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410    DOUGLASS' MONTHLY.    February, 1861.
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NEW PUBLICATIONS.
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REVELATIONS OF A SLAVE SMUGGLER.

The above is the title of a work recently issued from the press of R.M. De Witt, New York-- price, 25 cents. It appears from the preface to the book, that is a genuine confession of a slave-pirate, who died under the charge of a home missionary in New York; and the story bears internal evidence of its truth. No one but an eye-witness could give such thrilling details of that great tragedy which is constantly being enacted before our Christian world, with no adequate effort made for its suppression. Some of the scenes and characters of this work remind us of Milton's devils more than human beings. The career of a man of seventy, engaged during his whole life in the trade of kidnapping negroes, could not be barren of horrible interest; but in Drake's wretched life, a fatality of crime seems to have dogged his footsteps.-- He appears to have lived and died a sort of slave-trading Cain. According to the promise we made in our December number, we will give a few extracts from the book.

BURNING OF THE MIRANDA.

The following is a thrilling description of the discovery by Drake of his native wife and child, among the perishing slaves of his own ship, destroyed by fire at sea, with her living cargo:

I had smoked my cigar, and bidden Diego Ramos good night; moralized a few moments on slavery and the slave trade; concluding as usual, with a calculation of future gains; and finally gone off into a deep slumber, when I was aroused by a sudden cry through the vessel, and sprung at once from my berth to the open deck.

'Fire!' was the hoarse response of Diego, to my alarmed looks and gestures; and the startling cry that had awakened me rung again from the brig's bows. At the same time, I saw the seamen running back and forth, like wild men, with buckets of water, which they were dashing in torrents about the forecastle gratings.

'Merciful heaven!' I cried, 'what is to be done?'

Diego answered in the same hoarse tone, 'Follow me, and keep the men quiet. We must build a raft, and take to the boats, if no other resource be left.'

I ran forward with the captain, who preserved a wonderful coolness, and found that fire was raging under the hatches. Thick smoke issued from the temporary decks, near the bulkhead, and half stifled groans and shrieks came from the poor blacks, who were suffocating to death. Diego's calm manner encouraged the men to new exertions, and gallons on gallons of water quickly deluged the slave-quarters. But, in spite of every effort, the flames increased, and presently broke out through the tarred seams, midships, by the main gratings.

'All is lost,' murmured Diego to me, and then, raising his voice, shouted, 'Bear away, lads! lashing and spars for a raft, my hearties!'

Diego Ramos had hardly made three voyages with the Miranda's crew, and every man of them had confidence in their chief. They sprung at once to the work of cutting away the brig's masts and bowsprit, and hoisted out the boats, without confusion, while the fire was allowed to smoulder between decks. Regardless of the yells and cries of the doomed wretches below, my partner ordered tarpaulins to be thrown over the gratings, and every crevice smothered with wet canvas, to keep down the fire. Meanwhile he himself worked with terrible activity, whilst I seconded his exertion to the best of my ability. The men toiled for their lives, and in what seemed a miraculously brief space, a strongly secured and tolerably capacious raft was launched, and
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cut away, with the rigging which composed a portion of it. Meanwhile, our boats were out, and a couple of casks of water, that were fortunately on deck- the bulk of our supply of that element being under the slave decks-were made fast, with all the provisions that could be got at, to the middle of our life raft. Then came the vital question of saving such portions of our living cargo, as could be transferred without danger to the raft.

Fortunately the sea was calm, and a bright moonlight enabled all our operations to go on without the confusion that darkness must have occasioned. A majority of the crew manned our two boats, to which my own and Diego's valuables were transferred; and Diego Ramos, myself, and the rest of the men , took our stations on the raft, and pushed off, having first shifted the hatch-gratings, and flung down the shackle-keys to the slave gangs, to allows their escape from the hold.

I shall never forget the screech that rung in our ears, as the panic stricken blacks scrambled from their dreadful confinement, pursued by smoke and flames. Hardly had the first gangs gained the brig's decks, than fire began to run over all her loose rigging, from wheel to bowsprit, and enveloped the wretched blacks who had rushed to leeward. There was but little air stirring, yet that little was sufficient to fan the flames into fury. The shouts of men and screams of women rose in horrible discord, and, one by one, the negroes, catching sight of our boats and craft in the increasing light, began to leap overboard, and swim toward us. Then came the most frightful of all the horrors of that night; for it was necessary to prevent a sudden swamping of the raft, and our two boats, which had made fast to it, were ordered to forge ahead, and tow us to windward of the swimming blacks, whilst the Miranda fell off slowly on our lee.

The sea was illumined for miles by the flames, which wrapped the doomed Miranda As the raft steadily receded from them, the blacks, who still clung to our vessel's side, set up despairing cries, and those who were swimming, numbering some hundreds, sprung out of the water with their hands clasped over their heads. Most of these were encumbered with shackles on the feet; for they had been released on board by unlocking and drawing out the padlocked rods. The drag of these fetters impeded their progress, so that we were enabled to keep the raft at a distance, and only allow the fugitives to board us singly or by twos or threes. Seamen were stationed on every side to keep off the swimmers with handspikes; and thus we were able to rescue what the raft could accommodate with safety to ourselves. It was a piteous sight, however, to witness the terror and despair of the doomed ones, who sank constantly before our eyes, or were knocked back from their hold, when they became too heavy for the raft's buoyancy. And here, alas! I was called upon to feel a personal interest in two, at least, of that miserable multitude, which my avarice had assisted in consigning to an untimely fate.

It was when the flames had reached their height, and the Miranda, from stem to stern, presented a sheet of lurid fire, that a piercing shriek was suddenly heard, rising above all sounds, and then, to my horror and astonishment, the name of 'Philip' was distinctly pealed across the water. Diego Ramos started and looked at me, and we both turned our gaze to the vessel's deck, where stood the erect form of a woman, her naked black form relieved in clear outline by the background of fire. She held a naked child of about seven years in her outstretched arms, and sent her piercing voice over the space that intervened between her and the raft, with another and louder cry of 'Philip!'

In an instant my heart was thrilled with the recollection of an African forest scene, where a young girl had knelt over my prostrate body, and sucked the venom of a serpent from my wounded breast. I recognized the face, the form of Sooluh, the daughter of Mammee.-- I saw before me my devoted Yallaba wife, and doubtless, it was my own child that I beheld
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embraced by the poor loving mother. At that moment I forgot Diego Ramos and my uncle; remembered nothing but that I had once held this poor African wife in my arms, and the she had once preserved my life at the risk of her own. I stretched out my arms, and shouted in the Dahoman tongue, 'Sooluh! Sooluh! Philip will save you!'-- A wild scream of joy broke from the poor creature's lips as the sounds reached her, and she leaped at once, with the child, into the sea that divided us.

'Ramos Diego!' I exclaimed; 'I must save that woman!  Cast off the larboard boat!' I shouted at the top of my voice.

'Are you mad?  Look at those black devils!  they will swamp us!' cried my partner, pointing to a score of black hands that had just reached and grasped the raft.  'Row away, men!' he cried to the boat's crews-- 'Drive back the niggers, or we'll all drown!'  And suiting action to words, he ran along the raft's edge, striking hands and faces of the clinging negroes, till they let go their hold and sunk, one by one, under the timbers.  My blood grew cold, and then rushed to my head like a torrent.  I tried to shout, and motioned to poor Sooluh, whose left arm still sustained her child, whilst she swam bravely toward the raft.  But the boats were pulled ahead by vigorous strokes; the raft followed, and receded from the ship.  I saw the unhappy girl lift her right hand upward, and caught a momentary glimpse of her face in the water.-- Then a faint cry came to my ears, and the sea closed over my African child.  I cared not to see or hear more, but sunk upon the raft like one stupefied, and remained so I know not how long.  When I became conscious again of what was passing around me, I saw the Miranda's hull, like an enormous firebrand, drifting far to leeward.  Diego Ramos was beside me on the raft, and scores of black bodies were lying thickly around us.  Our two boats were along-side.  The moon had gone down, but it was a clear starlight night.

THE FATE OF THE GLORIA.

The scenes describes as having taken place on board the clipper Gloria, with her drunken captain and crew, are most dreadful to contemplate.  The subjoined extract relates to the catastrophe of this vessel.  The smuggler goes on to say: 

But this was to be my last trip in the blood-stained Gloria.  Hardly were we out a fortnight before it was discovered that our roystering crew had neglected to change the sea water, which had served as our ballast, in the lower casks, and which ought to have been replaced with fresh water in Africa.  We were drawing from the last casks, before this discovery was made; and the horror of our situation sobered Captain Ruiz.  He gave orders to hoist the precious remnant abaft the main grating, and made me calculate how long it would sustain the crew and cargo.  I found that a half gill a day would hold out to the Spanish main; and it was decided that in order to save our cargo, we should allow the slaves a half-gill, and the crew a gill each day.  Then began a torture worse than death to the blacks.  Pent in their close dungeons, to the number of nearly five hundred, they suffered continual torment.  Our crew and drivers were unwilling to allow even the half gill per diem, and quarreled fiercely over their own stinted rations.  Our cargo had been stowed on the platforms closer than I ever saw slaves stowed before or since.  Instead of lowering buckets of water to then, as was customary, it became necessary to pour the water in half pint measures.  Those furthest from the gratings never got a drop, and became raving mad for drink.  Presently, diseases of different kinds added to their misery.  fevers and fluxes made the air reek with poison: and deaths followed so fast, that in a short time at least a hundred men and women were shackled to dead partners.  Our captain and crew, as well as myself, drank hard, but thirst and disease kept down all licentiousness.  Matters grew worse daily, for the dead were not thrown overboard, nor the
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