
Ned, who was some two years younger than Lewis, and the only brother he had left, was a wild, careless boy, who raced about among the other children, and did not seem to think much about anything. Lewis often wished he could have somebody to talk with, and he wondered if his mother would ever come back again.
Had he been a poet he might have put his wishes into verses like the following, in which Mrs. Follen has given beautiful expression to the wishes of such a slave boy as Lewis:
THE SLAVE BOY'S WISH.
I wish I was that little bird,?Up in the bright blue sky,?That sings and flies just where he will,?And no one asks him why.
I wish I was that little brook,?That runs so swift along,?Through pretty flowers and shining stones,?Singing a merry song.
I wish I was that butterfly,?Without a thought or care,?Sporting my pretty, brilliant wings,?Like a flower in the air.
I wish I was that wild, wild deer,?I saw the other day,?Who swifter