mention
these facts to show that the Americans have no right to revile us on
being the cause of slavery in America. They had the means, and were
bound, as honourable men, to act up to their declaration but they
entered into the question, they decided otherwise, and decided that they
would retain their ill-acquired property at the expense of their
principles.

The degrees of slavery in America are as various in their intensity as
are the communities composing the Union. They may, however, be divided
with great propriety under two general heads--eastern and western
slavery. By eastern slavery, I refer to that in the slave states
bordering on the Atlantic, and those slave states on the other side of
the Alleghany mountains, which may be more directly considered as their
colonies, viz, in the first instance, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia,
North and South Carolina; and, secondly, Kentucky and Tennessee. We
have been accustomed lately to class the slaves as non-predial and
predial,--that is, those who are domestic, and those who work on the
plantations. This classification is not correct, if it is intended to
distinguish between those who are well, and those who are badly treated.
The true line to be drawn is between those who work separately, and
those who are worked in a gang and superintended by an overseer. This
is fully exemplified in the United States, where it will be found that
in all states where they are worked in gangs the slaves are harshly
treated, while in the others their labour is light.

Now, with the exception of the rice grounds in South Carolina, the
eastern states are growers of corn, hemp, and tobacco; but their chief
staple is the breeding of horses, mules, horned cattle, and other stock:
the largest portion of these states remain in wild luxuriant pasture,
more especially in Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee, either of which
states is larger than the other four mentioned.

The proportion of slaves required for the cultivation of the purely
agricultural and chiefly grazing farms or plantations in these states is
small, fifteen or twenty being sufficient for a farm of two hundred or
three hundred acres; and their labour, which is mostly confined to
tending stock, is not only very light, but of the quality most agreeable
to the negro. Half the day you will see him on horseback with his legs
idly swinging--as he goes along, or seated on a shaft-horse driving his
wagons. He is quite in his glory;