Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1853-05-25

it, in the infinitely larger majority ofcases. an in;
strument of od;-conduciye to lndiyidualfand
public welfare; and necessary to the maintain
ance of public order; though it is perfectly natu
raj regret its liability to buse we would beun
wilingSto forego its advantages because of con-
tingencies to which its human ution renders
it liable, andit though there may be cruel
masters and refractory slaves; some who merit the
lash, and many who are too willing to administer
it; trafickers in blood, and those who sell human
flesh for gain, we contend that these, when carried
beyond approved custom; urgent necessity, and
proper regard for the victims of evil fortune, and
untoward circumstance, events in which human
agency has no part, are outrageous, and therefore,
prominent cases, and while they'excite the ,tn-s
qualified animadversion of the iuninformei and
unrehecting, never fail to meet tire approbium,
they justly merit. ofthe intelligent and discerning
We cannot conceive the possibility of one, de-
serving the name OF man, being the instrument
directly, or indirectly, of such atrocities; and the
same absence of moral law which inclines the
sufererto be their willing, and so for as earthly
tribunals are implicated, irresponsible agent, arms
him with power to subject wife and children,
friend, and fellow net corpo1eally, through their
Substitutes and affections to the same abuse, and
to murder the one, and Cypress and rule the 9th
ers, by processes, OF. which legislation takes no
cognizance, as efectual in purpose, and as crueln
their application as the knife and the thong.
+ But we will eschew such pictures, which hui
man deprayity would furnish in every department
of human circumstance, and human rule ;-from
the courts of God, on earth, where fanaticsm con-
dennis its victim to the stake for difference of be-
lief, to the lazar house which public benevolence
has instituted for poverty and disease, but where
its inmates, too often, find tyrants to administer
their dole, and are condemned 10 harder los than
that from which it was designed to rescue them
from wrongs which have shorn Catholicism of its
supremacy, to abuses employing the philantrophy
of Howard, i'll vain-ani these loo, claiming
piety and pity for their foundations Wewilltake
the negro cabin delineated by Mrs. Stowe,
though with no ulteror consequence to be dSap II
from it, as she has decuced, and which we neither
accord with, nor approve. We have 10 intention,
of building up superstructure of happiness
that we may throw 1t downto excite commiSsera-
ton for lis ruins, of being eloquent offthe
comforts of a position, that we may indulge in an
tithesis, and have our readers to weep over its
desolation. We do not intend 10 end on its occu-
pants with SenSbties as foreign to their nature
fairness 10 their skin, or the 'hyucintne fow, to
their woolly investiture; TO bring forward anon
alieS as class, W ich do not exist as indi-
vidunls. We surrender TO Mrs. Harriet Beecher
Stowe, the hybrids 10 educate, sentimentalize, or
victimiSe, as she sees proper, and to Afford, at
at least, profitable subjects for romance, while we
take, for our illustration, the American negro, as
she represents him, for the nonce, in the outset of
her history; and as we have found him in reality,
in our experience, Offering, as we think he does,
the. happiesl picture of contented labor, and nn-
CT nscious bondage, history or observation have
ever presented. We regard too the relation in
which he stands, perhaps we should say stood, 10
his superiors as afording an outlet for charities at
home, which would, in all probability, not fructify
at all, if required to seek their atmosphere abroad,
il would become exhausted of their Spirltif COM
PEELED to travel through distant channels to its ex-
ercise They would too be separated from that con-
seriousness of the entire dependence of their OBJ
ject on the faithfulness of their performance
which enhances their worth, and magnifes their
Importance. We are vain, and apardonable van
ity ills, for 1t promotes benevolence of what we
| rnte fam to
looks to us for its Light the cheek we gladden. with
Smiles, the mouth that expects, and receives from
us its food, are expressive of genuine graft
tude than is nourshcd i'll the hearts Of pensioners
whose wants other bounties, besides our own, have
supplied. The aged subjects of our care have
grown old with us, we have played and fought;
laughed and cred; been happy, or otherwise, and,
IN early youth, ate, drank and lived together, and
though, III after years. the barrier which separates
US, becomes Straitened, it is never closed on
them, as to the lower classes of our own complex
ion, from conviction that affection, not imper-
Thence, is the impulse that prompts them to over
leaPlt In the latter, an approach to familiarity
| would be regarded as presumption. Iu the for
mer, 1t Is the homely, but sincere, expression of
regard. And sterling that affection is, when put
| to the test 1t is of the nature of that instinct
which attaches more TO person than to qualities,
i and varies notwlth change of mind, circumstance,
or fortune. 1t is not the tie of consamguinity, a
i discriminating legacy may lose; or of worldly at
tachment, an adversity may dissolve; but the COM
pact oil hatl, association, and gratitude, binding its
subject to the superior intelligence ne has been
taught TO regard as the arbiter of his fate which
has kept him, without core of his own. above the
necessities of want, imbued him with religion, and
much oil It's enJoyments, nurSed him in sickness.
and eXacted only from health and vigor their trlb-
ute 10 whatthe negro considers the common stock,
for he thinks he has property in all that is his
ter's and, though often, perhaps habitually
less, and disposed TO make free with what he con
slders the SuperfluitieS, himself; watchful O;
4 tr6SDaSS and atnn in her -rThera iS
thing IN this social relation, it existed formerly
IN most OF our States, and as it is still preserved
IN districts where notions adverse to its contnu-
ance have not penetrated, that recalls the feudal
system, though in miniature: retaining its anna
Die features, and stripped of its formidable; the
i Joss etfurca,' the unlimited and unquestoned
authority of ancient serfdor. The Lord, nd the
vassal; the protector and the dependent; the pow
erful and the weak; the lofty and the lowly; the
benefactor and the recpent;-each distinct in
their position, but relatively one; each, in his
sphere Necessary to the existence, and well-being
OF the other. s---
what may be called the nitiatory of existence; the
animal life; the development of limb and muscle;
are taught, by their parents, TO look to as the
providence of their being. The roof that shelters
them, the ground they tread, the air they breathe,
the sun that shines upon them, their meat, tie
drink, their clothing; the fire that warns; the
sounds that enliven them know, in their estimation
no other origin; and it is not irreverent to say,
that not until mature age has taught them there is
a still higher power, to which even massa and
misses must bow, have they conception of an
other source of blessing, bounty, and authority,
with which to divide their gratitude and veneration
These are the pendtes of the cabin hearth, and
though pagon dolatry, Units display may have sur
passed the homage of its inmates, in splendor, it
fell far behind it in unity, sincerity and wiling-
ness of worship To them, the term slavery con-
i yeys no idea of 1eproach. 1t makes them free of
wants, of care, of labor; of even those lighter
tasks the harder condition of the white laborer
requires him to impose on female weakness, and
air liberal, the sun as bright to them as these
natural blessings are TO the free. in name, though
bond, TO Circumstance and fortune.
With our own children, they form the same re-
lations as their parents held to ourselves, and If