certain
day should be free at a certain age, and that their children should
never be slaves. The Ordinance of 1787 had prohibited slavery in the
Northwest Territory. But in 1790 New York, New Jersey, Delaware,
Maryland, and all the states south of these were slave states. (See map
on the next page.)

Though slaves were men and women and children, they had no civil rights
whatever. They could be bought and sold, leased, seized for a debt,
bequeathed by will, given away. If they made anything, or found
anything, or earned anything, it belonged not to them, but to their
owners. They were property just as oxen or horses were in the North. It
was unlawful to teach them to read or write. They were not allowed to
give evidence against a white man, nor to travel in bands of more than
seven unless a white man was with them, nor to quit the plantation
without leave.

If a planter provided coarse food, coarse clothes, and a rude shelter
for his slaves, if he did not work them more than fifteen hours out of
twenty-four in summer, nor more than fourteen in winter, and if he gave
them every Sunday to themselves, he did quite as much for their comfort
as the law required he should.

[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE AREA OF %SLAVE AND FREE SOIL IN 1790%]

If the slave committed any offense, if he stole anything, or refused to
work, or ran away, it was lawful to load him with irons, to confine him
for any length of time in a cell, and to beat him and whip him till the
blood ran in streams from the wounds, and he grew too weak to stand.
Old advertisements are still extant in which runaway blacks are
described by the scars left upon their bodies by the lash. When such
lashings were not prescribed by the court, they were commonly given
under the eye of the overseer, or inflicted by the owner himself.

%196. Six Days from Boston to New York.%--Our country was small when
Washington was President. The people lived on the seaboard. The towns
and cities were not actually very far apart; but the means of travel
were so poor, the time consumed in going even fifty miles was so great,
that the country was practically immense in extent. Now we step into a
beautifully fitted car, heated by steam, lighted by electricity, richly
carpeted, and provided with most comfortable seats and beds, and are
whirled across the continent from Philadelphia to San Francisco in less
time than it took Washington to go from New York to Boston.

[Illustration: Old