was introduced. Branding a human being on the naked body, the hot iron hissing in the quivering flesh, the cries and groans of the helpless creatures, were scenes enacted a few years ago, and which the African slave-trader did not deny.
There on a rude mat, spread upon the ground,
A stalwart Negro lieth firmly bound;
His brawny chest one brutal captor smites,
And notice to the ringing sound invites;
Another opes his mouth the teeth to show,
As cattle-dealers aye are wont to do.
Hark, to that shrill and agonizing cry!
Gaze on that upturned, supplicating eye!
How the flesh quivers, and how shrinks the frame,
As the initials of her owner's name
Burn on the back of that Mandingo girl;
Yet calmly do the smoke-wreaths upward curl
From his cigar, whose right unfaltering hand
Lights with a match the cauterizing brand,
The while his left doth the round shoulder clasp,
And hold his victim in a vise-like grasp.
As cruel as was the preparation before leaving their native land, it was equalled, if not surpassed, by the passage on shipboard. Two thousand human beings put on a vessel not capable of accommodating half that number; disease breaking out amongst the slaves, when but a few days on the voyage; the dead and the dying thrown overboard, and the cries and groans coming forth from below decks is but a faint picture of the horrid trade.
"All ready?" cried the captain;
"Ay, ay!" the seamen said;
"Heave up the worthless lubbers—
The dying and the dead."
