THE DEATH OF CYRUS AND STEPNEY.

Old Col.  Dick Singleton had several state places as I have mentioned.  In the South, the rich men who had a great deal of money bought all the plantations they could get and obtained them very cheap.  The Colonel had some ten or twenty places and had slaves settled on each of them.

He had four children, and after each had received a plantation, the rest were called state places, and these could not be sold until all the grandchildren should become of age; after they all had received places, the rest could be sold.

One of the places was called Biglake.  The slaves on these places were treated more cruelly than on those where the owner lived, for the overseers had full sway.

One day the overseer at Biglake punished the slaves so that some of them fell exhausted.  When he came to the two men, Cyrus and Stepney, they resisted, but were taken by force and severely punished.  A few days afterwards the overseer died, and those two men were taken up and hanged on the plantation without judge or jury.

After that another overseer was hired, with orders to arm himself, and every slave who did not submit to his punishment was to be shot immediately.  At times, when the overseer was angry with a man he would strike him on the head with a club and kill him instantly, and they would bury him in the field.  Some would run away and come to M.R.  Singleton, my master, but he would only tell them to go home and behave.  Then they were handcuffed or chained and carried back to Biglake, and when we would hear from them again the greater part would have been murdered.  When they were taken from master’s place, they would bid us good bye and say they knew they should be killed when they got home.

Oh! who can paint the sad feeling in our minds when we saw these, our own race, chained and carried home to drink the bitter cup of death from their merciless oppressors, with no one near to say, “Spare him, God made him,” or to say, “Have mercy on him, for Jesus died for him.”  His companions dared not groan above a whisper for fear of sharing the same fate; but thanks that the voice of the Lord was heard in the North, which said, “Go quickly to the South and let my prison-bound people go free, for I have heard their cries from cotton, corn and rice plantations, saying, how long before thou wilt come to deliver us from this chain?” and the Lord said to them, “Wait, I will send you John Brown who shall be the key to the door of your liberty, and I will harden the heart of Jefferson Davis, your devil, that I may show him and his followers my power; then shall I send you Abraham Lincoln, mine angel, who shall lead you from the land of bondage to the land of liberty.”  Our fathers all died in “the wilderness,” but thank God, the children reached “the promised land.”

THE WAY THE SLAVES DETECTED THIEVES AMONG THEMSELVES.