"Do you give up now?" said Dusenberry, still holding the knife pointed at him. Manuel was in the habit of carrying a poniard when on shore in foreign countries, and put his hand to his breast-pocket to feel for it. He remembered that he had left it in his chest, and that resistance would be useless against a posse giving expression to such hostility to him. The shackles were put upon his hands with ruffianly force.
"Oh! am I a man, or am I a brute? What have I done to receive such treatment? May God look down upon me and forgive me my transgressions; for in his hands are my rights, and he will give me justice," said Manuel, looking his cruel torturers in the face.
"A man! No, by heavens, you're a nigger; an' it's that we'd he teaching you! Come, none of yer sermons here, trot off! We'll give you a handkerchief to cover your hands, if you're so d--d delicate about walking through the streets," said Dunn, throwing him an old red handkerchief, and marching him along through Broad street. Dusenberry now left him entirely in the charge of Dunn; while, as he said, he went to Adger's Wharf to keep his eye on another vessel that was approaching the dock. The tricks of this man Dunn were well known to those, connected with the police and sheriff's office; but, instead of being displaced for his many offences, he was looked upon by them as the best officer upon the rolls; and in fishing for mischievous niggers he was held as a perfect paragon. In this instance he was not contented with the outrages he had inflicted upon Manuel at the Dutch grog-shop, which he had forced him into, but he would stop in the public street to hold conversation with every cove he met, and keep the poor man standing for public gaze, like chained innocence awaiting the nod of a villain. The picture would have been complete, if a monster in human form were placed in the foreground applying the lash, according to the statute laws of South Carolina.
IT is nine o'clock, on the morning of the 24th March, 1852. Manuel was marched into the sheriff's office, situated in the court-house, on the corner of Broad and Meeting streets. A large table stood in the centre of the room, covered with sundry old papers and an inkstand. At one side was an old sofa, bearing strong evidence of its being worn out at the expense of the State. A few pine-wood and painted book-stands, several tip-staffs, old broken-backed chairs, and last, but not least, a wood-sawyer's buck-saw, stood here and there in beautiful disorder around the room; while, as if to display the immense importance of the office, a "cocked" hat with the judicial sword hung conspicuously above the old sofa. A door opened upon the left hand, leading into the clerk's office, where the books and archives of the office were kept. Mr. Kanapeaux, the incumbent, exhibited a great deal of good feeling, which it would have lost the sheriff none of his reputation to pattern after, and kept his office in very respectable order.