Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Chapter 4 Summary & Analysis

As the years pass, Grandmother manages to buy a small home by making and selling preserves and bread. She tells her enslaved children and grandchildren to “pray for contentment,” but Linda and her youngest son Benjamin reject this argument, feeling that it can’t be “the will of God” for them to languish in slavery.

Grandmother can’t help Linda with the new oppression she’s now facing. Dr. Flint, “whose restless, craving, vicious nature roved about day and night,” has begun to harass Linda constantly, telling her that she must “obey his command in every thing” and “surrender” her will to him. One afternoon, as she’s trying to decide what to do, William approaches her, upset because Dr. Flint’s son, Nicholas, bullies him constantly and threatens to whip him when William, who is stronger, beats him up.

Linda counsels William to be “good and forgiving,” but she knows that she herself does not feel forgiving towards Dr. Flint and she knows that it’s in their “God-given nature” to “question the motives of those around” them, rather than accepting their actions.

In February, Grandmother has just bought Linda a badly-needed pair of shoes. However, the shoes’ noise bothers Mrs. Flint and she forbids Linda to wear them again. Linda has to run a long errand barefoot in the snow and she goes to bed sick, thinking she will die in the night and her mistress will be glad to get rid of the “little imp.” Her only consolation is that she loves young Emily Flint; it seems the little girl loves her as well, but Linda wonders if her feelings are really true.

One day, William comes to Linda telling her that their Uncle Benjamin has impetuously gotten in a fistfight with his master, an offense that can lead to great punishment. That night Linda meets Benjamin at Grandmother’s house; he says that he’s running away before he can be punished. Linda warns him about all the disasters that can befall runaways, but he tells her this is better than being treated like a “dog.” Benjamin flees the city aboard a ship, but the captain sees his description in an advertisement for runaway slaves, arrests him, and sends him back to the city jail.

At night, the family sneaks into the jail to visit Benjamin. Grandmother is deeply distressed to see her son in prison; she tells him to trust in God, but he says it’s impossible for a hunted man to think about God. At the moment of capture, he thought about throwing himself into the river, but remembered his mother and decided against it. Despite her entreaties, he refuses to beg his master’s forgiveness.

To punish his insolence, the master keeps Benjamin chained in jail, where he’s covered in vermin. Grandmother has to sneak him food and new clothes. After three months, a slave trader buys him with the intention of selling him in New Orleans. Grandmother starts saving up money and writing to friends in New Orleans, but before she does so, Benjamin makes another escape attempt. He’s delayed in Baltimore for three weeks and even spotted by a white acquaintance, but the man keeps his secret and helps him find a safe route to New York.

Once Benjamin has reached New York, he meets up with his brother Phillip, who is there on business for his mistress. He encourages Phillip to escape and join him, but Phillip is reluctant to leave Grandmother alone. Benjamin says she should use her savings to buy Phillip and, if possible, Linda. After he and Phillip bid farewell, the family never hears from Benjamin again.

When Phillip brings this news to Grandmother, the old woman is sadder at losing Benjamin than she is happy about his freedom. Eventually, she purchases Phillip for eight hundred dollars. That night mother and son sit around the hearthstone, proud of each other for securing their independence. The family says to themselves, “he that is willing to be a slave, let him be a slave.”