reated;
reminding Mr. ---- of the precious souls of his human cattle, and
requesting a further donation for the Baptist Church, of which most of
the people here are members. Now this man is known to be a hard master;
his negro houses are sheds, not fit to stable beasts in, his slaves are
ragged, half-naked and miserable--yet he is urgent for their religious
comforts, and writes to Mr. ---- about 'their souls, their precious
souls.' He was over here a few days ago, and pressed me very much to
attend his church. I told him I would not go to a church where the people
who worked for us were parted off from us, as if they had the pest, and
we should catch it of them. I asked him, for I was curious to know, how
they managed to administer the Sacrament to a mixed congregation? He
replied, Oh! very easily; that the white portion of the assembly received
it first, and the blacks afterwards. 'A new commandment I give unto you,
that ye love one another, even as I have loved you.' Oh, what a shocking
mockery! However, they show their faith at all events, in the declaration
that God is no respecter of persons, since they do not pretend to exclude
from His table those whom they most certainly would not admit to their
own.

I have as usual allowed this letter to lie by, dear E----, not in the hope
of the occurrence of any event--for that is hopeless--but until my daily
avocations allowed me leisure to resume it, and afforded me, at the same
time, matter wherewith to do so. I really never was so busy in all my
life, as I am here. I sit at the receipt of custom (involuntarily enough)
from morning till night--no time, no place, affords me a respite from my
innumerable petitioners, and whether I be asleep or awake, reading,
eating, or walking; in the kitchen, my bed-room, or the parlour, they
flock in with urgent entreaties, and pitiful stories, and my conscience
forbids my ever postponing their business for any other matter; for, with
shame and grief of heart I say it, by their unpaid labour I live--their
nakedness clothes me, and their heavy toil maintains me in luxurious
idleness. Surely the least I can do is to hear these, my most injured
benefactors; and, indeed, so intense in me is the sense of the injury they
receive from me and mine, that I should scarce dare refuse them the very
clothes from my back, or food from my plate, if they asked me for it. In
taking my daily walk round the banks yesterday, I found that I was walking
over