This story is very valuable in that sense, because very few others had the ability to do so. Frederick Douglass' narrative is a powerful story that provides criticism and exposition of a corrupt and peculiar institution. Douglass guides the reader along this carefully paved path so that the reader can understand and interpret the message of his Narrative. Douglass accomplishes this by using the basic structure of conversion narratives and religious texts as a foundation for his work. In his Narrative, Douglass exposes many striking and disturbing aspects of slavery in America. One example of this is found in chapter nine, Douglass tells of the hypocrisy of slaveholders with respect to their religion. This hypocrisy is shown through Douglass' life with Master Thomas Auld, beginning in March of 1832. .
Douglass, at the beginning of chapter nine, describes the difficulty of working for Captain Thomas Auld. Although the actions of all slaveholders are regarded as inhumane and cruel, Douglass believes that Captain Auld and his wife are the worst of them all. Not only are they mean but they deprive their slaves of the necessary amounts of food needed to be healthy. Even among slaveholders, starving a slave "is regarded as the most aggravated development of meanness The rule is, no matter how coarse the food, only let there be enough of it" (58-59). Captain Auld is also, in the words of Douglass, "a slaveholder without the ability to hold slaves" (60). He was a poor man who gained all of his slaves through marriage. Because of this, he is known to be "cruel, but cowardly"(59). "At times, he spoke to his slaves with the firmness of Napoleon and the fury of a demon; at other times, he might well be mistaken for an inquirer who had lost his way" (59). Because of this discrepancy of character, the slaves rarely called him "master," which aggravates Captain Auld. .
Douglass, in describing Auld, uses words such as "demon" and "deceive" to suggest that Auld is devil-like.
