CHAPTER XVII.

Sufferings of Captives-Shooting a Deaf Man-A Terrible Punishment-Arguments on Slavery-Opinions of Celebrated Men-A Sabbath School in Prison-A Loyal Lady -Pennsylvania a Pioneer-Emancipation-Our PrayerMeetings-Rays of Sunshine.

A LARGE proportion of the prisoners in Macon were nearly naked, and actually were obliged to wrap rags of blankets about themselves to hide their nakedness, and many times, while listening to their stories of wrong and woe, I was moved to tears. Among several harrowing incidents, about this time occurred the shooting of one of our party, a political prisoner, if I remember right, who was deaf. A brutal guard had fired on him because he did not obey some order which he had given, but which of course, the victim did not hear. I saw the poor fellow writhing in his death-agonies. The shot had pierced directly through his bowels, inflicting a horrid and mortal wound.

Another man named Flood, for the offence of coming nearer than ten feet to the guardlines, was pinned down to the earth. As this punishment is doubtless not understood by a

The prisoner is thrown to the ground, either face or back down, according to the whim of the punisher,

and a number of stakes are driven in the earth around him."-Page 211.

majority of readers, I will describe it. The person subjected to it is thrown to the ground, either face or back down, according to the whim of the punisher, and while held in this position, a number of stakes or wooden pins are driven in the earth around him, in such a manner as to bind him immovably to the ground. A more terrible punishment can scarcely be conceived.

Flood was a large man, and possessed of immense strength; and the first time he was thus pinned down, he tore himself loose from his fastenings. Upon seeing this, his captors again seized him. But he struggled manfully, and it was not until six or eight powerful men attacked him simultaneously, and with weapons, that he was secured. This done, however, they obtained stakes that an ox could not have broken, and with these they fastened their victim down so firmly, that it was impossible for him to move half an inch. And in this position, he lay face down for twenty-four hours, during which time a heavy rain fell. In consequence he took a fatal cold, and, four days later, he was laid in the grave. This punishment was quite common among the rebels.

While listening to the accounts of my fellowprisoners, especially concerning the deaf man

Oh

and Flood, I could not help thinking bitterly of the thousands in the free North, who, while our country is struggling for existence, are apologizing for the vile system which breeds such monsters as I have been describing. reader, if you would be just to yourself and to God, and not allow your mind to be influenced by the fallacies with which traitors would delude you, you would at once perceive the fountain-spring of all our national troubles to be naught else but slavery. And here, at the expense of interrupting my personal narrative, I have concluded to advance some facts and arguments in support of my conclusions. It is a most common and dangerous fallacy to condemn the emancipation theory of Abraham Lincoln, as the cause of this terrible bloodshed that has been going on for two years past. Now I assume the opposite side of the argument, and find myself supported therein, not only by common sense, but all the teachings of past history.

When the question of immediate abolition was first agitated in England, the friends of slavery were loud in their belief that universal insurrection and bloodshed would follow; and nothing could have taken a stronger hold on