is the possibility of the negroes falling into the hands of a brutal
owner capable of exercising all the power of inflicting misery which the
law gives him.

But the natural law of compensation is universal; and if the most
wretched object in existence be a slave subject to the sway of a brutal
owner, certainly the next is the humane master who has to do with a
sullen, malicious, or dishonest negro,--while for one instance of the
former, there are a hundred of the latter who would willingly give up
the whole value of their human chattels in order to get rid of the
vexations they occasion. And where master and man were equally bad, we
have known cases in which it was really hard to say which contrived to
inflict most misery: the one might get used to blows and curses so as
not much to mind them, but the other could never escape the agonies of
rage into which his contumacious chattel was able to throw him at any
time.

Captain Wilde's temper was more than usually mild and lenient; and he
was probably the most wretched being on his own plantation during the
last two years of his life,--a day seldom passing that he was not
compelled to inflict some sort of punishment upon his negroes. These,
however, never ceased to feel for him the respectful attachment inspired
by his kindness during the happy years of his bachelor-life; but,
strange as it may seem, that feeling was now mingled with a sort of
pity; for they well knew the painful reluctance with which he obeyed the
harsh commands of his wife. And of all who mourned the hapless fate
of this unfortunate gentleman, none mourned more bitterly, and few
cherished his memory so long or so tenderly, as these humble dependants,
who best knew his real character.