over, for the credit and safety of the city; and its evasive tone
contrasts strongly with the more frank and thorough statements of the
judges, made after the thing could no longer be hushed up. These high
authorities explicitly acknowledge that they had failed to detect more
than a small minority of those concerned in the project, and seem to
admit, that, if it had once been brought to a head, the slaves generally
would have joined in.

"We cannot venture to say," says the intendant's pamphlet, "to how many
the knowledge of the intended effort was communicated, who without
signifying their assent, or attending any of the meetings, were yet
prepared to profit by events. That there are many who would not have
permitted the enterprise to have failed at a critical moment, for the
want of their co-operation, we have the best reason for believing." So
believed the community at large; and the panic was in proportion, when
the whole danger was finally made public. "The scenes I witnessed," says
one who has since narrated the circumstances, "and the declaration of the
impending danger that met us at all times and on all occasions, forced
the conviction that never were an entire people more thoroughly alarmed
than were the people of Charleston at that time.... During the
excitement, and the trial of the supposed conspirators, rumor proclaimed
all, and doubtless more than all, the horrors of the plot. The city was
to be fired in every quarter; the arsenal in the immediate vicinity was
to be broken open, and the arms distributed to the insurgents, and a
universal massacre of the white inhabitants to take place. Nor did there
seem to be any doubt in the mind of the people, that such would actually
have been the result had not the plot fortunately been detected before
the time appointed for the outbreak. It was believed, as a matter of
course, that every black in the city would join in the insurrection, and
that if the original design had been attempted, and the city taken by