When I Was Nearly Twelve

Hot Weather Brings Out Snakes And Slaveholders, And I Like One Class Of The Venomous Creatures As Little As I Do The Other.

Always It Gave Me A Pang That My Children Had No Lawful Claim To A Name.

The Slave Child Had No Thought For The Morrow; But There Came That Blight, Which Too Surely Waits On Every Human Being Born To Be A Chattel.

There Is Something Akin To Freedom In Having A Lover Who Has No Control Over You, Except That Which He Gains By Kindness And Attachment.

I Would Rather Drudge Out My Life On A Cotton Plantation, Till The Grave Opened To Give Me Rest, Than To Live With An Unprincipled Master And A Jealous Mistress.