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Uncle Tom's Cabin

By HARRIET BEECHER STOWE Condensation by JOHN KENDRICK BANGS IT was in the days when African slavery flourished under the free skies of America. Evil times had befallen the house of Shelby, and pressing debt required the sacrifice of a portion of the holdings of the Kentucky planter in human chattles. Uncle Tom, instead of the freedom that had been promised him as the reward of a lifetime of devoted service, found himself torn from wife, home, and children, transferred to the hands of an unscrupulous trader, and consigned to the terror-ridden slave-markets of the lower Mississippi. So trusted had the black man been that numerous avenues of escape lay open to him. Of one of these, in the dead of winter, over the ice-bound waters of the Ohio River, by the "underground" to Sandusky, and thence to freedom in Canada, the mulatto-girl Eliza, and her son, who had been sold at the same time, had availed themselves. But Tom's fidelity to his master was too strong, and, fearing to involve him in further difficulties, he bravely faced the miseries of the future. "I am in the Lord's hands," said he to those who tried to persuade him to escape, "and there'll be the same God there that there is here." "Well, it's a nasty mean shame, Tom!" sobbed his master's son George, as he bade the old slave farewell. "But remember--some day I'll come down and buy you back."

The voyage down the Mississippi with the slave-gang to which Tom was attached was filled with scenes and episodes of woe and tragedy, but Tom found relief from sorrow in the companionship of a fellow-passenger, a fairy-like little girl, full of the smiling spirit of play, who, fascinated by Tom's unusual dexterity in the making of strange toys dear to the hearts of children, clung to him as to an old and beloved friend. "Where are you going, Tom?" she asked one day. "I dunno, missy," said Tom. "Reckon I'm gwine to be sold to somebody--but I dunno who." "Well, my father can buy you," said she, "and I'll ask him to this very day." "Thank you, my little lady," smiled Tom, gratefully. And his "little lady" she soon became, for the brave black won little Eva's life back from the swirling waters of the Mississippi into which she had fallen; and in sheer gratitude for her deliverance the child's father, Augustine St. Clare, bought him from the trader.