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Show 54 DESPOTISM his. The dance is forbidden; no merry laugh is heard. no torch-lights are seen glancing and streaming on th~ darkness or eclipsing the splendor of the moon1 as the sl~ves pdss from one cabin to an?ther. ~\.ll is still as night an~ tyrannY: can make tt ; ar~d tf the slaves, spite of this. de~pot1sm, yet have their meetiugs, for talk, for drmk.mg, for plunder, or for pray?r, all are equally prohibited, and they steal forth With slow and stealthy steps, watchful and caut1ous as the midnight wolf. 'rhe masters grievously complain of this night-walking propensity on the part of the slaves. Besides the efforts of each planter to suppress tt on hts own estate and the barbarous severity, with which it is custot~ary to punish .slaves for being found visitin.g on a plantation to wh1ch they do not belong,-pubhe patrols are established for the purpose of arrestmg, flogging, and sending home, aH.slaves .caught w~n~ering at large without a pass, that 1s, a wnttcn permiSSIOn. rrhe two grand charges, however, brought against the slaves and which are quoted by the masters as decisive p~oofs of their lamentable depravity, and total destitution of all moral principle, arc the accusations of lying, and of theft. 1. rrhe slaves, we are told, are arrant liars. They lie for themselves; they lie for each other; and to deceive their master or the overseer is esteemed among them as an action, not blameless only, but even praiseworthy. Well,-why not? Falsehood has ever been considered a lawful art of war; and slavery, as we have seen is but a state of protracted hostilities. Do we uot ~pplaud a general for the stratagems and arts by which he deceives, misleads, entraps h1s enemy1 Do not the very masters themselves, chucldc and exult over the inaenious falsehoods by which they have detected a tl~eft, or recovered a runaway 1 Thoug!I they be tyrants let them use a little philosophy. Dionysius did so, and so did Pisistratns. \\ nh thmr masters, enemies who have seized them, and who IN Ai\IF.RICA . 55 keep .them by _force, the sl~vcs arc not connected by any tws ~f socJ_~l duty. It 1s a condition of open war; and as Hl pomt of strength, the slaves are wholly overmatched, s~ratagem and falsehood are their onl r?sotucc; and If.by ~old lying, vociferous protcst.I-" tiO~l s, and cumu~g f1:auds, they can escape some t~H catcn?d aggressiOn, 1f they can so secure some particle of liberty from the prying search and greedy grasp of despotism, why blame them for acts, which in like cases, all the world has justified, and has even exalted to the character of heroism 1 In a· slave, _conside!ed as ~slave, cunning is almost the S?le qual1ty of mmd wh1ch he has any occasion to exercise ; ~nd_ by long practice it is sometimes carried to an astomshmg perfecti~n_. Under an air of the greatest heedlessness and stup1d1ty, and an apparent apathy more than brutal, there is occasionally veiled a quick a~d a~c.urate. observation, a just estimate of temper and diSpOSillon, hvely and ardent feelings, and a loftiness of spmt, whiCh some day perhaps, will burst its ordinary cautiOus bounds, and terminate the life of its possessor, by bullets, knives, the gibbet, or the flames. 2. It IS ~stomshmg say the masters, how destitute of all conscJCnce. these rascals are. T he best among tl~cm, the most pwus and obedient, are no more to be tmsted than so many foxes. Even our domestic servants steal every thing they can touch. There must be a lock on ev?ry door, every trunk, every closet. Bn~ even the stnctcst watchfulness is no match for the~r ar~s.; and the sternest severities cannot repress then· spmt of plunder. 'rhe slaves it seems then, however overmastered and subdued, do s_till, in a silent and quiet way, and to the best of thelf ability, retort npon their masters the aggressiOns and the robbery that are perpetrated on tllcmsel ves. dProperty, it is to be recollected, is a thing cstabl ishe am?ng men, by mutual consent, and fOr mutual convemence. The game I have killed the fish I have caught, the vegetables I have cultivated, arc decided |