Since the master, although making the rules of the plantation, was frequently absent, and since the enforcement of the rules and the severity of the labor depended upon the overseer, it is helpful to know the general character of this important power in order to understand the labor of the slaves. He was usually ignorant, high-tempered, and brutal. Patrick Henry has described him as a most "abject, degraded, and unprincipled man." Such men usually worked the Negroes to the limit, having a Negro driver go with each gang of slaves in order to secure the utmost labor. In the light of these facts, it is easy to understand how the slaves might be mistreated, in spite of the benevolent intentions of the master. Yet the overseers were not wholly blamable for their cruelty, inasmuch as they were assured of work only as long as they pleased the master, who judged them by the good behavior of the slaves, the general condition of the plantation, and the size and quality of the crop. Calhoun has truthfully said that by displaying too great an interest in the size of the crop, the master unconsciously encouraged cruelty by the overseer. As to the general severity of the work, writers differ. Rhodes, in his history of the United States, says that the slaves presented a picture of sadness and fear, and that they toiled from morning until night, working on an average of fifteen hours a day, while during the picking season on the cotton plantations they worked sixteen hours and during the grinding season on the sugar plantations they labored eighteen hours daily. On the other hand, Murat, in his history of the United States, says that the work of the slaves was less strenuous than that of the free workers of the North, that they worked from sunrise till three o'clock in the afternoon, resting two hours at noon and receiving Sunday as a holiday and a half holiday on Saturday, and that they received many privileges, such as farming a small piece of land for themselves and selling its products. According to him, the slaves were supremely happy and contented. Which of these views is correct, it is difficult to say, for it is doubtless true that some slaves were driven to the extreme, while others enjoyed a comparatively easy life. When it is remembered, however, that, since the Constitution forbade the importation of slaves after 1808, the price of slaves had steadily risen, it is safe to conclude that the work was no more severe to the slaves than was agricultural life to the whites in the North, for it was advantageous to the owner to keep the slave in good health as long as possible, and this was not to be accomplished by overworking him.