mmonly prevailing
in their rude camps, despite of the apparent discomfort and privation to
which they were exposed.

Many of the negroes, however, I am informed, are exceedingly averse to a
removal from the sites on which they have been bred, and where their
connexions are formed: in these cases, planters who are uncertain of the
personal attachment of their slaves, generally dispose of them amongst
their neighbours: when they are really attached to their owners,
however, there is little difficulty experienced in their removal.

In most of the parties I encountered, I should say, judging fairly by
their deportment and loud merriment, despite the great fatigue and
constant exposure, the affair was taken in a sort of holiday spirit, no
way warranted by their half-naked miserable appearance.

Thus they crawl onward from day to day, for weeks or months, until they
have reached that portion of the forest, or cane-brake, fixed upon for
the plantation: and here the enterprising settler has to encounter new
toil, and a long series of privations, cheered however by the hope,
seldom a delusive one, of ultimate wealth accumulating to the survivors
of the party; for, unhappily, health is the sacrifice, I believe,
generally paid for the possession of the fat soil lying along these
sluggish rivers.

Along the whole line of our route from Augusta in Georgia to the banks
of the Alabama, we found the road covered by parties of this
description; and, according to the opinions of well-informed residents,
with whom I conversed on this subject, not fewer than ten thousand
families have quitted the two Carolinas and Georgia during the course of
this season.

Amongst these families journeying to the land of promise, inspired by
hopes for the future and cheered by the presence of those on whom they
relied for their fulfilment, we now and then met little parties of
broken-men retracing their sad steps toward the homes they had consigned
to strangers: of these, one family, which we encountered camping near
the banks of a swollen river whose bridge we were compelled to repair
before we could cross it, excited deep commiseration. The establishment
consisted of a single covered waggon, a small open cart, and
half-a-dozen slaves, principally women: its conductress was a widow, not
exceeding thirty years of age, having by her side five children, one an
infant.

Within a year after the location of his family on the banks of the
Black-warrior,