"it made my very heart ache to see
them." The very recital unnerved and unfitted me for thought or
reflection on any other subject for some time. It is scenes like this,
of which ladies of my country and my state complained in their
petitions, some time since, as rendering this District unpleasant,
should they visit the capital of the nation as wives, sisters,
daughters, or friends of members of Congress. Yet, sir, these
respectable females were treated here with contemptuous sneers; they
were compared, on this floor, to the fish-women of Paris, who dipped
their fingers in the blood of revolutionary France. Sir, if the
transaction in slaves here, which I have mentioned, could make such an
impression on the heart of a lady, a resident of the District, one who
had been used to slaves, and was probably an owner, what would be the
feelings of ladies from free states on beholding a like transaction? I
will leave every gentleman and every lady to answer for themselves. I
am unable to describe it. Shall the capital of your country longer
exhibit scenes so revolting to humanity, that the ladies of your
country cannot visit it without disgust? No; wipe off the foul stain,
and let it become a suitable and comfortable place for the seat of
Government. The Senator, as if conscious that his argument on this
point had proved too much, and of course had proven the converse of
what he wished to establish, concluded this part by saying, that if
slavery is abolished, the act ought to be confined to the city alone.
We thank him for this small sprinkling of correct opinion upon this
arid waste of public feeling. Liberty may yet vegetate and grow even
here.

The Senator insists that the States of Virginia and Maryland would
never have ceded this District if they had have thought slavery would
ever have been abolished in it. This is an old story twice told. It
was never, however, thought of, until the slave power imagined it, for
its own security. Let the States ask a retrocession of the District,
and I am sure the free States will rejoice to make the grant.

The Senator condemns the abolitionists for desiring that slavery
should not exist in the Territories, even in Florida. He insists that,
by the treaty, the inhabitants of that country have the right to
remove their EFFECTS when they please; and that, by this condition,
they have the right to retain their slaves as effects, independently
of the power of Congress. I am no diplomatist, s