from a great meeting lasting several days, when the people are as much as possible abstracted from secular business, than from the ordinary services of the church. They refer, in order to prove the propriety of this sort of meeting, to the 15th chapter of St. Matthew, verses 30 and seq. where the multitude, consisting of 4000, besides women and children, remained with Christ three days,-to the 8th chapter of St. Mark, verses 4 and seq.--and to the sermon from the Mount, (in St. Matthew, chapters 5, 6, 7,) preached by Christ from the mountain to

the multitudes.

"It is to be recollected," says Lord Byron, (perhaps a singular authority to refer to on such a subject,) "that the most beautiful and impressive doctrines of the Divine Founder of Christianity were delivered, not in the Temple, but on the Mount; and that, waiving the question of devotion, and turning to human eloquence, the most effectual and splendid specimens were not pronounced within walls. Demosthenes addressed the public and popular assemblies. Cicero spoke in the forum. That this added to their effect, on the mind of both orator and hearer, may be conceived, from the difference between what we read of the emotions then and there produced, and those we ourselves experience in the perusal in the closet."

'Lord Byron adds, "that, were the early and rapid progress of what is called Methodism to be attributed to any cause beyond the enthusiasm excited by vehement faith and doctrines, (the truth or error of which he presumed neither to canvass nor to question,) he should venture to ascribe it to the practice of preaching in the fields, and the unstudied and extemporaneous effusions of its teachers."

Vol. I. pp. 424-426. Passing over much interesting matter, and some that would tempt animadversion*, we must now turn to the darker side of the picture. While Mr. Stuart was at New York,

"

A strange incident, as it appeared to us, happened at the beginning of one of Mr. Dennys' Lectures. A man of colour, perfectly well apparelled, entered the room, and was coming forward with a view to hear the lecture, which had commenced. Mr. Dennys, addressing him, told him to go out, saying, "We want no people of colour here; they are very well in their own way, but we don't mean to make them astronomers.' The poor fellow was obliged to comply. After the lecture, I ventured to remonstrate with Mr. Dennys upon the gross impropriety of his conduct; but his answer was quite satisfactory, as far as he was concerned, the fact being, as he stated, that he had no alternative. The people connected with the schools, and his audience generally, would have left the room if he had allowed a man of colour to remain. Nothing can be more disgraceful to the people of the United States, nor more inconsistent with their professed principles of

* We regret that Mr. Stuart has given insertion at pp. 50-62, to the official report on Sunday Mails, without noticing the counter-report, and without any expression of disapprobation of Col. Johnson's flippant, declamatory, and discreditable production.

VOL. IX.-N.S.

H H

equality, than their treatment of the free people of colour. They constantly subject them to indignities of every kind, and refuse altogether to eat or drink with them. If you have black servants and white servants in the same house, they never upon any occasion eat together, and this circumstance very often obliges people to have servants of colour together.' Vol. II. pp. 16, 17.

One of the first circumstances that struck Mr. Stuart, on approaching the slave-states, was the profane language which there became familiar.

The habit of lording it over the black population, and swearing at them, seems to have induced a general habit of swearing among the whites as well as the blacks; which is the more remarkable, because an oath is scarcely ever heard in the northern states of this country.' Vol. II. p. 122.

While sitting in the portico at Halifax (N. Carolina), where they stopped to change horses, Mr. Stuart was accosted by a gentleman, who inquired of him what was the number of slaves for sale at the court-house that day; as here a person would ask the price of corn or of stocks. Mr. Stuart says:

'I explained his mistake to him, and I then asked him some questions with respect to the slave-market here. He said, the price generally given for a young man, was 375 dollars, though, for the best hands, 400 dollars are sometimes given; that 250 dollars was the price for a fine young woman, until after she had her first child; after which she became more valuable, as she was then more to be depended on for increasing the stock. He never, he said, separated husband and wife, but some people did separate them, as well as children, and then they had a crying scene; that was all.' Vol. II. pp. 113, 114.

A few stages further, Mr. Stuart's stopping place was a riceplantation, where he obtained some further insight into the treatment of slaves in America.

The slaves were numerous, and were, I had reason to believe from what I afterwards heard, as well treated as they generally are in this country; but it did not seem to me that their want of education, and the want of ordinary comforts, place them in a situation much removed from the brutes. They had little clothing, all of one drab colour; and not one of them had bed-clothes. I had full leisure to talk with them, but of course I was bound to do so with prudence. Every one of them, however, with whom I had an opportunity of conversing, declared themselves unhappy and miserable in their situation. A certain task is allotted to each of them, and if this is not done, they are subjected to one of three punishments, whipping, wearing irons, or putting in the stocks. They detest nothing so much as to be punished by a black overseer-by one of their own race; they view the degradation to be comparatively trifling when the punishment is inflicted by the master himself. I was told here, on authority which seemed to be

quite unquestionable, that of a wealthy planter who lived in this neighbourhood, that a planter, whose estate is at no great distance from the high road which I was travelling, was in the habit of punishing his slaves, when he thought that they required severe discipline, by putting them in coffins, which were partly nailed down, and that this punishment had again and again resulted in the death of the slaves. The gentleman who communicated this information to me, spoke of it with horror; but, upon my asking why such conduct was not punished, since it was known in the neighbourhood, by virtue of the law which declared the killing of a slave to be murder, he replied, that his neighbour took very good care of himself. The punishment was inflicted only in the presence of slaves, whose evidence was inadmissible. He added, however, that the coffins had been seen, and that the slaves, who it was said had lost their lives, had disappeared, and that no doubt was entertained that their deaths had been occasioned by their being shut up in coffins. The same person who has recourse to this savage punishment, works his slaves on Sunday, though contrary to law, taking care that no white man sees them.'

Vol. II. pp. 118, 119.

Marriage among the slaves is generally allowed; but the most revolting polygamy is forced upon the married slaves of both sexes, at the pleasure of the owner. Anecdotes which we cannot detail, are given by Mr. Stuart, in illustration of the state of morals induced by slavery in both the whites and the blacks. In one conversation at which he was present, it turned out, that 'the planter was frequently waited upon at table by his own children, and had actually sent some of them to the public 'market, to be sold as slaves.' This was in South Carolina. At Charleston, the capital of this state, there is a regulation, which prohibits any of the coloured people, who form about one half of the population, from being out of their residences after nine o'clock in the evening. On returning to his hotel, Mr. Stewart found the male servants of the house' already laid down 'for the night in the passages, with their clothes on. They nei'ther get beds nor bedding here, and you may kick them or tread upon them with impunity. Mr. S. was so fortunate as to arrive at Charleston the week of the races. They were very well attended, he says, by gentlemen and by the nobility; (an expression which we do not precisely understand ;) but the number of ladies was comparatively small.

6

Although there are constables at the starting-post, to prevent the people from coming on the course, one of the stewards appeared very much to envy them their calling; for no sooner did a man of colour appear on the course, and within his reach, than he struck him with his horsewhip. No wonder that these people thirst for vengeance. Here, on the race-course, there were at least two men of colour for every white person; yet they were obliged to submit to treatment

which the white man dared not even to have threatened to a person of his own colour.' Vol. II. p. 134.

What then must be, in such a state of society, the treatment of the slaves? Let Mr. Stuart supply the answer.

room. room.

room.

'I was placed in a situation at Charleston, which gave me too frequent opportunities to witness the effects of slavery in its most aggravated state. Mrs. Street (the mistress of the hotel) treated all the servants in the house in the most barbarous manner; and this, although she knew that Stewart, the hotel-keeper here, had lately nearly lost his life by maltreating a slave. He beat his cook, who was a stout fellow, until he could no longer support it. He rose upon his master, and in his turn gave him such a beating that it had nearly cost him his life; the cook immediately left the house, ran off, and was never afterwards heard of,-it was supposed that he had drowned himself. Not a day, however, passed without my hearing of Mrs. Street whipping and ill using her unfortunate slaves. On one occasion, when one of the female slaves had disobliged her, she beat her until her own strength was exhausted, and then insisted on the bar-keeper, Mr. Ferguson, (a Scotchman,) proceeding to inflict the remainder of the punishment. Mrs. Street in the mean time took her place in the barShe instructed him to lay on the whip severely in an adjoining His nature was repugnant to the execution of the duty which was imposed on him. He gave a wink to the girl, who understood it and bellowed lustily, while he made the whip crack on the walls of the Mrs. Street expressed herself to be quite satisfied with the way in which Ferguson had executed her instructions; but, unfortunately for him, his lenity to the girl became known in the house, and the subject of merriment, and was one of the reasons for his dismissal before I left the house ;-but I did not know of the most atrocious of all the proceedings of this cruel woman until the very day that I quitted the house. I had put up my clothes in my portmanteau, when I was about to set out; but, finding it was rather too full, I had difficulty in getting it closed to allow me to lock it; I therefore told one of the boys to send me one of the stoutest of the men to assist me. A great robust fellow soon afterwards appeared, whom I found to be the cook, with tears in his eyes;-I asked him what was the matter? He told me that, just at the time when the boy called for him, he had got so sharp a blow on the cheek-bone, from this devil in petticoats, as had unmanned him for the moment. Upon my expressing commiseration for him, he said, he viewed this as nothing, but that he was leading a life of terrible suffering;-that about two years had elapsed since he and his wife, with his two children, had been exposed in the public market at Charleston for sale,-that he had been purchased by Mr. Street, that his wife and children had been purchased by a different person, and that, though he was living in the same town with them, he never was allowed to see them ;—he would be beaten within an ace of his life if he ventured to go to the corner of the street.

'Wherever the least symptom of rebellion or insubordination ap

pears at Charleston on the part of a slave, the master sends the slave to the gaol, where he is whipped or beaten as the master desires. The Duke of Saxe Weimar, in his travels, mentions that he visited this gaol in December 1825; that the "black overseers go about everywhere armed with cow hides; that in the basement story there is an apparatus upon which the Negroes, by order of the police, or at the request of the masters, are flogged; that the machine consists of a sort of crane, on which a cord with two nooses runs over pulleys; the nooses are made fast to the hands of the slave and drawn up, while the feet are bound tight to a plank; that the body is stretched out as much as possible, and thus the miserable creature receives the exact number of lashes as counted off."-The public sale of slaves in the marketplace at Charleston occurs frequently. I was present at two sales where, especially at one of them, the miserable creatures were in tears on account of their being separated from their relations and friends. At one of them, a young woman of sixteen or seventeen was separated from her father and mother, and all her relations, and every one she had formerly known. This not unfrequently happens, although I was told and believe that there is a general wish to keep relations together where it can be done.

The following extract of a letter from a gentleman at Charleston, to a friend of his at New York, published in the New York newspapers while I was there, contains even a more shocking account of the public sale of slaves here :-" Curiosity sometimes leads me to the auction sales of the Negroes. A few days since I attended one which exhibited the beauties of slavery in all their sickening deformity. The bodies of these wretched beings were placed upright on a table,-their physical proportions examined, their defects and beauties noted. A prime lot, here they go!' There I saw the father looking with sullen contempt on the crowd, and expressing an indignation in his countenance that he dare not speak ;-and the mother, pressing her infants closer to her bosom with an involuntary grasp, and exclaiming, in wild and simple earnestness, while the tears chased down her cheeks in quick succession, I can't leff my children! I won't leff my children!' But on the hammer went, reckless alike whether it united or sundered for ever. On another stand I saw a man apparently as white as myself exposed for sale. I turned away from the humiliating spectacle.

"At another time, I saw the concluding scene of this infernal drama. It was on the wharf. A slave ship for New Orleans was lying in the stream, and the poor Negroes, handcuffed, and pinioned, were hurried off in boats, eight at a time. Here I witnessed the last farewell,— the heart-rending separation of every earthly tie. The mute and agonizing embrace of the husband and wife, and the convulsive grasp of the mother and the child, who were alike torn asunder-for ever! It was a living death,-they never see or hear of each other more. Tears flowed fast, and mine with the rest."

Charleston has long been celebrated for the severity of its laws against the blacks, and the mildness of its punishments towards the whites for maltreating them. Until the late law, there were about seventy-one crimes for which slaves were capitally punished, and for