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LIFE AND TIMES OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 199

serves to illustrate how easily Americans could set aside their notoriously
inveterate prejudice against color, when it stood in the way of their wishes,
or when in an atmosphere which made that prejudice unpopular and
unchristian.

At the entrance to the House of Commons I had one day been conversing
for a few moments with Lord Morpeth, and just as I was parting from him I
felt an emphatic push against my arm, and, looking around, I saw at my
elbow Rev. Dr. Kirk of Boston. "Introduce me to Lord Morpeth," he said.
"Certainly," said I, and introduced him: not without remembering, however,
that the amiable Doctor would scarcely have asked such a favor of a colored
man at home.

The object of my labors in Great Britain was the concentration of the
moral and religious sentiment of its people against American slavery. To this
end. I visited and lectured in nearly all the large towns and cities in the
United Kingdom, and enjoyed many favorable opportunities for observa-
tion and information. I should like to write a book on those countries, if for
nothing else, to make grateful mention of the many dear friends whose
benevolent actions towards me are ineffaceably stamped upon my memory,
and warmly treasured in my heart. To these friends, I owe my freedom in the
United States.

Miss Ellen Richardson, an excellent member of the Society of Friends,
assisted by her sister-in-law Mrs. Henry Richardson,—a lady devoted to
every good word and work the friend of the Indian and the African, con-
ceived the plan of raising a fund to effect my ransom from slavery. They
corresponded with Hon. Walter Forward of Pennsylvania, and through him,
ascertained that Captain Auld would take one hundred and fifty pounds ster-
ling for me; and this sum they promptly raised, and paid for my liberation;
placing the papers of my manumission into my hands, before they would
tolerate the idea of my return to this my native land. To this commercial
transaction, to this blood-money I owe my immunity from the operation of
the fugitive slave law of 1793, and also from that of 1850. The whole affair
speaks for itself and needs no comment now that slavery has ceased to exist
in this country, and is not likely ever again to be revived.

Some of my uncompromising anti-slavery friends in this country failed
to see the wisdom of this commercial transaction, and were not pleased that
I consented to it, even by my silence. They thought it a violation of anti-
slavery principles, conceding the right of property in man, and a wasteful
expenditure of money. For myself, viewing it simply in the light of a ransom,
or as money extorted by a robber, and my liberty of more value than one

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