Chapter 24

_Twenty-One Months in Great Britain_

GOOD ARISING OUT OF UNPROPITIOUS EVENTS--DENIED CABIN PASSAGE--
PROSCRIPTION TURNED TO GOOD ACCOUNT--THE HUTCHINSON FAMILY--THE
MOB ON BOARD THE "CAMBRIA"--HAPPY INTRODUCTION TO THE BRITISH
PUBLIC--LETTER ADDRESSED TO WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON--TIME AND
LABORS WHILE ABROAD--FREEDOM PURCHASED--MRS. HENRY RICHARDSON--
FREE PAPERS--ABOLITIONISTS DISPLEASED WITH THE RANSOM--HOW MY
ENERGIES WERE DIRECTED--RECEPTION SPEECH IN LONDON--CHARACTER OF
THE SPEECH DEFENDED--CIRCUMSTANCES EXPLAINED--CAUSES CONTRIBUTING
TO THE SUCCESS OF MY MISSION--FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND--
TESTIMONIAL.

The allotments of Providence, when coupled with trouble and
anxiety, often conceal from finite vision the wisdom and goodness
in which they are sent; and, frequently, what seemed a harsh and
invidious dispensation, is converted by after experience into a
happy and beneficial arrangement. Thus, the painful liability to
be returned again to slavery, which haunted me by day, and
troubled my dreams by night, proved to be a necessary step in the
path of knowledge and usefulness. The writing of my pamphlet, in
the spring of 1845, endangered my liberty, and led me to seek a
refuge from republican slavery in monarchical England. A rude,
uncultivated fugitive slave was driven, by stern necessity, to
that country to which young American gentlemen go to increase
their stock of knowledge, to seek pleasure, to have their rough,
democratic manners softened by contact with English aristocratic
refinement. On applying for a passage to England, on board the
"Cambria", of the Cunard line, my friend, James N. Buffum, of
Lynn, Massachusetts, was
informed that I could not be received on board as a cabin
passenger. American prejudice against color triumphed over
British liberality and civilization, and erected a color test and
condition for crossing the sea in the cabin of a British vessel.
The insult was keenly felt by my white friends, but to me, it was
common, expected, and therefore, a thing of no great consequence,
whether I went in the cabin or in the steerage. Moreover, I felt
that if I could not go into the first cabin, first-cabin
passengers could come into the second cabin, and the result
justified my anticipations to the fullest extent. Indeed, I soon
found myself an object of more general interest than I wished to
be; and so far from being degraded by being placed in the second
cabin, that part of the ship became the scene of as much pleasure
and refinement, during the voyage, as the cabin itself. The
Hutchinson Family, celebrated vocalists--fellow-passengers--often
came to my rude forecastle deck, and sung their sweetest songs,
enlivening the place with eloquent music, as well as