In stating the foregoing facts, my object has been to show the practical workings of the system of slavery, and if possible to correct the misapprehension on this subject, so common at the north.  In doing this I am not at war with slave-holders.  No, my soul is moved for them as well as for the poor slaves.  May God send them repentance to the acknowledgment of the truth!  Principle, on a subject of this nature, is dearer to me than the applause of men, and should not be sacrificed on any subject, even though the ties of friendship may be broken.  We have too long been silent on this subject, the slave has been too much considered, by our northern states, as being kept by necessity in his present condition.—­Were we to ask, in the language of Pilate, “what evil have they done”—­we may search their history, we cannot find that they have taken up arms against our government, nor insulted us as a nation—­that they are thus compelled to drag out a life in chains! subjected to the most terrible inflictions if in any way they manifest a wish to be released.—­Let us reverse the question.  What evil has been done to them by those who call themselves masters?  First let us look at their persons, “neither clothed nor naked”—­I have seen instances where this phrase would not apply to boys and girls, and that too in winter.  I knew one young man seventeen years of age, by the name of Dave, on Mr. J. Swan’s plantation, worked day after day in the rice machine as naked as when he was born.  The reason of his being so, his master said in my hearing, was, that he could not keep clothes on him—­he would get into the fire and burn them off.

Follow them next to their huts; some with and some without floors:—­Go at night, view their means of lodging, see them lying on benches, some on the floor or ground, some sitting on stools, dozing away the night:—­others, of younger age, with a bare blanket wrapped about them; and one or two lying in the ashes.  These things I have often seen with my own eyes.

Examine their means of subsistence, which consists generally of seven quarts of meal or eight quarts of small rice for one week; then follow them to their work, with driver and overseer pushing them to the utmost of their strength, by threatening and whipping.

If they are sick from fatigue and exposure, go to their huts, as I have often been, and see them groaning under a burning fever or pleurisy, lying on some straw, their feet to the fire with barely a blanket to cover them; or on some boards nailed together in form of a bedstead.

And after seeing all this, and hearing them tell of their sufferings, need I ask, is there any evil connected with their condition? and if so; upon whom is it to be charged?  I answer for myself, and the reader can do the same.  Our government stands first chargeable for allowing slavery to exist, under its own jurisdiction.  Second, the states for enacting laws to secure their victim.  Third, the slaveholder for carrying out such enactments, in horrid form enough to chill the blood.  Fourth, every person who knows what slavery is, and does not raise his voice against this crying sin, but by silence gives consent to its continuance, is chargeable with guilt in the sight of God.  “The blood of Zacharias who was slain between the temple and altar,” says Christ, “WILL I REQUIRE OF THIS GENERATION.”