only wonder is, that considering the extent of our country, the
variety of our population, its fluctuating character, and the publicity
of all our transactions, the number of cases is so small. It speaks well
for us. Yet of these, many are false, all highly colored, some occurring
half a century, most of them many years ago; and no doubt a large
proportion of them perpetrated by foreigners. With a few rare
exceptions, the emigrant Scotch and English are the worst masters among
us, and next to them our Northern fellow-citizens. Slaveholders born and
bred here are always more humane to slaves, and those who have grown up
to a large inheritance of them, the most so of any--showing clearly that
the effect of the system is to foster kindly feelings. I do not mean so
much to impute innate inhumanity to foreigners, as to show that they
come here with false notions of the treatment usual and necessary for
slaves, and that newly acquired power here, as everywhere else, is apt
to be abused. I cannot enter into a detailed examination of the cases
stated by the abolitionists. It would be disgusting, and of little
avail. I know nothing of them. I have seen nothing like them, though
born and bred here, and have rarely heard of any thing at all to be
compared to them. Permit me to say that I think most of _your_ facts
must have been drawn from the West Indies, where undoubtedly slaves were
treated much more harshly than with us. This was owing to a variety of
causes, which might, if necessary, be stated. One was, that they had at
first to deal more extensively with barbarians fresh from the wilds of
Africa; another, and a leading one, the absenteeism of proprietors.
Agents are always more unfeeling than owners, whether placed over West
Indian or American slaves, or Irish tenantry. We feel this evil greatly
even here. You describe the use of _thumb screws_, as one mode of
punishment among us. I doubt if a thumb screw can be found in America. I
never saw or heard of one in this country. Stocks are rarely used by
private individuals, and confinement still more seldom, though both are
common punishments for whites, all the world over. I think they should
be more frequently resorted to with slaves, as substitutes for flogging,
which I consider the most injurious and least efficacious mode of
punishing them for serious offenses. It is not degrading, and unless
excessive, occasions little pain. You may be a little astonished, after
all the fl