CHAPTER XI.
_I attend a prayer meeting .-- Punishment therefor threatened .-- I attempt to escape alone .-- My return to take my family .-- Our sufferings .-- Dreadful attack of wolves .-- Our recapture._ Some months after Malinda had recovered from her sickness, I got permission from the Deacon, on one Sabbath day, to attend a prayer meeting, on a neighboring plantation, with a few old superannuated slaves, although this was contrary to the custom of the country--for slaves were not allowed to assemble for religious worship.

Being more numerous than the whites there was fear of rebellion, and the overpowering of their oppressors in order to obtain freedom.
But this gentleman on whose plantation I attended the meeting was not a Deacon nor a professor of religion.

He was not afraid of a few old Christian slaves rising up to kill their master because he allowed them to worship God on the Sabbath day.
We had a very good meeting, although our exercises were not conducted in accordance with an enlightened Christianity; for we had no Bible--no intelligent leader--but a conscience, prompted by our own reason, constrained us to worship God the Creator of all things.
When I returned home from meeting I told the other slaves what a good time we had at our meeting, and requested them to go with me to meeting there on the next Sabbath.

As no slave was allowed to go from the plantation on a visit without a written pass from his master, on the next Sabbath several of us went to the Deacon, to get permission to attend that prayer meeting; but he refused to let any go.

I thought I would slip off and attend the meeting and get back before he would miss me, and would not know that I had been to the meeting.
When I returned home from the meeting as I approached the house I saw Malinda, standing out at the fence looking in the direction in which I was expected to return.