Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Slavery volume 5 .djvu/138

126 more reputation in Boston than lie gained, by emancipating the human beings which fell to his lot. But here is a story which I take from the Boston Republican. It is worth preserving as a monument of the morals of Boston in 1850, and may be worth preserving at the end of the century:—

"A year or two since, a bright-looking mulatto youth, about twenty years of age, and whose complexion was not much, if any, darker than that of the great 'Expounder of the Constitution,’ entered the counting-room, on some errand for his master, a Kentuckian, who was making a visit here. A merchant on one of our principal wharves, who came in and spoke to him, remarked to the writer that he once owned this "boy" and his mother, and sold them for several hundred dollars. Upon my expressing astonishment to him that he could thus deal in human flesh, he remarked that 'When you are among the Romans, you must do as the Eomans do.' I know of others of my Northern acquaintances, and good Whigs too, who have owned slaves at the South, and who, if public opinion warranted it, would be as likely, I presume, to buy and sell them at the North."

I have yet to learn that the controlling men of this city have any considerable aversion to domestic slavery.

Mr Mann's zeal in behalf of freedom, and against the extension of slavery, has drawn upon him the indignation of Mr Webster, who is grieved to see him so ignorant of American law. But Mr Mann is able to do his own fighting.

So much for the political parties and their relation to the matters at issue at this moment. Still, there is some reason to hope that the attempt to extend slavery, made in the face of the world, and supported by such talent, will yet fail; that it will bring only shame on the men who aim to extend and perpetuate so foul a blight. The fact that Mr Webster’s retainers must come to the rescue of their attorney; that himself must write letters to defend himself, and must even obtain the services of a clergyman to help him—this shows the fear that is felt from the anti-slavery spirit of the North. Depend upon it, a politician