46. On the 4th day of December 1815, (the day on which the session of congress commenced,) being at the seat of government of the United States, I was preparing to enjoy the first opportunity that had occurred to me, of beholding the assembled representatives of the American republic. As I was about to proceed to the building where the session was opened, my agreeable reverie was suddenly interrupted by the voice of a stammering boy, who, as he was coming into the house, from the street, exclaimed, "There goes the Ge-Ge-orgy men[12] with a drove o' niggers chain'd together two and two." What's that, said I,--I must see,--and, going to the door, I just had a distant glimpse of a light covered waggon, followed by a procession of men, women and children, resembling that of a funeral. I followed them hastily; and as I approached so near as to discover that they were bound together in pairs, some with ropes, and some with iron chains (which I had hitherto seen used only for restraining beasts,) the involuntary successive heavings of my bosom became irrepressible. This was, with me, an affection perfectly peculiar to itself, which never having before experienced, gave me some surprise. I have since heard an intelligent gentleman, from Scotland, describe a similar symptom. He affirmed, that on his arrival upon the coast of the United States, (in Chesapeake Bay,) his first view of the slaves _brought his heart into his throat_. I have also been told by a gentleman, who holds a seat in the senate of the United States, that "a drove of manacled slaves was to him an insupportable spectacle, which he generally endeavoured to avoid;"--and by a representative, (since deceased,) from one of the slave states, who was himself a possessor of slaves, "that he never could bear to see slaves manacled and fettered with bolts and chains, nor families torn asunder and sold to the slave-traders, and wondered how any one could be so inhuman as to do such acts." Overtaking the caravan, just opposite to the old Capitol (then in a state of ruins from the conflagration by the British army,)[13] I inquired of one of the _drivers_ (of whom there were two) what part of the country they were taking all these people to? "To Georgia," he replied. "Have you not, said I, enough such people in that country yet?" "Not quite enough," he said. I found myself incapable of saying more, and was compelled to avert my eyes immediately from the heart-rending scene! Had Sterne been present, and surveyed (with _real_ instead of imaginary vision) this groupe of bond-men and bond-women, and _bond-children_, with their mute sad faces veiled with _black_ despair--"and heard the chains rattle, which encumbered their bodies,"--and "had seen the _iron_ enter their souls"--he would again have "_burst into tears_." I walked along some distance before them, down Pennsylvania Avenue, and, on turning round, observed that they had left that street, (as if the spirit of PENN had repelled the contact of