[18] There were in the selling of slaves, as in the vending of animals established grounds entitling the purchaser to recover in full or in part his purchase price. Six months were allowed for causes of the first class to manifest themselves, a year for the latter.
Deafness, dumbness, short-sightedness, tertiary or quaternary ague, gout, epilepsy, polyp, varicose veins, a breath indicating an internal malady, sterility among the women—such were the grounds accepted for complete abrogation of the contract. As to moral defects, nothing was said. Nevertheless, the merchant was not allowed to ascribe to a slave qualities he did not possess. One was bound above all to make known whether a slave possessed a tendency toward suicide. (Wallon, History of Slavery in Antiquity, vol. II, p. 63.)
[19] We do not dare to expatiate on these monstrosities. We shall only cite the words of the lawyer Heterus: "Shamelessness is a crime in a free man—a duty in a freedman—and a necessity in a slave." For further details of the abominable and precocious depravity into which slaves and their children were dragged, see Wallon, History of Slavery in Antiquity, p. 266, following.
[20] "Masters disemboweled their slaves, to search for prognostications in their entrails."—Wallon, vol. II, p. 251.
[21] The characteristics of different nationalities of slaves had passed into bywords with the dealers. Thus they said "timid as a Phrygian," "vain as a Moor," "deceitful as a Cretan," "intractable as a Sardinian," "fierce as a Dalmatian," "gentle as an Ionian," etc., etc. (Wallon, vol. II, p. 65.)
[22] Caesar wished to make a severe example. So "He put the Senate to death, and sold the rest at auction."—Caesar, De Bello Gallico, book III, ch. XVI.
[23] See Wallon, vol. II, ch. III, for the singular means employed by the "horse-dealers" to rejuvenate their slaves.
[24] The Gauls in the north and west of France attached so much importance and dignity to the length of their hair that the provinces they inhabited were called "Long-haired Gaul." (Latour d'Auvergne, Gallic Origins.)
[25] When prisoners of war were sold as slaves, they were made to wear wreaths of the leaves of trees as a distinctive sign. (Wallon.)
[26] "The magic philters of Media and Circe of old were nothing but pharmaceutical brews of an action as diversified as powerful. Several of these narcotic or exhilarators, which threw a man into an incredible moral prostration, or else into a fit of frenzy, were long employed among the Romans. The slave merchants used them to overcome and enervate their more unconquerable captives."—Philosophic Dictionary, p. 345.