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Show 20 would keep them in working order being a constantly rccurl'ing problem,- the necessity of dri,•crs and ovcrsccrs,-the ever-necessary whip, first, last, and only argument,- the whole thing was insufferably disgusting and loathsome to me; and when I thought of my mother's estimate of one poor human soul, it became even frightful ! ''It's aU nonsense to talk to me about sla.ves enjoying all this! 1'o this day, I have no patience with the unutterable tr:I.Sh that some of your patronizing Northerners have made up, as in their zeal to apologize for our sins. 'Vc aH know better. ~roll me that any man living wants to work all his days, from day-dawn till dark, under the constant eye of a master, without the power of putting forth one irresponsible volition, on the same dreary, monotonous, unchanging toil, and all for two pairs of pantaloons and a. pair of shoes a. ycm\ with enough food and shelter to keep him in working ortlcr ! Any man who thinks that human beings can, ns a general thing, be made about as comfortable that way n.s any other, I wish he might try it. I'd buy the dog, anu work him, with a clear conscience ! '' "I always have supposed," said ~'[iss Ophcli~~, 1 ' that you, all of you, approved of these things, aml thought them right, - according to Scripture. n "Humbug! We arc not quite reduced to that yet. Alfred, who is as determined "despot as eyer walked, docs not pretend to this kind of defence;- no, he stands, high and lmughty, on that good old respectable ground, the rig!tt of lite strongest; and he says, and I think quite sensibly, that the American planter is 1 only Uoing, in another form, what the English aristocracy anu capitalists arc doing by the lower classes;' that is, I take it, .appropriating them, body and bone, soul and spirit, to their use and convenience. He LIFt: A:"tlONV THE LOWLY. 21 defends both,- and I think, at least, consistently. He snys that there can be no high civilization without ens1.wement of the masses, cilher nominal or real. 'l111Cro must, he says, be a lower class, given up to physical toil and confined to an animal nature; rmd a higher one thereby acquires leisure aml wealth for a. more expanded intelligence and improvement, and becomes the directing soul of the lower. So he reasons, bcc::mse, as I said, he is born an aristocrat;- so I don't believe, because I was born a. dcmocra.t." u How in the world can tho two things be compared 1" said ~iiss Ophelia. 1' The English laborer is not sold, traded, parted from his family, whipped." n He is as much at the will of his employer a.s if he were sold to him. The sla\'e-owncr can whip his refractory sl:we to death,- the capitalist can starve him to death. As to family security, it is hard to say which is the worst,- to have one's children sold, or sec them stn.ne to dca.th at home.'' "But it's no kind of apology for slaycry, to prore that it isn't worse than so10e other bad thing." n I didn't give it for one,- nay, I'll say, besides, that ours is the more bold and palpable infringement of human rights; actually buying a man up, like a horso,-looking at l1is teeth, cracking his joints, and trying his pa.ces, and then paying down for him,- having speculators, breeders, traders, nnd brokers in human bodies and souls,-sets the thing before the eyes of the civilized worlJ in a more tangible form, though the thing done be, after all, in its nature, the same; that is, appropriating one set of human heings to the usc and improvement of another, without any regard to their own." "I neYer thought of the matter in this light}" said Miss Ophelia. |