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iv PREFACE
but who for centuries has lain bound and bleeding at the foot of civilized and Christianized humanity, imploring compassion in vain.
But the heart of the dominant race, who have been her conquerors, her hard masters, has at length been turned towards her in mercy ; and it has been seen how far nobler it is in nations to protect the feeble than to oppress them. Thanks be to God, the world has at last outlived the slave-trade !
The object of these sketches is to awaken sympathy and feeling for the African race, as they exist among us; to show their wrongs and sorrows, under a system so necessarily cruel and unjust as to defeat and do away the good effects of all that can be attempted for them, by their best friends, under it.
In doing this, the author can sincerely disclaim any insidious feeling towards those individuals who, often without any fault of their own, are involved in the trials and embarrassments of the legal relations of slavery.
Experience has shown her that some of the noblest of minds and hearts are often thus involved; and no one knows better than they do, that what may be gathered of the evils of slavery from sketches like these, is not the half that could be told, of the unspeakable whole.
In the Northern States, these representations may, perhaps, be thought caricatures; in the Southern States are witnesses who know their fidelity. What personal knowledge the author has had, of the truth of incidents such as here are related, will appear in its time.
It is a comfort to hope, as so many of the world's sorrows and wrongs have, from age to age, been lived down, so a |
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