The South-West Volume Ii Part 8

Messengers were despatched to different quarters, and a general ma.s.sacre of the common enemy was agreed upon. A day was appointed, but being unacquainted with the art of writing, or the use of numbers, the period was designated by a bundle of sticks, every stick representing a day; each of the confederated chiefs prepared a bundle corresponding in number with those of his a.s.sociates, one of which was to be burned daily; and the committing of the last to the flames, was to be the signal for the attack.

"The wife of the sun," still attached to the French by many recollections, being the strangers whom she had protected and loved--trembling at the torrents of blood which must flow, and forgetting the wrongs which had been heaped upon her country, determined to preserve them, and intimated to their commander the necessity of caution; by some singular incredulity he despised and neglected the counsel thus tendered to him. Frustrated in her purpose of saving those within the limits of her own tribe, she determined, by the antic.i.p.ation of their fate, to preserve the majority scattered throughout other tribes. Having free access to the temple, she removed several of the sticks there deposited, and the warriors, on repairing thither, finding but one symbol remaining, prepared for the dreadful business on which they had resolved. They then consigned the last stick to the fire, and supposing that the united nations were all engaged in the same b.l.o.o.d.y work, fell upon the French, and cut them off almost to a man.[17]

Perrein, the commander, with a few more, escaped, and collecting a few of his countrymen, prevailed upon the neighbouring tribes, by threats or promises, to abandon and betray the devoted Natchez; and in one day consigned them to the sword, sparing neither age, s.e.x, nor condition; he burnt their houses, laid waste their fields, and desolation soon marked the spot, once the retreat of an unoffending, peaceful, and happy people. The few who escaped, fled for protection to a neighbouring tribe, then, and now, known as the Chickasaws; a brave, warlike, and independent nation. Their conduct toward these wretched outcasts should be remembered to their immortal honour; they received them with open arms, and resisted with unshaken firmness, the earnest and repeated demands of the French for their delivery; and to such an extent did they carry their magnanimity, that they preferred hazarding a doubtful contest, when their own existence was at stake, to a violation of the pledges of hospitality and protection, which they had made to a few persecuted strangers. Three times, with souls bent upon vengeance against the remnant of their ancient foes, and with no less b.l.o.o.d.y purposes against their defenders, did the French carry war to the Chickasaw boundary, and three times were they driven back with ignominy and loss--nor did they ever obtain their object. The poor Natchez shared the hospitality of their protectors until their necessities and sorrows were alike relieved by death; their bones repose in a land unknown to their fathers; their spirits may be again mingled in the beautiful regions which they believe to be prepared by the Great Spirit for the fearless warrior, the successful hunter, and the faithful and hospitable Indian, beyond the great lakes. Such is the story of the Natchez--such their melancholy end--such the kindness and benevolence extended to the white man in distress--and such the ingrat.i.tude, perfidy, and cruelty, with which these favours were repaid. Of the distinguished female, whose humanity and mercy proved so unexpectedly fatal to her race, we hear no more--but it is highly probable, that in the indiscriminate ma.s.sacre which took place, neither her strong claims to the grat.i.tude of the French, nor her merciful and forbearing disposition, nor her honours, t.i.tles, and dignities, nor even her s.e.x, could protect her; but that she fell an undistinguished victim, among her slaughtered people."

FOOTNOTES:

[17] The attack was made on Fort Rosalie, at Natchez, in 1729, the head quarters of the French.

XLII.

Slavery in the south-west--Southern feelings--Increase of slaves--Virginia--Mode of buying slaves, and slave-traders --Mode of transportation by sea--Arrival at the mart--Mode of life in the market--Transportation by land--Privileges of slaves--Conduct of planters toward their negroes--Anecdotes --Negro traders--Their origin.

In my desultory sketches of the white and negro population of the south-west, my intention has not been to detail minutely their social relations and domestic economy. To convey a general idea of their condition alone enters into my present plan. Having enlarged upon that of the white population, I will devote a portion of the following pages to a brief sketch of a variety of the human species, which has ever presented an interesting field for the efforts of the philanthropist.

The origin of slavery is lost: but there is no doubt that it prevailed, in the early post-diluvian ages, among all the infant nations of the earth.[18] Sacred history a.s.sures us of its existence shortly after the flood; and divine economy, in regulating the political and domestic state of the Jews, permitted its existence. But Jewish, and all ancient slavery, was a species of warlike retribution against enemies taken in battle. Civilization and Christianity had not then established the modern treatment and disposal of prisoners. Then they were held in bondage by their conquerors during life; now their detention is but for a limited time; then, they were individual, now they are national, property. Christianity, in this enlightened age, has taught conquerors to mitigate their severity toward the conquered; and national policy has found it most expedient to make other disposition of them than holding them in bondage.

But the establishment and preservation of slavery in the south-west, are more immediately the objects of my remarks. If any people can repudiate with justice the charge of originating it, the Mississippians can do so.

The Spaniards introduced it here; the first American settlers of this state found slaves attached to its soil, after the Spaniards resigned the country to the government of the United States, and they received them as a portion of the possessions, which fell into their hands by treaty or purchase. Finding them here they retained them--for the slavery question, like many others in those days of innocence, had not been agitated--or they might have sent them after their Spanish masters.

There was, of course, nothing more natural and easy than the increase of this property. The process of generation was too slow, however, and men commenced purchasing, not free men from slave s.h.i.+ps, but Africans who were already slaves. Virginia, where the lands were worn out, and slaves were numerous, and almost useless, afforded them facilities for purchasing; emigrants from that and other slave-holding states also brought great numbers with them, and in a few years this species of property had acc.u.mulated to a great extent. Planters' sons, and all new planters, must be supplied from the same fountain--losses by death and elopement must be made up, till, almost imperceptibly, slavery became firmly established here, and is now a state inst.i.tution; and Virginia, with the Carolinas and Georgia, and recently Kentucky, has become the great mart for slave purchasers from the south-west.

The increased demand for slaves led many farmers in Virginia, whose lands were unavailable, to turn their attention to raising slaves, if I may so term it, for the south-western market. Hence a nursery for slaves has been imperceptibly forming in that state, till now, by a sort of necessity, a vast amount of its capital is involved in this trade, the discontinuance of which would be as injurious in a pecuniary point of view, to those who raise them, as the want of the facilities which the trade affords, would be to the planter. Thus Virginia has become the field for the purchaser, and the phrase--"he is gone to Virginia to buy negroes," or "n.i.g.g.e.rs," as is the elegant and equally common phraseology, is as often applied to a temporarily absent planter, as "he is gone to Boston to buy goods," to a New-England country merchant.

Negroes are transported here both by sea and land. Alexandria and Norfolk are the princ.i.p.al depots of slaves, previous to their being s.h.i.+pped. To these cities they are brought from the surrounding country, and sold to the slave-trader, who purchases them for about one-half or one-third less than he expects to obtain for them in the southern market. After the resident slave-dealer has collected a sufficient number, he places them under the care of an agent. They are then s.h.i.+pped for New-Orleans, with as comfortable accommodations as can be expected, where one or two hundred are congregated in a single merchant vessel. I have seen more than one hundred landing from a brig, on the Levee, in New-Orleans, in fine condition, looking as lively and hearty as though a sea voyage agreed well with them. They are transferred, if destined for the Mississippi market, to a steamboat, and landed at Natchez. The debarkation of a hundred slaves, of both s.e.xes and all ages, is a novel spectacle to a northerner. Landing on the Levee, they proceed, each with his bundle, under the charge of their temporary master or conductor, toward the city, in a long straggling line, or sometimes in double files, in well-ordered procession, gazing about them with curiosity and wonder upon the new scenes opening before them, as they advance into the city, and speculating upon the advantages afforded as their home, by the beautiful country to which they find themselves transplanted. Nothing seems to escape their attention, and every few steps offer subjects for remark or laughter; for the risible muscles of the negro are uncommonly excitable.

On arriving on the "Hill," in view of the city, and obtaining a glimpse of the fine country spread out around them, their delight is very great.

Full of the impression, which they early imbibe, that the south is emphatically the grave of their race, and daily having it held up before their imaginations at home, _in terrorem_, to keep them in the line of duty, if insubordinate, they leave home, as they proudly and affectionately term Virginia, with something of the feelings of the soldier, allotted to a "forlorn hope." It cannot be denied that many have died shortly after being brought into this country; but this was owing to indiscretion, in transporting them at the wrong season of the year--in the spring, after a winter spent at the north; or in autumn, during the prevalence, in former years, of the epidemics, which once were almost annual visitants of this country. Experience has taught those who introduce slaves, in late years, to bring them quite late in autumn. Hence, the two great causes of mortality being removed, the effects have, in a great measure, ceased; and slaves, when they arrive here, and gaze with surprise upon the athletic figures and gray heads of their fellows, who meet them at every step, as they advance into the city--find that they can live even in the south, and grow old on other plantations than those in "Ol' Wirginny." "I see no dead n.i.g.g.e.r yet, Jef."--"No--nor no coffin pile up neider in de street,"--said another of a gang of negroes pa.s.sing through the streets, peering on all sides for these ominous signs of this "fatal" climate, as they trudged along to their quarters in the slave-market. This too common opinion of master and slave must soon be exploded, for it has now no foundation in fact.

Pa.s.sing through the city in procession, sometimes dressed in a new uniform, purchased for them in New-Orleans, but often in the brown rags in which they left Virginia, preceded by a large wagon, carrying the surplus baggage; they are marched beyond the city limits, within which, till recently, they were publicly sold, the marts being on nearly every street. Arriving at their quarters, which are usually old unoccupied buildings, and often tents or booths, pitched upon the common, beside some stream of water, and under the shade of trees, they resort, in the first place, to a general ablution, preparatory to being exposed for sale. The toilet arrangements of one hundred negroes, just from a long voyage, are a formidable affair. Both the rivers, Alpheus and Peneus, would hardly suffice for the process. Two or three days are consumed in it; after which, all appear in new, comfortable, uniform dresses, with s.h.i.+ning faces, and refreshed after the fatigue of travel. They are now ready for inspection and sale. To this important period, the day of sale, they cheerfully look forward, manifesting not a little emulation to be "sol' fust." The interim between their arrival and sale--for they are not sold at auction, or all at once, but singly, or in parties, as purchasers may be inclined to buy--is pa.s.sed in an _otium c.u.m dignitate_ of a peculiarly African character, involving eating, drinking, playing, and sleeping. The interval of ease enjoyed in the slave-market is an oasis of luxury in their existence, which they seldom know how to appreciate, if we may judge from the wishful manner in which they gaze upon gentlemen who enter the mart, as though anxious to put a period to this kind of enjoyment, so congenial to their feelings and temperament.

Probably two-thirds of the first slaves came into this state from Virginia; and nearly all now introduced, of whom there are several thousands annually, are brought from that state. Kentucky contributes a small number, which is yearly increasing; and since the late pa.s.sage of the slave law in Missouri, a new market is there opened for this trade.

It is computed that more than two hundred thousand dollars' worth of slaves will be purchased in Missouri this season, for the Natchez market. A single individual has recently left Natchez with one hundred thousand dollars, for the purpose of buying up negroes in that state to sell in Mississippi.

The usual way of transporting slaves is by land, although they are frequently brought round by sea; but the last is the most expensive method, and therefore, to "bring them through," is accounted preferable.

This is done by forming them into a caravan at the place where they are purchased, and conducting them by land through the Indian nations to this state. The route is for the most part through a continuous forest, and is usually performed by the negroes, on foot, in seven or eight weeks. Their personal appearance, when they arrive at Natchez, is by no means improved, although they are usually stouter and in better condition than when they leave home, for they are generally well fed, and their health is otherwise carefully attended to, while on the route.

Arrived within two or three miles of Natchez, they encamp in some romantic spot near a rivulet, and like their brethren transported by sea, commence polis.h.i.+ng their skins, and arraying themselves in the coa.r.s.e but neat uniform, which their master has purchased for them in Natchez.

A few Sabbaths ago, while standing before a village church in the country, my attention was drawn to a long procession at the extremity of the street, slowly approaching like a troop of wearied pilgrims. There were several gentlemen in company, some of them planters, who gazed upon the singular spectacle with unusual interest. One sooty brown hue was cast over the whole horde, by the sombre colour of their tattered garments, which, combined with the slow pace and fatigued air of most of those who composed it, gave to the whole train a sad and funereal appearance. First came half a dozen boys and girls, with fragments of blankets and ragged pantaloons and frocks, hanging upon, but not covering their glossy limbs. They pa.s.sed along in high spirits, glad to be once more in a village, after their weary way through the wilderness; capering and practising jokes upon each other, while their even rows of teeth, and the whites of their eyes--the most expressive features in the African physiognomy--were displayed in striking contrast to their ebony skins. These were followed by a tall mulatto, with high cheek-bones, and lean and hungry looks, making rapid inroads into a huge loaf of bread, whose twin brother was secured under his left arm. A woman, very black, very short, and very pursy, who breathed like a porpoise, and whose capacity for rapid movement was equal to that of a puncheon, trudged along behind, evidently endeavouring to come up with the mulatto, as her eye was fixed very resolutely on the spare loaf; but its owner strode forward deliberately and with perfect impunity. She was followed by another female, bearing an infant in her arms, probably born in the wilderness. Close behind her came a covered wagon, from which she had just descended to walk, drawn by two fine horses, and loaded with young negroes, who were permitted to ride and walk alternately on the journey. Behind the wagon, at a long distance, came an old patriarch, at least eighty years of age, bent nearly double with the weight of years and infirmity. By his side moved an old negress, nearly coeval with him, who supported her decrepit form by a staff. They were the venerable progenitors of the children and grandchildren who preceded them. This aged couple, who were at liberty to ride when they chose, in a covered wagon behind them, were followed by a mixed crowd of negroes of all ages, and of both s.e.xes, with and without staff, hatless and bare-footed. The office of the negro's hat is a mere sinecure--they love the warm sun upon their heads--but they like to be well shod, and that with boots, for the lower region of their limbs about the ancles is very sensitive. Behind these came a wretched cart, covered with torn, red-painted canva.s.s, and drawn by a mule and a horse;--Sancho Panza's mule and Rosinante--I mean no insult to the worthy knight or his squire--if coupled together, would have made precisely such a pair. This vehicle contained several invalids, two of whom were reclining on a matra.s.s laid along the bottom. Around it were many young slaves of both s.e.xes, talking and marching along in gleeful mood. Two or three old people followed, one of whom, who walked with both hands grasping a long staff, stopped as he pa.s.sed us, and with an air of affecting humility, and with his venerable forehead bowed to the earth, addressed us, "hab ma.s.sas got piece 'bacca' for ol' n.i.g.g.e.r?" An old gentleman standing by, whose locks were whitened with the snows of sixty winters, having first obtained leave to do so from the owner of the drove, who, mounted on a fine blooded horse, rode carelessly along behind them, gave the old slave all he had about him, which, fortunately for the pet.i.tioner, happened to be a large quant.i.ty, and for which he appeared extremely grateful. Several other negroes, walking along with vigorous steps, and another white conductor, with a couple of delicately limbed race-horses, enveloped in broidered mantles, and ridden by bright-eyed little mulatto boys, and two or three leashes of hounds, led by a slave, completed the train. They had been seven weeks on the road, through the "nation," as the southern wilderness is here termed--travelling by easy stages, and encamping at night. Old people are seldom seen in these "droves." The young and athletic usually compose them. But as in this instance, the old people are sometimes allowed to come with the younger portion of their families, as a favour; and if sold at all, they are sold with their children, who can take care of them in their old age, which they well do--for negroes have a peculiarly strong affection for the old people of their own colour. Veneration for the aged is one of their strongest characteristics.

Nor are planters indifferent to the comfort of their gray-headed slaves.

I have been much affected at beholding many exhibitions of their kindly feeling toward them. They always address them in a mild and pleasant manner--as "Uncle," or "Aunty"--t.i.tles as peculiar to the old negro and negress, as "boy" and "girl," to all under forty years of age. Some old Africans are allowed to spend their last years in their houses, without doing any kind of labour; these, if not too infirm, cultivate little patches of ground, on which they raise a few vegetables--for vegetables grow nearly all the year round in this climate--and make a little money to purchase a few extra comforts. They are also always receiving presents from their masters and mistresses, and the negroes on the estate, the latter of whom are extremely desirous of seeing the old people comfortable. A relation of the extra comforts, which some planters allow their slaves, would hardly obtain credit at the north.

But you must recollect that southern planters are men--and men of feeling--generous and high minded, and possessing as much of the "milk of human kindness," as the sons of colder climes--although they may have been educated to regard that as right, which a different education has led northerners to consider wrong.

"What can you do with so much tobacco?" said a gentleman--who related the circ.u.mstance to me--on hearing a planter, whom he was visiting, give an order to his teamster to bring two hogsheads of tobacco out to the estate from the "Landing." "I purchase it for my negroes; it is a harmless indulgence, which it gives me pleasure to afford them."

"Why are you at the trouble and expense of having high-post bedsteads for your negroes?" said a gentleman from the north, while walking through the handsome "quarters," or village for the slaves, then in progress on a plantation near Natchez--addressing the proprietor.

"To suspend their "bars" from, that they may not be troubled with musquitoes."

"Master, me would like, if you please, a little bit gallery, front my house." "For what, Peter?" "Cause, master, de sun too hot" (an odd reason for a negro to give,) "dat side, and when he rain we no able to keep de door open." "Well, well, when the carpenter gets a little leisure you shall have one." A few weeks after I was at the plantation, and riding past the quarters one Sabbath morning, beheld Peter, his wife, and children, with his old father, all sunning themselves in their new gallery.

"Missus, you promise me a Chrismus gif'." "Well, Jane, there is a new calico frock for you." "It werry pretty, missus," said Jane, eyeing it at a distance without touching it, "but me prefer muslin, if you please; muslin de fas.h.i.+on dis Chrismus." "Very well, Jane, call to-morrow and you shall have a muslin."

These little anecdotes are unimportant in themselves, but they serve to ill.u.s.trate what I have stated above, of the kindness and indulgence of masters to their slaves. I could add many others, of frequent occurrence; but these are sufficiently numerous for my purpose.

Probably of the two ways of bringing slaves here, that by land is preferable; not only because attended with less expense, but by gradually advancing them into the climate, it in a measure precludes the effect which a sudden transition from one state to the other might produce. All slaves, however, are not brought here by negro traders.

Many of the planters prefer going on and purchasing for themselves, for which purpose it is not unusual for them to take on from twenty to forty and fifty thousand dollars, lay the whole out in slaves, and either accompany them through the wilderness themselves on horseback, or engage a conductor. By adopting this method they purchase them at a much greater advantage, than at second-hand from the professional trader, as slaves can be bought for fifty per cent. less there, than after they are once brought into this market. The number of slaves introduced into the south-western market is annually increasing. Last year more than four thousand were brought into the state, one-third of whom were sold in the Natchez market. The prices of slaves vary with the prices of cotton and sugar. At this time, when cotton brings a good price, a good "field hand" cannot be bought for less than eight hundred dollars, if a male; if a female, for six hundred. "Body servants" sell much higher, one thousand dollars being a common price for them. Good mechanics sometimes sell for two thousand dollars, and seldom for less than nine hundred.

Coachmen are high, and house servants are worth at all times, from ten to thirty per cent. more than field negroes. The usual price for a good seamstress, or nurse, is from seven hundred to one thousand dollars.

Children are valued in proportion to their ages. An infant adds one hundred dollars to the price of the mother; and from infancy the children of the slaves increase in value about one hundred dollars for every three years, until they arrive at mature age. All domestic slaves, or "house servants," which cla.s.s includes coachmen, nurses, hostlers, gardeners, footmen, cooks, waiting-maids, &c., &c.--all indispensable to the _menage_ of a wealthy planter--are always in great demand, and often sell at the most extravagant prices. Some of these, born and raised in this climate, (acclimated as they are termed,) often sell for eighteen hundred and two thousand dollars apiece, of either s.e.x. But these are exceptions, where the slave possesses some peculiarly valuable trait as a domestic.

Negro traders soon acc.u.mulate great wealth, from the immense profit they make on their merchandise. Certainly such a trade demands no trifling consideration. If any of the wors.h.i.+ppers of Mammon earn their gold, it is the slave-dealer. One of their number, who is the great southern slave-merchant, and who, for the last fifteen years, has supplied this country with two-thirds of the slaves brought into it, has ama.s.sed a fortune of more than a million of dollars by this traffic alone. He is a bachelor, and a man of gentlemanly address, as are many of these merchants, and not the ferocious, Captain Kidd looking fellows, we Yankees have been apt to imagine them. Their admission into society, however, is not recognised. Planters a.s.sociate with them freely enough, in the way of business, but notice them no farther. A slave trader is, nevertheless, very much like other men. He is to-day a plain farmer, with twenty or thirty slaves, endeavouring to earn a few dollars from worn-out land, in some old "homestead" among the Alleghanies; which, with his slaves, he has inherited from his father. He is in debt, and hears that he can sell his slaves in Mississippi for twice their value in his own state. If there is no harm in selling them to his next neighbour, and coming to Mississippi without them, he feels that there can be no harm--nay, justice to his creditors requires that he should place them in the highest market--in bringing them into this state, and selling them here. He rises in the morning, gathers his slaves, prepares his wagons and horses, takes one or two of his sons, or hires a neighbour, who may add a few of his own to the stock, to accompany him; and, by and by, the caravan moves slowly off toward the south and west.

Seven or eight weeks afterward, a drove of negroes, weary and worn, from a long journey, are seen within two or three miles of Natchez, turning from the high road, to pitch their tents upon the green sward, beneath some wide-spreading tree. It is the caravan from the Alleghanies. The ensuing morning a bright array of white tents, and busy men moving among them, excites the attention of the pa.s.ser-by. The figure of the old Virginia farmer, mingling among his slaves, attracts the notice of a stranger. "Who is that old gentleman?" he inquires of the southerner with whom he is riding in company. "A negro trader," is the reply. This is the first step of the trader. He finds it profitable; and if his inclinations prompt him, he will return home, after selling his slaves, and buy, with ready money, from his neighbours, a few here and a few there, until he has a sufficient number to make another caravan, with which he proceeds a second time to the south-western market. He follows this trade from season to season, and does it conscientiously. He reasons as I have above stated; and if there is no harm in selling the first, there is none in selling the last. This is the metal of which a slave trader is moulded. The humane characteristics of the trade will be, of course, regulated by the tempers and dispositions of the individuals who engage in it.

FOOTNOTES:

[18] "Slavery, at a very early period after the flood, prevailed, perhaps in every region of the globe. In Asia it is practised to this day. The savage nations of Africa have at no period been exempted from it. In Germany, and other countries of Europe, slaves were generally attached to the soil, as in Russia and Poland at the present day. They were generally employed in tending cattle, and in conducting the business of agriculture."--_Tacitus de moribus Germanorum._ "Among the ancient Germans, according to the same author, it was not uncommon for an ardent gamester to stake his personal liberty on a throw of the dice.

The latter species of slaves were alone considered as materials of commerce. In England, now so tenacious of the rights of man, a species of slavery, similar to that among the ancient Germans, subsisted even to the end of the sixteenth century, as appears from a commission issued by Queen Elizabeth in 1574. Colliers and salters were not totally emanc.i.p.ated from every vestige of slavery till about the year 1750.

Before that period the sons of colliers could follow no business but that of their fathers, nor could they seek employment in any other mines than in those to which they were attached by birth."

_Encyclopedia Britan._

XLIII.

Slaves--Cla.s.ses--Anecdotes--Negro instruction--Police--Natchez fencibles--Habitual awe of the negro for the white man-- Ill.u.s.trations--Religious slaves--Negro preaching--General view of slavery and emanc.i.p.ation--Conclusion.

There are properly three distinct cla.s.ses of slaves in the south. The first, and most intelligent cla.s.s, is composed of the domestic slaves, or "servants," as they are properly termed, of the planters. Some of these both read and write, and possess a great degree of intelligence: and as the negro, of all the varieties of the human species, is the most imitative, they soon learn the language, and readily adopt the manners, of the family to which they are attached. It is true, they frequently burlesque the latter, and select the high-sounding words of the former for practice--for the negro has an ear for euphony--which they usually misapply, or mis-p.r.o.nounce.

"Ben, how did you like the sermon to-day?" I once inquired of one, who, for pompous language and high-sounding epithets, was the Johnson of negroes.--"Mighty obligated wid it, master, de 'clusive 'flections werry distructive to de ignorum."

In the more fas.h.i.+onable families, negroes feel it their duty--to show their aristocratic breeding--to ape manners, and to use language, to which the common herd cannot aspire. An aristocratic negro, full of his master's wealth and importance, which he feels to be reflected upon himself, is the most aristocratic personage in existence. He supports his own dignity, and that of his own master, or "_family_," as he phrases it, which he deems inseparable, by a course of conduct befitting coloured gentlemen. Always about the persons of their masters or mistresses, the domestic slaves obtain a better knowledge of the modes of civilized life than they could do in the field, where negroes can rise but little above their original African state. So identified are they with the families in which they have been "raised," and so accurate, but rough, are the copies which they individually present, of their masters, that were all the domestic slaves of several planters'

families transferred to Liberia, or Hayti, they would there const.i.tute a by no means inferior state of African society, whose model would be found in Mississippi. Each family would be a faithful copy of that with which it was once connected: and should their former owners visit them in their new home, they would smile at its resemblance to the original.

It is from this cla.s.s that the friends of wisely-regulated emanc.i.p.ation are to seek material for carrying their plans into effect.

The second cla.s.s is composed of town slaves; which not only includes domestic slaves, in the families of the citizens, but also all negro mechanics, draymen, hostlers, labourers, hucksters, and washwomen, and the heterogeneous mult.i.tude of every other occupation, who fill the streets of a busy city--for slaves are trained to every kind of manual labour. The blacksmith, cabinet-maker, carpenter, builder, wheelwright,--all have one or more slaves labouring at their trades. The negro is a third arm to every working man, who can possibly save money enough to purchase one. He is emphatically the "right-hand man" of every man. Even free negroes cannot do without them: some of them own several, to whom they are the severest masters.

"To whom do you belong?" I once inquired of a negro whom I had employed.

"There's my master," he replied; pointing to a steady old negro, who had purchased himself, then his wife, and subsequently his three children, by his own manual exertions and persevering industry. He was now the owner of a comfortable house, a piece of land, and two or three slaves, to whom he could add one every three years. It is worthy of remark, and serves to ill.u.s.trate one of the many singularities characteristic of the race, that the free negro, who "buys his wife's freedom," as they term it, from her master, by paying him her full value, ever afterward considers her in the light of property.

"Thomas, you are a free man," I remarked to one who had purchased himself and wife from his master, by the profits of a poultry yard and vegetable garden, industriously attended to for many years, in his leisure hours and on Sundays. "You are a free man; I suppose you will soon have negroes of your own."

"Hi! Hab one now, master." "Who, Tom?"--"Ol' Sarah, master." "Old Sarah!