Page:Abstract of the evidence for the abolition of the slave-trade 1791.djvu/100

( 66 ) with which they are inflicted, and the power it has, and the effect it produces wherever it is seriously applied.

The whip, says Woolrich, is generally made of plaited cowskin, with a thick strong lash. It is so formidable an instrument in the hands of some of the overseers, that by means of it they can take the skin off a horse's back. He has heard them boast of laying the marks of it in a board, and he has seen it done. On its application on a slave's back he has seen the blood spurt out immediately on the first stroke.

Nearly the same account of its construction is given by other evidences, and its power and effects are thus described. At every stroke, says Captain Smith, a piece of flesh was drawn out. Dalrymple avers the same thing. It will even bring blood through the breeches, says J. Terry; aud [sic] such is the effusion of blood on those occasions, adds Fitzmaurice, as to make their frocks, if immediately put on, appear as stiff as buckram; and Coor observes, that at his first going to Jamaica, a sight of a common flogging would put him in a tremble, so that he did not feel right for the rest of the day. It is observed also by Dr. Harrison and the Dean of Middleham, that the incisions are sometimes so deep that you may lay your fingers in the wounds. There are also wheals, says Mr. Coor, from their hams to the small of their backs. These wheals, cuts, or marks, are described by Captain Thompson, Dean of Middleham, Mr. Jeffreys, and General Tottenham, as indelible, as lasting to old age, or as such as no time can erase, and Woolrich has often seen their backs one undistinguished mass of lumps, holes, and furrows.

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