If any one wishes to be impressed with a sense of the soul-killing power of slavery, let him go to Col.

Lloyd's plantation, and, on allowance day, place himself in the deep, pine woods, and there let him, in silence, thoughtfully analyze the sounds that shall pass through the chambers of his soul, and if he is not thus impressed, it will only be because "there is no flesh in his obdurate heart." The remark is not unfrequently made, that slaves are the most contended and happy laborers in the world.

They dance and sing, and make all manner of joyful noises--so they do; but it is a great mistake to suppose them happy because they sing.

The songs of the slave represent the sorrows, rather than the joys, of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an aching heart is relieved by its tears.

Such is the constitution of the human mind, that, when pressed to extremes, it often avails itself of the most opposite methods.