Christian people. Cincinnati being near the border-line of Kentucky,
was naturally the battle-ground of ideas. Slaves fled into the
free State and were helped into Canada by means of the "Underground
Railroad," which was in reality only a friendly house about every ten
miles, where the colored people could be secreted during the day, and
then carried in wagons to the next "station" in the night.

Lane Seminary became a hot-bed of discussion. Many of the Southern
students freed their slaves, or helped to establish schools for
colored children in Cincinnati, and were disinherited by their fathers
in consequence. Dr. Bailey, a Christian man who attempted to carry on
a fair discussion of the question in his paper, had his presses broken
twice and thrown into the river. The feeling became so intense, that
the houses of free colored people were burned, some killed, and the
seminary was in danger from the mob. The members of Professor Stowe's
family slept with firearms, ready to defend their lives. Finally
the trustees of the college forbade all slavery discussion by the
students, and as a result, nearly the whole body left the institution.

Dr. Beecher, meantime, was absent at the East, having raised a large
sum of money for the seminary, and came back only to find his labor
almost hopeless. For several years, however, he and his children
stayed and worked on. Mrs. Stowe opened her house to colored children,
whom she taught with her own. One bright boy in her school was claimed
by an estate in Kentucky, arrested, and was to be sold at auction. The
half-crazed mother appealed to Mrs. Stowe, who raised the needed money
among her friends, and thus saved the lad.

Finally, worn out with the "irrepressible conflict," the Beecher
family, with the Stowes, came North in 1850, Mr. Stowe accepting a