The Liberator

[From the Boston Gleaner.]

The Trial of Tobey,—You state that 'no person can read the trial without being satisfied that Hart was brutally murdered.' I believe that no unprejudiced man could have heard the trial without being satisfied that the Captain, even if he did not give the death blow, permitted and sanctioned it. and the preceding and subsequent brutality of the mate. He might have stopped it any moment, and yet he permitted it to go on when the unfortunate man was already so reduced and enfeebled, that according to the testimony of the captain's own witness (Snowdon, he fell down 'two or three times' in walking from the quarter deck where he had been scraping, to the pumps.

Still more, Mr. Editor, all the witnesses agree that when the poor soul was in this situation, Capt. Tobey ordered him to 'pump out the ship.' And when the inoffensive and patient creature said, 'Yes sir,' and made the effort, and had not strength enough to handle the brake, and was knocked down by somebody and with something, the captain stood by and saw his mate put a rope round the neck of the man, drag him forward to the cathead, tie him under it, and keep him there three quarters of an hour, with heavy seas breaking over him.

In all this, (the captain had struck no blow with his own hand,) I see if not an aiding and abetting of murder, no title whatever to the eulogies of a judge, or the plaudits of the people!

Again, Mr. Editor, where was the propriety or justice of cautioning the jury against the prejudice of colored witnesses against a white man, and passing over that of the white witnesses against colored men, and in favor of the accused white? Sir, these things surprised and distressed me. They may be drowned and submerged for a time by general clamor, but there are minds to which they will remain and reappear.

Another thing. Mr. Editor. if the mate committed the murder, how is the captain to answer for permitting the murderer to quit the vessel at Richmond? Nay more, he actually discharged him at that place! Because he got intoxicated,' says Snowdon, the second mate; and after saying this, the same Snowdon in almost the same breath, said on the stand that the mate 'cleared because he had killed a man,' and was afraid to come home. At the primary examination four or five months ago, this same Snowdon swore positively 'that he did not know why the mate cleared.' On several other material points. Snowdon swore on the trial diametrically opposite to what he did on the examination. and this was proved, but no comments were made from the bench on his inconsistencies.

Mr. Editor. if the mate should ever be caught and brought to trial for this murder, we shall see whether he will not get off by proving that the captain did it.