Lloyd, as did, also, the slaves upon them. Each
farm was under the management of an overseer. As I have said of
the overseer of the home plantation, so I may say of the
overseers on the smaller ones; they stand between the slave and
all civil constitutions--their word is law, and is implicitly
obeyed.
The colonel, at this time, was reputed to be, and he apparently
was, very rich. His slaves, alone, were an immense fortune.
These, small and great, could not have been fewer than one
thousand in number, and though scarcely a month passed without
the sale of one or more lots to the Georgia traders, there was no
apparent diminution in the number of his human stock: the home
plantation merely groaned at a removal of the young increase, or
human crop, then proceeded as lively as ever. Horse-shoeing,
cart-mending, plow-repairing, coopering, grinding, and weaving,
for all the neighboring farms, were performed here, and slaves
were employed in all these branches. "Uncle Tony" was the
blacksmith; "Uncle Harry" was the cartwright; "Uncle Abel" was
the shoemaker; and all these had hands to assist them in their
several departments.
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