“The devil is got you now!” She forgot that the child was looking on.  She had just begun to talk; and she said to her father, “I did see ma, and mammy did strike ma, so,” striking her own face with her little hand.  The master was startled.  He could not imagine how the nurse could obtain access to the room where the corpse lay; for he kept the door locked.  He questioned her.  She confessed that what the child had said was true, and told how she had procured the key.  She was sold to Georgia.

In my childhood I knew a valuable slave, named Charity, and loved her, as all children did.  Her young mistress married, and took her to Louisiana.  Her little boy, James, was sold to a good sort of master.  He became involved in debt, and James was sold again to a wealthy slaveholder, noted for his cruelty.  With this man he grew up to manhood, receiving the treatment of a dog.  After a severe whipping, to save himself from further infliction of the lash, with which he was threatened, he took to the woods.  He was in a most miserable condition—­cut by the cowskin, half naked, half starved, and without the means of procuring a crust of bread.

Some weeks after his escape, he was captured, tied, and carried back to his master’s plantation.  This man considered punishment in his jail, on bread and water, after receiving hundreds of lashes, too mild for the poor slave’s offence.  Therefore he decided, after the overseer should have whipped him to his satisfaction, to have him placed between the screws of the cotton gin, to stay as long as he had been in the woods.  This wretched creature was cut with the whip from his head to his feet, then washed with strong brine, to prevent the flesh from mortifying, and make it heal sooner than it otherwise would.  He was then put into the cotton gin, which was screwed down, only allowing him room to turn on his side when he could not lie on his back.  Every morning a slave was sent with a piece of bread and bowl of water, which was placed within reach of the poor fellow.  The slave was charged, under penalty of severe punishment, not to speak to him.

Four days passed, and the slave continued to carry the bread and water.  On the second morning, he found the bread gone, but the water untouched.  When he had been in the press four days and five night, the slave informed his master that the water had not been used for four mornings, and that horrible stench came from the gin house.  The overseer was sent to examine into it.  When the press was unscrewed, the dead body was found partly eaten by rats and vermin.  Perhaps the rats that devoured his bread had gnawed him before life was extinct.  Poor Charity!  Grandmother and I often asked each other how her affectionate heart would bear the news, if she should ever hear of the murder of her son.  We had known her husband, and knew that James was like him in manliness and intelligence.  These were the qualities that made it so hard for him to be a plantation slave.  They