“[…和19世纪后半叶大多数家境富裕的女孩一样,瑞秋也接受了教育。好心的医生和和蔼的老教授教了她大约十门不同学科的基础知识,但他们会像告诉她她的手很脏一样,强迫她彻底完成一项苦差事。每周有一两个小时过得很愉快,这一部分是因为其他学生的缘故,一部分是因为这扇窗户正对着一家商店的后面,冬天,商店里的红色橱窗里会出现人影,还有一部分是因为两个人以上呆在一个房间里必然会发生意外。但是世界上没有一门学科是她能准确地知道的。她的思想处于伊丽莎白女王统治初期一个聪明人的思想状态;她几乎相信别人告诉她的任何事情,为她说的任何事情编造理由。地球的形状,世界的历史,火车是怎样运行的,金钱是怎样投资的,现行的法律是什么,人们想要什么,为什么想要,这些都是现代生活中最基本的制度观念——这些都不是她的教授或情妇传授给她的。但是这种教育制度有一个很大的优势。它没有教会学生任何东西,但它没有在学生可能拥有的真正才能的道路上设置障碍。 Rachel, being musical, was allowed to learn nothing but music; she became a fanatic about music. All the energies that might have gone into languages, science, or literature, that might have made her friends, or shown her the world, poured straight into music. Finding her teachers inadequate, she had practically taught herself. At the age of twenty-four she knew as much about music as most people do when they are thirty; and could play as well as nature allowed her to, which, as became daily more obvious, was a really generous allowance. If this one definite gift was surrounded by dreams and ideas of the most extravagant and foolish description, no one was any the wiser."
当我还是个奴隶的时候,我并不能理解那些粗鲁而明显语无伦次的歌曲的深层含义。我自己也在圈子里;以致我所看见所听见的,不如外人所看见所听见的。他们讲述了一个悲惨的故事,当时我完全无法理解;这些声音响亮、悠长、深沉;他们呼吸着因极度痛苦而沸腾的灵魂的祈祷和抱怨。每一个声音都是反对奴隶制的见证,都是在祈求上帝把他们从枷锁中解救出来。听到那些狂野的音符总是使我精神沮丧,使我充满了难以言喻的悲伤。我经常发现自己在听他们的时候会流泪。即使是现在,只要一想起那些歌曲,我就会感到痛苦; and while I am writing these lines, an expression of feeling has already found its way down my cheek. To those songs I trace my first glimmering conception of the dehumanizing character of slavery. I can never get rid of that conception. Those songs still follow me, to deepen my hatred of slavery, and quicken my sympathies for my brethren in bonds. If any one wishes to be impressed with the soul-killing effects of slavery, let him go to Colonel Lloyd's plantation, and, on allowance-day, place himself in the deep pine woods, and there let him, in silence, analyze the sounds that shall pass through the chambers of his soul,--and if he is not thus impressed, it will only be because "there is no flesh in his obdurate heart."