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FOUR YEARS’ RESIDENCE
Happiness is generally visible by some external indications; and if the dark desponding look, that speaks unutterable woe, be the common sign of misery—so is the bright smile that illumines the countenance of man a type of the happiness that reigns in his heart. If then external appearances denote happiness we may draw from these the inference that the slaves are happy. I have seen them under every circumstance, and never without those light and buoyant spirits, that joyous and unrestrained clatter, those lively and often keen and witty sallies which so eminently characterise them: above all, the children enjoy themselves, but then childhood is that blissful and unthinking season of our lives when we are joyous in spite of ourselves. I am now about to advance an argument in which I know not how far I may be joined by my readers. I am about to contend that if a slave be really happy in his slavery he is by no means fit for emancipation. If he feel that he enjoys blessings and privileges of no common order—that he is provided with all the necessaries and comforts he can desire, and if contented with that feeling he exclaim “ what do I want more ?” I maintain that he is not prepared for freedom; but if on the contrary he say, “ I am housed, fed, clothed, and nourished, but what is all this without liberty ?” then I say that he is entitled to the emancipation he desires. That the slaves however are, generally speaking, contented, is a fact which all who have seen the