identified, they are under the necessity of describing the marks of the
whip on the backs of women, the iron collars about the neck--the
gun-shot wounds, and the traces of the branding-iron. Such testimony
must, in the nature of things, be partial and incomplete. But for a full
revelation of the secrets of the prison-house, we must look to the slave
himself. The Inquisitors of Goa and Madrid never disclosed the peculiar
atrocities of their "hall of horrors." It was the escaping heretic, with
his swollen and disjointed limbs, and bearing about him the scars of
rack and fire, who exposed them to the gaze and abhorrence of
Christendom.

The following pages contain the simple and unvarnished story of an
AMERICAN SLAVE,--of one, whose situation, in the first place, as a
favorite servant in an aristocratic family in Virginia; and afterwards
as the sole and confidential driver on a large plantation in Alabama,
afforded him rare and peculiar advantages for accurate observation of
the practical workings of the system. His intelligence, evident candor,
and grateful remembrance of those kindnesses, which in a land of
Slavery, made his cup of suffering less bitter; the perfect accordance
of his statements, (made at different times, and to different
individuals),[B] one with another, as well as those statements
themselves, all afford strong confirmation of the truth and accuracy of
his story. There seems to have been no effort, on his part to make his
picture of Slavery one of entire darkness--he details every thing of a
mitigating character which fell under his observation; and even the
cruel deception of his master has not rendered him unmindful of his
early kindness.

[Footnote B: The reader is referred to JOHN G. WHITTIER, of
Philadelphia, or to the following gentlemen, who have heard the whole,