Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/331

Rh are invited to-morrow evening to the large party,” was the reply.

I inquired still farther from other persons, and found that these facts were universally acknowledged.

“And yet his house is frequented by the best society of the city?” said I, astonished; “and yet you maintain that public opinion protects the slave and punishes the bad master.”

“But then, Mr. ——'s wife and daughters are so good and so amiable," argued they, “it is for their sake that people associate with Mr. ——.”

But I suspect, in reality, that Mr. ——'s wealth has as much to do with their overlooking his offence as the goodness of his wife and daughter.

I returned my thanks for the invitation, but declined it.

In order for this much-praised public opinion to make a decided demonstration against the rich slave-owner, it is necessary that something very horrible and flagrant should be committed by him which cannot be concealed. An instance of this kind has lately occurred in Virginia. A rich planter, not far from here, killed one of his house-slaves, one of his most confidential servants, by the most barbarous treatment, and that merely on suspicion. The fact was so horrible that it aroused the public indignation, and the murderer was brought before the Court of Justice.

I have heard slave-owners say, “If justice had been done, that man would have been hanged!” But he was rich; and on the sacrifice of a considerable amount of his property to the learned in the law, both the affair and the law were turned and twisted, and the sentence which has just been pronounced adjudges to the murderer five years' imprisonment in the House of Correction. Many right-minded people have declared it to be shameful, but the conscience of the Slave State is enslaved.

An old free negro woman has just been sentenced to the same punishment because she endeavoured to assist a