The Negroes live as easily as in any other Part of America, and
at set Times have a pretty deal of Liberty in their Quarters, as
they are called. The Argument of the Reasonableness and Legality,
according to Nature, of the Slave-Trade, has been so well handled
on the Negative Side of the Question, that there remains little
for an Author to say on that Head; and that Captives taken in
War, are the Property of the Captor, as to Life and Person, as
was the Custom amongst the Spartans; who, like the Americans,
perpetuated a Race of Slaves, by marrying them to one another, I
think, has been fully disprov'd: But allowing some Justice in,
or, at least, a great deal of Necessity for, making Slaves of
this sable Part of the Species; surely, I think, Christianity,
Gratitude, or, at least, good Policy, is concerned in using them
well, and in abridging them, instead of giving them
Encouragement, of several brutal and scandalous Customs, that are
too much practised: Such as giving them a Number of Wives, or, in
short, setting them up for Stallions to a whole Neighborhood;
when it has been prov'd, I think, unexceptionably, that Polygamy
rather destroys than multiplies the Species; of which we have
also living Proofs under the Eastern Tyrants, and amongst the
Natives of America; so that it can in no Manner answere the End;
and were these Masters to calculate, they'd find a regular
Procreation would make them greater Gainers. A sad Consequence of
this Practice is, that their Children's Morals are debauch'd by
the Frequency of such Sights, as only fit them to become the
Masters of Slaves. This is one bad Custom amongst many others;
but as to their general Usage of them, 'tis monstrous, and
shocking. To be sure, a new Negro, if he must be broke, either
from Obstinacy, or, which I am more apt to suppose, from
Greatness of Soul, will require more hard Discipline than a
young Spaniel: You would really be surpriz'd at their
Perseverance; let an hundred men shew him how to hoe, or drive a
Wheelbarrow, he'll still take the one by the Bottom, and the
other by the Wheel; and they often die before they can be
conquer'd. They are, no Doubt, very great Thieves, but this may
flow from their unhappy, indigent Circumstances, and not from a
natural Bent; and when they have robb'd, you may lash them Hours
before they will confess the Fact; however, were they not to look
upon every White Man as their Tormentor; were a slight Fault to
be pardon'd now and then; were their Masters, and those
adamantine-hearted Overseers, to exercise a little more
Persuasion, Complacency, Tenderness and Humanity towards them, it
might perhaps, improve their Tempers to a greater Degree of
Tractability. Such Masters and such Overseers, Maryland may with
Justice Boast; and Mr. Bull, the late Lieutenant-Governor of
Carolina, is an Instance, amongst many, of the same, in that
Province: But, on the contrary, I remember an Instance of a late
Sea Officer, then resident in a neighbouring Colony, that for a
mere Peccadillo, order'd his Slave to be ty'd up, and for a whole
Hour diverted himself with the Wretched Groans; struck at the
Mournful Sound, with a Friend, I hasted to the Noise, where the
Brute was beginning a new Scene of Barbarity, and belabour'd the
Creature so long with a large Cane, his Overseer being tir'd with
the Cowskin, that he remained without Sense and Motion. Happily
he recovered, but, alas! deceas'd soon after, and perhaps, may
meet him, where the Wicked cease from troubling, and the Weary be
at rest: Where as our immortal Pope sings.
No friends torment, no christians thirst for gold. Another, upon
the same Spot, when a Girl had been lash'd till she confess'd a
Robbery, in mere Wantonness continu'd the Persecution, repeating
every now and then these christian-like, and sensible Expressions
in the Ragings of his Fury, G--dd--mn you, when you go to Hell, I
wish G--d would d--mn me, that I might follow you with the
Cowskin there.
Slavery, thou worst and greatest of Evils! Sometimes thou
appearest to my affrighted Imagination, sweating in the Mines of
Potosi, and wiping the hard-bound Tears from thy exhausted eyes;
sometimes I view thy sable Liberty under the Torture of the Whip,
inflicted by the Hands, the remorseless Hands of an American
Planter: At other Times I view thee in the Semblance of a Wretch
trod upon by ermin'd or turban'd Tyrants, and with poignant,
heart-breaking Sighs, dragging after thee a toilsome Length of
Chain, or bearing African Burdens. Anon I am somewhat comforted,
to see thee attempt to smile under the Grand Monarque; but on the
other Side of the Alpes, thou again resum'st thy Tears, and what,
and how great are thy Iberian Miseries! In Britain, and Britain
only, thy name is not heard; thou hast assum'd a new Form, and
the heaviest Labours are lightsome under those mild Skies!
Oh Liberty, do thou inspire our breasts!
And make our lives in thy possession happy;
Or our deaths glorious, in thy just defence.
Addison.
--Campbell, _Itinerant Observations in America_,
1745-1746, p. 37.