nual labour, must be sufficiently painful of
itself. How then must the pain be sharpened, if it be accompanied with
severity! if an unfortunate slave does not come into the field exactly
at the appointed time, if, drooping with sickness or fatigue, he appears
to work unwillingly, or if the bundle of grass that he has been
collecting, appears too small in the eye of the overseer, he is equally
sure of experiencing the whip. This instrument erases the skin, and cuts
out small portions of the flesh at almost every stroke; and is so
frequently applied, that the smack of it is all day long in the ears of
those, who are in the vicinity of the plantations. This severity of
masters, or managers, to their slaves, which is considered only as
common discipline, is attended with bad effects. It enables them to
behold instances of cruelty without commiseration, and to be guilty of
them without remorse. Hence those many acts of deliberate mutilation,
that have taken place on the slightest occasions: hence those many acts
of inferiour, though shocking, barbarity, that have taken place without
any occasion at all: the very slitting[065] of ears has been considered
as an operation, so perfectly devoid of pain, as to have been performed
for no other reason than that for which a brand is set upon cattle,
_as a mark of property_.

But this is not the only effect, which this severity produces: for
while it hardens their hearts, and makes them insensible of the misery
of their fellow-creatures, it begets a turn for wanton cruelty. As a
proof of this, we shall mention one, among the many instances that
occur, where ingenuity has been exerted in contriving modes of torture.
"An iron coffin, with holes in it, was kept by a certain colonist, as an
auxiliary to the lash. In this the poor victim of the master's
resentment was inclosed, and placed sufficiently near a fire, to
occasion extreme pain, and consequently shrieks and groans, until the
revenge of the master was satiated, without any other inconvenience on
his part, than a temporary suspension of the slave's labour. Had he been
flogged to death, or his limbs mutilated, the interest of the brutal
tyrant would have suffered a more irreparable loss.

"In mentioning, this instance, we do not mean to insinuate, that it is
common. We know that it was reprobated by many. All that we would infer
from it is, that where men are habituated to a system of severity, they
become _wantonly cruel_, and th