Douglass recalls the moment when he discovered that he was being sent to Baltimore to live with "ecstasy." In short, this is because he does not like life on Colonel Lloyd's plantation, where he remembers being treated as an animal, suffering from cold and hunger. Douglass remembers eating like a pig, out of a trough, alongside other slave children, and though he is not regularly beaten, he is happy to leave the plantation. He also has no immediate family on the plantation, and so has no real ties there. So although he is not yet aware of the advantages of living in a city like Baltimore, with the opportunities for more freedoms than existed on the plantation, he is still eager to go.