of the Lord; it will give you fortitude to live out the long journey of slave life.  How we shall feel when, in heaven, we are brought face to face with master, before the Lord Judge.  Our rights and his wrongs will then weigh in the balance of heavenly justice.”  With these remarks, Harry counsels them to join him in prayer.  He kneels on the brick pavement of the yard, clasps his hands together as they gather around him kneeling devotedly.  Fervently he offers up a prayer,—­he invokes the God of heaven to look down upon them, to bestow his mercy upon master, to incline his ways in the paths of good; and to protect these, his unfortunate children, and guide them through their separate wayfaring.  The ardour, grotesqueness, and devotion of this poor forlorn group, are painfully touching.  How it presents the portrait of an oppressed race! how sunk is the nature that has thus degraded it!  Under the painful burden of their sorrow they yet manifest the purity of simple goodness.  “Oh!  Father in heaven, hast thou thus ordained it to be so?” breaks forth from Harry’s lips, as the criminals, moved by the affecting picture, gather upon the veranda, and stand attentive listeners.  Their attention seems rivetted to his words; the more vicious, as he looks through grated bars upon them, whispers words of respect.

Harry has scarcely concluded his prayer when the sheriff, accompanied by several brokers (slave-dealers), comes rushing through the transept into the yard.  The sheriff is not rude; he approaches Harry, tells him he is a good boy, has no objection to his praying, and hopes a good master will buy him.  He will do all he can to further his interests, having heard a deal about his talents.  He says this with good-natured measure, and proceeds to take a cursory view of the felons.  While he is thus proceeding, the gentlemen of trade who accompanied him are putting “the property” through a series of examinations.

“Property like this ye don’t start up every day,” says one.  “Best I’ze seen come from that ar’ district.  Give ye plenty corn, down there, don’t they, boys?” enjoins another, walking among them, and every moment bringing the end of a small whip which he holds in his right hand about their legs.  This, the gentleman remarks, is merely for the purpose-one of the phrases of the very honourable trade-of testing their nimbleness.

“Well!” replies a tall, lithe dealer, whose figure would seem to have been moulded for chasing hogs through the swamp, “There’s some good bits among it; but it won’t stand prime, as a lot!” The gentleman, who seems to have a nicely balanced mind for judging the human nature value of such things, is not quite sure that they have been bacon fed.  He continues his learned remarks.  “Ye’h han’t had full tuck out, I reckon, boys?” he inquires of them, deliberately examining the mouths and nostrils of several.  The gentleman is very cool in this little matter of trade; it is an essential element of southern democracy; some say, nothing more!