Sometimes, he said, it
was necessary to suspend the culprit for a moment or so, to intimidate,
but this was only in cases where the victim (he used the word rascal)
was inclined to be sullen, and refused readily to give the required
information. I inquired whether it ever occurred that actual execution
took place; to this my new acquaintance replied, "Wall, yes, where the
nigger had dar'd to strike a white man;" but that it was usual to go to
a magistrate first, in such cases. The appearance of these gibbets,
after the information I had received respecting them from my
slave-holding acquaintance, made my flesh creep as we steamed onwards,
the more so as, in many of the grounds skirting the river, where these
sombre murky-looking objects presented themselves to the gaze of the
traveller, gangs of negroes were at work, looking up complacently for a
moment as the vessel glided by. I was subsequently told by a gentleman
who had been long resident in the state of Louisiana, that no punishment
so effectually strikes with terror the negro mind, as that of hanging,
the very threat being sufficient to subdue (in general) the most
hardened offenders.
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