the
slavery era.[383] The stories of the mildness of the institution in
Kentucky which reached the North were little accredited by the radical
element, which could never see any virtue in servile labor. Perhaps
the most zealous abolitionist who visited the State was J. W.
Buckingham, who wrote in 1840 that the "condition of the Negroes, as
to food, clothing, and light labor struck me as being better in
Kentucky than in any other State."[384] While traveling in the heart
of the slave section of the State between Frankfort and Louisville he
saw many instances of black and white laborers, slave and free,
working side by side in the same field.[385]

The relation between the owner and the household type of slave was of
a more intimate nature and the master was careful to pick only the
best of the Negroes. In such an environment we see the picture of the
Kentucky gentleman of song and story, and the Negro in all the best
that tradition has related of him. The latter became identified with
the family of the master in sentiment and feeling. Under ordinary
circumstances he had nothing to worry about, and with no cares
pressing upon him, he became as happy as any Negro ever was. If the
crops failed, or the owner became bankrupt he had none of the anxiety
of his master, although he may have displayed the greatest sympathy
with the existing condition. It was his duty to give only his labor to
his master and in return he was sheltered, clothed and supported when
sick or too old to labor; and at last when his earthly toils were
over, he was given a Christian burial. The humble affection which the
slave had for his master in conjunction with the extreme confidence
which he held for the outcome of all pecuniary troubles is shown by
instances in the life history of every slaveholding family. No matter
what might be the circumstances and conditions of the estate the slave
could go on in his daily work without any fears or cares, except for
the one great cloud that in the event of a disruption of the estate
through a legal process he might be sold to satisfy his master's
creditors.

From our present viewpoint the treatment may have been at times rather
harsh but we must be careful to judge it from the general standard of
those times. It has been pointed out that it would bear "favorable
comparison with the treatment of the white sailors in the British and
American navies of the same period."[386] The slave code allowed a
much severer