Page:Abstract of the evidence for the abolition of the slave-trade 1791.djvu/96

( 62 ) they refuse the next call from the same person, they are summoned before a magistrate, and punished on the parade for refusal, and he has known them so punished.

To the same description belong those unhappy females, who have leave to go out for prostitution, and are obliged to bring their owners a certain payment per week. Handsome women are expected to bring home more money than the ordinary. They are punished if they return without the full wages of their prostitution.

Ordinary Punishments of the Slaves by the Whip &amp; Cowskin.

Having now described the labour, food, clothing, houses, property, and different kinds of employment of the planation, as well as the situation of the In-and-out-door slaves, as far as the evidence will warrant, it may be proper to advert to their punishments; and, first, to those that are inflicted by the cowskin or the whip.

In the towns many people have their slaves flogged upon their own premisses [sic], in which case it is performed by a man, who is paid for it, and who goes round the town in quest of delinquents. But those, says Mr. H. Ross, who do not chuse [sic] to disturb their neighbours with the slaves cries, send them to the wharfs or gaol, where they are corrected also by persons paid. At other times they are whipped publickly round the town, and at others tied down, or made to stand in some publick place, and receive it there.

When they are flogged on the wharfs, to which they go for the convenience of the cranes and weights, they are described by H. Ross, Morley, Jeffreys, Towne, and Captain Scott, to have their arms tied to the hooks of the crane, and weights of fifty-six pounds applied to their feet. In this situation the crane is wound up, so that it lifts them nearly from the ground, and keeps them in a stretched posture, when the whip or cow-skin is used. After this they are again whipped, but with ebony bushes (which are more prickly than the thorn bushes in this country) in order to let out the congealed blood. Captain Scott, describing it, says, that he saw a white man