necessary to agree among yourselves before you do that?
I met a turpentine farmer below here who openly declared that he is
friendly to abolishing slavery. He thinks the masters can make more
money by hiring than by owning the negroes.'

'Yes, that's the talk of them North County[A] fellers, who've squatted
round har. We'll hang every mother's son on 'em, by G----.'

[Footnote A: The 'North Counties' are the north-eastern portion of North
Carolina, and include the towns of Washington and Newberne. They are an
old turpentine region, and the trees are nearly exhausted. The finer
virgin forests of South Carolina, and other cotton States, have tempted
many of these farmers to emigrate thither, within the past ten years,
and they now own nearly all the trees that are worked in South Carolina,
Georgia, and Florida. They generally have few slaves of their own, their
hands being hired of wealthier men in their native districts. The
'hiring' is an annual operation, and is done at Christmas time, when the
negroes are frequently allowed to go home. They treat the darkies well,
give them an allowance of meat (salt pork or beef), as much corn as they
can eat, and a gill of whisky daily. No class of men at the South are so
industrious, energetic, and enterprising. Though not so well informed,
they have many of the traits of our New England farmers; in fact, are
frequently called 'North Carolina Yankees.' It was these people the
Overseer proposed to hang. The reader will doubtless think that 'hanging
was not good enough for them.']

'I wouldn't do that: in a free country every man has a right to his
opinions.'

'Not to sech opinions as them. A man may think, but he mustn't think
onraasonable.'

'I don't know, but it seems to me reasonable, that if the negroes cost
these farmers now one hundred and fifty dollars a year, and they could
hire them, if free, for a hundred, that they would make by abolition.'

'Ab'lish'n! By G----, sir, ye ain't an ab'lishener, is ye?' exclaimed
the fellow, in an excited tone, bringing his hand down on the table in a
way that set the crockery a-dancing.

'Come, come, my friend,' I replied, in a mild tone, and as unruffled as
a basin of water that has been out of a December night; 'you'll knock
off the dinner things, and I'm not quite through.'

'Wal, sir, I've heerd yer from the North, and I'd like to know if yer an
ab'lishener.'

'My dear sir, you surprise me. You certainly can't expect a modest