ented a slave-driver, I will here give an extract from a
paper published in a slaveholding State, Tennessee, called the
"Millennial Trumpeter."

"Droves of negroes, chained together in dozens and scores, and
hand-cuffed, have been driven through our country in numbers far
surpassing any previous year, and these vile slave-drivers and dealers
are swarming like buzzards around a carrion. Through this county, you
cannot pass a few miles in the great roads without having every feeling
of humanity insulted and lacerated by this spectacle, nor can you go
into any county or any neighborhood, scarcely, without seeing or hearing
of some of these despicable creatures, called negro-drivers.

"Who is a negro-driver? One whose eyes dwell with delight on lacerated
bodies of helpless men, women and children; whose soul feels diabolical
raptures at the chains, and handcuffs, and cart-whips, for inflicting
tortures on weeping mothers torn from helpless babes, and on husbands
and wives torn asunder forever!"

Dark and revolting as is the picture here drawn, it is from the pen of
one living in the midst of slavery. But though these men may cant about
negro-drivers, and tell what despicable creatures they are, who is it, I
ask, that supplies them with the human beings that they are tearing
asunder? I answer, as far as I have any knowledge of the State where I
came from, that those who raise slaves for the market are to be found
among all classes, from Thomas H. Benton down to the lowest political
demagogue, who may be able to purchase a woman for the purpose of
raising stock, and from the Doctor of Divinity down to the most humble
lay member in the church.

It was not uncommon in St. Louis to pass by an auction-stand, and behold
a woman upon the auction-block, and hear the seller crying out, "_How
much is offered for this woman? She is a good cook, good washer, a good
obedient servant. She has got religion!_" Why should this man tell the
purchasers that she has religion? I answer, because in Missouri, and as
far as I have any knowledge of slavery in the other States, the
religious teaching consists in teaching the slave that he must never
strike a white man; that God made him for a slave; and that, when
whipped, he must not find fault,--for the Bible says, "He that knoweth
his master's will, and doeth it not, shall be beaten with many stripes!"
And slaveholders find such religion very profitable to them.

After leaving the steamer Ott