of course, could neither institute a suit, nor testify against
the murderer. His bare word would go further in a court of law, than the
united testimony of ten thousand black witnesses.

All that Mr. Gore had to do, was to make his peace with Col. Lloyd. This
done, and the guilty perpetrator of one of the most foul murders goes
unwhipped of justice, and uncensured by the community in which he lives.
Mr. Gore lived in St. Michael's, Talbot county, when I left Maryland; if
he is still alive he probably yet resides there; and I have no reason
to doubt that he is now as highly esteemed, and as greatly respected, as
though his guilty soul had never been stained with innocent blood. I am
well aware that what I have now written will by some be branded as false
and malicious. It will be denied, not only that such a thing ever did
transpire, as I have now narrated, but that such a thing could happen in
_Maryland_. I can only say--believe it or not--that I have said nothing
but the literal truth, gainsay it who may.

I speak advisedly when I say this,--that killing a slave, or any colored
person, in Talbot county, Maryland, is not treated as a crime, either by
the courts or the community. Mr. Thomas Lanman, ship carpenter, of St.
Michael's, killed two slaves, one of whom he butchered with a hatchet,
by knocking his brains out. He used to boast of the commission of the
awful and bloody deed. I have heard him do so, laughingly, saying, among
other things, that he was the only benefactor of his country in the
company, and that when "others would do as much as he had done, we
should be relieved of the d--d niggers."

As an evidence of the reckless disregard of human life where the life
is that of a slave I may state the notorious fact, that the{98} wife of
Mr. Giles Hicks, who lived but a short distance from Col. Lloyd's, with
her own hands murdered my wife's cousin, a young girl between fifteen
and sixteen years of age--mutilating her person in a most shocking
manner. The atrocious woman, in the paroxysm of her wrath, not content
with murdering her victim, literally mangled her face, and broke her
breast bone. Wild, however, and infuriated as she was, she took the
precaution to cause the slave-girl to be buried; but the facts of the
case coming abroad, very speedily led to the disinterment of the remains
of the murdered slave-girl. A coroner's jury was assembled, who
decided that the girl had come to her death by severe beating. I