on his way back, he saw ahead of him half a dozen
men and women approaching, with fear written in their faces, in every
degree from apprehension to terror. Women were weeping and children
crying, and all were going as fast as seemingly lay in their power,
looking behind now and then as if pursued by some deadly enemy. At sight
of Miller's buggy they made a dash for cover, disappearing, like a covey
of frightened partridges, in the underbrush along the road.

Miller pulled up his horse and looked after them in startled wonder.

"What on earth can be the matter?" he muttered, struck with a vague
feeling of alarm. A psychologist, seeking to trace the effects of
slavery upon the human mind, might find in the South many a curious
illustration of this curse, abiding long after the actual physical
bondage had terminated. In the olden time the white South labored under
the constant fear of negro insurrections. Knowing that they themselves,
if in the negroes' place, would have risen in the effort to throw off
the yoke, all their reiterated theories of negro subordination and
inferiority could not remove that lurking fear, founded upon the obscure
consciousness that the slaves ought to have risen. Conscience, it has
been said, makes cowards of us all. There was never, on the continent of
America, a successful slave revolt, nor one which lasted more than a few
hours, or resulted in the loss of more than a few white lives; yet never
was the planter quite free from the fear that there might be one.

On the other hand, the slave had before his eyes always the fear of the
master. There were good men, according to their lights,--according to
their training and environment,--among the Southern slaveholders, who
treated their slaves kindly, as slaves, from principle, because they
recognized the claims of humanity, even under the dark skin of a human
chattel. There was many a one who protected or pampered his negroes, as
the case might be, just as a man fondles his dog,--because they were
his; they were a part of his estate, an integral part of the entity of
property and person which made up the aristocrat; but with all this
kindness, there was always present, in the consciousness of the lowest
slave, the knowledge that he was in his master's power, and that he
could make no effectual protest against the abuse of that authority.
There was also the knowledge, among those who could think at all, that
the best of masters was himself a slave