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88 THE UNDERGROUND RAIL ROAD.
"MB. STILL—Sir: Will you come down to Bloodgood's Hotel as soon as possible—as there are three fugitive slaves here and they want liberty. Their master is here with them, on his way to New York."
The note was without date, and the signature so indistinctly written as not to be understood by me, baring evidently been penned in a moment of haste.
Without delay I ran with the note to Mr. P. Williamson's office, Seventh and Arch, found him at his desk, and gave it to him, and after reading it, he remarked that he could not go down, as he had to go to Harrisburg that night on business—but he advised me to go, and to get the names of the slave-holder and the slaves, in order to telegraph to New York to have them arrested there, as no time remained to procure a writ of habeas corpus here.
I could not have been two minutes in Mr. W.'s office before starting in haste for the wharf. To my surprise, however, when I reached the wharf, there I found Mr. W., his mind having undergone a sudden change; he was soon on the spot.
I saw three or four colored persons in the hall at Bloodgood's, none of whom I recognized except the boy who brought me the note. Before having time for making inquiry some one said they had gone on board the boat. " Get their description," said Mr. W. I instantly inquired of one of the colored persons for the desired description, and was told that she was " a tall, dark woman, with two little boys."
Mr. W. and myself ran on board of the boat, looked among the passengers on the first deck, but saw them not. '•' They are up on the second deck," an unknown voice uttered. In a second we were in their presence. We approached the anxious-looking slave-mother with her two boys on her left-hand; close on her right sat an ill-favored white man having a cane in his hand which I took to be a sword-cane. (As to its being a sword-cane, however, I might have been mistaken.)
The first words to the mother were: " Are you traveling?" |