SLAVERY. 



237 



his lot to be ordered to perform. Besides the 

 obligation of following an unsuitable trade, or 

 at any rate of following one which he has not 

 chosen, he has to endure the still incomparably 

 greater grievance of bearing with a tyrannical, 

 an inconsiderate, or a peevish master, whose 

 commands are not to be called in question, whose 

 will is absolute, and from whom the possibility of 

 appeal is far removed, and that of redress placed 

 at a still greater distance. Masters are punished 

 by the payment of fines, for cruelty to their 

 slaves, if any account of such behaviour should 

 reach the ear of the Ouvidor of the province ; 

 but I never heard of punishment having been 

 carried farther than this trifling manner of cor- 

 rection. The emoluments which proceed from 

 this mode of chastising the offenders weigh 

 heavily in its favour ; the injury which the slave 

 has received is not, I am afraid, the only cause 

 which urges the exaction of the stipulated pe- 

 nalty ; of this the slave does not receive any 

 part. 



All slaves in Brazil follow the religion of their 

 masters * ; and notwithstanding the impure state 



* The same occurs in the Spanish and French colonies. 

 DuTertre, who seems from the general tenour of his work, 

 to have been a much better man than friars usually are, 

 speaks of the difficulty of converting the Caribs, and of their 

 indifference to religion, and then adds, " Mais les negres 

 soul ccrtainement touchcz dc. Dieu, puis quils conscrvent, jusqu 



