Mr. Breckinridge rose. Having taken a good many notes of what Mr. Thompson had said in the speech now delivered, he was prepared for replying, if an opportunity were presented after he should have finished saying what seemed to him more pertinent to the subject in hand. In the meantime, he would introduce what he had now to say by reading another version of the events which had been represented as one of Mr. Thompson's triumphs at Boston.
Mr. May introduced a resolution denouncing the Colonization Society as unworthy of patronage, because it disseminates opinions unfavorable to the interest of the colored people.
Mr. Gurley replied. He finished the consideration of Mr. May's objections, went into an exposition of the advantages of the Colonization Society, and contrasted its claims with those of the Anti-Slavery Society. In doing this, he exhibited a handbill, having a large cut of a negro in chains, with some inflammatory sentences under it. Here he was interrupted by hisses, which were answered by clapping. Mr. George Thompson rose and attempted to address the meeting. This increased the confusion, Cries of "sit down—shame—be silent—let Mr. May answer if he can—no foreign interference," &c., from all parts of the hall. Mr. Thompson persevered as few men would have done, but at last yielded to the evident determination of the audience, and took his seat. The hall then became still, and Mr. Gurley proceeded.
We do not know that any Anti-Colonizationist was convinced by these discussions; except men who are committed against the Society, we believe the very general opinion is, that their overthrow on the field of argument was as complete as any could desire. It is evident that the cause of the Colonization Society is gaining a hold on the convictions and affections of the people of New-England stronger than it ever had before. We say this in view of facts which are coming to our knowledge from various parts. The storm of abuse and misrepresentation with which it has been assailed, is beginning already to contribute to its strength.
Now he begged to remark that the paper from which he had read the foregoing extract, the New-York Observer, together with the one from which it was originally taken, the Boston Recorder, printed more matter weekly than all the avowed abolition newspapers, in America, put together, did in half a year. He would notice farther, in relation to the great display of abolition publications which had been made by Mr. Thompson on the platform, that one of the papers lying there on the table, had advocated his principles and cause when he was in Boston, and likely to be mobbed at the instigation, as he believed, of Mr. Garrison. Some of the remainder of the publications were, he believed, long ago dead; some could hardly be said ever to have lived; some were purely occasional; the greater part as limited in circulation as they were contemptible in point of merit. Not above two or three of the dozen or fifteen that had been produced before them—and the names of which he (Mr. B.) required to be recorded—were in fact, worthy to be called respectable and avowed abolition newspapers. But to come to the point immediately in hand. He would on the present occasion attempt to show that abolition was not worthy to supplant the colonization scheme in the affections of Americans or Britons, or of any other thinking people. He acknowledged that there were many respectable men in the ranks of the abolitionists; but these, almost without exception, had been at one time colonizationists; and had he time he might show that many of them had deserted the colonization society on some peculiar or personal grounds, not involving the principles of the cause. He was prepared to show, however, that by whomsoever supported, the principles of the abolitionists were essentially wrong, and that their practice was still worse. He had not access to the voluminous documents brought forward by Mr. Thompson. Mr. Thompson had, indeed, that evening, on this platform, publicly offered him access to them. Had that offer been made at the beginning of the discussion, instead of the end of it, or during the four or five days we spent in Glasgow before it commenced, it might have been turned to some advantage. But as it was, the audience would know how to appreciate it; and he must rely solely upon memory, when he stated the principles promulgated by abolitionists; though at the same time he pledged himself that his statements not only were intended to be, but were, substantially correct and entirely candid. The abolitionists held, then, in the first place, as a fundamental truth, that every human being had an instant right to be free, irrespective of consequences to himself and others; consequently that it was the duty of masters to set free their slaves instantly, and irrespective of all consequences; and of course, sinful to exercise the powers of a master for one moment, or for any purpose. This was, in substance, the great principle on which the abolitionists acted—a principle which he was now prepared to question. He had, on a former occasion, shown that there were only two parties responsible for the existence of slavery, namely, individual slave-holders, and slave-holding communities. He would now attempt to prove, that, as applied to either of these, this principle was not only false, but that it was a mere figment, and calculated to produce tremendous evil. Let them first attend to what the abolitionists say to the individual slave-holder. Perhaps the person addressed was an inhabitant of Louisiana; where, if it is not directly contrary to law, to manumit a slave—the law refuses to recognize the act. Was he to be told then that he should turn off his slaves, the young and helpless along with the old and the infirm, with the certain knowledge that so soon as they left his plantation, they would commence a career of trouble and sorrow most likely to end in their being seized, imprisoned, fined, and again enslaved. Mr. Thompson had mentioned, in nearly all his printed speeches, the case of a certain colored man, who had been thrown into prison at Washington city, and sold into eternal slavery to discharge the fees which had accrued by reason of his oppression. Now he (Mr. B.) took leave to say that this story was false, in toto. It was customary in some parts of America to sell vagabonds, in order to make up their jail fees; but they were bound for no longer a period than was necessary to do this. The system was this—they were taken up as vagrants. If they were able and willing to show that they had some regular and honest means of livelihood, they were of course acquitted and discharged; but when they were unable to do this, they were sold for as much as would pay the fees of detention, trial, &c. That any person, black or white, once recognized by the law as free, was ever sold into everlasting slavery, he positively denied, and demanded proof. In Louisiana, however, it being illegal to manumit a slave, those whom the abolitionists would set free, would not be considered free in the eye of the law. They might be harrassed, imprisoned as vagabonds, sold to pay expenses, as vagabonds, and so soon as set free again imprisoned. He admitted that such proceedings would be inexcusable; but what was a benevolent man, who had the welfare of his slave really at heart, to do with an eye to them? To act upon the abolitionist principle, would be to consign the slave to incalculable misery, for they had but one lesson to teach—turn loose the slaves, and leave consequences to God! The colonizationists, however, are provided with a better remedy. If Louisiana would not countenance manumission, nor suffer manumitted slaves to remain within her bounds, with the usual privileges of freemen, let them be taken to some other State, where such laws did not exist; or if this should not on the whole be desirable, let them be taken to Liberia. No, repeats Mr. Thompson; discharge your slaves at once, and leave the consequences to God. If, by the wicked laws of Louisiana, they are left to starve, or driven to desperation, or sold again into slavery, the responsibility is theirs; do you your duty in setting them immediately at liberty. It would require, however, that a humane individual should be very strongly impressed with the truth of this principle before he could persuade himself to do that which was evidently so cruel in its immediate effects, and so likely to be ruinous in those that are more remote. Yet that principle was, to say the least, extremely doubtful, and ought not at every hazard to be crammed down the throats of an entire nation. If the laws of the community were bad, as he admitted it to be the case, he supposed it was the duty of enlightened citizens to seek a change of that law by proper means, but not in the meantime to do that which would be totally insubordinate to the State—and injurious to all parties. Whether, moreover, it was either fair or candid to denounce, as had been done, the free States as being participators in slavery, because, though they did not themselves hold a property in slaves, they did not choose to swallow such nostrums even without chewing, could not be a question. If it was so doubtful whether duty to the slaves themselves rendered the immediate breaking up of all relations between them and their masters a proper or even a permitted thing, it was still more questionable whether our duties to the State may not imperiously forbid what our duties to the slave have already warned us against. I have omitted all considerations of a personal or selfish kind—all rules of conduct drawn from what is due to one's self, one's family, or one's condition, or engagements. Common benevolence forbids, as we have seen, and common loyalty prohibits, as we shall see—what a man must do, or lie under the curse of abolitionism. For though it be our duty to seek the amendment of bad laws, because they are bad, it is equally our duty to obey laws because they are laws, unless it is clear that greater ill will follow from obedience than from disobedience. Now all our slave States are perfectly willing that their citizens should emancipate their slaves; only many of them insist on their doing it elsewhere, than within their borders. As long as other lands exist, ready to receive the manumitted slave, and certain to be benefitted by his reception, it is to preach treason, as well as cruelty, and folly as well as either, to assert the bounden duty of the individual slave-holder, at all hazards, to attempt an impossibility on the instant, rather than accomplish a better result by foresight, preparation, and suitable delay. It may therefore be boldly said that instant surrender of the authority of the master, irrespective of all other considerations, must, in many cases, be a great crime in the individual slave-holder. He would now speak of this abolition principle to which he had adverted as a rule of conduct for slave-holding communities. In this respect, also, he considered that it was at best extremely questionable. Let us illustrate the principle by the oft-repeated case of the District of Columbia. Abolitionism asserts that it is the clear duty of Congress to abolish slavery instantly in that District, without regard to what may occur afterwards in consequence of that act. Let us admit that the dissolution of the Federal Union is a consequence not worthy of regard—even when distinctly foreseen; and that all the evils attendant on such a result, to human society, and to all the great interests of man throughout the earth, are as nothing, compared with the establishment of a doubtful definition, having an antiquity of at least four years, and a paternity disputed between Mr. Garrison and Mr. Thompson. As a principle concerning no other creature but the slaves of the District, and no interest but theirs, it can be shown to be false. If Congress were instantly to abolish slavery there, with a tolerable certainty that every slave in the District would be removed and continued with their issue in perpetual slavery; when by an arrangement with the owners, they might so prospectively abolish it as to secure the freedom of every slave in five or ten years, and of their issue as they successively arrived at twenty or twenty-five years of age; if Congress could do the latter, and were in preference to do the former, they would deserve the execrations of the world. The first plea is Mr. Thompson and abolitionism; the second express my principles and those of the despised gradualists. At all events, the truth of the principle involved in the former supposition was not so manifest as to justify Mr. Thompson in denouncing, as he had done, those who did not see proper to follow it. A wise man would hesitate—he would weigh well the resulting circumstances as one of the best tests of the truth and utility of his principles before he propagated, as indisputably and exclusively true, and that in despite of all results, such principles, with the violence which had been manifested—principles which, he repeated, were but four years old, and which he was still convinced, were but arrant quackery. There was another aspect of the subject. Reference had been made to the representation of the black population in the National Government. He would remark on this subject that it was the duty of every State to see that power was committed only to the hands of those qualified to exercise it properly, wisely, and beneficially. What would be said in this country, were Mr. Thompson to propose that the elective franchise should be made universal, and that the age at which it might be exercised should be fixed at fifteen years? He would venture to say that the ministry who would introduce such a scheme to Parliament, would not exist for three days. The proposal, as Mr. T. no doubt knew, would be considered altogether revolutionary and shocking. Yet it must be admitted that the average of the boys of Britain who are fifteen years old, are fully as well qualified for the exercise of the elected franchise, as the average of the slaves in the various parts of the United States are at the age of twenty-one years. But with us, as with you, twenty-one years is the age at which electors vote. As I have shown, in most of our States the elective franchise is extended to every white man, who has attained that age; while the qualifications of a property kind, anywhere required, are so extremely moderate, that in all our communities nine-tenths at least of the adult white males are entitled to vote. Now let it be borne in mind, that abolitionism requires not only instant freedom for the slave, but also instant treatment of him, in every civil and political, as well as every social and religious respect, as if he were white, that is, in plain terms—if we should follow the dogmas you sent Mr. T. to teach us, and in which we have been held up to the scorn of all good men, for declining to receive, a revolution far more terrible and revolting would immediately follow throughout all our slave States, than would follow in Britain by enfranchising in a day, every boy in it fifteen years old—even if your house of lords were substituted by an elective senate, and your parliaments made annual! And it is in the light of such results, that America has received with horror the enunciation of principles which lead directly to them, while their advocates declare "all consequences" indifferent as it regards their conduct! And can it be the duty of any commonwealth to bring upon itself "instantly,"—or at all—such a condition as this? The abolitionists themselves had evidently felt that their scheme was absurd; for they had never ventured to propose it to a slave State. Their papers were published and their efforts all made, and their organized agitation carried on, and a tremendous uproar raised in States where there existed no power whatever to put an end to slavery; but hardly a syllable had been uttered where, if anywhere, some effect might have been produced beneficial to the slaves, had abolition principles been practicable anywhere. The conduct of the abolitionists had been of a piece with what would have taken place in this country, had an agitation been got up for the direct abolition of idolatry in China, or of popery in Spain. Their principles had never yet been advocated in the South, but by means of the post-office, the effects of which, in the tearing up of mail bags, &c., Mr. Thompson well knew, and had declared. But the fact was, that such metaphysical propositions as those propounded by the abolitionists—even admitting them to be true—were altogether uncalled for. Thousands of slaves had been emancipated before the abolition principles were heard of, and all that was needed, was, that those who were engaged in the good work should have been let alone or aided on their own principles. What was the use of blazoning forth a doctrine which was in all likelihood false and ruinous, but which, were it true, could do no good? For if you could persuade a man that his duty required him to give freedom to his slaves, and he became suitably impressed with a sense thereof—he would do it just as certainly and effectually as though you had begun by saying to him—now as soon as I convince you, you must set them free immediately! He could indeed characterize such a mode of proceeding by no other term than that of gratuitous folly.
Again he might say that this principle of abolitionism was contrary to all the experience which America had acquired as a nation on this subject. Principles favorable to emancipation first took root where there were few slaves, and when the products of their labor were of little value. They had spread gradually towards the South, the border States being always first inoculated, till no fewer than eight States which tolerated slavery, adopted this principle, and successively abolished it. To these eight States were to be added four others, created since the formation of the Federal Constitution, which never tolerated slavery, thus making twelve States in which slavery was not permitted. By the influence of gradualism alone, had the cause of freedom advanced steadily to this point, and every day rendered its ultimate triumph throughout the whole empire more and more probable. At this time it might have been carried South by at least 5 degrees of latitude; and Virginia, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware, and Missouri, added to the free States; and the shackles of 1,000,000 slaves been in a process of gradual melting off. If fifty years had seen the rise of 12 free States, was it too much to hope that the next fifty years should enfranchise twelve more. For all the ruin brought on this glorious cause during the last four years by principles and practices of Mr. Thompson's friends, what have they to compensate suffering humanity? Have they or theirs released from his bonds a single slave? The abolition plan had in fact, been a signal, a total, absolute failure. Mr. Thompson himself did not pretend to say that a twentieth part of the population of America had embraced his views. The whole theory was as false as the whole practice was fatal; and just and pious men would hereafter hesitate before they sent out new missions to advocate them, or lent the influence of their just weight to denunciations levelled against all who did not think them worthy of their applause. The second great principle of the abolitionists, to which he would invite attention, was this—that it was the inherent and indestructible right of every man to abide in perfect freedom in whatever spot he was born; and that while it is a crime to deny him there all the rights of a man, a citizen and a Christian, it was not less so to persuade, to win, or to coerce him into what they called exile—this principle was levelled at the Colonization Society; and while instant abolition formed the first, and denunciation of what they call prejudice against color formed the last; hatred to colonization formed the middle and active principle of the band. Of this, it might be said, first, that it had the advantage of contradicting all the wisdom and practice of mankind. Whether it was meant to embrace women and minors—or at what age to establish the beginning of rights so extraordinary and unprecedented, whether at twenty-one, as here, or twenty-five, as in some countries, or twenty-eight, as in others, had not yet been defined. Thus much at least might be said—that if these rights resided in black men, they resided in no others, of whatever hue or race; and the philosophers who discovered their existence had found out something to compensate these unhappy men for their unparalleled sufferings. It certainly need not create surprise that we should listen with suspicion to such dogmas taught by an Englishman, when we remember that, from time immemorial, all the institutions of his own country were built upon dogmas precisely opposite; and all her practice the reverse of the preaching of the semi-national representative. Mr. Thompson says, a man is a citizen by inherent right, wherever he is born; the British monarchy, which Mr. Thompson says he prefers to all things else, says on the contrary, that let a man be born where he may he is a Briton, if born of British parents; and it both claims his allegiance, and will extend to him every right of a subject born at home! Then why is not a man an African if born of African parents in America, as well as a Briton, if born of British parents there? Or why are we to be attacked first with cannon on one side, and then with Billingsgate on the other side of this vexed question? Nor did our own notions, adverse as they were to those of Britain, conflict less with Mr. T. and abolitionism on another part of the principle. All our notions permit men to expatriate themselves, many of our constitutions guarantee it as a natural right, and America had actually gone to war with Britain in defence of that right in her unnaturalized citizens. Britain had insisted on searching American vessels for British sailors—America had refused to submit to the search; because, among other things the man sought was, by naturalization, an American. America did not oppose any of her citizens becoming Britons, if they thought fit, and was resolved to maintain the right of those who chose to become American citizens, from whatever country they might have emigrated, and therefore could hear only with contempt this dictum of abolitionism. Again he would say that, this principle is contrary to common sense. Rights of citizenship were not to be considered natural rights. They were given by the community—they might be withheld by the community; and, therefore, to talk of their being indestructible, was sheer nonsense. No man had a natural right to say, I will be a citizen of this or that State; and in point of fact, the great bulk of mankind were not citizens at all, but merely subjects. There were laws establishing the present form of government, giving a certain power to the king and to the Parliament, and regulating the mode in which Parliament was to be elected. These laws were altogether conventional; and as well might a man claim a natural right to be a king or a judge as to be a citizen. It might be as truly said that one is inherently a shark because he was born at sea, or a horse because he happened to have been born in a stable. So far is the theory of abolition from the truth; and so widely remote is their hatred to colonization, from being based in justice, or reason, that circumstances may occur in which it shall become imperative duty for men to emigrate. America presented a striking example of the truth of this. In this country it was customary to talk of America as a daughter of England. He had heard people talk as if America were about as large as one English shire, and settled principally from their own villages. But the fact was that America was an epitome of the whole world, peopled by colonies from almost all parts of it. It was an eclectic nation; and to talk to Americans, of the inherent right of a man to stay and be oppressed, where he happened to be born—or the guilt of seducing him to emigrate, is only to expose one's self to pity or scorn. To realize this, it is only necessary to take a map of our wide empire, washed by both oceans, and embracing all the climates of the earth, and get some American boy to tell you the migrations of his ancestors. To omit all mention of the red man, from Asia, and the poor black man, from Africa; there, he will say in New-England, are the children of the pilgrims, who were the fathers of your own Roundheads, driven out by the mean and vexatious tyranny of James I.; and there, in lower Virginia, three hundred leagues off, are the descendants of the Cavaliers and Malignants. There, in the back parts of the same ancient commonwealth, and in all western Pennsylvania, are the sturdy Scotch, whose fathers were hanged in the streets of your cities, by that perjured Charles II., who thus rewarded the loyalty that gave him back his crown. In the same key State, of the Union is a nation of industrious Germans; while in the empire state of New-York, are the children of those glorious United Provinces, that disputed with yourselves for ages, the empire of the seas; and between them both in New-Jersey the descendants of those ancient Danes who often ravaged your own coasts. The descendants of the Hugonauts, whose ancestors Louis XIV. expelled from France, and placed cordons on his frontiers to butcher as they went out, simply because they were Protestants, peopling parts of the south; in other parts of which, are colonies of Swiss, of Spaniards, and of Catholic French. The Irishmen is everywhere; and everywhere better treated than at home. Amongst such a people, it must needs be an instinctive sentiment, that he who loves country more than liberty, is unworthy to have either; that he who inculcates or affects the love of place above the possession of precious privileges, must have a sinister object. But he might proceed much farther; and having shown that it might be the duty of men to emigrate under various circumstances, prove that such a duty never was more imperative than on the free colored population of America. Possessing few motives to remain in America that were not base or insignificant compared with those that ought to urge their return, every attempt to explain and defend their conduct revealed a selfishness on their part a thousand times greater than that they charge upon the whites; and a cruelty on the part of their advisers towards the dying millions of heathen in Africa, more atrocious than that charged, even by them, on the master against his slave. The love of country, of kindred, of liberty, of the souls of men, and of God himself, impels them to depart, and do a work which none but they can do; and which they forego through the love of ease, the lack of energy, vanity gratified by the caresses of abolitionists, and deadness to the great motives detailed above. But there was another, and most obvious truth, which shows the utter futility of the principle of abolition now contested. So far was the fact from being so, that anybody, black or white, held an inherent right of citizenship in the place of his birth; that it is most certain, no man had even a right of bare residence, which the state might not justly and properly deprive him of—upon sufficient reason. The state has the indisputable right to coerce emigration, whenever the public good required it; and when that public good coincided with the interest of the emigrating party—and that also of the land to which they went—to coerce such emigration might become a most sacred duty. It was indeed true, that the friends of colonization had not contemplated nor proposed any other than a purely voluntary emigration; for even the traduced State of Maryland not only made the fact of removal voluntary, but, going a step further than any other, gave a choice of place to the emigrant. I recommend Africa, says she, but I will aid you to go wherever you prefer to go. It should, however, be borne in mind that this power is inherent in all communities, and has been exercised in all time. And it were well for the advocates of abolition principles to remember that the final, and, if necessary, forcible separation of the parties is surely preferable to the annihilation, or the eternal slavery of either; while it is infinitely more probable than the instant emancipation—the universal levelling—or the general mixture for which they contend. He had still left a third principle advanced by the abolitionists on which to comment, but as only two or three minutes of his allotted time remained, he would not enter on the subject; but would read, for the information of the audience a speech delivered by Mr. Thompson at Andover, in Massachusetts, the seat of one of our largest theological seminaries, as reported by a student who was present. He wished this speech to be put on record for the information of the British public.
Students—I shall first speak of the natural and inalienable rights to discuss slavery. It is not a question; you ought to do it; you sin against God and conscience, and are traitors to human nature and truth, if you neglect it. Whoever attempts to stop you from the exercise of this right, snatches the trident from the Almighty, and whoever dares to put manacles upon mind must answer for it to the bar of God. It belongs to God, and to God exclusively. You are not at liberty to give respect to any entreaty or suggestion or to take into consideration the feelings of any man or body of men on the subject. The wicked spirit of expediency is the spirit of hell, the infamous doctrines of the demons of hell; and whoever attempts to preach it to the rising youth of the land, preaches the doctrine of the damned spirits. It is the spirit of the flame and faggot, revealing itself as it dares, and corrupting the atmosphere so as to prevent the free breathing of a free soul. Where are the students of the Lane seminary? Where they ought to be;—from Georgia to Maine, and from the Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains—far from a prison-house where fetters are forged and rivetted. They could not stay in a place where a thermometer was hung up to graduate the state of their feelings. It was not till Dr. Beecher consulted the faculty at New-Haven and Andover, to see if they would sustain him, that he ventured to put the screws on. But, perhaps you may say, we must bid farewell to promotion if we do as you desire. The faculty have the power, in a degree, to fix our future settlements by the recommendation, and, therefore, we must desist. What if you do have to leave the seminary? Far better to be away than to breathe the tainted air of tyranny. I proclaim it here, that the only reason why abolition is not countenanced at Andover is, because it is unpopular; when it is popular it will be received. In 1823, the Colonization Society was the pet child of the churches, the seminaries, and the colleges of the land; but now, forsooth, because it is unpopular, it is cast off. Aye, once the eloquent tongues voiced its praise, and the gold and silver were its tributaries—where is it now? Cast off because it is not popular. This is rather hard; in its old age, too. But I forbear, it is a touching theme. I return to the Lane seminary. Never were nobler spirits and finer minds congregated together; never in all time and place a more heroic and generous band. Dr. Beecher himself has pronounced the eulogy. In what condition is the seminary now. Lying in ruins, irretrievably gone! Dr. Beecher then sacrificed honor and reputation.
Mr. Thompson read extracts from an article in the Liberator, which went to show that the faculty at Andover advised the students to be uncommitted on the dividing topic of slavery. Yes, added Mr. Thompson, go out uncommitted; wait till you get into a pulpit and have it cushioned and a settee in it, and then you may commit yourself. The speaker observed that very ill effects had resulted from the failure of the students at Andover to form themselves into an Anti-Slavery Society—the evil example had extended to Philip's Academy, Amherst College, &c. He had been twitted about it wherever he had been, but you may recover yourselves, he added, condescendingly; there is some apology for you, only let a Society be formed instantly. Those who attempted to show from the Bible that slavery was justifiable, were paving the slave-holders' paths to hell with texts of Scripture. Mr. Thompson enlarged upon the merits of the refractory students at Lane Seminary, with a most abundant supply of adjectives; and the mean-spirited students of Andover, although not expressly designated as such, were understood by the manner of expression to be placed in contrast. Mr. Thompson remarked that such conduct would not be tolerated by the students of any college in England, Scotland, or Ireland. This abuse, of the faculty at Andover was more personal and pointed than I have described; one of the faculty was called by name, but the severe expressions I have forgotten. He would probably have outrun himself, and exhausted the vocabulary of opprobrious epithets, had he not been interrupted. At the conclusion of the lecture, with the strange inconsistency which belongs to the man, he remarked that he had a high respect for the members of the faculty, and that he would willingly sit at their feet as a learner.
He had only one remark before he sat down. It had been publicly stated by a student of this seminary, that Mr. Thompson, in a conversation with him, had said, that every slave-holder deserved to have his throat cut, and that his slaves ought to do it. He could not, of course, vouch for the truth of this; but Mr. Thompson was there to explain. One thing, however, he could state as an indisputable fact, namely, that the professors of the seminaries had signed a document in which it was asserted that the young man had been in the college for three years, and that his veracity was unimpeached and unimpeachable. If the story were true—it was well that it was timely made public. If the young man misunderstood Mr. Thompson, he (Mr. B.) believed he formed one of a very large class in America, who had fallen into similar mistakes, and drawn similar conclusions from the general drift of his doings and sayings in that country.