CHAPTER III.
Mrs.Cox was always very severe and exacting with my mother, and one occasion, when something did not suit her, she turned on mother like a fury, and declared, "I am just tired out with the 'white airs' you put on, and if you don't behave differently, I will make Mr.Cox sell you down the river at once." Although mother turned grey with fear, she presented a bold front and retorted that "she didn't care, she was tired of that place, and didn't like to live there, nohow." This so infuriated Mr.Cox that he cried, "How dare a negro say what she liked or what she did not like; and he would show her what he should do." So, on the day following, he took my mother to an auction-room on Main Street and sold her to the highest bidder, for five hundred and fifty dollars.

Oh! God! the pity of it! "In the home of the brave and the land of the free," in the sight of the stars and stripes--that symbol of freedom--sold away from her child, to satisfy the anger of a peevish mistress! My mother returned to the house to get her few belongings, and straining me to her breast, begged me to be a good girl, that she was going to run away, and would buy me as soon as she could.

With all the inborn faith of a child, I believed it most fondly, and when I heard that she had actually made her escape, three weeks after, my heart gave an exultant throb and cried, "God is good!" A large reward was offered, the bloodhounds (curse them and curse their masters) were set loose on her trail.

In the day time she hid in caves and the surrounding woods, and in the night time, guided by the wondrous North Star, that blessed lodestone of a slave people, my mother finally reached Chicago, where she was arrested by the negro-catchers.

At this time the Fugitive Slave Law was in full operation, and it was against the law of the whole country to aid and protect an escaped slave; not even a drink of water, for the love of the Master, might be given, and those who dared to do it (and there were many such brave hearts, thank God!) placed their lives in danger.
The presence of bloodhounds and "nigger-catchers" in their midst, created great excitement and scandalized the community.