阳光照进了我的眼睛, as indistinct and dark as the gloom of death; the beauties of nature to me were “blotted out for ever,在我23岁的时候, 我盼望安逸舒适的日子, 从我的活动和工作的资源中，我的道路被封锁了, 世界变得一片空白，充满了模糊和不确定……

 

180页的叙述就这样结束了 《利记手机官网》, And Travels into the Interior of that Country; Containing Particular Descriptions of the Climate and Inhabitants and Interesting Particulars Concerning the Slave Trade 约瑟夫·霍金斯. The book was published “by his Friends” soon after his return from Africa, the first of many attempts to secure a financial footing for the blind young man.

约瑟夫·霍金斯出生在金斯伯里, 华盛顿县, 1772年的纽约, 他是约瑟夫·霍金斯和雷切尔·霍金斯八个孩子中的第一个. 根据他的说法 历史, at the age of 18 Joseph became convinced that a prosperous future as a merchant awaited him in Alburg, Vermont—some 350 miles away from home near the Canadian border; his hopes of success were “disappointed” just 14 months later and he cast about for new opportunities. Having heard that young men of “moderate education and industrious habits” could be assured “constant employment in the southern states,” 霍金斯 departed for Boston on horseback and from thence to 查尔斯顿 南卡罗来纳, 通过海运.

Again sorely disappointed by the opportunities he found in 查尔斯顿 霍金斯签约成为船上的一名超级货运员 查尔斯顿 开往非洲海岸. 根据他的叙述, 一旦有, 他率领一支探险队到内陆去, acquiring captives from a war between two rival nations and leading them into enslavement in the United States. 有时, 他似乎对被奴役者的困境不无同情, describing the “deep sighs of the poor Galla prisoners … eyes flowing with tears” as “deeply affecting to me.” He is also teased by his fellow officers who “had all provided themselves with three or four wives each, 还责备我没带我的, alleging that they would … bring a good price when we arrived in America.” Whatever his true feelings about the slave trade and the enslaved people on board, 霍金斯和他的船带着500名奴隶前往美国. 在回程通道上, 一种引起痢疾症状的传染病, but also swelling and inflammation of the eyes and eyelids struck most of those aboard the vessel, 让霍金斯失明.

玩彩票

Lotteries for both public and private benefit have been common throughout American history, but it’s a bit unclear why the state legislators of Vermont authorized a lottery for the benefit of someone intimately in卷ved in the slave trade. 按他自己的说法, 霍金斯 resided in Vermont for less than 2 years before departing on his voyage to the coast of Africa. Nonetheless during the October 1798 session of Vermont’s legislature, 立法者授权为霍金斯- 16发放福利彩票,000张票，每张3美元, 最高奖金是5000美元. 在1798年12月31日发行的 《拉特兰编辑对霍金斯和彩票的评价颇有褒奖之意。

在公众支持的申请人中，我们认为. 约瑟夫·霍金斯, 谁是最值得公众鼓励的人, 努力, 如此积极进取的人的不幸, pointed him out to the legislature of this state as an object worthy of their attention … We do not know of any lottery, in which the adventurer may depose his property with more entire safety, 或者对自己有更好的好处.

The first issue of the lottery apparently went well enough that a second class was authorized in 1800, 由霍金斯亲自管理. The Vermont legislature authorized both issues of the lottery benefiting 霍金斯, 而且彩票可以在州外出售. By 1801, 然而, 霍金斯 seems to have run into some trouble and the Managers of the Philanthropic Lottery advertised in the newspapers that “not having been able to extricate it [the lottery] from the difficulty and embarrassment into which it had been in卷ved by the defection of Joseph 霍金斯 … cannot … proceed to complete the drawing, 在原先提议的时间.” The Managers are unclear about what the “defection” was, but in the 15 June 1802 issue of the 马萨诸塞州汞, 霍金斯 writes “to explain away the unfavorable remarks and dishonorable reports which have been prevailing these two years past to the disadvantage of my character.显然是在获得彩票管理权之后, 霍金斯 was “called upon to discharge a heavy debt which I had contracted … long before my unhappy misfortune. I had only three days left me to determine whether I would pay the debt or suffer myself to be prosecuted.然后，他把彩票收据交给了一名上校. Storrs and hightailed it back to New York State where the debt could not be collected and found himself charged with embezzlement from the lottery for his trouble.

霍金斯后彩票时代的生活

At the smae time 霍金斯 was administering the Philanthropic Lottery in Boston, 他开始出版一本短命的文学杂志，叫做 哥伦比亚凤凰号 出版于1800年1月到7月之间. He married Hannah Washburn Sweetland that year and had three sons, born in Connecticut. 霍金斯似乎也在纽约待过一段时间, 费城, 和巴尔的摩, 从事与蒸汽动力有关的发明. He never made it to Europe to see the oculists who it was thought might have restored his sight, a trip that was supposed to have been paid for out of the lottery proceeds. However, in September 1804, newspaper advertisements for a New York City physician named Mr. Launey(或Launy)出现在各种报纸上, along with a fawning testimonial from 霍金斯 claiming that Launey’s “apparatus” had given him relief that no other physician in America had been able to. 然而，由于后来的报道总是提到霍金斯的失明. 劳尼的治疗只是暂时的.