“One Mrs. Mann, living near ——­, in ——­ co., Missouri was known to be very cruel to her slaves.  She had a bench made purposely to whip them upon; and what she called her “six pound paddle,” an instrument of prodigious torture, bored through with holes; this she would wield with both hands as she stood over her prostrate victim.

“She thus punished a hired slave woman named Fanny, belonging to Mr. Charles Trabue, who lives neat Palmyra, Marion co., Missouri; on the morning after the punishment Fanny was a corpse; she was silently and quickly buried, but rumor was not so easily stopped.  Mr. Trabue heard of it, and commenced suit for his property.  The murdered slave was disinterred, and an inquest held; her back was a mass of jellied muscle; and the coroner brought in a verdict of death by the ’six pound paddle.’  Mrs. Mann fled for a few months, but returned again, and her friends found means to protract the suit.

“This same Mrs. Mann had another hired slave woman living with her, called Patterson’s Fanny, she belonged to a Mr. Patterson; she had a young babe with her, just beginning to creep.  One day, after washing, whilst a tub of rinsing water yet stood in the kitchen, Mrs. Mann came out in haste, and sent Fanny to do something out of doors.  Fanny tried to beg off—­she was afraid to leave her babe, lest it should creep to the tub and get hurt—­Mrs. M. said she would watch the babe, and sent her off.  She went with much reluctance, and heard the child struggle as she went out the door.  Fearing lest Mrs. M. should leave the babe alone, she watched the room, and soon saw her pass out of the opposite door.  Immediately Fanny hurried in, and looked around for her babe, she could not see it, she looked at the tub—­there her babe was floating, a strangled corpse.  The poor woman gave a dreadful scream; and Mrs. M. rushed into the room, with her hands raised, and exclaimed, ‘Heavens, Fanny! have you drowned your child?’ It was vain for the poor bereaved one to attempt to vindicate herself:  in vain she attempted to convince them that the babe had not been alone a moment, and could not have drowned itself; and that she had not been in the house a moment, before she screamed at discovering her drowned babe.  All was false!  Mrs. Mann declared it was all pretence—­that Fanny had drowned her own babe, and now wanted to lay the blame upon her! and Mrs. Mann was a white woman—­of course her word was more valuable than the oaths of all the slaves of Missouri.  No evidence but that of slaves could be obtained, or Mr. Patterson would have prosecuted for his ‘loss of property.’  As it was, every one believed Mrs. M. guilty, though the affair was soon hushed up.”

Extract of a letter from Col.  THOMAS ROGERS, a native of Kentucky, now an elder in the Presbyterian Church at New Petersburg, Highland co., Ohio.