His government of the plantation was in the manner of a despot.

Everybody--from his own son to the merest pickaninny--was at the mercy of his caprice.

When he was in good humor, he was kindness itself to the darkies; when he was in bad humor, he vented his anger on whoever happened to be nearest.
I shall never forget the feeling of indignation with which I first saw him strike a man.

A strange negro was caught one morning in the neighborhood of the chicken coop, and was brought up to the house by two of the stable-men.

My uncle, who was standing on the portico steps waiting for his horse, was in a particularly savage mood, as he had just come from an altercation with Radnor.