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Show 138 NOTES ON "The Dismal Swamps arc noted pllccs of refuge for runaway negroes. ~'hey were formerly. pcoplc~l in thi.') way mt~c:h more than at prcscut; a 8ystcm:tt\C huntmg of them wn_h dogs and guns ha.ving been made by indiviUuals who took 1t up as a business a Lout len years ngo. 011ihlrc~1 ·were born, bred, lived and died here. 'J'hc negro, my gwJc, tol(l me he had seen skeletons, nn<l hacl helped to bury bodies recently dead. There arc people in the swnmps now, he thou(l'ht, tlmt arc the children of fugitiYcs, and fugit in~s thcm~clvcs all their lives. \Yhat a strange li_fc it must be! "There can be, though, but very few, if any, of the~c 'natives' left. 'l1bcy cannot obtain the means of st1pporting life without coming often either to the outskirts to steal from th o plantations, or to tho neighbourhood of tho camps of the lumbermen. 'Ihcy live mainly upon the charity Ol' the wages given thc LD by the latter. ~(.1hc poorer white men owning small tracts of the swamps will sometimes employ them, and the negroes- frequently. In the h;1nds of either they arc liable to be betrayed to the 'drivers; as the negro h unters arc call ed, or to their owners if they nrc known. T ho negro told me that they had huts in 'back places,' h idden by bushes, and difficult of access, and had apparently been himself quite intimate with them. lie said \rhen the shingle negroes employed them, tllcy made them get up logs for them, and would gi,,e them enough to eat oml some clothes, and perhaps two dollnrs a month in money. 1lut some when they owed them money, would betray them instead of paying them. "lie said the 'drivers' sometimes shot them. 'Vhcn they saw a fugitive, if he tried to run away from them, they would call out to him, that if he did not stop \hey would shoot, and if he did not, then they would shoot, an(l some· times kil l him. 'Dut some of 'em would rather Lc shot th:1n be took, Rir,' he ncl<lcd, f;imJtly. A farmer li\'ing nc;il' tl!:• UNOLE , TOM'S CADIN. 199 swamp confirmed this account, a.nd snid he knew of three or four being shot in one day. I suppose when the drivers first commenced their business in a brgc wa.y, they made a. practice of killing those that would not surrender, without mercy, that they might strike terror iuto those that remained, nnd prevent others from continuing to join them. In this purpose they have beQ.:n. in a grea.t degree successful. I judged that the drivers were looked upon with repugnance by the .community in general." . Now I ask1 as a Christian, which is best,-that these pests of society should be rooted out and their hnunts broken up,-or that they should be suffered to go on preying upon the community, increasing in numbers, and sinking daily deeper and deeper in barbarism ? Is it not better tha.t one thousand should be exterminated, if need be, than tlmt ten thousand should be added to them, and tlms ruined for time and eten1ity? 'l'he truth is, these men arc at war with society, and society lw.s therefore an undoubted right to pro. teet itself against them. If the sorereign State of North Carolina has the right to call out the military to subdue, and, if need be, exterminate them, as none will question who admit that the magistrate "bcurcth not the S\\'ord in va.in,'_' then it has the right to make usc of any other rqualJy cflecttvc nnd Jess burdensome way of accomplishinfl' the object. If it were white men who were thus "lyin(J' 0 out" no one would doubt this; but a black skin makes~\ wo:1_ dcrful difference. A word, now, upon the adrertiscmcnts offering rcwarcTs for tho apprehension of runa\\"ays, DEAD or ALfVE, (p. 21.) ~rlw first of these advertisements is evidently of an ~u~la.w, a.nd the second, probably so. In C\'cry one of them, 1t IS nnphcd that tho slave is to be killed legally, that is, ONLY when 1'esisting captw·e, antl in three of them it is expressly so s tated. l\lorcorer, in one of them no reward |