The hearing of those wild notes always depressed my spirits, and filled my heart with ineffable sadness.

The mere recurrence, even now, afflicts my spirit, and while I am writing these lines, my tears are falling.

To those songs I trace my first glimmering conceptions of the dehumanizing character of slavery.

I can never get rid of that conception.

Those songs still follow me, to deepen my hatred of slavery, and quicken my sympathies for my brethren in bonds.