An Eastern paper says:—
“The sum of $500 was contributed at a meeting at New Bedford on Monday evening, to make Kansas free. The following sums have been contributed for the same purpose: $2,000 in Taunton: $600 in Raynham: $800 in Clinton: $300 in Danbury, Ct. In Wisconsin, $2,500 at Janesville: $500 at Dalton: $500 at the Women’s Aid Meeting in Chicago: $2,000 in Rockford, Ill.”
A telegraphic dispatch, dated Boston, January 2, 1857, informs us that—
“The Secretary of the Kansas Aid Committee acknowledges the receipt of $42,678.”
Exclusive of the amounts above, the readers of the New-York Tribune have contributed about $30,000 for the purpose of securing Kansas to Freedom; and, with the same object in view, other individuals and societies have, from time to time, made large contributions, of which we have failed to keep a memorandum. The legislature of Vermont has appropriated $20,000; and other free State legislatures are prepared to appropriate millions, if necessary. Free men have determined that Kansas shall be free, and free it soon shall be, and ever so remain. Harmoniously the work proceeds.
Now let us see how slavery has rewarded the poor, ignorant, deluded, and degraded mortals—swaggering lickspittles—who have labored so hard to gain for it “a local habitation and a name” in the disputed territory. One D. B. Atchison, Chairman of the Executive Committee of Border Ruffians, shall tell us all about it. Over date of October 13th, 1856, he says:
“Up to this moment, from all the States except Missouri, we have only received the following sums, and through the following persons:—
| A. W. Jones, Houston, Miss., | $152 | |
| H. D. Clayton, Eufala, Ala., | 500 | |
| Capt. Deedrick, South Carolina, | 500 | |
| $1,152.” | ||
On this subject, further comment is unnecessary.
Numerous other contrasts, equally disproportionate, might be drawn between the vigor and munificence of freedom and the impotence and stinginess of slavery. We will, however, in addition to the above, advert to only a single instance. During the latter part of the summer of 1855, the citizens of the niggervilles of Norfolk and Portsmouth, in Virginia, were sorely plagued with yellow fever. Many of them fell victims to the disease, and most of those who survived, and who were not too unwell to travel, left their homes, horror-stricken and dejected. To the horror of mankind in general, and to the glory of freemen in particular, contributions in money, provisions, clothing, and other valuable supplies, poured in from all parts of the country, for the relief of the sufferers. Portsmouth alone, according to the report of her relief association, received $42,547 in cash from the free States, and only $12,182 in cash from all the slave States, exclusive of Virginia, within whose borders the malady prevailed. Including Virginia, the sum total of all the slave State contributions amounted to only $33,398. Well did the Richmond Examiner remark at the time—“we fear that generosity of Virginians is but a figure of speech.” Slavery! thy name is shame!