to the hands of the enemy in some of those petty wars
which were continually going on, when, if there had been no market for
their sale, they would almost certainly have been killed.

It is hardly necessary to state that in giving these statements we are
not attempting the impossible task of vindicating slavery either of the
black or white man. It would be well, however, if, in mitigation of the
offence against the negro, his former condition were taken into
consideration, and the undoubted fact that he was better treated by the
West India planter than by his own countrymen. His lot was by no means
so hard as slavery had been to the Indian and white bond-servant. He did
not sink under the hardships of a life of toil in the burning sun, but
was happy in his way, and in most cases better off than his descendant,
the West Indian peasant of to-day. He was certainly treated as a
domestic animal, but his value was always high enough to prevent
anything like ill-usage. There were certainly people who could be cruel
to their negroes, as there are yet men so low as to brutally flog
valuable horses, but that such were common is a statement utterly
without foundation. As a well-kept animal, the planter took a pride in
him, fed and doctored him, patted him on the back, and proudly showed
him to his friends. All this appears very degrading to humanity, but
after all the negro did not see it in that light. On the contrary, he
took a pride in exhibiting his strong muscles and in showing the
"buccras" what a fine nigger massa had got.

The slave of the rich planter, like the horse of the English gentleman,
was undoubtedly very comfortable. First, he was a picked lot--the
healthiest, strongest, and most suitable for his work--one of those
"pieces d'India," as the best negroes were called by the traders. Then,
as an expensive chattel, everything was done to make him still more
valuable, and to prevent his deteriorating. But unfortunately there was
another class--the miserable, broken-down creatures sold cheap as refuse
lots to poor white men or even to slaves. Yes, the slaves bought their
diseased fellow-countrymen, to work on their own allotments, treating
them as the costermonger sometimes does his donkey. Half-starved,
hard-worked, and covered with sores, they lingered in misery until death
came to make them free. Some were so disfigured with yaws, or leprosy,
that none but a negro could bear the sight of them; these were kept out
of