Page:The White Slave, or Memoirs of a Fugitive.djvu/363

 

was not very difficult to discover under the volubility and vivacity, a little forced, of this philosophical blackleg, into whose intimacy I had been so suddenly introduced, a deep-seated and bitter chagrin, and even shame, at living as he did; however he might urge, by way of apology, that it was only one of the applications of the fundamental principle of every slaveholding community. This, indeed, was an idea upon which he seemed to pride himself, and upon which he dwelt with a good deal of pertinacious ingenuity. To gain a living by the plunder of the weak and simple, was, he admitted, in the abstract, not to be defended. Yet, if he did not do it, somebody else would. His abstinence would not save them. ‘The weak and simple were destined to be plundered; and plundered they would be by somebody. Bred up as he had been to extravagant habits, could he be expected to renounce an employment — liable indeed to some fluctuations and uncertainties, as well as ta some moral objections, but, on the whole, one that paid—and to run the risk of starving, just to gratify his conscientious scruples? He trusted, he said, that, though a professional gambler, he had a conscience. His quarrel with Gouge and MecGrab, and his abandonment of the slave trading business, at which he might have made a fortune, was, he thought, evidence enough of that. But there was a limit to all things. A man must live, and live by such means, too, as his position and gifts allow him to adopt; and, all things considered, he did not see that he could be expected to give up his profession any more than the slaveholders their slaves, Nor can I say that I did, either.

On the whole, besides the necessity I was under of using him, and the additional information he might give me, in the search in which I was engaged, there