v.
sufficient time for natural rest, be it therefore enacted, that if any Owner of Slaves, or other persons who shall have the care, management, or overseeing of Slaves, shall work or put any such Slave or Slaves to labour more than fifteen hours in twenty-four hours, from the 25th day of September, or more than fourteen hours in 24 hours from the 25th day of September to the 25th day of March, any such person shall forfeit any sum not exceeding £20, nor under £5 current money, for every time he, she, or they shall offend therein, at the discretion of the Justice before whom the complaint shall be made."—2 Brevard's Digest, 243.
Georgia.—"Any Owner of a Slave, or Slaves, who shall cruelly treat such a Slave or Slaves by unnecessary or excessive whipping, by withholding proper food or nourishment, by requiring greater labour from such Slave or Slaves than he, she, or they may be able to perform, by not affording proper clothing, whereby the health of such Slave or Slaves may be injured or impaired, every such Owner or Owners of Slaves shall, upon sufficient information being laid before the Grand Jury, whereupon it shall be the duty of the Attorney or Solicitor General to prosecute said Owner or Owners, who, on conviction, shall be sentenced to pay a fine, or be imprisoned at the discretion of the Court."—Prence's Digest, 376.
These provisions are of no practical value to the Slaves whatever. The whole matter is a well-arranged systematic scheme of diabolical hypocrisy. No Slave, and no free person of colour can be a witness against a white person in any case. The Planters are not expected to prosecute each other for ill-treatment to the Slaves. The Overseers, who do the flogging and order the working, are not apt to inform against each other; depending, as
