The fire which began in the dry tree has spread to the green!
Long live thegreat Christianizing Institution!!!
FOOTNOTE:[3]The original document from which this is taken can be seen in the Appendix. It appeared in theWilmington Journal, December 18, 1850.
[3]The original document from which this is taken can be seen in the Appendix. It appeared in theWilmington Journal, December 18, 1850.
[3]The original document from which this is taken can be seen in the Appendix. It appeared in theWilmington Journal, December 18, 1850.
Clayton, at the time of the violent assault which we have described, received an injury upon the head which rendered him insensible.
When he came to himself, he was conscious at first only of a fanning of summer breezes. He opened his eyes, and looked listlessly up into the blue sky, that appeared through the thousand leafy hollows of waving boughs. Voices of birds warbling and calling, like answering echoes, to each other, fell dreamily on his ear. Some gentle hand was placing bandages around his head; and figures of women, he did not recognize, moved whisperingly around him, tending and watching.
He dropped asleep again, and thus for many hours lay in a kind of heavy trance.
Harry and Lisette had vacated, for his use, their hut; but, as it was now the splendid weather of October, when earth and sky become a temple of beauty and serenity, they tended him during the hours of the day in the open air, and it would seem as if there were no art of healing like to this. As air and heat and water all have a benevolent tendency to enter and fill up a vacuum, so we might fancy the failing vitality of the human system to receive accessions of vigor by being placed in the vicinity of the healthful growths of nature. All the trees which John saw around the river of life and heaven bore healing leaves; and there may be a sense in which the trees of our world bear leaves that are healing both to body and soul. He who hath gone out of the city, sick, disgusted, and wearied, and lain himself down in the forest, under the fatherly shadow of an oak, may have heard this whispered to him in the leafy rustlings of a thousand tongues.
* * * * * * * * * * *
"See," said Dred to Harry, as they were watching over the yet insensible form of Clayton, "how the word of the Lord is fulfilled on this people. He shall deliver them, every man into the hand of his neighbor; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey!"
"Yes," said Harry; "but this is a good man; he stands up for our rights. If he had his way, we should soon have justice done us."
"Yes," said Dred, "but it is even as it was of old; 'behold I send unto you prophets and wise men, and some of them shall ye slay. For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears have they closed. Therefore, the Lord shall bring upon this generation the blood of all the slain, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias, the son of Barachias, whom they slew between the temple and the altar.'"
* * * * * * * * * * *
After a day or two spent in a kind of listless dreaming, Clayton was so far recovered as to be able to sit up and look about him. The serene tranquillity of the lovely October skies seemed to fall like a spell upon his soul.
Amidst the wild and desolate swamp, here was an island of security, where nature took men to her sheltering bosom. A thousand birds, speaking with thousand airy voices, were calling from breezy tree-tops, and from swinging cradles of vine-leaves; white clouds sailed, in changing and varying islands, over the heavy green battlements of the woods. The wavering, slumberous sound of thousand leaves, through which the autumn air walked to and fro, consoled him. Life began to look to him like a troubled dream, forever past. His own sufferings, the hours of agony and death which he had never dared to remember, seemed now to wear a new and glorified form. Such is the divine power in which God still reveals himself through the lovely and incorruptible forms of nature.
Clayton became interested in Dred, as a psychological study. At first he was silent and reserved, but attended to the wants of his guest with evident respect and kindness. Gradually, however, the love of expression, which lies hidden in almost every soul, began to unfold itself in him, and he seemed to find pleasure in a sympathetic listener. His wild jargon of hebraisticphrases, names, and allusions, had for Clayton, in his enfeebled state, a quaint and poetic interest. He compared him, in his own mind, to one of those old rude Gothic doorways, so frequent in European cathedrals, where scriptural images, carved in rough granite, mingle themselves with a thousand wayward, fantastic freaks of architecture; and sometimes he thought, with a sigh, how much might have been accomplished by a soul so ardent and a frame so energetic, had they been enlightened and guided.
Dred would sometimes come, in the shady part of the afternoon, and lie on the grass beside him, and talk for hours in a quaint, rambling, dreamy style, through which there were occasional flashes of practical ability and shrewdness.
He had been a great traveller—a traveller through regions generally held inaccessible to human foot and eye. He had explored not only the vast swamp-girdle of the Atlantic, but the everglades of Florida, with all their strange and tropical luxuriance of growth; he had wandered along the dreary and perilous belt of sand which skirts the southern Atlantic shores, full of quicksands and of dangers, and there he had mused of the eternal secret of the tides, with whose restless, never-ceasing rise and fall the soul of man has a mysterious sympathy. Destitute of the light of philosophy and science, he had revolved in the twilight of his ardent and struggling thoughts the causes of natural phenomena, and settled these questions for himself by theories of his own. Sometimes his residence for weeks had been a stranded hulk, cast on one of these inhospitable shores, where he fasted and prayed, and fancied that answering voices came to him in the moaning of the wind and the sullen swell of the sea.
Our readers behold him now, stretched on the grass beside the hut of Harry and Lisette, in one of his calmest and most communicative moods.
The children, with Lisette and the women, were searching for grapes in a distant part of the inclosure; and Harry, with the other fugitive man, had gone to bring in certain provisions which were to have been deposited for them in a distant part of the swamp by some of their confederates on one of the plantations. Old Tiff was hoeing potatoes diligently in a spot not very far distant, and evidently listening to the conversation with an ear of shrewd attention.
"Yes," said Dred, with that misty light in his eye which one may often have remarked in the eye of enthusiasts, "the glory holds off, but it is coming! Now is the groaning time!Thatwas revealed to me when I was down at Okerecoke, when I slept three weeks in the hulk of a ship out of which all souls had perished."
"Rather a dismal abode, my friend," said Clayton, by way of drawing him on to conversation.
"The Spirit drove me there," said Dred, "for I had besought the Lord to show unto me the knowledge of things to come; and the Lord bade me to go from the habitations of men, and to seek out the desolate places of the sea, and dwell in the wreck of a ship that was forsaken, for a sign of desolation unto this people. So I went and dwelt there. And the Lord called me Amraphal, because hidden things of judgment were made known unto me. And the Lord showed unto me that even as a ship which is forsaken of the waters, wherein all flesh have died, so shall it be with the nation of the oppressor."
"How did the Lord show you this?" said Clayton, bent upon pursuing his inquiry.
"Mine ear received it in the night season," said Dred, "and I heard how the whole creation groaneth and travaileth, waiting for the adoption; and because of this he hath appointed the tide."
"I don't see the connection," said Clayton. "Why because of this?"
"Because," said Dred, "every day is full of labor, but the labor goeth back again into the seas. So that travail of all generations hath gone back, till the desire of all nations shall come, and He shall come with burning and with judgment, and with great shakings; but in the end thereof shall be peace. Wherefore, it is written that in the new heavens and the new earth there shall be no more sea."
These words were uttered with an air of solemn, assured confidence, that impressed Clayton strangely. Something in his inner nature seemed to recognize in them a shadow of things hoped for. He was in that mood into which the mind of him who strives with the evils of this world must often fall—a mood of weariness and longing; and heard within him the cry of thehuman soul, tempest-tossed and not comforted, for rest and assurance of the state where there shall be no more sea.
"So, then," he said unto Dred, "so, then, you believe that these heavens and earth shall be made new."
"Assuredly," said Dred. "And the King shall reign in righteousness. He shall deliver the needy when he crieth,—the poor and him that hath no helper. He shall redeem their souls from deceit and violence. He shall sit upon a white cloud, and the rainbow shall be round about his head. And the elect of the Lord shall be kings and priests on the earth."
"And do you think you shall be one of them?" said Clayton.
Dred gave a kind of inward groan.
"Not every one that prophesieth in his name shall be found worthy!" he said. "I have prayed the Lord, but He hath not granted me the assurance. I am the rod of his wrath, to execute vengeance on his enemies. Shall the axe magnify itself against him that lifteth it?"
The conversation was here interrupted by Harry, who, suddenly springing from the tree, came up, in a hurried and agitated manner.
"The devil is broke loose!" he said. "Tom Gordon is out, with his whole crew at his heels, beating the swamp! A more drunken, swearing, ferocious set I never saw! They have got on to the trail of poor Jim, and are tracking him without mercy!"
A dark light flashed from Dred's eye, as he sprang upon his feet.
"The voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness; yea, the wilderness of Kadesh. I will go forth and deliver him!"
He seized his rifle and shot-bag, and in a few moments was gone. It was Harry's instinct to have followed him; but Lisette threw herself, weeping, on his neck.
"Don't go—don't!" she said. "What shall we all do without you? Stay with us! You'll certainly be killed, and you can do no good!"
"Consider," said Clayton, "that you have not the familiarity with these swamps, nor the wonderful physical power of this man. It would only be throwing away your life."
The hours of that day passed gloomily. Sometimes the brutal sound of the hunt seemed to sweep near them,—the crack of rifles, the baying of dogs, the sound of oaths,—and then again all went off into silence, and nothing was heard but the innocent patter of leaf upon leaf, and the warbling of the birds, singing cheerily, ignorant of the abyss of cruelty and crime over which they sang.
Towards sunset a rustling was heard in the branches of the oak, and Dred dropped down into the inclosure, wet, and soiled, and wearied. All gathered round him, in a moment.
"Where is Jim?" asked Harry.
"Slain!" said Dred. "The archers pressed him sore and he hath fallen in the wilderness!"
There was a general exclamation of horror. Dred made a movement to sit down on the earth. He lost his balance, and fell; and they all saw now, what at first they had not noticed, a wound in his breast, from which the blood was welling. His wife fell by his side, with wild moans of sorrow. He lifted his hand, and motioned her from him.
"Peace," he said, "peace! It is enough! Behold, I go unto the witnesses who cry day and night!"
The circle stood around him in mute horror and surprise. Clayton was the first who had presence of mind to kneel and stanch the blood. Dred looked at him; his calm, large eyes filled with supernatural light.
"All over!" he said.
He put his hand calmly to his side, and felt the gushing blood. He took some in his hand and threw it upward, crying out, with wild energy, in the words of an ancient prophet,—
"Oh, earth, earth, earth! Cover thou not my blood!"
Behind the dark barrier of the woods the sun was setting gloriously. Piles of loose, floating clouds, which all day long had been moving through the sky in white and silvery stillness, now one after another took up the rosy flush, and became each one a light-bearer, filled with ethereal radiance. And the birds sang on as they ever sing, unterrified by the great wail of human sorrow.
It was evident to the little circle that He who is mightier than the kings of the earth was there, and that that splendidframe, which had so long rejoiced in the exuberance of health and strength, was now to be resolved again into the eternal elements.
"Harry," he said, "lay me beneath the heap of witness. Let the God of their fathers judge between us!"
The death of Dred fell like a night of despair on the hearts of the little fugitive circle in the swamps—on the hearts of multitudes in the surrounding plantations, who had regarded him as a prophet and a deliverer. He in whom they trusted was dead! The splendid, athletic form, so full of wild vitality, the powerful arm, the trained and keen-seeing eye, all struck down at once! The grand and solemn voice hushed, and all the splendid poetry of olden time, the inspiring symbols and prophetic dreams, which had so wrought upon his own soul, and with which he had wrought upon the souls of others, seemed to pass away with him, and to recede into the distance and become unsubstantial, like the remembered sounds of mighty winds, or solemn visions of evening clouds, in times long departed.
On that night, when the woods had ceased to reverberate the brutal sounds of baying dogs, and the more brutal profanity of drunken men; when the leaves stood still on the trees, and the forest lay piled up in the darkness like black clouds, and the morning star was standing like a calm angelic presence above them, there might have been heard in the little clearing a muffled sound of footsteps, treading heavily, and voices of those that wept with a repressed and quiet weeping, as they bore the wild chieftain to his grave beneath the blasted tree. Of the undaunted circle who had met there at the same hour many evenings before, some had dared to be present to-night; for, hearing the report of the hunt, they had left their huts on the plantations by stealth when all were asleep, and, eluding the vigilance of the patrols, the night watch which commonly guards plantations, had come to the forest to learn the fate of their friends; and bitter was the dismay and anguish which filled their souls when they learned the result. It is melancholy to reflect, that among thechildren of one Father an event which excites in one class bitterness and lamentation should in another be cause of exultation and triumph. But the world has been thousands of years and not yet learned the first two words of the Lord's Prayer; and not until all tribes and nations have learned these will his kingdom come, and his will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven.
Among those who stood around the grave, none seemed more bowed down and despairing than one whom we have before introduced to the reader, under the name of Hannibal. He was a tall and splendidly formed negro, whose large head, high forehead, and marked features, indicated resolution and intellectual ability. He had been all his life held as the property of an uneducated man, of very mean and parsimonious character, who was singularly divided in his treatment of him, by a desire to make the most of his energies and capabilities as a slave, and a fear lest they should develop so fast as to render him unfit for the condition of slavery.
Hannibal had taught himself to read and write, but the secret of the acquisition was guarded in his own bosom, as vigilantly as the traveller among thieves would conceal in his breast an inestimable diamond; for he well knew that, were these acquisitions discovered, his master's fears would be so excited as to lead him to realize at once a present sum upon him, by selling him to the more hopeless prison-house of the far south, thus separating him from his wife and family.
Hannibal was generally employed as the keeper of a ferryboat by his master, and during the hours when he was waiting for passengers found many opportunities for gratifying, in an imperfect manner, his thirst for knowledge.
Those who have always had books about them more than they could or would read know nothing of the passionate eagerness with which a repressed and starved intellect devours in secret its stolen food.
In a little chink between the logs of his ferry-house there was secreted a Bible, a copy of Robinson Crusoe, and an odd number of a northern newspaper which had been dropped from the pocket of a passenger; and when the door was shut and barred at night, and his bit of pine knot lighted, he would take these out and read them hour by hour. There he yearned after thewild freedom of the desolate island. He placed his wife and children, in imagination, in the little barricaded abode of Robinson. He hunted and made coats of skin, and gathered strange fruits from trees with unknown names, and felt himself a free man.
Over a soul so strong and so repressed it is not to be wondered at that Dred should have acquired a peculiar power. The study of the Bible had awakened in his mind that vague tumult of aspirations and hopes which it ever excites in the human breast; and he was prompt to believe that the Lord who visited Israel in Egypt had listened to the sighings of their captivity, and sent a prophet and a deliverer to his people.
Like a torch carried in a stormy night, this hope had blazed up within him; but the cold blast of death had whistled by, and it was extinguished forever.
Among the small band that stood around the dead, on the edge of the grave, he stood, looking fixedly on the face of the departed. In the quaint and shaggy mound to which Dred had attached that strange, rugged, oriental appellation,Jegar Sahadutha, or the "heap of witness," there was wildly flaring a huge pine-knot torch, whose light fell with a red, distinct glare on the prostrate form that lay there like a kingly cedar uprooted, no more to wave its branches in air, yet mighty in its fall, with all the shaggy majesty of its branches around. Whatever might have been the strife and struggle of the soul once imprisoned in that form, there was stamped upon the sombre face an expression of majestic and mournful tranquillity, as if that long-suffering and gracious God, to whose judgment he had made his last appeal, had rendered that judgment in mercy. When the statesmen and mighty men ofourrace die, though they had the weaknesses and sins of humanity, they want not orators in the church to draw the veil gently, to speak softly of their errors and loudly of their good, and to predict for them, if not an abundant entrance, yet at least a safe asylum among the blessed; and something not to be rebuked in our common nature inclines to join in a hopeful amen. It is not easy for us to believe that a great and powerful soul can be lost to God and itself forever.
But he who lies here so still and mournfully in this flickering torch-light had struggling within him the energies which makethe patriot and the prophet. Crushed beneath a mountain of ignorance, they rose blind and distorted; yet had knowledge enlightened and success crowned them, his name might have been, with that of Toussaint, celebrated in mournful sonnet by the deepest thinking poet of the age:—
"Thou hast left behindPowers that will work for thee; air, earth, and skies;There's not a breathing of the common windThat will forget thee; thou hast great allies;Thy friends are exaltations, agonies,And love, and man's unconquerable mind."
"Thou hast left behindPowers that will work for thee; air, earth, and skies;There's not a breathing of the common windThat will forget thee; thou hast great allies;Thy friends are exaltations, agonies,And love, and man's unconquerable mind."
"Thou hast left behindPowers that will work for thee; air, earth, and skies;There's not a breathing of the common windThat will forget thee; thou hast great allies;Thy friends are exaltations, agonies,And love, and man's unconquerable mind."
"Thou hast left behind
Powers that will work for thee; air, earth, and skies;
There's not a breathing of the common wind
That will forget thee; thou hast great allies;
Thy friends are exaltations, agonies,
And love, and man's unconquerable mind."
The weight of so great an affliction seemed to have repressed the usual vivacity with which the negro is wont to indulge the expression of grief. When the body was laid down by the side of the grave, there was for a time a silence so deep that the rustling of the leaves, and the wild, doleful clamor of the frogs and turtles in the swamps, and the surge of the winds in the pine-tree tops, were all that met the ear. Even the wife of the dead stood with her shawl wrapped tightly about her, rocking to and fro, as if in the extremity of grief.
An old man in the company, who had officiated sometimes as preacher among the negroes, began to sing a well-known hymn very commonly used at negro funerals, possibly because its wild and gloomy imagery has something exciting to their quick imaginations. The words rose on the night air:—
"Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound,My ears attend the cry;Ye living men, come view the groundWhere you must shortly lie."
"Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound,My ears attend the cry;Ye living men, come view the groundWhere you must shortly lie."
"Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound,My ears attend the cry;Ye living men, come view the groundWhere you must shortly lie."
"Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound,
My ears attend the cry;
Ye living men, come view the ground
Where you must shortly lie."
During the singing of this verse Hannibal stood silent, with his arms gloomily folded, his eyes fixed on the lifeless face. Gradually the sentiment seemed to inspire his soul with a kind of serene triumph; he lifted his head, and joined his deep bass voice in the singing of the second verse:—
"Princes, this clay must be your bed,In spite of all your towers;The tall, the wise, the reverend head,Must lie as low as ours."
"Princes, this clay must be your bed,In spite of all your towers;The tall, the wise, the reverend head,Must lie as low as ours."
"Princes, this clay must be your bed,In spite of all your towers;The tall, the wise, the reverend head,Must lie as low as ours."
"Princes, this clay must be your bed,
In spite of all your towers;
The tall, the wise, the reverend head,
Must lie as low as ours."
"Yes," he said, "brethren, that will be the way of it. Theytriumph and lord it over us now, but their pomp will be brought down to the grave, and the noise of their viols. The worm shall be spread under them, and the worm shall cover them; and when we come to stand together at the judgment seat, our testimony will be took there if it never was afore; and the Lord will judge atween us and our oppressors,—that's one comfort. Now, brethren, let's jest lay him in the grave, and he that's a better man, or would have done better in his place, let him judge him if he dares."
They lifted him up and laid him into the grave; and in a few moments all the mortal signs by which that soul had been known on earth had vanished, to appear no more till the great day of judgment and decision.
Clayton had not been an unsympathizing or inattentive witness of these scenes.
It is true that he knew not the whole depth of the affair; but Harry's letter and his own observations had led him, without explanation, to feel that there was a perilous degree of excitement in some of the actors in the scene before him, which, unless some escape-valve were opened, might lead to most fatal results.
The day after the funeral, he talked with Harry, wisely and kindly, assuming nothing to himself on the ground either of birth or position; showing to him the undesirableness and hopelessness, under present circumstances, of any attempt to right by force the wrongs under which his class were suffering, and opening to him and his associates a prospect of a safer way by flight to the Free States.
One can scarcely appreciate the moral resolution and force of character which could make a person in Clayton's position in society—himself sustaining, in the eye of the law, the legal relation of a slave-holder—give advice of this kind. No crime is visited with more unsparing rigor by therégimeof southern society than the aiding or abetting the escape of a slave. He who does it is tried as a negro-stealer; and in some states death, in others a long and disgraceful imprisonment in the penitentiary, is the award.
For granting the slightest assistance and succor, in cases like these,—for harboring the fugitive for even a night,—for giving him the meanest shelter and food,—persons have been stripped of their whole property, and turned out destitute upon the world. Others for no other crime, have languished years in unhealthy dungeons, and coming out at last with broken healthand wasted energies; nor has the most saintly patience and purity of character in the victim been able to lessen or mitigate the penalty.
It was therefore only by the discerning power of a mind sufficiently clear and strong to see its way through the mists of educational association, that Clayton could feel himself to be doing right in thus violating the laws and customs of the social state under which he was born. But, in addition to his belief in the inalienable right of every man to liberty, he had at this time a firm conviction that nothing but the removal of some of these minds from the oppressions which were goading them could prevent a development of bloody insurrection.
It is probable that nothing has awakened more bitterly the animosity of the slave-holding community than the existence in the Northern States of an indefinite yet very energetic institution, known asthe underground railroad; and yet, would they but reflect wisely on the things that belong to their peace, they would know that this has removed many a danger from their dwellings. One has only to become well acquainted with some of those fearless and energetic men who have found their way to freedom by its means, to feel certain that such minds and hearts would have proved, in time, an incendiary magazine under the scorching reign of slavery. But by means of this, men of that class who cannot be kept in slavery have found a road to liberty which endangered the shedding of no blood but their own; and the record of the strange and perilous means by which these escapes have been accomplished sufficiently shows the resolute nature of the men by whom they were undertaken.
It was soon agreed that a large party of fugitives should in concert effect their escape. Harry, being so white as easily to escape detection out of the immediate vicinity where he was known, assumed the task of making arrangements, for which he was amply supplied with money by Clayton.
It is well known that there are, during the greater part of the year, lumberers engaged in the cutting and making of shingles, who have extensive camps in the swamp, and live there for months at a time. These camps are made by laying foundations of logs on the spongy soil, thus forming platforms on which rude cabins are erected. In the same manner roads areconstructed into distant parts of the swamp, by means of which transportation is carried on. There is also a canal cut through the middle of the swamp, on which small sailing craft pass backwards and forwards with shingles and produce.
In the employ of these lumberers are multitudes of slaves hired from surrounding proprietors. They live here in a situation of comparative freedom, being obliged to make a certain number of staves or shingles within a stipulated time, and being furnished with very comfortable provision. Living thus somewhat in the condition of freemen, they are said to be more intelligent, energetic, and self-respecting, than the generality of slaves. The camp of the fugitives had not been without intercourse with the camp of lumberers, some five miles distant. In cases of straits they had received secret supplies from them, and one or two of the more daring and intelligent of the slave lumberers had attended some of Dred's midnight meetings. It was determined, therefore, to negotiate with one of the slaves who commanded a lighter, or small vessel, in which lumber was conveyed to Norfolk, to assist their escape.
On some consultation, however, it was found that the numbers wanting to escape were so large as not to be able, without exciting suspicion, to travel together, and it was therefore decided to make two detachments. Milly had determined to cast in her lot with the fugitives, out of regard to her grandchild, poor little Tomtit, whose utter and merry thoughtlessness formed a touching contrast to the gravity and earnestness of her affections and desires for him. He was to her the only remaining memorial of a large family, which had been torn from her by the ordinary reverses and chances of slavery; and she clung to him, therefore, with the undivided energy of her great heart. As far as her own rights were concerned, she would have made a willing surrender of them, remaining patiently in the condition wherein she was called, and bearing injustice and oppression as a means of spiritual improvement, and seeking to do what good lay in her power.
Every individual has an undoubted right, if he chooses, thus to resign the rights and privileges of his earthly birthright; but the question is a very different one when it involves the improvement and the immortal interests of those for whom the ties of blood oblige him to have care.
Milly, who viewed everything with the eye of a Christian, was far less impressed by the rigor and severity of Tom Gordon's administration than by the dreadful demoralization of character which he brought upon the plantation.
Tomtit being a bright, handsome child, his master had taken a particular fancy to him. He would have him always about his person, and treated him with the same mixture of indulgence and caprice which one would bestow upon a spaniel. He took particular pleasure in teaching him to drink and to swear, apparently for nothing else than the idle amusement it afforded him to witness the exhibition of such accomplishments in so young a child.
In vain Milly, who dared use more freedom with him than any other servant, expostulated. He laughed or swore at her, according to the state in which he happened to be. Milly, therefore, determined at once to join the flying party, and take her darling with her. Perhaps she would not have been able to accomplish this, had not what she considered a rather fortunate reverse, about this time, brought Tomtit into disgrace with his master. Owing to some piece of careless mischief which he had committed, he had been beaten with a severity as thoughtless as the indulgence he at other times received, and, while bruised and trembling from this infliction, he was fully ready to fly anywhere.
Quite unexpectedly to all parties, it was discovered that Tom Gordon's confidential servant and valet, Jim, was one of the most forward to escape. This man, from that peculiar mixture of boldness, adroitness, cunning, and drollery, which often exists among negroes, had stood for years as prime and undisputed favorite with his master; he had never wanted for money, or for anything that money could purchase; and he had had an almost unreproved liberty of saying, in an odd fashion, what he pleased, with the licensed audacity of a court buffoon.
One of the slaves expressed astonishment that he, in his favored position, should think of such a thing. Jim gave a knowing inclination of his head to one side, and said:—
"Fac' is, bredren, dis chile is jest tired of dese yer partnership concerns. I and mas'r, we has all tings in common, sure 'nough; but den I'd rather have less of 'em, and havesomething dat'smine; 'sides which, I never's going to have a wife till I can get one dat'll belong to myself; dat ar's a ting I's 'ticular 'bout."
The conspirators were wont to hold their meetings nightly in the woods, near the swamp, for purposes of concert and arrangement.
Jim had been trusted so much to come and go at his own pleasure, that he felt little fear of detection, always having some plausible excuse on hand, if inquiries were made.
It is to be confessed that he had been a very profane and irreverent fellow, often attending prayer-meetings, and other religious exercises of the negroes, for no other apparent purpose than to be able to give burlesque imitations of all the proceedings for the amusement of his master and his master's vile associates. Whenever, therefore, he was missed, he would, upon inquiry, assert, with a knowing wink, that "he had been out to de prayer-meetin'."
"Seems to me, Jim," says Tom, one morning, when he felt peculiarly ill-natured, "seems to me you are doing nothing but go to meeting, lately. I don't like it, and I'm not going to have it. Some deviltry or other you are up to, and I'm going to put a stop to it. Now, mind yourself; don't you go any more, or I'll give you——"
We shall not mention particularly what Tom was in the habit of threatening to give.
Here was a dilemma. One attendance more in the woods this very night was necessary,—was, indeed, indispensable. Jim put all his powers of pleasing into requisition. Never had he made such desperate efforts to be entertaining. He sang, he danced, he mimicked sermons, carried on mock meetings, and seemed to whip all things sacred and profane together, in one great syllabub of uproarious merriment; and this to an idle man, with a whole day upon his hands, and an urgent necessity for never having time to think, was no small affair.
Tom mentally reflected in the evening, as he lay stretched out in the veranda, smoking his cigar, what in the world he should do without Jim, to keep him in spirits; and Jim, under cover of the day's glory, had ventured to request of his master the liberty of an hour, which he employed in going to his trystin the woods. This was a bold step, considering how positively he had been forbidden to do it in the morning; but Jim heartily prayed to his own wits, the only god he had been taught to worship, to help him out once more. He was returning home, hastening, in order to be in season for his master's bed-time, hoping to escape unquestioned as to where he had been.
The appointments had all been made, and, between two and three o'clock that night, the whole party were to strike out upon their course, and ere morning to have travelled the first stage of their pilgrimage towards freedom.
Already the sense of a new nature was beginning to dawn on Jim's mind—a sense of something graver, steadier, and more manly, than the wild, frolicsome life he had been leading; and his bosom throbbed with a strange, new, unknown hope.
Suddenly, on the very boundary of the spot where the wood joins the plantation, whom should he meet but Tom Gordon, sent there as if he had been warned by his evil stars.
"Now, Lord help me! if dere is any Lord," said Jim. "Well, I's got to blaze it out now de best way I ken."
He walked directly up to his master, with his usual air of saucy assurance.
"Why, Jim," said Tom, "where have you been? I've been looking for you."
"Why, bless you, mas'r, honey, I's been out to de meetin'."
"Didn't I tell you, you dog," said Tom, with an oath, "that you were not to go to any more of those meetings?"
"Why, laws, mas'r, honey, chile, 'fore my heavenly mas'r, I done forgot every word you said!" said Jim. "I's so kind o' tumbled up and down this day, and things has been so cur'us!"
The ludicrous grimace and tone, and attitude of affected contrition, with which all this was said, rather amused Tom; and, though he still maintained an air of sternness, the subtle negro saw at once his advantage, and added, "'Clare if I isn't most dead! Ole Pomp, he preached, and he gets me so full o' grace I's fit to bust. Has to do something wicked, else I'll get translated one dese yer days, like 'Lijah, and den who'd mas'r have fur to wait on him?"
"I don't believe you've been to meeting," said Tom, eyeinghim with affected suspicion. "You've been out on some spree."
"Why, laws, mas'r, honey, you hurts my feelings! Why, now, I's in hopes you'd say you see de grace a shining out all over me. Why, I's been in a clar state of glorrufication all dis evening. Dat ar ole Pomp, dar's no mistake, he does lift a body up powerful!"
"You don't remember a word he said, now, I'll bet," said Tom. "Where was the text?"
"Text!" said Jim, with assurance; "'twas in de twenty-fourth chapter of Jerusalem, sixteenth verse."
"Well," said Tom, "what was it? I should like to know."
"Laws, mas'r, I b'lieve I can 'peat it," said Jim, with an indescribable air of waggish satisfaction. "'Twas dis yer: 'Ye shall sarch fur me in de mornin' and ye won't find me.' Dat ar's a mighty solemn text, mas'r, and ye ought to be 'flecting on't."
And Tom had occasion to reflect upon it, the next morning, when, having stormed, and sworn, and pulled until he broke the bell-wire, no Jim appeared. It was some time before he could actually realize or believe he was gone.
The ungrateful dog! The impudent puppy, who had had all his life everything he wanted, to run away from him!
Tom aroused the whole country in pursuit; and, as servants were found missing in many other plantations, there was a general excitement through the community. TheTrumpet of Libertybegan to blow dolorous notes, and articles headed, "The results of Abolitionist teaching, and covert incendiarism," began to appear. It was recommended that a general search should be made through the country for all persons tinctured with abolitionist sentiments, and immediate measures pursued to oblige them to leave the state forthwith.
One or two respectable gentlemen, who were in the habit of taking theNational Era, were visited by members of a vigilance committee, and informed that they must immediately drop the paper or leave the state; and when one of them talked of his rights as a free citizen, and inquired how they would enforce their requisitions, supposing he determined to stand for his liberty, the party informed him succinctly to the followingpurport: "If you do not comply, your corn, grain, and fodder, will be burned; your cattle driven off; and, if you still persist, your house will be set on fire and consumed, and you will never know who does it."
When the good gentleman inquired if this was freedom, his instructors informed him that freedom consisted in their right and power to make their neighbors submit to their own will and dictation; and he would find himself in a free country so far as this, that every one would feel at liberty to annoy and maltreat him so long as he opposed the popular will.
This modern doctrine of liberty has of late been strikingly and edifyingly enforced on the minds of some of our brethren and sisters in the new states, to whom the offer of relinquishing their principles or their property and lives has been tendered with the same admirable explicitness.
It is scarcely necessary to remark that both these worthy gentlemen, to use the language of their conquerors, "caved in," and thus escaped with no other disadvantage than a general plundering of their smoke-houses, the hams in which were thought a desirable addition to a triumphal entertainment proposed to be given in honor of law and order byThe Associate Bandsof theGlorious Immortal Coons, the body-guard which was Tom Gordon's instrument in all these exploits.
In fact, this association, although wanting the advantage of an ordaining prayer and a distribution of Bibles, as has been the case with some more recently sent from Southern States, to beat the missionary drum of state rights and the principles of law and order on our frontiers, yet conducted themselves in a manner which might have won them approbation even in Col. Buford's regiment, giving such exhibitions of liberty as were sufficient to justify all despots for putting it down by force for centuries to come.
Tom Gordon was the great organizer and leader of all these operations; his suspicions had connected Clayton with the disappearance of his slaves, and he followed upon his track with the sagacity of a bloodhound.
The outrage which he had perpetrated upon him in the forest, so far from being a matter of shame or concealment, was paraded as a cause for open boast and triumph. Tom rodeabout with his arm in a sling as a wounded hero, and received touching testimonials and demonstrations from sundry ladies of his acquaintance for his gallantry and spirit. When on the present occasion he found the pursuit of his slaves hopeless, his wrath and malice knew no bounds, and he determined to stir up and enkindle against Clayton to the utmost degree the animosities of the planters around his estate of Magnolia Grove.
This it was not difficult to do. We have already shown how much latent discontent and heart-burning had been excited by the course which Clayton and his sister had pursued on their estate.
Tom Gordon had a college acquaintance with the eldest son of one of the neighboring families, a young man of as reckless and dissipated habits as his own.
Hearing, therefore, that Clayton had retired to Magnolia Grove, he accepted an invitation of this young man to make him a visit, principally, as it would appear, for the purpose of instigating some mischief.
The reader next beholds Clayton at Magnolia Grove, whither he had fled to recruit his exhausted health and spirits. He had been accompanied there by Frank Russel.
Our readers may often have observed how long habits of intimacy may survive between two persons who have embarked in moral courses, which, if pursued, must eventually separate them forever.
For such is the force of moral elements, that the ambitious and self-seeking cannotalwayswalk with those who love good for its own sake. In this world, however, where all these things are imperfectly developed, habits of intimacy often subsist a long time between the most opposing affinities.
The fact was that Russel would not give up the society of Clayton. He admired the very thing in him which he wanted himself; and he comforted himself for not listening to his admonitions by the tolerance and good-nature with which he had always heard them. When he heard that he was ill, he came to him and insisted upon travelling with him, attending him with the utmost fidelity and kindness.
Clayton had not seen Anne before since his affliction—both because his time had been very much engaged, and because they who cannot speak of their sorrows often shrink from the society of those whose habits of intimacy and affection might lead them to desire such confidence. But he was not destined in his new retreat to find the peace he desired. Our readers may remember that there were intimations conveyed through his sister some time since of discontent arising in the neighborhood.
The presence of Tom Gordon soon began to make itself felt. As a conductor introduced into an electric atmosphere will drawto itself the fluid, so he became an organizing point for the prevailing dissatisfaction.
He went to dinner-parties and talked; he wrote in the nearest paper; he excited the inflammable and inconsiderate; and, before he had been there many weeks, a vigilance association was formed among the younger and more hot-headed of his associates, to search out and extirpate covert abolitionism. Anne and her brother first became sensible of an entire cessation of all those neighborly acts of kindness and hospitality, in which southern people, when in a good humor, are so abundant.
At last, one day Clayton was informed that three or four gentlemen of his acquaintance were wishing to see him in the parlor below.
On descending, he was received first by his nearest neighbor, Judge Oliver, a fine-looking elderly gentleman, of influential family connection.
He was attended by Mr. Bradshaw, whom we have already introduced to our readers, and by a Mr. Knapp, who was a very wealthy planter, a man of great energy and ability, who had for some years figured as the representative of his native state in Congress.
It was evident, by the embarrassed air of the party, that they had come on business of no pleasing character.
It is not easy for persons, however much excited they may be, to enter at once upon offensive communications to persons who receive them with calm and gentlemanly civility; therefore, after being seated, and having discussed the ordinary topics of the weather and the crops, the party looked one upon another, in a little uncertainty which should begin the real business of the interview.
"Mr. Clayton," at length said Judge Oliver, "we are really sorry to be obliged to make disagreeable communications to you. We have all of us had the sincerest respect for your family and for yourself. I have known and honored your father many years, Mr. Clayton; and, for my own part, I must say I anticipated much pleasure from your residence in our neighborhood. I am really concerned to be obliged to say anything unpleasant; but I am under the necessity of telling you that the course you have been pursuing with regard to your servants,being contrary to the laws and usages of our social institutions, can no longer be permitted among us. You are aware that the teaching of slaves to read and write is forbidden by the law, under severe penalties. We have always been liberal in the interpretation of this law. Exceptional violations, conducted with privacy and discretion, in the case of favored servants, whose general good conduct seems to merit such confidence, have from time to time existed, and passed among us without notice or opposition; but the institution of a regular system of instruction, to the extent and degree which exists upon your plantation, is a thing so directly in the face of the law, that we can no longer tolerate it; and we have determined, unless this course is dropped, to take measures to put the law into execution."
"I had paid my adopted state the compliment," said Clayton, "to suppose such laws to be a mere relic of barbarous ages, which the practical Christianity of our times would treat as a dead letter. I began my arrangements in all good faith, not dreaming that there could be found those who would oppose a course so evidently called for by the spirit of the Gospel, and the spirit of the age."
"You are entirely mistaken, sir," said Mr. Knapp, in a tone of great decision, "if you suppose these laws are, or can ever be, a matter of indifference to us, or can be suffered to become a dead letter. Sir, they are founded in the very nature of our institutions. They are indispensable to the preservation of our property, and the safety of our families. Once educate the negro population, and the whole system of our domestic institutions is at an end. Our negroes have acquired already, by living among us, a degree of sagacity and intelligence which makes it difficult to hold an even rein over them; and, once open the flood-gates of education, and there is no saying where they and we might be carried. I, for my part, do not approve of these exceptional instances Judge Oliver mentioned. Generally speaking, those negroes whose intelligence and good conduct would make them the natural recipients of such favors are precisely the ones who ought not to be trusted with them. It ruins them. Why, just look at the history of the insurrection that very nearly cut off the whole city of Charleston: what sort ofmen were those who got it up? They were just your steady, thoughtful, well-conducted men,—just the kind of men that people are teaching to read, because they think they are so good it can do no harm. Sir, my father was one of the magistrates on the trial of those men, and I have heard him say often there was not one man of bad character among them. They had all beenremarkablefor their good character. Why, there was that Denmark Vesey, who was the head of it: for twenty years he served his master, and was the most faithful creature that ever breathed; and after he got his liberty, everybody respected him, and liked him. Why, at first, my father said the magistrates could not be brought to arrest him, they were so sure that he could not have been engaged in such an affair. Now, all the leaders in that affair could read and write. They kept their lists of names; and nobody knows, or ever will know, how many were down on them, for those fellows were deep as the grave, and you could not get a word out of them. Sir, they died and made no sign; but all this is a warning to us."
"And do you think," said Clayton, "that if men of that degree of energy and intelligence are refused instruction, they will not find means to get knowledge for themselves? And if they do get it themselves, in spite of your precautions, they will assuredly use it against you.
"The fact is, gentlemen, it is inevitable that a certain degree of culture must come from their intercourse with us, and minds of a certain classwillbe stimulated to desire more; and all the barriers we put up will only serve to inflame curiosity, and will make them feel a perfect liberty to use the knowledge they conquer from us against us. In my opinion, the only sure defence against insurrection is systematic education, by which we shall acquire that influence over their minds which our superior cultivation will enable us to hold. Then, as fast as they become fitted to enjoy rights, we must grant them."
"Not we, indeed!" said Mr. Knapp, striking his cane upon the floor. "We are not going to lay down our power in that way. We will not allow any such beginning. We must hold them down firmly and consistently. For my part, I dislike even the system of oral religious instruction. It starts their minds, and leads them to want something more. It's indiscreet,and I always said so. As for teaching them out of the Bible,—why, the Bible is the most exciting book that ever was put together! It always starts up the mind, and it's unsafe."
"Don't you see," said Clayton, "what an admission you are making? What sort of a system must this be, that requires such a course to sustain it?"
"I can't help that," said Mr. Knapp. "There's millions and millions invested in it, and we can't afford to risk such an amount of property for mere abstract speculation. The system is as good as forty other systems that have prevailed, and will prevail. We can't take the frame-work of society to pieces. We must proceed with things as they are. And now, Mr. Clayton, another thing I have to say to you," said he, looking excited, and getting up and walking the floor. "It has been discovered that you receive incendiary documents through the post-office; and this cannot be permitted, sir."
The color flushed into Clayton's face, and his eye kindled as he braced himself in his chair. "By what right," he said, "does any one pry into what I receive through the post-office? Am I not a free man?"
"No, sir, you are not," said Mr. Knapp,—"not free to receive that which may imperil a whole neighborhood. You are not free to store barrels of gunpowder on your premises, when they may blow up ours. Sir, we are obliged to hold the mail under supervision in this state; and suspected persons will not be allowed to receive communications without oversight. Don't you remember that the general post-office was broken open in Charleston, and all the abolition documents taken out of the mail-bags and consumed, and a general meeting of all the most respectable citizens, headed by the clergy in their robes of office, solemnly confirmed the deed?"
"I think, Mr. Knapp," said Judge Oliver, interposing in a milder tone, "that your excitement is carrying you further than you are aware. I should rather hope that Mr. Clayton would perceive the reasonableness of our demand, and of himself forego the taking of these incendiary documents."
"I take no incendiary documents," said Clayton, warmly. "It is true I take an anti-slavery paper, edited at Washington, in which the subject is fairly and coolly discussed. I hold itno more than every man's duty to see both sides of a question."
"Well, there, now," said Mr. Knapp, "you see the disadvantage of having your slaves taught to read. If they could not read your papers, it would be no matter what you took; but to have them get to reasoning on these subjects, and spread their reasonings through our plantations,—why, there'll be the devil to pay, at once."
"You must be sensible," said Judge Oliver, "that there must be some individual rights which we resign for the public good. I have looked over the paper you speak of, and I acknowledge it seems to me very fair; but, then, in our peculiar and critical position, it might prove dangerous to have such reading about my house, and I never have it."
"In that case," said Clayton, "I wonder you don't suppress your own newspapers; for as long as there is a congressional discussion, or a Fourth of July oration, or senatorial speech in them, so long they are full of incendiary excitement. Our history is full of it, our state bills of rights are full of it, the lives of our fathers are full of it; we must suppress our whole literature, if we would avoid it."
"Now, don't you see," said Mr. Knapp, "you have stated just so many reasons why slaves must not learn to read?"
"To be sure I do," said Clayton, "if they are always to remain slaves, if we are never to have any views of emancipation for them."
"Well, theyareto remain slaves," said Mr. Knapp, speaking with excitement. "Their condition is a finality; we will not allow the subject of emancipation to be discussed, even."
"Then, God have mercy on you!" said Clayton, solemnly; "for it is my firm belief that, in resisting the progress of human freedom, you will be found fighting against God."
"It isn't the cause of human freedom," said Mr. Knapp, hastily. "They are not human; they are an inferior race, made expressly for subjection and servitude. The Bible teaches this plainly."
"Why don't you teach them to read it, then?" said Clayton, coolly.
"The long and the short of the matter is, Mr. Clayton," saidMr. Knapp, walking nervously up and down the room, "you'll find this is not a matter to be trifled with. We come, as your friends, to warn you; and, if you don't listen to our warnings, we shall not hold ourselves responsible for what may follow. You ought to have some consideration for your sister, if not for yourself."
"I confess," said Clayton, "I had done the chivalry of South Carolina the honor to think that a lady could have nothing to fear."
"It is so generally," said Judge Oliver, "but on this subject there is such a dreadful excitability in the public mind, that we cannot control it. You remember, when the commissioner was sent by the Legislature of Massachusetts to Charleston, he came with his daughter, a very cultivated and elegant young lady; but the mob was rising, and we could not control it, and we had to go and beg them to leave the city. I, for one, wouldn't have been at all answerable for the consequences, if they had remained."
"I must confess, Judge Oliver," said Clayton, "that I have been surprised, this morning, to hear South Carolinians palliating two such events in your history, resulting from mob violence, as the breaking open of the post-office, and the insult to the representative of a sister state, who came in the most peaceable and friendly spirit, and to womanhood in the person of an accomplished lady. Is this hydra-headed monster, the mob, to be our governor?"
"Oh, it is only upon this subject," said all three of the gentlemen, at once; "this subject is exceptional."
"And do you think," said Clayton, "that