oung, it is too much like kid; if they are too old, it's like sole
leather, it's so tough; and if they have been whipt, as all on 'em have
a'most, why the back is all cut to pieces, and the hide ruined. It
takes several sound nigger skins to make a stole; but when made, it's a
beautiful article, that's a fact.

"It is used on a plantation for punishment. When the whip don't do its
work, strip a slave, and jist clap on to him the Black Stole. Dress
him up in a dead man's skin, and it frightens him near about to death.
You'll hear him screetch for a mile a'most, so 'tarnally skeered. And
the best of the fun is, that all the rest of the herd, bulls, cows, and
calves, run away from him, jist as if he was a panther."

"Fun, Sir! Do you call this fun?"

"Why sartainly I do. Ain't it better nor whippin' to death? "What's
a Stole arter all? It's nothin' but a coat. Philosophizin' on it,
Stranger, there is nothin' to shock a man. The dead don't feel.
Skinnin', then, ain't cruel, nor is it immoral. To bury a good hide, is,
waste--waste is wicked. There are more good hides buried in the
States, black and white, every year, than would pay the poor-rates and
state-taxes. They make excellent huntin'-coats, and would make beautiful
razor-straps, bindin' for books, and such like things; it would make a
noble export. Tannin' in hemlock bark cures the horrid nigger flavour.
But then, we hante arrived at that state of philosophy; and when it is
confined to one class of the human family, it would be dangerous.
The skin of a crippled slave might be worth more than the critter was
himself; and I make no doubt, we should soon hear of a stray nigger
being shot for his hide, as you do of a moose for his skin, and a bear
for his fur.

"Indeed, that is the reason (though I shouldn't mention it as an
Attache), that our government won't now concur to suppress the slave
trade. They say the prisoners will all be murdered, and their peels
sold; and that vessels, instead of taking, in at Africa a cargo of
humans, will take in a cargo of hides, as they do to South America. As a
Christian, a philanthropist, indeed, as a man, this is a horrid subject
to contemplate, ain't it?"

"Indeed it is," said Turkey. "I feel a little overcome--my head swims--I
am oppressed with nausea--I must go below."

"How the goney swallered it all, didn't he?" said Mr. Slick, with great
glee. "Hante he a most a beautiful twist that feller? How he gobbled it
down, tank, s