Sunday in fishing and other harmless pursuits; these were now all put an
end to. The Sabbath became a season of dread to William: he was required
to drive the family to and from the church, a distance of four miles
either way; and while they attended to the salvation of their souls
within the building, he was compelled to attend to the horses without
it, standing by them during divine service under a burning sun, or
drizzling rain. Although William did not get the religion of his master,
he acquired a family passion which appears to have been strongly
intermixed with the devotional exercises of the household of Dr.
Young--a love of sweet julep. In the evening, the slaves were required
to attend family worship. Before commencing the service, it was the
custom to hand a pitcher of the favourite beverage to every member of
the family, not excepting the nephew, a child of between four and five
years old. William was in the habit of watching his opportunity during
the prayer and helping himself from the pitcher, but one day letting it
fall, his propensity for this intoxicating drink was discovered, and he
was severely punished for its indulgence.

In 1830, being then about sixteen years of age, William was hired to a
slave-dealer named Walker. This change of employment led the youth away
south and frustrated, for a time, his plans for escape. His experience
while in this capacity furnishes some interesting, though painful,
details of the legalized traffic in human beings carried on in the
United States. The desperation to which the slaves are driven at their
forced separation from husband, wife, children, and kindred, he found to
be a frequent cause of suicide. Slave-dealers he discovered were as
great adepts at deception in the sale of their commodity as the most
knowing down-easter, or tricky horse dealer. William's occupation on
board the steamer, as they steamed south, was to prepare the stock for
the market, by shaving off whiskers and blacking the grey hairs with a