My Bondage And My Freedom by Frederick Douglass

EARLY REFLECTIONS ON SLAVERY--PRESENTIMENT OF ONE DAY BEING A FREEMAN--COMBAT BETWEEN AN OVERSEER AND A SLAVEWOMAN--THE ADVANTAGES OF RESISTANCE--ALLOWANCE DAY ON THE HOME PLANTATION--THE SINGING OF SLAVES--AN EXPLANATION--THE SLAVES FOOD AND CLOTHING--NAKED CHILDREN--LIFE IN THE QUARTER--DEPRIVATION OF SLEEP--NURSING CHILDREN CARRIED TO THE FIELD--DESCRIPTION OF THE COWSKIN--THE ASH-CAKE--MANNER OF MAKING IT--THE DINNER HOUR--THE CONTRAST.

The heart-rending incidents, related in the foregoing chapter, led me, thus early, to inquire into the nature and history of slavery. _Why am I a slave? Why are some people slaves, and others masters? Was there ever a time this was not so? How did the relation commence?_ These were the perplexing questions which began now to claim my thoughts, and to exercise the weak powers of my mind, for I was still but a child, and knew less than children of the same age in the free states. As my questions concerning these things were only put to children a little older, and little better informed than myself, I was not rapid in reaching a solid footing. By some means I learned from these inquiries that _"God, up in the sky,"_ made every body; and that he made _white_ people to be masters and mistresses, and _black_ people to be slaves.