Pursuing My Perambulations, I Came To The Slave And General Cotton Place Of Vendue, To The Left Of The General Post-Office, Which Building Is A Very Substantial Edifice Of Stone.

Here a dozen or twenty auctioneers were loudly holding forth to the assembled crowds, and cracking up their wares in New York style.

The most indescribable scene of bustle and confusion prevailed, the whole street being covered with open bales and boxes of goods. In one part of the street was a slave warehouse, and advertisements were placarded outside of the particulars of the various lots to be offered for competition, and now on view. As the privilege of viewing in this instance was confined to those who possessed tickets, I did not apply for one, as I knew that the wish would be attributed to curiosity, and possibly a worse construction be put upon it, through my being a stranger in the place.

Passing onwards through the assembled throng, I got into a more secluded part of the city, and came upon a large burial-ground, in which many of the monuments erected to the memory of the dead were of a very expensive description. One in particular attracted my notice; this, on inquiry of a gentlemanly-looking man, who, like myself, was inclined to "meditate among the tombs," I ascertained had been erected by the relatives of a planter, who had resided in an adjoining state, but who had several cotton plantations within ten miles of Charleston; these he occasionally visited, but in general confided to the care of an overseer, who lived with his family on one of them.

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