Part 34

The tears gushed from her eyes in full flood, and she replied earnestly, "I do want to be free. To be sure I do want to be free; but then I want to go to my husband."

Mr. Morgan and his Southern friend grew excited. With an angry glance at the old gentleman, the latter exclaimed, "I only wish we had you in New-Orleans! We'd hang you up in twenty-four hours."

"Then you are a set of savages," replied Friend Hopper.

"You are a set of thieves," retorted he.

"Well, savages may be thieves also," rejoined the abolitionist, with a significant smile.

"You are no gentleman," responded the other, in an irritated tone.

"I don't profess to be a gentleman," answered the impassive Quaker. "But I am an honest old man; and perhaps that will do as well."

This remark occasioned a general smile. Indeed it was pleasant to observe, throughout this scene in the court-room, that popular sympathy was altogether on the side of freedom. It was a strange blind instinct on the part of the people, considering how diligently they had been instructed otherwise by pulpit and press; but so it was.

When the slave was summoned into the judge's room, Friend Hopper followed; being extremely desirous to have her understand her position clearly. He found Mr. Morgan and his Southern friend in close and earnest conversation with her. When he attempted to approach her, he was unceremoniously shoved aside, with the remark, "Don't push me away!"

"I did not push thee," said Friend Hopper; "and see that thou dost not push me!" He then inquired of the woman if he had rightly understood that her husband was free. She replied in the affirmative. "Then let me tell thee," said the kind-hearted old gentleman, "that we will send for him, and obtain employment for him here, if it is thy choice to remain."

Again she wept, and repeated, "I do want to be free." But she was evidently bewildered and distrustful, and did not know how to understand the opposite professions that were made to her.

On representation of the claimant's friends, Judge Oakley adjourned the case till the next morning; telling the woman she was at liberty to go with whom she pleased. The colored people had assembled in considerable numbers, and were a good deal excited. Experience led them to suppose that she would either be cajoled into consenting to return to slavery, or else secretly packed off to New-Orleans, if she were left in Southern hands. They accordingly made haste to hustle her away. But their well-intended zeal terrified the poor bewildered creature, and she escaped from them, and went back to her mistress.

The pro-slavery papers chuckled, as they always do, when some poor ignorant victim is deceived by false representation, alarmed by an excitement that she does not comprehend, afraid that strangers are not telling her the truth, or that they have not the power to protect her; and in continual terror of future punishment, if she should attempt to take her freedom, and yet be unable to maintain it. Great is the triumph of republicans, when, under such trying circumstances, one poor bewildered wretch goes back to slavery; but of the hundreds, who every month take their freedom, through fire and flood, and all manner of deadly perils, they are as silent as the grave.

In the spring of 1841, I went to New-York to edit the Anti-Slavery Standard, and took up my abode with the family of Isaac T. Hopper. The zealous theological controversy among Friends naturally subsided after the separation between the opposing parties had become an old and settled fact. Consequently the demand for Quaker books diminished more and more. The Anti-Slavery Society, at that time, needed a Treasurer and Book-Agent; and Friend Hopper was proposed as a suitable person for that office. As only a small portion of his time was occupied with the sale of books he had on hand, he concluded to accept the proposition. He was then nearly seventy years old; but he appeared at least twenty years younger, in person and manners. His firm, elastic step seemed like a vigorous man of fifty. He would spring from the Bowery cars, while they were in motion, with as much agility as a lad of fourteen. His hair was not even sprinkled with gray. It looked so black and glossy, that a young lady, who was introduced to him, said she thought he wore a wig unnaturally dark for his age. It was a favorite joke of his to make strangers believe he wore a wig; and they were not easily satisfied that he spoke in jest, until they examined his head.

The roguery of his boyhood had subsided into a love of little mischievous tricks; and the playful tone of humor, that rippled through his conversation, frequently reminded me of the Cheeryble Brothers, so admirably described by Dickens. If some one rang at the door, and inquired for Mr. Hopper, he always answered, "There is no such person lives here." If the stranger urged that he had been directed by a man who said he knew Mr. Hopper, he would persevere in saying, "There must be some mistake. No such person lives here." At last, when the disappointed visitor turned to go away, he would call out, "Perhaps thou means Isaac T. Hopper? That is my name."

Being called upon to give a receipt to a Catholic priest for some money deposited in his hands, he simply wrote "Received of John Smith." When the priest had read it, he handed it back and said, "I am disbursing other people's money, and shall be obliged to show this receipt; therefore, I should like to have you write my name, the Reverend John Smith." "I have conscientious scruples about using titles," replied Friend Hopper. "However, I will try to oblige thee." He took another slip of paper, and wrote, "Received of John Smith, who calls himself the Reverend." The priest smiled, and accepted the compromise; being well aware that the pleasantry originated in no personal or sectarian prejudice.

He always had something facetious to say to the people with whom he traded. The oyster-men, the coal-men, and the women at the fruit-stalls in his neighborhood, all knew him as a pleasant old gentleman, always ready for a joke. One day, when he was buying some peaches, he said to the woman, "A serious accident happened at our house last night. I killed two robbers." "Dear me!" she exclaimed. "Were they young men, or old convicts? Had they ever been in Sing Sing?" "I don't know about that," replied he. "I should think they might have been by the noise they made. But I despatched them before they had stolen much. The walls are quite bloody." "Has a Coroner's inquest been called?" inquired the woman. When he answered, "No," she lifted her hands in astonishment, and exclaimed, "Well now, I do declare! If anybody else had done it, there would have been a great fuss made about it; but you are a privileged man, Mr. Hopper." When he was about to walk away, he turned round and said, "I did not mention to thee that the robbers I killed were two mosquitoes." The woman had a good laugh, and he came home as pleased as a boy, to think how completely his serious manner had deceived her.

One day he went to a hosiery store, and said to the man, "I bought a pair of stockings here yesterday. They looked very nice; but when I got home, I found two large holes in them; and I have come for another pair. The man summoned his wife, and informed her of what the gentleman had said.

"Bless me! Is it possible, sir?" she exclaimed.

"Yes," replied Friend Hopper, I found they had holes as large as my hand."

"It is very strange," rejoined she; "for I am sure they were new. But if you have brought them back, of course we will change them."

"O," said he, "upon examination, I concluded that the big holes were made to put the feet in; and I liked the stockings so well, that I have come to buy another pair."

At another time, he entered a crockery shop, where a young girl was tending. He made up a very sorrowful face, and in whining tones, told her that he was in trouble and needed help. She asked him to wait till the gentleman came; but he continued to beseech that she would take compassion on him. The girl began to be frightened by his importunity, and looked anxiously toward the door. At last, the man of the shop came in; and Friend Hopper said, "This young woman thinks she cannot help me out of my trouble; but I think she can. The fact is, we are going to have company, and so many of our tumblers are broken, that I came to ask if she would sell me a few."

One day, when he was walking quickly up the Bowery, his foot slipped on a piece of orange-peel, and he fell prostrate on the sidewalk. He started up instantly, and turning to a young man behind him, he said, "Couldst thou have done that any better?"

He very often mingled with affairs in the street, as he passed along. One day, when he saw a man beating his horse brutally, he stepped up to him and said, very seriously, "Dost thou know that some people think men change into animals when they die?"

The stranger's attention was arrested by such an unexpected question, and he answered that he never was acquainted with anybody who had that belief.

"But some people do believe it," rejoined Friend Hopper; "and they also believe that animals may become men. Now I am thinking if thou shouldst ever be a horse, and that horse should ever be a man, with such a temper as thine, the chance is thou wilt get some cruel beatings." Having thus changed the current of his angry mood, he proceeded to expostulate with him in a friendly way; and the poor beast was reprieved, for that time, at least.

He could imitate the Irish brogue very perfectly; and it was a standing jest with him to make every Irish stranger believe he was a countryman. During his visit to Ireland, he had become so well acquainted with various localities, that I believe he never in any instance failed to deceive them, when he said, "Och! and sure I came from old Ireland meself." After amusing himself in this way for a while, he would tell them, "It is true I did come from Ireland; but, to confess the truth, I went there first."