In PART III., THE NEGRO DURING THE REVOLUTION, I found much of an
almost romantic character. Many traditions have been put down, and
many obscure truths elucidated. Some persons may think it irreverent
to tell the truth in the plain, homely manner that characterizes my
narrative; but, while I have nothing to regret in this particular, I
can assure them that I have been actuated by none other spirit than
that of candor. Where I have used documents it was with a desire to
escape the charge of superficiality. If, however, I may be charged
with seeking to escape the labor incident to thorough digestion, I
answer, that, while men with the reputation of Bancroft and Hildreth
could pass unchallenged when disregarding largely the use of documents
and the citation of authorities, I would find myself challenged by a
large number of critics. Moreover I have felt it would be almost cruel
to mutilate some of the very rare old documents that shed such
peerless light upon the subject in hand.

I have brought the first volume down to the close of the eighteenth
century, detailing the great struggle through which the slavery
problem passed. I have given as fair an idea of the debate on this
question, in the convention that framed the Constitution, as possible.
It was then and there that the hydra of slavery struck its fangs into
the Constitution; and, once inoculated with the poison of the monster,
the government was only able to purify itself in the flames of a great
civil war.

The second volume opens with the present century, and closes with the
year 1880. Unable to destroy slavery by constitutional law, the best
thought and effort of this period were directed against the extension
of the evil into the territory beyond the Ohio, Mississippi, and
Missouri rivers. But having placed three-fifths of the slave