the body of a young female, which by
the torches seemed almost perfectly white. On inquiry I learned that
the master had so unmercifully beaten this girl that she died under
the operation: and that also he had so severely punished another of
his slaves that he was but just alive.'"

We here rest the case for the present, so far as respects the
presentation of facts showing the condition of the slaves, and proceed
to consider the main objections which are usually employed to weaken
such testimony, or wholly to set it aside. But before we enter upon
the examination of specific objections, and introductory to them, we
remark,--

1. That the system of slavery must be a system of horrible cruelty,
follows of necessity, from the fact that two millions seven hundred
thousand human beings _are held by force_, and used as articles of
property. Nothing but a heavy yoke, and an iron one, could possibly
keep so many necks in the dust. That must be a constant and mighty
pressure which holds so still such a vast army; nothing could do it
but the daily experience of severities, and the ceaseless dread and
certainty of the most terrible inflictions if they should dare to toss
in their chains.

2. Were there nothing else to prove it a system of monstrous cruelty,
the fact that FEAR is the only motive with which the slave is plied
during his whole existence, would be sufficient to brand it with
execration as the grand tormentor of man. The slave's _susceptibility
of pain_ is the sole fulcrum on which slavery works the lever that
moves him. In this it plants all its stings; here it sinks its hot
irons; cuts its deep gashes; flings its burning embers, and dashes its
boiling brine and liquid fire: into this it strikes its cold flesh
hooks, grappling irons, and instruments of nameless torture; and by it
drags him shrieking to the end of his pilgrimage. The fact that the
master inflicts pain upon the slave not merely as an _end_ to gratify
passion, but constantly as a _means_ of extorting labor, is enough of
itself to show that the system of slavery is unmixed cruelty.

3. That the slaves must suffer frequent and terrible inflictions,
follows inevitably from the _character of those who direct their
labor_. Whatever may be the character of the slaveholders themselves,
all agree that the overseers are, as a class, most abandoned, brutal,
and desperate men. This is so well known and believed that any
testimony to prove it seems needless. T