t 'negroes cannot be considered in any other light
than as beasts of burden; and to lighten a vessel it is permitted to
throw overboard its least valuable effects.'

"Some of the unhappy slaves escaped from those who attempted to tie
them, and jumped into the sea. One of them was saved by means of a cord
thrown by the sailors of another vessel; and the monster who murdered
his innocent companions had the audacity to claim him as his property.
The Judges, either from shame, or a sense of justice, refused his
demand."[E]

[Footnote E: The Abbe Gregoire's Inquiry into the Intellect and Morals
of Negroes.]

Some people speculate in what are called refuse slaves; i. e. the poor
diseased ones. Many of them die in the piazzas of the auctioneers; and
sometimes, in the agonies of death, they are sold as low as a dollar.

Even this is better than to be unprotected on the wide ocean, in the
power of such wild beasts as I have described. It may seem incredible
to some that human nature is capable of so much depravity. But the
confessions of pirates show how habitual scenes of blood and violence
harden the heart of man; and history abundantly proves that despotic
power produces a fearful species of moral insanity. The wanton cruelties
of Nero, Caligula, Domitian, and many of the officers of the
Inquisition, seem like the frantic acts of madmen.

The public has, however, a sense of justice, which can never be entirely
perverted. Since the time when Clarkson, Wilberforce and Fox made
the horrors of the slave-trade understood, the slave-captain, or
slave-jockey, is spontaneously and almost universally regarded with
dislike and horror. Even in the slaveholding states it is deemed
disreputable to associate with a professed slave-trader, though few
perhaps would think it any harm to bargain with him. This public feeling
makes itself felt so strongly, that men engaged in what is called the
African traffic, kept it a secret, if they could, even before the laws
made it hazardous.

No man of the least principle could for a moment think of engaging in
such enterprises; and if he have any feeling, it is soon destroyed by
familiarity with scenes of guilt and anguish. The result is, that the
slave-trade is a monopoly in the hands of the very wicked; and this is
one reason why it has always been profitable.

Yet even the slave-_trade_ has had it champions--of course among those
who had money invested in it. Politicians have boldly said tha