Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/139

 being brought on board, says Dr. Trotter, they show signs of extreme Mistress and despair, from a feeling of their situation, and regret at being torn from their friends and connections; many retain those impressions fur a long time; in proof of which, the slaves on board his ship being often heard in the night making a howling melancholy noise, expressive of extreme anguish, he repeatedly ordered the woman who had been his interpreter to inquire into the She discovered it to he owing to their having dreamed they were in their own country again, and finding themselves, when awake, in the hold of a slave-ship. This exquisite sensibility was particularly observable among the women, many of whom, on such occasions, he found in hysteric fits.

The foregoing description, as far afi relates to their dejection, when brought onboard, and the cause of it, is confirmed by Hall, Wilson, Claxton, Ellison, Towne, and Falconbridge, the latter of whom relates an instance of a young woman who cried and pined away after being brought on board, who recovered when put on shore, and who hung herself when informed she was to be sent again to the ship.

Captain Hall says, after the first eight or ten of them come on board, the men are put into irons. They are linked two and two together by the hands and feet, in which situation they continue till they arrive in the West Indies, except such as may be sick, whose irons are then taken off. The women, however, he says, are not ironed. On being brought up in a morning, says Surgeon Wilson, an additional mode of securing them takes place, for to the shackles of each pair of them there is a ring, through which is reeved a large chain, which locks them all in a body to ring-bolts fastened to the deck. The time of their coming up in the morning, if fair, is described by Mr. Towne to be between eight and nine, and the time of their remaining there to be till four in the afternoon, when they are again put below till the next morning. In the interval of being upon deck they are fed twice. They have also a pint of water allowed to each of them a day, which being divided is served out to them at two different times, namely, after their meals. These meals, says Mr. Falconbridge, consist of rice, yams, and horse-beans, with now and then a little beef and bread. After meals they are made to jump in their irons. This is called dancing by the slave-dealers. In every ship he has been desired to flog such as would not jump. He had generally a cat-of-nine-tails in his hand among the women, and the chief mate, he believes, another among the men.

The parts, says Mr. Claxton, (to continue the account,) on which their shackles are fastened, are often excoriated by the violent exercise they are thus to take, of which they made many grievous complaints to him. In his ship even those who had the flux, scurvy, and such œdematous swellings in their legs as made it painful to them to move at all, were compelled to dance by the cat. He says, also, that on board his ship they sometimes sung, but not for their amusement. The captain ordered them to sing, and they sung songs of sorrow. The subject of these songs were their wretched situation, and the idea of never returning home. He recollects their very words upon these occasions.