“The country at this period was one vast wilderness. The continent of North America was then one continued forest … There were no horses, cattle, sheep, hogs, or tame beasts of any kind … There were no domestic poultry … There were no gardens, orchards, public roads, meadows, or cultivated fields … They often burned the woods that they could advantageously plant their corn … They had neither spice, salt, bread, butter, cheese, nor milk. They had no set meals, but eat when they were hungry, or could find anything to satisfy the cravings of nature. Very little of their food was derived from the earth, except what it spontaneously produced … The ground was both their seat and table … Their best bed was a skin … They had neither iron, steel, nor any metallic instruments.”--_Ramsay’s Hist._, pp. 39, 40.
We adduce not these extracts to disparage or detract from the real worth of our brother Indian,--for we are identical as the subjects of American wrongs, outrages, and oppression, and therefore one in interest,--far be it from our designs. Whatever opinion he may entertain of our race,--in accordance with the impressions made by the contumely heaped upon us by our mutual oppressor, the American nation,--we admire his, for the many deeds of heroic and noble daring with which the brief history of his liberty-loving people is replete. We sympathize with him, because our brethren are the successors of his in the degradation of American bondage; and we adduce them in evidence against the many aspersions heaped upon the African race, avowing that their inferiority to the other races, and unfitness for a high civil and social position, caused them to be reduced to servitude.
For the purpose of proving their availability and eminent fitness alone--not to say superiority, and not inferiority--first suggested to Europeans the substitution of African for that of Indian labor in the mines; that their superior adaptation to the difficulties consequent to a new country and different climate made them preferable to Europeans themselves; and their superior skill, industry, and general thriftiness in all that they did, first suggested to the colonists the propriety of turning their attention to agricultural and other industrial pursuits than those of mining operations.