Incidents in the life of a slave girl.: Written by herself. Edited by L. Maria Child.

The New Tie to Life.
You are my slave, and shall always be my slave. I
will never sell you, that you may depend upon."
Hope died away iil my heart as he closed the door
after him. I had calculated that in his rage he would
sell me to a slave-trader; and I knew the father of my
child was on the watchl to buy me.
About this time my uncle Phillip was expected to
return from a voyage. The day before his departure
I had officiated as bridesmaid to a young friend. My
heart was then ill at ease, but my smiling countenance
did not betray it. Only a year had passed; but what
fearful changes it had wrought! My heart had grown
gray in misery. Lives that flashi in sunshine, and lives
that are born in tears, receive their hue from circumstances. None of us know what a year may bring
forth.
I felt no joy when they told me my uncle had come.
He wanted to see me, though he knew what had happened. I shrank from him at first; but at last consented that he should come to my room. He received
me as he always had done. - 0, how my heart smote
me when I felt his tears on my burning cheeks! The
words of my grandmother came to my mind, -" Perhaps your mother and father are taken from the evil
days to come." My disappointed heart could now
praise God that it was so. But why, thought I, did
my relatives ever cherish hopes for me? What was
there to save me from the usual fate of slave girls?
Mlany more beautiful and more intelligent than I had
experienced a similar fate, or a far worse one. Hiow
could they hope that I should escape?
-Iy uncle's stay was short, and I was not sorry for
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