Read this excerpt from "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.”I spent Saturday with my grandmother. A calmer, more beautiful day never came out of heaven. To me, it was a day of conflicting emotions. Perhaps it was the last day I should ever have with the faithful old friend of my whole life! Perhaps it was the last time that I and my children should be together! Well, better so, I thought, that that they should be slaves. I knew the doom that awaited my fair baby in slavery. And I was determined to save her from it, or perish in the attempt. I went to make this vow at the graves of my poor parents, in the burying-ground of the slaves. . . .The graveyard was in the woods, and twilight was coming on. Nothing broke the death-like stillness except the occasional twitter of a bird. My spirit was overawed by the solemnity of the scene. For more than ten years I had frequented this spot, but never had it seemed to me so sacred as now. A black stump, at the head of my mother’s grave, was all that remained of a tree my father had planted. His grave was marked by a small wooden board, bearing his name, the letters of which were nearly gone. I knelt down and kissed them, and poured forth a prayer . . . for guidance and support in the perilous step I was about to take. As I passed the wreck of the old meeting house . . . I seemed to hear my father’s voice come from it, telling me not to tarry until I reached freedom or the grave. I rushed on with renovated hopes. . . .