“Any restraint?” Are there no restraints (supposing them necessary) short of absolute slavery to keep “troublesome characters” in order?  But this, I suppose, is the argumentum ad gubernatorem—­to frighten the governor.  She is such a termagant, it seems, that if she once gets back to the colony free, she will not only make it too hot for poor Mr. Wood, but the police and courts of justice will scarce be a match for her!  Sir Patrick Ross, no doubt, will take care how he intercedes farther for so formidable a virago!  How can one treat such arguments seriously?

4.  She is not a native of the colony, and he knows of no relation she has there.

True:  But was it not her home (so far as a slave can have a home) for thirteen or fourteen years?  Were not the connexions, friendships, and associations of her mature life formed there?  Was it not there she hoped to spend her latter years in domestic tranquillity with her husband, free from the lash of the taskmaster?  These considerations may appear light to Mr. Wood, but they are every thing to this poor woman.

5.  He induced her, he says, to take a husband, a short time before she left Antigua, and gave them a comfortable house in his yard, &c. &c.

This paragraph merits attention.  He “induced her to take a husband?” If the fact were true, what brutality of mind and manners does it not indicate among these slave-holders?  They refuse to legalize the marriages of their slaves, but induce them to form such temporary connexions as may suit the owner’s conveniency, just as they would pair the lower animals; and this man has the effrontery to tell us so!  Mary, however, tells a very different story, (see page 17;) and her assertion, independently of other proof, is at least as credible as Mr. Wood’s.  The reader will judge for himself as to the preponderance of internal evidence in the conflicting statements.

6.  He alleges that she was, before marriage, licentious, and even depraved in her conduct, and unfaithful to her husband afterwards.

These are serious charges.  But if true, or even partially true, how comes it that a person so correct in his family hours and arrangements as Mr. Wood professes to be, and who expresses so edifying a horror of licentiousness, could reconcile it to his conscience to keep in the bosom of his family so depraved, as well as so troublesome a character for at least thirteen years, and confide to her for long periods too the charge of his house and the care of his children—­for such I shall shew to have been the facts?  How can he account for not having rid himself with all speed, of so disreputable an inmate—­he who values her loss so little “in a pecuniary point of view?” How can he account for having sold five other slaves in that period, and yet have retained this shocking woman—­nay, even have refused to sell her, on more than one occasion, when offered her full value?  It could not be