ourishes her reeking hands in the face of
the world.[34]

[Footnote 34: We have just learned from Mississippi papers, that the
citizens of Vicksburg are erecting a public monument in honor of Dr.
H.S. Bodley, who was the ring-leader of the Lynchers in their attack
upon the miserable victims. To give the crime the cold encouragement
of impunity alone, or such slight tokens of favor as a home and a
sanctuary, is beneath the chivalry and hospitality of Mississippians;
so they tender it incense, an altar, and a crown of glory. Let the
marble rise till it be seen from afar, a beacon marking the spot where
law lies lifeless by the hand of felons; and murderers, with chaplets
on their heads, dance and shout upon its grave, while 'all the people
say, amen.']

The letter of the law on the statute book is one thing, the practice
of the community under that law often a totally different thing. Each
of the slave states has laws providing that the life of no _white_ man
shall be taken without his having first been indicted by a grand jury,
allowed an impartial trial by a petit jury, with the right of counsel,
cross-examination of witnesses, &c.; but who does not know that if
ARTHUR TAPPAN were pointed out in the streets of New Orleans, Mobile,
Savannah, Charleston, Natchez, or St. Louis, he would be torn in
pieces by the citizens with one accord, and that if any one should
attempt to bring his murderers to punishment, he would be torn in
pieces also. The editors of southern newspapers openly vaunt, that
every abolitionist who sets foot in their soil, shall, if he be
discovered, be hung at once, without judge or jury. What mockery to
quote the _letter of the law_ in those states, to show that
abolitionists would have secured to them the legal protection of an
impartial trial!

Before the objector can make out his case, that the life of the slave
is protected by the law, he must not only show that the _words of the
law_ grant him such protection, but that such a state of public
sentiment exists as will carry out the provisions of the law in their
true spirit. Any thing short of this will be set down as mere prating
by every man of common sense. It has been already abundantly shown in
the preceding pages, that the public sentiment of the slaveholding
states toward the slaves is diabolical. Now, if there were laws in
those states, the _words_ of which granted to the life of the slave
the same protection granted to that of the mast