surprised. He would have opened his eyes with wonder if he had known
that Dansley was to pay me five dollars per month extra. He gave me a
written permission to work for Mr. Dansley as long as Dansley should
want me. I immediately went to Dansley's, and stayed with him nine
months--nine months of contented time.

I found my new master every way worthy of any confidence I might repose
in him. In moderate circumstances, he used prudence and diligence in his
business transactions and farm operations. He was one of those kind of
men some of which may be found in almost every community--an unassuming,
industrious, Christian gentleman.

For his farm-force he hired men, both white and black; and when his work
pushed him he would require his cook and house-maid, the only slaves he
owned, to assist in the fields. At the time of my commencing to work for
him he had white men hired who were worse, if any thing, in their habits
of shiftless laziness than the lazy blacks. These whites, whom the
negroes usually termed "white trash," were, as a general thing, the most
vicious, brutal, thieving, shiftless, and lazy human beings imaginable.
They were ignorant in the greatest degree, and would not work so long as
they could obtain food to sustain life in any other way. They deemed it
an honor to be noticed civilly by a respectable negro, and would fawn
and truckle to the behests of any one who had the physical courage to
command them. Such people can be found in no place except the South.
They are a result of the system of slavery and slave-laws, and
slave-owners are responsible for their condition. Such were the kind of
men I had to work with. These men would quarrel and wrangle among
themselves, and would consume time and neglect their work. When the
house-servants were at work in the field, they would insult and misuse
them in every conceivable manner, and it was with great difficulty that