he master, to indemnify himself for this
expense, retrenches half an hour from his negro's hours of
respite, during the short days of the rigorous season!

Their ordinary food is indian corn, or rice and beans, boiled in
water, without fat or salt. To them nothing comes amiss. They
will devour greedily racoon, opossum, squirrels, wood-rats, and
even the crocodile; leaving to the white people the roebuck and
rabbit, which they sell them when they kill those animals.

They raise poultry and hogs, but seldom eat either. They prefer
selling them, and purchasing from their profits, cloathing and
brandy. They love brandy to excess. Promise a negro a dram, and
he will go through fire and water to serve you.

Their smoaky huts admit both wind and rain. An anecdote offers
itself to my pen on this subject, which will exhibit the frigid
indifference of the colonists of Louisiana towards every thing
that interests humanity. Being on a visit at a plantation on the
Mississippi, I walked out one fine evening in winter, with some
ladies and gentlemen, who had accompanied me from the town, and
the planters at whose house we were entertained. We approached
the quarter where the huts of the negroes stood. "Let us visit
the negroes," said one of the party; and we advanced towards the
door of a miserable hut, where an old negro woman came to the
threshold in order to receive us, but so decrepit as well as old,
that it was painful for her to move.

Notwithstanding the winter was advanced, she was partly naked;
her only covering being some old thrown away rags. Her fire was a
few chips, and she was parching a little corn for supper. Thus
she lived abandoned and forlorn; incapable from old age to work
any longer, she was no longer noticed.

But independently of her long services, this negro woman had
formerly suckled and brought up two brothers of her master, who
made one of our party. She perceived him, and accosting him,
said, "My master, when will you send one of your carpenters to
repair the roof of my hut? Whenever it rains, it pours down upon
my head." The master lifting his eyes, directed them to the roof
of the hut, which was within the reach of his hand. "I will think
of it," said he.--"You will think of it," said the poor creature.
"You always say