rejects it. In vain you tell me of the laws that sanction such a claim! There is a law above all the enactments of human codes the same throughout the world, the same in all times such it was before the daring genius of Columbus pierced the night of ages, and opened to one world the sources of power, wealth and knowledge, to another all unutterable woes; such as it is at this day. It is the law written by the finger of God on the heart of man; and by that law, unchangeable and eternal, while men despise fraud, and loathe rapine, and abhor blood, they shall reject with indignation the wild and guilty fantasy that man can hold property in man."

While the hearts of British citizens and Christians were stirred by appeals like this from statesmen of renown, and by orators, ministers and philanthropists of every sort, the statesmen and the divines of America were weaving defences and apologies for slavery out of the Bible and the Constitution, thus leading the country toward the retribution that afterwards befel in the catastrophe of the Southern Rebellion.

VI.

Colorphobia Illustrated-Its Meanness and Cruelty-Doctors Gurley and Bacon - A Contrast - The Nat Turner Insurrection — Discussion in Virginia — Why it Failed to Accomplish Anything - Power of Immediatism as a Principle.

WHEN it is remembered that the New England Anti-Slavery Society sought not only to free the slaves but to "improve the character and condition of the free people of color," it may seem strange that among those who took part in its formation there was not a single individual of the latter class. But the fact is easily explained. It was not from any lack of interest on their part in the movement, for they saw in it a bright star of promise for their race, and thanked God for the sight. They had rallied, at least the most intelligent among them, to the support of "The Liberator," and were indulging in bright dreams of speedy deliverance from civil and social proscription. Why then were they not conspicuous among the formers of the new society? It was because they instinctively knew that their presence and co-operation would serve only to increase and intensify the prejudices which the society must encounter. Their very anxiety for its success kept them aloof at first. They were careful not to embarrass in its infancy a movement on which were staked their dearest hopes. Anglo-Saxon prejudice against the negro is strong even yet, but it is weak compared with what it was then. No man with a black skin could enter a Christian church without consenting to the degradation of the "nigger pew." He could not ride in any public conveyance on terms of equality with others. A very

intelligent colored girl, the daughter of a devoted and useful clergyman of Boston, was suddenly summoned to the bedside of a dying relative in New Hampshire. A seat was bespoken for her in the stage, then the only means of public conveyance; but the driver, on coming to the door and finding that she was a negro, cracked his whip with an accompanying oath and drove off without her. A colored man of Boston, in trading with a white man, became the owner of a pew in the central aisle of the Park Street Church, and, thinking he might be profited by the ministrations of an intelligent white minister, went to it one Sunday morning with his family. They listened to the "stated preaching of the Gospel" for once under the gaze of a whole battery of frowning faces; but they were not permitted to enjoy the privilege a second time. The trustees of the church found some technicality by which to deprive the black man of his legal rights. His appearance and that of his family in that fashionable house of worship was accounted by all Boston as an outrage scarcely less flagrant than would have been the use of the pew as a pigpen. A colored merchant from Liberia, a man of intelligence as well as wealth, and highly esteemed by Colonizationists, being on a visit to Boston, took the opportunity of making the acquaintance of the Abolitionists. As he wished to hear Dr. Beecher preach, I invited him, as an act of courtesy to a distinguished foreigner, to take a seat in my pew. On my way out of church I encountered the indignant frowns of a large number of the congregation; but it was amusing to witness the change of countenance that fell upon the advocates of colonization as I introduced to them "Mr., of Liberia." They really seemed to think his odor was not quite so offensive, after all, as they had suspected. The air of Liberia was such a powerful disinfectant! The slaveholders used to think the atmosphere of their homes was perfectly de

lectable when slaves in kitchen, dining-room, parlor and boudoir were as all-pervading as flies; but there was no odor so offensive to them as that imparted to a "negro" when he was set free; and Northern people in the days of slavery, while they required the free negro to occupy a separate apartment on steamboat and railcar, as being personally offensive to white olfactories, never thought of remonstrating when the slaveholders (in the hot summer weather, too!) claimed for their slaves all the privileges of first-class travellers. Strange that in a republican country freedom was so offensive, while slavery was so fragrant!

The meanness and cruelty of this hateful race prejudice, as it was often manifested in that day, was simply indescribable. A bright colored lad belonging to my class in Sunday school, in 1831, said to me, sadly, in reply to my efforts to awaken in him an ambition for self-improvement, "What's the use in my attempting to improve myself, when, do what I may, I can never be anything but a nigger?" I tried to

cheer this boy, to kindle some hope in his breast, by reminding him that a few good men were struggling to deliver him and his unfortunate race from their terrible surroundings; and I am glad to say that he became an honorable and useful man, and during the later years of his life he was a faithful servant of the United States in the Post Office Department. In that day no colored boy could be apprenticed to any trade in any shop where white men worked; still less could he find a place, except as a menial, in any store or office. I well remember what amazement was excited when Mr. Garrison and his partner first took a black boy as an apprentice in the office of "The Liberator." It was declared on every side that no "nigger" could learn the art of printing, and it was held to be evidence of arrant folly to try the experiment. If the negroes, under such circumstances, sometimes seemed

dull and even stupid, who can wonder? What race or class of men is strong enough to keep its feet under such a load of prejudice and contumely? The wonder is that the negroes bore it so patiently and cheerfully, keeping alive in their souls the hope of a better day to come, when the hearts of Christians should be purged from the foul spirit of caste. They could not have done it if God had not made them gentle, patient and forgiving above almost every other class of the human family. The worst of it all was that the prejudice was defended in pulpit and press as natural and therefore justifiable. The scheme of African colonization rested upon it as its corner-stone. If it had pleased God, in a night to give the slaves a white skin, every man in the United States would have arisen from his bed the next morning a flaming Abolitionist. No need of any colonies then, in Africa or elsewhere, and no danger that the slaves, if set free, would cut the throats of their masters. Every excuse and apology for slavery would have been instantly swept away, and no premium for a text of Scripture to support it would have been of any avail, for no theological professor would have dared in that case to torture the Bible, even for a reward.

Mr. Garrison won the grateful confidence of the free colored people, not more by demanding the instant emancipation of the slaves than by his uncompromising assaults upon the spirit of caste. In short, his recognition of the humanity of the negro was unqualified and complete, and he was firmly resolved to content himself with nothing less than the admission of that, alike in principle and practice. He made open

war upon an old statute of Massachusetts inflicting a fine of $50-upon any person who should join in marriage any white person with any negro, Indian or mulatto. He saw that this statute set a stigma upon the negro, and therefore demanded its repeal. haps of all his acts this was for a time the most unpop

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