78 TREATMENT OF SLAVES IN CHARLESTON. 



sales of slaves here. — " Curiosity sometimes leads 

 me to the auction sales 9f the negroes. A few days 

 since I attended one which exhibited the beauties of 

 slavery in all their sickening deformity. The bodies 

 of these wretched beings were placed upright on a 

 table, — their physical proportions examined, — their 

 defects and beauties noted. — ' A prime lot, here they 

 go ! ' There I saw the father looking sullen con- 

 tempt upon the crowd, and expressing an indignation 

 in his countenance that he dared not speak ; — and 

 the mother, pressing her infants closer to her bosom 

 with an involuntary srasp, and exclaiming, in wild 

 and simple earnestness, while the tears chased down 

 her cheeks in quick succession, ' I can't leff my 

 children ! I won't leff my children ! ' But on the 

 hammer went, reckless alike whether it united or 

 sundered for ever. On another stand I saw a man 

 apparently as white as myself exposed for sale. I 

 turned away from the humiliating spectacle. 



*' At another time I saw the concluding scene of 

 this infernal drama. It was on the wharf. A slave 

 ship, for New Orleans, was lying in the stream, and 

 the poor nej>;roes, handcuffed and pinioned, were 

 hurried off in boats, eight at a time. Here I wit- 

 nessed the last farewell, — the heart-rending separa- 

 tion of every earthly tie. The mute and agonizing 

 embrace of the husband and wife, and the convulsive 

 grasp of the mother and the child were alike torn 

 asunder — for ever ! It was a living death, — the}' 

 never see nor hear of each other more. Tears flowed 

 fast, and mine with the rest." 



Charleston has long been celebrated for^the seve- 

 rity of its laws against the blacks, and the mildness 

 of its punishment towards the whites for maltreating 

 them. Until the late law, there were about seventy- 

 one crimes, for which slaves were capitally punished, 

 and for which the highest punishment for whites was 

 imprisonment in the penitentiary. 



A dreadful case of murder occurred at Charleston 

 in 1806. A planter, called John Slater, made an 



