That African slavery was the most direful curse that ever afflicted any civilized country may now be safely affirmed. It had its beginning in our country in the year 1619 at Jamestown, Virginia, where a Dutch warship short of provisions exchanged fourteen negroes for a supply thereof. Slavery of both Indians and negroes already existed in the West Indies and was regarded with favor by the colonists and their home governments. It began in Massachusetts in 1637 as a consequence of hostilities with the aborigines, the slaves being captives taken in war. They were looked upon by the whites as heathen and were treated according to precedents found in the Old Testament for dealing with the enemies of Jehovah. In order that they might not escape from servitude they were sent to the West Indies to be exchanged for negroes, and this slave trade was not restricted to captives taken in war, but was applied to any red men who could be safely seized and shipped away. From these small beginnings slavery spread over all the colonies from Massachusetts to Georgia and lasted in all of them for a century and a half, i.e., until after the close of the Revolutionary War. Then it began to lose ground in the Northern States. Public sentiment turned against it in Massachusetts, but all attempts to abolish it there by act of the legislature failed. Its death-blow was given by a judicial decision in 1783 in a case where a master was prosecuted, convicted, and fined forty shillings for beating a slave.[4] Public opinion sustained this judgment, although there had been no change in the law since the time when the Pequot Indians were sent by shiploads to the Bermudas to be exchanged for negroes. If masters could not punish their slaves in their discretion,--if slaves had any rights which white men were bound to respect,--slavery was virtually dead. No law could kill it more effectually.