What could the white sails symbolize? "Our house stood within a few rods of the Chesapeake Bay, whose broad bosom was ever white with sails from every quarter of the habitable globe. Those beautiful vessels, robed in purest white, so delightful to the eye of freemen, were to me so many shrouded ghosts, to terrify and torment me with thoughts of my wretched conditionI have often, in the deep stillness of a summer's Sabbath, stood all alone upon the lofty banks of that noble bay, and traced $,$ with saddened heart and tearful eye, the countless number of sails moving off to the mighty ocean."

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