he past, constant and authentic as they are;
and they hardly concern the practical question which now presses for a
solution. Nor in referring to them is there any need of injustice or
exaggeration. Human nature has not the physical endurance or moral
persistence to keep up a perpetual and universal cruelty; and there are
fortunate slaves who never received a blow from their masters. Besides,
there was less labor exacted and less discipline imposed on the loosely
managed plantations of the Sea Islands than in other districts where
slave-labor was better and more profitably organized and directed.

The capture of Hilton Head and Bay Point by the navy, November 7th,
1861, was followed by the immediate military occupation of the Sea
Islands. In the latter part of December, the Secretary of the Treasury,
Mr. Chase, whose foresight as a statesman and humane disposition
naturally turned his thoughts to the subject, deputed a special agent to
visit this district for the purpose of reporting upon the condition of
the negroes who had been abandoned by the white population, and of
suggesting some plan for the organization of their labor and the
promotion of their general well-being. The agent, leaving New York
January 13th, 1862, reached that city again on his way to Washington on
the 13th of February, having in the mean time visited a large number of
the plantations, and talked familiarly with the negroes in their cabins.
The results of his observations, in relation to the condition of the
people, their capacities and wishes, the culture of their crops, and the
best mode of administration, on the whole favorable, were embodied in a
report. The plan proposed by him recommended the appointment of
superintendents to act as guides of the negroes and as local
magistrates, with an adequate corps of teachers. It was accepted by the
Secretary with a full indorsement, and its execution intrusted to the
same agent. The agent presented the subject to several members of
Congress, with whom he had a personal acquaintance, but, though they
listened respectfully, they seemed either to dread the magnitude of the
social question, or to feel that it was not one with which they as
legislators were called upon immediately to deal. The Secretary himself,
and Mr. Olmsted, then connected with the Sanitary Commission, alone
seemed to grasp it, and to see the necessity of immediate action. It is
doubtful if any member of the Cabinet, except Mr. Chase, to