This young man was of a very feeble constitution, and was frequently a
proper subject of medical treatment.--When a prisoner complained of
being sick, he was very often permitted very kindly to take his choice
of three things; 1, to take an emetic; 2, to go and do his usual task;
or 3, to go into the cell and live on bread and water, and sleep on a
stone floor. A. W. was taken sick and this choice was given to him; he
took the emetic, remarking that he "might as well die one way as
another." He was now left in his room, and for three days received no
further attention. After this the physician visited him, and
immediately ordered him to be moved into the hospital, where he
suffered a severe course of fever.
Mr. Woodruff was the keeper who gave him the emetic, and he was much
displeased when the physician rescued him from his hands. After the
fever left him, and he went to his work, he was so weak that he
applied to the physician for relief, and some bark and wine were
ordered for him; but Mr. Woodruff thought fit to refuse the wine, and
gave him only a small quantity of bark, and that of the poorest kind.
At another time when he was sick, and unable to do his task, I got
some bark for him at my own expense, and wove as much over my task as
he fell short of his, and caused it to be placed to his credit, to
keep him out of punishment. This was done with the master weaver's
knowledge, and was the only arrangement I could make to save him. It
was nothing in his favor that he was sick; his task was required, and
it must be done by himself or some one else.
The cruel man who allowed this youth no peace in his sickness, was
very soon after doomed, in his turn, to a sickness which admitted of
no comfort for him. His conduct in this instance is only a specimen of
what it _generally_ was. And when he became the prey to disease, he
became sullen, unsocial, and desponding; evidently the victim of his
own self-condemning reflections, and of that _retributive justice_
which never suffers the wicked to go unpunished. Let the other tyrants
of that little world of cruelty, think of this, and remember that the
cry of the oppressed is always heard in heaven.