get all the work out of his hands he could, before I
left, (about fifty in number,) bought for them every week, or twice a
week, a beef's head from market. With this, they made a soup in a
large iron kettle, around which the hands came at meal-time, and
dipping out the soup, would mix it with their hommony, and eat it as
though it were a feast. This man permitted his slaves to eat twice a
day while I was doing a job for him. He promised me a beaver hat and
as good a suit of clothes as could be bought in the city, if I would
accomplish so much for him before I returned to the north; giving me
the entire control over his slaves. Thus you may see the temptations
overseers sometimes have, to get all the work they can out of the poor
slaves. The above is an exception to the general rule of feeding. For
in all other places where I worked and visited; the slaves had
_nothing from their masters but the corn_, or its equivalent in
potatoes or rice, and to this, they were not permitted to come but
_once a day_. The custom was to blow the horn early in the morning,
as a signal for the hands to rise and go to work, when commenced; they
continued work until about eleven o'clock, A.M., when, at the signal,
all hands left off and went into their huts, made their fires, made
their corn-meal into hommony or cake, ate it, and went to work again
at the signal of the horn, and worked until night, or until their
tasks were done. Some cooked their breakfast in the field while at
work. Each slave must grind his own corn in a hand-mill after he has
done his work at night. There is generally one hand-mill on every
plantation for the use of the slaves.

Some of the planters have no corn, others often get out. The
substitute for it is, the equivalent of one peek of corn either in
rice or sweet potatoes; neither of which is as good for the slaves as
corn. They complain more of being faint, when fed on rice or potatoes,
than when fed on corn. I was with one man a few weeks who gave me his
hands to do a job of work, and to save time one cooked for all the
rest. The following course was taken,--Two crotched sticks were driven
down at one end of the yard, and a small pole being laid on the
crotches, they swung a large iron kettle on the middle of the pole;
then made up a fire under the kettle and boiled the hommony; when
ready, the hands were called around this kettle with their wooden
plates and spoons. They dipped out and ate standing around the ket