Sabbath with
them. While there, one of the female slaves did something which
displeased her mistress. She took a chisel and mallet, and very
deliberately cut off one of her toes!"

SLAVE BREEDING AN INDEX OF PUBLIC 'OPINION' AMONG THE 'HIGHEST CLASS
OF SOCIETY' IN VIRGINIA AND OTHER NORTHERN SLAVE STATES.

But we shall be told, that 'slave-breeders' are regarded with
contempt, and the business of slave breeding is looked upon as
despicable; and the hot disclaimer of Mr. Stevenson, our Minister
Plenipotentiary at the Court of St. James, in reply to Mr. O'Connell,
who had intimated that he might be a 'slave breeder,' will doubtless
be quoted.[40] In reply, we need not say what every body knows, that
if Mr. Stevenson is not a 'slave breeder,' he is a solitary exception
among the large slaveholders of Virginia. What! Virginia slaveholders
not 'slave-breeders?' the pretence is ridiculous and contemptible; it
is meanness, hypocrisy, and falsehood, as is abundantly proved by the
testimony which follows:--

Mr. GHOLSON, of Virginia, in his speech in the Legislature of that
state, Jan. 18, 1832, (see Richmond Whig,) says:--

"It has always (perhaps erroneously) been considered by steady and
old-fashioned people, that the owner of land had a reasonable right to
its annual profits; the owner of orchards, to their annual fruits; the
owner of _brood mares_, to their product; and the owner of _female
slaves, to their increase_. We have not the fine-spun intelligence,
nor legal acumen, to discover the technical distinctions drawn by
gentlemen. The legal maxim of '_Partus sequitur ventrem_' is coeval
with the existence of the rights of property itself, and is founded in
wisdom and justice. It is on the justice and inviolability of this
maxim that the master foregoes the service of the female slave; has
her nursed and attended during the period of her gestation, and raises
the helpless and infant offspring. The value of the property justifies
the expense; and I do not hesitate to say, that in its _increase
consists much of our wealth_."

Hon. THOMAS MANN RANDOLPH, of Virginia. formerly Governor of that
state, in his speech before the legislature in 1832, while speaking of
the number of slaves annually sold from Virginia to the more southern
slave states, said:--

"The exportation has _averaged_ EIGHT THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED for the
last twenty years. Forty years ago, the whites exceeded the colored
25,000, the colored now exceed