The writer has often been inquired of, by correspondents from differentparts of the country, whether this narrative is a true one; and to theseinquiries she will give one general answer.

The separate incidents that compose the narrative are, to a verygreat extent, authentic, occurring, many of them, either under her ownobservation, or that of her personal friends. She or her friendshave observed characters the counterpart of almost all that are hereintroduced; and many of the sayings are word for word as heard herself,or reported to her.

The personal appearance of Eliza, the character ascribed to her, aresketches drawn from life. The incorruptible fidelity, piety and honesty,of Uncle Tom, had more than one development, to her personal knowledge.Some of the most deeply tragic and romantic, some of the most terribleincidents, have also their parallels in reality. The incident of themother's crossing the Ohio river on the ice is a well-known fact. Thestory of "old Prue," in the second volume, was an incident thatfell under the personal observation of a brother of the writer, thencollecting-clerk to a large mercantile house, in New Orleans. From thesame source was derived the character of the planter Legree. Of him herbrother thus wrote, speaking of visiting his plantation, on acollecting tour; "He actually made me feel of his fist, which was likea blacksmith's hammer, or a nodule of iron, telling me that it was'calloused with knocking down niggers.' When I left the plantation, Idrew a long breath, and felt as if I had escaped from an ogre's den."

That the tragical fate of Tom, also, has too many times had itsparallel, there are living witnesses, all over our land, to testify.Let it be remembered that in all southern states it is a principle ofjurisprudence that no person of colored lineage can testify in a suitagainst a white, and it will be easy to see that such a case may occur,wherever there is a man whose passions outweigh his interests, and aslave who has manhood or principle enough to resist his will. There is,actually, nothing to protect the slave's life, but the _character_ ofthe master. Facts too shocking to be contemplated occasionally forcetheir way to the public ear, and the comment that one often hears madeon them is more shocking than the thing itself. It is said, "Very likelysuch cases may now and then occur, but they are no sample of generalpractice." If the laws of New England were so arranged that a mastercould _now and then_ torture an apprentice to death, would it bereceived with equal composure? Would it be said, "These cases are rare,and no samples of general practice"? This injustice is an _inherent_ onein the slave system,--it cannot exist without it.

The public and shameless sale of beautiful mulatto and quadroon girlshas acquired a notoriety, from the incidents following the capture ofthe Pearl. We extract the following from the speech of Hon. Horace Mann,one of the legal counsel for the defendants in that case. He says: "Inthat company of seventy-six persons, who attempted, in 1848, to escapefrom the District of Columbia in the schooner Pearl, and whose officersI assisted in defending, there were several young and healthy girls, whohad those peculiar attractions of form and feature which connoisseursprize so highly. Elizabeth Russel was one of them. She immediatelyfell into the slave-trader's fangs, and was doomed for the New Orleansmarket. The hearts of those that saw her were touched with pity forher fate. They offered eighteen hundred dollars to redeem her; and somethere were who offered to give, that would not have much left after thegift; but the fiend of a slave-trader was inexorable. She was despatchedto New Orleans; but, when about half way there, God had mercy on her,and smote her with death. There were two girls named Edmundson in thesame company. When about to be sent to the same market, an older sisterwent to the shambles, to plead with the wretch who owned them, for thelove of God, to spare his victims. He bantered her, telling what finedresses and fine furniture they would have. 'Yes,' she said, 'that maydo very well in this life, but what will become of them in the next?'They too were sent to New Orleans; but were afterwards redeemed, at anenormous ransom, and brought back." Is it not plain, from this, that thehistories of Emmeline and Cassy may have many counterparts?

Justice, too, obliges the author to state that the fairness of mind andgenerosity attributed to St. Clare are not without a parallel, asthe following anecdote will show. A few years since, a young southerngentleman was in Cincinnati, with a favorite servant, who had been hispersonal attendant from a boy. The young man took advantage of thisopportunity to secure his own freedom, and fled to the protection ofa Quaker, who was quite noted in affairs of this kind. The ownerwas exceedingly indignant. He had always treated the slave with suchindulgence, and his confidence in his affection was such, that hebelieved he must have been practised upon to induce him to revolt fromhim. He visited the Quaker, in high anger; but, being possessed ofuncommon candor and fairness, was soon quieted by his arguments andrepresentations. It was a side of the subject which he never hadheard,--never had thought on; and he immediately told the Quaker that,if his slave would, to his own face, say that it was his desire to befree, he would liberate him. An interview was forthwith procured, andNathan was asked by his young master whether he had ever had any reasonto complain of his treatment, in any respect.

"No, Mas'r," said Nathan; "you've always been good to me."

"Well, then, why do you want to leave me?"

"Mas'r may die, and then who get me?--I'd rather be a free man."

After some deliberation, the young master replied, "Nathan, in yourplace, I think I should feel very much so, myself. You are free."

He immediately made him out free papers; deposited a sum of money in thehands of the Quaker, to be judiciously used in assisting him to startin life, and left a very sensible and kind letter of advice to the youngman. That letter was for some time in the writer's hands.

The author hopes she has done justice to that nobility, generosity, andhumanity, which in many cases characterize individuals at the South.Such instances save us from utter despair of our kind. But, she asks anyperson, who knows the world, are such characters _common_, anywhere?

For many years of her life, the author avoided all reading upon orallusion to the subject of slavery, considering it as too painful tobe inquired into, and one which advancing light and civilization wouldcertainly live down. But, since the legislative act of 1850, when sheheard, with perfect surprise and consternation, Christian and humanepeople actually recommending the remanding escaped fugitives intoslavery, as a duty binding on good citizens,--when she heard, on allhands, from kind, compassionate and estimable people, in the free statesof the North, deliberations and discussions as to what Christian dutycould be on this head,--she could only think, These men and Christianscannot know what slavery is; if they did, such a question could neverbe open for discussion. And from this arose a desire to exhibit it in a_living dramatic reality_. She has endeavored to show it fairly, in itsbest and its worst phases. In its _best_ aspect, she has, perhaps,been successful; but, oh! who shall say what yet remains untold in thatvalley and shadow of death, that lies the other side?

To you, generous, noble-minded men and women, of the South,--you, whosevirtue, and magnanimity and purity of character, are the greater for theseverer trial it has encountered,--to you is her appeal. Have you not,in your own secret souls, in your own private conversings, felt thatthere are woes and evils, in this accursed system, far beyond what arehere shadowed, or can be shadowed? Can it be otherwise? Is _man_ ever acreature to be trusted with wholly irresponsible power? And does not theslave system, by denying the slave all legal right of testimony, makeevery individual owner an irresponsible despot? Can anybody fail tomake the inference what the practical result will be? If there is, as weadmit, a public sentiment among you, men of honor, justice and humanity,is there not also another kind of public sentiment among the ruffian,the brutal and debased? And cannot the ruffian, the brutal, the debased,by slave law, own just as many slaves as the best and purest? Are thehonorable, the just, the high-minded and compassionate, the majorityanywhere in this world?

The slave-trade is now, by American law, considered as piracy. Buta slave-trade, as systematic as ever was carried on on the coast ofAfrica, is an inevitable attendant and result of American slavery. Andits heart-break and its horrors, can they be told?

The writer has given only a faint shadow, a dim picture, of the anguishand despair that are, at this very moment, riving thousands of hearts,shattering thousands of families, and driving a helpless and sensitiverace to frenzy and despair. There are those living who know the motherswhom this accursed traffic has driven to the murder of their children;and themselves seeking in death a shelter from woes more dreadedthan death. Nothing of tragedy can be written, can be spoken, can beconceived, that equals the frightful reality of scenes daily and hourlyacting on our shores, beneath the shadow of American law, and the shadowof the cross of Christ.

And now, men and women of America, is this a thing to be trifled with,apologized for, and passed over in silence? Farmers of Massachusetts,of New Hampshire, of Vermont, of Connecticut, who read this book by theblaze of your winter-evening fire,--strong-hearted, generous sailorsand ship-owners of Maine,--is this a thing for you to countenance andencourage? Brave and generous men of New York, farmers of rich andjoyous Ohio, and ye of the wide prairie states,--answer, is this a thingfor you to protect and countenance? And you, mothers of America,--youwho have learned, by the cradles of your own children, to love and feelfor all mankind,--by the sacred love you bear your child; by your joyin his beautiful, spotless infancy; by the motherly pity and tendernesswith which you guide his growing years; by the anxieties of hiseducation; by the prayers you breathe for his soul's eternal good;--Ibeseech you, pity the mother who has all your affections, and not onelegal right to protect, guide, or educate, the child of her bosom! Bythe sick hour of your child; by those dying eyes, which you can neverforget; by those last cries, that wrung your heart when you couldneither help nor save; by the desolation of that empty cradle, thatsilent nursery,--I beseech you, pity those mothers that are constantlymade childless by the American slave-trade! And say, mothers of America,is this a thing to be defended, sympathized with, passed over insilence?

Do you say that the people of the free state have nothing to do with it,and can do nothing? Would to God this were true! But it is not true. Thepeople of the free states have defended, encouraged, and participated;and are more guilty for it, before God, than the South, in that theyhave not the apology of education or custom.

If the mothers of the free states had all felt as they should, in timespast, the sons of the free states would not have been the holders, and,proverbially, the hardest masters of slaves; the sons of the free stateswould not have connived at the extension of slavery, in our nationalbody; the sons of the free states would not, as they do, trade thesouls and bodies of men as an equivalent to money, in their mercantiledealings. There are multitudes of slaves temporarily owned, and soldagain, by merchants in northern cities; and shall the whole guilt orobloquy of slavery fall only on the South?

Northern men, northern mothers, northern Christians, have something moreto do than denounce their brethren at the South; they have to look tothe evil among themselves.

But, what can any individual do? Of that, every individual can judge.There is one thing that every individual can do,--they can see to itthat _they feel right_. An atmosphere of sympathetic influence encirclesevery human being; and the man or woman who _feels_ strongly, healthilyand justly, on the great interests of humanity, is a constant benefactorto the human race. See, then, to your sympathies in this matter! Arethey in harmony with the sympathies of Christ? or are they swayed andperverted by the sophistries of worldly policy?

Christian men and women of the North! still further,--you have anotherpower; you can _pray!_ Do you believe in prayer? or has it become anindistinct apostolic tradition? You pray for the heathen abroad; prayalso for the heathen at home. And pray for those distressed Christianswhose whole chance of religious improvement is an accident of trade andsale; from whom any adherence to the morals of Christianity is, in manycases, an impossibility, unless they have given them, from above, thecourage and grace of martyrdom.

But, still more. On the shores of our free states are emerging the poor,shattered, broken remnants of families,--men and women, escaped, bymiraculous providences from the surges of slavery,--feeble in knowledge,and, in many cases, infirm in moral constitution, from a system whichconfounds and confuses every principle of Christianity and morality.They come to seek a refuge among you; they come to seek education,knowledge, Christianity.

What do you owe to these poor unfortunates, oh Christians? Doesnot every American Christian owe to the African race some effort atreparation for the wrongs that the American nation has brought uponthem? Shall the doors of churches and school-houses be shut upon them?Shall states arise and shake them out? Shall the church of Christ hearin silence the taunt that is thrown at them, and shrink away from thehelpless hand that they stretch out; and, by her silence, encourage thecruelty that would chase them from our borders? If it must be so, itwill be a mournful spectacle. If it must be so, the country will havereason to tremble, when it remembers that the fate of nations is in thehands of One who is very pitiful, and of tender compassion.

Do you say, "We don't want them here; let them go to Africa"?

That the providence of God has provided a refuge in Africa, is, indeed,a great and noticeable fact; but that is no reason why the church ofChrist should throw off that responsibility to this outcast race whichher profession demands of her.

To fill up Liberia with an ignorant, inexperienced, half-barbarizedrace, just escaped from the chains of slavery, would be only toprolong, for ages, the period of struggle and conflict which attends theinception of new enterprises. Let the church of the north receive thesepoor sufferers in the spirit of Christ; receive them to the educatingadvantages of Christian republican society and schools, until they haveattained to somewhat of a moral and intellectual maturity, and thenassist them in their passage to those shores, where they may put inpractice the lessons they have learned in America.

There is a body of men at the north, comparatively small, who have beendoing this; and, as the result, this country has already seen examplesof men, formerly slaves, who have rapidly acquired property, reputation,and education. Talent has been developed, which, considering thecircumstances, is certainly remarkable; and, for moral traits ofhonesty, kindness, tenderness of feeling,--for heroic efforts andself-denials, endured for the ransom of brethren and friends yet inslavery,--they have been remarkable to a degree that, considering theinfluence under which they were born, is surprising.

The writer has lived, for many years, on the frontier-line of slavestates, and has had great opportunities of observation among those whoformerly were slaves. They have been in her family as servants; and, indefault of any other school to receive them, she has, in many cases, hadthem instructed in a family school, with her own children. She hasalso the testimony of missionaries, among the fugitives in Canada, incoincidence with her own experience; and her deductions, with regard tothe capabilities of the race, are encouraging in the highest degree.

The first desire of the emancipated slave, generally, is for_education_. There is nothing that they are not willing to give or do tohave their children instructed, and, so far as the writer has observedherself, or taken the testimony of teachers among them, they areremarkably intelligent and quick to learn. The results of schools,founded for them by benevolent individuals in Cincinnati, fullyestablish this.

The author gives the following statement of facts, on the authorityof Professor C. E. Stowe, then of Lane Seminary, Ohio, with regardto emancipated slaves, now resident in Cincinnati; given to show thecapability of the race, even without any very particular assistance orencouragement.

The initial letters alone are given. They are all residents ofCincinnati.

"B----. Furniture maker; twenty years in the city; worth ten thousanddollars, all his own earnings; a Baptist.

"C----. Full black; stolen from Africa; sold in New Orleans; been freefifteen years; paid for himself six hundred dollars; a farmer; ownsseveral farms in Indiana; Presbyterian; probably worth fifteen or twentythousand dollars, all earned by himself.

"K----. Full black; dealer in real estate; worth thirty thousanddollars; about forty years old; free six years; paid eighteen hundreddollars for his family; member of the Baptist church; received a legacyfrom his master, which he has taken good care of, and increased.

"G----. Full black; coal dealer; about thirty years old; worth eighteenthousand dollars; paid for himself twice, being once defrauded tothe amount of sixteen hundred dollars; made all his money by his ownefforts--much of it while a slave, hiring his time of his master, anddoing business for himself; a fine, gentlemanly fellow.

"W----. Three-fourths black; barber and waiter; from Kentucky; nineteenyears free; paid for self and family over three thousand dollars; deaconin the Baptist church.

"G. D----. Three-fourths black; white-washer; from Kentucky; nine yearsfree; paid fifteen hundred dollars for self and family; recently died,aged sixty; worth six thousand dollars."

Professor Stowe says, "With all these, except G----, I have been, forsome years, personally acquainted, and make my statements from my ownknowledge."

The writer well remembers an aged colored woman, who was employed as awasherwoman in her father's family. The daughter of this woman married aslave. She was a remarkably active and capable young woman, and, by herindustry and thrift, and the most persevering self-denial, raised ninehundred dollars for her husband's freedom, which she paid, as she raisedit, into the hands of his master. She yet wanted a hundred dollars ofthe price, when he died. She never recovered any of the money.

These are but few facts, among multitudes which might be adduced, toshow the self-denial, energy, patience, and honesty, which the slave hasexhibited in a state of freedom.

And let it be remembered that these individuals have thus bravelysucceeded in conquering for themselves comparative wealth and socialposition, in the face of every disadvantage and discouragement. Thecolored man, by the law of Ohio, cannot be a voter, and, till within afew years, was even denied the right of testimony in legal suits withthe white. Nor are these instances confined to the State of Ohio. In allstates of the Union we see men, but yesterday burst from the shacklesof slavery, who, by a self-educating force, which cannot be toomuch admired, have risen to highly respectable stations in society.Pennington, among clergymen, Douglas and Ward, among editors, are wellknown instances.

If this persecuted race, with every discouragement and disadvantage,have done thus much, how much more they might do if the Christian churchwould act towards them in the spirit of her Lord!

This is an age of the world when nations are trembling and convulsed.A mighty influence is abroad, surging and heaving the world, as with anearthquake. And is America safe? Every nation that carries in its bosomgreat and unredressed injustice has in it the elements of this lastconvulsion.

For what is this mighty influence thus rousing in all nations andlanguages those groanings that cannot be uttered, for man's freedom andequality?

O, Church of Christ, read the signs of the times! Is not this power thespirit of Him whose kingdom is yet to come, and whose will to be done onearth as it is in heaven?

But who may abide the day of his appearing? "for that day shall burnas an oven: and he shall appear as a swift witness against those thatoppress the hireling in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, andthat _turn aside the stranger in his right_: and he shall break inpieces the oppressor."

Are not these dread words for a nation bearing in her bosom so mightyan injustice? Christians! every time that you pray that the kingdomof Christ may come, can you forget that prophecy associates, in dreadfellowship, the _day of vengeance_ with the year of his redeemed?

A day of grace is yet held out to us. Both North and South have beenguilty before God; and the _Christian church_ has a heavy account toanswer. Not by combining together, to protect injustice and cruelty,and making a common capital of sin, is this Union to be saved,--butby repentance, justice and mercy; for, not surer is the eternal law bywhich the millstone sinks in the ocean, than that stronger law, by whichinjustice and cruelty shall bring on nations the wrath of Almighty God!