Fruitlands by Gloria Whelan

under which the slaves live and how they are bought and sold like cattle and their families broken up. The merchants and cotton exporters who owe their living to slavery are the ones supporting its cruelty.
    Mr. Pillsbury says the battle has just begun. He told us of an abolitionist who went about preaching against slavery. One day he received a package from the South. When he opened the package, he found a dried ear and a length of rope. The ear had been severed from a slave who attempted to escape. The length of rope wasmeant for the abolitionist if he ever attempted to go to the South.
    Slaves who have been helped to escape are to be found on any Boston street. Many of the homes in Concord have a special room where escaped slaves are hidden. Now there is talk that a fugitive slave law might be passed. Such a law would punish those who help slaves to freedom. Mr. Pillsbury says one day there will be fighting in our country between those who support slavery and those who wish to end it. I would gladly fight in such a war. But what of the Quakers, who are against slavery but are opposed to all fighting, even for so noble a cause?
    Tonight Abraham Everett left.
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    A UGUST 18, 1843
    I wrote a play about slaves and masters. My sisters and I were the slaves. William would agree to be the cruel master only if he could also be the one to free the slaves. After we were freed, we ran into the woods and hid and would not come out until Mother called us for supper.
    After supper Abraham went up to his room and came down with all his things. He has been quiet these last days, spending more time by himself. I believe Mr. Pillsbury’s talk today about slavery set him to thinking. While having Mr. Lane and Father over him is not slavery, still I believe he grew tired of being told what to do. After having been shut up in an asylum by his relatives, I think his need for freedom is very deep. My sisters and I cried when he left, and so did Mother. He has been the only one to help her. I have heard her call him “son.”
    No one is left now but Mr. Palmer, who is living at his farm and comes here each day, and Mr. Bower, whom you can’t really count. How will we manage with so small a community?
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    A UGUST 20, 1843
    A needy family appeared at our door, a father and mother and two girls near the age of Anna and me. Their house has burned down and they have no food or clothes. Mother was much moved and gave them a basketful of vegetables from the garden, dishes, Father’strousers, Anna’s blue dress, and my lavender cotton muslin with lilac sprigs and a ruffle at the hem. The girls looked very pleased and snatched at the dresses in a way I thought ill-bred. I was sad to see my dress disappear down the lane on the arm of one of the girls. I know we no longer wear the dresses, but sometimes I took my dress out and looked at it. Lizzie ran after the girls to give them one of her dolls.
    I had the care of Abby May this afternoon. She is good-natured as long as she gets her way. So she is usually good-natured, for it is hard to deny her anything. She is so comely, with large blue eyes and golden curls.
    We found a praying mantis sitting on a twig. It looked so much like a stick, you could hardly tell it from the twig. With its sharp elbows and knees it looked like Ichabod Crane in “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
    In an alder bush along the river I showed Abby May a sparrow’s nest. It was made of grass and moss all cleverly woven together and lined with feathers. In the nest were three small greenish-blue eggs and one large white egg speckled all over with freckles of brown.
    We let a beetle, green as an emerald, crawl up anddown our arms until it got tired of the pastime and scampered away.
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    A UGUST 20, 1843
    Today Father measured us. I have grown an inch, Anna an inch and a half, and Lizzie nearly two inches. It was hard to make Abby May stand still, but Father says she has grown nearly two and a