to a cabinet-maker. But he was still discontented, yearning continually for an occupation more congenial to his feelings and tastes, and his articles of apprenticeship were cancelled at his own earnest request. He found, at length, his right place in a printing-office in his native town. This proved for him both high school and college, from which he graduated with honor after a long and faithful apprenticeship. During the period of his minority he became deeply interested in current moral and political questions, upon which he wrote frequently and acceptably for the newspaper on which he daily worked as a printer, "The Newburyport Herald.' He also contributed to a Boston paper a series of political essays, which, being anonymous, were by many attributed to the Hon. Timothy Pickering, then one of the most eminent citizens of Massachusetts. At the end of his apprenticeship he became the editor of a new paper, "The Free Press," in his native place. It was distinguished for its high moral tone, but proved unremunerative, as such papers generally do. He was next heard of as editor of "The National Philanthropist," in Boston, the first paper ever established to support the doctrine of total abstinence from intoxicating drinks. The theme was congenial to him, and he discussed it with great earnestness and ability. The motto of the paper was his O It expressed a great truth in these words: " Moderate drinking is the down-hill road to drunkenThis was in 1827-28. While engaged upon this paper he made the acquaintance of Benjamin Lundy, who came to Boston for the purpose of interesting some of the people of that city in the question of slavery. об ne Sometime in 1828 Mr. Garrison accepted an invitation to go to Bennington, Vt., to establish a paper for the support of John Quincy Adams for the Presidency. The title of this paper was "The Journal of the Times." As a boy, I had greatly admired "The National Philanthropist," and had tried my own 'prentice hand as a writer in its columns. But I found new cause for admiring "The Journal of the Times" in the fact that it was published in my native State. How eagerly did I read and file away for preservation every number as it came to the office in which I was serving my own apprenticeship-"The Watchman" office in Montpelier. It was to me the ideal newspaper, and it stirred in me that ambition of editorship which springs up in the breast of every boy who learns to handle a composing-stick. Mr. Garrison did not neglect the purpose for which his paper was established. He supported Mr. Adams with zeal and ability, but he also discussed questions of reform which were quite distasteful to some of his readers. He was the champion of temperance and peace, and Lundy's "Genius of Universal Emancipation," which was among his exchanges, fanned his instinctive hatred of slavery to an intense heat. He wrote a petition for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, which he sent to all the postmasters in the State of Vermont, begging them to procure signatures thereto. In that day postmasters enjoyed the privilege of receiving and sending letters free of postage, and Mr. Garrison succeeded in getting a large number of signatures to his p etition, which caused quite a flutter in Congress. Mr. Lundy's paper was a small sheet, published b once a month. He spent the greater portion of time in travelling from place to place procuring subscribers and endeavoring to excite an interest in the subject by conversation and lecturing. In some instances he carried the head-rules, column-rules and subscription book of his paper with him, and when he came to a town where he found a printing-office, he would stop long enough to print and mail a number of "The Genius." He travelled for the most part on foot, carrying a heavy pack. He was a man of slight figure, though of a wiry temperament, and these exertions no doubt overtaxed his strength. In his boyhood he had seen coffles of Virginia slaves going down the Ohio on their way to the far South, and his Quaker education had so intensified his hatred of the slave system that he counted no labor or sacrifice on his part too great to be endured in efforts for its suppression. No apostle of the Christian faith ever exhibited a more ardent and unselfish devotion to his work than that which characterized the anti-slavery labors of this devoted but simple-minded Quaker, who obeyed the rule of his sect in "minding the light" of the Divine Spirit in his own soul. The torch of liberty which Mr. Garrison was holding aloft in the Green Mountains of Vermont naturally attracted his attention and kindled a new hope in his bosom. His heart yearned toward the young champion of freedom, and he longed to enlist him more fully in the cause to make him, if it were possible, his coadjutor. After making the journey to Boston by stage, he walked, staff in hand and pack on back, in the winter snow, all the long and weary way from that city to Bennington. The meeting of these two men under the shadow of the Green Mountains, whose winds were ever the swift messengers of freedom, may be regarded as the beginning of a movement that was destined, under God, to work the overthrow of American slavery. In this fresh mountain-spring originated the moral influences which, feeble at the first, became at length too mighty to be resisted. The two men took sweet and solemn counsel gether, and formed a resolution whose final results re seen in the deliverance of their country from very, and proclaimed in the exultant shouts of milns of emancipated bondmen. The immediate result the conference was that Mr. Garrison agreed to n Mr. Lundy in Baltimore. He went there accord ingly in the fall of 1829, and took the principal charge of The Genius of Universal Emancipation," which was enlarged, and from that time issued weekly. Mr. Lundy, it was understood, would contribute to the editorial columns so far as he could while spending most of his time in lecturing and soliciting subscriptions. Never was a partnership entered upon for a holier purpose or in a more fraternal spirit. And yet, from the outset, there was between the two men a wide difference of opinion upon one fundamental point. Mr. Lundy's conviction of the wrong and sinfulness of slavery was as deep and earnest as that of Mr. Garrison, but he was an advocate of gradual emancipation, while his mind was preoccupied with schemes for colonizing the slaves as fast as they should be set free. Mr. Garrison, on the other hand, from the moment of setting himself to the serious consideration of the subject, saw clearly that gradualism was a delusion and a snare. Slavery was either right or wrong in principle, as well as in practice. If it was right even for an hour, it might be so for a year, for a century, or to the end of time; and, therefore, any effort for its abolition would be a war upon Divine Providence. If it was wrong, it was so upon the instant and in the nature of things; and, therefore, there could be no excuse for its continuance for a day or even an hour. All this seemed as clear to him as any mathematical axiom, and as fundamental as the law of Divine justice. His experience in the temperance cause had taught him that any movement against a wrong custom or an unrighteous institution, if it was to be of much avail, must rest upon some clearly defined moral principle which would commend itself instantly to the popular apprehension as a self-evident truth. It was this clear moral perception of Mr. Garrison, which, penetrating through all the subterfuges in which slavery had become intrenched, qualified him to |