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. . . but a great crowd of people gathered and remained around the jail all the morning; many of whom were intoxicated, and sang and shouted in honor of free government and the rights of man. About eleven o'clock, a long table was spread under a row of trees which grew in the street, not far from the jail, and which appeared to me to be of the kind called in Pennsylvania, the pride of China. At this table several hundred persons sat down to dinner soon after noon, and continued to eat and drink, and sing songs in honor of liberty, for more than two hours. At the end of the dinner a gentleman rose and stood upon his chair, near one end of the table, and begged the company to hear him for a few minutes. He informed them that he was a candidate for some office -- but what office it was I do not recollect -- and said, that as it was an acknowledged principle of our free government, that all men were born free and equal, he presumed it would not be deemed an act of arrogance in him, to call upon them for their votes at the coming election. About five o'clock, the jailer came and stood at the front door of the jail, and proclaimed, in a very loud voice, that a sale of the most valuable slaves would immediately take place . . . |
. . . it was near the middle of the forenoon when we entered the market square of the town. We dismounted, and left our thanks once more for my lord, and then approached a crowd assembled in the center of the square, to see what might be the object of interest. It was the remnant of that old peregrinating band of slaves! So they had been dragging their chains about, all this weary time. That poor husband was gone, and also many others; and some few purchases had been added to the gang. The king was not interested, and wanted to move along, but I was absorbed, and full of pity. I could not take my eyes away from these worn and wasted wrecks of humanity. There they sat, grounded upon the ground, silent, uncomplaining, with bowed heads, a pathetic sight. And by hideous contrast, a redundant orator was making a speech to another gathering not thirty steps away, in fulsome laudation of "our glorious British liberties!" I was boiling. I had forgotten I was a plebeian, I was remembering I was a man. Cost what it might, I would mount that rostrum and -- Click! the king and I were handcuffed together! Our companions, those servants, had done it; my lord Grip stood looking on. The king burst out in a fury, and said: "What meaneth this ill-mannered jest?" My lord merely said to his head miscreant, coolly: "Put up the slaves and sell them!" SLAVES! The word had a new sound -- and how unspeakably awful! |
TO TWAIN'S TEXT