ired, and with
no more exciting motive for the continuance of intellectual culture than
the general sense of its worth and fitness.

XII.

FROM PLANTATION TO PLANTATION

If the master of a plantation is faithful and thorough, will tolerate no
misconduct or imposition, and yet is humane and watchful over the
interests and rights, as well as over the duties of the Negroes, he has
a hard and anxious life. Sickness to be ministered to, the feigning of
sickness to be counteracted, rights of the slaves to be secured against
other Negroes, as well as against whites, with a poor chance of getting
at the truth from either; the obligations of the Negro _quasi_ marriage
to be enforced against all the sensual and childish tendencies of the
race; theft and violence and wanderings from home to be detected and
prevented; the work to be done, and yet no one to be over-worked; and
all this often with no effectual aid, often with only obstructions, from
the intermediate whites! Nor is it his own people only that are to be
looked to. The thieving and violence of Negroes from other plantations,
their visits by night against law, and the encroachments of the
neighboring free blacks and low whites, are all to be watched and
prevented or punished. The master is a policeman, as well as an
economist and a judge. His revolver and rifle are always loaded. He has
his dogs, his trackers and seizers, that lie at his gate, trained to
give the alarm when a strange step comes near the house or the quarters,
and ready to pursue. His hedges may be broken down, his cane trampled or
cut, or, still worse, set fire to, goats let into his pastures, his
poultry stolen, and sometimes his dogs poisoned. It is a country of
little law and order, and what with slavery and free Negroes and low
whites, violence or fraud are imminent and always formidable. No man
rides far unarmed. The Negroes are held under the subjection of force. A
quarter-deck organization is established. The master owns vessel and
cargo, and is captain of the ship, and he and his family live in the
cabin and hold the quarter-deck. There are no other commissioned
officers on board, and no guard of marines. There are a few petty
officers, and under all, a great crew of Negroes, for every kind of
work, held by compulsion--the results of a press-gang. All are at sea
together. There are some laws, and civil authorities for the protection
of each, but not very near, nor always accessible.