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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Among the Pines, by James R. Gilmore
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Among the Pines
+       or, South in Secession Time
+
+
+Author: James R. Gilmore
+
+
+
+Release Date: October 11, 2007  [eBook #22960]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMONG THE PINES***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Garcia, Annie McGuire, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page
+images generously made available by the Kentuckiana Digital Library
+(http://kdl.kyvl.org/)
+
+
+
+Note: Images of the original pages are available through
+      Kentuckiana Digital Library. See
+      http://kdl.kyvl.org/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=kyetexts;cc=kyetexts;xc=1&idno=B96-8-34456937&view=toc
+
+
+
+
+
+AMONG THE PINES.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+A NEW WORK, Descriptive of Southern Social Life,
+BY THE AUTHOR OF AMONG THE PINES,
+Is now in course of publication in THE "CONTINENTAL MONTHLY,"
+PUBLISHED BY J. R. GILMORE, 532 Broadway, NEW YORK.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+AMONG THE PINES:
+
+or, South in Secession Time.
+
+by
+
+EDMUND KIRKE.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Tenth Thousand.
+New York: J. R. Gilmore, 532 Broadway.
+Charles T. Evans.
+1862.
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1862,
+by J. R. Gilmore,
+In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for
+the Southern District of New York.
+
+M'crea & Miller, Stereotypers.      C. A. Alvord, Printer
+
+
+
+
+TO
+RICHARD B. KIMBALL,
+
+THE ACCOMPLISHED AUTHOR, THE POLISHED GENTLEMAN,
+AND
+MY OLD AND EVER-VALUED FRIEND,
+
+THESE SKETCHES ARE DEDICATED
+BY THE
+AUTHOR.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                                                    PAGE.
+
+CHAPTER I.--ON THE ROAD.--Arrival at Georgetown.--The Village
+  Inn.--Nocturnal Adventures.--My African Driver.--His Strange
+  History.--Genuine Negro Songs.--Arrival at Bucksville.              10
+
+CHAPTER II.--WAYSIDE HOSPITALITY.--A Strange Meeting.--A Well
+  Ordered Plantation.--A Thunder-storm.--A New Guest.--The Hidden
+  Springs or Secession Exposed.--On the Way Again.--Intelligence
+  of the Negro.--Renconter with a Secessionist.                       30
+
+CHAPTER III.--CROSSING THE RUNS.--The Black Declines His
+  Freedom.--His Reasons for so Doing.--A "native"
+  Abolitionist.--Swimming the Run.--Black Spirits and
+  White.--Shelter.                                                    55
+
+CHAPTER IV.--POOR WHITES.--The Mills House.--South Carolina
+  Clay-Eaters.--Political Discussion.--President Lincoln a
+  Negro.--"Three in a Bed and one in the Middle."--$250 reward.--A
+  Secret League.                                                      69
+
+CHAPTER V.--ON THE PLANTATION.--The Planter's Dwelling.--His
+  House-Keeper.--The Process of Turpentine Making.--Loss to Carolina
+  by Secession.--The Dying Boy.--The Story of Jim.--A Northern Man
+  with Southern Principles.--Sam Murdered.--Pursuit of the Overseer.  94
+
+CHAPTER VI.--THE PLANTER'S FAMILY.--The old Nurse.--Her Story.--A
+  White Slave-Woman's Opinion of Slavery.--The Stables.--The
+  Negro-Quarters.--Sunday Exercises.--The Taking of Moye.            127
+
+CHAPTER VII.--PLANTATION DISCIPLINE.--The "Ole Cabin."--The Mode of
+  Negro Punishment.--The "Thumb-Screw."--A Ministering Angel.--A Negro
+  Trial.--A Rebellion.--A Turpentine Dealer.--A Boston Dray on its
+  Travels.                                                           150
+
+CHAPTER VIII.--THE NEGRO HUNTER.--Young Democrats.--Political
+  Discussion.--Startling Statistics.--A Freed Negro.                 169
+
+CHAPTER IX.--THE COUNTRY CHURCH.--Its Description.--The
+  "Corn-Cracker."--The News.--Strange Disclosure.                    180
+
+CHAPTER X.--THE NEGRO FUNERAL.--The Burial Ground.--A Negro
+  Sermon.--The Appearance of Juley.--The Colonel's
+  Heartlessness.--The Octoroon's Explanation of it.--The Escape
+  of Moye.                                                           196
+
+CHAPTER XI.--THE PURSUIT.--The Start.--"Carolina Race-Horses."--A
+  Race.--We Lose the Trail.--A Tornado.--A Narrow Escape.--          207
+
+CHAPTER XII.--THE YANKEE SCHOOLMISTRESS.--Our New
+  Apparel.--"Kissing Goes by Favor."--Schools at the South.          222
+
+CHAPTER XIII.--THE RAILWAY STATION.--The Village.--A Drunken
+  Yankee.--A Narrow Escape.--Andy Jones.--A Light-Wood Fire.--The
+  Colonel's Departure.                                               227
+
+CHAPTER XIV.--THE BARBACUE.--The Camp-Ground.--The
+  Stump-Speaker.--A Stump Speech.--Almost a Fight.--The
+  Manner of Roasting the Ox.                                         239
+
+CHAPTER XV.--THE RETURN.--Arrival at the Plantation.--Disappearance
+  of Juley and her child.--The Old Preacher's Story.--Scene Between
+  the Master and the Slave.                                          253
+
+CHAPTER XVI.--"ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE."--Attempted Whipping of
+  Jim.--Appearance of the "Corn-Cracker."--"Drowned.--Drowned."      260
+
+CHAPTER XVII.--THE SMALL PLANTER.--His House.--His
+  Wife.--His Negroes.--A Juvenile Darky.--Lazarus in "Ab'ram's
+  Buzzum."--White and Black Labor Compared.--The Mysteries
+  of "Rosum" manufacture.                                            277
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.--THE BURIAL OF JULE.--"He Tempers the Wind to the
+  Shorn Lamb."--The Funeral.                                         295
+
+CHAPTER XIX.--HOMEWARD BOUND.--Colonel A---- Again.--Parting with
+  Scipio.--Why this Book was Written.                                298
+
+CHAPTER XX.--CONCLUSION.--The Author's Explanations.--Last
+  News from Moye and Scipio.--Affecting Letter from
+  Andy Jones.--The End.                                              303
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+ON THE ROAD.
+
+
+Some winters ago I passed several weeks at Tallahassee, Florida, and
+while there made the acquaintance of Colonel J----, a South Carolina
+planter. Accident, some little time later, threw us together again at
+Charleston, when I was gratified to learn that he would be my _compagnon
+du voyage_ as far north as New York.
+
+He was accompanied by his body-servant, "Jim," a fine specimen of the
+genus darky, about thirty years of age, and born and reared in his
+master's family. As far as possible we made the journey by day, stopping
+at some convenient resting-place by night; on which occasions the
+Colonel, Jim, and myself would occupy the same or adjoining apartments,
+"we white folks" sleeping on four posts, while the more democratic negro
+spread his blanket on the floor. Thrown together thus intimately, it
+was but natural that we should learn much of each other.
+
+The "Colonel" was a highly cultivated and intelligent gentleman, and
+during this journey a friendship sprung up between us--afterward kept
+alive by a regular correspondence--which led him, with his wife and
+daughter, and the man Jim, to my house on his next visit at the North,
+one year later. I then promised--if I should ever again travel in South
+Carolina--to visit him on his plantation in the extreme north-eastern
+part of the state.
+
+In December last, about the time of the passage of the ordinance of
+secession, I had occasion to visit Charleston, and, previous to setting
+out, dispatched a letter to the Colonel with the information that I was
+ready to be led of him "into the wilderness." On arriving at the
+head-quarters of secession, I found a missive awaiting me, in which my
+friend cordially renewed his previous tender of hospitality, gave me
+particular directions how to proceed, and stated that his "man Jim"
+would meet me with a carriage at Georgetown, and convey me thence,
+seventy miles, to "the plantation."
+
+Having performed the business which led me to Charleston, I set out for
+the rendezvous five days before the date fixed for the meeting,
+intending to occupy the intervening time in an exploration of the
+ancient town and its surroundings.
+
+The little steamer Nina (a cross between a full-grown nautilus and a
+half-grown tub), which a few weeks later was enrolled as the first
+man-of-war of the Confederate navy, then performed the carrying trade
+between the two principal cities of South Carolina. On her, together
+with sundry boxes and bales, and certain human merchandise, I embarked
+at Charleston, and on a delicious morning, late in December, landed at
+Georgetown.
+
+As the embryo war-steamer rounded up to the long, low, rickety dock,
+lumbered breast-high with cotton, turpentine, and rosin, not a white
+face was to be seen. A few half-clad, shiftless-looking negroes,
+lounging idly about, were the only portion of the population in waiting
+to witness our landing.
+
+"Are all the people dead?" I inquired of one of them, thinking it
+strange that an event so important as the arrival of the Charleston
+packet should excite no greater interest in so quiet a town. "Not dead,
+massa," replied the black, with a knowing chuckle, "but dey'm gettin'
+ready for a fun'ral." "What funeral?" I asked. "Why, dey'm gwine to
+shoot all de boblition darkies at de Norf, and hab a brack burying; he!
+he!" and the sable gentleman expanded the opening in his countenance to
+an enormous extent, doubtless at the brilliancy of his wit.
+
+I asked him to take my portmanteau, and conduct me to the best hotel. He
+readily assented, "Yas, yas, massa, I show you whar de _big-bugs_ stop;"
+but at once turning to another darky standing near, he accosted him
+with, "Here, Jim, you lazy nigga, tote de gemman's tings."
+
+"Why don't you take them yourself?" I asked; "you will then get all the
+pay." "No, no, massa; dat nigga and me in partenship; he do de work, and
+I keeps de change," was the grinning reply, and it admirably illustrates
+a peculiarity I have observed to be universal with the negro. When left
+to his own direction, he invariably "goes into partenship" with some one
+poorer than himself, and no matter how trivial the task, shirks all the
+labor he can.
+
+The silent darky and my portmanteau in the van, and the garrulous old
+negro guarding my flank, I wended my way through the principal street to
+the hotel. On the route I resumed the conversation:
+
+"So, uncle, you say the people here are getting ready for a black
+burying?"
+
+"Yas, massa, gwine to bury all dem mis'able free niggas at de Norf."
+
+"Why? What will you do that for?"
+
+"Why for, massa! you ax why for!" he exclaimed in surprise.
+
+"I don't know," I rejoined; "I'm a stranger here."
+
+"Well, you see, massa, dem boblition niggas up dar hab gone and 'lected
+a ole darky, dey call Uncle Abe; and Old Abe he'se gwine to come down
+Souf, and cut de decent niggas' troats. He'll hab a good time--_he
+will_! My young massa's captin ob de sogers, and he'll cotch de ole
+coon, and string him up so high de crows won't scent him; yas, he
+will;" and again the old darky's face opened till it looked like the
+entrance to the Mammoth Cave. He, evidently, had read the Southern
+papers.
+
+Depositing my luggage at the hotel, which I found on a side street--a
+dilapidated, unpainted wooden building, with a female landlord--I
+started out to explore the town, till the hour for dinner. Retracing my
+steps in the direction of the steamboat landing, I found the streets
+nearly deserted, although it was the hour when the business of the day
+is usually transacted. Soon I discovered the cause. The militia of the
+place were out on parade. Preceded by a colored band, playing national
+airs--in doleful keeping with the occasion--and followed by a motley
+collection of negroes of all sexes and ages, the company was entering
+the principal thoroughfare. As it passed me, I could judge of the
+prowess of the redoubtable captain, who, according to Pompey, will hang
+the President "so high de crows won't scent him." He was a
+harmless-looking young man, with long, spindle legs, admirably adapted
+to running. Though not formidable in other respects, there _was_ a
+certain martial air about an enormous sabre which hung at his side, and
+occasionally got entangled in his nether integuments, and a fiery,
+warlike look to the heavy tuft of reddish hair which sprouted in
+bristling defiance from his upper lip.
+
+The company numbered about seventy, some with uniforms and some without,
+and bearing all sorts of arms, from the old flint-lock musket to the
+modern revolving rifle. They were, however, sturdy fellows, and looked
+as if they might do service at "the imminent deadly breach." Their full
+ranks taken from a population of less than five hundred whites, told
+unmistakably the intense war feeling of the community.
+
+Georgetown is one of the oldest towns in South Carolina, and it has a
+decidedly _finished_ appearance. Not a single building, I was informed,
+had been erected there in five years. Turpentine is one of the chief
+productions of the district; yet the cost of white lead and chrome
+yellow has made paint a scarce commodity, and the houses, consequently,
+all wear a dingy, decayed look. Though situated on a magnificent bay, a
+little below the confluence of three noble rivers, which drain a country
+of surpassing richness, and though the centre of the finest rice-growing
+district in the world, the town is dead. Every thing about it wears an
+air of dilapidation. The few white men you meet in its streets, or see
+lounging lazily around its stores and warehouses, appear to lack all
+purpose and energy. Long contact with the negro seems to have given them
+his shiftless, aimless character.
+
+The ordinance of secession passed the legislature shortly prior to my
+arrival, and, as might be expected, the political situation was the
+all-engrossing topic of thought and conversation. In the estimation of
+the whites a glorious future was about to open on the little state.
+Whether she stood alone, or supported by the other slave states, she
+would assume a high rank among the nations of the earth; her cotton and
+rice would draw trade and wealth from every land, and when she spoke,
+creation would tremble. Such overweening state pride in _such_ a
+people--shiftless, indolent, and enervated as they are--strikes a
+stranger as in the last degree ludicrous; but when they tell you, in the
+presence of the black, whose strong brawny arm and sinewy frame show
+that in him lies the real strength of the state, that this great empire
+is to be built on the shoulders of the slave, your smile of incredulity
+gives way to an expression of pity, and you are tempted to ask if those
+sinewy machines may not THINK, and some day rise, and topple down the
+mighty fabric which is to be reared on their backs!
+
+Among the "peculiar institutions" of the South are its inns. I do not
+refer to the pinchbeck, imitation St. Nicholas establishments, which
+flourish in the larger cities, but to those home-made affairs, noted for
+hog and hominy, corn-cake and waffles, which crop out here and there in
+the smaller towns, the natural growth of Southern life and institutions.
+A model of this class is the one at Georgetown. Hog, hominy, and
+corn-cake for breakfast; waffles, hog, and hominy for dinner; and hog,
+hominy, and corn-cake for supper--and such corn-cake, baked in the ashes
+of the hearth, a plentiful supply of the grayish condiment still
+clinging to it!--is its never-varying bill of fare. I endured this fare
+for a day, _how_, has ever since been a mystery to me, but when night
+came my experiences were indescribable. Retiring early, to get the rest
+needed to fit me for a long ride on the morrow, I soon realized that
+"there is no rest for the wicked," none, at least, for sinners at the
+South. Scarcely had my head touched the pillow when I was besieged by an
+army of red-coated secessionists, who set upon me without mercy. I
+withstood the assault manfully, till "bleeding at every pore," and then
+slowly and sorrowfully beat a retreat. Ten thousand to one is greater
+odds than the gallant Anderson encountered at Sumter. Yet I determined
+not to fully abandon the field. Placing three chairs in a row, I mounted
+upon them, and in that seemingly impregnable position hurled defiance at
+the enemy, in the words of Scott (slightly altered to suit the
+occasion):
+
+"Come one, come all, these chairs shall fly
+From their firm base as soon as I."
+
+My exultation, however, was of short duration. The persistent foe,
+scaling my intrenchments, soon returned to the assault with redoubled
+vigor, and in utter despair I finally fled. Groping my way through the
+hall, and out of the street-door, I departed. The Sable Brother--alias
+the Son of Ham--alias the Image of GOD carved in Ebony--alias the
+Oppressed Type--alias the Contraband--alias the Irrepressible
+Nigger--alias the Chattel--alias the Darky--alias the Cullud Pusson--had
+informed me that I should find the Big Bugs at that hotel. I had found
+them.
+
+Staying longer in such a place was out of the question, and I determined
+to make my way to the up-country without longer waiting for Jim. With
+the first streak of day I sallied out to find the means of locomotion.
+
+The ancient town boasts no public conveyance, except a one-horse gig
+that carries the mail in tri-weekly trips to Charleston. That vehicle,
+originally used by some New England doctor, in the early part of the
+past century, had but one seat, and besides, was not going the way I
+intended to take, so I was forced to seek a conveyance at a
+livery-stable. At the only livery establishment in the place, kept by a
+"cullud pusson," who, though a slave, owns a stud of horses that might,
+among a people more _movingly_ inclined, yield a respectable income, I
+found what I wanted--a light Newark buggy, and a spanking gray. Provided
+with these, and a darky driver, who was to accompany me to my
+destination, and return alone, I started. A trip of seventy miles is
+something of an undertaking in that region, and quite a crowd gathered
+around to witness our departure, not a soul of whom, I will wager, will
+ever hear the rumble of a stage-coach, or the whistle of a steam-car, in
+those sandy, deserted streets.
+
+We soon left the village, and struck a broad avenue, lined on either
+side by fine old trees, and extending in an air-line for several miles.
+The road is skirted by broad rice-fields, and these are dotted here and
+there by large antiquated houses, and little collections of negro huts.
+It was Christmas week; no hands were busy in the fields, and every thing
+wore the aspect of Sunday. We had ridden a few miles when suddenly the
+road sunk into a deep, broad stream, called, as the driver told me, the
+Black River. No appliance for crossing being at hand, or in sight, I was
+about concluding that some modern Moses accommodated travellers by
+passing them over its bed dry-shod, when a flat-boat shot out from the
+jungle on the opposite bank, and pulled toward us. It was built of
+two-inch plank, and manned by two infirm darkies, with frosted wool, who
+seemed to need all their strength to sit upright. In that leaky craft,
+kept afloat by incessant baling, we succeeded, at the end of an hour, in
+crossing the river. And this, be it understood, is travelling in one of
+the richest districts of South Carolina!
+
+We soon left the region of the rice-fields, and plunged into dense
+forests of the long-leafed pine, where for miles not a house, or any
+other evidence of human occupation, is to be seen. Nothing could well be
+more dreary than a ride through such a region, and to while away the
+tedium of the journey I opened a conversation with the driver, who up to
+that time had maintained a respectful silence.
+
+He was a genuine native African, and a most original and interesting
+specimen of his race. His thin, close-cut lips, straight nose and
+European features contrasted strangely with a skin of ebon blackness,
+and the quiet, simple dignity of his manner betokened superior
+intelligence. His story was a strange one. When a boy, he was with his
+mother, kidnapped by a hostile tribe, and sold to the traders at Cape
+Lopez, on the western coast of Africa. There, in the slave-pen, the
+mother died, and he, a child of seven years, was sent in the slave-ship
+to Cuba. At Havana, when sixteen, he attracted the notice of a gentleman
+residing in Charleston, who bought him and took him to "the States." He
+lived as house-servant in the family of this gentleman till 1855, when
+his master died, leaving him a legacy to a daughter. This lady, a kind,
+indulgent mistress, had since allowed him to "hire his time," and he
+then carried on an "independent business," as porter, and doer of all
+work around the wharves and streets of Georgetown. He thus gained a
+comfortable living, besides paying to his mistress one hundred and fifty
+dollars yearly for the privilege of earning his own support. In every
+way he was a remarkable negro, and my three days' acquaintance with him
+banished from my mind all doubt as to the capacity of the black for
+freedom, and all question as to the disposition of the slave to strike
+off his chains when the favorable moment arrives. From him I learned
+that the blacks, though pretending ignorance, are fully acquainted with
+the questions at issue in the pending contest. He expressed the opinion,
+that war would come in consequence of the stand South Carolina had
+taken; and when I said to him: "But if it comes you will be no better
+off. It will end in a compromise, and leave you where you are." He
+answered: "No, massa, 't wont do dat. De Souf will fight hard, and de
+Norf will get de blood up, and come down har, and do 'way wid de _cause_
+ob all de trubble--and dat am de nigga."
+
+"But," I said, "perhaps the South will drive the North back; as you say,
+they will fight hard."
+
+"Dat dey will, massa, dey'm de fightin' sort, but dey can't whip de
+Norf, 'cause you see dey'll fight wid only one hand. When dey fight de
+Norf wid de right hand, dey'll hev to hold de nigga wid de leff."
+
+"But," I replied, "the blacks wont rise; most of you have kind masters
+and fare well."
+
+"Dat's true, massa, but dat an't freedom, and de black lub freedom as
+much as de white. De same blessed LORD made dem both, and HE made dem
+all 'like, 'cep de skin. De blacks hab strong hands, and when de day
+come you'll see dey hab heads, too!"
+
+Much other conversation, showing him possessed of a high degree of
+intelligence, passed between us. In answer to my question if he had a
+family, he said: "No, sar. My blood shall neber be slaves! Ole massa
+flog me and threaten to kill me 'cause I wouldn't take to de wimmin; but
+I tole him to kill, dat 't would be more his loss dan mine."
+
+I asked if the negroes generally felt as he did, and he told me that
+many did; that nearly all would fight for their freedom if they had the
+opportunity, though some preferred slavery because they were sure of
+being cared for when old and infirm, not considering that if their
+labor, while they were strong, made their masters rich, the same labor
+would afford _them_ provision against old age. He told me that there are
+in the _district_ of Georgetown twenty thousand blacks, and not more
+than two thousand whites, and "Suppose," he added, "dat one-quarter ob
+dese niggas rise--de rest keep still--whar den would de white folks be?"
+
+"Of course," I replied, "they would be taken at a disadvantage; but it
+would not be long before aid came from Charleston, and you would be
+overpowered."
+
+"No, massa, de chivarly, as you call dem, would be 'way in Virginny, and
+'fore dey hard of it Massa Seward would hab troops 'nough in Georgetown
+to chaw up de hull state in less dan no time."
+
+"But you have no leaders," I said, "no one to direct the movement. Your
+race is not a match for the white in generalship, and without generals,
+whatever your numbers, you would fare hardly."
+
+To this he replied, an elevated enthusiasm lighting up his face, "De
+LORD, massa, made generals ob Gideon and David, and de brack man know as
+much 'bout war as dey did; p'raps," he added, with a quiet humor, "de
+brack aint equal to de white. I knows most ob de great men, like
+Washington and John and James and Paul, and dem ole fellers war white,
+but dar war Two Sand (Tousaint L'Overture), de Brack Douglass, and de
+Nigga Demus (Nicodemus), dey war brack."
+
+The argument was unanswerable, and I said nothing. If the day which sees
+the rising of the Southern blacks comes to this generation, that negro
+will be among the leaders. He sang to me several of the songs current
+among the negroes of the district, and though of little poetic value,
+they interested me, as indicating the feelings of the slaves. The blacks
+are a musical race, and the readiness with which many of them improvise
+words and melody is wonderful; but I had met none who possessed the
+readiness of my new acquaintance. Several of the tunes he repeated
+several times, and each time with a new accompaniment of words. I will
+try to render the sentiment of a few of these songs into as good negro
+dialect as I am master of, but I cannot hope to repeat the precise
+words, or to convey the indescribable humor and pathos which my darky
+friend threw into them, and which made our long, solitary ride through
+those dreary pine-barrens pass rapidly and pleasantly away. The first
+referred to an old darky who was transplanted from the cotton-fields of
+"ole Virginny" to the rice-swamps of Carolina, and who did not like the
+change, but found consolation in the fact that rice is not grown on "the
+other side of Jordan."
+
+        "Come listen, all you darkies, come listen to my song,
+         It am about ole Massa, who use me bery wrong.
+         In de cole, frosty mornin', it an't so bery nice,
+         Wid de water to de middle to hoe among de rice;
+               When I neber hab forgotten
+               How I used to hoe de cotton,
+               How I used to hoe de cotton,
+                  On de ole Virginny shore;
+               But I'll neber hoe de cotton,
+               Oh! neber hoe de cotton
+                  Any more.
+
+        "If I feel de drefful hunger, he tink it am a vice,
+         And he gib me for my dinner a little broken rice,
+         A little broken rice and a bery little fat--
+         And he grumble like de debil if I eat too much of dat;
+                 When I neber hab forgotten, etc.
+
+        "He tore me from my DINAH; I tought my heart would burst--
+         He made me lub anoder when my lub was wid de first,
+         He sole my picaninnies becase he got dar price,
+         And shut me in de marsh-field to hoe among de rice;
+                 When I neber had forgotten, etc.
+
+        "And all de day I hoe dar, in all de heat and rain,
+         And as I hoe away dar, my heart go back again,
+         Back to de little cabin dat stood among de corn,
+         And to de ole plantation where she and I war born!
+                 Oh! I wish I had forgotten, etc.
+
+        "Den DINAH am beside me, de chil'ren on my knee,
+         And dough I am a slave dar, it 'pears to me I'm free,
+         Till I wake up from my dreaming, and wife and chil'ren gone,
+         I hoe away and weep dar, and weep dar all alone!
+                 Oh! I wish I had forgotten, etc.
+
+        "But soon a day am comin, a day I long to see,
+         When dis darky in de cole ground, foreber will be free,
+         When wife and chil'ren wid me, I'll sing in Paradise,
+         How HE, de blessed JESUS, hab bought me wid a price.
+                 How de LORD hab not forgotten
+                 How well I hoed de cotton,
+                 How well I hoed de cotton
+                     On de ole Virginny shore;
+                 Dar I'll neber hoe de cotton,
+                 Oh! neber hoe de cotton
+                     Any more."
+
+The politics of the following are not exactly those of the rulers at
+Washington, but we all may come to this complexion at last:
+
+        "Hark! darkies, hark! it am de drum
+         Dat calls ole Massa 'way from hum,
+         Wid powder-pouch and loaded gun,
+         To drive ole ABE from Washington;
+             Oh! Massa's gwine to Washington,
+             So clar de way to Washington--
+             Oh! wont dis darky hab sum fun
+             When Massa's gwine to Washington!
+
+        "Dis darky know what Massa do;
+         He take him long to brack him shoe,
+         To brack him shoe and tote him gun,
+         When he am 'way to Washington.
+             Oh! Massa's gwine to Washington,
+             So clar de way to Washington,
+             Oh! long afore de mornin' sun
+             Ole Massa's gwine to Washington!
+
+        "Ole Massa say ole ABE will eat
+         De niggas all excep' de feet--
+         De feet, may be, will cut and run,
+         When Massa gets to Washington,
+             When Massa gets to Washington;
+             So clar de way to Washington--
+             Oh! wont dis darky cut and run
+             When Massa gets to Washington!
+
+        "Dis nigga know ole ABE will save
+         His brudder man, de darky slave,
+         And dat he'll let him cut and run
+         When Massa gets to Washington,
+             When Massa gets to Washington;
+             So clar de way to Washington,
+             Ole ABE will let the darkies run
+             When Massa gets to Washington."
+
+The next is in a similar vein:
+
+        "A storm am brewin' in de Souf,
+           A storm am brewin' now,
+         Oh! hearken den and shut your mouf,
+           And I will tell you how:
+         And I will tell you how, ole boy,
+           De storm of fire will pour,
+         And make de darkies dance for joy,
+           As dey neber danced afore:
+         So shut your mouf as close as deafh,
+         And all you niggas hole your breafh,
+           And I will tell you how.
+
+        "De darkies at de Norf am ris,
+           And dey am comin' down--
+         Am comin' down, I know dey is,
+           To do de white folks brown!
+         Dey'll turn ole Massa out to grass,
+           And set de niggas free,
+         And when dat day am come to pass
+           We'll all be dar to see!
+         So shut your mouf as close as deafh,
+         And all you niggas hole your breafh,
+           And do de white folks brown!
+
+
+        "Den all de week will be as gay
+           As am de Chris'mas time;
+         We'll dance all night and all de day,
+           And make de banjo chime--
+         And make de banjo chime, I tink,
+           And pass de time away,
+         Wid 'nuf to eat and 'nuf to drink,
+           And not a bit to pay!
+         So shut your mouf as dose as deafh.
+         And all you niggas hole your breaf,
+           And make de banjo chime.
+
+        "Oh! make de banjo chime, you nigs,
+           And sound de tamborin,
+         And shuffle now de merry jigs,
+           For Massa's 'gwine in'--
+         For Massa's 'gwine in,' I know,
+           And won't he hab de shakes,
+         When Yankee darkies show him how
+           Dey cotch de rattle-snakes![A]
+         So shut your mouf as close as deafh,
+         And all you niggas hole your breaf,
+           For Massa's 'gwine in'--
+         For Massa's 'gwine in,' I know,
+           And won't he hab de shakes
+         When Yankee darkies show him how
+           Dey cotch de rattle-snakes!"
+
+The reader must not conclude that my darky acquaintance is an average
+specimen of his class. Far from it. Such instances of intelligence are
+very rare, and are never found except in the cities. There, constant
+intercourse with the white renders the black shrewd and intelligent, but
+on the plantations, the case is different. And besides, my musical
+friend, as I have said, is a native African. Fifteen years of
+observation have convinced me that the imported negro, after being
+brought in contact with the white, is far more intelligent than the
+ordinary Southern-born black. Slavery cramps the intellect and dwarfs
+the nature of a man, and where the dwarfing process has gone on, in
+father and son, for two centuries, it must surely be the case--as surely
+as that the qualities of the parent are transmitted to the child--that
+the later generations are below the first. This deterioration in the
+better nature of the slave is the saddest result of slavery. His moral
+and intellectual degradation, which is essential to its very existence,
+constitutes the true argument against it. It feeds the body but starves
+the soul. It blinds the reason, and shuts the mind to truth. It degrades
+and brutalizes the whole being, and does it purposely. In that lies its
+strength, and in that, too, lurks the weakness which will one day topple
+it down with a crash that will shake the Continent. Let us hope the
+direful upheaving, which is now felt throughout the Union, is the
+earthquake that will bury it forever.
+
+The sun was wheeling below the trees which skirted the western horizon,
+when we halted in the main road, abreast of one of those by-paths, which
+every traveller at the South recognizes as leading to a planter's
+house. Turning our horse's head, we pursued this path for a short
+distance, when emerging from the pine-forest, over whose sandy barrens
+we had ridden all the day, a broad plantation lay spread out before us.
+On one side was a row of perhaps forty small but neat cabins; and on the
+other, at the distance of about a third of a mile, a huge building,
+which, from the piles of timber near it, I saw was a lumber-mill. Before
+us was a smooth causeway, extending on for a quarter of a mile, and
+shaded by large live-oaks and pines, whose moss fell in graceful drapery
+from the gnarled branches. This led to the mansion of the proprietor, a
+large, antique structure, exhibiting the dingy appearance which all
+houses near the lowlands of the South derive from the climate, but with
+a generous, hospitable air about its wide doors and bulky windows, that
+seemed to invite the traveller to the rest and shelter within. I had
+stopped my horse, and was absorbed in contemplation of a scene as
+beautiful as it was new to me, when an old negro approached, and
+touching his hat, said: "Massa send his complimens to de gemman, and
+happy to hab him pass de night at Bucksville."
+
+"Bucks_ville_!" I exclaimed, "and where is the village?"
+
+"Dis am it, massa; and it am eight mile and a hard road to de 'Boro"
+(meaning Conwayboro, a one-horse village at which I had designed to
+spend the night). "Will de gemman please ride up to de piazza?"
+continued the old negro.
+
+"Yes, uncle, and thank you," and in a moment I had received the cordial
+welcome of the host, an elderly gentleman, whose easy and polished
+manners reminded me of the times of our grandfathers in glorious New
+England. A few minutes put me on a footing of friendly familiarity with
+him and his family, and I soon found myself in a circle of daughters and
+grandchildren, and as much at home as if I had been a long-expected
+guest.
+
+[Footnote A: The emblem of South Carolina.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+WAYSIDE HOSPITALITY.
+
+
+Years ago--how many it would not interest the reader to know, and might
+embarrass me to mention--accompanied by a young woman--a blue-eyed,
+golden-haired daughter of New-England--I set out on a long journey; a
+journey so long that it will not end till one or the other of us has
+laid off forever the habiliments of travel.
+
+One of the first stations on our route was--Paris. While there,
+strolling out one morning alone, accident directed my steps to the _Arc
+d'Etoile_, that magnificent memorial of the greatness of a great man.
+Ascending its gloomy staircase to the roof, I seated myself, to enjoy
+the fine view it affords of the city and its environs.
+
+I was shortly joined by a lady and gentleman, whose appearance indicated
+that they were Americans. Some casual remark led us into a conversation,
+and soon, to our mutual surprise and gratification, we learned that the
+lady was a dear and long-time friend of my travelling-companion. The
+acquaintance thus begun, has since grown into a close and abiding
+friendship.
+
+The reader, with this preamble, can readily imagine my pleasure on
+learning, as we were seated after our evening meal, around that pleasant
+fireside in far-off Carolina, that my Paris acquaintance was a favorite
+niece, or, as he warmly expressed it, "almost a daughter" of my host.
+This discovery dispelled any lingering feeling of "strangeness" that had
+not vanished with the first cordial greeting of my new-found friends,
+and made me perfectly "at home."
+
+The evening wore rapidly away in a free interchange of "news," opinions,
+and "small-talk," and I soon gathered somewhat of the history of my
+host. He was born at the North, and his career affords a striking
+illustration of the marvellous enterprise of our Northern character. A
+native of the State of Maine, he emigrated thence when a young man, and
+settled down, amid the pine-forest in that sequestered part of
+Cottondom. Erecting a small saw-mill, and a log shanty to shelter
+himself and a few "hired" negroes, he attacked, with his own hands, the
+mighty pines, whose brothers still tower in gloomy magnificence around
+his dwelling.
+
+From such beginnings he had risen to be one of the wealthiest land and
+slave owners of his district, with vessels trading to nearly every
+quarter of the globe, to the Northern and Eastern ports, Cadiz, the West
+Indies, South America, and if I remember aright, California. It seemed
+to me a marvel that this man, alone, and unaided by the usual appliances
+of commerce, had created a business, rivalling in extent the
+transactions of many a princely merchant of New York and Boston.
+
+His "family" of slaves numbered about three hundred, and a more healthy,
+and to all appearance, happy set of laboring people, I had never seen.
+Well fed, comfortably and almost neatly clad, with tidy and well-ordered
+homes, exempt from labor in childhood and advanced age, and cared for in
+sickness by a kind and considerate mistress, who is the physician and
+good Samaritan of the village, they seemed to share as much physical
+enjoyment as ordinarily falls to the lot of the "hewer of wood and
+drawer of water." Looking at them, I began to question if Slavery is, in
+reality, the damnable thing that some untravelled philanthropists have
+pictured it. If--and in that "_if_" my good Abolition friend, is the
+only unanswerable argument against the institution--if they were taught,
+if they knew their nature and their destiny, the slaves of such an owner
+might unprofitably exchange situations with many a white man, who, with
+nothing in the present or the future, is desperately struggling for a
+miserable hand-to-mouth existence in our Northern cities. I say "of such
+an owner," for in the Southern Arcadia such masters are "few and far
+between"--rather fewer and farther between than "spots upon the sun."
+
+But they are _not_ taught. Public sentiment, as well as State law,
+prevents the enlightened master, who would fit the slave by knowledge
+for greater usefulness, from letting a ray of light in upon his darkened
+mind. The black knows his task, his name, and his dinner-hour. He knows
+there is a something within him--he does not understand precisely
+what--that the white man calls his soul, which he is told will not rest
+in the ground when his body is laid away in the grave, but will--if he
+is a "good nigger," obeys his master, and does the task allotted
+him--travel off to some unknown region, and sing hallelujahs to the
+LORD, forever. He rather sensibly imagines that such everlasting singing
+may in time produce hoarseness, so he prepares his vocal organs for the
+long concert by a vigorous discipline while here, and at the same time
+cultivates instrumental music, having a dim idea that the LORD has an
+ear for melody, and will let him, when he is tired of singing, vary the
+exercise "wid de banjo and de bones." This is all he knows; and his
+owner, however well-disposed he may be, cannot teach him more. Noble,
+Christian masters whom I have met--have told me that they did not _dare_
+instruct their slaves. Some of their negroes were born in their houses,
+nursed in their families, and have grown up the playmates of their
+children, and yet they are forced to see them live and die like the
+brutes. One need not be accused of fanatical abolitionism if he deems
+such a system a _little_ in conflict with the spirit of the nineteenth
+century!
+
+The sun had scarcely turned his back upon the world, when a few drops of
+rain, sounding on the piazza-roof over our heads, announced a coming
+storm. Soon it burst upon us in magnificent fury--a real, old-fashioned
+thunderstorm, such as I used to lie awake and listen to when a boy,
+wondering all the while if the angels were keeping a Fourth of July in
+heaven. In the midst of it, when the earth and the sky appeared to have
+met in true Waterloo fashion, and the dark branches of the pines seemed
+writhing and tossing in a sea of flame, a loud knock came at the
+hall-door (bells are not the fashion in Dixie), and a servant soon
+ushered into the room a middle-aged, unassuming gentleman, whom my host
+received with a respect and cordiality which indicated that he was no
+ordinary guest. There was in his appearance and manner that indefinable
+something which denotes the man of mark; but my curiosity was soon
+gratified by an introduction. It was "Colonel" A----. This title, I
+afterward learned, was merely honorary: and I may as well remark here,
+that nearly every one at the South who has risen to the ownership of a
+negro, is either a captain, a major, or a colonel, or, as my ebony
+driver expressed it: "Dey'm all captins and mates, wid none to row de
+boat but de darkies." On hearing the name, I recognized it as that of
+one of the oldest and most aristocratic South Carolina families, and the
+new guest as a near relative to the gentleman who married the beautiful
+and ill-fated Theodosia Burr.
+
+In answer to an inquiry of my host, the new-comer explained that he had
+left Colonel J----'s (the plantation toward which I was journeying),
+shortly before noon, and being overtaken by the storm after leaving
+Conwayboro, had, at the solicitation of his "boys" (a familiar term for
+slaves), who were afraid to proceed, called to ask shelter for the
+night.
+
+Shortly after his entrance, the lady members of the family retired; and
+then the "Colonel," the "Captain," and myself, drawing our chairs near
+the fire, and each lighting a fragrant Havana, placed on the table by
+our host, fell into a long conversation, of which the following was a
+part:
+
+"It must have been urgent business, Colonel, that took you so far into
+the woods at this season," remarked our host.
+
+"These are urgent times, Captain B----," replied the guest. "All who
+have any thing at stake, should be _doing_."
+
+"These _are_ unhappy times, truly," said my friend; "has any thing new
+occurred?"
+
+"Nothing of moment, sir; but we are satisfied Buchanan is playing us
+false, and are preparing for the worst."
+
+"I should be sorry to know that a President of the United States had
+resorted to underhand measures! Has he really given you pledges?"
+
+"He promised to preserve the _statu quo_ in Charleston harbor, and we
+have direct information that he intends to send out reinforcements,"
+rejoined Colonel A----.
+
+"Can that be true? You know, Colonel, I never admired your friend, Mr.
+Buchanan, but I cannot see how, if he does his duty, he can avoid
+enforcing the laws in Charleston, as well as in the other cities of the
+Union."
+
+"The 'Union,' sir, does not exist. Buchanan has now no more right to
+quarter a soldier in South Carolina than I have to march an armed force
+on to Boston Common. If he persists in keeping troops near Charleston,
+we shall dislodge them."
+
+"But that would make war! and war, Colonel," replied our host, "would be
+a terrible thing. Do you realize what it would bring upon us? And what
+could our little State do in a conflict with nearly thirty millions?"
+
+"We should not fight with thirty millions. The other Cotton States are
+with us, and the leaders in the Border States are pledged to Secession.
+They will wheel into line when we give the word. But the North will not
+fight. The Democratic party sympathizes with us, and some of its
+influential leaders are pledged to our side. They will sow division
+there, and paralyze the Free States; besides, the trading and
+manufacturing classes will never consent to a war that will work their
+ruin. With the Yankees, sir, the dollar is almighty."
+
+"That may be true," replied our host; "but I think if we go too far,
+they will fight. What think you, Mr. K----?" he continued, appealing to
+me, and adding: "This gentleman, Colonel, is very recently from the
+North."
+
+Up to that moment, I had avoided taking part in the conversation. Enough
+had been said to satisfy me that while my host was a staunch
+Unionist,[B] his visitor was not only a rank Secessionist, but one of
+the leaders of the movement, and even then preparing for desperate
+measures. Discretion, therefore, counselled silence. To this direct
+appeal, however, I was forced to reply, and answered: "I think, sir, the
+North does not yet realize that the South is in earnest. When it wakes
+up to that fact, its course will be decisive."
+
+"Will the Yankees _fight_, sir?" rather impatiently and imperiously
+asked the Colonel, who evidently thought I intended to avoid a direct
+answer to the question.
+
+Rather nettled by his manner, I quickly responded: "Undoubtedly they
+will, sir. They have fought before, and it would not be wise to count
+them cowards."
+
+A true gentleman, he at once saw that his manner had given offence, and
+instantly moderating his tone, rather apologetically replied: "Not
+cowards, sir, but too much absorbed in the 'occupations of peace,' to go
+to war for an idea."
+
+"But what you call an 'idea,'" said our host, "_they_ may think a great
+fact on which their existence depends. _I_ can see that we will lose
+vastly by even a peaceful separation. Tell me, Colonel, what we will
+gain?"
+
+"Gain!" warmly responded the guest. "Everything! Security, freedom, room
+for the development of our institutions, and each progress in wealth as
+the world has never seen."
+
+"All that is very fine," rejoined the "Captain," "but where there is
+wealth, there must be work; and who will do the work in your new
+Empire--I do not mean the agricultural labor; you will depend for that,
+of coarse, on the blacks--but who will run your manufactories and do
+your mechanical labor? The Southern gentleman would feel degraded by
+such occupation; and if you put the black to any work requiring
+intelligence, you must let him _think_, and when he THINKS, _he is
+free_!"
+
+"All that is easily provided for," replied the Secessionist. "We shall
+form intimate relations with England. She must have our cotton, and we
+in return will take her manufactures."
+
+"That would be all very well at present, and so long as you should keep
+on good terms with her; but suppose, some fine morning, Exeter Hall got
+control of the English Government, and hinted to you, in John Bull
+fashion, that cotton produced by free labor would be more acceptable,
+what could three, or even eight millions, cut off from the sympathy and
+support of the North, do in opposition to the power of the British
+empire?"
+
+"Nothing, perhaps, if we _were_ three or even eight millions, but we
+shall be neither one nor the other. Mexico and Cuba are ready, now, to
+fall into our hands, and before two years have passed, with or without
+the Border States, we shall count twenty millions. Long before England
+is abolitionized, our population will outnumber hers, and our territory
+extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and as far south as the
+Isthmus. We are founding, sir, an empire that will be able to defy all
+Europe--one grander than the world has seen since the age of Pericles!"
+
+"You say, with or without the Border States," remarked our host. "I
+thought you counted on their support."
+
+"We do if the North makes war upon us, but if allowed to go in peace, we
+can do better without them. They will be a wall between us and the
+abolitionized North."
+
+"You mistake," I said, "in thinking the North is abolitionized. The
+Abolitionists are but a handful there. The great mass of our people are
+willing the South should have undisturbed control of its domestic
+concerns."
+
+"Why, then, do you send such men as Seward, Sumner, Wilson, and Grow to
+Congress? Why have you elected a President who approves of
+nigger-stealing? and why do you tolerate such incendiaries as Greeley,
+Garrison, and Phillips?"
+
+"Seward, and the others you name," I replied, "are not Abolitionists;
+neither does Lincoln approve of nigger-stealing. He is an honest man,
+and I doubt not, when inaugurated, will do exact justice by the South.
+As to incendiaries, you find them in both sections. Phillips and
+Garrison are only the opposite poles of Yancey and Wise."
+
+"Not so, sir; they are more. Phillips, Greeley, and Garrison create and
+control your public opinion. They are mighty powers, while Yancey and
+Wise have no influence whatever. Yancey is a mere bag-pipe; we play upon
+him, and like the music, but smile when he attempts to lead us. Wise is
+a harlequin; we let him dance because he is good at it, and it amuses
+us. Lincoln may be honest, but if made President he will be controlled
+by Seward, who hates the South. Seward will whine, and wheedle, and
+attempt to cajole us back, but mark what I say, sir, I _know_ him; he is
+physically, morally, and constitutionally a COWARD, and will never
+strike a blow for the UNION. If hard pressed by public sentiment, he
+may, to save appearances, bluster a little, and make a show of getting
+ready for a fight; but he will find some excuse at the last moment, and
+avoid coming to blows. For our purposes, we had rather have the North
+under his control than under that of the old renegade, Buchanan!"
+
+"All this may he very true," I replied, "but perhaps you attach too much
+weight to what Mr. Seward or Mr. Lincoln may or may not do. You seem to
+forget that there are twenty intelligent millions at the North, who will
+have something to say on this subject, and who may not consent to be
+driven into disunion by the South, or wheedled into it by Mr. Seward."
+
+"I do not forget," replied the Secessionist, "that you have four
+millions of brave, able-bodied men, while we have not, perhaps, more
+than two millions; but bear in mind that you are divided, and therefore
+weak; we united, and therefore strong!"
+
+"But," I inquired, "_have_ you two millions without counting your
+blacks; and are _they_ not as likely to fight on the wrong as on the
+right side?"
+
+"They will fight on the right side, sir. We can trust them. You have
+travelled somewhat here. Have you not been struck with the contentment
+and cheerful subjection of the slaves?"
+
+"No, sir, I have not been! On the contrary, their discontent is evident.
+You are smoking a cigar on a powder-barrel."
+
+An explosion of derisive laughter from the Colonel followed this remark,
+and turning to the Captain, he good-humoredly exclaimed: "Hasn't the
+gentleman used his eyes and ears industriously!"
+
+"I am afraid he is more than half right," was the reply. "If this thing
+should go on, I would not trust my own slaves, and I think they are
+truly attached to me. If the fire once breaks out, the negroes will rush
+into it, like horses into a burning barn."
+
+"Think you so!" exclaimed the Colonel in an excited manner. "By Heaven,
+if I believed it, I would cut the throat of every slave in Christendom!
+What," addressing me, "have you seen or heard, sir, that gives you that
+opinion?"
+
+"Nothing but a sullen discontent and an eagerness for news, which show
+they feel intense interest in what is going on, and know it concerns
+_them_."
+
+"I haven't remarked that," he said rather musingly, "but it _may_ be so.
+Does the North believe it? If we came to blows, would they try to excite
+servile insurrection among us?"
+
+"The North, beyond a doubt, believes it," I replied, "yet I think even
+the Abolitionists would aid you in putting down an insurrection; but
+war, in my opinion, would not leave you a slave between the Rio Grande
+and the Potomac."
+
+The Colonel at this rose, remarking: "You are mistaken. You are
+mistaken, sir!" then turning to our host, said: "Captain, it is late:
+had we not better retire?" Bidding me "good-night," he was gone.
+
+Our host soon returned from showing the guest to his apartment, and with
+a quiet but deliberate manner, said to me: "You touched him, Mr. K----,
+on a point where he knows we are weakest; but allow me to caution you
+about expressing your opinions so freely. The Colonel is a gentleman,
+and what you have said will do no harm, but, long as I have lived here,
+_I_ dare not say to many what you have said to him to-night."
+
+Thanking the worthy gentleman for the caution, I followed him up stairs,
+and soon lost, in a sweet oblivion, all thoughts of Abolitionists,
+niggers, and the "grand empire."
+
+I was awakened in the morning by music under my window, and looking out
+discovered about a dozen darkies gathered around my ebony driver, who
+was clawing away with all his might at a dilapidated banjo, while his
+auditory kept time to his singing, by striking the hand on the knee, and
+by other gesticulations too numerous to mention. The songs were not much
+to boast of, but the music was the genuine, dyed-in-the-wool, darky
+article. The following was the refrain of one of the songs, which the
+reader will perceive was an exhortation to early rising:
+
+        "So up, good massa, let's be gwoin',
+           Let's be scratchin' ob de grabble;
+         For soon de wind may be a blowin',
+           An' we'se a sorry road to trabble."
+
+The storm of the previous night had ceased, but the sky was overcast,
+and looked as if "soon de wind might be a-blowin'." Prudence counselled
+an early start, for, doubtless, the runs, or small creeks, had become
+swollen by the heavy rain, and would be unsafe to cross after dark.
+Besides, beyond Conwayboro, our route lay for thirty miles through a
+country without a solitary house where we could get decent shelter, were
+we overtaken by a storm.
+
+Hurriedly performing my toilet, I descended to the drawing-room, where I
+found the family assembled. After the usual morning salutations were
+exchanged, a signal from the mistress caused the sounding of a bell in
+the hall, and some ten or twelve men and women house-servants, of
+remarkably neat and tidy appearance, among whom was my darky driver,
+entered the apartment. They took a stand at the remote end of the room,
+and our host, opening a large, well-worn family BIBLE, read the
+fifty-fourth chapter of Isaiah. Then, all kneeling, he made a short
+extemporaneous petition, closing with the LORD'S Prayer; all present,
+black as well as white, joining in it. Then Heber's beautiful hymn,
+"From Greenland's icy mountains," was sung; the negroes, to my ear,
+making much better music than the whites.
+
+The services over, we adjourned to the dining-room, and after we were
+seated, the "Colonel" remarked to me: "Did you notice how finely that
+negro 'boy' (he was fully forty years old) sung?"
+
+"Yes," I replied, "I did. Do you know him, sir?"
+
+"Oh! yes, very well. His mistress wishes to sell him, but finds
+difficulty in doing so. Though a likely negro, people will not buy him.
+He's too smart."
+
+"That strikes me as a singular objection," I remarked.
+
+"Oh! no, not at all! These _knowing_ niggers frequently make a world of
+trouble on a plantation."
+
+It was after ten o'clock before we were ready to start. The mills, the
+negro-quarters, and various other parts of the plantation, and then
+several vessels moored at the wharf, had to be seen before I could get
+away. Finally, I bade my excellent host and his family farewell, and
+with nearly as much regret as I ever felt at leaving my own home. I had
+experienced the much-heard-of Southern hospitality, and had found the
+report far below the reality.
+
+The other guest had taken his leave some time before, but not till he
+had given me a cordial invitation to return by the way I came, and spend
+a day or two with him, at his plantation on the river, some twenty miles
+below.
+
+The sky was lowery, and the sandy road heavy with the recent rain, when
+we started. The gloomy weather seemed to have infected the driver as
+well as myself. He had lost the mirthfulness and loquacity of the
+previous day, and we rode on for a full hour in silence. Tiring at last
+of my own thoughts, I said to him: "Scip, what is the matter with you?
+what makes you so gloomy?"
+
+"Nuffin, massa; I war only tinkin'," he abstractedly replied.
+
+"And what are you thinking about?"
+
+"I's wond'rin', massa, if de LORD mean de darkies in dose words of HIS
+dat Massa B---- read dis mornin'."
+
+"What words do you mean?
+
+"Dese, massa: 'O dou 'fflicted! tossed wid de tempest, and habin no
+comfort, behold, I will make you hous'n ob de fair colors, and lay dar
+foundations wid safomires. All dy chil'ren shill be taught ob de LORD,
+and great shill be dar peace. In de right shill dey be 'stablished; dey
+shill hab no fear, no terror; it shan't come nigh 'em, and who come
+against dem shill fall. Behold! I hab make de blacksmif dat blow de
+coals, and make de weapons; and I hab make de waster dat shill destroy
+de oppressors.'"
+
+If he had repeated one of Webster's orations I could not have been more
+astonished. I did not remember the exact words of the passage, but I
+knew he had caught its spirit. Was this his recollection of the reading
+heard in the morning? or had he previously committed it to memory? These
+questions I asked myself; but, restraining my curiosity, I answered:
+"Undoubtedly they are meant for both the black and the white."
+
+"Do dey mean, massa, dat we shall be like de wite folks--wid our own
+hous'n, our chil'ren taught in de schools, and wid weapons to strike
+back when dey strike us?"
+
+"No, Scipio, they don't mean that. They refer principally to spiritual
+matters. They were a promise to _all the world_ that when the SAVIOUR
+came, all, even the greatly oppressed and afflicted, should hear the
+great truths of the BIBLE about GOD, REDEMPTION, and the FUTURE."
+
+"But de SAVIOUR hab come, massa; and dose tings an't taught to de black
+chil'ren. We hab no peace, no rights; nuffin but fear, 'pression, and
+terror."
+
+"That is true, Scipio. The LORD takes HIS own time, but HIS time will
+_surely_ come."
+
+"De LORD bless you, massa, for saying dat; and de LORD bless you for
+telling dat big Cunnel, dat if dey gwo to war de brack man will be
+FREE!"
+
+"Did you hear what we said?" I inquired, greatly surprised, for I
+remembered remarking, during the interview of the previous evening,
+that our host carefully kept the doors closed.
+
+"Ebery word, massa."
+
+"But how _could_ you hear? The doors and windows were shut. Where were
+you?"
+
+"On de piazzer; and when I seed fru de winder dat de ladies war gwine, I
+know'd you'd talk 'bout politics and de darkies--gemmen allers do. So I
+opened de winder bery softly--you didn't har 'cause it rained and blowed
+bery hard, and made a mighty noise. Den I stuffed my coat in de crack,
+so de wind could'nt blow in and lef you know I was dar, but I lef a hole
+big 'nough to har. My ear froze to dat hole, massa, bery tight, I 'shore
+you."
+
+"But you must have got very wet and very cold."
+
+"Wet, massa! wetter dan a 'gator dat's been in de riber all de week, but
+I didn't keer for de rain or de cold. What I hard made me warm all de
+way fru."
+
+To my mind there was a rough picture of true heroism in that poor darky
+standing for hours in his shirt-sleeves, in the cold, stormy night, the
+lightning playing about him, and the rain drenching him to the
+skin--that he might hear something he thought would benefit his
+down-trodden race.
+
+I noticed his clothing though bearing evident marks of a drenching, was
+then dry, and I inquired: "How did you dry your clothes?"
+
+"I staid wid some ob de cullud folks, and arter you gwoes up stars, I
+went to dar cabin, and dey gabe me some dry cloes. We made up a big
+fire, and hung mine up to dry, and de ole man and woman and me sot up
+all night and talked ober what you and de oder gemmen said."
+
+"Will not those folks tell what you did, and thus get you into trouble?"
+
+"Tell! LORD bless you, massa, _de bracks am all freemasons_; dat ar ole
+man and woman wud die 'fore dey'd tell."
+
+"But are not Captain B---'s negroes contented?" I asked; "they seem to
+be well treated."
+
+"Oh! yas, dey am. All de brack folks 'bout har want de Captin to buy
+'em. He bery nice man--one ob de LORD'S own people. He better man dan
+David, 'cause David did wrong, and I don't b'lieve de Captin eber did."
+
+"I should think he was a very good man," I replied.
+
+"Bery good man, massa, but de white folks don't like him, 'cause dey say
+he treats him darkies so well, all dairn am uncontented."
+
+"Tell me, Scipio," I resumed after a while, "how it is you can repeat
+that passage from Isaiah so well?"
+
+"Why, bless you, massa, I know Aziar and Job and de Psalms 'most all by
+heart. Good many years ago, when I lib'd in Charles'on, the gub'ness
+learned me to read, and I hab read dat BOOK fru good many times."
+
+"Have you read any others?" I asked.
+
+"None but dat and Doctor Watts. I hab _dem_, but wite folks wont sell
+books to de bracks, and I wont steal 'em. I read de papers sometimes."
+
+I opened my portmanteau, that lay on the floor of the wagon, and handed
+him a copy of Whittier's poems. It happened to be the only book,
+excepting the BIBLE, that I had with me.
+
+"Read that, Scipio," I said. "It is a book of poetry, but written by a
+good man at the North, who greatly pities the slave."
+
+He took the book, and the big tears rolled down his cheeks, as he said:
+"Tank you, massa, tank you. Nobody war neber so good to me afore."
+
+During our conversation, the sky, which had looked threatening all the
+morning, began to let fall the big drops of rain; and before we reached
+Conwayboro, it poured down much after the fashion of the previous night.
+It being cruelty to both man and beast to remain out in such a deluge,
+we pulled up at the village hotel (kept, like the one at Georgetown, by
+a lady), and determined to remain overnight, unless the rain should
+abate in time to allow us to reach our destination before dark.
+
+Dinner being ready soon after our arrival (the people of Conwayboro,
+like the "common folks" that Davy Crockett told about, dine at twelve),
+I sat down to it, first hanging my outer garments, which were somewhat
+wet, before the fire in the sitting-room. The house seemed to be a sort
+of public boarding-house, as well as hotel, for quite a number of
+persons, evidently town's-people were at the dinner-table. My appearance
+attracted some attention, though not more, I thought, than would be
+naturally excited in so quiet a place by the arrival of a stranger; but
+"as nobody said nothing to me, I said nothing to nobody."
+
+Dinner over, I adjourned to the "sitting-room," and seating myself by
+the fire, watched the drying of my "outer habiliments." While thus
+engaged, the door opened, and three men--whom I should have taken for
+South Carolina gentlemen, had not a further acquaintance convinced me to
+the contrary--entered the room. Walking directly up to where I was
+sitting, the foremost one accosted me something after this manner:
+
+"I see you are from the North, sir."
+
+Taken a little aback by the abruptness of the "salute," but guessing his
+object, I answered: "No, sir; I am from the South."
+
+"From what part of the South?"
+
+"I left Georgetown yesterday, and Charleston two days before that," I
+replied, endeavoring to seem entirely oblivious to his meaning.
+
+"We don't want to know whar you war yesterday; we want to know whar you
+_belong_," he said, with a little impatience.
+
+"Oh! that's it. Well, sir, I belong _here_ just at present, or rather I
+shall, when I have paid the landlady for my dinner."
+
+Annoyed by my coolness, and getting somewhat excited, he replied
+quickly: "You mustn't trifle with us, sir. We know you. You're from the
+North. We've seen it on your valise, and we can't allow a man who
+carries the New York _Independent_ to travel in South Carolina."
+
+The scoundrels had either broken into my portmanteau, or else a copy of
+that paper had dropped from it on to the floor of the wagon when I gave
+the book to Scipio. At any rate, they had seen it, and it was evident
+"Brother Beecher" was getting me into a scrape. I felt indignant at the
+impudence of the fellow, but determined to keep cool, and, a little
+sarcastically, replied to the latter part of his remark:
+
+"That's a pity, sir. South Carolina will lose by it."
+
+"This game wont work, sir. We don't want such people as you har, and the
+sooner you make tracks the better."
+
+"I intend to leave, sir, as soon as the rain is over, and shall travel
+thirty miles on your sandy roads to-day, if you don't coax me to stay
+here by your hospitality," I quietly replied.
+
+The last remark was just the one drop needed to make his wrath "bile
+over," and he savagely exclaimed: "I tell you, sir, we will not be
+trifled with. You must be off to Georgetown at once. You can have just
+half an hour to leave the Boro', not a second more."
+
+His tone and manner aroused what little combativeness there is in me.
+Rising from my chair, and taking up my outside-coat, in which was one of
+Colt's six-shooters, I said to him: "Sir, I am here, a peaceable man, on
+peaceable, private business. I have started to go up the country, and go
+there I shall; and I shall leave this place at my convenience--not
+before. I have endured your impertinence long enough, and shall have no
+more of it. If you attempt to interfere with my movements, you will do
+so at your peril."
+
+My blood was up, and I was fast losing that better part of valor called
+discretion; and _he_ evidently understood my movement, and did not
+dislike the turn affairs were taking. There is no telling what might
+have followed had not Scip just at that instant inserted his woolly head
+between us, excitedly exclaiming: "Lord bless you, Massa B----ll; what
+_am_ you 'bout? Why, dis gemman am a 'ticlar friend of Cunnel A----.
+He'm a reg'lar sesherner. He hates de ablisherners worser dan de debble.
+I hard him swar a clar, blue streak 'bout dem only yesterday."
+
+"Massa B----ll" was evidently taken aback by the announcement of the
+negro, but did not seem inclined to "give it up so" at once, for he
+asked: "How do you know he's the Colonel's friend, Scip? Who told you
+so?"
+
+"Who told me so?" exclaimed the excited negro, "why, didn't he stay at
+Captin B----'s, wid de Cunnel, all night last night; and didn't dey set
+up dar doin' politic business togedder till arter midnight? Didn't de
+Cunnel come dar in all de storm 'pressly to see dis gemman?"
+
+The ready wit and rude eloquence of the darky amused me, and the idea of
+the "Cunnel" travelling twenty miles through the terrible storm of the
+previous night to meet a man who had the New York _Independent_ about
+him, was so perfectly ludicrous, that I could not restrain my laughter.
+That laugh did the business for "Massa B----ll." What the negro had
+said staggered, but did not convince him; but my returning good-humor
+brought him completely round. Extending his hand to me, he said: "I see,
+sir, I've woke up the wrong passenger. Hope you'll take no offence. In
+these times we need to know who come among us."
+
+"No offence whatever, sir," I replied. "It is easy to be mistaken; but,"
+I added smilingly, "I hope, for the sake of the next traveller, you'll
+be less precipitate another time."
+
+"I _am_ rather hasty; that's a fact," he said. "But no harm is done. So
+let's take a drink, and say no more about it. The old lady har keeps
+nary a thing, but we can get the _raal stuff_ close by."
+
+Though not a member of a "Total Abstinence Society," I have always
+avoided indulging in the quality of fluid that is the staple beverage at
+the South. I therefore hesitated a moment before accepting the
+gentleman's invitation; but the alternative seemed to be squarely
+presented, pistols or drinks; cold lead or poor whiskey, and--I am
+ashamed to confess it--I took the whiskey.
+
+Returning to the hotel, I found Scip awaiting me. "Massa," he said, "we
+better be gwine. Dat dar sesherner am ugly as de bery ole debble; and
+soon as he knows I cum de possum ober him 'bout de Cunnel, he'll be
+down on you _shore_."
+
+The rain had dwindled to a drizzle, which the sun was vigorously
+struggling to get through with a tolerable prospect of success, and I
+concluded to take the African's advice. Wrapping myself in an
+India-rubber overcoat, and giving the darky a blanket of the same
+material, I started.
+
+[Footnote B: I very much regret to learn, that since my meeting with
+this most excellent gentleman, being obnoxious to the Secession leaders
+for his well-known Union sentiments, he has been very onerously assessed
+by them for contributions for carrying on the war. The sum he has been
+forced to pay, is stated as high as forty thousand dollars, but that may
+be, and I trust is, an exaggeration. In addition--and this fact is
+within my own knowledge--five of his vessels have been seized in the
+Northern ports by our Government. This exposure of true Union men to a
+double fire, is one of the most unhappy circumstances attendant upon
+this most unhappy war.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+CROSSING THE "RUNS."
+
+
+The long, tumble-down bridge which spans the Waccamaw at Conwayboro,
+trembled beneath our horse's tread, as with lengthened stride he shook
+the secession mud from his feet, and whirled us along into the dark,
+deep forest. It may have been the exhilaration of a hearty dinner of
+oats, or it may have been sympathy with the impatience of his
+fellow-travellers that spurred him on; whichever it was, away he went as
+if Lucifer--that first Secessionist--were following close at his heels.
+
+The sun, which for a time had been industriously wedging his way into
+the dark masses of cloud, finally slunk out of sight and left us
+enveloped in a thick fog, which shut from view all of Cottondom, except
+a narrow belting of rough pines, and a few rods of sandy road that
+stretched out in dim perspective before us. There being nothing in the
+outside creation to attract my attention, I drew the apron of the
+carriage about me, and settling myself well back on the seat to avoid
+the thick-falling mist, fell into a train of dreamy reflection.
+
+Niggers, slave-auctions, cotton-fields, rice-swamps, and King Cotton
+himself, that blustering old despot, with his swarthy arms and
+"under-pinning," his face of brass, and body of "raw material," passed
+through my mind, like Georgia trains through the Oconee Swamp, till
+finally my darky friend came into view. He seemed at first a little
+child, amid the blazing ruins of his wilderness home, gazing in stupid
+horror on the burning bodies of his father and his kindred. Then he was
+kneeling at the side of his dying mother in the slave-pen at Cape Lopez,
+and--still a child--cooped in the "Black-hole" of the accursed
+slave-ship, his little frame burning with the fever-fire, and his
+child-heart longing for death. Then he seemed mounting the Cuban
+slave-block, and as the "going! going! gone!" rung in my ear, he was
+hurried away, and driven to the cruel task--still a child--on the hot,
+unhealthy sugar-field. Again he appeared, stealing away at night to a
+lonely hut, and by the light of a pine-knot, wearily poring over the
+BOOK of BOOKS, slowly putting letters into words, and words into
+sentences, that he might know _"What God says to the black man."_ Then
+he seemed a man--splendid of frame, noble of soul--suspended in the
+whipping-rack, his arms bound above his head, his body resting on the
+tips of his toes, and the merciless lash falling on his bare back, till
+the red stream ran from it like a river--scourged because he would not
+aid in creating beings as wretched as himself, and make merchandise of
+his own blood to gorge the pocket of an incarnate white devil.
+
+As these things passed before me, and I thought of his rare
+intelligence, of his fine traits of character, and of the true heroism
+he had shown in risking, perhaps, his own life to get me--a
+stranger--out of an ugly hobble, I felt a certain spot in my left side
+warming toward him, very much as it might have done had his blood been
+as pure as my own. It seemed to me a pity--anti-Abolitionist and
+Southern-sympathizer though I was--that a man of such rare natural
+talent, such character and energy, should have his large nature dwarfed,
+be tethered for life to a cotton-stalk, and made to wear his soul out in
+a tread-mill, merely because his skin had a darker tinge and his shoe a
+longer heel than mine.
+
+As I mused over his "strange, eventful history," and thought of the
+handy way nature has of putting the _right_ man in the _wrong_ place, it
+occurred to me how "Brother Beecher" one evening, not a long time
+before, had charmed the last dollar from my waistcoat pocket by
+exhibiting, _à la_ Barnum, a remarkably ugly "cullud pusson" on his
+pulpit stairs, and by picturing the awful doom which awaited her--that
+of being reduced from baby-tending to some less useful employment--if
+his audience did not at once "do the needful." Then it occurred to me
+how much finer a spectacle my ebony friend would make; how well his six
+feet of manly sinew would grace those pulpit stairs; how eloquently the
+reverend gentleman might expatiate on the burning sin of shrouding the
+light of such an intellect in the mists of niggerdom, only to see it
+snuffed out in darkness; how he might enlarge on what the black could do
+in elevating his race, either as "cullud" assistant to "Brother Pease"
+at the Five-Points, or as co-laborer with Fred Douglass at abolition
+conventions, or, if that didn't _pay_, how, put into the minstrel
+business, he might run the white "troupes" off the track, and yield a
+liberal revenue to the "Cause of Freedom." As I thought of the probable
+effect of this last appeal, it seemed to me that the thing was already
+done, and that SCIP was FREE.
+
+I got back from dreamland by the simple act of opening my eyes, and
+found myself still riding along in that Jersey wagon, over that heavy,
+sandy road, and drenched with the mists of that dreary December day. The
+reverie made, however, a deep impression on me, and I gave vent to it
+somewhat as follows:
+
+"Colonel A---- tells me, Scip, that your mistress wants to sell you. Do
+you know what she asks?"
+
+"She ax fifteen hundred dollar, massa, but I an't worth dat now. Nigger
+property's mighty low."
+
+"What is your value now?"
+
+"P'raps eight hundred, p'raps a thousand dollar, massa."
+
+"Would your mistress take a thousand for you?"
+
+"Don't know, sar, but reckon she would. She'd be glad to get shut of me.
+She don't like me on de plantation, 'cause she say de oder darkies tink
+too much ob me; and she don't like me in de city, 'cause she 'fraid I
+run away."
+
+"Why afraid you'll runaway? Did you ever try to?"
+
+"Try to! LOR, massa, I neber taught ob such a ting--wouldn't
+gwo ef I could."
+
+"But wouldn't you?" I asked, thinking he had conscientious scruples
+about running away; "wouldn't you if you could buy yourself, and go
+honestly, as a _free_ man?"
+
+"Buy myself, sar!" he exclaimed in surprise; "buy _my own_ flesh and
+blood dat de LORD hissef gabe me! No, no! massa; I'd likes to be free,
+but I'd neber do _dat_!"
+
+"Why not do that?" I asked.
+
+"'Cause 't would be owning dat de white folks hab a right to de brack;
+and 'cause, sar, if I war free I couldn't stay har."
+
+"Why should you stay here? You have no wife nor child; why not go where
+the black man is respected and useful?"
+
+"I'se 'spected and useful har, massa. I hab no wife nor child, and dat
+make me feel, I s'pose, like as ef all de brack people war my chil'ren."
+
+"But they are not your children; and you can be of no service to them.
+At the North you might learn, and put your talents to some use."
+
+"Sar," he replied, a singular enthusiasm lighting up his face, "de LORD,
+dat make me what I ar, put me har, and I must stay. Sometimes when tings
+look bery brack, and I feel a'most 'scouraged, I goes to HIM, and I say,
+'LORD, I's ob no use, take me 'way; let me get fru wid dis; let me no
+more see de suffrin' and 'pression ob de pore cullud race;' den HE say
+to me, just so plain as I say it to you, 'Keep up good courage, Scipio,
+de time will come;'[C] and now, bless de LORD, de time am coming!"
+
+"_What_ time is coming, Scipio?"
+
+He gave me a quick, suspicious glance, but his face in a moment resumed
+its usual expression, as he replied: "I'se sure, massa, dat I could
+trust you. I feel you am my friend, but I can't say no more."
+
+"You need not, Scip--I can guess. What you have said is safe with me.
+But let me counsel you--wait for the white man. Do not let your freedom
+come in blood!"
+
+"It will come, massa, as de LORD will. When HE war freed _de earth
+shook, and de vail ob de temple war rent in twain_!"
+
+We said no more, but rode on in silence; the darky absorbed in his own
+reflections, I musing over the black volcano, whose muffled echoes I
+then heard "away down South in Dixie."
+
+We had ridden on for about an hour, when an opening in the trees
+disclosed a by-path, leading to a plantation. Following it for a short
+distance, we came upon a small clearing, in the midst of which, flanked
+by a ragged corn and potato patch, squatted a dilapidated, unpainted
+wooden building, a sort of "half-way house" between a hut and a shanty.
+In its door-way, seated on a chair which wanted one leg and a back, was
+a suit of linsey-woolsey, adorned by enormous metal buttons, and
+surmounted by a queer-looking headpiece that might have passed for
+either a hat or an umbrella. I was at a loss to determine whether the
+object were a human being or a scarecrow, when, at the sound of our
+approach, the umbrella-like article lifted, and a pair of sunken eyes, a
+nose, and an enormous beard, disclosed themselves. Addressing myself to
+the singular figure, I inquired how far we were from our destination,
+and the most direct route to it.
+
+"Wal, stranger," was the reply, "it's a right smart twenty mile to the
+Cunnel's, but I reckon ye'll get thar, if ye follow yer critter's nose,
+and ar good at swimming."
+
+"Why good at swimming?" I inquired.
+
+"'Cause the 'runs' have ris, and ar considerable deep by this time."
+
+"That's comforting news."
+
+"Yas, to a man as seems in a hurry," he replied, looking at my horse,
+which was covered with foam.
+
+"How far is it to the nearest run?" I asked.
+
+"Wal, it mought be six mile; it mought be seven, but you've one or two
+all-fired ones to cross arter that."
+
+Here was a pleasant predicament. It was nearly five o'clock, and our
+horse, though a noble animal, could not make the distance on an
+unobstructed route, in the then heavy state of the roads, in less than
+three hours. Long before that time it would be dark, and no doubt
+stormy, for the sky, which had lowered all the afternoon, every now and
+then uttered an ominous growl, and seemed ready to fall down upon us.
+But turning back was out of the question, so, thanking the "native," I
+was about to proceed, when he hailed me as follows:
+
+"I say, stranger, what's the talk in the city?"
+
+"Nothing, sir," I replied, "but fight and Secession."
+
+"D--n Secession!" was the decidedly energetic answer.
+
+"Why so, my friend? That doctrine seems to be popular hereabouts."
+
+"Yas, pop'lar with them South Car'lina chaps. They'd be oneasy in heaven
+if Gabriel was cook, and the LORD head-waiter."
+
+"They must be hard to suit," I said; "I 'kalkerlate' _you're_ not a
+South Carolinian."
+
+"No, sir-ee! not by several mile. My mother moved over the line to born
+me a decent individual."
+
+"But why are you for the Union, when your neighbors go the other way?"
+
+"'Cause it's allers carried us 'long as slick as a cart with new-greased
+wheels; and 'cause, stranger, my grand'ther was one of Marion's boys,
+and spilt a lettle claret at Yewtaw for the old consarn, and I reckon
+he'd be oneasy in his grave if I turned my back on it now."
+
+"But, my friend," I said, "they say Lincoln is an Abolitionist, and if
+inaugurated, he will free every darky you've got."
+
+"He can't do that, stranger, 'cordin' to the Constetution, and
+grand'ther used to say that ar dokermunt would hold the d--l himself;
+but, for my part, I'd like to see the niggers free."
+
+"See the niggers free!" I replied in undisguised astonishment; "why, my
+good sir, that is rank treason and abolition."
+
+"Call it what yer a mind to, them's my sentiments; but I say, stranger,
+if thar's ony thing on airth that I uttarly dispise it ar a Northern
+dough-face, and it's clar yer one on 'em."
+
+"There, my friend, you're mistaken. I'm neither an Abolitionist nor a
+dough-face. But _why_ do you go for freeing the niggers?"
+
+"'Cause the white folks would be better off. You see, I have to feed and
+clothe my niggers, and pay a hundred and twenty and a hundred and fifty
+a year for 'em, and if the niggers war free, they'd work for 'bout half
+that."
+
+Continuing the conversation, I learned that the umbrella-hatted
+gentleman worked twenty hired negroes in the gathering of turpentine;
+and that the district we were entering was occupied by persons in the
+same pursuit, who nearly all employed "hired hands," and entertained
+similar sentiments; Colonel J----, whom I was about to visit, and who
+was a large slave-_owner_, being about the only exception. This, the
+reader will please remember, was the state of things at the date of
+which I am writing, in the _very heart_ of Secessiondom.
+
+Bidding the turpentine-getter a rather reluctant "good-by," I rode on
+into the rain.
+
+It was nearly dark when we reached the first "run," but, fortunately, it
+was less swollen than our way-side acquaintance had represented, and we
+succeeded in crossing without difficulty. Hoping that the others might
+be equally as fordable, we pushed rapidly on, the darkness meanwhile
+gathering thickly about us, and the rain continuing to fall. Our way lay
+through an unbroken forest, and as the wind swept fiercely through it,
+the tall dark pines which towered on either side, moaned and sighed like
+a legion of unhappy spirits let loose from the dark abodes below.
+Occasionally we came upon a patch of woods where the turpentine-gatherer
+had been at work, and the white faces of the "tapped" trees, gleaming
+through the darkness, seemed an army of "sheeted ghosts" closing
+steadily around us. The darkness, the rain, and the hideous noises in
+the forest, called up unpleasant associations, and I inwardly determined
+to ask hospitality from the first human being, black or white, whom we
+should meet.
+
+We had ridden on for about an hour after dark, when suddenly our horse's
+feet plashed in the water, and he sank to his middle in a stream. My
+first thought was that we were in the second "run," but as he pushed
+slowly on, the water momentarily growing deeper, and spreading on either
+side as far as we could see, it flashed upon me that we had missed the
+road in the darkness, and were fairly launched into the Waccamaw river!
+Turning to the darky, who was then driving, I said quickly:
+
+"Scip, stop the horse. Where are we?"
+
+"Don't know, massa; reckon we'se in de riber."
+
+"A comfortable situation this. We can't turn round. The horse can't swim
+such a stream in harness. What shall we do?"
+
+"Can you swim, massa?" he quietly asked.
+
+"Yes, like an eel."
+
+"Wal, den, we'd better gwo on. De hoss'll swim. But, massa, you might
+take off your boots and overcoat, and be ready for a spring ef he gwo
+down."
+
+I did as he directed, while he let down the apron and top of the wagon,
+and fastened the reins loosely to the dash-board, saying as he did so,
+"You must allers gib a hoss his head when he swim, massa; if you rein
+him, he gwo down, shore." Then, undoing a portion of the harness, to
+give the horse the free use of his legs, he shouted, "Gee up, ole Gray,"
+and we started.
+
+The noble animal stepped off slowly and cautiously, as if fully aware of
+the danger of the passage, but had proceeded only about fifty yards when
+he lost his footing, and plunged us into an entirely new and decidedly
+cold hip-bath. "Now's de time, ole Gray," "show your broughten up, ole
+boy," "let de gemman see you swim, ole feller," and similar remarks
+proceeded rapidly from the darky, who all the time avoided touching the
+reins.
+
+It may have been one minute, it may have been five minutes--I took "no
+note of _time_"--before the horse again struck bottom, and halted from
+sheer exhaustion, the water still almost level with his back, and the
+opposite bank too far-off to be seen through the darkness. After a short
+rest, he again "breasted the waters," and in a few moments landed us on
+the shore; not, unfortunately, in the road, but in the midst of the
+pine-trees, there so entangled with under-growth, that not even a man,
+much less a horse, could make his way through them. Wet to the skin, and
+shivering with the cold, we had no time to lose "in gittin' out of dat,"
+if we would avoid greater dangers than those we had escaped. So,
+springing from the wagon, the darky waded up the stream, near its bank,
+to reconnoitre. Returning in a few minutes, he reported that we were
+about a hundred yards below the road. We had been carried that far down
+stream by the strength of the current. Our only course was to follow the
+"run" up along its bank; this we did, and in a short time had the
+satisfaction of striking the high road. Arranging the harness, we were
+soon under way again, the horse bounding along as if he felt the
+necessity of vigorous exercise to restore his chilled circulation. We
+afterward learned that it was not the Waccamaw we had crossed, but the
+second "run" our native friend had told us of, and that the water in the
+middle of its stream was fifteen feet deep!
+
+Half-dead with cold and wet, we hurried on, but still no welcome light
+beckoned us to a human habitation. The darkness grew denser till we
+could not even distinguish the road, much less our horse's nose, which
+we had been directed to follow. Inwardly cursing the folly which
+brought me into such a wilderness, I said to the darky:
+
+"Scip, I'm sorry I took you on such a trip as this."
+
+"Oh! neber mind me, massa; I ruther like de dark night and de storm."
+
+"Like the night and the storm! why so?"
+
+"'Cause den de wild spirits come out, and talk in de trees. Dey make me
+feel bery strong _har_," he replied, striking his hand on his breast.
+
+"The night and the storm, Scip, make _me_ feel like cultivating another
+sort of _spirits_. There are some in the wagon-box; suppose we stop and
+see what they are."
+
+We stopped, and I took out a small willow-flask, which held the "spirits
+of Otard," and offered it to the darky.
+
+"No, massa," he said, laughing, "I neber touch dem sort ob spirits; dey
+raise de bery ole deble."
+
+Not heeding the darky's example, I took "a long and a strong pull,"
+and--felt the better for it.
+
+Again we rode on, and again and again I "communed with the spirits,"
+till a sudden exclamation from Scip aroused me from the half-stupor into
+which I was falling. "What's the matter?" I asked.
+
+"A light, massa, a light!"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Dar, way off in de trees--"
+
+"Sure enough, glory, hallelujah, there it is! We're all right now,
+Scip."
+
+We rode on till we came to the inevitable opening in the trees, and were
+soon at the door of what I saw, by the light which came through the
+crevices in the logs, was a one-story shanty, about twenty feet square.
+"Will you let us come in out of de rain?" asked Scip of a
+wretched-looking, half-clad, dirt-bedraggled woman, who thrust her head
+from the doorway.
+
+"Who ar ye?" was the reply.
+
+"Only massa and me, and de hoss, and we'm half dead wid de cold,"
+replied Scip; "can we cum in out ob de rain?"
+
+"Wal, strangers," replied the woman, eyeing us as closely as the
+darkness would permit, "you'll find mighty poor fixins har, but I reckon
+ye can come in."
+
+[Footnote C: The Southern blacks, like all ignorant people, are intensely
+fanatical on religious subjects. The most trifling occurrences have to
+their minds a hidden significance, and they believe the LORD speaks to
+them in signs and dreams, and in almost every event of nature. This
+superstition, which has been handed down from their savage ancestry, has
+absolute sway over them, and one readily sees what immense power it
+would give to some leading, adroit mind, that knew how to use it. By
+means of it they might be led to the most desperate deeds, fully
+believing all the while that they were "led ob de LORD."]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+POOR WHITES.
+
+
+Entering the house, we saw, by the light of a blazing pile of
+pine-knots, which roared and crackled on the hearth, that it contained
+only a single apartment. In front of the fire-place, which occupied the
+better half of one side of this room, the floor was of the bare earth,
+littered over with pine chips, dead cinders, live coals, broken pots,
+and a lazy spaniel dog. Opposite to this, at the other end of the room,
+were two low beds, which looked as if they had been "slept in forever,
+and never made up." Against the wall, between the beds and the
+fire-place, stood a small pine table, and on it was a large wooden bowl,
+from whose mouth protruded the handles of several unwashed pewter
+spoons. On the right of the fire was a razeed rocking-chair, evidently
+the peculiar property of the mistress of the mansion, and three blocks
+of pine log, sawn off smoothly, and made to serve for seats. Over
+against these towered a high-backed settle, something like that on which
+
+                    "sot Huldy all alone,
+        When Zeke peeked thru the winder;"
+
+and on it, her head resting partly on her arm, partly on the end of the
+settle, one small, bare foot pressing the ground, the other, with the
+part of the person which is supposed to require stockings, extended in a
+horizontal direction--reclined, not Huldy, but her Southern cousin, who,
+I will wager, was decidedly the prettier and dirtier of the two. Our
+entrance did not seem to disconcert her in the least, for she lay there
+as unmoved as a marble statue, her large black eyes riveted on my face,
+as if seeing some nondescript animal for the first time. I stood for a
+moment transfixed with admiration. In a somewhat extensive observation
+of her sex in both hemispheres, I had never witnessed such a form, such
+eyes, such faultless features, and such wavy, black, luxuriant hair. A
+glance at her dress--a soiled, greasy, grayish linsey-woolsey gown,
+apparently her only garment--and a second look at her face, which, on
+closer inspection, had precisely the hue of a tallow candle, recalled me
+to myself, and allowed me to complete the survey of the premises.
+
+The house was built of unhewn logs, separated by wide interstices,
+through which the cold air came, in decidedly fresh if not health-giving
+currents, while a large rent in the roof, that let in the rain, gave the
+inmates an excellent opportunity for indulging in a shower-bath, of
+which they seemed greatly in need. The chimney, which had intruded a
+couple of feet into the room, as if to keep out of the cold, and
+threatened momentarily to tumble down, was of sticks, built up in clay,
+while the windows were of thick, unplaned boards.
+
+Two pretty girls, one of perhaps ten and the other of fourteen years,
+evidently sisters of the unadorned beauty, the middle-aged woman
+who had admitted us, and the dog--the only male member of the
+household--composed the family. I had seen negro cabins, but these
+people were whites, and these whites were _South Carolinians_. When such
+counterparts of the feudal serfs still exist, who will say that the days
+of chivalry are over!
+
+After I had seated myself by the fire, and the driver had gone out to
+stow the horse away under the tumble-down shed at the back of the house,
+the elder woman said to me--
+
+"Reckon yer wet. Ben in the rain!"
+
+"Yes, madam, we've been out most of the day, and got in the river below
+here."
+
+"Did ye? Ye mean the 'run.' I reckon it's right deep now."
+
+"Yes, our horse had to swim," I replied.
+
+"Ye orter strip and put on dry cloes to onst."
+
+"Thank you, madam, I will."
+
+Going to my portmanteau, which the darky had placed near the door, I
+found it dripping with wet, and opening it I discovered that every
+article had undergone the rite of immersion.
+
+"Every thing is thoroughly soaked, madam. I shall have to dry myself by
+your fire. Can you get me a cup of tea?"
+
+"Right sorry, stranger, but I can't. Haint a morsel to eat or drink in
+the house."
+
+Remembering that our excellent hostess of the night before had insisted
+on filling the wagon-box with a quantity of "chicken fixins," to serve
+us in an emergency, and that my brandy flask was in my India-rubber
+coat, I sent Scip out for them.
+
+The stores disclosed boiled chicken, bacon, sandwiches, sweet potatoes,
+short cake, corn-bread, buttered waffles, and 'common doin's' too
+numerous to mention, enough to last a family of one for a fortnight, but
+all completely saturated with water. Wet or dry, however, the provisions
+were a godsend to the half-starved family, and their hearts seemed to
+open to me with amazing rapidity. The dog got up and wagged his tail,
+and even the marble-like beauty rose from her reclining posture and
+invited me to a seat with her on the bench.
+
+The kettle was soon steaming over the fire, and the boiling water, mixed
+with a little brandy, served as a capital substitute for tea. After the
+chicken was recooked, and the other edibles "warmed up," the little pine
+table was brought out, and I learned--what I had before suspected--that
+the big wooden bowl and the half dozen pewter spoons were the only
+"crockery" the family possessed.
+
+I declined the proffered seat at the table, the cooking utensils being
+any thing but inviting, and contented myself with the brandy and water;
+but, forgetting for a moment his color, I motioned to the darky--who was
+as wet and jaded, and much more hungry than I was--to take the place
+offered to me. The negro did not seem inclined to do so, but the woman,
+observing my gesture, yelled out, her eyes flashing with anger:
+
+"No, sar! No darkies eats with us. Hope you don't reckon _yerself_ no
+better than a good-for-nothin', no account nigger!"
+
+"I beg your pardon, madam; I intended no offence. Scipio has served me
+very faithfully for two days, and is very tired and hungry. I forgot
+myself."
+
+This mollified the lady, and she replied:
+
+"Niggers is good enuff in thar place, but warn't meant to 'sociate with
+white folks."
+
+There may have been some ground for a distinction in that case; there
+certainly was a difference between the specimens of the two races then
+before me; but, not being one of the chivalry, it struck me that the
+odds were on the side of the black man. The whites were shiftless,
+ragged, and starving; the black well clad, cleanly, energetic, and as
+much above the others in intellect as Jupiter is above a church steeple.
+To be sure, color was against him, and he was, after all, a servant in
+the land of chivalry and of servant-owners. Of course the woman was
+right.
+
+She soon resumed the conversation with this remark:
+
+"Reckon yer a stranger in these parts; whar d'ye come from?"
+
+"From New York, madam."
+
+"New York! whar's that?"
+
+"It's a city at the North."
+
+"Oh! yas; I've heern tell on it: that's whar the Cunnel sells his
+turpentime. Quite a place, arnt it?"
+
+"Yes, quite a place. Something larger than all South Carolina."
+
+"What d'ye say? Larger nor South Carolina. Kinder reckon tain't, is't?"
+
+"Yes, madam, it is."
+
+"Du tell! 'Taint so large as Charles'n, is't?"
+
+"Yes, twenty times larger than Charleston."
+
+"Lord o'massy! How does all the folks live thar?"
+
+"Live quite as well as they do here."
+
+"Ye don't have no niggers thar, does ye?"
+
+"Yes, but none that are slaves."
+
+"Have Ablisherners thar, don't ye? them people that go agin the South?"
+
+"Yes, some of them."
+
+"What do they go agin the South for?"
+
+"They go for freeing the slaves. Some of them think a black man as good
+as a white one."
+
+"Quar, that; yer an Ablisherner, arnt ye?"
+
+"No, I'm an old-fashioned Whig."
+
+"What's that? Never heerd on them afore."
+
+"An old-fashioned Whig, madam, is a man whose political principles are
+perfect, and who is as perfect as his principles."
+
+That was a "stumper" for the poor woman, who evidently did not
+understand one-half of the sentence.
+
+"Right sort of folks, them," she said, in a half inquiring tone.
+
+"Yes, but they're all dead now."
+
+"Dead?"
+
+"Yes, dead, beyond the hope of resurrection."
+
+"Iv'e heern all the dead war to be resurrected. Didn't ye say ye war one
+on 'em? _Ye_ aint dead yet," said the woman, chuckling at having
+cornered me.
+
+"But I'm more than _half_ dead just now."
+
+"Ah," replied the woman, still laughing, "yer a chicken."
+
+"A chicken! what's that?"
+
+"A thing that goes on tu legs, and karkles," was the ready reply.
+
+"Ah, my dear madam, you can out-talk me."
+
+"Yas, I reckon I kin outrun ye, tu. Ye arnt over rugged." Then, after a
+pause, she added--"What d'ye 'lect that darky, Linkum, President for?"
+
+"I didn't elect him. _I_ voted for Douglas. But Lincoln is not a darky."
+
+"He's a mullater, then; I've heern he war," she replied.
+
+"No, he's not a mulatto; he's a rail-splitter."
+
+"Rail-splitter? _Then he's a nigger, shore._"
+
+"No, madam; white men at the North split rails."
+
+"An' white wimmin tu, p'raps," said the woman, with a contemptuous toss
+of the head.
+
+"No, they don't," I replied, "but white women _work_ there."
+
+"White wimmin work thar!" chimed in the hitherto speechless beauty,
+showing a set of teeth of the exact color of her skin--_yaller_. "What
+du the' du?"
+
+"Some of them attend in stores, some set type, some teach school, and
+some work in factories."
+
+"Du tell! Dress nice, and make money?"
+
+"Yes," I replied, "they make money, and dress like fine ladies; in fact,
+_are_ fine ladies. I know one young woman, of about your age, that had
+to get her own education, who earns a thousand dollars a year by
+teaching, and I've heard of many factory-girls who support their
+parents, and lay by a great deal of money, by working in the mills."
+
+"Wal!" replied the young woman, with a contemptuous curl of her
+matchless upper lip; "schule-marms arn't fine ladies; fine ladies don't
+work; only niggers works _har_. I reckon I'd rather be 'spectable than
+work for a livin'."
+
+I could but think how magnificently the lips of some of our glorious
+Yankee girls would have curled had they have heard that remark, and have
+seen the poor girl that made it, with her torn, worn, greasy dress; her
+bare, dirty legs and feet, and her arms, neck, and face so thickly
+encrusted with a layer of clayey mud that there was danger of
+hydrophobia if she went near a wash-tub. Restraining my involuntary
+disgust, I replied:
+
+"We at the North think work is respectable. We do not look down on a man
+or a woman for earning their daily bread. We all work."
+
+"Yas, and that's the why ye'r all sech cowards," said the old woman.
+
+"Cowards!" I said; "who tells you that?"
+
+"My old man; he says one on our _boys_ can lick five of your Yankee
+_men_."
+
+"Perhaps so. Is your husband away from home?"
+
+"Yas, him and our Cal. ar down to Charles'n."
+
+"Cal. is your son, is he?"
+
+"Yas, he's my oldest, and a likely lad he ar tu--he's twenty-one, and
+his name are JOHN CAL'OUN MILLS. He's gone a troopin' it with his
+fader."
+
+"What, both gone and left you ladies here alone?"
+
+"Yas, the Cunnel sed every man orter go, and they warn't to be ahind the
+rest. The Cunnel--Cunnel J.--looks arter us while they is away."
+
+"But I should think the Colonel looked after you poorly--giving you
+nothing to eat."
+
+"Oh! it's ben sech a storm to-day, the gals couldn't go for the vittles,
+though 'tain't a great way. We'r on his plantation; this house is
+his'n."
+
+This last was agreeable news, and it occurred to me that if we were so
+near the Colonel's we might push on, in spite of the storm, and get
+there that night; so I said:
+
+"Indeed; I'm going to the Colonel's. How far is his house from here?"
+
+"A right smart six mile; it's at the Cross roads. Ye know the Cunnel, du
+ye?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I know him well. If his home is not more than six miles off, I
+think we had better go on to-night. What do you say, Scip?"
+
+"I reckon we'd better gwo, massa," replied the darky, who had spread my
+travelling-shawl in the chimney-corner, and was seated on it, drying his
+clothes.
+
+"Ye'd better not," said the woman; "ye'd better stay har; thar's a right
+smart run twixt har and the Cunnel's, and 'tain't safe to cross arter
+dark."
+
+"If that is so we'd better stay, Scip; don't you think so?" I said to
+the darky.
+
+"Jess as you say, massa. We got fru wid de oder one, and I reckon taint
+no wuss nor dat."
+
+"The bridge ar carried away, and ye'll hev to swim _shore_," said the
+woman. "Ye'd better stay."
+
+"Thank you, madam, I think we will," I replied, after a moment's
+thought; "our horse has swum one of your creeks to-night, and I dare not
+try another."
+
+Having taken off my coat, I had been standing, during the greater part
+of this conversation, in my shirt-sleeves before the fire, turning round
+occasionally to facilitate the drying process, and taking every now and
+then a sip from the gourd containing our brandy and water; aided in the
+latter exercise by the old woman and the eldest girl, who indulged quite
+as freely as I did.
+
+"Mighty good brandy that," at last said the woman. "Ye like brandy,
+don't ye?"
+
+"Not very much, madam. I take it to-night because I've been exposed to
+the storm, and it stimulates the circulation. But Scip, here, don't like
+spirits. He'll get the rheumatism because he don't."
+
+"Don't like dem sort of sperits, massa; but rumatics neber trubble me."
+
+"But I've got it mighty bad," said the woman, "_and I take 'em whenever
+I kin get 'em_."
+
+I rather thought she did, but I "reckoned" her principal beverage was
+whiskey.
+
+"You have the rheumatism, madam, because your house is so open; a
+draught of air is always unhealthy."
+
+"I allers reckoned 'twar _healthy_," she replied. "Ye Yankee folks have
+quar notions."
+
+I looked at my watch, and found it was nearly ten o'clock, and, feeling
+very tired, said to the hostess:
+
+"Where do you mean we shall sleep?"
+
+"Ye can take that ar bed," pointing to the one nearer the wall, "the
+darky can sleep har;" motioning to the settle on which she was seated.
+
+"But where will you and your daughters sleep? I don't wish to turn you
+out of your beds."
+
+"Oh! don't ye keer for us; we kin all bunk together; dun it afore. Like
+to turn in now?"
+
+"Yes, thank you, I would;" and without more ceremony I adjourned to the
+further part of the room, and commenced disrobing. Doffing my boots,
+waistcoat, and cravat, and placing my watch and purse under the pillow,
+I gave a moment's thought to what a certain not very old lady, whom I
+had left at home, might say when she heard of my lodging with a
+grass-widow and three young girls, and sprang into bed. There I removed
+my under-mentionables, which were still too damp to sleep in, and in
+about two minutes and thirty seconds sunk into oblivion.
+
+A few streaks of grayish light were beginning to creep through the
+crevices in the logs, when a movement at the foot of the bed awakened
+me, and glancing downward I beheld the youngest girl emerging from under
+the clothes at my feet. She had slept there, "cross-wise," all night. A
+stir in the adjoining bed soon warned me that the other feminines were
+preparing to follow her example; so, turning my face to the wall, I
+feigned to be sleeping. Their toilet was soon made, when they quietly
+left Scip and myself in possession of the premises.
+
+The darky rose as soon as they were gone, and, coming to me, said:
+
+"Massa, we'd better be gwine. I'se got your cloes all dry, and you can
+rig up and breakfust at de Cunnel's."
+
+The storm had cleared away, and the sun was struggling to get through
+the distant pines, when Scip brought the horse to the door, and we
+prepared to start. Turning to the old woman, I said:
+
+"I feel greatly obliged to you, madam, for the shelter you have given
+us, and would like to make you some recompense for your trouble. Please
+to tell me what I shall pay you."
+
+"Wal, stranger, we don't gin'rally take in lodgers, but seein' as how as
+thar ar tu on ye, and ye've had a good night on it, I don't keer if ye
+pay me tu dollars."
+
+That struck me as "rather steep" for "common doin's," particularly as we
+had furnished the food and "the drinks;" yet, saying nothing, I handed
+her a two-dollar bank-note. She took it, and held it up curiously to the
+sun for a moment, then handed it back, saying, "I don't know nuthin'
+'bout that ar sort o' money; haint you got no silver?"
+
+I fumbled in my pocket a moment, and found a quarter-eagle, which I gave
+her.
+
+"Haint got nary a fip o' change," she said, as she took it.
+
+"Oh! never mind the change, madam; I shall want to stop and _look_ at
+you when I return," I replied, good-humoredly.
+
+"Ha! ha! yer a chicken," said the woman, at the same time giving me a
+gentle poke in the ribs. Fearing she might, in the exuberance of her joy
+at the sight of the money, proceed to some more decided demonstration of
+affection, I hastily stepped into the wagon, bade her good-by, and was
+off.
+
+We were still among the pines, which towered gigantically all around us,
+but were no longer alone. Every tree was scarified for turpentine, and
+the forest was alive with negro men and women gathering the "last
+dipping," or clearing away the stumps and underbrush preparatory to the
+spring work. It was Christmas week; but, as I afterward learned, the
+Colonel's negroes were accustomed to doing "half tasks" at that season,
+being paid for their labor as if they were free. They stopped their work
+as we rode by, and stared at us with a stupid, half-frightened
+curiosity, very much like the look of a cow when a railway train is
+passing. It needed but little observation to convince me that their
+_status_ was but one step above the level of the brutes.
+
+As we rode along I said to the driver, "Scip, what did you think of our
+lodgings?"
+
+"Mighty pore, massa. Niggas lib better'n dat."
+
+"Yes," I replied, "but these folks despise you blacks; they seem to be
+both poor and proud."
+
+"Yas, massa, dey'm pore 'cause dey wont work, and dey'm proud 'cause
+dey'r white. Dey wont work 'cause dey see de darky slaves doin' it, and
+tink it am beneaf white folks to do as de darkies do. Dis habin' slaves
+keeps dis hull country pore."
+
+"Who told you that?" I asked, astonished at hearing a remark showing so
+much reflection from a negro.
+
+"Nobody, massa; I see it myseff."
+
+"Are there many of these poor whites around Georgetown?"
+
+"Not many 'round Georgetown, sar, but great many in de up-country har,
+and dey'm all 'like--pore and no account; none ob 'em kin read, and dey
+all eat clay."
+
+"Eat clay!" I said; "what do you mean by that?"
+
+"Didn't you see, massa, how yaller all dem wimmin war? Dat's 'cause dey
+eat clay. De little children begin 'fore dey kin walk, and dey eat it
+till dey die; dey chaw it like 'backer. It makes all dar stumacs big,
+like as you seed 'em, and spiles dar 'gestion. It'm mighty onhealfy."
+
+"Can it be possible that human beings do such things! The brutes
+wouldn't do that."
+
+"No, massa, but _dey_ do it; dey'm pore trash. Dat's what de big folks
+call 'em, and it am true; dey'm long way lower down dan de darkies."
+
+By this time we had arrived at the "run." We found the bridge carried
+away, as the woman had told us; but its abutments were still standing,
+and over these planks had been laid, which afforded a safe crossing for
+foot-passengers. To reach these planks, however, it was necessary to
+wade into the stream for full fifty yards, the "run" having overflowed
+its banks for that distance on either side of the bridge. The water was
+evidently receding, but, as we could not well wait, like the man in the
+fable, for it all to run by, we alighted, and counselled as to the best
+mode of making the passage.
+
+Scip proposed that he should wade in to the first abutment, ascertain
+the depth of the stream, and then, if it was not too deep for the horse
+to ford to that point, drive that far, get out, and walk to the end of
+the planking, leading the horse, and then again mount the wagon at the
+further end of the bridge. We were sure the horse would have to swim in
+the middle of the current, and perhaps for a considerable distance
+beyond; but, having witnessed his proficiency in aquatic performances,
+we had no doubt he would get safely across.
+
+The darky's plan was decided on, and divesting himself of his trowsers,
+he waded into the "run" to take the soundings.
+
+While he was in the water my attention was attracted to a printed paper,
+posted on one of the pines near the roadside. Going up to it, I read as
+follows:
+
+     "$250 REWARD.
+
+     "Ran away from the subscriber, on Monday, November 12th, his
+     mulatto man, SAM. Said boy is stout-built, five feet nine inches
+     high, 31 years old, weighs 170 lbs., and walks very erect, and with
+     a quick, rapid gait. The American flag is tattooed on his right arm
+     above the elbow. There is a knife-cut over the bridge of his nose,
+     a fresh bullet-wound in his left thigh, and his back bears marks of
+     a recent whipping. He is supposed to have made his way back to
+     Dinwiddie County, Va., where he was raised, or to be lurking in the
+     swamps in this vicinity.
+
+     "The above reward will be paid for his confinement in any jail in
+     North or South Carolina, or Virginia, or for his delivery to the
+     subscriber on his plantation at ----.
+
+     "----, December 2, 1860."
+
+The name signed to this hand-bill was that of the planter I was about to
+visit.
+
+Scip having returned, and reported the stream fordable to the bridge, I
+said to him, pointing to the "notice:"
+
+"Read that, Scip."
+
+He read it, but made no remark.
+
+"What does it mean--that fresh bullet wound, and the marks of a recent
+whipping?" I asked.
+
+"It mean, massa, dat de darky hab run away, and ben took; and dat when
+dey took him dey shot him, and flogged him arter dat. Now, he hab run
+away agin. De Cunnel's mighty hard on his niggas!"
+
+"Is he? I can scarcely believe that."
+
+"He am, massa; but he arnt so much to blame, nuther; dey'm awful bad,
+most ob 'em--so dey say."
+
+Our conversation was here interrupted by our reaching the bridge. After
+safely "walking the plank," and making our way to the opposite bank, I
+resumed it by asking:
+
+"Why are the Colonel's negroes so particularly bad?"
+
+"'Cause, you see, massa, de turpentime business hab made great profits
+for sum yars now, and de Cunnel hab been gettin' rich bery fass. He put
+all his money, jes so fass as he make it, into darkies, so to make more;
+for he's got bery big plantation, and need nuffin' but darkies to work
+it to make money jess like a gold mine. He goes up to Virginny to buy
+niggas; and up dar _now_ dey don't sell none less dey'm bad uns, 'cep
+when sum massa die or git pore. Virginny darkies dat cum down har aint
+gin'rally ob much account. Dey'm either kinder good-for-nuffin, or dey'm
+ugly; and de Cunnel'd ruther hab de ugly dan de no-account niggas."
+
+"How many negroes has he?"
+
+"'Bout two hundred, men and wimmin, I b'lieve, massa."
+
+"It can't be pleasant for his family to remain in such an out-of-the-way
+place, with so bad a gang of negroes about them, and no white people
+near."
+
+"No, massa, not in dese times; but de missus and de young lady arnt dar
+now."
+
+"Not there now? The Colonel said nothing to me about that. Are you
+sure?"
+
+"Oh yas, massa; I seed 'em gwo off on de boat to Charles'n most two
+weeks ago. Dey don't mean to cum back till tings am more settled; dey'm
+'fraid to stay dar."
+
+"Would it be safe for the Colonel there, if a disturbance broke out
+among the slaves."
+
+"'T wouldn't be safe den anywhar, sar; but de Cunnel am a bery brave
+man. He'm better dan twenty of _his_ niggas."
+
+"Why better than twenty of _his_ niggers?"
+
+"'Cause dem ugly niggas am gin'rally cowards. De darky dat is quiet,
+'spectful, and does his duty, am de brave sort; _dey'll_ fight, massa,
+till dey'm cut down."
+
+We had here reached a turn in the road, and passing it, came suddenly
+upon a coach, attached to which were a pair of magnificent grays, driven
+by a darky in livery.
+
+"Hallo, dar!" said Scip to the driver, as we came nearly abreast of the
+carriage. "Am you Cunnel J----'s man?"
+
+"Yas, I is dat," replied the darky.
+
+At this moment a woolly head, which I recognized at once as that of the
+Colonel's man "Jim," was thrust from the window of the vehicle.
+
+"Hallo, Jim," I said. "How do you do? I'm glad to see you."
+
+"Lor bress me, Massa K----, am dat you?" exclaimed the astonished negro,
+hastily opening the door, and coming to me. "Whar _did_ you cum from?
+I'se mighty glad to see you;" at the same time giving my hand a hearty
+shaking. I must here say, in justice to the reputation of South
+Carolina, that no respectable Carolinian refuses to shake hands with a
+black man, unless--the black happens to be free.
+
+"I thought I wouldn't wait for you," I replied. "But how did you expect
+to get on? the 'runs' have swollen into rivers."
+
+"We got a 'flat' made for dis one--it's down by dis time--de oders we
+tought we'd get ober sumhow."
+
+"Jim, this is Scip," I said, seeing the darkies took no notice of each
+other.
+
+"How d'ye do, Scip_io?_" said Jim, extending his hand to him. A look of
+singular intelligence passed over the faces of the two negroes as their
+hands met; it vanished in an instant, and was so slight that none but a
+close observer would have detected it, but some words that Scip had
+previously let drop had put me on the alert, and I felt sure it had a
+hidden significance.
+
+"Wont you get into de carriage, massa?" inquired Jim.
+
+"No, thank you, Jim. I'll ride on with Scip. Our horse is jaded, and you
+had better go ahead."
+
+Jim mounted the driver's seat, turned the carriage, and drove off at a
+brisk pace to announce our coming at the plantation, while Scip and I
+rode on at a slower gait.
+
+"Scip, did you know Jim before?" I asked.
+
+"Hab seed him afore, massa, but neber know'd him."
+
+"How is it that you have lived in Georgetown five years, and have not
+known him?"
+
+"I cud hab know'd him, massa, good many time, ef I'd liked, but darkies
+hab to be careful."
+
+"Careful of what?"
+
+"Careful ob who dey knows; good many bad niggas 'bout."
+
+"Pshaw, Scip, you're 'coming de possum'; there isn't a better nigger
+than Jim in all South Carolina. I know him well."
+
+"P'raps he am; reckon he _am_ a good 'nuff nigga."
+
+"Good enough nigga, Scip! Why, I tell you he's a splendid fellow; just
+as true as steel. He's been North with the Colonel, often, and the
+Abolitionists have tried to get him away; he knew he could go, but
+wouldn't budge an inch."
+
+"I knew he wouldn't," said the darky, a pleasurable gleam passing
+through his eyes; "dat sort don't run; dey face de music!"
+
+"Why don't they run? What do you mean by facing the music?"
+
+"Nuffin' massa--only dey'd rather stay har."
+
+"Come, Scip, you've played this game long enough. Tell me, now, what
+that look you gave each other when you shook hands meant."
+
+"What look, massa? Oh! I s'pose 'twar 'cause we'd both _heerd_ ob each
+oder afore."
+
+"'Twas more than that, Scip. Be frank; you know you can trust _me_."
+
+"Wal, den, massa," he replied hesitatingly, adding, after a short pause,
+"de ole woman called you a Yankee, sar--you can guess."
+
+"If I should guess, 't would be that it meant _mischief_."
+
+"It don't mean mischief, sar," said the darky, with a tone and air that
+would not have disgraced a Cabinet officer; "it mean only RIGHT and
+JUSTICE."
+
+"It means that there is some secret understanding between you."
+
+"I toled you, massa," he replied, relapsing into his usual manner, "dat
+de blacks am all Freemasons. I gabe Jim de grip, and he knowd me. He'd
+ha knowd my name ef you hadn't toled him."
+
+"Why would he have known your name?"
+
+"'Cause I gabe de grip, dat tole him."
+
+"Why did he call you Scip_io_? I called you _Scip_."
+
+"Oh! de darkies all do dat. Nobody but de white folks call me _Scip_. I
+can't say no more, massa; I SHUD BREAK DE OATH EF I DID!"
+
+"You have said enough to satisfy me that there is a secret league among
+the blacks, and that you are a leader in it. Now, I tell you, you'll get
+yourself into a scrape. I've taken a liking to you, Scip, and I should
+be _very sorry_ to see you run yourself into danger."
+
+"I tank you, massa, from de bottom ob my soul I tank you," he said, as
+the tears moistened his eyes. "You bery kind, massa; it do me good to
+talk wid you. But what am my life wuth? What am any _slave's_ life wuth?
+_Ef you war me you'd do like me!_"
+
+I could not deny it, and I made no reply.
+
+The writer is aware that he is here making an important statement, and
+one that may be called in question by those persons who are accustomed
+to regard the Southern blacks as only reasoning brutes. The great mass
+of them _are_ but a little above the brutes in their habits and
+instincts, but a large body are fully on a par, except in mere
+book-education, with their white masters.
+
+The conversation above recorded is, _verbatim et literatim_, TRUE. It
+took place at the time indicated, and was taken down, as were other
+conversations recorded in this book, within twenty-four hours after its
+occurrence. The name and the locality, only, I have, for very evident
+reasons, disguised.
+
+From this conversation, together with others, held with the same negro,
+and from after developments made to me at various places, and at
+different times, extending over a period of six weeks, I became
+acquainted with the fact that there exists among the blacks a secret and
+wide-spread organization of a Masonic character, having its grip,
+pass-word, and oath. It has various grades of leaders, who are
+competent and _earnest_ men, and its ultimate object is FREEDOM. It is
+quite as secret and wide-spread as the order of the "Knights of the
+Golden Circle," the kindred league among the whites.
+
+This latter organization, which was instituted by John C. Calhoun,
+William L. Porcher, and others, as far back as 1835, has for its sole
+object the dissolution of the Union, and the establishment of a Southern
+Empire--Empire is the word, not Confederacy, or Republic; and it was
+solely by means of its secret but powerful machinery that the Southern
+States were plunged into revolution, in defiance of the will of a
+majority of their voting population.
+
+Nearly every man of influence at the South (and many a pretended Union
+man at the North) is a member of this organization, and sworn, under the
+penalty of assassination, to labor "in season and out of season, by fair
+means and by foul, at all times, and all occasions," for the
+accomplishment of its object. The blacks are bound together by a similar
+oath, and only _bide their time_.
+
+The knowledge of the real state of political affairs which the negroes
+have acquired through this organization is astonishingly accurate; their
+leaders possess every essential of leadership--except, it may be,
+military skill--and they are fully able to cope with the whites.
+
+The negro whom I call Scipio, on the day when Major Anderson evacuated
+Fort Moultrie, and before he or I knew of that event, which set all
+South Carolina in a blaze, foretold to me the breaking out of this war
+in Charleston harbor, and as confidently predicted that it would result
+in the freedom of the slaves!
+
+The fact of this organization existing is not positively known (for the
+black is more subtle and crafty than any thing human), but it is
+suspected by many of the whites, the more moderate of whom are disposed
+to ward off the impending blow by some system of gradual
+emancipation--declaring all black children born after a certain date
+free--or by some other action that will pacify and keep down the slaves.
+These persons, however, are but a small minority, and possess no
+political power, and the South is rushing blindly on to a catastrophe,
+which, if not averted by the action of our government, will make the
+horrors of San Domingo and the French Revolution grow pale in history.
+
+I say the action of our government, for with it rests the
+responsibility. What the black wants is freedom. Give him that, and he
+will have no incentive to insurrection. If emancipation is proclaimed at
+the head of our armies--emancipation for _all_--confiscation for the
+slaves of rebels, compensation for the slaves of loyal citizens--the
+blacks will rush to the aid of our troops, the avenging angel will pass
+over the homes of the many true and loyal men who are still left at the
+South, and the thunderbolts of this war will fall only--where they
+should fall--on the heads of its blood-stained authors. If this is not
+done, after we have put down the whites we shall have to meet the
+blacks, and after we have waded knee-deep in the blood of both, we
+shall end the war where it began, but with the South desolated by fire
+and sword, the North impoverished and loaded down with an everlasting
+debt, and our once proud, happy, and glorious country the by-word and
+scorn of the civilized world.
+
+Slavery is the very bones, marrow, and life-blood of this rebellion, and
+it cannot be crushed till we have destroyed that accursed institution.
+If a miserable peace is patched up before a death-stroke is given to
+slavery, it will gather new strength, and drive freedom from this
+country forever. In the nature of things it cannot exist in the same
+hemisphere with liberty. Then let every man who loves his country
+determine that if this war must needs last for twenty years, it shall
+not end until this root of all our political evils is weeded out
+forever.
+
+A short half-hour took us to the plantation, where I found the Colonel
+on the piazza awaiting me. After our greeting was over, noticing my
+soiled and rather dilapidated condition, he inquired where I had passed
+the night. I told him, when he burst into a hearty fit of laughter, and
+for several days good-naturedly bantered me about "putting up" at the
+most aristocratic hotel in South Carolina--the "Mills House."
+
+We soon entered the mansion, and the reader will, I trust, pardon me, if
+I leave him standing in its door-way till another chapter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+ON THE PLANTATION.
+
+
+The last chapter left the reader in the door-way of the Colonel's
+mansion. Before entering, we will linger there awhile and survey the
+outside of the premises.
+
+The house stands where two roads meet, and, unlike most planters'
+dwellings, is located in full view of the highway. It is a rambling,
+disjointed structure, thrown together with no regard to architectural
+rules, and yet there is a rude harmony in its very irregularities that
+has a pleasing effect. The main edifice, with a frontage of nearly
+eighty feet, is only one and a half stories high, and is overshadowed by
+a broad projecting roof, which somehow, though in a very natural way,
+drops down at the eaves, and forms the covering of a piazza, twenty feet
+wide, and extending across the entire front of the house. At its
+south-easterly angle, the roof is truncated, and made again to form a
+covering for the piazza, which there extends along a line of irregular
+buildings for sixty yards. A portion of the verandah on this side being
+enclosed, forms a bowling-alley and smoking-room, two essential
+appendages to a planter's residence. The whole structure is covered with
+yellow-pine weather boarding, which in some former age was covered with
+paint of a grayish brown color. This, in many places, has peeled off
+and allowed the sap to ooze from the pine, leaving every here and there
+large blotches on the surface, somewhat resembling the "warts" I have
+seen on the trunks of old trees.
+
+The house is encircled by grand old pines, whose tall, upright stems,
+soaring eighty and ninety feet in the air, make the low hamlet seem
+lower by the contrast. They have stood there for centuries, their rough,
+shaggy coats buttoned close to their chins, and their long green locks
+waving in the wind; but the long knife has been thrust into their veins,
+and their life-blood is now fast oozing away.
+
+With the exception of the negro huts, which are scattered at irregular
+intervals through the woods in the rear of the mansion, there is not a
+human habitation within an hour's ride; but such a cosy, inviting,
+hospitable atmosphere surrounds the whole place, that a stranger does
+not realize he has happened upon it in a wilderness.
+
+The interior of the dwelling is in keeping with the exterior, though in
+the drawing-rooms, where rich furniture and fine paintings actually
+lumber the apartments, there is evident the lack of a nice perception of
+the "fitness of things," and over the whole hangs a "dusty air," which
+reminds one that the Milesian Bridget does not "flourish" in South
+Carolina.
+
+I was met in the entrance-way by a tall, fine-looking woman, to whom the
+Colonel introduced me as follows:
+
+"Mr. K----, this is Madam P----, my housekeeper; she will try to make
+you forget that Mrs. J---- is absent."
+
+After a few customary courtesies were exchanged, I was shown to a
+dressing-room, and with the aid of Jim, a razor, and one of the
+Colonel's shirts--all of mine having undergone a drenching--soon made a
+tolerably presentable appearance. The negro then conducted me to the
+breakfast-room, where I found the family assembled.
+
+It consisted, besides the housekeeper, of a tall, raw-boned,
+sandy-haired personage, with a low brow, a blear eye, and a sneaking
+look--the overseer of the plantation; and of a well-mannered,
+intelligent lad--with the peculiarly erect carriage and uncommon
+blending of good-natured ease and dignity which distinguished my
+host--who was introduced to me as the housekeeper's son.
+
+Madam P----, who presided over the "tea-things," was a person of perhaps
+thirty-five, but a rich olive complexion, enlivened by a delicate red
+tint, and relieved by thick masses of black hair, made her appear to a
+casual observer several years younger. Her face bore vestiges of great
+beauty, which time, and, perhaps, care, had mellowed but not
+obliterated, and her conversation indicated high cultivation. She had
+evidently mingled in refined society in this country and in Europe, and
+it was a strange freak of fortune that had reduced her to a menial
+condition in the family of a backwoods planter.
+
+After some general conversation, the Colonel remarked that his wife and
+daughter would pass the winter in Charleston.
+
+"And do _you_ remain on the plantation?" I inquired.
+
+"Oh yes, I am needed here," he replied; "but Madam's son is with my
+family."
+
+"Madam's son!" I exclaimed in astonishment, forgetting in my surprise
+that the lady was present.
+
+"Yes, sir," she remarked, "my oldest boy is twenty."
+
+"Excuse me, Madam; I forgot that in your climate one never grows old."
+
+"There you are wrong, sir; I'm sure I _feel_ old when I think how soon
+my boys will be men."
+
+"Not old yet, Alice," said the Colonel, in a singularly familiar tone;
+"you seem to me no older than when you were fifteen."
+
+"You have been long acquainted," I remarked, not knowing exactly what to
+say.
+
+"Oh, yes," replied my host, "we were children together."
+
+"Your Southern country, Madam, affords a fine field for young men of
+enterprise."
+
+"My eldest son resides in Germany," replied the lady. "He expects to
+make that country his home. He would have passed his examination at
+Heidelberg this autumn had not circumstances called him here."
+
+"You are widely separated," I replied.
+
+"Yes, sir; his father thinks it best, and I suppose it is. Thomas,
+here, is to return with his brother, and I may live to see neither of
+them again."
+
+My curiosity was naturally much excited to learn more, but nothing
+further being volunteered, and the conversation soon turning to other
+topics, I left the table with it unsatisfied.
+
+After enjoying a quiet hour with the Colonel in the smoking-room, he
+invited me to join him in a ride over the plantation. I gladly assented,
+and Jim shortly announced the horses were in waiting. That darky, who
+invariably attended his master when the latter proceeded from home,
+accompanied us. As we were mounting I bethought me of Scip, and asked
+where he was.
+
+"He'm gwine to gwo, massa, and want to say good-by to you."
+
+It seemed madness for Scip to start on a journey of seventy miles
+without rest, so I requested the Colonel to let him remain till the next
+day. He cheerfully assented, and sent Jim to find him. While waiting for
+the darky, I spoke of how faithfully he had served me during my journey.
+
+"He's a splendid nigger," replied the Colonel; "worth his weight in
+gold. If affairs were more settled I would buy him."
+
+"But Colonel A---- tells me he is too intelligent. He objects to
+'knowing' niggers."
+
+"_I_ do not," replied my host, "if they are honest, and I would trust
+Scip with uncounted gold. Look at him," he continued, as the negro
+approached; "were flesh and bones ever better put together?"
+
+The darky _was_ a fine specimen of sable humanity, and I readily
+understood why the practiced eye of the Colonel appreciated his physical
+developments.
+
+"Scip," I said, "you must not think of going to-day; the Colonel will be
+glad to let you remain until you are fully rested."
+
+"Tank you, massa, tank you bery much, but de ole man will spec' me, and
+I orter gwo."
+
+"Oh, never mind old----," said the Colonel, "I'll take care of him."
+
+"Tank you, Cunnel, den I'll stay har till de mornin'."
+
+Taking a by-path which led through the forest in the rear of the
+mansion, we soon reached a small stream, and, following its course for a
+short distance, came upon a turpentine distillery, which the Colonel
+explained to me was one of three that prepared the product of his
+plantation for market, and provided for his family of nearly three
+hundred souls.
+
+It was enclosed, or rather roofed, by a rude structure of rough boards,
+which was open at the sides, and sustained on a number of pine poles
+about thirty feet in height, and bore a strong resemblance to the usual
+covering of a New England haystack.
+
+Three stout negro men, divested of all clothing excepting a pair of
+coarse gray trowsers and a red shirt--it was a raw, cold, wintry
+day--and with cotton bandannas bound about their heads, were "tending
+the still." The foreman stood on a raised platform level with its top,
+but as we approached very quietly seated himself on a turpentine barrel
+which a moment before he had rolled over the mouth of the boiler.
+Another negro was below, feeding the fire with "light wood," and a third
+was tending the trough by which the liquid rosin found its way into the
+semicircle of rough barrels intended for its reception.
+
+"Hello, Junius, what in creation are you doing there?" asked the
+Colonel, as we approached, of the negro on the turpentine barrel.
+
+"Holein' her down, Cunnel; de ole ting got a mine to blow up dis
+mornin'; I'se got dis barrl up har to hole her down."
+
+"Why, you everlasting nigger, if the top leaks you'll be blown to
+eternity in half a second."
+
+"Reckon not, massa; be barrl and me kin hole her. We'll take de risk."
+
+"Perhaps _you_ will," said the Colonel, laughing, "but I wont. Nigger
+property isn't of much account, but you're too good a darky, June, to be
+sent to the devil for a charge of turpentine."
+
+"Tank you, massa, but you dun kno' dis ole ting like I do. You cudn't
+blow her up nohow; I'se tried her afore dis way."
+
+"Don't you do it again; now mind; if you do I'll make a white man of
+you." (This I suppose referred to a process of flaying with a whip;
+though the whip is generally thought to _redden_, not _whiten_, the
+negro.)
+
+The black did not seem at all alarmed, for he showed his ivories in a
+broad grin as he replied, "Jess as you say, massa; you'se de boss in dis
+shanty."
+
+Directing the fire to be raked out, and the still to stand unused until
+it was repaired, the Colonel turned his horse to go, when he observed
+that the third negro was shoeless, and his feet chapped and swollen with
+the cold. "Jake," he said, "where are your shoes?"
+
+"Wored out, massa."
+
+"Worn out! Why haven't you been to me?"
+
+"'Cause, massa, I know'd you'd jaw; you tole me I wears 'em out mighty
+fass."
+
+"Well, you do, that's a fact; but go to Madam and get a pair; and you,
+June, you've been a decent nigger, you can ask for a dress for Rosy. How
+is little June?"
+
+"Mighty pore, massa; de ma'am war dar lass night and dis mornin', and
+she reckun he'm gwine to gwo, sartain."
+
+"Sorry to hear that," said the Colonel. "I'll go and see him. Don't feel
+badly, June," he continued, for the tears welled up to the eyes of the
+black man as he spoke of his child; "we all must die."
+
+"I knows dat, massa, but it am hard to hab 'em gwo."
+
+"Yes, it is, June, but we may save him."
+
+"Ef you cud, massa! Oh, ef you cud!" and the poor darky covered his face
+with his great hands and sobbed like a child.
+
+We rode on to another "still," and there dismounting, the Colonel
+explained to me the process of gathering and manufacturing turpentine.
+The trees are "boxed" and "tapped" early in the year, while the frost is
+still in the ground. "Boxing" is the process of scooping a cavity in the
+trunk of the tree by means of a peculiarly shaped axe, made for the
+purpose; "tapping" is scarifying the rind of the wood above the boxes.
+This is never done until the trees have been worked one season, but it
+is then repeated year after year, till on many plantations they present
+the marks of twenty and frequently thirty annual "tappings," and are
+often denuded of bark for a distance of thirty feet from the ground. The
+necessity for this annual tapping arises from the fact that the scar on
+the trunk heals at the end of a season, and the sap will no longer run
+from it; a fresh wound is therefore made each spring. The sap flows down
+the scarified surface and collects in the boxes, which are emptied six
+or eight times in a year, according to the length of the season. This is
+the process of "dipping," and it is done with a tin or iron vessel
+constructed to fit the cavity in the tree.
+
+The turpentine gathered from the newly boxed or virgin tree is very
+valuable, on account of its producing a peculiarly clear and white
+rosin, which is used in the manufacture of the finer kinds of soap, and
+by "Rosin the Bow." It commands, ordinarily, nearly five times the price
+of the common article. When barrelled, the turpentine is frequently sent
+to market in its crude state, but more often is distilled on the
+plantation, the gatherers generally possessing means sufficient to own
+a still.
+
+In the process of distilling, the crude turpentine is "dumped" into the
+boiler through an opening in the top--the same as that on which we saw
+Junius composedly seated--water is then poured upon it, the aperture
+made tight by screwing down the cover and packing it with clay, a fire
+built underneath, and when the heat reaches several hundred degrees
+Fahrenheit, the process of manufacture begins. The volatile and more
+valuable part of the turpentine, by the action of the heat, rises as
+vapor, then condensing flows off through a pipe in the top of the still,
+and comes out spirits of turpentine, while the heavier portion finds
+vent at a lower aperture, and comes out rosin.
+
+No article of commerce is so liable to waste and leakage as turpentine.
+The spirits can only be preserved in tin cans, or in thoroughly seasoned
+oak barrels, made tight by a coating of glue on the inner side. Though
+the material for these barrels exists at the South in luxuriant
+abundance, they are all procured from the North, and the closing of the
+Southern ports has now entirely cut off the supply; for while the
+turpentine farmer may improvise coopers, he can by no process give the
+oak timber the seasoning which is needed to render the barrel
+spirit-tight. Hence it is certain that a large portion of the last crop
+of turpentine must have gone to waste. When it is remembered that the
+one State of North Carolina exports annually nearly twenty millions in
+value of this product, and employs fully two-thirds of its negroes in
+its production, it will be seen how dearly the South is paying for the
+mad freak of secession. Putting out of view his actual loss of produce,
+how does the turpentine farmer feed and employ his negroes? and pressed
+as these blacks inevitably are by both hunger and idleness, those
+prolific breeders of sedition, what will keep them quiet?
+
+"What effect will secession have on your business?" I asked the Colonel,
+after a while.
+
+"A favorable one. I shall ship my crop direct to Liverpool and London,
+instead of selling it to New York middle-men."
+
+"But is not the larger portion of the turpentine crop consumed at the
+North?"
+
+"Oh, yes. We shall have to deal with the Yankees anyhow, but we shall do
+as little with them as possible."
+
+"Suppose the Yankees object to your setting up by yourselves, and put
+your ports under lock and key?"
+
+"They wont do that, and if they do, England will break the blockade."
+
+"We may rap John Bull over the knuckles in that event," I replied.
+
+"Well, suppose you do; what then?"
+
+"Merely, England would not have a ship in six months to carry your
+cotton. A war with her would ruin the shipping trade of the North. Our
+marine would seek employment at privateering, and soon sweep every
+British merchant ship from the ocean. We could afford to give up ten
+years' trade with you, and to put secession down by force, for the sake
+of a year's brush with John Bull."
+
+"But, my good friend, where would the British navy be all this while?"
+
+"Asleep. The English haven't a steamer that can catch a Brookhaven
+schooner. The last war proved that government vessels are no match for
+privateers."
+
+"Well, well! but the Yankees wont fight."
+
+"Suppose they do. Suppose they shut up your ports, and leave you with
+your cotton and turpentine unsold? You raise scarcely any thing
+else--what would you eat?"
+
+"We would turn our cotton fields into corn and wheat. Turpentine-makers,
+of course, would suffer."
+
+"Then why are not _you_ a Union man?"
+
+"My friend, I have nearly three hundred mouths to feed. I depend on the
+sale of my crop to give them food. If our ports are closed, I cannot do
+it--they will starve, and I be ruined. But sooner than submit to the
+domination of the cursed Yankees, I will see my negroes starving, and my
+child a beggar!"
+
+At this point in the conversation we arrived at the negro shanty where
+the sick child was. Dismounting, the Colonel and I entered.
+
+The cabin was almost a counterpart of the "Mills House," described in
+the previous chapter, but it had a plank flooring, and was scrupulously
+neat and clean. The logs were stripped of bark, and whitewashed. A
+bright, cheerful fire was blazing on the hearth, and an air of rude
+comfort pervaded the whole interior. On a low bed in the farther corner
+of the room lay the sick child. He was a boy of about twelve years, and
+evidently in the last stages of consumption. By his side, bending over
+him as if to catch his almost inaudible words, sat a tidy,
+youthful-looking colored woman, his mother, and the wife of the negro we
+had met at the "still." Playing on the floor, was a younger child,
+perhaps five years old, but while the faces of the mother and the sick
+lad were of the hue of charcoal, _his_ skin by a process well understood
+at the South, had been bleached to a bright yellow.
+
+The woman took no notice of our entrance, but the little fellow ran to
+the Colonel and caught hold of the skirts of his coat in a free-and-easy
+way, saying, "Ole massa, you got suffin' for Dicky?"
+
+"No, you little nig," replied the Colonel, patting his woolly head as I
+might have done a white child's, "Dicky isn't a good boy."
+
+"Yas, I is," said the little darky; "you'se ugly ole massa to gib
+nuffin' to Dick."
+
+Aroused by the Colonel's voice, the woman turned toward us. Her eyes
+were swollen, and her face bore traces of deep emotion.
+
+"Oh massa!" she said, "de chile am dyin'! It'm all along ob his workin'
+in de swamp--no _man_ orter work dar, let alone a chile like dis."
+
+"Do you think he is dying, Rosy?" asked the Colonel, approaching the
+bed-side.
+
+"Shore, massa, he'm gwine fass. Look at 'im."
+
+The boy had dwindled to a skeleton, and the skin lay on his face in
+crimpled folds, like a mask of black crape. His eyes were fixed, and he
+was evidently going.
+
+"Don't you know massa, my boy?" said the Colonel, taking his hand
+tenderly in his.
+
+The child's lips slightly moved, but I could hear no sound. The Colonel
+put his ear down to him for a moment, then, turning to me, said:
+
+"He _is_ dying. Will you be so good as to step to the house and ask
+Madam P---- here, and please tell Jim to go for Junius and the old man."
+
+I returned in a short while with the lady, but found the boy's father
+and "the old man"--the darky preacher of the plantation--there before
+us. The preacher was a venerable old negro, much bowed by years, and
+with thin wool as white as snow. When we entered, he was bending over
+the dying boy, but shortly turning to my host, said:
+
+"Massa, de blessed Lord am callin' for de chile--shall we pray?"
+
+The Colonel nodded assent, and we all, blacks and whites, knelt down on
+the floor, while the old preacher made a short, heart-touching prayer.
+It was a simple, humble acknowledgment of the dependence of the creature
+on the Creator--of His right to give and to take away, and was uttered
+in a free, conversational tone, as if long communion with his Maker had
+placed the old negro on a footing of friendly familiarity with Him, and
+given the black slave the right to talk with the Deity as one man talks
+with another.
+
+As we rose from our knees my host said to me, "It is _my_ duty to stay
+here, but I will not detain _you_. Jim will show you over the
+plantation. I will join you at the house when this is over." The scene
+was a painful one, and I gladly availed myself of the Colonel's
+suggestion.
+
+Mounting our horses, Jim and I rode off to the negro house where Scip
+was staying.
+
+Scip was not at the cabin, and the old negro woman told us he had been
+away for several hours.
+
+"Reckon he'll be 'way all day, sar," said Jim, as we turned our horses
+to go.
+
+"He ought to be resting against the ride of to-morrow. Where has he
+gone?"
+
+"Dunno, sar, but reckon he'm gwine to fine Sam."
+
+"Sam? Oh, he's the runaway the Colonel has advertised."
+
+"Yas, sar, he'm 'way now more'n a monfh."
+
+"How can Scip find him?"
+
+"Dunno, sar. Scipio know most ebery ting--reckon he'll track him. He
+know him well, and Sam'll cum back ef he say he orter."
+
+"Where do you think Sam is?"
+
+"P'raps in de swamp."
+
+"Where is the swamp?"
+
+"'Bout ten mile from har."
+
+"Oh, yes! the shingles are cut there. I should think a runaway would be
+discovered where so many men are at work."
+
+"No, massa, dar'm places dar whar de ole debble cudn't fine him, nor de
+dogs nudder."
+
+"I thought the bloodhounds would track a man anywhere."
+
+"Not fru de water, massa; dey lose de scent in de swamp."
+
+"But how can a man live there--how get food?"
+
+"De darkies dat work dar take 'em nuff."
+
+"Then the other negroes know where the runaways are; don't they
+sometimes betray them?"
+
+"Neber, massa; a darky neber tells on anoder. De Cunnel had a boy in dat
+swamp once good many years."
+
+"Is it possible! Did he come back?"
+
+"No, he died dar. Sum ob de hands found him dead one mornin' in de hut
+whar he lib'd, and buried him dar."
+
+"Why did Sam run away?"
+
+"'Cause de oberseer flog him. He use him bery hard, massa."
+
+"What had Sam done?"
+
+"Nuffin, massa."
+
+"Then why was he flogged? Did the Colonel know it?"
+
+"Oh, yas; Moye cum de possum ober de Cunnel, and make him b'lieve Sam
+war bad. De Cunnel dunno de hull ob dat story."
+
+"Why didn't _you_, tell him? The Colonel trusts _you_."
+
+"'T wudn't hab dun no good; de Cunnel wud hab flogged me for tellin' on
+a wite man. Nigga's word aint ob no account."
+
+"What is the story about, Sam?"
+
+"You wont tell dat _I_ tole you, massa?"
+
+"No, but I'll tell the Colonel the truth."
+
+"Wal den, sar, you see Sam's wife am bery good-lookin', her skin's most
+wite--her mudder war a mulatter, her fader a wite man--she lub'd Sam
+'bout as well as de wimmin ginrally lub dar husbands" (Jim was a
+bachelor, and his observation of plantation morals had given him but
+little faith in the sex), "but most ob 'em, ef dey'm married or no, tink
+dey must smile on de wite men, so Jule she smiled on de oberseer--so Sam
+tought--and it made him bery jealous. He war sort o' sassy, and de
+oberseer strung him up, and flog him bery hard. Den Sam took to de
+swamp, but he didn't know whar to gwo, and de dogs tracked him; he'd ha'
+got 'way dough ef ole Moye hadn't a shot him; den he cudn't run. Den
+Moye flogged him till he war 'most dead, and arter dat chained him down
+in de ole cabin, and gave him 'most nuffin' to eat. De Cunnel war gwine
+to take Sam to Charles'on and sell him, but somehow he got a file and
+sawed fru de chain and got 'way in de night to de 'still.' Den when de
+oberseer come dar in de mornin', Sam jump on him and 'most kill him.
+He'd hab sent him whar dar aint no niggas, ef Junius hadn't a holed him.
+_I'd_ a let de ole debble gwo."
+
+"Junius, then, is a friend of the overseer."
+
+"No, sar; _he_ haint no friends, 'cep de debble; but June am a good
+nigga, and he said 'twarn't right to kill ole Moye so sudden, for den
+dar'd be no chance for de Lord to forgib him."
+
+"Then Sam got away again?"
+
+"Oh yas; nary one but darkies war round, and dey wouldn't hole him. Ef
+dey'd cotched him den, dey'd hung him, shore."
+
+"Why hung him?"
+
+"'Cause he'd struck a wite man; it'm shore death to do dat."
+
+"Do you think Scip will bring him back?"
+
+"Yas; 'cause he'm gwine to tell massa de hull story. De Cunnel will
+b'lieve Scipio ef he _am_ brack. Sam'll know dat, so he'll come back. De
+Cunnel'll make de State too hot to hole ole Moye, when he fine him out."
+
+"Does Sam's wife 'smile' on the overseer now?"
+
+"No; she see de trubble she bring on Sam, and she bery sorry. She wont
+look at a wite man now."
+
+During the foregoing conversation, we had ridden for several miles over
+the western half of the plantation, and were again near the house. My
+limbs being decidedly stiff and sore from the effect of the previous
+day's journey, I decided to alight and rest until the hour for dinner.
+
+I mentioned my jaded condition to Jim, who said:
+
+"Dat's right, massa; come in de house. I'll cure de rumatics; I knows
+how to fix dem."
+
+Fastening the horses at the door, Jim accompanied me to my
+sleeping-room, where he lighted a fire of pine knots, which in a moment
+blazed up on the hearth and sent a cheerful glow through the apartment;
+then, saying he would return after stabling the horses, the darky left
+me.
+
+I took off my boots, drew the sofa near the fire, and stretched myself
+at full length upon it. If ever mortal was tired, "I reckon" I was. It
+seemed as though every joint and bone in my body had lost the power of
+motion, and sharp, acute pains danced along my nerves, as I have seen
+the lightning play along the telegraph wires. My entire system had the
+toothache.
+
+Jim soon returned, bearing in one hand a decanter of "Otard," and in the
+other a mug of hot water and a crash towel.
+
+"I'se got de stuff dat'll fix de rumatics, massa."
+
+"Thank you, Jim; a glass will do me good. Where did you get it?" I
+asked, thinking it strange the Colonel should leave his brandy-bottle
+within reach of the negroes, who have an universal weakness for spirits.
+
+"Oh, I keeps de keys; de Cunnel hissef hab to come to me when he want
+suffin' to warm hissef."
+
+It was the fact; Jim had exclusive charge of the wine-cellar; in short,
+was butler, barber, porter, footman, and body-servant, all combined.
+
+"Now, massa, you lay right whar you is, and I'll make you ober new in
+less dan no time."
+
+And he did; but I emptied the brandy-bottle. Lest my temperance friends
+should be horror-stricken, I will mention, however, that I took the
+fluid by external absorption. For all rheumatic sufferers, I would
+prescribe hot brandy, in plentiful doses, a coarse towel, and an active
+Southern darky, and if on the first application the patient is not
+cured, the fault will not be the negro's. Out of mercy to the chivalry,
+I hope our government, in saving the Union, will not annihilate the
+order of body-servants. They are the only perfect institution in the
+Southern country, and, so far as I have seen, about the only one worth
+saving.
+
+The dinner-bell sounded a short while after Jim had finished the
+scrubbing operation, and I went to the table with an appetite I had not
+felt for a week. My whole system was rejuvenated, and I am not sure that
+I should, at that moment, have declined a wrestling match with Heenan
+himself.
+
+I found at dinner only the overseer and the young son of Madam P----,
+the Colonel and the lady being still at the cabin of the dying boy. The
+dinner, though a queer mixture of viands, would not have disgraced,
+except, perhaps, in the cooking, the best of our Northern hotels.
+Venison, bacon, wild fowl, hominy, poultry, corn bread, French
+"made-dishes," and Southern "common doin's," with wines and brandies of
+the choicest brands, were placed on the table together.
+
+"Dis, massa," said Jim, "am de raal juice; it hab been in de cellar eber
+since de house war built. Massa tole me to gib you some, wid him
+complimen's."
+
+Passing it to my companions, I drank the Colonel's health in as fine
+wine as I ever tasted.
+
+I had taken an instinctive dislike to the overseer at the
+breakfast-table, and my aversion was not lessened by learning his
+treatment of Sam; curiosity to know what manner of man he was, however,
+led me, toward the close of our meal, to "draw him out," as follows:
+
+"What is the political sentiment, sir, of this section of the State?"
+
+"Wal, I reckon most of the folks 'bout har' is Union; they'm from the
+'old North,' and gin'rally pore trash."
+
+"I have heard that the majority of the turpentine-farmers are
+enterprising men and good citizens--more enterprising, even, than the
+cotton and rice planters."
+
+"Wal, they is enterprisin', 'cause they don't keer for nuthin' 'cep'
+money."
+
+"The man who is absorbed in money-getting is generally a quiet citizen."
+
+"P'raps that's so. But I think a man sh'u'd hev a soul suthin' 'bove
+dollars. Them folks will take any sort o' sarce from the Yankees, ef
+they'll only buy thar truck."
+
+"What do you suffer from the Yankees?"
+
+"Suffer from the Yankees? Don't they steal our niggers, and haint they
+'lected an ab'lishener for President?"
+
+"I've been at the North lately, but I am not aware that is so."
+
+"So! it's damnably so, sir. I knows it. We don't mean to stand it eny
+longer."
+
+"What will you do?"
+
+"We'll give 'em h--l, ef they want it!"
+
+"Will it not be necessary to agree among yourselves before you do that?
+I met a turpentine farmer below here who openly declared that he is
+friendly to abolishing slavery. He thinks the masters can make more
+money by hiring than by owning the negroes."
+
+"Yes, that's the talk of them North County[D] fellers, who've squatted
+round har. We'll hang every mother's son on 'em, by ----."
+
+"I wouldn't do that: in a free country every man has a right to his
+opinions."
+
+"Not to sech opinions as them. A man may think, but he mustn't think
+onraasonable."
+
+"I don't know, but it seems to me reasonable, that if the negroes cost
+these farmers now one hundred and fifty dollars a year, and they could
+hire them, if free, for seventy-five or a hundred, that they would make
+by abolition."
+
+"Ab'lish'n! By--, sir, ye aint an ab'lishener, is ye?" exclaimed the
+fellow, in an excited manner, bringing his hand down on the table in a
+way that set the crockery a-dancing.
+
+"Come, come, my friend," I replied, in a mild tone, and as unruffled as
+a pool of water that has been out of a December night; "you'll knock off
+the dinner things, and I'm not quite through."
+
+"Wal, sir, I've heerd yer from the North, and I'd like to know if yer an
+ab'lishener."
+
+"My dear sir, you surprise me. You certainly can't expect a modest man
+like me to speak of himself."
+
+"Ye can speak of what ye d-- please, but ye can't talk ab'lish'n har,
+by--," he said, again applying his hand to the table, till the plates
+and saucers jumped up, performed several jigs, then several reels, and
+then rolled over in graceful somersaults to the floor.
+
+At this juncture, the Colonel and Madam P---- entered.
+
+Observing the fall in his crockery, and the general confusion of things,
+my host quietly asked, "What's to pay?"
+
+I said nothing, but burst into a fit of laughter at the awkward
+predicament of the overseer. That gentleman also said nothing, but
+looked as if he would like to find vent through a rat-hole or a
+window-pane. Jim, however, who stood at the back of my chair, gave _his_
+eloquent thoughts utterance, very much as follows:
+
+"Moye hab 'sulted Massa K----, Cunnel, awful bad. He hab swore a blue
+streak at him, and called him a d-- ab'lishener, jess 'cause Massa K----
+wudn't get mad and sass him back. He hab disgrace your hosspital,
+Cunnel, wuss dan a nigga."
+
+The Colonel turned white with rage, and striding up to Moye, seized him
+by the throat, yelling, rather than speaking, these words: "You
+d---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----, have you dared to insult a guest in
+my house?"
+
+"I did'nt mean to 'sult him," faltered out the overseer, his voice
+running through an entire octave, and changing with the varying pressure
+of the Colonel's fingers on his throat; "but he said he war an
+ab'lishener."
+
+"No matter what he said, he is my guest, and in my house he shall say
+what he pleases, by--. Apologize to him, or I'll send you to h--in a
+second."
+
+The fellow turned cringingly to me, and ground out something like this,
+every word seeming to give him the face-ache:
+
+"I meant no offence, sar; I hope ye'll excuse me."
+
+This satisfied me, but, before I could reply, the Colonel again seized
+him by the throat and yelled:
+
+"None of your sulkiness; you d-- white-livered hound, ask the gentleman's
+pardon like a man."
+
+The fellow then got out, with less effort than before:
+
+"I 'umbly ax yer pardon, sar, very 'umbly, indeed."
+
+"I am satisfied, sir," I replied. "I bear you no ill-will."
+
+"Now go," said the Colonel; "and in future take your meals in your
+cabin. I have none but gentlemen at my table."
+
+The fellow went. As soon as he closed the door, the Colonel said to me:
+
+"Now, my dear friend, I hope you will pardon _me_ for this occurrence. I
+sincerely regret you have been insulted in my house."
+
+"Don't speak of it, my dear sir; the fellow is ignorant, and really
+thinks I am an abolitionist. His zeal in politics led to his warmth. I
+blame him very little," I replied.
+
+"But he lied, Massa K----," chimed in Jim, very warmly; "you neber said
+you war an ab'lishener."
+
+"You know what _they_ are, Jim, don't you?" said the Colonel, laughing,
+and taking no notice of his breach of decorum in wedging black ideas
+into a white conversation.
+
+"Yas, I does dat," said the darky, grinning.
+
+"Jim," said his master, "you're a prince of a nigger, but you talk too
+much; ask me for something to-day, and I reckon you'll get it; but go
+now, and tell Chloe (the cook) to get us some dinner."
+
+The negro left, and, excusing myself, I soon followed suit.
+
+I went to my room, laid down on the lounge, and soon fell asleep. It was
+nearly five o'clock when a slight noise in the apartment awoke me, and,
+looking up, I saw the Colonel quietly seated by the fire, smoking a
+cigar. His feet were elevated above his head, and he appeared absorbed
+in no very pleasant reflections.
+
+"How is the sick boy, Colonel?" I asked.
+
+"It's all over with him, my friend. He died easy; but 'twas very painful
+to me; I feel I have done him wrong."
+
+"How so?"
+
+"I was away all summer, and that cursed Moye sent him to the swamp to
+tote for the shinglers. It killed him."
+
+"Then you are not to blame," I replied.
+
+"I wish I could feel so."
+
+The Colonel remained with me till supper-time, evidently much depressed
+by the events of the morning, which had affected him more than I should
+have thought possible. I endeavored, by directing his mind to other
+topics, to cheer him, and in a measure succeeded.
+
+While we were seated at the supper table, the black cook entered from
+the kitchen--a one-story shanty, detached from, and in the rear of the
+house--and, with a face expressive of every conceivable emotion a negro
+can feel--joy, sorrow, wonder, and fear all combined--exclaimed, "O
+massa, massa! dear massa! Sam, O Sam!"
+
+"Sam!" said the Colonel; "what about Sam?"
+
+"Why, he hab--dear, dear massa, don't yer, don't yer hurt him--he hab
+come back!"
+
+If a bombshell had fallen in the room, a greater sensation could not
+have been produced. Every individual arose from the table, and the
+Colonel, striding up and down the apartment, exclaimed:
+
+"Is he mad? The everlasting fool! Why in h--has he come back?"
+
+"Oh, don't ye hurt him massa," said the black cook, wringing her hands.
+"Sam hab been bad, bery bad, but he won't be so no more."
+
+"Stop your noise, aunty," said the Colonel, but with no harshness in his
+tone. "I shall do what I think right."
+
+"Send for him, David," said Madame P----; "let us hear what he has to
+say. He would not come back if he meant to be ugly."
+
+"_Send_ for him, Alice!" replied my host. "He's prouder than Lucifer,
+and would send me word to come to _him_. I will go. Will you accompany
+me, Mr. K----? You'll hear what a runaway nigger thinks of slavery: Sam
+has the gift of speech, and uses it regardless of persons."
+
+"Yes, sir, I'll go with pleasure."
+
+It was about an hour after nightfall when we emerged from the door of
+the mansion and took our way to the negro quarters. The full moon had
+risen half way above the horizon, and the dark pines cast their shadows
+around the little collection of negro huts, which straggled about
+through the woods for the distance of a third of a mile. It was dark,
+but I could distinguish the figure of a man striding along at a rapid
+pace a few hundred yards in advance of us.
+
+"Is'nt that Moye?" I asked the Colonel, directing his attention to the
+receding figure.
+
+"I reckon so; that's his gait. He's had a lesson to-day that'll do him
+good."
+
+"I don't like that man's looks," I replied, carelessly; "but I've heard
+of singed cats."
+
+"He _is_ a sneaking d--l," said the Colonel; "but he's very valuable to
+me. I never had an overseer who got so much work out of the hands."
+
+"Is he severe with them?"
+
+"Well, I reckon he is; but a nigger is like a dog--you must flog him to
+make him like you."
+
+"I judge your niggers haven't been flogged into liking Moye."
+
+"Why, have you heard any of them speak of him?"
+
+"Yes; though, of course, I've made no effort to draw gossip from them. I
+had to hear."
+
+"O yes; I know; there's no end to their gabble; niggers will talk. But
+what have you heard?"
+
+"That Moye is to blame in this affair of Sam, and that you don't know
+the whole story."
+
+"What _is_ the whole story?" he asked, stopping short in the road; "tell
+me before I see Sam."
+
+I then told him what Jim had recounted to me. He heard me through
+attentively, then laughingly exclaimed:
+
+"Is that all! Lord bless you, he didn't seduce her. There's no seducing
+these women; with them it's a thing of course. It was Sam's d-- high
+blood that made the trouble. His father was the proudest man in
+Virginia, and Sam is as like him as a nigger can be like a white man."
+
+"No matter what the blood is, it seems to me such an injury justifies
+revenge."
+
+"Pshaw, my good fellow, you don't know these people. I'll stake my
+plantation against a glass of whiskey there's not a virtuous woman with
+a drop of black blood in her veins in all South Carolina. They prefer
+the white men; their husbands know it, and take it as a matter of
+course."
+
+We had here reached the negro cabin. It was one of the more remote of
+the collection, and stood deep in the woods, an enormous pine growing up
+directly beside the doorway. In all respects it was like the other huts
+on the plantation. A bright fire lit up its interior, and through the
+crevices in the logs we saw, as we approached, a scene that made us
+pause involuntarily, when within a few rods of the house. The mulatto
+man, whose clothes were torn and smeared with swamp mud, stood near the
+fire. On a small pine table near him lay a large carving-knife, which
+glittered in the blaze, as if recently sharpened. His wife was seated on
+the side of the low bed at his back, weeping. She was two or three
+shades lighter than the man, and had the peculiar brown, kinky hair,
+straight, flat nose, and speckled, gray eyes which mark the metif.
+Tottling on the floor at the feet of the man, and caressing his knees,
+was a child of perhaps two years.
+
+As we neared the house, we heard the voice of the overseer issuing from
+the doorway on the other side of the pine-tree.
+
+"Come out, ye black rascal."
+
+"Come in, you wite hound, ef you dar," responded the negro, laying his
+hand on the carving-knife.
+
+"Come out, I till ye; I sha'n't ax ye agin."
+
+"I'll hab nuffin' to do wid you. G'way and send your massa har," replied
+the mulatto man, turning his face away with a lordly, contemptuous
+gesture, that spoke him a true descendant of Pocahontas. This movement
+exposed his left side to the doorway, outside of which, hidden from us
+by the tree, stood the overseer.
+
+"Come away, Moye," said the Colonel, advancing with me toward the door;
+"_I'll_ speak to him."
+
+Before all of the words had escaped the Colonel's lips, a streak of fire
+flashed from where the overseer stood, and took the direction of the
+negro. One long, wild shriek--one quick, convulsive bound in the
+air--and Sam fell lifeless to the floor, the dark life-stream pouring
+from his side. The little child also fell with him, and its greasy,
+grayish shirt was dyed with its father's blood. Moye, at the distance of
+ten feet, had discharged the two barrels of a heavily-loaded shot-gun
+directly through the negro's heart.
+
+"You incarnate son of h--," yelled the Colonel, as he sprang on the
+overseer, bore him to the ground, and wrenched the shot-gun from his
+hand. Clubbing the weapon, he raised it to brain him. The movement
+occupied but a second; the gun was descending, and in another instant
+Moye would have met Sam in eternity, had not a brawny arm caught the
+Colonel's, and, winding itself around his body, pinned his limbs to his
+side so that motion was impossible. The woman, half frantic with
+excitement, thrust open the door when her husband fell, and the light
+which came through it revealed the face of the new-comer. But his voice,
+which rang out on the night air as clear as a bugle, had there been no
+light, would have betrayed him. It was Scip. Spurning the prostrate
+overseer with his foot, he shouted:
+
+"Run, you wite debble, run for your life!"
+
+"Let me go, you black scoundrel," shrieked the Colonel, wild with rage.
+
+"When he'm out ob reach, you'd kill him," replied the negro, as cool as
+if he was doing an ordinary thing.
+
+"I'll kill you, you black--hound, if you don't let me go," again
+screamed the Colonel, struggling violently in the negro's grasp, and
+literally foaming at the mouth.
+
+"I shan't lef you gwo, Cunnel, till you 'gree not to do dat."
+
+The Colonel was a stout, athletic man, in the very prime of life, and
+his rage gave him more than his ordinary strength, but Scip held him as
+I might have held a child.
+
+"Here, Jim," shouted the Colonel to his body-servant, who just then
+emerged from among the trees, "'rouse the plantation--shoot this
+d-- nigger."
+
+"Dar aint one on 'em wud touch him, massa. He'd send _me_ to de debble
+wid one fist."
+
+"You ungrateful dog," groaned his master. "Mr. K----, will you stand by
+and see me handcuffed by a miserable slave?"
+
+"The black means well, my friend; he has saved you from murder. Say he
+is safe, and I'll answer for his being away in an hour."
+
+The Colonel made one more ineffectual attempt to free himself from the
+vice-like grip of the negro, then relaxing his efforts, and, gathering
+his broken breath, he said, "You're safe _now_, but if you're found
+within ten miles of my plantation by sunrise, by--you're a dead man."
+
+The negro relinquished his hold, and, without saying a word, walked
+slowly away.
+
+"Jim, you--rascal," said the Colonel to that courageous darky, who was
+skulking off, "raise every nigger on the plantation, catch Moye, or I'll
+flog you within an inch of your life."
+
+"I'll do dat, Cunnel; I'll kotch de ole debble, ef he's dis side de hot
+place."
+
+His words were echoed by about twenty other darkies, who, attracted by
+the noise of the fracas, had gathered within a safe distance of the
+cabin. They went off with Jim, to raise the other plantation hands, and
+inaugurate the hunt.
+
+"If that -- nigger hadn't held me, I'd had Moye in -- by this time," said
+the Colonel to me, still livid with excitement.
+
+"The law will deal with him, my friend. The negro has saved you from
+murder."
+
+"The law be d--; it's too good for such a--hound; and that the d-- nigger
+should have dared to hold me--by--he'll rue it."
+
+He then turned, exhausted with the recent struggle, and, with a weak,
+uncertain step, entered the cabin. Kneeling down by the dead body of the
+negro, he attempted to raise it; but his strength was gone. He motioned
+to me to aid him, and we placed the corpse on the bed. Tearing open the
+clothing, we wiped away the still flowing blood, and saw the terrible
+wound which had sent the negro to his account. It was sickening to look
+on, and I turned to go.
+
+The negro woman, who was weeping and wringing her hands, now approached,
+and, in a voice nearly choked with sobs, said:
+
+"Massa, oh massa, I done it! it's me dat killed him!"
+
+"I know you did, you d----. Get out of my sight."
+
+"Oh, massa," sobbed the woman, falling on her knees, "I'se so sorry; oh,
+forgib me!"
+
+"Go to ----, you ----, that's the place for you," said the Colonel, striking
+the kneeling woman with his foot, and felling her to the floor.
+
+Unwilling to see or hear more, I left the master with the slave.
+
+[Footnote D: The "North Counties" are the north-eastern portion of North
+Carolina, and include the towns of Washington and Newbern. They are an
+old turpentine region, and the trees are nearly exhausted. The finer
+virgin forests of South Carolina, and other cotton States, have tempted
+many of the North County farmers to emigrate thither, within the past
+ten years, and they now own nearly all the trees that are worked in
+South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. They generally have few slaves of
+their own, their hands being hired of wealthier men in their native
+districts. The "hiring" is an annual operation, and is done at Christmas
+time, when the negroes are frequently allowed to go home. They treat the
+slaves well, give them an allowance of meat (salt pork or beef), as much
+corn as they can eat, and a gill of whiskey daily. No class of men at
+the South are so industrious, energetic, and enterprising. Though not so
+well informed, they have many of the traits of our New England farmers;
+in fact, are frequently called "North Carolina Yankees." It was these
+people the overseer proposed to hang. The reader will doubtless think
+that "hanging was not good enough for them."]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE PLANTER'S "FAMILY."
+
+
+A quarter of a mile through the woods brought me to the cabin of the old
+negress where Scip lodged. I rapped at the door, and was admitted by the
+old woman. Scip, nearly asleep, was lying on a pile of blankets in the
+corner.
+
+"Are you mad?" I said to him. "The Colonel is frantic with rage, and
+swears he will kill you. You must be off at once."
+
+"No, no, massa; neber fear; I knows him. He'd keep his word, ef he loss
+his life by it. I'm gwine afore sunrise; till den I'm safe."
+
+"Der ye tink Massa Davy wud broke his word, sar?" said the old negress,
+bridling up her bent form, and speaking in a tone in which indignation
+mingled with wounded dignity; "p'raps gemmen do dat at de Norf--dey
+neber does it har."
+
+"Excuse me, Aunty; I know your master is a man of honor; but he's very
+much excited, and very angry with Scip."
+
+"No matter for dat, sar; Massa Davy neber done a mean ting sense he war
+born."
+
+"Massa K---- tinks a heap ob de Cunnel, Aunty; but he reckon he'm sort
+o' crazy now; dat make him afeard," said Scip, in an apologetic tone.
+
+"What ef he am crazy? You'se safe _har_," rejoined the old woman,
+dropping her aged limbs into a chair, and rocking away with much the air
+which ancient white ladies occasionally assume.
+
+"Wont you ax Massa K---- to a cheer?" said Scip; "he hab ben bery kine
+to me."
+
+The negress then offered me a seat; but it was some minutes before I
+rendered myself sufficiently agreeable to thaw out the icy dignity of
+her manner. Meanwhile I glanced around the apartment.
+
+Though the exterior of the cabin was like the others on the plantation,
+the interior had a rude, grotesque elegance about it far in advance of
+any negro hut I had ever seen. The logs were chinked with clay, and the
+one window, though destitute of glass, and ornamented with the
+inevitable board-shutter, had a green moreen curtain, which kept out the
+wind and the rain. A worn but neat and well swept carpet partly covered
+the floor, and on the low bed was spread a patch-work counter-pane.
+Against the side of the room opposite the door stood an antique,
+brass-handled bureau, and an old-fashioned table, covered with a faded
+woollen cloth, occupied the centre of the apartment. In the corner near
+the fire was a curiously-contrived sideboard, made of narrow strips of
+yellow pine, tongued and grooved together, and oiled so as to bring out
+the beautiful grain of the wood. On it were several broken and cracked
+glasses, and an array of irregular crockery. The rocking chair, in which
+the old negress passed the most of her time, was of mahogany, wadded and
+covered with chintz, and the arm-seat I occupied, though old and patched
+in many places, had evidently moved in good society.
+
+The mistress of this second-hand furniture establishment was arrayed in
+a mass of cast-off finery, whose gay colors were in striking contrast
+with her jet-black skin and bent, decrepit form. Her gown, which was
+very short, was of flaming red and yellow worsted stuff, and the
+enormous turban that graced her head and hid all but a few tufts of her
+frizzled, "pepper-and-salt" locks, was evidently a contribution from the
+family stock of worn-out pillow-cases. She was very aged--upward of
+seventy--and so thin that, had she not been endowed with speech and
+motion, she might have passed for a bundle of whalebone thrown into
+human shape, and covered with a coating of gutta-percha. It was evident
+she had been a valued house-servant, whose few remaining years were
+being soothed and solaced by the kind and indulgent care of a grateful
+master.
+
+Scip, I soon saw, was a favorite with the old negress, and the marked
+respect he showed me quickly dispelled the angry feeling my doubts of
+"Massa Davy" had excited, and opened her heart and her mouth at the same
+moment. She was terribly garrulous; her tongue, as soon as it got under
+way, ran on as if propelled by machinery and acquainted with the secret
+of perpetual motion; but she was an interesting study. The
+single-hearted attachment she showed for her master and his family gave
+me a new insight into the practical working of "the peculiar
+institution," and convinced me that even slavery, in some of its
+aspects, is not so black as it is painted.
+
+When we were seated, I said to Scip, "What induced you to lay hands on
+the Colonel? It is death, you know, if he enforces the law."
+
+"I knows dat, massa; I knows dat; but I had to do it. Dat Moye am de ole
+debble, but de folks round har wud hab turned on de Cunnel, shore, ef
+he'd killed him. Dey don't like de Cunnel; dey say he'm a stuck-up
+seshener."
+
+"The Colonel, then, has befriended you at some time?"
+
+"No, no, sar; 'twarn't dat; dough I'se know'd him a long w'ile--eber
+sense my ole massa fotched me from Habana--but 'twarn't dat."
+
+"Then _why_ did you do it?"
+
+The black hesitated a moment, and glanced at the old negress, then said:
+
+"You see, massa, w'en I fuss come to Charles'n, a pore little ting, wid
+no friend in all de worle, dis ole aunty war a mudder to me. She nussed
+de Cunnel; he am jess like her own chile, and I know'd 'twud kill her ef
+he got hissef enter trubble."
+
+I noticed certain convulsive twitchings about the corners of the old
+woman's mouth as she rose from her seat, threw her arms around Scip,
+and, in words broken by sobs, faltered out:
+
+"_You_ am my chile; I loves you better dan Massa Davy--better dan all de
+worle."
+
+The scene, had they not been black, would have been one for a painter.
+
+"You were the Colonel's nurse, Aunty," I said, when she had regained her
+composure. "Have you always lived with him?"
+
+"Yas, sar, allers; I nussed him, and den de chil'ren--all ob 'em."
+
+"_All_ the children? I thought the Colonel had but one--Miss Clara."
+
+"Wal, he habn't, massa, only de boys."
+
+"What boys? I never heard he had sons."
+
+"Neber heerd of young Massa Davy, nor Massa Tommy! Haint you _seed_
+Massa Tommy, sar?"
+
+"Tommy! I was told he was Madam P----'s son."
+
+"So he am; Massa Davy had _her_ long afore he had missus."
+
+The truth flashed upon me; but could it be possible? Was I in South
+Carolina or in Utah?
+
+"Who _is_ Madam P----?" I asked.
+
+The old woman hesitated a moment as if in doubt whether she had not said
+too much; but Scip quietly replied:
+
+"She'm jess what aunty am--_de Cunnel's slave!_"
+
+"His _slave!_ it can't be possible; she is white!"
+
+"No, massa; she am brack, and de Cunnel's slave!"
+
+Not to weary the reader with a long repetition of negro-English, I will
+tell in brief what I gleaned from an hour's conversation with the two
+blacks.
+
+Madam P---- was the daughter of Ex-Gov. ----, of Virginia, by a quarteron
+woman. She was born a slave, but was acknowledged as her father's child,
+and reared in his family with his legitimate children. When she was ten
+years old her father died, and his estate proving insolvent, the land
+and negroes were brought under the hammer. His daughter, never having
+been manumitted, was inventoried and sold with the other property. The
+Colonel, then just of age, and a young man of fortune, bought her and
+took her to the residence of his mother in Charleston. A governess was
+provided for her, and a year or two afterward she was taken to the North
+to be educated. There she was frequently visited by the Colonel; and
+when fifteen her condition became such that she was obliged to return
+home. He conveyed her to the plantation, where her elder son, David, was
+soon after born, "Aunt Lucy" officiating on the occasion. When the child
+was two years old, leaving it in charge of the aged negress, she
+accompanied the Colonel to Europe, where they remained for a year.
+Subsequently she passed another year at a Northern seminary; and then,
+returning to the homestead, was duly installed as its mistress, and had
+ever since presided over its domestic affairs. She was kind and good to
+the negroes, who were greatly attached to her, and much of the
+Colonel's wealth was due to her excellent management of the plantation.
+
+Six years after the birth of "young Massa Davy," the Colonel married his
+present wife, that lady having full knowledge of his left-handed
+connection with Madam P----, and consenting that the "bond-woman" should
+remain on the plantation, as its mistress. The legitimate wife resided,
+during most of the year, in Charleston, and when at the homestead took
+little interest in domestic matters. On one of her visits to the
+plantation, twelve years before, her daughter, Miss Clara, was born, and
+within a week, under the same roof, Madam P---- presented the Colonel
+with a son--the lad Thomas, of whom I have spoken. As the mother was
+slave, the children were so also at birth, but _they_ had been
+manumitted by their father. One of them was being educated in Germany;
+and it was intended that both should spend their lives in that country,
+the taint in their blood being an insuperable bar to their ever
+acquiring social position at the South.
+
+As she finished the story, the old woman said, "Massa Davy am bery kind
+to the missus, sar, but he _love_ de ma'am; an' he can't help it, 'cause
+she'm jess so good as de angels."[E]
+
+In conversation with a well-known Southern gentleman, not long since, I
+mentioned these two cases, and commented on them as a man educated with
+New England ideas might be supposed to do. The gentleman admitted that
+he knew of twenty such instances, and gravely defended the practice as
+being infinitely more moral and respectable than the _more common
+relation_ existing between masters and slaves.
+
+I looked at my watch--it was nearly ten o'clock, and I rose to go. As I
+did so the old negress said:
+
+"Don't yer gwo, massa, 'fore you hab sum ob aunty's wine; you'm good
+friends wid Scip, and I knows _you'se_ not too proud to drink wid brack
+folks, ef you am from de Norf."
+
+Being curious to know what quality of wine a plantation slave indulged
+in, I accepted the invitation. She went to the side-board, and brought
+out a cut-glass decanter, and three cracked tumblers, which she placed
+on the table. Filling the glasses to the brim, she passed one to Scip,
+and one to me, and, with the other in her hand, resumed her seat.
+Wishing her a good many happy years, and Scip a pleasant journey home, I
+emptied my glass. It was Scuppernong, and the pure juice of the grape!
+
+"Aunty," I said, "this wine is as fine as I ever tasted."
+
+"Oh, yas, massa, it am de raal stuff. I growed de grapes myseff."
+
+"You grew them?"
+
+"Yas, sar, an' Massa Davy make de wine. He do it ebery yar for de ole
+nuss."
+
+"The Colonel is very good. Do you raise any thing else?"
+
+"Yas, I hab collards and taters, a little corn, and most ebery ting."
+
+"But who does your work? _You_ certainly can't do it?"
+
+"Oh, de ma'am looks arter dat, sar; she'm bery good to de ole aunty."
+
+Shaking hands with both the negroes, I left the cabin, fully convinced
+that all the happiness in this world is not found within plastered
+apartments.
+
+The door of the mansion was bolted and barred; but, rapping for
+admission, I soon heard the Colonel's voice asking, "Who is there?"
+Giving a satisfactory answer, I was admitted. Explaining that he
+supposed I had retired to my room, he led the way to the library.
+
+That apartment was much more elegantly furnished than the drawing-rooms.
+Three of its sides were lined with books, and on the centre-table,
+papers, pamphlets, and manuscripts were scattered in promiscuous
+confusion. In an arm-chair near the fire, Madame P---- was seated,
+reading. The Colonel's manner was as composed as if nothing had
+disturbed the usual routine of the plantation; no trace of the recent
+terrible excitement was visible; in fact, had I not been a witness to
+the late tragedy, I should have thought it incredible that he, within
+two hours, had been an actor in a scene which had cost a human being his
+life.
+
+"Where in creation have you been, my dear fellow?" he asked, as we took
+our seats.
+
+"At old Lucy's cabin, with Scip," I replied.
+
+"Indeed. I supposed the darky had gone."
+
+"No, he doesn't go till the morning."
+
+"I told you he wouldn't, David," said Madame P----; "now, send for
+him--make friends with him before he goes."
+
+"No, Alice, it wont do. I bear him no ill-will, but it wont do. It would
+be all over the plantation in an hour."
+
+"No matter for that; our people would like you the better for it."
+
+"No, no. I can't do it. I mean him no harm, but I can't do that."
+
+"He told me _why_ he interfered between you and Moye," I remarked.
+
+"Why did he?"
+
+"He says old Lucy, years ago, was a mother to him; that she is greatly
+attached to you, and it would kill her if any harm happened to you; and
+that your neighbors bear you no good-will, and would have enforced the
+law had you killed Moye."
+
+"It is true, David; you would have had to answer for it."
+
+"Nonsense! what influence could this North County scum have against
+_me_?"
+
+"Perhaps none. But that makes no difference; Scipio did right, and you
+should tell him you forgive him."
+
+The Colonel then rang a small bell, and a negro woman soon appeared.
+"Sue," he said, "go to Aunt Lucy's, and ask Scip to come here. Bring him
+in at the front door, and, mind, let no one know he comes."
+
+The woman in a short time returned with Scip. There was not a trace of
+fear or embarrassment in the negro's manner as he entered the room.
+Making a respectful bow, he bade us "good evening."
+
+"Good evening, Scip," said the Colonel, rising and giving the black his
+hand; "let us be friends. Madam tells me I should forgive you, and I
+do."
+
+"Aunt Lucy say ma'am am an angel, sar, and it am tru--_it am tru_, sar,"
+replied the negro with considerable feeling.
+
+The lady rose, also, and took Scip's hand, saying, "_I_ not only forgive
+you, but I _thank_ you for what you have done. I shall never forget it."
+
+"You'se too good, ma'am; you'se too good to say dat," replied the darky,
+the moisture coming to his eyes; "but I meant nuffin' wrong--I meant
+nuffin' dis'specful to de Cunnel."
+
+"I know you didn't, Scip; but we'll say no more about it;--good-by,"
+said the Colonel.
+
+Shaking hands with each one of us, the darky left the apartment.
+
+One who does not know that the high-bred Southern gentleman considers
+the black as far below him as the horse he drives, or the dog he kicks,
+cannot realize the amazing sacrifice of pride which the Colonel made in
+seeking a reconciliation with Scip. It was the cutting off of his right
+hand. The circumstance showed the powerful influence held over him by
+the octoroon woman. Strange that she, his slave, cast out from society
+by her blood and her life, despised, no doubt, by all the world, save by
+him and a few ignorant blacks, should thus control a proud, self-willed,
+passionate man, and control him, too, only for good.
+
+After the black had gone, I said to the Colonel, "I was much interested
+in old Lucy. A few more such instances of cheerful and contented old
+age, might lead me to think better of slavery."
+
+"Such cases are not rare, sir. They show the paternal character of our
+'institution.' We are _forced_ to care for our servants in their old
+age."
+
+"But have your other aged slaves the same comforts that Aunt Lucy has?"
+
+"No; they don't need them. She has been accustomed to live in my house,
+and to fare better than the plantation hands; she therefore requires
+better treatment."
+
+"Is not the support of that class a heavy tax upon you?"
+
+"Yes, it _is_ heavy. We have, of course, to deduct it from the labor of
+the able-bodied hands."
+
+"What is the usual proportion of sick and infirm on your plantation?"
+
+"Counting in the child-bearing women, I reckon about twenty per cent."
+
+"And what does it cost you to support each hand?"
+
+"Well, it costs _me_, for children and all, about seventy-five dollars a
+year. In some places it costs less. _I_ have to buy all my provisions."
+
+"What proportion of your slaves are able-bodied hands?"
+
+"Somewhere about sixty per cent. I have, all told, old and young--men,
+women, and children--two hundred and seventy. Out of that number I have
+now equal to a hundred and fifty-four _full_ hands. You understand that
+we classify them: some do only half tasks, some three-quarters. I have
+_more_ than a hundred and fifty-four working-men and women, but they do
+only that number of full tasks."
+
+"What does the labor of a _full_ hand yield?"
+
+"At the present price of turpentine, my calculation is about two hundred
+dollars a year."
+
+"Then your crop brings you about thirty-one thousand dollars, and the
+support of your negroes costs you twenty thousand."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"If that's the case, my friend, let me advise you to sell your
+plantation, free your niggers, and go North."
+
+"Why so, my dear fellow?" asked the Colonel laughing.
+
+"Because you'd make money by the operation."
+
+"I never was good at arithmetic; go into the figures," he replied, still
+laughing, while Madam P----, who had laid aside her book, listened very
+attentively.
+
+"Well, you have two hundred and seventy negroes, whom you value, we'll
+say, with your mules, 'stills,' and movable property, at two hundred
+thousand dollars; and twenty thousand acres of land, worth about three
+dollars and a half an acre; all told, two hundred and seventy thousand
+dollars. A hundred and fifty-four able-bodied hands produce you a yearly
+profit of eleven thousand dollars, which, saying nothing about the cost
+of keeping your live stock, the wear and tear of your mules and
+machinery, and the yearly loss of your slaves by death, is only four per
+cent. on your capital. Now, with only the price of your land, say
+seventy thousand dollars, invested in safe stocks at the North, you
+could realize eight per cent.--five thousand six hundred dollars--and
+live at ease; and that, I judge, if you have many runaways, or many die
+on your hands, is as much as you really _clear_ now. Besides, if you
+should invest seventy thousand dollars in almost any legitimate business
+at the North, and should add to it, _as you now do_, your _time_ and
+_labor_, you would realize far more than you do at present from your
+entire capital."
+
+"I never looked at the matter in that light. But I have given you my
+profits as they _now_ are; some years I make more; six years ago I made
+twenty-five thousand dollars."
+
+"Yes; and six years hence you may make nothing."
+
+"That's true. But it would cost me more to live at the North."
+
+"There you are mistaken. What do you pay for your corn, your pork, and
+your hay, for instance?"
+
+"Well, my corn I have to bring round by vessel from Washington (North
+Carolina), and it costs me high when it gets here--about ten bits (a
+dollar and twenty-five cents), I think."
+
+"And in New York you could buy it now at sixty to seventy cents. What
+does your hay cost?"
+
+"Thirty-five dollars. I pay twenty for it in New York--the balance is
+freight and hauling."
+
+"Your pork costs you two or three dollars, I suppose, for freight and
+hauling."
+
+"Yes; about that."
+
+"Then in those items you might save nearly a hundred per cent.; and they
+are the principal articles you consume."
+
+"Yes; there's no denying that. But another thing is just as certain: it
+costs less to support one of my niggers than one of your laboring men."
+
+"That may be true. But it only shows that our laborers fare better than
+your slaves."
+
+"I am not sure of that. I _am_ sure, however, that our slaves are more
+contented than the run of laboring men at the North."
+
+"That proves nothing. Your blacks have no hope, no chance to rise; and
+they submit--though I judge not cheerfully--to an iron necessity. The
+Northern laborer, if very poor, may be discontented; but discontent
+urges him to effort, and leads to the bettering of his condition. I tell
+you, my friend, slavery is an expensive luxury. You Southern nabobs
+_will_ have it; and you have to _pay for it_."
+
+"Well, we don't complain. But, seriously, my good fellow, I feel that I
+am carrying out the design of the Almighty in holding my niggers. I
+think he made the black to serve the white."
+
+"_I_ think," I replied, "that whatever He designs works perfectly. Your
+institution certainly does not. It keeps the producer, who, in every
+society, is the really valuable citizen, in the lowest poverty, while it
+allows those who do nothing to be 'clad in fine linen, and to fare
+sumptuously every day.'"
+
+"It does more than that, sir," said Madam P----, with animation; "it
+brutalizes and degrades the _master_ and the _slave_; it separates
+husband and wife, parent and child; it sacrifices virtuous women to the
+lust of brutal men; and it shuts millions out from the knowledge of
+their duty and their destiny. A good and just God could not have
+designed it; and it _must_ come to an end."
+
+If lightning had struck in the room I could not have been more startled
+than I was by the abrupt utterance of such language in a planter's
+house, in his very presence, and _by his slave_. The Colonel, however,
+expressed no surprise and no disapprobation. It was evidently no new
+thing to him.
+
+"It is rare, madam," I said, "to hear such sentiments from a Southern
+lady--one reared among slaves."
+
+Before she could reply, the Colonel laughingly said:
+
+"Bless you, Mr. K----, madam is an out-and-out abolitionist, worse by
+fifty per cent. than Garrison or Wendell Phillips. If she were at the
+North she would take to pantaloons, and 'stump' the entire free States;
+wouldn't you, Alice?"
+
+"I have no doubt of it," rejoined the lady, smiling. "But I fear I
+should have poor success. I've tried for ten years to convert _you_, and
+Mr. K---- can see the result."
+
+It had grown late; and with my head full of working niggers and white
+slave-women, I went to my apartment.
+
+The next day was Sunday. It was near the close of December, yet the air
+was as mild and the sun as warm as in our Northern October. It was
+arranged at the breakfast-table that we all should attend service at
+"the meeting-house," a church of the Methodist persuasion, located some
+eight miles away; but as it wanted some hours of the time for religious
+exercises to commence, I strolled out after breakfast, with the Colonel,
+to inspect the stables of the plantation. "Massa Tommy" accompanied us,
+without invitation; and in the Colonel's intercourse with him I observed
+as much freedom and familiarity as he would have shown to an
+acknowledged son. The youth's manners and conversation showed that great
+attention had been given to his education and training, and made it
+evident that the mother whose influence was forming his character,
+whatever a false system of society had made her life, possessed some of
+the best traits of her sex.
+
+The stables, a collection of one-story framed buildings, about a hundred
+rods from the house, were well lighted and ventilated, and contained all
+"the modern improvements." They were better built, warmer, more
+commodious, and in every way more comfortable than the shanties occupied
+by the human cattle of the plantation. I remarked as much to the
+Colonel, adding that one who did not know would infer that he valued his
+horses more than his slaves.
+
+"That may be true," he replied, laughing. "Two of my horses are worth
+more than any eight of my slaves;" at the same time calling my attention
+to two magnificent thorough-breds, one of which had made "2.32" on the
+Charleston course. The establishment of a Southern gentleman is not
+complete until it includes one or two of these useless appendages. I had
+an argument with my host as to their value compared with that of the
+steam-engine, in which I forced him to admit that the iron horse is the
+better of the two, because it performs more work, eats less, has greater
+speed, and is not liable to the spavin or the heaves; but he wound up by
+saying, "After all, I go for the thorough-breds. You Yankees have but
+one test of value--use."
+
+A ramble through the negro-quarters, which followed our visit to the
+stables, gave me some further glimpses of plantation life. Many of the
+hands were still away in pursuit of Moye, but enough remained to make it
+evident that Sunday is the happiest day in the darky calendar. Groups of
+all ages and colors were gathered in front of several of the cabins,
+some singing, some dancing, and others chatting quietly together, but
+all enjoying themselves as heartily as so many young animals let loose
+in a pasture. They saluted the Colonel and me respectfully, but each one
+had a free, good-natured word for "Massa Tommy," who seemed an especial
+favorite with them. The lad took their greetings in good part, but
+preserved an easy, unconscious dignity of manner that plainly showed he
+did not know that _he_ too was of their despised, degraded race.
+
+The Colonel, in a rapid way, gave me the character and peculiarities of
+nearly every one we met. The titles of some of them amused me greatly.
+At every step we encountered individuals whose names have become
+household words in every civilized country.[F] Julius Cæsar, slightly
+stouter than when he swam the Tiber, and somewhat tanned from long
+exposure to a Southern sun, was seated on a wood-pile, quietly smoking a
+pipe; while near him, Washington, divested of regimentals, and clad in a
+modest suit of reddish-gray, his thin locks frosted by time, and his
+fleshless visage showing great age, was gazing, in rapt admiration, at a
+group of dancers in front of old Lucy's cabin.
+
+In this group about thirty men and women were making the ground quake
+and the woods ring with their unrestrained jollity. Marc Antony was
+rattling away at the bones, Nero fiddling as if Rome were burning, and
+Hannibal clawing at a banjo as if the fate of Carthage hung on its
+strings. Napoleon, as young and as lean as when he mounted the bridge of
+Lodi, with the battle-smoke still on his face, was moving his legs even
+faster than in the Russian retreat; and Wesley was using his heels in a
+way that showed _they_ didn't belong to the Methodist church. But the
+central figures of the group were Cato and Victoria. The lady had a face
+like a thunder-cloud, and a form that, if whitewashed, would have
+outsold the "Greek Slave." She was built on springs, and "floated in the
+dance" like a feather in a high wind. Cato's mouth was like an
+alligator's, but when it opened, it issued notes that would draw the
+specie even in this time of general suspension. As we approached he was
+singing a song, but he paused on perceiving us, when the Colonel,
+tossing a handful of coin among them, called out, "Go on, boys; let the
+gentleman have some music; and you, Vic, show your heels like a beauty."
+
+A general scramble followed, in which "Vic's" sense of decorum forbade
+her to join, and she consequently got nothing. Seeing that, I tossed her
+a silver piece, which she caught. Grinning her thanks, she shouted,
+"Now, clar de track, you nigs; start de music. I'se gwine to gib de
+gemman de breakdown."
+
+And she did; and such a breakdown! "We w'ite folks," though it was no
+new thing to the Colonel or Tommy, almost burst with laughter.
+
+In a few minutes nearly every negro on the plantation, attracted by the
+presence of the Colonel and myself, gathered around the performers; and
+a shrill voice at my elbow called out, "Look har, ye lazy,
+good-for-nuffin' niggers, carn't ye fotch a cheer for Massa Davy and de
+strange gemman?"
+
+"Is that you, Aunty?" said the Colonel. "How d'ye do?"
+
+"Sort o' smart, Massa Davy; sort o' smart; how is ye?"
+
+"Pretty well, Aunty; pretty well. Have a seat." And the Colonel helped
+her to one of the chairs that were brought for us, with as much
+tenderness as he would have shown to an aged white lady.
+
+The "exercises," which had been suspended for a moment, recommenced, and
+the old negress entered into them as heartily as the youngest present. A
+song from Cato followed the dance, and then about twenty "gentleman and
+lady" darkies joined, two at a time, in a half "walk-round" half
+breakdown, which the Colonel told me was the original of the well-known
+dance and song of Lucy Long. Other performances succeeded, and the whole
+formed a scene impossible to describe. Such uproarious jollity, such
+full and perfect enjoyment, I had never seen in humanity, black or
+white. The little nigs, only four or five years old, would rush into the
+ring and shuffle away at the breakdowns till I feared their short legs
+would come off; while all the darkies joined in the songs, till the
+branches of the old pines above shook as if they too had caught the
+spirit of the music. In the midst of it, the Colonel said to me, in an
+exultant tone:
+
+"Well, my friend, what do you think of slavery _now_?"
+
+"About the same that I thought yesterday. I see nothing to change my
+views."
+
+"Why, are not these people happy? Is not this perfect enjoyment?"
+
+"Yes; just the same enjoyment that aunty's pigs are having; don't you
+hear _them_ singing to the music? I'll wager they are the happier of the
+two."
+
+"No; you are wrong. The higher faculties of the darkies are being
+brought out here."
+
+"I don't know that," I replied. "Within the sound of their voices, two
+of their fellows--victims to the inhumanity of slavery--are lying dead,
+and yet they make _Sunday_ "hideous" with wild jollity, while Sam's fate
+may be theirs to-morrow."
+
+Spite of his genuine courtesy and high breeding, a shade of displeasure
+passed over the Colonel's face as I made this remark. Rising to go, he
+said, a little impatiently, "Ah, I see how it is; that d---- Garrison's
+sentiments have impregnated even you. How can the North and the South
+hold together when moderate men like you and me are so far apart?"
+
+"But you," I rejoined, good-humoredly, "are not a moderate man. You and
+Garrison are of the same stripe, both extremists. _You_ have mounted one
+hobby, _he_ another; that is all the difference."
+
+"I should be sorry," he replied, recovering his good nature, "to think
+myself like Garrison. I consider him the ---- scoundrel unhung."
+
+"No; I think he means well. But you are both fanatics, both 'bricks' of
+the same material; we conservatives, like mortar, will hold you together
+and yet keep you apart."
+
+"I, for one, _won't_ be held. If I can't get out of this cursed Union in
+any other way, I'll emigrate to Cuba."
+
+I laughed, and just then, looking up, caught a glimpse of Jim, who
+stood, hat in hand, waiting to speak to the Colonel, but not daring to
+interrupt a white conversation.
+
+"Hallo, Jim," I said; "have you got back?"
+
+"Yas, sar," replied Jim, grinning all over as if he had some agreeable
+thing to communicate.
+
+"Where is Moye?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Kotched, massa; I'se got de padlocks on him."
+
+"Kotched," echoed half a dozen darkies, who stood near enough to hear;
+"Ole Moye is kotched," ran through the crowd, till the music ceased, and
+a shout went up from two hundred black throats that made the old trees
+tremble.
+
+"Now gib him de lashes, Massa Davy," cried the old nurse. "Gib him what
+he gabe pore Sam; but mine dat you keeps widin de law."
+
+"Never fear, Aunty," said the Colonel; "I'll give him ----."
+
+How the Colonel kept his word will be told in another chapter.
+
+[Footnote E: Instances are frequent where Southern gentlemen form these
+left-handed connections, and rear two sets of differently colored
+children; but it is not often that the two families occupy the same
+domicil. The only other case within my _personal_ knowledge was that of
+the well-known President of the Bank of St. M----, at Columbus, Ga. That
+gentleman, whose note ranked in Wall Street, when the writer was
+acquainted with that locality, as "A No. 1," lived for fifteen years
+with two "wives" under one roof. One, an accomplished white woman, and
+the mother of several children--did the honors of his table, and moved
+with him in "the best society;" the other--a beautiful quadroon, also
+the mother of several children--filled the humbler office of nurse to
+her own and the other's offspring.]
+
+[Footnote F: Among the things of which slavery has deprived the black is a
+_name_. A slave has no family designation. It may be for that reason
+that a high-sounding appellation is usually selected for the single one
+he is allowed to appropriate.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+PLANTATION DISCIPLINE.
+
+
+The "Ole Cabin" to which Jim had alluded as the scene of Sam's
+punishment by the overseer, was a one-story shanty in the vicinity of
+the stables. Though fast falling to decay, it had more the appearance of
+a human habitation than the other huts on the plantation. Its thick
+plank door was ornamented with a mouldy brass knocker, and its four
+windows contained sashes, to which here and there clung a broken pane,
+the surviving relic of its better days. It was built of large unhewn
+logs, notched at the ends and laid one upon the other, with the bark
+still on. The thick, rough coat which yet adhered in patches to the
+timber had opened in the sun, and let the rain and the worm burrow in
+its sides, till some parts had crumbled entirely away. At one corner the
+process of decay had gone on till roof, superstructure, and foundation
+had rotted down and left an opening large enough to admit a coach and
+four horses. The huge chimneys which had graced the gable ends of the
+building were fallen in, leaving only a mass of sticks and clay to tell
+of their existence, and two wide openings to show how great a figure
+they had once made in the world. A small space in front of the cabin
+would have been a lawn, had the grass been willing to grow upon it; and
+a few acres of cleared land in its rear might have passed for a garden,
+had it not been entirely overgrown with young pines and stubble. This
+primitive structure was once the "mansion" of that broad plantation,
+and, before the production of turpentine came into fashion in that
+region, its rude owner drew his support from its few surrounding acres,
+more truly independent than the present aristocratic proprietor, who,
+raising only one article, and buying all his provisions, was forced to
+draw his support from the Yankee or the Englishman.
+
+Only one room, about forty feet square, occupied the interior of the
+cabin. It once contained several apartments, vestiges of which still
+remained, but the partitions had been torn away to fit it for its
+present uses. What those uses were, a moment's observation showed me.
+
+In the middle of the floor, a space about fifteen feet square was
+covered with thick pine planking, strongly nailed to the beams. In the
+centre of this planking, an oaken block was firmly bolted, and to it was
+fastened a strong iron staple that held a log-chain, to which was
+attached a pair of shackles. Above this, was a queer frame-work of oak,
+somewhat resembling the contrivance for drying fruit I have seen in
+Yankee farmhouses. Attached to the rafters by stout pieces of timber,
+were two hickory poles, placed horizontally, and about four feet apart,
+the lower one rather more than eight feet from the floor. This was the
+whipping-rack, and hanging to it were several stout whips with short
+hickory handles, and long triple lashes. I took one down for closer
+inspection, and found burned into the wood, in large letters, the words
+"Moral Suasion." I questioned the appropriateness of the label, but the
+Colonel insisted with great gravity, that the whip is the only "moral
+suasion" a darky is capable of understanding.
+
+When punishment is inflicted on one of the Colonel's negroes, his feet
+are confined in the shackles, his arms tied above his head, and drawn by
+a stout cord up to one of the horizontal poles; then, his back bared to
+the waist, and standing on tip-toe, with every muscle stretched to its
+utmost tension, he takes "de lashes."
+
+A more severe but more unusual punishment is the "thumb-screw." In this
+a noose is passed around the negro's thumb and fore-finger, while the
+cord is thrown over the upper cross-pole, and the culprit is drawn up
+till his toes barely touch the ground. In this position the whole weight
+of the body rests on the thumb and fore-finger. The torture is
+excruciating, and strong, able-bodied men can endure it but a few
+moments. The Colonel naively told me that he had discontinued its
+practice, as several of his _women_ had nearly lost the use of their
+hands, and been incapacitated for field labor, by its too frequent
+repetition. "My ---- drivers,"[G] he added, "have no discretion, and no
+humanity; if they have a pique against a nigger, they show him no
+mercy."
+
+The old shanty I have described was now the place of the overseer's
+confinement. Open as it was at top, bottom, and sides, it seemed an
+unsafe prison-house; but Jim had secured its present occupant by placing
+"de padlocks on him."
+
+"Where did you catch him?" asked the Colonel, as, followed by every
+darky on the plantation, we took our way to the old building.
+
+"In de swamp, massa. We got Sandy and de dogs arter him--dey treed him,
+but he fit like de debble."
+
+"Any one hurt?"
+
+"Yas, Cunnel; he knifed Yaller Jake, and ef I hadn't a gibin him a
+wiper, you'd a had anudder nigger short dis mornin'--shore."
+
+"How was it? tell me," said his master, while we paused, and the darkies
+gathered around.
+
+"Wal, yer see, massa, we got de ole debble's hat dat he drapped wen you
+had him down; den we went to Sandy's fur de dogs--dey scented him to
+onst, and off dey put for de swamp. 'Bout twenty on us follored 'em.
+He'd a right smart start on us, and run like a deer, but de hounds
+kotched up wid him 'bout whar he shot pore Sam. He fit 'em and cut up de
+Lady awful, but ole Cæsar got a hole ob him, and sliced a breakfuss out
+ob his legs. Somehow, dough, he got 'way from de ole dog, and clum a
+tree. 'Twar more'n an hour afore we kotched up; but dar he war, and de
+houns baying 'way as ef dey know'd what an ole debble he am. I'd tuk one
+ob de guns--you warn't in de house, massa, so I cudn't ax you."
+
+"Never mind that; go on," said the Colonel.
+
+"Wal, I up wid de gun, and tole him ef he didn't cum down I'd gib him
+suffin' dat 'ud sot hard on de stummuk. It tuk him a long w'ile, but--he
+_cum down_." Here the darky showed a row of ivory that would have been a
+fair capital for a metropolitan dentist.
+
+"When he war down," he resumed, "Jake war gwine to tie him, but de ole
+'gator, quicker dan a flash, put a knife enter him."
+
+"Is Jake much hurt?" interrupted the Colonel.
+
+"Not bad, massa; de knife went fru his arm, and enter his ribs, but de
+ma'am hab fix him, and she say he'll be 'round bery sudden."
+
+"Well, what then?" inquired the Colonel.
+
+"Wen de ole debble seed he hadn't finished Jake, he war gwine to gib him
+anudder dig, but jus den I drap de gun on his cocoanut, and he neber
+trubble us no more. 'Twar mons'rous hard work to git him out ob de
+swamp, 'cause he war jess like a dead man, and had to be toted de hull
+way; but he'm dar now, massa (pointing to the old cabin), and de
+bracelets am on him."
+
+"Where is Jake?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Dunno, massa, but reckon he'm to hum."
+
+"One of you boys go and bring him to the cabin," said the Colonel.
+
+A negro man went off on the errand, while we and the darkies resumed our
+way to the overseer's quarters. Arrived there, I witnessed a scene that
+words cannot picture.
+
+Stretched at full length on the floor, his clothes torn to shreds, his
+coarse carroty hair matted with blood, and his thin, ugly visage pale as
+death, lay the overseer. Bending over him, wiping away the blood from
+his face, and swathing a ghastly wound on his forehead, was the negress
+Sue; while at his shackled feet, binding up his still bleeding legs,
+knelt the octoroon woman!
+
+"Is _she_ here?" I said, involuntarily, as I caught sight of the group.
+
+"It's her nature," said the Colonel, with a pleasant smile; "if Moye
+were the devil himself, she'd do him good if she could; another such
+woman never lived."
+
+And yet this woman, with all the instincts that make her sex
+angel-ministers to man, lived in daily violation of the most sacred of
+all laws--because she was a slave. Can Mr. Caleb Cushing or Charles
+O'Conor tell us why the Almighty invented a system which forces his
+creatures to break laws of His own making?
+
+"Don't waste your time on him, Alice," said the Colonel, kindly; "he
+isn't worth the rope that'll hang him."
+
+"He was bleeding to death; unless he has care he'll die," said the
+octoroon woman.
+
+"Then let him die, d---- him," replied the Colonel, advancing to where
+the overseer lay, and bending down to satisfy himself of his condition.
+
+Meanwhile more than two hundred dusky forms crowded around and filled
+every opening of the old building. Every conceivable emotion, except
+pity, was depicted on their dark faces. The same individuals whose
+cloudy visages a half hour before I had seen distended with a wild mirth
+and careless jollity, that made me think them really the docile,
+good-natured animals they are said to be, now glared on the prostrate
+overseer with the infuriated rage of aroused beasts when springing on
+their prey.
+
+"You can't come the possum here. Get up, you ---- hound," said the
+Colonel, rising and striking the bleeding man with his foot.
+
+The fellow raised himself on one elbow and gazed around with a stupid,
+vacant look. His eye wandered unsteadily for a moment from the Colonel
+to the throng of cloudy faces in the doorway; then, his recent
+experience flashing upon him, he shrieked out, clinging wildly to the
+skirts of the octoroon woman, who was standing near, "Keep off them
+cursed hounds--keep them off, I say--they'll kill me! they'll kill me!"
+
+One glance satisfied me that his mind was wandering. The blow on the
+head had shattered his reason, and made the strong man less than a
+child.
+
+"You wont be killed yet," said the Colonel. "You've a small account to
+settle with me before you reckon with the devil."
+
+At this moment the dark crowd in the doorway parted, and Jake entered,
+his arm bound up and in a sling.
+
+"Jake, come here," said the Colonel; "this man would have killed you.
+What shall we do with him?"
+
+"'Taint for a darky to say dat, massa," said the negro, evidently
+unaccustomed to the rude administration of justice which the Colonel
+was about to inaugurate; "he did wuss dan dat to Sam, massa--he orter
+swing for shootin' him."
+
+"That's _my_ affair; we'll settle your account first," replied the
+Colonel.
+
+The darky looked undecidedly at his master, and then at the overseer,
+who, overcome by weakness, had sunk again to the floor. The little
+humanity in him was evidently struggling with his hatred of Moye and his
+desire for revenge, when the old nurse yelled out from among the crowd,
+"Gib him fifty lashes, Massa Davy, and den you wash him down.[H] Be a
+man, Jake, and say dat."
+
+Jake still hesitated, and when at last he was about to speak, the eye of
+the octoroon caught his, and chained the words to his tongue, as if by
+magnetic power.
+
+"Do you say that, boys;" said the Colonel, turning to the other negroes;
+"shall he have fifty lashes?"
+
+"Yas, massa, fifty lashes--gib de ole debble fifty lashes," shouted
+about fifty voices.
+
+"He shall have them," quietly said the master.
+
+The mad shout that followed, which was more like the yell of demons than
+the cry of men, seemed to arouse Moye to a sense of his real position.
+Springing to his feet, he gazed wildly around; then, sinking on his
+knees before the octoroon, and clutching the folds of her dress, he
+shrieked, "Save me, good lady, save me! as you hope for mercy, save me!"
+
+
+Not a muscle of her face moved, but, turning to the excited crowd, she
+mildly said, "Fifty lashes would kill him. _Jake_ does not say
+that--your master leaves it to him, and _he_ will not whip a dying
+man--will you, Jake?"
+
+"No, ma'am--not--not ef you gwo agin it," replied the negro, with very
+evident reluctance.
+
+"But he whipped Sam, ma'am, when Sam war nearer dead than _he_ am," said
+Jim, whose station as house-servant allowed him a certain freedom of
+speech.
+
+"Because he was brutal to Sam, should you be brutal to him? Can you
+expect me to tend you when you are sick, if you beat a dying man? Does
+Pompey say you should do such things?"
+
+"No, good ma'am," said the old preacher, stepping out, with the freedom
+of an old servant, from the black mass, and taking his stand beside me
+in the open space left for the "w'ite folks;" "de ole man dusn't say
+dat, ma'am; he tell 'em dat de Lord want 'em to forgib dar en'mies--to
+lub dem dat pursyskute 'em;" and, turning to the Colonel, he added, as
+he passed his hand meekly over his thin crop of white wool and threw his
+long heel back, "ef massa'll 'low me I'll talk to 'em."
+
+"Fire away," said the Colonel, with evident chagrin. "This is a nigger
+trial; if you want to screen the d---- hound you can do it."
+
+"I dusn't want to screed him, massa, but I'se bery ole and got soon to
+gwo, and I dusn't want de blessed Lord to ax me wen I gets dar why I
+'lowed dese pore ig'nant brack folks to mudder a man 'fore my bery
+face. I toted you, massa, 'fore you cud gwo, I'se worked for you till I
+can't work no more; and I dusn't want to tell de Lord dat _my_ massa let
+a brudder man be killed in cole blood."
+
+"He is no brother of mine, you old fool; preach to the nigs, don't
+preach to me," said the Colonel, stifling his displeasure, and striding
+off through the black crowd, without saying another word.
+
+Here and there in the dark mass a face showed signs of relenting; but
+much the larger number of that strange jury, had the question been put,
+would have voted--DEATH.
+
+The old preacher turned to them as the Colonel passed out, and said, "My
+chil'ren, would you hab dis man whipped, so weak, so dyin' as he am, ef
+he war brack?"
+
+"No, not ef he war a darky--fer den he wouldn't be such an ole debble,"
+replied Jim, and about a dozen of the other negroes.
+
+"De w'ite aint no wuss dan de brack--we'm all 'like--pore sinners all on
+us. De Lord wudn't whip a w'ite man no sooner dan a brack one--He tinks
+de w'ite juss so good as de brack (good Southern doctrine, I thought).
+De porest w'ite trash wudn't strike a man wen he war down."
+
+"We'se had 'nough of dis, ole man," said a large, powerful negro (one of
+the drivers), stepping forward, and, regardless of the presence of Madam
+P---- and myself, pressing close to where the overseer lay, now totally
+unconscious of what was passing around him. "You needn't preach no more;
+de Cunnel hab say we'm to whip ole Moye, and we'se gwine to do it,
+by ----."
+
+I felt my fingers closing on the palm of my hand, and in a second more
+they might have cut the darky's profile, had not Madam P---- cried out,
+"Stand back, you impudent fellow: say another word, and I'll have you
+whipped on the spot."
+
+"De Cunnel am my massa, ma'am--_he_ say ole Moye am to be whipped, and
+I'se gwine to do it--shore."
+
+I have seen a storm at sea--I have seen the tempest tear up great
+trees--I have seen the lightning strike in a dark night--but I never saw
+any thing half so grand, half so terrible, as the glance and tone of
+that woman as she cried out, "Jim, take this man--give him fifty lashes
+this instant."
+
+Quicker than thought, a dozen darkies were on him. His hands and feet
+were tied and he was under the whipping-rack in a second. Turning then
+to the other negroes, the brave woman said, "Some of you carry Moye to
+the house, and you, Jim, see to this man--if fifty lashes don't make him
+sorry, give him fifty more."
+
+This summary change of programme was silently acquiesced in by the
+assembled negroes, but many a cloudy face scowled sulkily on the
+octoroon, as, leaning on my arm, she followed Junius and the other
+negroes, who bore Moye to the mansion. It was plain that under those
+dark faces a fire was burning that a breath would have fanned into a
+flame.
+
+We entered the house by its rear door, and placed Moye in a small room
+on the ground floor. He was laid on a bed, and stimulants being given
+him, his senses and reason shortly returned. His eyes opened, and his
+real position seemed suddenly to flash upon him, for he turned to Madam
+P----, and in a weak voice, half choked with emotion, faltered out: "May
+God in heaven bless ye, ma'am; God _will_ bless ye for bein' so good to
+a wicked man like me. I doesn't desarve it, but ye woant leave me--ye
+woant leave me--they'll kill me ef ye do!"
+
+"Don't fear," said the Madam; "you shall have a fair trial. No harm
+shall come to you here."
+
+"Thank ye, thank ye," gasped the overseer, raising himself on one arm,
+and clutching at the lady's hand, which he tried to lift to his lips.
+
+"Don't say any more now," said Madam P----, quietly; "you must rest and
+be quiet, or you wont get well."
+
+"Shan't I get well? Oh, I can't die--I can't die _now_!"
+
+The lady made a soothing reply, and giving him an opiate, and arranging
+the bedding so that he might rest more easily, she left the room with
+me.
+
+As we stepped into the hall, I saw through the front door, which was
+open, the horses harnessed in readiness for "meeting," and the Colonel
+pacing to and fro on the piazza, smoking a cigar. He perceived us, and
+halted in the doorway.
+
+"So you've brought that d---- bloodthirsty villain into my house!" he
+said to Madam P---- in a tone of strong displeasure.
+
+"How could I help it? The negroes are mad, and would kill him anywhere
+else," replied the lady, with a certain self-confidence that showed she
+knew her power over the Colonel.
+
+"Why should _you_ interfere between them and him? Has he not insulted
+you enough to make you let him alone? Can you so easily forgive his
+taunting you with"--He did not finish the sentence, but what I had
+learned on the previous evening from the old nurse gave me a clue to its
+meaning. A red flame flushed the face and neck of the octoroon
+woman--her eyes literally flashed fire, and her very breath seemed to
+come with pain; in a moment, however, this emotion passed away, and she
+quietly said, "Let me settle that in my own way. He has served _you_
+well--_you_ have nothing against him that the law will not punish."
+
+"By ----, you are the most unaccountable woman I ever knew," exclaimed
+the Colonel, striding up and down the piazza, the angry feeling passing
+from his face, and giving way to a mingled expression of wonder and
+admiration. The conversation was here interrupted by Jim, who just then
+made his appearance, hat in hand.
+
+"Well, Jim, what is it?" asked his master.
+
+"We'se gib'n Sam twenty lashes, ma'am, but he beg so hard, and say he so
+sorry, dat I tole him I'd ax you 'fore we gabe him any more."
+
+"Well, if he's sorry, that's enough; but tell him he'll get fifty
+another time," said the lady.
+
+"What Sam is it?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Big Sam, the driver," said Jim.
+
+"Why was he whipped?"
+
+"He told me _you_ were his master, and insisted on whipping Moye,"
+replied the lady.
+
+"Did he dare to do that? Give him a hundred, Jim, not one less," roared
+the Colonel.
+
+"Yas, massa," said Jim, turning to go.
+
+The lady looked significantly at the negro and shook her head, but said
+nothing, and he left.
+
+"Come, Alice, it is nearly time for meeting, and I want to stop and see
+Sandy on the way."
+
+"I reckon I wont go," said Madam P----.
+
+"You stay to take care of Moye, I suppose," said the Colonel, with a
+slight sneer.
+
+"Yes," replied the lady, "he is badly hurt, and in danger of
+inflammation."
+
+"Well, suit yourself. Mr. K----, come, _we'll_ go--you'll meet some of
+the _natives_."
+
+The lady retired to the house, and the Colonel and I were soon ready.
+The driver brought the horses to the door, and as we were about to enter
+the carriage, I noticed Jim taking his accustomed seat on the box.
+
+"Who's looking after Sam?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Nobody, Cunnel; de ma'am leff him gwo."
+
+"How dare you disobey me? Didn't I tell you to give him a hundred?"
+
+"Yas, massa, but de ma'am tole me notter."
+
+"Well, another time you mind what _I_ say--do you hear?" said his
+master.
+
+"Yas, massa," said the negro, with a broad grin, "I allers do dat."
+
+"You _never_ do it, you d---- nigger; I ought to have flogged you long
+ago."
+
+Jim said nothing, but gave a quiet laugh, showing no sort of fear, and
+we entered the carriage. I afterward learned from him that he had never
+been whipped, and that all the negroes on the plantation obeyed the lady
+when, which was seldom, her orders came in conflict with their master's.
+They knew if they did not, the Colonel would whip them.
+
+As we rode slowly along the Colonel said to me, "Well, you see that the
+best people have to flog niggers sometimes."
+
+"Yes, _I_ should have given that fellow a hundred lashes, at least. I
+think the effect on the others would have been bad if Madam P---- had
+not had him flogged."
+
+"But she generally goes against it. I don't remember of her having it
+done in ten years before. And yet, though I've the worst gang of niggers
+in the district, they obey her like so many children."
+
+"Why is that?"
+
+"Well, there's a kind of magnetism about her that makes everybody love
+her; and then she tends them in sickness, and is constantly doing little
+things for their comfort; _that_ attaches them to her. She is an
+extraordinary woman."
+
+"Whose negroes are those, Colonel?" I asked, as, after a while, we
+passed a gang of about a dozen, at work near the roadside. Some were
+tending a tar-kiln, and some engaged in cutting into fire-wood the pines
+which a recent tornado had thrown to the ground.
+
+"They are mine, but they are working now for themselves. I let such as
+will, work on Sunday. I furnish the "raw material," and pay them for
+what they do, as I would a white man."
+
+"Wouldn't it be better to make them go to hear the old preacher;
+couldn't they learn something from him?"
+
+"Not much; Old Pomp never read any thing but the Bible, and he doesn't
+understand that; besides, they can't be taught. You can't make 'a
+whistle out of a pig's tail;' you can't make a nigger into a white man."
+
+Just here the carriage stopped suddenly, and we looked out to see the
+cause. The road by which we had come was a mere opening through the
+pines; no fences separated it from the wooded land, and being seldom
+travelled, the track was scarcely visible. In many places it widened to
+a hundred feet, but in others tall trees had grown up on its opposite
+sides, leaving scarcely width enough for a single carriage to pass
+along. In one of these narrow passages, just before us, a queer-looking
+vehicle had upset, and scattered its contents in the road. We had no
+alternative but to wait till it got out of the way; and we all alighted
+to reconnoitre.
+
+The vehicle was a little larger than an ordinary handcart, and was
+mounted on wheels that had probably served their time on a Boston dray
+before commencing their travels in Secessiondom. Its box of pine
+boarding and its shafts of rough oak poles were evidently of Southern
+home manufacture. Attached to it by a rope harness, with a primitive
+bridle of decidedly original construction, was--not a horse, nor a mule,
+nor even an alligator, but a "three-year-old heifer."
+
+The wooden linch-pin of the cart had given way, and the weight of a
+half-dozen barrels of turpentine had thrown the box off its balance, and
+rolled the contents about in all directions.
+
+The appearance of the proprietor of this nondescript vehicle was in
+keeping with his establishment. His coat, which was much too short in
+the waist and much too long in the skirts, was of the common reddish
+gray linsey, and his nether garments, which stopped just below the
+knees, were of the same material. From there downwards, he wore only the
+covering that is said to have been the fashion in Paradise before Adam
+took to fig-leaves. His hat had a rim broader than a political platform,
+and his skin a color half way between tobacco-juice and a tallow
+candle.
+
+"Wal, Cunnul, how dy'ge?" said the stranger, as we stepped from the
+carriage.
+
+"Very well, Ned; how are you?"
+
+"Purty wal, Cunnul; had the nagur lately, right smart, but'm gittin'
+'roun'."
+
+"You're in a bad fix here, I see. Can Jim help you?"
+
+"Wal, p'raps he moight. Jim, how dy'ge?"
+
+"Sort o' smart, ole feller. But come, stir yerseff; we want ter gwo
+'long," replied Jim, with a lack of courtesy that showed he regarded the
+white man as altogether too "trashy" to be treated with much ceremony.
+
+With the aid of Jim, a new linch-pin was soon whittled out, the
+turpentine rolled on to the cart, and the vehicle put in a moving
+condition.
+
+"Where are you hauling your turpentine?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"To Sam Bell's, at the 'Boro'."
+
+"What will he pay you?"
+
+"Wal, I've four barr'ls of 'dip,' and tu of 'hard.' For the hull, I
+reckon he'll give three dollar a barr'l."
+
+"By tale?"
+
+"No, for tu hun'red and eighty pound."
+
+"Well, _I'll_ give you two dollars and a half, by weight."
+
+"Can't take it, Cunnel; must get three dollar."
+
+"What, will you go sixty miles with this team, and waste five or six
+days, for fifty cents on six barrels--three dollars!"
+
+"Can't 'ford the time, Cunnel, but must git three dollar a barr'l."
+
+"That fellow is a specimen of our 'natives,'" said the Colonel, as we
+resumed our seats in the carriage. "You'll see more of them before we
+get back to the plantation."
+
+"He puts a young cow to a decidedly original use," I remarked.
+
+"Oh no, not original here; the ox and the cow with us are both used for
+labor."
+
+"You don't mean to say that cows are generally worked here?"
+
+"Of course I do. Our breeds are good for nothing as milkers, and we put
+them to the next best use. I never have cow's milk on my plantation."
+
+"You don't! I could have sworn it was in my coffee this morning."
+
+"I wouldn't trust you to buy brandy for me, if your organs of taste are
+not keener than that. It was goat's milk."
+
+"Then how do you get your butter?"
+
+"From the North. I've had mine from my New York factors for over ten
+years."
+
+We soon arrived at Sandy, the negro-hunter's, and halted to allow the
+Colonel to inquire as to the health of his family of children and
+dogs--the latter the less numerous, but, if I might judge by
+appearances, the more valued of the two.
+
+[Footnote G: The negro-whippers and field overseers.]
+
+[Footnote H: Referring to the common practice of bathing the raw and
+bleeding backs of the punished slaves with a strong solution of salt
+and water.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE NEGRO HUNTER.
+
+
+Alighting from the carriage, I entered, with my host, the cabin of the
+negro-hunter. So far as external appearance went, the shanty was a
+slight improvement on the "Mills House," described in a previous
+chapter; but internally, it was hard to say whether it resembled more a
+pig-sty or a dog-kennel. The floor was of the bare earth, covered in
+patches with loose plank of various descriptions, and littered over with
+billets of "lightwood," unwashed cooking utensils, two or three cheap
+stools, a pine settee--made from the rough log and hewn smooth on the
+upper side--a full-grown bloodhound, two younger canines, and nine
+half-clad juveniles of the flax-head species. Over against the
+fire-place three low beds afforded sleeping accommodation to nearly a
+dozen human beings (of assorted sizes, and dove-tailed together with
+heads and feet alternating), and in the opposite corner a lower couch,
+whose finer furnishings told plainly it was the peculiar property of the
+"wee ones" of the family--a mother's tenderness for her youngest thus
+cropping out even in the midst of filth and degradation--furnished
+quarters for an unwashed, uncombed, unclothed, saffron-hued little
+fellow about fifteen months old, and--the dog "Lady." She was of a dark
+hazel color--a cross between a pointer and a bloodhound--and one of the
+most beautiful creatures I ever saw. Her neck and breast were bound
+about with a coarse cotton cloth, saturated with blood, and emitting a
+strong odor of bad whiskey; and her whole appearance showed the
+desperate nature of the encounter with the overseer.
+
+The nine young democrats who were lolling about the room in various
+attitudes, rose as we entered, and with a familiar but rather
+deferential "How-dy'ge," to the Colonel, huddled around and stared at me
+with open mouths and distended eyes, as if I were some strange being,
+dropped from another sphere. The two eldest were of the male gender, as
+was shown by their clothes--cast-off suits of the inevitable
+reddish-gray, much too large, and out at the elbows and the knees--but
+the sex of the others I was at a loss to determine, for they wore only a
+single robe, reaching, like their mother's, from the neck to the knees.
+Not one of the occupants of the cabin boasted a pair of stockings, but
+the father and mother did enjoy the luxury of shoes--coarse, stout
+brogans, untanned, and of the color of the legs which they encased.
+
+"Well, Sandy, how is 'Lady?'" asked the Colonel, as he stepped to the
+bed of the wounded dog.
+
+"Reckon she's a goner, Cunnel; the d---- Yankee orter swing fur it."
+
+This intimation that the overseer was a countryman of mine, took me by
+surprise, nothing I had observed in his speech or manners having
+indicated it, but I consoled myself with the reflection that Connecticut
+had reared him--as she makes wooden hams and nutmegs--expressly for the
+Southern market.
+
+"He _shall_ swing for it, by ----. But are you sure the slut will die?"
+
+"Not shore, Cunnel, but she can't stand, and the blood _will_ run. I
+reckon a hun'red and fifty ar done for thar, sartin."
+
+"D---- the money--I'll make that right. Go to the house and get some
+ointment from Madam--she can save her--go at once," said my host.
+
+"I will, Cunnel," replied the dirt-eater, taking his broad-brim from a
+wooden peg, and leisurely leaving the cabin. Making our way then over
+the piles of rubbish and crowds of children that cumbered the apartment,
+the Colonel and I returned to the carriage.
+
+"Dogs must be rare in this region," I remarked, as we resumed our seats.
+
+"Yes, well-trained bloodhounds are scarce everywhere. That dog is well
+worth a hundred and fifty dollars."
+
+"The business of nigger-catching, then, is brisk, just now?"
+
+"No, not more brisk than usual. We always have more or less runaways."
+
+"Do most of them take to the swamps?"
+
+"Yes, nine out of ten do, though now and then one gets off on a trading
+vessel. It is almost impossible for a strange nigger to make his way by
+land from here to the free states."
+
+"Then why do you Carolinians make such an outcry about the violation of
+the Fugitive Slave Law?"
+
+"For the same reason that dogs quarrel over a naked bone. We should be
+unhappy if we couldn't growl at the Yankees," replied the Colonel,
+laughing.
+
+"_We_, you say; you mean by that, the hundred and eighty thousand nabobs
+who own five-sixths of your slaves?"[I]
+
+"Yes, I mean them, and the three millions of poor whites--the ignorant,
+half-starved, lazy vermin you have just seen. _They_ are the real basis
+of our Southern oligarchy, as you call it," continued my host, still
+laughing.
+
+"I thought the negroes were the serfs in your feudal system?"
+
+"Both the negroes and the poor whites are the serfs, but the white trash
+are its real support. Their votes give the small minority of
+slave-owners all their power. You say we control the Union. We do, and
+we do it by the votes of these people, who are as far below our niggers
+as the niggers are below decent white men. Who that reflects that this
+country has been governed for fifty years by such scum, would give a
+d---- for republican institutions?"
+
+"It does speak badly for _your_ institutions. A system that reduces
+nearly half of a white population to the level of slaves cannot stand in
+this country. The late election shows that the power of your 'white
+trash' is broken."
+
+"Well, it does, that's a fact. If the states should remain together, the
+West would in future control the Union. We see that, and are therefore
+determined on dissolution. It is our only way to keep our niggers."
+
+"The West will have to consent to that project. My opinion is, your
+present policy will, if carried out, free every one of your slaves."
+
+"I don't see how. Even if we are put down--which we cannot be--and are
+held in the Union against our will, government cannot, by the
+constitution, interfere with slavery in the states."
+
+"I admit that, but it can confiscate the property of traitors. Every
+large slave-holder is to-day, at heart, a traitor. If this movement goes
+on, you will commit overt acts against the government, and in
+self-defence it will punish treason by taking from you the means of
+future mischief."
+
+"The Republicans and Abolitionists might do that if they had the power,
+but nearly one-half of the North is on our side, and will not fight us."
+
+"Perhaps so; but if _I_ had this thing to manage, I would put you down
+without fighting."
+
+"How would you do it--by preaching abolition where even the niggers
+would mob you? There's not a slave in all South Carolina but would shoot
+Garrison or Greeley on sight."
+
+"That may be, but if so, it is because you keep them in ignorance. Build
+a free-school at every cross-road, and teach the poor whites, and what
+would become of slavery? If these people were on a par with the farmers
+of New England, would it last for an hour? Would they not see that it
+stands in the way of their advancement, and vote it out of existence as
+a nuisance?"
+
+"Yes, perhaps they would; but the school-houses are not at the
+cross-roads, and, thank God, they will not be there in this generation."
+
+"The greater the pity; but that which will not flourish alongside of a
+school-house, cannot, in the nature of things, outlast this century. Its
+time must soon come."
+
+"Enough for the day is the evil thereof. I'll risk the future of
+slavery, if the South, in a body, goes out of the Union."
+
+"In other words, you'll shut out schools and knowledge, in order to keep
+slavery in existence. The Abolitionists claim it to be a relic of
+barbarism, and you admit it could not exist with general education among
+the people."
+
+"Of course it could not. If Sandy, for instance, knew he were as good a
+man as I am--and he would be if he were educated--do you suppose he
+would vote as I tell him, go and come at my bidding, and live on my
+charity? No, sir! give a man knowledge, and, however poor he may be,
+he'll act for himself."
+
+"Then free-schools and general education would destroy slavery?"
+
+"Of course they would. The few cannot rule when the many know their
+rights. If the poor whites realized that slavery kept them poor, would
+they not vote it down? But the South and the world are a long way off
+from general education. When it comes to that, we shall need no laws,
+and no slavery, for the millennium will have arrived."
+
+"I'm glad you think slavery will not exist during the millennium," I
+replied, good-humoredly; "but how is it that you insist the negro is
+naturally inferior to the white, and still admit that the 'white trash,'
+are far below the black slaves?"
+
+"Education makes the difference. We educate the negro enough to make him
+useful to us; but the poor white man knows nothing. He can neither read
+nor write, and not only that, he is not trained to any useful
+employment. Sandy, here, who is a fair specimen of the tribe, obtains
+his living just like an Indian, by hunting, fishing, and stealing,
+interspersed with nigger-catching. His whole wealth consists of two
+hounds and pups; his house--even the wooden trough his miserable
+children eat from--belongs to me. If he didn't catch a runaway-nigger
+once in a while, he wouldn't see a dime from one year to another."
+
+"Then you have to support this man and his family?"
+
+"Yes, what I don't give him he steals. Half a dozen others poach on me
+in the same way."
+
+"Why don't you set them at work?"
+
+"They can't be made to work. I have hired them time and again, hoping to
+make something of them, but I never got one to work more than half a day
+at a time. It's their nature to lounge and to steal."
+
+"Then why do you keep them about you?"
+
+"Well, to be candid, their presence is of use in keeping the blacks in
+subordination, and they are worth all they cost me, because I control
+their votes."
+
+"I thought the blacks were said to be entirely contented?"
+
+"No, not contented. I do not claim that. I only say that they are unfit
+for freedom. I might cite a hundred instances in which it has been their
+ruin."
+
+"I have not heard of one. It seems strange to me that a man who can
+support another cannot support himself."
+
+"Oh! no, it's not at all strange. The slave has hands, and when the
+master gives him brains, he works well enough; but to support himself he
+needs both hands and brains, and he has only hands. I'll give you a case
+in point: At Wilmington, N. C., some years ago, there lived a negro by
+the name of Jack Campbell. He was a slave, and was employed, before the
+river was deepened so as to admit of the passage of large vessels up to
+the town, in lightering cargoes to the wharves. He hired his time of his
+master, and carried on business on his own account. Every one knew him,
+and his character for honesty, sobriety, and punctuality stood so high
+that his word was considered among merchants as good as that of the
+first business-men of the place. Well, Jack's wife and children were
+free, and he finally took it into his head to be free himself. He
+arranged with his master to purchase himself within a specified time, at
+eight hundred dollars, and he was to deposit his earnings in the hands
+of a certain merchant till they reached the required sum. He went on,
+and in three years had accumulated nearly seven hundred dollars, when
+his owner failed in business. As the slave has no right of property,
+Jack's earnings belonged by law to his master, and they were attached by
+the Northern creditors (mark that, _by Northern creditors_), and taken
+to pay the master's debts. Jack, too, was sold. His new owner also
+consented to his buying himself, at about the price previously agreed
+on. Nothing discouraged, he went to work again. Night and day he toiled,
+and it surprised every one to see so much energy and firmness of
+purpose in a negro. At last, after four more years of labor, he
+accomplished his purpose, and received his free-papers. He had worked
+seven years--as long as Jacob toiled for Rachel--for his freedom, and
+like the old patriarch he found himself cheated at last. I was present
+when he received his papers from his owner--a Mr. William H. Lippitt,
+who still resides at Wilmington--and I shall never forget the ecstasy of
+joy which he showed on the occasion. He sung and danced, and laughed,
+and wept, till my conscience smote me for holding my own niggers, when
+freedom might give them so much happiness. Well, he went off that day
+and treated some friends, and for three days afterward lay in the
+gutter, the entreaties of his wife and children having no effect on him.
+He swore he was free, and would do as he 'd---- pleased.' He had
+previously been a class-leader in the church, but after getting his
+freedom he forsook his previous associates, and spent his Sundays and
+evenings in a bar-room. He neglected his business; people lost
+confidence in him, and step by step he went down, till in five years he
+sunk into a wretched grave. That was the effect of freedom on _him_, and
+it would be the same on all of his race."
+
+"It is clear," I replied, "_he_ could not bear freedom, but that does
+not prove he might not have 'endured' it if he had never been a slave.
+His overjoy at obtaining liberty, after so long a struggle for it, led
+to his excesses and his ruin. According to your view, neither the black
+nor the poor white is competent to take care of himself. The Almighty,
+therefore, has laid upon _you_ a triple burden; you not only have to
+provide for yourself and your children, but for two races beneath you,
+the black and the clay-eater. The poor nigger has a hard time, but it
+seems to me you have a harder one."
+
+"Well, it's a fact, we do. I often think that if it wasn't for the color
+and the odor, I'd willingly exchange places with my man Jim."
+
+The Colonel made this last remark in a half-serious, half-comic way,
+that excited my risibilities, but before I could reply, the carriage
+stopped, and Jim, opening the door, announced:
+
+"We's har, massa, and de prayin' am gwine on."
+
+[Footnote I: The foregoing statistics are correct. That small number of
+slave-holders sustains the system of slavery, and has caused this
+terrible rebellion. They are, almost to a man, rebels and secessionists,
+and we may cover the South with armies, and keep a file of soldiers upon
+every plantation, and not smother this insurrection, unless we break
+down the power of that class. Their wealth gives them their power, and
+their wealth is in their slaves. Free their negroes by an act of
+emancipation, or confiscation, and the rebellion will crumble to pieces
+in a day. Omit to do it, and it will last till doomsday.
+
+The power of this dominant class once broken, with landed property at
+the South more equally divided, a new order of things will arise there.
+Where now, with their large plantations, not one acre in ten is tilled,
+a system of small farms will spring into existence, and the whole
+country be covered with cultivation. The six hundred thousand men who
+have gone there to fight our battles, will see the amazing fertility of
+the Southern soil--into which the seed is thrown and springs up without
+labor into a bountiful harvest--and many of them, if slavery is crushed
+out, will remain there. Thus a new element will be introduced into the
+South, an element that will speedily make it a loyal, prosperous, and
+_intelligent_ section of the Union.
+
+I would interfere with no one's rights, but a rebel in arms against his
+country has no rights; all that he has "is confiscate." Will the loyal
+people of the North submit to be ground to the earth with taxes to pay
+the expenditures of a war, brought upon them by these Southern
+oligarchists, while the traitors are left in undisturbed possession of
+every thing, and even their slaves are exempted from taxation? It were
+well that our legislators should ask this question now, and not wait
+till it's asked of them by THE PEOPLE.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE COUNTRY CHURCH.
+
+
+Had we not been absorbed in conversation, we might have discovered, some
+time previous to our arrival at the church door, that the services had
+commenced, for the preacher was shouting at the top of his lungs. He
+evidently thought the Lord either a long way off, or very hard of
+hearing. Not wishing to disturb the congregation while at their
+devotions, we loitered near the doorway until the prayer was over, and
+in the mean time I glanced around the vicinity.
+
+The "meeting-house," of large unhewn logs, was a story and a half in
+height, and about large enough to seat comfortably a congregation of two
+hundred persons. It was covered with shingles, with a roof projecting
+some four feet over the walls, and was surmounted at the front gable by
+a tower, about twelve feet square. This also was built of logs, and
+contained a bell "to call the erring to the house of prayer," though,
+unfortunately, all of that character thereabouts dwelt beyond the sound
+of its voice. The building was located at a cross-roads, about equally
+distant from two little hamlets (the nearer nine miles off), neither of
+which was populous enough to singly support a church and a preacher. The
+trees in the vicinity had been thinned out, so that carriages could
+drive into the woods, and find under the branches shelter from the rain
+and the sun; and at the time of my visit, about twenty vehicles of all
+sorts and descriptions, from the Colonel's magnificent barouche to the
+rude cart drawn by a single two-horned quadruped, filled the openings.
+There was a rustic simplicity about the whole scene that charmed me. The
+low, rude church, the grand old pines that towered in leafy magnificence
+around it, and the soft, low wind, that sung a morning hymn in the
+green, wavy woods, seemed to lift the soul up to Him who inhabiteth
+eternity, but who deigns to visit the erring children of men.
+
+The preacher was about to "line out" one of Watts' psalms when we
+entered the church, but he stopped short on perceiving us, and, bowing
+low, waited till we had taken our seats. This action, and the
+sycophantic air which accompanied it, disgusted me, and turning to the
+Colonel, I asked, jocosely:
+
+"Do the chivalry exact so much obsequiousness from the country clergy?
+Do you require to be bowed up to heaven?"
+
+In a low voice, but high enough, I thought, for the preacher to hear,
+for we sat very near, the Colonel replied:
+
+"He's a renegade Yankee--the meanest thing on earth."
+
+I said no more, but entered into the services as seriously as the
+strange gymnastic performances of the preacher would allow of my doing;
+for he was quite as amusing as a circus clown.
+
+With the exception of the Colonel's, and a few other pews in the
+vicinity of the pulpit, all of the seats were mere rough benches,
+without backs, and placed so closely together as to interfere
+uncomfortably with the knees of the sitters. The house was full, and the
+congregation as attentive as any I ever saw. All classes were there; the
+black serving-man away off by the doorway, the poor white a little
+higher up, the small turpentine-farmer a little higher still, and the
+wealthy planter, of the class to which the Colonel belonged, on "the
+highest seats of the synagogue," and in close proximity to the preacher.
+
+The "man of prayer" was a tall, lean, raw-boned, angular-built
+individual, with a thin, sharp, hatchet-face, a small sunken eye, and
+long, loose hair, brushed back and falling over the collar of a seedy
+black coat. He looked like a dilapidated scare-crow, and his pale,
+sallow face, and cracked, wheezy voice, were in odd and comic keeping
+with his discourse. His text was: "Speak unto the children of Israel,
+that they go forward." And addressing the motley gathering of poor
+whites and small planters before him as the "chosen people of God," he
+urged them to press on in the mad course their state had taken. It was a
+political harangue, a genuine stump-speech, but its frequent allusions
+to the auditory as the legitimate children of the old patriarch, and the
+rightful heirs of all the promises, struck me as out of place in a
+rural district of South Carolina, however appropriate it might have been
+in one of the large towns, before an audience of merchants and traders,
+who are, almost to a man, Jews.
+
+The services over, the congregation slowly left the church. Gathered in
+groups in front of the "meeting-house," they were engaged in a general
+discussion of the affairs of the day, when the Colonel and I emerged
+from the doorway. The better class greeted my host with considerable
+cordiality, but I noticed that the well-to-do small planters, who
+composed the greater part of the assemblage, received him with decided
+coolness. These people were the "North County folks," on whom the
+overseer had invoked a hanging. Except that their clothing was more
+uncouth and ill-fashioned, and their faces generally less "cute" of
+expression, they did not materially differ in appearance from the rustic
+citizens who may be seen on any pleasant Sunday gathered around the
+doorways of the rural meeting-houses of New England.
+
+One of them, who was leaning against a tree, quietly lighting a pipe,
+was a fair type of the whole, and as he took a part in the scene which
+followed, I will describe him. He was tall and spare, with a swinging,
+awkward gait, and a wiry, athletic frame. His hair, which he wore almost
+as long as a woman's, was coarse and black, and his face strongly
+marked, and of the precise color of two small rivulets of tobacco-juice
+that escaped from the corners of his mouth. He had an easy,
+self-possessed manner, and a careless, devil-may-care way about him,
+that showed he had measured his powers, and was accustomed to "rough it"
+with the world. He wore a broadcloth coat of the fashion of some years
+ago, but his waistcoat and nether garments of the common, reddish
+homespun, were loose and ill-shaped, as if their owner did not waste
+thought on such trifles. His hat, as shockingly bad as Horace Greeley's,
+had the inevitable broad brim, and fell over his face like a
+calash-awning over a shop-window. As I approached him he extended his
+hand with a pleasant "How are ye, stranger?"
+
+"Very well," I replied, returning his grasp with equal warmth, "how are
+you?"
+
+"Right smart, right smart, thank ye. You're----" the rest of the
+sentence was cut short by a gleeful exclamation from Jim, who, mounted
+on the box of the carriage, which was drawn up on the cleared plot in
+front of the meeting-house, waved an open newspaper over his head, and
+called out, as he caught sight of the Colonel:
+
+"Great news, massa--great news from Charls'on!"
+
+(The darky, while we were in church, had gone to the post-office, some
+four miles away, and got the Colonel's mail, which consisted of letters
+from his New York and Charleston factors, the Charleston _Courier_ and
+_Mercury_ and the New York _Journal of Commerce_. The latter sheet, at
+the date of which I am writing, was in wide circulation at the South,
+its piety (!) and its politics being then calculated with mathematical
+precision for secession latitudes.)
+
+"What is it, Jim?" shouted his master. "Give it to us."
+
+The darky had somehow learned to read, but holding the paper at arm's
+length, and throwing himself into a theatrical attitude, he cried out,
+with any amount of gesticulation:
+
+"De news am, massa, and gemmen and ladies, dat de ole fort fore
+Charls'on hab ben devacuated by Major Andersin and de sogers, and dey
+hab stole 'way in de dark night and gone to Sumter, whar dey can't be
+took; and dat de ole Gubner hab got out a procdemation dat all dat don't
+lub de Aberlishen Yankees shill cum up dar and clar 'em out; and de
+paper say dat lots ob sogers hab cum from Georgi and Al'bama, and 'way
+down Souf, to help 'em. Dis am w'at de _Currer_ say," he continued,
+holding the paper up to his eyes and reading: "Major Andersin, ob de
+United States army hab 'chieved de 'stinction ob op'ning cibil war
+'tween American citizens; he hab desarted Moulfrie, and by false
+fretexts hab took dat ole Garrison and all his millinery stores to Fort
+Sumter."
+
+"Get down, you d----d nigger," said the Colonel, laughing, and mounting
+the carriage-box beside him. "You can't read. Old Garrison isn't
+there--he's the d----d Northern Abolitionist."
+
+"I knows dat, Cunnel, but see dar," replied Jim, holding the paper out
+to his master, "don't dat say he'm dar? It'm him dat make all de
+trubble. P'raps dis nig can't read, but ef dat aint readin' I'd like to
+know it!"
+
+"Clear out," said the Colonel, now actually roaring with laughter; "it's
+the garrison of soldiers that the _Courier_ speaks of, not the
+Abolitionist."
+
+"Read it yoursef, den, massa, I don't seed it dat way."
+
+Jim was altogether wiser than he appeared, but while equally as well
+pleased with the news as his master, he was so for an entirely different
+reason. In the crisis which these tidings announced, he saw hope for his
+race.
+
+The Colonel then read the paper to the assemblage. The news was received
+with a variety of manifestations by the auditory, the larger portion, I
+thought, hearing it, as I did, with sincere regret.
+
+"Now is the time to stand by the state, my friends," said my host, as he
+finished the reading. "I hope every man here is ready to do his duty by
+old South Carolina."
+
+"Yes, _sar_! if she does _har_ duty by the Union. We'll go to the death
+for har just so long as she's in the right, but not a d----d step if
+she arn't," said the long-legged native I have introduced to the reader.
+
+"And what have _you_ to say about South Carolina? What does she owe to
+_you_?" asked the Colonel, turning on the speaker with a proud and angry
+look.
+
+"More, a darned sight, than she'll pay, if ye cursed 'ristocrats run her
+to h---- as ye'r doin'. She owes me, and 'bout ten as likely niggers as
+ye ever seed, a living, and we've d----d hard work to get it out on
+her _now_, let alone what's comin'."
+
+"Don't talk to me, you ill-mannered cur," said my host, turning his back
+on his neighbor, and directing his attention to the remainder of the
+assemblage.
+
+"Look har, Cunnel," replied the native, "if ye'll jest come down from
+thar, and throw 'way yer shootin'-irons, I'll give ye the all-firedest
+thrashing ye ever did get."
+
+The Colonel gave no further heed to him, but the speaker mounted the
+steps of the meeting-house and harangued the natives in a strain of rude
+and passionate declamation, in which my host, the aristocrats, and the
+secessionists came in for about equal shares of abuse. Seeing that the
+native (who, it appeared, was quite popular as a stump-speaker) was
+drawing away his audience, the Colonel descended from the driver's seat,
+and motioning for me to follow, entered the carriage. Turning the horses
+homeward, we rode off at a brisk pace.
+
+"Not much secession about that fellow, Colonel," I remarked, after a
+while.
+
+"No," he replied, "he's a North Carolina 'corn-cracker,' one of the
+ugliest specimens of humanity extant. They're as thick as fleas in this
+part of the state, and about all of them are traitors."
+
+"Traitors to the state, but true to the Union. As far as I've seen, that
+is the case with the middling class throughout the South." "Well, it
+may be, but they generally go with us, and I reckon they will now, when
+it comes to the rub. Those in the towns--the traders and
+mechanics--will, certain; its only these half-way independent planters
+that ever kick the traces. By the way," continued my host, in a jocose
+way, "what did you think of the preaching?"
+
+"I thought it very poor. I'd rather have heard the stump-speech, had it
+not been a little too personal on you."
+
+"Well, it was the better of the two," he replied, laughing, "but the old
+devil can't afford any thing good, he don't get enough pay."
+
+"Why, how much does he get?"
+
+"Only a hundred dollars."
+
+"That _is_ small. How does the man live?"
+
+"Well, he teaches the daughter of my neighbor, Captain Randall, who
+believes in praying, and gives him his board. Randall thinks that
+enough. The rest of the parish can't afford to pay him, and I _wont_."
+
+"Why wont you?"
+
+"Because he's a d----d old hypocrite. He believes in the Union with all
+his heart--at least so Randall, who's a sincere Union man, says--and
+yet, he never sees me at meeting but he preaches a red-hot secession
+sermon."
+
+"He wants to keep you in the faith," I replied.
+
+A few more miles of sandy road took us to the mansion, where we found
+dinner in waiting. Meeting "Massa Tommy"--who had staid at home with
+his mother--as we entered the doorway, the Colonel asked after the
+overseer.
+
+"He seems well enough, sir; I believe he's coming the possum over
+mother."
+
+"I'll bet on it, Tommy; but he wont fool you and me, will he, my boy?"
+said his father, slapping him affectionately on the back.
+
+After dinner I went, with my host to the room of the wounded man. His
+head was still bound up, and he was groaning piteously, as if in great
+pain; but I thought there was too fresh a color in his face to be
+entirely natural in one who had lost so much blood, and been so severely
+wounded as he affected to have been.
+
+The Colonel mentioned our suspicions to Madam P----, and suggested that
+the shackles should be put on him.
+
+"Oh! no, don't do that; it would be inhuman," said the lady; "the color
+is the effect of fever. If you fear he is plotting to get away, let him
+be watched."
+
+The Colonel consented, but with evident reluctance, to the arrangement,
+and retired to his room to take a _siesta_, while I lit a segar, and
+strolled out to the negro quarters.
+
+Making my way through the woods to the scene of the morning's
+jollification, I found about a hundred darkies gathered around Jim, on
+the little plot in front of old Lucy's cabin. He had evidently been
+giving them the news. Pausing when I came near, he exclaimed:
+
+"Har's Massa K----, he'll say dat I tells you de trufh;" and turning to
+me, he said: "Massa K----, dese darkies say dat Massa Andersin am an
+ab'lisherner, and dat none but de ab'lisherners will fight for de Union;
+am dat so, sar?"
+
+"No, I reckon not, Jim; I think the whole North would fight for it if it
+were necessary."
+
+"Am dat so, massa? am dat so?" eagerly inquired a dozen of the darkies;
+"and am dar great many folks at de Norf--more dan dar am down har?"
+
+"Yas, you fools, didn't I tell you dat?" said Jim, as I, not exactly
+relishing the idea of preaching treason, in the Colonel's absence, to
+his slaves, hesitated to reply. "Haint I tole you," he continued, "dat
+in de big city ob New York dar'm more folks dan in all Car'lina? I'se
+been dar, and I knows; and Massa K----'ll tell you dat dey--most on
+'em--feel mighty sorry for de brack man."
+
+"No he wont," I replied, "and besides, Jim, you should not talk in this
+way before me; I might tell your master."
+
+"No! you wont do dat; I knows you wont, massa. Scipio tole us he'd trust
+his bery life wid _you_."
+
+"Well, perhaps he might; it's true I would not injure you;" saying that,
+I turned away, though my curiosity was greatly excited to hear more.
+
+I wandered farther into the woods, and a half-hour found me near one of
+the turpentine distilleries. Seating myself on a rosin barrel, I quietly
+finished my segar, and was about lighting another, when Jim made his
+appearance.
+
+"Beg pardon, Massa K----," said the negro, bowing very low, "but I wants
+to ax you one or two tings, ef you please, sar."
+
+"Well," I replied, "I'll tell you any thing that I ought to."
+
+"Der yer tink, den, massa, dat dey'll git to fightin' at Charl'son?"
+
+"Yes, judging by the tone of the Charleston papers you've read to-day, I
+think they will."
+
+"And der yer tink dat de rest ob de Souf will jine wid Souf Car'lina, if
+she go at it fust?"
+
+"Yes, Jim, I'm inclined to think so."
+
+"I hard you say to massa, dat ef dey goes to war, 'twill free all de
+niggers--der you raily b'lieve dat, sar?"
+
+"_You_ heard me say that; how did you hear it?" I exclaimed, in
+surprise.
+
+"Why, sar, de front winder ob de carriage war down jess a crack, so I
+hard all you said."
+
+"Did you let it down on purpose?"
+
+"P'r'aps so, massa. Whot's de use ob habin' ears, ef you don't har?"
+
+"Well, I suppose not much; and you tell all you hear to the other
+negroes?"
+
+"I reckon so, massa," said the darky, looking very demure.
+
+"That's the use of having a tongue, eh?" I replied, laughing.
+
+"Dat's it 'zactly, massa."
+
+"Well, Jim, I do think the slaves will be finally freed; but it will
+cost more white blood to do it than all the niggers in creation are
+worth. Do you think the darkies would fight for their freedom?"
+
+"Fight, sar!" exclaimed the negro, straightening up his fine form, while
+his usual good-natured look passed from his face, and gave way to an
+expression that made him seem more like an incarnate devil than a human
+being; "FIGHT, sar; gib dem de chance, and den see."
+
+"Why are you discontented? You have been at the North, and you know the
+blacks are as well off as the majority of the poor laboring men there."
+
+"You says dat to _me_, Massa K----; you don't say it to de _Cunnel_. We
+am _not_ so well off as de pore man at de Norf! You knows dat, sar. He
+hab his wife and chil'ren, and his own home. What hab we, sar? No wife,
+no chil'ren, no home; all am de white man's. Der yer tink we wouldn't
+fight to be free?" and he pressed his teeth together, and there passed
+again over his face the same look it wore the moment before.
+
+"Come, come, Jim, this may be true of your race; but it don't apply to
+yourself. Your master is kind and indulgent to _you_."
+
+"He am kine to me, sar; he orter be," said the negro, the savage
+expression coming again into his eyes. For a moment he hesitated; then,
+taking a step toward me, he placed his face down to mine, and hissed out
+these words, every syllable seeming to come from the very bottom of his
+being. "I tell you he orter be, sar, FUR I AM HIS OWN FATHER'S SON!"
+
+"His brother!" I exclaimed, springing to my feet, and looking at him in
+blank amazement. "It can't be true!"
+
+"It am true, sar--as true as there's a hell! His father had my
+mother--when he got tired of her, he sold her Souf. _I war too young den
+eben to know her!_"
+
+"This is horrible--too horrible!" I said.
+
+"It am slavery, sar! Shouldn't we be contented?" replied the negro with
+a grim smile. Drawing, then, a large spring-knife from his pocket, he
+waved it above his head, and added: "Ef I had de hull white race
+dar--right dar under dat knife, don't yer tink I'd take all dar
+lives--all at one blow--to be FREE!"
+
+"And yet you refused to run away when the Abolitionists tempted you, at
+the North. Why didn't you go then?"
+
+"'Cause I had promised, massa."
+
+"Promised the Colonel before you went?"
+
+"No, sar; he neber axed me; but _I_ can't tell you no more. P'raps
+Scipio will, ef you ax him."
+
+"Oh! I see; you're in that league of which Scip is a leader. You'll get
+into trouble, _sure_," I replied, in a quick, decided tone, which
+startled him.
+
+"You tole Scipio dat, sar, and what did _he_ tell you?"
+
+"That he didn't care for his life."
+
+"No more do I, sar," said the negro, turning on his heel with a proud,
+almost defiant gesture, and starting to go.
+
+"A moment, Jim. You are very imprudent; never say these things to any
+other mortal; promise me that."
+
+"You'se bery good, massa, bery good. Scipio say you's true, and he'm
+allers right. I ortent to hab said what I hab; but sumhow, sar, dat news
+brought it all up _har_" (laying his hand on his breast), "and it wud
+come out."
+
+The tears filled his eyes as he said this, and turning away without
+another word, he disappeared among the trees.
+
+I was almost stunned by this strange revelation, but the more I
+reflected on it, the more probable it appeared. Now too, that my
+thoughts were turned in that direction, I called to mind a certain
+resemblance between the colonel and the negro that I had not heeded
+before. Though one was a high-bred Southern gentleman, claiming an old
+and proud descent, and the other a poor African slave, they had some
+striking peculiarities which might indicate a common origin. The
+likeness was not in their features, for Jim's face was of the
+unmistakable negro type, and his skin of a hue so dark that it seemed
+impossible he could be the son of a white man (I afterward learned that
+his mother was a black of the deepest dye), but it was in their form and
+general bearing. They had the same closely-knit and sinewy frame, the
+same erect, elastic step, the same rare blending of good-natured ease
+and dignity--to which I have already alluded as characteristic of the
+Colonel--and in the wild burst of passion that accompanied the negro's
+disclosure of their relationship, I saw the same fierce, unbridled
+temper, whose outbreaks I had witnessed in my host.
+
+What a strange fate was theirs! Two brothers--the one the owner of three
+hundred slaves, and the first man of his district--the other, a bonded
+menial, and so poor that the very bread he ate, and the clothes he wore,
+were another's!
+
+I passed the remainder of the afternoon in my room, and did not again
+meet my host until the family assembled at the tea-table. Jim then
+occupied his accustomed seat behind the Colonel's chair, and that
+gentleman was in more than his usual spirits, though Madam P----, I
+thought, wore a sad and absent look.
+
+The conversation rambled over a wide range of subjects, and was carried
+on mainly by the Colonel and myself; but toward the close of the meal
+the lady said to me:
+
+"Mr. K----, Sam and young Junius are to be buried this evening; if you
+have never seen a negro funeral, perhaps you'd like to attend."
+
+"I will be happy to accompany you, Madam, if you go," I replied,
+
+"Thank you," said the lady.
+
+"Pshaw! Alice, you'll not go into the woods on so cold a night as this!"
+said the Colonel.
+
+"Yes, I think I ought to. Our people will expect me."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+THE NEGRO FUNERAL.
+
+
+It was about an hour after nightfall when we took our way to the
+burial-ground. The moon had risen, but the clouds which gathered when
+the sun went down, covered its face, and were fast spreading their
+thick, black shadows over the little collection of negro-houses. Near
+two new-made graves were gathered some two hundred men and women, as
+dark as the night that was setting around them. As we entered the circle
+the old preacher pointed to seats reserved for us, and the sable crowd
+fell back a few paces, as if, even in the presence of death, they did
+not forget the difference between their race and ours.
+
+Scattered here and there among the trees, torches of lightwood threw a
+wild and fitful light over the little cluster of graves, revealing the
+long, straight boxes of rough pine that held the remains of the two
+negroes, and lighting up the score or two of russet mounds where slept
+the dusky kinsmen who had gone before them.
+
+The simple head-boards that marked these humble graves chronicled
+no bad biography or senseless rhyme, and told no false tales of
+lives that might better not have been, but "SAM, AGE 22;" "JAKE'S
+ELIZA;" "AUNT SUE;" "AUNT LUCY'S TOM;" "JOE;" and other like
+inscriptions, scratched in rough characters on the unplaned boards, were
+all the records there. The rude tenants had passed away and "left no
+sign;" their birth, their age, their deeds, were alike unknown--unknown,
+but not forgotten! for are they not written in the book of His
+remembrance--and when he counteth up his jewels, may not some of them be
+there?
+
+The queer, grotesque dress, and sad, earnest looks of the black group;
+the red, fitful glare of the blazing pine, and the white faces of the
+tapped trees, gleaming through the gloom like so many sheeted ghosts
+gathered to some death-carnival, made up a strange, wild scene--the
+strangest and the wildest I had ever witnessed.
+
+The covers of the rude coffins were not yet nailed down, and when we
+arrived, the blacks were, one by one, taking a last look at the faces of
+the dead. Soon, Junius, holding his weeping wife by the hand, approached
+the smaller of the two boxes, which held all that was left of their
+first-born. The mother, kneeling by its side, kissed again and again the
+cold, shrunken lips, and sobbed as if her heart would break; and the
+strong frame of the father shook convulsively, as he choked down the
+great sorrow which welled up in his throat, and turned away from his boy
+forever. As he did so, old Pompey said:
+
+"Don't grebe, June, he'm whar de wicked cease from trubling, whar de
+weary am at rest."
+
+"I knows it; I knows it, Uncle. I knows de Lord am bery good to take
+'im 'way; but why did he take de young chile, and leab de ole man har?"
+
+"De little sapling dat grow in de shade may die while it'm young; de
+great tree dat grow in de sun must lib till he'm rotted down."
+
+These words were the one drop wanting to make the great grief which was
+swelling in the negro's heart overflow. Giving one low, wild cry, he
+folded his wife in his arms, and burst into a paroxysm of tears.
+
+"Come now, my chil'ren," said the old preacher, kneeling down, "let us
+pray."
+
+The whole assemblage then knelt on the cold ground, while the old man
+prayed, and a more sincere, heart-touching prayer never went up from
+human lips to that God "who hath made of one blood all nations that
+dwell on the face of the earth." Though clothed in rags, and in feeble
+age at the mercy of a cruel taskmaster, that old slave was richer far
+than his master. His simple faith, which saw through the darkness around
+him into the clear and radiant light of the unseen day, was of far more
+worth than all the wealth and glory of this world. I know not why it
+was, but as I looked at him in the dim red light, which fell on his bent
+form and cast a strange halo around his upturned face, I thought of
+Stephen, as he gazed upward and behold heaven open, and "the Son of Man
+seated at the right hand of the throne of God."
+
+Rising from his knees, the old preacher turned slowly to the black mass
+that encircled him, and said:
+
+"My dear brederin and sisters, de Lord say dat 'de dust shill return to
+de earth as it war, and de spirit to Him who gabe it,' and now, 'cordin'
+to dat text, my friends, we'm gwine to put dis dust (pointing to the two
+coffins) in de groun' whar it cum from, and whar it shill lay till de
+bressed Lord blow de great trumpet on de resumrection mornin'. De
+spirits of our brudders har de Lord hub already took to hisseff. 'Our
+brudders,' I say, my chil'ren, 'case ebery one dat de Lord hab made am
+brudders to you and to me, whedder dey'm bad or good, white or brack.
+
+"Dis young chile, who hab gone 'way and leff his pore fader and mudder
+suffrin' all ober wid grief, _he_ hab gone to de Lord, _shore_. _He_
+neber done no wrong; he allers 'bey'd his massa, and neber said no hard
+word, nor found no fault, not eben w'en de cruel, bad oberseer put de
+load so heaby on him dat it kill him. Yes, my brederin and sisters, _he_
+hab gone to de Lord; gone whar dey don't work in de swamps; whar de
+little chil'ren don't tote de big shingles fru de water up to dar knees.
+No swamps am dar; no shingles am dar; dey doan't need 'em, 'case dar de
+hous'n haint builded wid hands, for dey'm all builded by de Lord, and
+gib'n to de good niggers, ready-made, and for nuffin'. De Lord don't
+say, like as ded massa say, 'Pomp, dar's de logs and de shingles' (dey'm
+allers pore shingles, de kine dat woant sell; but massa say, 'dey'm good
+'nuff for niggers,' ef de roof do leak). De Lord doan't say: 'Now, Pomp,
+you go to work and build you' own house; but mine dat you does you,
+task all de time, jess de same!' But de Lord--de bressed Lord--He say,
+w'en we goes up dar, 'Dar, Pomp, dar's de house dat I'se been a buildin'
+for you eber sence 'de foundation ob de worle.' It'm done now, and you
+kin cum in; your room am jess ready, and ole Sal and de chil'ren dat I
+tuk 'way from you eber so long ago, and dat you mourned ober and cried
+ober as ef you'd neber see dem agin, dey'm dar too, all on 'em, a
+waitin' for you. Dey'm been fixin' up de house 'spressly for you all
+dese long years, and dey'b got it all nice and comfible now.' Yas, my
+friends, glory be to Him, dat's what our Heabenly massa say, and who ob
+you wouldn't hab sich a massa as dat? A massa dat doan't set you no hard
+tasks, and dat gibs you 'nuff to eat, and time to rest and to sing and
+to play! A massa dat doan't keep no Yankee oberseer to foller you 'bout
+wid de big free-lashed whip; but dat leads you hisseff to de green
+pastures and de still waters; and w'en you'm a-faint and a-tired, and
+can't go no furder, dat takes you up in his arms, and carries you in his
+bosom! What pore darky am dar dat wudn't hab sich a massa? What one ob
+us, eben ef he had to work jess so hard as we works now, wudn't tink
+heseff de happiest nigger in de hull worle, ef he could hab sich hous'n
+to lib in as dem? dem hous'n 'not made wid hands, eternal in de
+heabens!'
+
+"But glory, glory to de Lord! my chil'ren, wese all got dat massa, ef we
+only knowd it, and He'm buildin' dem hous'n up dar, now, for ebery one
+ob us dat am tryin' to be good and to lub one anoder. _For ebery one ob
+us_, I say, and we kin all git de fine hous'n ef we try.
+
+"Recolember, too, my brudders, dat our great Massa am rich, bery rich,
+and he kin do all he promise. _He_ doant say, w'en wese worked ober time
+to git some little ting to comfort de sick chile, 'I knows, Pomp, you'se
+done de work, an' I did 'gree to gib you de pay; but de fact am, Pomp,
+de frost hab come so sudden dis yar, dat I'se loss de hull ob de sebenfh
+dippin', and I'se pore, so pore, de chile muss go widout dis time.' No,
+no, brudders, de bressed Lord He neber talk so. He neber break, 'case de
+sebenfh dip am shet off, or 'case de price of turpentime gwo down at de
+Norf. He neber sell his niggers down Souf, 'case he lose his money on he
+hoss-race. No, my chil'ren, our HEABENLY Massa am rich, RICH, I say. He
+own all dis worle, and all de oder worles dat am shinin' up dar in de
+sky. He own dem all; but he tink more ob one ob you, more ob one ob
+you--pore, ign'rant brack folks dat you am--dan ob all dem great worles!
+Who wouldn't belong to sich a Massa as dat? Who wouldn't be his
+nigger--not his slave--He doant hab no slaves--but his chile; and 'ef
+his chile, den his heir, de heir ob God, and de jined heir wid de
+bressed Jesus.' O my chil'ren! tink of dat! de heir ob de Lord ob all de
+'arth and all de sky! What white man kin be more'n dat?
+
+"Don't none ob you say you'm too wicked to be His chile; 'ca'se you
+haint. He lubs de wicked ones de best, 'ca'se dey need his lub de most.
+Yas, my brudders, eben de wickedest, ef dey's only sorry, and turn roun'
+and leab off dar bad ways, he lub de bery best ob all, 'ca'se he'm all
+lub and pity.
+
+"Sam, har, my chil'ren, war wicked, but don't _we_ pity him; don't _we_
+tink he hab a hard time, and don't we tink de bad oberseer, who'm layin'
+dar in de house jess ready to gwo and answer for it--don't we tink he
+gabe Sam bery great probincation?
+
+"Dat's so," said a dozen of the auditors.
+
+"Den don't you 'spose dat de bressed Lord know all dat, and dat He pity
+Sam too. If we pore sinners feel sorrer for him, haint de Lord's heart
+bigger'n our'n, and haint he more sorrer for him? Don't you tink dat ef
+He lub and pity de bery worse whites, dat He lub and pity pore Sam, who
+warn't so bery bad, arter all? Don't you tink He'll gib Sam a house?
+P'r'aps' 'twont be one ob de fine hous'n, but wont it be a comfible
+house, dat hain't no cracks, and one dat'll keep out de wind and de
+rain? And don't you s'pose, my chil'ren, dat it'll be big 'nuff for
+Jule, too--dat pore, repentin' chile, whose heart am clean broke, 'ca'se
+she hab broughten dis on Sam--and won't de Lord--de good Lord--de
+tender-hearted Lord--won't He touch Sam's heart, and coax him to forgib
+Jule, and to take her inter his house up dar? I knows he will, my
+chil'ren. I knows----"
+
+The old negro paused abruptly; there was a quick swaying in the black
+crowd--a hasty rush--a wild cry--and Sam's wife burst into the open
+space around the preacher, and fell at his feet. Throwing her arms
+wildly about him, she shrieked out:
+
+"Say dat agin, Uncle Pomp! for de lub ob de good Lord, oh! say dat
+agin!"
+
+Bending down, the old man raised her gently in his arms, and folding her
+there, as he would have folded a child, he said, in a voice thick with
+emotion:
+
+"It am so, Juley. I knows dat Sam will forgib you, and take you wid him
+up dar."
+
+Fastening her arms frantically around Pompey's neck, the poor woman
+burst into a paroxysm of grief, while the old man's tears fell in great
+drops on her upturned face, and many a dark cheek was wet, as with rain.
+
+The scene had lasted a few minutes, and I was turning away to hide the
+emotion that fast filled my eyes, and was creeping up, with a choking
+feeling, to my throat, when the Colonel, from the farther edge of the
+group, called out:
+
+"Take that d---- d---- away--take her away, Pomp!"
+
+The old negro turned toward his master with a sad, grieved look, but
+gave no heed to the words.
+
+"Take her away, some of you, I say," again cried the Colonel. "Pomp, you
+mustn't keep these niggers all night in the cold."
+
+At the sound of her master's voice the metif woman fell to the ground as
+if struck by a Minie-ball. Soon several negroes lifted her up to bear
+her off; but she struggled violently, and rent the woods with her wild
+cries for "one more look at Sam."
+
+"Look at him, you d---- d----; then go, and don't let me see you again."
+
+She threw herself on the face of the dead, and covered the cold lips
+with her kisses; then she rose, and with a weak, uncertain step,
+staggered out into the darkness.
+
+Was not the system which had so seared and hardened that man's heart,
+begotten in the lowest hell?
+
+The old preacher said no more, but four stout negro men stepped forward,
+nailed down the lids, and lowered the rough boxes into the ground.
+Turning to Madam P----, I saw her face was red with weeping. She turned
+to go as the first earth fell, with a dull, heavy sound, on the rude
+coffins; and giving her my arm, I led her from the scene.
+
+As we walked slowly back to the house, a low wail--half a chant, half a
+dirge--rose from the black crowd, and floated off on the still night
+air, till it died away amid the far woods, in a strange, unearthly moan.
+With that sad, wild music in our ears, we entered the mansion.
+
+As we seated ourselves by the bright wood-fire on the library hearth,
+obeying a sudden impulse which I could not restrain, I said to Madam
+P----:
+
+"The Colonel's treatment of that poor woman is inexplicable to me. Why
+is he so hard with her? It is not in keeping with what I have seen of
+his character."
+
+"The Colonel is a peculiar man," replied the lady. "Noble, generous, and
+a true friend, he is also a bitter, implacable enemy. When he once
+conceives a dislike, his feelings become even vindictive. Never having
+had an ungratified wish, he does not know how to feel for the sorrows of
+those beneath him. Sam, though a proud, headstrong, unruly character,
+was a great favorite with him; he felt his death much; and as he
+attributes it to Jule, he feels terribly bitter toward her. She will
+have to be sold to get her out of his way, for he will _never_ forgive
+her."
+
+It was some time before the Colonel joined us, and when at last he made
+his appearance, he seemed in no mood for conversation. The lady soon
+retired; but feeling unlike sleep, I took down a book from the shelves,
+drew my chair near the fire, and fell to reading. The Colonel, too, was
+deep in the newspapers, till, after a while, Jim entered the room:
+
+"I'se cum to ax ef you've nuffin more to-night, Cunnel?" said the negro.
+
+"No, nothing, Jim," replied his master; "but, stay--hadn't you better
+sleep in front of Moye's door?"
+
+"Dunno, sar; jess as you say."
+
+"I think you'd better," returned the Colonel.
+
+"Yas, massa," and the darky left the apartment.
+
+The Colonel shortly rose, and bade me "good-night." I continued reading
+till the clock struck eleven, when I laid the book aside and went to my
+room.
+
+I lodged, as I have said before, on the first floor, and was obliged to
+pass by the overseer's apartment in going to mine. Wrapped in his
+blanket, and stretched at full length on the ground, Jim lay there, fast
+asleep. I passed on, thinking of the wisdom of placing a tired negro on
+guard over an acute and desperate Yankee.
+
+I rose in the morning with the sun, and had partly donned my clothing,
+when I heard a loud uproar in the hall. Opening my door, I saw Jim
+pounding vehemently at the Colonel's room, and looking as pale as is
+possible with a person of his complexion.
+
+"What the d--l is the matter?" asked his master, who now, partly
+dressed, stepped into the hall.
+
+"Moye hab gone, sar--he'm gone and took Firefly (my host's
+five-thousand-dollar thorough-bred) wid him."
+
+For a moment the Colonel stood stupified; then, his face turning to a
+cold, clayey white, he seized the black by the throat, and hurled him to
+the floor. With his thick boot raised, he seemed about to dash out the
+man's brains with its ironed heel, when, on the instant, the octoroon
+woman rushed, in her night-clothes, from his room, and, with desperate
+energy, pushed him aside, exclaiming: "What would you do? Remember WHO
+HE IS!"
+
+The negro rose, and the Colonel, without a word, passed into his own
+apartment.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+THE PURSUIT.
+
+
+I sauntered out, after the events recorded in the last chapter, to
+inhale the fresh air of the morning. A slight rain had fallen during the
+night, and it still moistened the dead leaves which carpeted the woods,
+making an extended walk out of the question; so, seating myself on the
+trunk of a fallen tree, in the vicinity of the house, I awaited the hour
+for breakfast. I had not remained there long before I heard the voices
+of my host and Madam P---- on the front piazza:
+
+"I tell you, Alice, I cannot--must not do it. If I overlook this, the
+discipline of the plantation is at an end."
+
+"Do what you please with him when you return," replied the lady, "but do
+not chain him up, and leave me, at such a time, alone. You know Jim is
+the only one I can depend on."
+
+"Well, have your own way. You know, my darling, I would not cause you a
+moment's uneasiness, but I must follow up this d----d Moye."
+
+I was seated where I could hear, though I could not see the speakers,
+but it was evident from the tone of the last remark, that an action
+accompanied it quite as tender as the words. Being unwilling to
+overhear more of a private conversation, I rose and approached them.
+
+"Ah! my dear fellow," said the Colonel, on perceiving me, "are you
+stirring so early? I was about to send to your room to ask if you'll go
+with me up the country. My d----d overseer has got away, and I must
+follow him at once."
+
+"I'll go with pleasure," I replied. "Which way do you think Moye has
+gone?"
+
+"The shortest cut to the railroad, probably; but old Cæsar will track
+him."
+
+A servant then announced breakfast--an early one having been prepared.
+We hurried through the meal with all speed, and the other preparations
+being soon over, were in twenty minutes in our saddles, and ready for
+the journey. The mulatto coachman, with a third horse, was at the door,
+ready to accompany us. As we mounted, the Colonel said to him:
+
+"Go and call Sam, the driver."
+
+The darky soon returned with the heavy, ugly-visaged black who had been
+whipped, by Madam P----'s order, the day before.
+
+"Sam," said his master, "I shall be gone some days, and I leave the
+field-work in your hands. Let me have a good account of you when I
+return."
+
+"Yas, massa, you shill dat," replied the negro.
+
+"Put Jule--Sam's Jule--into the woods, and see that she does full
+tasks," continued the Colonel.
+
+"Haint she wanted 'mong de nusses, massa?"
+
+"Put some one else there--give her field-work; she needs it."
+
+On large plantations the young children of the field-women are left with
+them only at night, and are herded together during the day, in a
+separate cabin, in charge of nurses. These nurses are feeble, sickly
+women, or recent mothers; and the fact of Jule's being employed in that
+capacity was evidence that she was unfit for outdoor labor.
+
+Madam P----, who was waiting on the piazza to see us off, seemed about
+to remonstrate against this arrangement, but she hesitated a moment, and
+in that moment we had bidden her "Good-bye," and galloped away.
+
+We were soon at the cabin of the negro-hunter, and the coachman,
+dismounting, called him out.
+
+"Hurry up, hurry up," said the Colonel, as Sandy appeared, "we haven't a
+moment to spare."
+
+"Jest so--jest so, Cunnel; I'll jine ye in a jiffin," replied he of the
+reddish extremities.
+
+Emerging from the shanty with provoking deliberation--the impatience of
+my host had infected me--the clay-eater slowly proceeded to mount the
+horse of the negro, while his dirt-bedraggled wife, and clay-encrusted
+children, followed close at his heels, the younger ones huddling around
+for the tokens of paternal affection usual at parting. Whether it was
+the noise they made, or their frightful aspect, I know not, but the
+horse, a spirited animal, took fright on their appearance, and nearly
+broke away from the negro, who was holding him. Seeing this, the Colonel
+said:
+
+"Clear out, you young scare-crows. Into the house with you."
+
+"They arn't no more scare-crows than yourn, Cunnel J----," said the
+mother, in a decidedly belligerent tone. "You may 'buse my old man--he
+kin stand it--but ye shan't blackguard my young 'uns!"
+
+The Colonel laughed, and was about to make a good-natured reply, when
+Sandy yelled out:
+
+"Gwo enter the house and shet up, ye---- ----."
+
+With this affectionate farewell, he turned his horse and led the way up
+the road.
+
+The dog, who was a short distance in advance, soon gave a piercing howl,
+and started off at the speed of a reindeer. He had struck the trail, and
+urging our horses to their fastest speed, we followed.
+
+We were all well mounted, but the mare the Colonel had given me was a
+magnificent animal, as fleet as the wind, and with a gait so easy that
+her back seemed a rocking-chair. Saddle-horses at the South are trained
+to the gallop--Southern riders not deeming it necessary that one's
+breakfast should be churned into a Dutch cheese by a trotting nag, in
+order that he may pass for a horseman.
+
+We had ridden on at a perfect break-neck pace for half an hour, when the
+Colonel shouted to our companion:
+
+"Sandy, call the dog in; the horses wont last ten miles at this
+gait--we've a long ride before us."
+
+The dirt-eater did as he was bidden, and we soon settled into a gentle
+gallop.
+
+We had passed through a dense forest of pines, but were emerging into a
+"bottom country," where some of the finest deciduous trees--then brown
+and leafless, but bearing promise of the opening beauty of
+spring--reared, along with the unfading evergreen, their tall stems in
+the air. The live-oak, the sycamore, the Spanish mulberry, the holly,
+and the persimmon--gaily festooned with wreaths of the white and yellow
+jessamine, the woodbine and the cypress-moss, and bearing here and there
+a bouquet of the mistletoe, with its deep green and glossy leaves
+upturned to the sun--flung their broad arms over the road, forming an
+archway grander and more beautiful than any the hand of man ever wove
+for the greatest hero the world has worshipped.
+
+The woods were free from underbrush, and a coarse, wiry grass, unfit for
+fodder, and scattered through them in detached patches, was the only
+vegetation visible. The ground was mainly covered with the leaves and
+burrs of the pine.
+
+We passed great numbers of swine, feeding on these burrs, and now and
+then a horned animal browsing on the cypress-moss where it hung low on
+the trees. I observed that nearly all the swine were marked, though they
+seemed too wild to have ever seen an owner, or a human habitation. They
+were a long, lean, slab-sided race, with legs and shoulders like deer,
+and bearing no sort of resemblance to the ordinary hog, except in the
+snout, and that feature was so much longer and sharper than the nose of
+the Northern swine, that I doubt if Agassiz would class the two as one
+species. However, they have their uses--they make excellent bacon, and
+are "death on snakes." Ireland itself is not more free from the
+serpentine race than are the districts frequented by these long-nosed
+quadrupeds.
+
+"We call them Carolina race-horses," said the Colonel, as he finished an
+account of their peculiarities.
+
+"Race-horses! Why, are they fleet of foot?"
+
+"Fleet as deer. I'd match one against an ordinary horse at any time."
+
+"Come, my friend, you're practising on my ignorance of natural history."
+
+"Not a bit of it. See! there's a good specimen yonder. If we can get him
+into the road, and fairly started, I'll bet you a dollar he'll beat
+Sandy's mare on a half-mile stretch--Sandy to hold the stakes and have
+the winnings."
+
+"Well, agreed," I said, laughing, "and I'll give the pig ten rods the
+start."
+
+"No," replied the Colonel, "you can't afford it. He'll _have_ to start
+ahead, but you'll need that in the count. Come, Sandy, will you go in
+for the pile?"
+
+I'm not sure that the native would not have run a race with Old Nicholas
+himself, for the sake of so much money. To him it was a vast sum; and as
+he thought of it, his eyes struck small sparks, and his enormous beard
+and mustachio vibrated with something that faintly resembled a laugh.
+Replying to the question, he said:
+
+"Kinder reckon I wull, Cunnel; howsomdever, I keeps the stakes, ony
+how?"
+
+"Of course," said the planter, "but be honest--win if you can."
+
+Sandy halted his horse in the road, while the planter and I took to the
+woods on either side of the way. The Colonel soon manoeuvred to
+separate the selected animal from the rest of the herd, and, without
+much difficulty, got him into the road, where, by closing down on each
+flank, we kept him till he and Sandy were fairly under way.
+
+"He'll keep to the road when once started," said the Colonel, laughing:
+"and he'll show you some of the tallest running you ever saw in your
+life."
+
+Away they went. At first the pig, seeming not exactly to comprehend the
+programme, cantered off at a leisurely pace, though he held his own.
+Soon, however, he cast an eye behind him--halted a moment to collect his
+thoughts and reconnoitre--and then, lowering his head and elevating his
+tail, put forth all his speed. And such speed! Talk of a deer, the wind,
+or a steam-engine--they are not to be compared with it. Nothing in
+nature I ever saw run--except, it may be, a Southern tornado, or a Sixth
+Ward politician--could hope to distance that pig. He gained on the horse
+at every step, and it was soon evident that my dollar was gone!
+
+"'In for a shilling, in for a pound,' is the adage, so, turning to the
+Colonel, I said, as intelligibly as my horse's rapid pace and my excited
+risibilities would allow:
+
+"I see I've lost, but I'll go you another dollar that _you_ can't beat
+the pig!"
+
+"No--sir!" the Colonel got out in the breaks of his laughing explosions;
+"you can't hedge on me in that manner. I'll go a dollar that _you_ can't
+do it, and your mare is the fastest on the road. She won me a thousand
+not a month ago."
+
+"Well, I'll do it--Sandy to have the stakes."
+
+"Agreed," said the Colonel, and away _we_ went.
+
+The swinish racer was about a hundred yards ahead when I gave the mare
+the reins, and told her to go. And she _did_ go. She flew against the
+wind with a motion so rapid that my face, as it clove the air, felt as
+if cutting its way through a solid body, and the trees, as we passed,
+seemed struck with panic, and running for dear life in the opposite
+direction.
+
+For a few moments I thought the mare was gaining, and I turned to the
+Colonel with an exultant look.
+
+"Don't shout till you win, my boy," he called out from the distance
+where I was fast leaving him and Sandy.
+
+I _did not shout_, for spite of all my efforts the space between me and
+the pig seemed to widen. Yet I kept on, determined to win, till, at the
+end of a short half-mile, we reached the Waccamaw--the swine still a
+hundred yards ahead! There his pigship halted, turned coolly around,
+eyed me for a moment, then with a quiet, deliberate trot, turned off
+into the woods.
+
+A bend in the road kept my companions out of sight for a few moments,
+and when they came up I had somewhat recovered my breath, though the
+mare was blowing hard, and reeking with foam.
+
+"Well," said the Colonel, "what do you think of our bacon 'as it runs?'"
+
+"I think the Southern article can't be beat, whether raw or cooked,
+standing or running."
+
+At this moment the hound, who had been leisurely jogging along in the
+rear, disdaining to join in the race in which his dog of a master and I
+had engaged, came up, and dashing quickly on to the river's edge, set up
+a most dismal howling. The Colonel dismounted, and clambering down the
+bank, which was there twenty feet high, and very steep, shouted:
+
+"The d----d Yankee has swum the stream!"
+
+"Why so?" I asked.
+
+"To cover his tracks and delay pursuit; but he has overshot the mark.
+There is no other road within ten miles, and he must have taken to this
+one again beyond here. He's lost twenty minutes by this manoeuvre.
+Come, Sandy, call in the dog, we'll push on a little faster."
+
+"But he tuk to t'other bank, Cunnel. Shan't we trail him thar?" asked
+Sandy.
+
+"And suppose he found a boat here," I suggested, "and made the shore
+some ways down?"
+
+"He couldn't get Firefly into a flat--we should only waste time in
+scouring the other bank. The swamp this side the next run has forced him
+into the road within five miles. The trick is transparent. He took me
+for a fool," replied the Colonel, answering both questions at once.
+
+I had reined my horse out of the road, and when my companions turned to
+go, was standing at the edge of the bank, overlooking the river.
+Suddenly I saw, on one of the abutments of the bridge, what seemed a
+long, black log--strange to say, _in motion_!
+
+"Colonel," I shouted, "see there! a live log as I'm a white man!"
+
+"Lord bless you," cried the planter, taking an observation, "it's an
+alligator!"
+
+I said no more, but pressing on after the hound, soon left my companions
+out of sight. For long afterward, the Colonel, in a doleful way, would
+allude to my lamentable deficiency in natural history--particularly in
+such branches as bacon and "live logs."
+
+I had ridden about five miles, keeping well up with the hound, and had
+reached the edge of the swamp, when suddenly the dog darted to the side
+of the road, and began to yelp in the most frantic manner. Dismounting,
+and leading my horse to the spot, I made out plainly the print of
+Firefly's feet in the sand. There was no mistaking it--that round shoe
+on the off forefoot. (The horse had, when a colt, a cracked hoof, and
+though the wound was outgrown, the foot was still tender.) These prints
+were dry, while the tracks we had seen at the river were filled with
+water, thus proving that the rain had ceased while the overseer was
+passing between the two places. He was therefore not far off.
+
+The Colonel and Sandy soon rode up.
+
+"Caught a live log! eh, my good fellow?" asked my host, with a laugh.
+
+"No; but here's the overseer as plain as daylight; and his tracks not
+wet!"
+
+Quickly dismounting, he examined the ground, and then exclaimed:
+
+"The d--l----it's a fact--here not four hours ago! He has doubled on
+his tracks since, I'll wager, and not made twenty miles--we'll have him
+before night, sure! Come, mount--quick."
+
+We sprang into our saddles, and again pressed rapidly on after the dog,
+who followed the scent at the top of his speed.
+
+Some three miles more of wet, miry road took us to the run of which the
+Colonel had spoken. Arrived there, we found the hound standing on the
+bank, wet to the skin, and looking decidedly chop-fallen.
+
+"Death and d----n!" shouted the Colonel; "the dog has swum the run, and
+lost the trail on the other side! The d--d scoundrel has taken to the
+water, and balked us after all! Take up the dog, Sandy, and try him
+again over there."
+
+The native spoke to Cæsar, who bounded on to the horse's back in front
+of his master. They then crossed the stream, which there was about
+fifty yards wide, and so shallow that in the deepest part the water
+merely touched the horse's breast; but it was so roiled by the recent
+rain that we could not distinguish the foot-prints of the horse beneath
+the surface.
+
+The dog ranged up and down the opposite bank, but all to no purpose: the
+overseer had not been there. He had gone either up or down the
+stream--in which direction, was now the question. Calling Sandy back to
+our side of the run, the Colonel proceeded to hold a 'council of war.'
+Each one gave his opinion, which was canvassed by the others, with as
+much solemnity as if the fate of the Union hung on the decision.
+
+The native proposed we should separate--one go up, another down the
+stream, and the third, with the dog, follow the road; to which he
+thought Moye had finally returned. Those who should explore the run
+would easily detect the horse's tracks where he had left it, and then
+taking a straight course to the road, all might meet some five miles
+further on, at a place indicated.
+
+I gave my adhesion to Sandy's plan, but the Colonel overruled it on the
+ground of the waste of time that would be incurred in thus recovering
+the overseer's trail.
+
+"Why not," he said, "strike at once for the end of his route? Why follow
+the slow steps he took in order to throw us off the track? He has not
+come back to this road. Ten miles below there is another one leading
+also to the railway. He has taken that. We might as well send Sandy and
+the dog back and go on by ourselves."
+
+"But if bound for the Station, why should he wade through the creek
+here, ten miles out of his way? Why not go straight on by the road?" I
+asked.
+
+"Because he knew the dog would track him, and he hoped by taking to the
+run to make me think he had crossed the country instead of striking for
+the railroad."
+
+I felt sure the Colonel was wrong, but knowing him to be tenacious of
+his own opinions, I made no further objection.
+
+Directing Sandy to call on Madam P---- and acquaint her with our
+progress, he then dismissed the negro-hunter, and once more led the way
+up the road.
+
+The next twenty miles, like our previous route, lay through an unbroken
+forest. As we left the watercourses, we saw only the gloomy pines, which
+there--the region being remote from the means of transportation--were
+seldom tapped, and presented few of the openings that invite the weary
+traveller to the dwelling of the hospitable planter.
+
+After a time the sky, which had been bright and cloudless all the
+morning, grew overcast, and gave out tokens of a coming storm. A black
+cloud gathered in the west, and random flashes darted from it far off in
+the distance; then gradually it neared us; low mutterings sounded in the
+air, and the tops of the tall pines a few miles away, were lit up now
+and then with a fitful blaze, all the brighter for the deeper gloom that
+succeeded. Then a terrific flash and peal broke directly over us, and a
+great tree, struck by a red-hot bolt, fell with a deafening crash, half
+way across our path. Peal after peal followed, and then the rain--not
+filtered into drops as it falls from our colder sky, but in broad,
+blinding sheets--poured full and heavy on our shelterless heads.
+
+"Ah! there it comes!" shouted the Colonel. "God have mercy upon us!"
+
+As he spoke, a crashing, crackling, thundering roar rose above the
+storm, filling the air, and shaking the solid earth till it trembled
+beneath our horses' feet, as if upheaved by a volcano. Nearer and nearer
+the sound came, till it seemed that all the legions of darkness were
+unloosed in the forest, and were mowing down the great pines as the
+mower mows the grass with his scythe. Then an awful, sweeping crash
+thundered directly at our backs, and turning round, as if to face a foe,
+my horse, who had borne the roar and the blinding flash till then
+unmoved, paralyzed with dread, and panting for breath, sunk to the
+ground; while close at my side the Colonel, standing erect in his
+stirrups, his head uncovered to the pouring sky, cried out:
+
+"THANK GOD, WE ARE SAVED!"
+
+There--not three hundred yards in our rear, had passed the
+TORNADO--uprooting trees, prostrating dwellings, and sending many a soul
+to its last account, but sparing _us_ for another day! For thirty miles
+through the forest it had mowed a swath of two hundred feet, and then
+moved on to stir the ocean to its briny depths.
+
+With a full heart, I remounted, and turning my horse, pressed on in the
+rain. We said not a word till a friendly opening pointed the way to a
+planter's dwelling. Then calling to me to follow, the Colonel dashed up
+the by-path which led to the mansion, and in five minutes we were
+warming our chilled limbs before the cheerful fire that roared and
+crackled on its broad hearth-stone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE YANKEE-SCHOOL-MISTRESS.
+
+
+The house was a large, old-fashioned frame building, square as a
+packing-box, and surrounded, as all country dwellings at the South are,
+by a broad, open piazza. Our summons was answered by its owner, a
+well-to-do, substantial, middle-aged planter, wearing the ordinary
+homespun of the district, but evidently of a station in life much above
+the common "corn-crackers" I had seen at the country meeting-house. The
+Colonel was an acquaintance, and greeting us with great cordiality, our
+host led the way directly to the sitting-room. There we found a bright,
+blazing fire, and a pair of bright sparkling eyes, the latter belonging
+to a blithesome young woman of about twenty, with a cheery face, and a
+half-rustic, half-cultivated air, whom our new friend introduced to us
+as his wife.
+
+"I regret not having had the pleasure of meeting Mrs. S---- before, but
+am very happy to meet her now," said the Colonel, with all the
+well-bred, gentlemanly ease that distinguished him.
+
+"The pleasure is mutual, Colonel J----," replied the lady, "but thirty
+miles in this wild country, should not have made a neighbor so distant
+as you have been."
+
+"Business, madam, is at fault, as your husband knows. I have much to do;
+and besides, all my connections are in the other direction--with
+Charleston."
+
+"It's a fact, Sally, the Colonel is the d---- busy man in these parts.
+Not content with a big plantation and three hundred niggers, he looks
+after all South Carolina, and the rest of creation to boot," said our
+host.
+
+"Tom will have his joke, Madam, but he's not far from the truth."
+
+Seeing we were dripping wet, the lady offered us a change of clothing,
+and retiring to a chamber, we each appropriated a suit belonging to our
+host, giving our own to a servant, to be dried.
+
+Arrayed in our fresh apparel, we soon rejoined our friends in the
+sitting-room. The new garments fitted the Colonel tolerably well, but,
+though none too long, they were a world too wide for me, and as my wet
+hair hung in smooth flat folds down my cheeks, and my limp shirt-collar
+fell over my linsey coat, I looked for all the world like a cross
+between a theatrical Aminodab Sleek and Sir John Falstaff, with the
+stuffing omitted. When our hostess caught sight of me in this new garb,
+she rubbed her hands together in great glee, and, springing to her feet,
+gave vent to a perfect storm of laughter--jerking out between the
+explosions:
+
+"Why--you--you--look jest like--a scare-crow."
+
+There was no mistaking that hearty, hoydenish manner; and seizing both
+of her hands in mine, I shouted: "I've found you out--you're a
+"country-woman" of mine--a clear-blooded Yankee!"
+
+"What! _you_ a Yankee!" she exclaimed, still laughing, "and here with
+this horrid 'secesherner,' as they call him."
+
+"True as preachin', Ma'am," I replied, adopting the drawl--"all the way
+from Down East, and Union, tu, stiff as buckram."
+
+"Du tell!" she exclaimed, swinging my hands together as she held them in
+hers. "If I warn't hitched to this 'ere feller, I'd give ye a smack
+right on the spot. I'm _so_ glad to see ye."
+
+"Do it, Sally--never mind _me_," cried her husband, joining heartily in
+the merriment.
+
+Seizing the collar of my coat with both hands, she drew my face down
+till my lips almost touched hers (I was preparing to blush, and the
+Colonel shouted, "Come, come, I shall tell his wife"): but then turning
+quickly on her heel, she threw herself into a chair, exclaiming, "_I_
+wouldn't mind, but the _old man would be jealous_." Addressing the
+Colonel, she added, "_You_ needn't be troubled, sir, no Yankee girl will
+kiss _you_ till you change your politics."
+
+"Give me that inducement, and I'll change them on the spot," said the
+Colonel.
+
+"No, no, Dave, 'twouldn't do," replied the planter; "the conversion
+wouldn't be genuwine--besides such things arn't proper, except 'mong
+blood-relations--and all the Yankees, you know are first-cousins."
+
+The conversation then subsided into a more placid mood, but lost none of
+its genial, good humor. Refreshments were soon set before us, and while
+partaking of them I gathered from our hostess that she was a Vermont
+country-girl, who, some three years before, had been induced by liberal
+pay to come South as a teacher. A sister accompanied her, and about a
+year after their arrival, she married a neighboring planter. Wishing to
+be near her sister, our hostess had also married and settled down for
+life in that wild region. "I like the country very well," she added;
+"it's a great sight easier living here than in Vermont; but I do hate
+these lazy, shiftless, good-for-nothing niggers; they are _so_ slow, and
+_so_ careless, and _so_ dirty, that I sometimes think they will worry
+the very life out of me. I do believe I'm the hardest mistress in all
+the district."
+
+I learned from her that a majority of the teachers at the South are from
+the North, and principally, too, from New England. Teaching is a very
+laborious employment there, far more so than with us, for the
+Southerners have no methods like ours, and the same teacher usually has
+to hear lessons in branches all the way from Greek and Latin to the
+simple A B C. The South has no system of public instruction; no common
+schools; no means of placing within the reach of the sons and daughters
+of the poor even the elements of knowledge. While the children of the
+wealthy are most carefully educated, it is the policy of the ruling
+class to keep the great mass of the people in ignorance; and so long as
+this policy continues, so long will that section be as far behind the
+North as it now is, in all that constitutes true prosperity and
+greatness.
+
+The afternoon wore rapidly and pleasantly away in the genial society of
+our wayside-friends. Politics were discussed (our host was a Union man),
+the prospects of the turpentine crop talked over, the recent news
+canvassed, the usual neighborly topics touched upon, and--I hesitate to
+confess it--a considerable quantity of corn whiskey disposed of, before
+the Colonel discovered, all at once, that it was six o'clock, and we
+were still seventeen miles from the railway station. Arraying ourselves
+again in our dried garments, we bade a hasty but regretful "good-bye" to
+our hospitable entertainers, and once more took to the road.
+
+The storm had cleared away, but the ground was heavy with the recent
+rain, and our horses were sadly jaded with the ride of the morning. We
+gave them the reins, and, jogging on at their leisure, it was ten
+o'clock at night before they landed us at the little hamlet of W----
+Station, in the state of North Carolina.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+THE RAILWAY STATION.
+
+
+A large hotel, or station-house, and about a dozen log shanties made up
+the village. Two of these structures were negro-cabins; two were small
+groceries, in which the vilest alcoholic compounds were sold at a bit
+(ten cents) a glass; one was a lawyer's office, in which was the
+post-office, and a justice's court, where, once a month, the small
+offenders of the vicinity "settled up their accounts;" one was a
+tailoring and clothing establishment, where breeches were patched at a
+dime a stitch, and payment taken in tar and turpentine; and the rest
+were private dwellings of one apartment, occupied by the grocers, the
+tailor, the switch-tenders, the postmaster, and the negro _attachés_ of
+the railroad. The church and the school-house--the first buildings to go
+up in a Northern village--I have omitted to enumerate, because--they
+were not there.
+
+One of the natives told me that the lawyer was a "stuck-up critter;" "he
+don't live; he don't--he puts-up at th' hotel." And the hotel! Would
+Shakspeare, had he have known it, have written of taking one's _ease_ at
+his inn? It was a long, framed building, two stories high, with a
+piazza extending across the side and a front door crowded as closely
+into one corner as the width of the joist would permit. Under the
+piazza, ranged along the wall, was a low bench, occupied by about forty
+tin wash-basins and water-pails, and with coarse, dirty crash towels
+suspended on rollers above it. By the side of each of these towels hung
+a comb and a brush, to which a lock of everybody's hair was clinging,
+forming in the total a stock sufficient to establish any barber in the
+wig business.
+
+It was, as I have said, ten o'clock when we reached the Station.
+Throwing the bridles of our horses over the hitching-posts at the door,
+we at once made our way to the bar-room. That apartment, which was in
+the rear of the building, and communicated with by a long, narrow
+passage, was filled almost to suffocation, when we entered, by a cloud
+of tobacco smoke, the fumes of bad whiskey, and a crowd of drunken
+chivalry, through whom the Colonel with great difficulty elbowed his way
+to the counter, where "mine host" and two assistants were dispensing
+"liquid death," at the rate of ten cents a glass, and of ten glasses a
+minute.
+
+"Hello, Cunnel, how ar' ye," cried the red-faced liquor-vender, as he
+caught sight of my companion, and, relinquishing his lucrative
+employment for a moment, took the Colonel's hand, "how ar' ye?"
+
+"Quite well, thank you, Miles," said the Colonel, with a certain
+patronizing air, "have you seen my man, Moye?"
+
+"Moye, no! What's up with him?"
+
+"He's run away with my horse, Firefly--I thought he would have made for
+this station. At what time does the next train go up?"
+
+"Wal, it's due half arter 'leven, but 'taint gin'rally 'long till nigh
+one."
+
+The Colonel was turning to join me at the door, when a well-dressed
+young man of very unsteady movements, who was filling a glass at the
+counter, and staring at him with a sort of dreamy amazement, stammered
+out, "Moye--run--run a--way, zir! that--k--kant be--by G--. I know--him,
+zir--he's a--a friend of mine, and--I'm--I'm d----d if he ain't
+hon--honest."
+
+"About as honest as the Yankees run," replied the Colonel, "he's a
+d----d thief, sir!"
+
+"Look here--here, zir--don't--don't you--you zay any--thing 'gainst--the
+Yankees. D----d if--if I aint--one of 'em mezelf--zir," said the fellow
+staggering toward the Colonel.
+
+"_I_ don't care _what_ you are; you're drunk."
+
+"You lie--you--you d----d 'ris--'ristocrat," was the reply, as the
+inebriated gentleman aimed a blow, with all his unsteady might, at the
+Colonel's face.
+
+The South Carolinian stepped quickly aside, and dexterously threw his
+foot before the other, who--his blow not meeting the expected
+resistance--was unable to recover himself, and fell headlong to the
+floor. The planter turned on his heel, and was walking quietly away,
+when the sharp report of a pistol sounded through the apartment, and a
+ball tore through the top of his boot, and lodged in the wall within two
+feet of where I was standing. With a spring, quick and sure as the
+tiger's, the Colonel was on the drunken man. Wrenching away the weapon,
+he seized the fellow by the neck-tie, and drawing him up to nearly his
+full height, dashed him at one throw to the other end of the room. Then
+raising the revolver he coolly levelled it to fire!
+
+But a dozen strong men were on him. The pistol was out of his hand, and
+his arms were pinioned in an instant; while cries of "Fair play, sir!"
+"He's drunk!" "Don't hit a man when he's down," and other like
+exclamations, came from all sides.
+
+"Give _me_ fair play, you d----d North Carolina hounds," cried the
+Colonel, struggling violently to get away, "and I'll fight the whole
+posse of you."
+
+"One's 'nuff for _you_, ye d----d fire-eatin' 'ristocrat;" said a long,
+lean, bushy-haired, be-whiskered individual, who was standing near the
+counter: "ef ye want to fight, _I'll_ 'tend to yer case to onst. Let him
+go, boys," he continued as he stepped toward the Colonel, and parted the
+crowd that had gathered around him: "give him the shootin'-iron, and
+let's see ef he'll take a man thet's sober."
+
+I saw serious trouble was impending, and stepping forward, I said to the
+last speaker, "My friend, you have no quarrel with this gentleman. He
+has treated that man only as you would have done."
+
+"P'raps thet's so; but he's a d----d hound of a Secesherner thet's
+draggin' us all to h--ll; it'll du the country good to git quit of one
+on 'em."
+
+"Whatever his politics are, he's a gentleman, sir, and has done you no
+harm--let me beg of you to let him alone."
+
+"Don't beg any thing for me, Mr. K----," growled the Colonel through his
+barred teeth, "I'll fight the d----d corn-cracker, and his whole race,
+at once."
+
+"No you won't, my friend. For the sake of those at home you won't;" I
+said, taking him by the arm, and partly leading, partly forcing him,
+toward the door.
+
+"And who in h--ll ar you?" asked the corn-cracker, planting himself
+squarely in my way.
+
+"I'm on the same side of politics with you, Union to the core!" I
+replied.
+
+"Ye ar! Union! Then give us yer fist," said he, grasping me by the hand;
+"by ---- it does a feller good to see a man dressed in yer cloes thet
+haint 'fraid to say he's Union, so close to South Car'lina, tu, as this
+ar! Come, hev a drink: come boys--all round--let's liquor!"
+
+"Excuse me now, my dear fellow--some other time I'll be glad to join
+you."
+
+"Jest as ye say, but thar's my fist, enyhow."
+
+He gave me another hearty shake of the hand, and the crowd parting, I
+made my way with the Colonel out of the room. We were followed by Miles,
+the landlord, who, when we had reached the front of the entrance-way,
+said, "I'm right sorry for this row, gentlemen; the boys will hev a time
+when they gets together."
+
+"Oh, never mind;" said the Colonel, who had recovered his coolness; "but
+why are all these people here?"
+
+"Thar's a barbacue cumin' off to-morrer on the camp-ground, and the
+house is cram full."
+
+"Is that so?" said the Colonel, then turning to me he added, "Moye has
+taken the railroad somewhere else; I must get to a telegraph office at
+once, to head him off. The nearest one is Wilmington. With all these
+rowdies here, it will not do to leave the horses alone--will you stay
+and keep an eye on them over to-morrow?"
+
+"Yes, I will, cheerfully."
+
+"Thar's a mighty hard set, round har now, Cunnel," said the landlord;
+"and the most peaceable get enter scrapes ef they hain't no friends.
+Hadn't ye better show the gentleman some of your'n, 'fore you go?"
+
+"Yes, yes, I didn't think of that. Who is here?"
+
+"Wal, thar's Cunnel Taylor, Bill Barnes, Sam Heddleson, Jo Shackelford,
+Andy Jones, Rob Brown, and lots of others."
+
+"Where's Andy Jones?"
+
+"Reckon he's turned in; I'll see."
+
+As the landlord opened a door which led from the hall, the Colonel said
+to me, "Andy is a Union man; but he'd fight to the death for me."
+
+"Sal!" called out the hotel keeper.
+
+"Yas, massa, I'se har," was the answer from a slatternly woman, awfully
+black in the face, who soon thrust her head from the door-way.
+
+"Is Andy Jones har?" asked Miles.
+
+"Yas, massa, he'm turned in up thar on de table."
+
+We followed the landlord into the apartment. It was the dining-room of
+the hotel, and by the dim light which came from a smoky fire on the
+hearth, I saw it contained about a hundred people, who, wrapped in
+blankets, bed-quilts and travelling-shawls, were disposed in all
+conceivable attitudes, and scattered about on the hard floor and tables,
+sleeping soundly. The room was a long, low apartment--extending across
+the entire front of the house--and had a wretched, squalid look. The
+fire, which was tended by the negro-woman--(she had spread a blanket on
+the floor, and was keeping a drowsy watch over it for the night)--had
+been recently replenished with green wood, and was throwing out thick
+volumes of black smoke, which, mixing with the effluvia from the lungs
+of a hundred sleepers, made up an atmosphere next to impossible to
+breathe. Not a window was open, and not an aperture for ventilation
+could be seen!
+
+Carefully avoiding the arms and legs of the recumbent chivalry, we
+picked our way, guided by the negro-girl, to the corner of the room
+where the Unionist was sleeping. Shaking him briskly by the shoulder,
+the Colonel called out: "Andy! Andy! wake up!"
+
+"What--what the d----l is the matter?" stammered the sleeper, gradually
+opening his eyes, and raising himself on one elbow, "Lord bless you,
+Cunnel, is that you? what in ---- brought _you_ har?"
+
+"Business, Andy. Come, get up, I want to see you, and I can't talk
+here."
+
+The North Carolinian slowly rose, and throwing his blanket over his
+shoulders, followed us from the room. When we had reached the open air
+the Colonel introduced me to his friend, who expressed surprise, and a
+great deal of pleasure, at meeting a Northern Union man in the Colonel's
+company.
+
+"Look after our horses, now, Miles; Andy and I want to talk," said the
+planter to the landlord, with about as little ceremony as he would have
+shown to a negro.
+
+I thought the white man did not exactly relish the Colonel's manner, but
+saying, "All right, all right, sir," he took himself away.
+
+The night was raw and cold, but as all the rooms of the hotel were
+occupied, either by sleepers or carousers, we had no other alternative
+than to hold our conference in the open air. Near the railway-track a
+light-wood fire was blazing, and, obeying the promptings of the frosty
+atmosphere, we made our way to it. Lying on the ground around it,
+divested of all clothing except a pair of linsey trousers and a flannel
+shirt, and with their naked feet close to its blaze--roasting at one
+extremity, and freezing at the other--were several blacks, the
+switch-tenders and woodmen of the Station--fast asleep. How human beings
+could sleep in such circumstances seemed a marvel, but further
+observation convinced me that the Southern negro has a natural aptitude
+for that exercise, and will, indeed, bear more exposure than any other
+living thing. Nature in giving him such powers of endurance, appears to
+have specially fitted him for the life of hardship and privation to
+which he is born.
+
+The fire-light enabled me to scan the appearance of my new acquaintance.
+He was rather above the medium height, squarely and somewhat stoutly
+built, and had an easy and self-possessed, though rough and unpolished
+manner. His face, or so much of it as was visible from underneath a
+thick mass of reddish gray hair, denoted a firm, decided character; but
+there was a manly, open, honest expression about it that gained one's
+confidence in a moment. He wore a slouched hat and a suit of the
+ordinary "sheep's-grey," cut in the "sack" fashion, and hanging loosely
+about him. He seemed a man who had made his own way in the world, and I
+subsequently learned that appearances did not belie him. The son of a
+"poor white" man, with scarcely the first rudiments of book-education,
+he had, by sterling worth, natural ability, and great force of
+character, accumulated a handsome property, and acquired a leading
+position in his district. Though on "the wrong side of politics," his
+personal popularity was so great that for several successive years he
+had been elected to represent the county in the state legislature. The
+Colonel, though opposed to him in politics--and party feeling at the
+South runs so high that political opponents are seldom personal
+friends--had, in the early part of his career, aided him by his
+endorsements; and Andy had not forgotten the service. It was easy to see
+that while two men could not be more unlike in character and appearance
+than my host and the North Carolinian, they were warm and intimate
+friends.
+
+"So, Moye has been raising h--ll gin'rally, Colonel," said my new
+acquaintance after a time. "I'm not surprised. I never did b'lieve in
+Yankee nigger-drivers--sumhow it's agin natur' for a Northern man to go
+Southern principles quite so strong as Moye did."
+
+"Which route do you think he has taken?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Wal, I reckon arter he tuk to the run, he made fur the mountings. He
+know'd you'd head him on the travelled routes; so he's put, I think, fur
+the Missussippe, where he'll sell the horse and make North."
+
+"I'll follow him," said the Colonel, "to the ends of the earth. If it
+costs me five thousand dollars, I'll see him hung."
+
+"Wal," replied Andy, laughing, "if he's gone North you'll need a
+extradition treaty to kotch him. South Car'lina, I b'lieve, has set up
+fur a furrin country."
+
+"That's true," said the Colonel, also laughing, "she's "furrin" to the
+Yankees, but not to the old North State."
+
+"D----d if she haint," replied the North Carolinian, "and now she's got
+out on our company, I swear she must keep out. We'd as soon think of
+goin' to h----ll in summer time, as of jining partnership with her.
+Cunnel, you'r the only decent man in the State--d----d if you
+haint--and _your_ politics are a'most bad 'nuff to spile a township. It
+allers seemed sort o'queer to me, that a man with such a mighty good
+heart as your'n, could be so short in the way of brains."
+
+"Well, you're complimentary," replied the Colonel, with the utmost
+good-nature, "but let's drop politics; we never could agree, you know.
+What shall I do about Moye?"
+
+"Go to Wilmington and telegraph all creation: wait a day to har, then if
+you don't har, go home, hire a native overseer, and let Moye go to the
+d----l. Ef it'll do you any good I'll go to Wilmington with you, though
+I did mean to give you Secesherners a little h--har to-morrer."
+
+"No, Andy, I'll go alone. 'Twouldn't be patriotic to take you away from
+the barbacue. You'd 'spile' if you couldn't let off some gas soon."
+
+"I do b'lieve I shud. Howsumdever, thar's nary a thing I wouldn't do for
+you--you knows that."
+
+"Yes, I do, and I wish you'd keep an eye on my Yankee friend here, and
+see he don't get into trouble with any of the boys--there'll be a hard
+set 'round, I reckon."
+
+"Wal, I will," said Andy, "but all he's to do is to keep his mouth
+shet."
+
+"That seems easy enough," I replied, laughing.
+
+A desultory conversation followed for about an hour, when the
+steam-whistle sounded, and the up-train arrived. The Colonel got on
+board and bidding us "good-night," went on to Wilmington. Andy then
+proposed we should look up sleeping accommodations. It was useless to
+seek quarters at the hotel, but an empty car was on the turn-out, and
+bribing one of the negroes we got access to it, and were soon stretched
+at full length on two of its hard-bottomed seats.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+THE BARBACUE.
+
+
+The camp-ground was about a mile from the station, and pleasantly
+situated in a grove, near a stream of water. It was in frequent use by
+the camp-meetings of the Methodist denomination--which sect at the South
+is partial to these rural religious gatherings. Scattered over it, with
+an effort at regularity, were about forty small but neat log cottages,
+thatched with the long leaves of the turpentine pine, and chinked with
+branches of the same tree. Each of these houses was floored with leaves
+or straw, and large enough to afford sleeping accommodations for about
+ten persons, provided they spread their bedding on the ground, and lay
+tolerably close together. Interspersed among the cabins were about a
+dozen canvas tents which had been erected for this especial occasion.
+
+Nearly in the centre of the group of huts a rude sort of scaffold, four
+or five feet high, and surrounded by a rustic railing, served for the
+speaker's stand. It would seat about a dozen persons, and was protected
+by a roof of pine-boughs, interlaced together so as to keep off the sun,
+without affording protection from the rain. In the rear of this stand
+were two long tables, made of rough boards, and supported on stout
+joists, crossed on each other in the form of the letter X. A canopy of
+green leaves shaded the grounds, and the whole grove, which was
+perfectly free from underbrush, was carpeted with the soft, brown
+tassels of the pine.
+
+Being fatigued with the ride of the previous day, I did not awake till
+the morning was far advanced, and it was nearly ten o'clock when Andy
+and I took our way to the camp-ground. Avoiding the usual route, we
+walked on through the forest. It was mid-winter, and vegetation lay dead
+all around us, awaiting the time when spring should breathe into it the
+breath of life, and make it a living thing. There was silence and rest
+in the deep woods. The birds were away on their winter wanderings; the
+leaves hung motionless on the tall trees, and nature seemed resting from
+her ceaseless labors, and listening to the soft music of the little
+stream which sung a cheerful song as it rambled on over the roots and
+fallen branches that blocked its way. Soon a distant murmur arose, and
+we had not proceeded far before as many sounds as were heard at Babel
+made a strange concert about our ears. The lowing of the ox, the
+neighing of the horse, and the deep braying of another animal, mingled
+with a thousand human voices, came through the woods. But above and over
+all rose the stentorian tones of the stump speaker,
+
+        "As he trod the shaky platform,
+         With the sweat upon his brow."
+
+About a thousand persons were already assembled on the ground, and a
+more motley gathering I never witnessed. All sorts of costumes and all
+classes of people were there; but the genuine back-woods corn-crackers
+composed the majority of the assemblage. As might be expected much the
+larger portion of the audience were men, still I saw some women and not
+a few children; many of the country people having taken advantage of the
+occasion to give their families a holiday. Some occupied benches in
+front of the stand, though a larger number were seated around in groups,
+within hearing of the speaker, but paying very little attention to what
+he was saying. A few were whittling--a few pitching quoits, or playing
+leap-frog, and quite a number were having a quiet game of whist, euchre
+or "seven-up."
+
+The speaker was a well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking man and a tolerably
+good orator. He seemed accustomed to addressing a jury, for he displayed
+all the adroitness in handling his subject, and in appealing to the
+prejudices of his hearers, that we see in successful special pleaders.
+But he overshot his mark. To nine out of ten of his audience, his words
+and similes, though correct, and sometimes beautiful, were as
+unintelligible as the dead languages. He advocated immediate,
+unconditional secession; and I thought from the applause which met his
+remarks, whenever he seemed to make himself understood, that the large
+majority of those present were of the same way of thinking.
+
+He was succeeded by a heavy-browed, middle-aged man, slightly bent, and
+with hair a little turned to gray, but still hale, athletic, and in the
+prime and vigor of manhood. His pantaloons and waistcoat were of the
+common homespun, and he used, now and then, a word of the country
+dialect, but as a stump-speaker he was infinitely superior to the more
+polished orator who had preceded him.
+
+He, too, advocated secession, as a right and a duty--separation, now and
+forever, from the dirt-eating, money-loving Yankees, who, he was ashamed
+to say, had the same ancestry, and worshipped the same God, as himself.
+He took the bold ground that slavery is a curse to both the black and
+the white, but that it was forced upon this generation before its birth,
+by these same greedy, grasping Yankees, who would sell not only the
+bones and sinews of their fellow men, but--worse than that--their own
+souls, for gold. It was forced upon them without their consent, and now
+that it had become interwoven with all their social life, and was a
+necessity of their very existence, the hypocritical Yankees would take
+it from them, because, forsooth, it is a sin and a wrong--as if _they_
+had to bear its responsibility, or the South could not settle its own
+affairs with its MAKER!
+
+"Slavery is now," he continued, "indispensable to us. Without it,
+cotton, rice, and sugar will cease to grow, and the South will starve.
+What if it works abuses? What if the black, at times, is overburdened,
+and his wife and daughters debauched? Man is not perfect anywhere--there
+are wrongs in every society. It is for each one to give his account, in
+such matters, to his God. But in this are we worse than they? Are there
+not abuses in society at the North? Are not their laborers overworked?
+While sin here hides itself under cover of the night, does it not there
+stalk abroad at noon-day? If the wives and daughters of blacks are
+debauched here, are not the wives and daughters of whites debauched
+there? and will not a Yankee barter away the chastity of his own mother
+for a dirty dollar? Who fill our brothels? Yankee women! Who load our
+penitentiaries, crowd our whipping-posts, debauch our slaves, and cheat
+and defraud us all? Yankee men! And I say unto you, fellow-citizens,"
+and here the speaker's form seemed to dilate with the wild enthusiasm
+which possessed him, "'come out from among them; be ye separate, and
+touch not the unclean thing,' and thus saith the Lord God of Hosts, who
+will guide you, and lead you, if need be, to battle and to victory!"
+
+A perfect storm of applause followed. The assemblage rose, and one long,
+wild shout rent the old woods, and made the tall trees tremble. It was
+some minutes before the uproar subsided; when it did, a voice near the
+speaker's stand called out, "Andy Jones!" The call was at once echoed by
+another voice, and soon a general shout for "Andy!" "Union Andy!" "Bully
+Andy!" went up from the same crowd which a moment before had so wildly
+applauded the secession speaker.
+
+Andy rose from where he was seated beside me, and quietly ascended the
+steps of the platform. Removing his hat, and passing to his mouth a huge
+quid of tobacco from a tin box in his pantaloons-pocket, he made
+several rapid strides up and down the speaker's stand, and then turned
+squarely to the audience.
+
+The reader has noticed a tiger pacing up and down in his cage, with his
+eyes riveted on the human faces before him. He has observed how he will
+single out some individual, and finally stopping short in his rounds,
+turn on him with a look of such intense ferocity as makes a man's blood
+stand still, and his very breath come thick and hard, as he momentarily
+expects the beast will tear away the bars of the cage and leap forth on
+the obnoxious person. Now, Andy's fine, open, manly face had nothing of
+the tiger in it, but, for a moment, I could not divest myself of the
+impression, as he halted in his walk up and down the stage, and turned
+full and square on the previous speaker--who had taken a seat among the
+audience near me--that he was about to spring upon him. Riveting his eye
+on the man's face, he at last slowly said:
+
+"A man stands har and quotes Scriptur agin his feller man, and forgets
+that 'God made of one blood all nations that dwell on the face of the
+'arth.' A man stands har and calls his brother a thief, and his mother a
+harlot, and axes us to go his doctrin's! I don't mean his brother in the
+Scriptur sense, nor his mother in a fig'rative sense, but I mean the
+brother of his own blood, and the mother that bore him; for HE,
+gentlemen (and he pointed his finger directly at the recent speaker,
+while his words came slow and heavy with intense scorn), HE is a Yankee!
+And now, I say, gentlemen, d--n sech doctrin's; d----n sech
+principles, and d----n the man that's got a soul so black as to utter
+'em!"
+
+A breathless silence fell on the assemblage, while the person alluded to
+sprang to his feet, his face on fire, and his voice thick and broken
+with intense rage, as he yelled out: "Andy Jones, by----, you shall
+answer for this!"
+
+"Sartin," said Andy, coolly inserting his thumbs in the armholes of his
+waistcoat; "enywhar you likes--har--now--ef 'greeable to you."
+
+"I've no weapon here, sir, but I'll give you a chance mighty sudden,"
+was the fierce reply.
+
+"Suit yourself," said Andy, with perfect imperturbability; "but as you
+haint jest ready, s'pose you set down, and har me tell 'bout your
+relations: they're a right decent set--them as I knows--and I'll swar
+they're 'shamed of you."
+
+A buzz went through the crowd, and a dozen voices called out: "Be civil,
+Andy"--"Let him blow"--"Shut up"--"Go in, Jones"--with other like
+elegant exclamations.
+
+A few of his friends took the aggrieved gentleman aside, and, soon
+quieting him, restored order.
+
+"Wal, gentlemen," resumed Andy, "all on you know whar I was raised--over
+thar in South Car'lina. I'm sorry to say it, but it's true. And you all
+know my father was a pore man, who couldn't give his boys no chance--and
+ef he could, thar warn't no schules in the district--so we couldn't hev
+got no book-larning ef we'd been a minded to. Wal, the next plantation
+to whar we lived was old Cunnel J----'s, the father of this cunnel. He
+was a d----d old nullifier, jest like his son--but not half so decent a
+man. Wal, on his plantation was an old nigger called Uncle Pomp, who'd
+sumhow larned to read. He was a mighty good nigger, and he'd hev been in
+heaven long afore now ef the Lord hadn't a had sum good use for him down
+har--but he'll be thar yet a d----d sight sooner than sum on us white
+folks--that's sartin. Wal, as I was saying, Pomp could read, and when I
+was 'bout sixteen, and had never seen the inside of a book, the old
+darky said to me one day--he was old then, and that was thirty years
+ago--wal, he said to me, 'Andy, chile, ye orter larn to read, 'twill be
+ob use to ye when you'se grow'd up, and it moight make you a good and
+'spected man--now, come to ole Pomp's cabin, and he'll larn you, Andy,
+chile.' Wal, I reckon I went. He'd nothin' but a Bible and Watts' Hymns;
+but we used to stay thar all the long winter evenin's, and by the light
+o' the fire--we war both so darned pore we couldn't raise a candle
+atween us--wal, by the light o' the fire he larned me, and fore long I
+could spell right smart.
+
+"Now, jest think on that, gentlemen. I, a white boy, and, 'cordin' to
+the Declaration of Independence, with jest as good blood in me as the
+old Cunnel had in him, bein' larned to read by an old slave, and that
+old slave a'most worked to death, and takin' his nights, when he orter
+hev been a restin' his old bones, to larn me! I'm d----d if he don't
+get to heaven for that one thing, if for nothin' else.
+
+"Wal, you all know the rest--how, when I'd grow'd up, I settled har, in
+the old North State, and how the young Cunnel backed my paper, and set
+me a runnin' at turpentining. P'raps you don't think this has much to do
+with the Yankees, but it has a durned sight, as ye'll see rather sudden.
+Wal, arter a while, when I'd got a little forehanded, I begun shipping
+my truck to York and Bostin'; and at last my Yankee factor, he come out
+har, inter the back woods, to see me, and says he, 'Jones, come North
+and take a look at us.' I'd sort o' took to him. I'd lots o' dealin's
+with him afore ever I seed him, and I allers found him straight as a
+shingle. Wal, I went North, and he took me round, and showed me how the
+Yankees does things. Afore I know'd him, I allers thought--as p'raps
+most on you do--that the Yankees war a sort o' cross atween the devil
+and a Jew; but how do you s'pose I found 'em? I found that they _sent
+the pore man's children to schule_, FREE--and that the schule-houses war
+a d----d sight thicker than the bugs in Miles Privett's beds! and
+that's sayin' a heap, for ef eny on you kin sleep in his house, excep'
+he takes to the soft side of the floor, I'm d----d. Yas, the pore man's
+children are larned thar, FREE!--all on 'em--and they've jest so good a
+chance as the sons of the rich man! Now, arter that, do you think that
+I--as got all my schulein, from an old slave, by the light of a borrored
+pine-knot--der you think that _I_ kin say any thing agin the Yankees?
+P'r'aps they _do_ steal--though I doant know it--p'r'aps they _do_
+debauch thar wives and darters, and sell thar mothers' vartue for
+dollars--but, ef they do, I'm d----d if they doant send pore children
+to schule--and that's more'n we do--and let me tell you, until we do
+thet, we must expec' they'll be cuter and smarter nor we are.
+
+"This gentleman, too, my friends, who's been a givin' sech a hard
+settin' down ter his own relation, arter they've broughten him up, and
+given him sech a schulein for nuthin', he says the Yankees want to
+interfere with our niggers. Now, thet haint so, and they couldn't ef
+they would, 'case it's agin the Constertution. And they stand on the
+Constertution a durned sight solider nor we do. Didn't thar big
+gun--Daniel Webster--didn't he make mince-meat of South Car'lina Hayne
+on thet ar' subjec'? But I tell you they haint a mind ter meddle with
+the niggers; they're a goin' to let us go ter h--l our own way, and
+we're goin' thar mighty fast, or I haint read the last census."
+
+"P'r'aps you haint heerd on the ab'lsh'ners, Andy?" cried a voice from
+among the audience.
+
+"Wal, I reckon I hev," responded the orator, "I've heerd on 'em, and
+seed 'em, too. When I was North I went to one on thar conventions, and
+I'll tell you how they look. They've all long, wimmin's har, and thin,
+shet lips, with big, bawlin' mouths, and long, lean, tommerhawk faces,
+as white as vargin dip--and they all talk through the nose (giving a
+specimen), and they all look for all the world jest like the South
+Car'lina fire-eaters--and they _are_ as near like 'em as two peas,
+excep' they don't swar quite so bad, but they make up for thet in
+prayin'--and prayin' too much, I reckon, when a man's a d----d
+hippercrit, is 'bout as bad as swearin'. But, I tell you, the decent
+folks up North haint ablisheners. They look on _'em_ jest as we do on
+mad dogs, the itch, or the nigger traders.
+
+"Now, 'bout this secession bis'ness--though 'taint no use to talk on
+that subjec', 'case this state never'll secede--South Car'lina has done
+it, and I'm raather glad she has, for though I was born thar--and say it
+as hadn't orter say it--she orter hev gone to h--l long ago, and now
+she's got thar, why--_let her stay_! But, 'bout thet bis'ness, I'll tell
+you a story.
+
+"I know'd an old gentleman once by the name of Uncle Sam, and he'd a
+heap of sons. They war all likely boys--but strange ter tell, though
+they'd all the same mother, and she was a white woman, 'bout half on 'em
+war colored--not black, but sorter half-and-half. Now, the white sons
+war well-behaved, industrious, hard-workin' boys, who got 'long well,
+edicated thar children, and allers treated the old man decently; but the
+mulatter fellers war a pesky set--though some on 'em war better nor
+others. They wouldn't work, but set up for airystocracy--rode in
+kerriges, kept fast horses, bet high, and chawed tobaccer like the
+devil. Wal, the result was, _they_ got out at the elbows, and 'case they
+warn't gettin' 'long quite so fast as the white 'uns--though that war
+all thar own fault--they got jealous, and one on 'em who was blacker nor
+all the rest--a little feller, but terrible big on braggin'--he packed
+up his truck one night, and left the old man's house, and swore he'd
+never come back. He tried to make the other mulatters go with him, but
+they put thar fingers to thar nose, and says they, 'No you doant.' I was
+in favor of lettin' on him stay out in the cold, but the old man was a
+bernevolent old critter, and so _he_ says: 'Now, sonny, you jest come
+back and behave yourself, and I'll forgive you all your old pranks, and
+treat you jest as I allers used ter; but, ef you wont, why--I'll make
+you, thet's all!'
+
+"Now, gentlemen, thet quarrelsome, oneasy, ongrateful, tobaccer-chawin',
+hoss-racin', high-bettin', big-braggin', nigger-stealin',
+wimmin-whippin', yaller son of the devil, is South Car'lina, and ef she
+doant come back and behave herself in futur', I'm d----d ef she wont be
+ploughed with fire, and sowed with salt, and Andy Jones will help ter do
+it."
+
+The speaker was frequently interrupted in the course of his remarks by
+uproarious applause--but as he closed and descended from the platform,
+the crowd sent up cheer after cheer, and a dozen strong men, making a
+seat of their arms, lifted him from the ground and bore him off to the
+head of the table, where dinner was in waiting.
+
+The whole of the large assemblage then fell to eating. The dinner was
+made up of the barbacued beef and the usual mixture of viands found on a
+planter's table, with water from the little brook hard by, and a
+plentiful supply of corn-whiskey. (The latter beverage had, I thought,
+been subjected to the rite of immersion, for it tasted wonderfully of
+water.)
+
+Songs and speeches were intermingled with the masticating exercises, and
+the whole company was soon in the best of humor.
+
+During the meal I was introduced by Andy to a large number of the
+"natives," he taking special pains to tell each one that I was a Yankee,
+and a Union man, but always adding, as if to conciliate all parties,
+that I also was a guest and a friend of _his_ very particular friend,
+"thet d----d seceshener, Cunnel J----."
+
+Before we left the table, the secession orator happening near where we
+were seated, Andy rose from his seat, and, extending his hand to him,
+said: "Tom, you think I 'sulted you; p'r'aps I did, but you 'sulted my
+Yankee friend har, and your own relation, and I hed to take it up, jest
+for the looks o' the thing. Come, there's my hand; I'll fight you ef you
+want ter, or we'll say no more 'bout it--jest as you like."
+
+"Say no more about it, Andy," said the gentleman, very cordially; "let's
+drink and be friends."
+
+They drank a glass of whiskey together, and then leaving the table,
+proceeded to where the ox had been barbacued, to show me how cooking on
+a large scale is done at the South.
+
+In a pit about eight feet deep, twenty feet long, and ten feet wide,
+laid up on the sides with stones, a fire of hickory had been made, over
+which, after the wood had burned down to coals, a whole ox, divested of
+its hide and entrails, had been suspended on an enormous spit. Being
+turned often in the process of cooking, the beef had finally been "done
+brown." It was then cut up and served on the table, and I must say, for
+the credit of Southern cookery, that it made as delicious eating as any
+meat I ever tasted.
+
+I had then been away from my charge--the Colonel's horses--as long as
+seemed to be prudent. I said as much to Andy, when he proposed to return
+with me, and, turning good-humoredly to his reconciled friend, he said:
+"Now, Tom, no secession talk while I'm off."
+
+"Nary a word," said "Tom," and we left.
+
+The horses had been well fed by the negro whom I had left in charge of
+them, but had not been groomed. Seeing that, Andy stripped off his coat,
+and setting the black at work on one, with a handful of straw and pine
+leaves, commenced operations on the other, whose hair was soon as smooth
+and glossy as if it had been rubbed by an English groom.
+
+The remainder of the day passed without incident till eleven at night,
+when the Colonel returned from Wilmington.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE RETURN.
+
+
+Moye had not been seen or heard of, and the Colonel's trip was
+fruitless. While at Wilmington he sent telegrams, directing the
+overseer's arrest, to the various large cities of the South, and then
+decided to return home, make arrangements preliminary to a protracted
+absence from the plantation, and proceed at once to Charleston, where he
+would await replies to his dispatches. Andy agreed with him in the
+opinion that Moye, in his weak state of health, would not take an
+overland route to the free states, but would endeavor to reach some town
+on the Mississippi, where he might dispose of the horse, and secure a
+passage up the river.
+
+As no time was to be lost, we decided to return to the plantation on the
+following morning. Accordingly, with the first streak of day we bade
+"good-bye" to our Union friend, and started homeward.
+
+No incident worthy of mention occurred on the way, till about ten
+o'clock, when we arrived at the house of the Yankee schoolmistress,
+where we had been so hospitably entertained two days before. The lady
+received us with great cordiality, forced upon us a lunch to serve our
+hunger on the road, and when we parted, enjoined on me to leave the
+South at the earliest possible moment. She was satisfied it would not
+for a much longer time be safe quarters for a man professing Union
+sentiments. Notwithstanding the strong manifestations of loyalty I had
+observed among the people, I was convinced the advice of my pretty
+"countrywoman" was judicious, and I determined to be governed by it.
+
+Our horses, unaccustomed to lengthy journeys, had not entirely recovered
+from the fatigues of their previous travel, and we did not reach our
+destination till an hour after dark. We were most cordially welcomed by
+Madam P----, who soon set before us a hot supper, which, as we were
+jaded by the long ride, and had fasted for twelve hours, on
+bacon-sandwiches and cold hoe-cake, was the one thing needful to us.
+
+While seated at the table the Colonel asked:
+
+"Has every thing gone right, Alice, since we left home?"
+
+"Every thing," replied the lady, "except"--and she hesitated, as if she
+dreaded the effect of the news; "except that Jule and her child have
+gone."
+
+"Gone!" exclaimed my host; "gone where?"
+
+"I don't know. We have searched everywhere, but have found no clue to
+them. The morning you left Sam set Jule at work among the pines; she
+tried hard, but could not do a full task, and at night was taken to the
+cabin to be whipped. I heard of it, and forbade it. It did not seem to
+me that she ought to be punished for not doing what she had not strength
+to do. When released from the cabin, she came and thanked me for having
+interfered for her, and talked with me awhile. She cried and took on
+fearfully about Sam, and was afraid you would punish her when you
+returned. I promised you would not, and she left me seeming more
+cheerful. I supposed she would go directly home after getting her child
+from the nurse's quarters; but it appears she went to Pompey's, where
+she staid till after ten o'clock. Neither she nor the child have been
+seen since."
+
+"Did you get no trace of her in the morning?"
+
+"Yes, but soon lost it. When she did not appear at work, Sam went to her
+cabin to learn the cause, and found the door open, and her bed
+undisturbed. She had not slept there. Knowing that Sandy had returned, I
+sent for him, and, with Jim and his dog, he commenced a search. The dog
+tracked her directly from Pompey's cabin to the bank of the run near the
+lower still. There all trace of her disappeared. We dragged the stream,
+but discovered nothing. Jim and Sandy then scoured the woods for miles
+in all directions, but the hound could not recover the trail. I hope
+otherwise, but I fear some evil has befallen her."
+
+"Oh, no! there's no fear of that," said the Colonel: "she is smart: she
+waded up the run far enough to baffle the dog, and then made for the
+swamp. That is why you lost her tracks at the stream. Rely upon it, I am
+right: but she shall not escape me."
+
+We shortly afterward adjourned to the library. After being seated there
+a while the Colonel, rising quickly, as if a sudden thought had struck
+him, sent for the old preacher.
+
+The old negro soon appeared, hat in hand, and taking a stand near the
+door, made a respectful bow to each one of us.
+
+"Take a chair, Pompey," said Madam P----, kindly.
+
+The black meekly seated himself, when the Colonel asked: "Well, Pomp,
+what do you know about Jule's going off?"
+
+"Nuffin', massa--I shures you, nuffin'. De pore chile say nuffin to ole
+Pomp 'bout dat."
+
+"What did she say?"
+
+"Wal, you see, massa, de night arter you gwo 'way, and arter she'd
+worked hard in de brush all de day, and been a strung up in de ole cabin
+fur to be whipped, she come ter me wid har baby in har arms, all a-faint
+and a-tired, and har pore heart clean broke, and she say dat she'm jess
+ready ter drop down and die. Den I tries ter comfut har, massa; I takes
+har up from de floor, and I say ter har dat de good Lord He pity
+har--dat He woant bruise de broken reed, and woant put no more on her
+dan she kin b'ar--dat He'd touch you' heart, and I toled har you'se a
+good, kine heart at de bottom, massa--and I knows it, 'case I toted you
+'fore you could gwo, and when you's a bery little chile, not no great
+sight bigger'n har'n, you'd put your little arms round ole Pomp's neck,
+and say dat when you war grow'd up you'd be bery kine ter de pore brack
+folks, and not leff 'em be 'bused like dey war in dem days."
+
+"Never mind what _you_ said," interrupted the Colonel, a little
+impatiently, but showing no displeasure; "what did _she_ say?"
+
+"Wal, massa, she tuk on bery hard 'bout Sam, and axed me ef I raaily
+reckoned de Lord had forgib'n him, and took'n him ter Heself, and gibin'
+him one o' dem hous'n up dar, in de sky. I toled her dat I _know'd_ it;
+but she say it didn't 'pear so ter har, 'case Sam had a been wid har out
+dar in de woods, all fru de day; dat she'd a _seed_ him, massa, and
+dough he handn't a said nuffin', he'd lukd at har wid sech a sorry,
+grebed luk, dat it gwo clean fru har heart, till she'd no strength leff,
+and fall down on de ground a'most dead. Den she say big Sam come 'long
+and fine har dar, and struck har great, heaby blows wid de big whip!"
+
+"The brute!" exclaimed the Colonel, rising from his chair, and pacing
+rapidly up and down the room.
+
+"But p'r'aps he warn't so much ter blame, massa," continued the old
+negro, in a deprecatory tone; "maybe he 'spose she war shirkin' de work.
+Wal, den she say she know'd nuffin' more, till byme-by, when she come
+to, and fine big Sam dar, and he struck har agin, and make har gwo ter
+de work; and she did gwo, but she feel like as ef she'd die. I toled har
+de good ma'am wudn't leff big Sam 'buse har no more 'fore you cum hum,
+and dat you'd hab 'passion on har, and not leff har gwo out in de woods,
+but put har 'mong de nusses, like as afore.
+
+"Den she say it 'twarn't de work dat trubble har--dat she orter work,
+and orter be 'bused, 'case she'd been bad, bery bad. All she axed war
+dat Sam would forgib har, and cum to har in de oder worle, and tell har
+so. Den she cried, and tuk on awful; but de good Lord, massa, dat am so
+bery kine ter de bery wuss sinners, He put de words inter my mouf, and I
+tink dey gib har comfut, fur she say dat it sort o' 'peared to har den
+dat Sam _would_ forgib har, and take har inter his house up dar, and she
+warn't afeard ter die no more.
+
+"Den she takes up de chile and gwo 'way, 'pearin' sort o' happy, and
+more cheerful like dan I'd a seed har eber sense pore Sam war shot."
+
+My host was sensibly affected by the old man's simple tale, but
+continued pacing up and down the room, and said nothing.
+
+"It's plain to me, Colonel," I remarked, as Pompey concluded, "she has
+drowned herself and the child--the dog lost the scent at the creek."
+
+"Oh, no!" he replied; "I think not. I never heard of a negro committing
+suicide--they've not the courage to do it."
+
+"I fear she _has_, David," said the lady. "The thought of going to Sam
+has led her to it; yet, we dragged the run, and found nothing. What do
+you think about it, Pompey?"
+
+"I dunno, ma'am, but I'se afeard of dat; and now dat I tinks ob it, I'se
+afeard dat what I tole har put har up ter it," replied the old preacher,
+bursting into tears. "She 'peared so happy like, when I say she'd be
+'long wid Sam in de oder worle, dat I'se afeard she's a gone and done
+it wid har own hands. I tole har, too, dat de Lord would oberlook good
+many tings dat pore sinners do when dey can't help 'emselfs--and it make
+har do it! Oh! it make har do it!" and the old black buried his face in
+his hands, and wept bitterly.
+
+"Don't feel so, Pomp," said his master, _very_ kindly. "You did the best
+you could; no one blames you."
+
+"I knows _you_ doant, massa--I knows you doant, and you'se bery good
+nottur--but oh! massa, de Lord!" and his body swayed to and fro with the
+great grief; "I fears de Lord do, massa, for I'se sent har ter Him wid
+har own blood, and de blood of dat pore innercent chile, on har hands.
+Oh, I fears de Lord neber'll forgib me--neber'll forgib me for _dat_."
+
+"He will, my good Pomp--He will!" said the Colonel, laying his hand
+tenderly on the old man's shoulder. "The Lord will forgive you, for the
+sake of the Christian example you've set your master, if for nothing
+else;" and here the proud, strong man's feelings overpowering him, his
+tears fell in great drops on the breast of the old slave, as they had
+fallen there in his childhood.
+
+Such scenes are not for the eye of a stranger, and turning away, I left
+the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+"ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE."
+
+
+The family met at the breakfast-table at the usual hour on the following
+morning; but I noticed that Jim was not in his accustomed place behind
+the Colonel's chair. That gentleman exhibited his usual good spirits,
+but Madam P---- looked sad and anxious, and _I_ had not forgotten the
+scene of the previous evening.
+
+While we were seated at the meal, the negro Junius hastily entered the
+room, and in an excited manner exclaimed:
+
+"Oh, massa, massa, you muss cum ter de cabin--Jim hab draw'd his knife,
+and he swar he'll kill de fuss 'un dat touch him!"
+
+"He does, does he!" said his master, springing from his seat, and
+abruptly leaving the apartment.
+
+Remembering the fierce burst of passion I had seen in the negro, and
+fearing there was danger a-foot, I rose to follow, saying, as I did so:
+
+"Madam, cannot you prevent this?"
+
+"I cannot, sir; I have already done all I can. Go and try to pacify the
+Colonel--Jim will die before he'll be whipped." Jim was standing at the
+farther end of the old cabin, with his back to the wall, and the large
+spring knife in his hand. Some half-dozen negroes were in the centre of
+the room, apparently cowed by his fierce and desperate looks, and his
+master was within a few feet of him.
+
+"I tell you, Cunnel," cried the negro, as I entered, "you touch me at
+your peril!"
+
+"You d----d nigger, do you dare to speak so to me?" said his master,
+taking a step toward him.
+
+The knife rose in the air, and the black, in a cool, sneering tone,
+replied: "Say your prayers 'fore you come nigher, for, so help me God,
+you'm a dead man!"
+
+I laid my hand on the Colonel's arm, to draw him back, saying, as I did
+so: "There's danger in him! I _know_ it. Let him go, and he shall ask
+your pardon."
+
+"I shan't ax his pardon," cried the black; "leff him an' me be, sir;
+we'll fix dis ourselfs."
+
+"Don't interfere, Mr. K----," said my host, with perfect coolness, but
+with a face pallid with rage. "Let me govern my own plantation."
+
+"As you say, sir," I replied, stepping back a few paces; "but I warn
+you--there is danger in him!"
+
+Taking no notice of my remark, the Colonel turning to the trembling
+negroes, said: "One of you go to the house and bring my pistols."
+
+"You kin shoot me, ef you likes," said Jim, with a fierce, grim smile;
+"but I'll take you ter h--l wid me, _shore_. You knows WE wont stand a
+blow!"
+
+The Colonel, at the allusion to their relationship, started as if shot,
+and turning furiously on the negro, yelled out: "I'll shoot you for
+that, you d----d nigger, by ----."
+
+"It 'pears ter me, Cunnel, ye've hed 'bout nuff shootin' round har,
+lately; better stop thet sort o' bis'ness; it moight give ye a sore
+throat," said the long, lean, loose-jointed stump-speaker of the
+previous Sunday, as he entered the cabin and strode directly up to my
+host.
+
+"What brought you here, you d----d insolent hound?" cried the Colonel,
+turning fiercely on the new-comer.
+
+"Wal, I cum ter du ye a naaboorly turn--I've kotched two on yer niggers
+down ter my still, and I want ye ter take 'em 'way," returned the
+corn-cracker, with the utmost coolness.
+
+"Two of my niggers!" exclaimed the Colonel, perceptibly moderating his
+tone--"which ones?"
+
+"A yaller gal, and a chile."
+
+"I thank you, Barnes; excuse my hard words--I was excited."
+
+"All right, Cunnel; say no more 'bout thet. Will ye send fur 'em? I'd
+hev fotched 'em 'long, but my waggin's off jest now."
+
+"Yes, I'll send at once. Have you got them safe?"
+
+"Safe? I reckon so! Kotched 'em last night, arter dark, and they've kept
+right still ever sense, I 'sure ye--but th' gal holds on ter th' young
+'un ter kill--we cudn't get it 'way no how."
+
+"How did you catch them?"
+
+"They got 'gainst my turpentime raft--the curren' driv 'em down, I
+s'pose."
+
+"What! are they dead?"
+
+"Dead? deader'n drownded rats!" replied the native,
+
+"My God! drowned herself and her child!" exclaimed the Colonel, with
+deep emotion.
+
+"It is terrible, my friend. Come, let us go to them, at once," I said,
+laying my hand on his arm, and drawing him unresistingly away.
+
+A pair of mules was speedily harnessed to a large turpentine wagon, and
+the horses we had ridden the day before were soon at the door. When the
+Colonel, who had been closeted for a few minutes with Madam P----, came
+out of the house, we mounted, and rode off with the "corn-cracker."
+
+The native's farm was located on the stream which watered my friend's
+plantation, and was about ten miles distant. Taking a by-road which led
+to it through the woods, we rode rapidly on in advance of the wagon.
+
+"Sort o' likely gal, thet, warn't she?" remarked the turpentine-maker,
+after a while.
+
+"Yes, she was," replied the Colonel, in a half-abstracted manner;
+"_very_ likely."
+
+"Kill harself 'case har man war shot by thet han'som overseer uv
+your'n?"
+
+"Not altogether for that, I reckon," replied my host; "I fear the main
+reason was her being put at field-work, and abused by the driver."
+
+"Thet comes uv not lookin' arter things yerself, Cunnel. I tend ter my
+niggers parsonally, and they keer a durned sight more fur this world
+then fur kingdom-cum. Ye cudn't hire 'em ter kill 'emselves fur no
+price."
+
+"Well," replied the Colonel, in a low tone, "I _did_ look after her. I
+put her at full field-work, myself!"
+
+"By----!" cried the native, reining his horse to a dead stop, and
+speaking in an excited manner: "I doant b'lieve it--'taint 't all like
+ye--yer a d----d seceshener; thet comes uv yer bringin'-up--but ye've a
+soul bigger'n a meetin'-house, and ye cudn't hev put thet slim, weakly
+gal inter th' woods, no how!"
+
+The Colonel and I instinctively halted our horses, as the "corn-cracker"
+stopped his, and were then standing abreast of him in the road.
+
+"It's true, Barnes," said my host, in a voice that showed deep
+dejection; "I _did_ do it!"
+
+"May God Almighty furgive ye, Cunnel," said the native, starting his
+horse forward; "_I_ wudn't hev dun it fur all yer niggers, by ----."
+
+The Colonel made no reply, and we rode on the rest of the way in
+silence.
+
+The road was a mere wagon-track through the trees, and it being but
+little travelled, and encumbered with the roots and stumps of the pine,
+our progress was slow, and we were nearly two hours in reaching the
+plantation of the native.
+
+The corn-cracker's house--a low, unpainted wooden building--stood near
+the little stream, and in the centre of a cleared plot of some ten
+acres. This plot was surrounded by a post-and-rail fence, and in its
+front portion was a garden, which grew a sufficient supply of vegetables
+to serve a family of twenty persons. In the rear, and at the sides of
+the dwelling, were about seven acres, devoted mainly to corn and
+potatoes. In one corner of the lot were three tidy-looking negro-houses,
+and close beside them I noticed a low shed, near which a large quantity
+of the stalks of the tall, white corn, common to that section, was
+stacked in the New England fashion. Browsing on the corn-stalks were
+three sleek, well-kept milch cows, and a goat.
+
+About four hundred yards from the farmer's house, and on the bank of the
+little run, which there was quite wide and deep, stood a turpentine
+distillery; and around it were scattered a large number of rosin and
+turpentine barrels, some filled and some empty. A short distance higher
+up, and far enough from the "still" to be safe in the event of a fire,
+was a long, low, wooden shed, covered with rough, unjointed boards,
+placed upright, and unbattened. This was the "spirit-house," used for
+the storage of the spirits of turpentine when barrelled for market, and
+awaiting shipment. In the creek, and filling nearly one-half of the
+channel in front of the spirit-shed, was a raft of pine timber, on which
+were laden some two hundred barrels of rosin. On such rude conveyances
+the turpentine-maker sent his produce to Conwayboro'. There the
+timber-raft was sold to my way-side friend, Captain B----, and its
+freight shipped on board vessel for New York. Two "prime" negro men,
+dressed in the usual costume, were "tending the still;" and a negro
+woman, as stout and strong as the men, and clad in a short, loose,
+linsey gown, from beneath which peeped out a pair of coarse leggins, was
+adjusting a long wooden trough, which conveyed the liquid rosin from the
+"still" to a deep excavation in the earth, at a short distance. In the
+pit was a quantity of rosin sufficient to fill a thousand barrels.
+
+"Here, Bill," said Barnes to one of the negro men, as we pulled up at
+the distillery, "put these critters up, and give 'em sum oats, and when
+they've cooled off a bit, water 'em."
+
+"Yas, yas, massa," replied the negro, springing nimbly forward, and
+taking the horses by the bridles, "an' rub 'em down, massa?"
+
+"Yas, rub 'em down right smart," replied the corn-cracker; then turning
+to me, as we dismounted, he said: "Stranger, thet's th' sort o' niggers
+fur ye; all uv mine ar' jess like him--smart and lively as kittens."
+
+"He does seem to go about his work cheerfully," I replied.
+
+"Cheerfully! d----d ef he doant--all on 'em du! They like me better'n
+thar own young 'uns, an' it's 'cause I use 'em like human bein's;" and
+he looked slyly toward the Colonel, who just then was walking silently
+away, in the direction of the run, as if in search of the browned
+"chattels."
+
+"Not thar, Cunnel," cried the native; "they're inter th' shed;" and he
+started to lead the way to the "spirit-house."
+
+"Not now, Barnes," I said, putting my hand on his arm: "leave him alone
+for a little while. He is feeling badly, and we'd better not disturb him
+just yet."
+
+The native motioned me to a seat on a rosin-barrel, as he replied:
+
+"Wal, he 'pears ter--thet's a fact, and he orter. D----d ef it arn't
+wicked to use niggers like cattle, as he do."
+
+"I don't think he means to ill-treat them--he's a kind-hearted man."
+
+"Wal, he ar sort o' so; but he's left ev'ry thing ter thet d----d
+overseer uv his'n. I wudn't ha' trusted him to feed my hogs."
+
+"Hogs!" I exclaimed, laughing; "I supposed you didn't _feed_ hogs in
+these diggins. I supposed you 'let 'em run.'"
+
+"_I_ doant; an' I've got th' tallest porkys round har."
+
+"I've been told that they get a good living in the woods."
+
+"Wal, p'r'aps the' du jest make eout ter live thar; but my ole 'oman
+likes 'em ter hum--they clean up a place like--eat up all th' leavin's,
+an' give th' young nigs suthin' ter du."
+
+"It seems to me," I said, resuming the previous thread of the
+conversation; "that overseers are a necessity on a large plantation."
+"Wal, the' ar', an' thet's why thar ortent ter be no big plantations;
+God Almighty didn't make human bein's ter be herded togethar in th'
+woods like hogs. No man orter ter hev more'n twenty on 'em--he can't
+look arter no more himself, an' its agin natur ter set a feller over 'em
+what hain't no int'rest in 'em, an' no feelin' fur 'em, an' who'll drive
+'em round like brutes. I never struck one on 'em in my life, an' my ten
+du more'n ony fifteen th' Cunnel's got."
+
+"I thought they needed occasional correction. How do you manage them
+without whipping?"
+
+"Manage them! why 'cordin' ter scriptur--do ter 'em as I'd like ter be
+dun ter, ef I war a nigger. Every one on 'em knows I'd part with my last
+shirt, an' live on taters an' cow-fodder, fore I'd sell em; an' then I
+give 'em Saturdays for 'emselfs--but thet's cute dealin' in me (tho' th'
+pore, simple souls doant see it), fur ye knows the' work thet day for
+'emselfs, an' raise nigh all thar own feed, 'cept th' beef and
+whiskey--an' it sort o' makes 'em feel like folks, too, more like as ef
+the' war _free_--the' work th' better fur it all th' week."
+
+"Then you think the blacks would work better if free?"
+
+"In _course_ I does--its agin man's natur to be a slave. Thet lousy
+parson ye herd ter meetin, a Sunday, makes slavery eout a divine
+institooshun, but my wife's a Bible 'oman, and she says 'taint so; an'
+I'm d----d ef she arn't right."
+
+"Is your wife a South Carolina women?"
+
+"No, she an' me's from th' old North--old Car'tret, nigh on ter Newbern;
+an' we doant take nat'rally to these fire-eaters."
+
+"Have you been here long?"
+
+"Wal, nigh on ter six yar. I cum har with nuthin' but a thousan' ter my
+back--slapped thet inter fifteen hun'red acres--paid it down--and then
+hired ten likely, North Car'lina niggers--hired 'em with th' chance uv
+buyin' ef the' liked eout har. Wal, th' nigs all know'd me, and the'
+sprung ter it like blazes; so every yar I've managed ter buy two on 'em,
+and now I've ten grow'd up, and thar young'uns; th' still and all th'
+traps paid fur, an' ef this d----d secesh bis'ness hadn't a come 'long,
+I'd hev hed a right smart chance o' doin' well."
+
+"I'm satisfied secession will ruin the turpentine business; you'll be
+shut up here, unable to sell your produce, and it will go to waste."
+
+"Thet's my 'pinion; but I reckon I kin' manage now witheout turpentime.
+I've talked it over 'long with my nigs, and we kalkerlate, ef these ar
+doin's go eny furder, ter tap no more trees, but clar land an' go ter
+raisin' craps."
+
+"What! do you talk politics with your negroes?"
+
+"Nary a politic--but I'm d----d ef th' critters doan't larn 'em sumhow;
+the' knows 'bout as much uv what's goin' on as I du--but plantin arn't
+politics; its bisness, an' they've more int'rest in it nor I hev, 'cause
+they've sixteen mouths ter feed agin my four."
+
+"I'm glad, my friend, that you treat them like men: but I have supposed
+they were not well enough informed to have intelligent opinions on such
+subjects."
+
+"Informed! wal, I reckon the' is; all uv mine kin read, an' sum on 'em
+kin write, too. D'ye see thet little nig thar?" pointing to a juvenile
+coal-black darky of about six years, who was standing before the "still"
+fire; "thet ar little devil kin read an' speak like a parson. He's got
+hold, sumhow, uv my little gal's book o' pieces, an' larned a dozen on
+'em. I make him cum inter th' house, once in a while uv an evenin', an'
+speechify, an' 'twould do yer soul good ter har him, in his shirt tail,
+with a old sheet wound round him fur a toger (I've told him th'
+play-acters du it so down ter Charles'on), an' spoutin' out: 'My name am
+Norval; on de Gruntin' hills my fader feed him hogs!' The little coon
+never seed a sheep, an' my wife's told him a flock's a herd, an' he
+thinks 'hog' _sounds_ better'n 'flock,' so, contra'y ter th' book, he
+puts in 'hogs,' and hogs, you knows, hev ter grunt, so he gits 'em on
+th' 'Gruntin hills;" and here the kind-hearted native burst into a fit
+of uproarious laughter, in which, in spite of myself, I had to join.
+
+When the merriment had somewhat subsided, the turpentine-maker called
+out to the little darky:
+
+"Come here, Jim."
+
+The young chattel ran to him with alacrity, and wedging in between his
+legs, placed his little black hands, in a free-and-easy way, on his
+master's knees, and, looking up trustfully in his face, said:
+
+"Wal, massa?"
+
+"What's yer name?"
+
+"Dandy Jim, massa."
+
+"Thet arn't all--what's th' rest?"
+
+"Dandy Jim of ole Car'lina."
+
+"Who made ye?"
+
+"De good God, massa."
+
+"No, He didn't: God doant make little nigs. He makes none but white
+folks;" said the master, laughing.
+
+"Yas He'm do; Missus say He'm do; dat He make dis nig jess like He done
+little Totty."
+
+"Wal, He did, Jim. I'm d----d ef _He_ didn't, fur nobody else cud make
+_ye_!" replied the man, patting the little woolly head with undisguised
+affection.
+
+"Now, Jim, say th' creed fur 'de gemman.'"
+
+The young darky then repeated the Apostle's Creed and the Ten
+Commandments.
+
+"Is thet all ye knows?"
+
+"No, massa, I knows a heap 'sides dat."
+
+"Wal, say suthin' more--sum on 'em pieces thet jingle."
+
+The little fellow then repeated with entire correctness, and with
+appropriate gestures, and emphasis, though in the genuine darky
+dialect--which seems to be inborn with the pure-Southern black--Mrs.
+Hemans' poem:
+
+"The boy stood on the burning deck."
+
+"Mrs. Hemans draped in black!" I exclaimed, laughing heartily: "How
+would the good lady feel, could she look down from where she is, and
+hear a little darky doing up her poetry in that style?"
+
+"D----d ef I doant b'lieve 'twud make her love th' little nig like I
+do;" replied the corn-cracker, taking him up on his knee as tenderly as
+he would have taken up his own child.
+
+"Tell me, my little man," I said: "who taught you all these things?"
+
+"I larned 'em, myseff, sar," was the prompt reply.
+
+"You learned them, yourself! but who taught you to read?"
+
+"I larned 'em myseff, sar!"
+
+"You couldn't have learned _that_ yourself; didn't your 'massa' teach
+you?"
+
+"No, sar."
+
+"Oh! your 'missus' did."
+
+"No, sar."
+
+"No, sar!" I repeated; then suspecting the real state of the case, I
+looked him sternly in the eye, and said: "My little man, it's wrong to
+tell lies--you must _always_ speak the truth; now, tell me truly, did
+not your 'missus' teach you these things?"
+
+"No, sar, I larned 'em myseff."
+
+"Ye can't cum it, Stranger; ye moight roast him over a slow fire, an'
+not git nary a thing eout on him but thet," said the corn-cracker,
+leaning forward, and breaking into a boisterous fit of laughter. "It's
+agin th' law, an' I'm d----d ef I teached him. Reckon he _did_ larn
+himself!"
+
+"I must know your wife, my friend. She's a good woman."
+
+"Good! ye kin bet high on thet; she's uv th' stuff th' Lord makes angels
+eout on."
+
+I had no doubt of it, and was about to say so, when the Colonel's
+turpentine wagon drove up, and I remembered I had left him too long
+alone.
+
+The coachman was driving, and Jim sat on the wagon beside him.
+
+"Massa K----," said the latter, getting down and coming to me: "Whar am
+dey?"
+
+"In the spirit-shed."
+
+He was turning to go there, when I called him back, saying: "Jim, you
+must not see your master now; you'd better keep out of sight for the
+present."
+
+"No, massa; de ma'am say de Cunnel take dis bery hard, and dat I orter
+tell him I'se sorry for what I'se done."
+
+"Well, wait a while. Let me go in first."
+
+Accompanied by the corn-cracker, I entered the turpentine-shed. A row of
+spirit-barrels were ranged along each of its sides, and two tiers
+occupied the centre of the building. On these a number of loose planks
+were placed, and on the planks lay the bodies of the metif woman and her
+child. The Colonel was seated on a barrel near them, with his head
+resting on his hands, and his eyes fixed on the ground. He did not seem
+to notice our entrance, and, passing him without speaking, I stepped to
+the side of the dead.
+
+The woman's dress, the common linsey gown worn by her class, was still
+wet, and her short, kinky, brown hair fell in matted folds around her
+face. One arm hung loosely by her side; the other was clasped tightly
+around her child, which lay as if asleep on her bosom. One of its small
+hands clung to its mother's breast, and around its little lips played a
+smile. But how shall I describe the pale, sweet beauty of the face of
+the drowned girl, as she lay there, her eyes closed, and her lips
+parted, as in prayer? Never but once have I seen on human features the
+strange radiance that shone upon it, or the mingled expression of hope,
+and peace, and resignation that rested there--and that was in the
+long-gone time, when, standing by her bedside, I watched the passing
+away of one who is now an angel in heaven!
+
+"Come, my dear friend, let us go," I said, turning and gently taking the
+Colonel by the arm, "the negroes are here, and will take charge of the
+dead."
+
+"No, no!" he replied, rising, and looking around, as if aroused from a
+troubled dream; "that is for _me_ to do!" Then he added, after a
+moment's pause, "Will you help me to get them into the wagon?"
+
+"Yes, I will, certainly."
+
+He made one step toward the body of the dead girl, then sinking down
+again on the barrel, covered his face with his hands, and cried out: "My
+God! this is terrible! Did you ever see such a look as that? It will
+haunt me forever!"
+
+"Come, my friend, rouse yourself--this is weakness; you are tired with
+the long ride and excitement of the past few days. Come, go home--I will
+look after them."
+
+"No, no! I must do it. I will be a man again;" and he rose and walked
+steadily to the dead bodies. "Is there any one here to help?" he asked.
+
+Jim was standing in the door-way, and I motioned to him to come forward.
+The great tears were streaming down his face as he stepped timidly
+towards his master, and said: "I'll do dis, massa, don't you trubble
+yerself no more."
+
+"It's good of you, Jim. You'll forgive me for being so cruel to you,
+wont you?" said the Colonel, taking the black by the hand.
+
+"Forgib ye, massa! _I_ war all ter blame--but ye'll forgib me,
+massa--ye'll forgib me!" cried the black, with strong emotion.
+
+"Yes, yes; but say no more about it. Come, let us get Julie home."
+
+But the poor girl was already _home_--home where her sufferings and her
+sorrows were over, and all her tears were wiped away forever!
+
+We four bore away the mother and the child. A number of blankets were in
+the bottom of the wagon, and we laid the bodies carefully upon them.
+When all seemed ready, the Colonel, who was still standing by the side
+of the dead, turned to my new friend, and said: "Barnes, will you loan
+me a pillow? I will send it back to-night."
+
+"Sartin, Cunnel;" and the farmer soon brought one from the house.
+Lifting tenderly the head of the drowned girl, the Colonel placed it
+beneath her, and smoothing back her tangled hair, he gently covered her
+face with his handkerchief, as if she could still feel his kindness, or
+longer cared for the pity or the love of mortal. Yet, who knows but that
+her parted soul, from the high realm to which it had soared, may not
+then have looked down, have seen that act, and have forgiven him!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE SMALL PLANTER.
+
+
+In the first moments of grief the sympathy of friends, and the words of
+consolation bring no relief. How much more harshly do such words grate
+on the ear when the soul is bowed down by remorse and unavailing regret!
+Then the wounded spirit finds peace nowhere but with God.
+
+I saw that the Colonel would be alone, and turning to him, as he
+prepared to follow the strange vehicle, which, with its load of death,
+was already jolting its way over the rough forest road, I said,
+
+"Will you pardon me, if I remain with your friend here for awhile? I
+will be at the mansion before dark."
+
+"Oh, certainly, my friend, come when you feel disposed," he replied, and
+mounting his horse he was soon out of sight among the trees.
+
+"Now, Barnes," I said, shaking off the gloomy feelings that had
+oppressed me: "come, I must see that wife of yours, and get a glimpse of
+how you live?"
+
+"Sartin, stranger; come in; I'll give ye th' tallest dinner my 'oman can
+scare up, an' she's sum pumkins in th' cookin' line;" and he led the way
+to the farm-house.
+
+As I turned to follow, I slipped a half-dollar into the hand of the
+darky who was holding my horse, and asked him to put her again into the
+stable.
+
+"I'll do dat, sar, but I karn't take dis; masaa doant 'low it nohow;" he
+replied, tendering me back the money.
+
+"Barnes, your negroes have strange ways; I never met one before who'd
+refuse money."
+
+"Wal, stranger, 'taint hosspetality to take money on yer friends, and
+Bill gets all he wants from me."
+
+I took the silver and gave it to the first darky I met, who happened to
+be an old centenarian belonging to the Colonel. As I tossed it to him,
+he grinned out: "Ah, massa, I'll git sum 'backer wid dis; 'pears like I
+hadn't nary a chaw in forty yar." With more than one leg in the grave
+the old negro had not lost his appetite for the weed--in fact, that and
+whiskey are the only "luxuries" ever known to the plantation black.
+
+As we went nearer, I took a closer survey of the farm-house. It was, as
+I have said, a low, unpainted wooden building, located in the middle of
+a ten acre lot. It was approached by a straight walk, paved with a
+mixture of sand and tar, similar to that which the reader may have seen
+in the Champs Elysees. I do not know whether my back-woods friend, or
+the Parisian pavior, was the first inventor of this composition, but I
+am satisfied the corn-cracker had not stolen it from the stone-cracker.
+The walk was lined with fruit-bearing shrubs, and directly in front of
+the house, were two small flower-beds.
+
+The dwelling itself, though of a dingy brown wood-color, was neat and
+inviting. It may have been forty feet square on the ground, and was only
+a story and a half high, but a projecting roof, and a front
+dormer-window, relieved it from the appearance of disproportion. Its
+gable ends were surmounted by two enormous brick chimneys, carried up on
+the outside, in the fashion of the South, and its high, broad windows
+were ornamented with Venetian blinds. Its front door opened directly
+into the "living-room," and at the threshold we met its mistress.
+
+As the image of that lady has still a warm place in a pleasant corner of
+my memory, I will describe her. She was about thirty years of age, and
+had a fresh, cheerful face. To say that she was handsome, would not be
+strictly true; though she had that pleasant, gentle, kindly expression
+that sometimes makes even a homely person seem beautiful. But she was
+not homely. Her features were regular, her hair, glossy and brown, and
+her eyes, black and brilliant, and, for their color, the mildest and
+softest I had ever seen. Her figure was tall, and in its outline
+somewhat sharp and angular, but she had an ease and grace about her that
+made one forget she was not moulded as softly and roundly as others. She
+seemed just the woman on whose bosom a tired, worn, over-burdened man
+might lay his weary head, and find rest and forgetfulness.
+
+She wore a neat calico dress, fitting closely to the neck, and an apron
+of spotless white muslin. A little lace cap perched cosily on the back
+of her head, hiding a portion of her wavy, dark hair, and on her feet--a
+miracle, reader, in one of her class--were stockings and shoes! Giving
+me her hand--which, at the risk of making her husband jealous, I held
+for a moment--she said, making a gentle courtesy:
+
+"Ye ar welcome, stranger."
+
+"I sincerely thank you, madam; I _am_ a stranger in these parts."
+
+She tendered me a chair, while her husband opened a sideboard, and
+brought forth a box of Havanas, and a decanter of Scuppernong. As I took
+the proffered seat, he offered me the refreshments. I drank the lady's
+health in the wine, but declined the cigars. Seeing this, she remarked:
+
+"Yer from th' North, sir; arn't ye?"
+
+"Yes, madam, I live in New York, but I was born in New-England."
+
+"I reckoned so; I knew ye didn't belong in Car'lina."
+
+"How did you know that, madam?" I asked, laughing.
+
+"I seed ye doan't smoke 'fore wimmin. But ye musn't mind me; I sort o'
+likes it; its a great comfut to John, and may be it ar to ye."
+
+"Well, I do relish a good cigar, but I never smoke before any lady
+except my wife, and though she's only 'a little lower than the angels,'
+she _does_, once in awhile, say it's a shame to make the _house_ smell
+like a tobacco factory."
+
+Barnes handed me the box again, and I took one. As I was lighting it, he
+said:
+
+"Ye've got a good 'oman, hev ye?"
+
+"There's none better; at least, I think so."
+
+"Wal, I'm 'zactly uv thet 'pinion 'bout mine: I wouldn't trade her fur
+all this worle, an' th' best half uv 'tother."
+
+"Don't ye talk so, John," said the lady; then addressing me, she added:
+"It's a good husband thet makes a good wife, sir."
+
+"Sometimes, madam, but not always. I've known some of the best of wives
+who had miserable husbands."
+
+"An' I'm d----d ef I made my wife th' 'oman she ar'," said the
+corn-cracker.
+
+"Hush, John; ye musn't sw'ar so; ye knows how often ye've said ye
+wouldn't."
+
+"Wal, I du, an' I wont agin, by ----. But Sukey, whar's th' young 'uns?"
+
+"Out in the lot, I reckon; but ye musn't holler'm in--they'r all dirt."
+
+"No matter for that, madam," I said; "dirt is healthy for little ones;
+rolling in the mud makes them grow."
+
+"Then our'n orter grow right smart, fur they'r in it allers."
+
+"How many have you, madam?"
+
+"Two; a little boy, four, and a little gal, six."
+
+"They're of interesting ages."
+
+"Yas, the' is int'restin'; ev'ry 'uns own chil'ren is smart; but the'
+does know a heap. John was off ter Charl'ston no great while back, an'
+the little boy used ter pray ev'ry mornin' an' ev'nin' fur his fader ter
+cum hum. I larned 'em thet jest so soon as the' talked, 'cause thar's no
+tellin' how quick the' moight be tooken 'way. Wal, the little feller
+prayed ev'ry mornin' an' ev'nin' fur his fader ter cum back; an' John
+didn't cum; so finarly he got sort o' provoked with th' Lord; an' he
+said God war aither deaf, an' couldn't har, or he war naughty, an'
+wouldn't tell fader thet little Johnny wanted to seed 'im 'werry
+mooch'"--and here the good lady laughed pleasantly, and I joined in most
+heartily.
+
+Blessed are the children that have such a mother.
+
+Soon the husband returned with the little girl and boy, and four young
+ebonies, all bare-headed, and dressed alike, in thick trousers, and a
+loose linsey shirt. Among them was my new acquaintance, "Dandy Jim, of
+ole Car'lina."
+
+The little girl came to me, and soon I had two white children on one
+knee, and two black on the other, and Dandy Jim between my legs, playing
+with my watch-chain. The family made no distinction between the colors,
+and as the children were all equally clean I did not see why _I_ should
+do so.
+
+The lady renewed the conversation by remarking; "P'raps ye reckon it's
+quar, sir, that we 'low our'n to 'sociate 'long with th' black chil'ren;
+but we karn't help it. On big plantations it works sorry bad, fur th'
+white young 'ons larn all manner of evil from the black 'uns; but I've
+laboored ter teach our'n so one wont do no harm ter 'tother."
+
+"I suppose, madam, that is one of the greatest evils of slavery. The low
+black poisons the mind of the white child, and the bad influence lasts
+through life."
+
+"Yas, it's so, stranger; an' it's the biggest keer I hev. It often
+'pears strange ter me thet our grow'd up men arn't no wuss then the'
+is."
+
+In those few words that unlettered woman had said, what would--if men
+were but wise enough to hear and heed the great truth which she
+spoke--banish slavery from this continent forever!
+
+After awhile the farmer told the juvenile delineator of Mrs. Hemans, and
+the other poets, to give us a song; and planting himself in the middle
+of the floor, the little darky sang "Dixie," and several other negro
+songs, which his master had taught him, but into which he had introduced
+some amusing variations of his own. The other children joined in the
+choruses; and then Jim danced breakdowns, "walk-along-Joes," and other
+darky dances, his master accompanying him on a cracked fiddle, till my
+sides were sore with laughter, and the hostess begged them to stop.
+Finally the clock struck twelve, and the farmer, going to the door, gave
+a long, loud blast on a cow's horn. In about five minutes one after
+another of the field hands came in, till the whole ten had seated
+themselves on the verandah. Each carried a bowl, a tin-cup, or a gourd,
+into which my host--who soon emerged from a back room[J] with a pail of
+whiskey in his hand--poured a gill of the beverage. This was the day's
+allowance, and the farmer, in answer to a question of mine, told me he
+thought negroes were healthier, and worked better for a small quantity
+of alcohol daily. "The' work hard, and salt feed doant set 'em up
+'nough," was his remark.
+
+Meanwhile the hostess busied herself with preparations for dinner, and
+it was soon spread on a bright cherry table, covered by a spotless white
+cloth. The little darkies had scattered to the several cabins, and we
+soon sat down to as good a meal as I ever ate at the South.
+
+We were waited on by a tidy negro woman, neatly clad in a calico gown,
+with shoes on her feet, and a flaming red and yellow 'kerchief on her
+head. This last was worn in the form of a turban, and one end escaping
+from behind, and hanging down her back, it looked for all the world like
+a flag hung out from a top turret. Observing it, my host said:
+
+"Aggy--showin' yer colors? Ye'r Union gal--hey?"
+
+"Yas, I is dat, massa; Union ter de back bone;" responded the negress,
+grinning widely.
+
+"All th' Union _ye_ knows on," replied the master, winking slyly at me,
+"is th' union yer goin' ter hitch up 'long with black Cale over ter
+Squire Taylor's."
+
+"No, 'taint, massa; takes more'n tu ter make de Union."
+
+"Yas, I knows--it gin'rally takes ten or a dozen: reckon it'll take a
+dozen with ye."
+
+"John, ye musn't talk so ter th' sarvents; it spiles 'em," said his
+wife.
+
+"No it doant--do it, Aggy?"
+
+"Lor', missus, I doant keer what massa say; but I doant leff no oder man
+run on so ter me!"
+
+"No more'n ye doant, gal! only Cale."
+
+"Nor him, massa; I makes him stan' roun' _I_ reckon."
+
+"I reckon ye du; ye wudn't be yer massa's gal ef ye didn't."
+
+When the meal was over, I visited, with my host, the negro houses. The
+hour allowed for dinner[K] was about expiring, and the darkies were
+preparing to return to the field. Entering one of the cabins, where were
+two stout negro men and a woman, my host said to them, with a perfectly
+serious face:
+
+"Har, boys, I've fotched ye a live Yankee ab'lishener; now, luk at 'im
+all roun'. Did ye ever see sech a critter?"
+
+"Doant see nuffin' quar in dat gemman, massa," replied one of the
+blacks. "Him 'pears like bery nice gemman; doant 'pear like
+ab'lishener;" and he laughed, and scraped his head in the manner
+peculiar to the negro, as he added: "kinder reckon he wudn't be har ef
+he war one of _dem_."
+
+"What der _ye_ knows 'bout th' ab'lisheners? Ye never seed one--what
+d'ye 'spose the' luk like?"
+
+"Dey say dey luk likes de bery ole debil, massa, but reckon taint so."
+
+"Wal, the' doant; the' luk wusa then thet: they'm bottled up thunder an'
+lightnin', an' ef the' cum down har, they'll chaw ye all ter hash."
+
+"I reckon!" replied the darky, manipulating his wool, and distending his
+face into a decidedly incredulous grin.
+
+"What do you tell them such things for?" I asked, good-humoredly.
+
+"Lor, bless ye, stranger, the' knows th' ab'lisheners ar thar friends,
+jest so well as ye du; and so fur as thet goes, d----d ef the' doan't
+know I'm one on 'em myseff, fur I tells 'em, ef the' want to put, the'
+kin put, an' I'll throw thar trav'lin 'spences inter th' bargin. Doan't
+I tell ye thet, Lazarus."
+
+"Yas, massa, but none ob massa's nigs am gwine ter put--lesswise, not so
+long as you an' de good missus, am 'bove groun'."
+
+The darky's name struck me as peculiar, and I asked him where he got it.
+
+"_'Tain't_ my name, sar; but you see, sar, w'en massa fuss hire me ob
+ole Capt'in ----, up dar ter Newbern-way, I war sort o' sorry
+like--hadn't no bery good cloes--an' massa, he den call me Lazarus,
+'case he say I war all ober rags and holes, an' it hab sort o' stuck ter
+me eber sense. I war a'mighty bad off 'fore dat, but w'en I cum down har
+I gets inter Abr'am's buzzum, I does;" and here the darky actually
+reeled on his seat with laughter.
+
+"Is this woman your wife?" I asked.
+
+"No, sar; my wife 'longs to Cunnel J----; dat am my new wife--my ole
+wife am up dar whar I cum from!"
+
+"What! have you two wives?"
+
+"Yas, massa, I'se two."
+
+"But that's contrary to Scripture."
+
+"No, sar; de Cunnel say 'tain't. He say in Scriptur' dey hab a heap ob'
+'em, and dat niggers kin hab jess so many as dey likes--a hun'red ef dey
+want ter."
+
+"Does the Colonel teach that to his negroes?" I asked, turning to the
+native.
+
+"Yas, I reckon he do--an' sits 'em th' 'zample, too," he replied,
+laughing; "but th' old sinner knows better'n thet; he kin read."
+
+"Do you find that in the Bible, Lazarus?"
+
+"Yas, massa; whar I reads it. Dat's whar it tell 'bout David and Sol'mon
+and all dem--dey hab a heap ob wives. A pore ole darky karn't hab
+'nuffin 'sides dem, an' he _orter_ be 'low'd jess so many as he likes."
+
+Laughing at the reasoning of the negro, I asked:
+
+"How would _you_ like it, if your wife over at Colonel J----'s, had as
+many husbands as _she_ liked?"
+
+"Wal, I couldn't fine no fault, massa: an' I s'pose she do; dough I
+doan't knows it, 'case I'se dar only Sundays."
+
+"Have you any children?"
+
+"Yas, sar; I'se free 'longin' ter de Cunnel, an' four or five--I doant
+'zactly know--up ter hum; but _dey'se_ grow'd up."
+
+"Is your wife, up there, married again?"
+
+"Yas, massa, she got anoder man jess w'en I cum 'way; har ole massa make
+har do it."
+
+We then left the cabin, and when out of hearing of the blacks, I said to
+the corn-cracker: "That _may be_ Scripture doctrine, but _I_ have not
+been taught so!"
+
+"Scriptur or no Scriptur, stranger, it's d----d heathenism," replied
+the farmer, who, take him all in all, is a superior specimen of the
+class of small-planters at the South; and yet, seeing polygamy practised
+by his own slaves, he made no effort to prevent it. He told me that if
+he should object to his darky cohabiting with the Colonel's negress, it
+would be regarded as unneighborly, and secure him the enmity of the
+whole district! And still we are told that slavery is a _Divine_
+institution!
+
+After this, we strolled off into the woods, where the hands were at
+work. They were all stout, healthy and happy-looking, and in answer to
+my comments on their appearance, the native said that the negroes on the
+turpentine farms are always stronger and longer-lived, than those on the
+rice and cotton-fields. Unless carried off by the fevers incident to the
+climate, they generally reach a good old age, while the rice-negro
+seldom lives to be over forty, and the cotton-slave very rarely attains
+sixty. Cotton-growing, however, my host thought, is not, in itself, much
+more unhealthy than turpentine-gathering, though cotton-hands work in
+the sun, while the turpentine slaves labor altogether in the shade.
+"But," he said, "the' work 'em harder nor we does, an' doan't feed 'em
+so well. We give our'n meat and whiskey ev'ry day, but them articles is
+skarse 'mong th' cotton blacks, an' th' rice niggers never get 'em
+excep' ter Chris'mas time, an' thet cums but onst a yar."
+
+"Do you think the white could labor as well as the black, on the rice
+and cotton-fields?" I asked.
+
+"Yas, an' better--better onywhar; but, in coorse, 'tain't natur' fur
+black nor white ter stand long a workin' in th' mud and water up ter
+thar knees; sech work wud kill off th' very devil arter a while. But th'
+white kin stand it longer nor the black, and its' 'cordin' ter reason
+that he shud; fur, I reckon, stranger, that the sperit and pluck uv a
+man hev a durned sight ter du with work. They'll hole a man up when he's
+clean down, an' how kin we expec' thet the pore nig', who's nary a thing
+ter work fur, an' who's been kept under an' 'bused ever sense Adam was a
+young un'--how kin we expec' he'll work like men thet own 'emselfs, an'
+whose faders hev been free ever sense creation? I reckon that the
+parient has a heap ter du with makin' th' chile. He puts the sperit
+inter 'im: doan't we see it in hosses an' critters an' sech like? It
+mayn't crap eout ter onst, but it's shore ter in th' long run, and
+thet's th' why th' black hain't no smarter nor he is. He's been a-ground
+down an' kept under fur so long thet it'll take more'n 'un gin'ration
+ter bring him up. 'Tain't his fault thet he's no more sperit, an'
+p'raps 'tain't ourn--thet is, them on us as uses 'em right--but it war
+the fault uv yer fader an' mine--yer fader stole 'em, and mine bought
+'em, an' the' both made cattle uv 'em."
+
+"But I had supposed the black was better fitted by nature for hard
+labor, in a hot climate, than the white?"
+
+"Wal, he arn't, an' I knows it. Th' d----d parsons an' pol'tishuns say
+thet, but 'tain't so. I kin do half agin more work in a day then th'
+best nig' I've got, an' I've dun it, tu, time an' agin, an' it didn't
+hurt me nuther. Ye knows ef a man hev a wife and young 'uns 'pendin' on
+him, an' arn't much 'forehanded, he'll work like th' devil. I've dun it,
+and ye hev ef ye war ever put ter it; but th' nig's, why the' hain't got
+no wives and young 'uns ter work fur--the law doan't 'low 'em ter hev
+any--the' hain't nary a thing but thar carcasses, an' them's thar
+masters'."
+
+"You say a man works better for being free; then you must think 'twould
+be well to free the negroes?"
+
+"In coorse, I does. Jest luk at them nig's o' mine; they're ter all
+'tents an' purposes free, 'case I use 'em like men, an' the' knows the'
+kin go whenever the' d----d please. See how the' work--why, one on 'em
+does half as much agin as ony hard-driv' nigger in creation."
+
+"What would you do with them, if they were _really_ free?"
+
+"Du with 'em? why, hire 'em, an' make twice as much eout on 'em as I
+does now."
+
+"But I don't think the two races were meant to live together."
+
+"No more'n the' warn't. But 'tain't thar fault thet they's har. We
+hain't no right ter send 'em off. We orter stand by our'n an' our
+faders' doin's. The nig' keers more fur his hum, so durned pore as it
+ar', then ye or I does fur our'n. I'd pack sech off ter Libraria or th'
+devil, as wanted ter go, but I'd hev no 'pulsion 'bout it."
+
+"Why, my good friend, you're half-brother to Garrison. You don't talk to
+your neighbors in this way?"
+
+"Wal; I doan't;" he replied, laughing. "Ef I dun it, they'd treat me to
+a coat uv tar, and ride me out uv th' deestrict raather sudden, I
+reckon; but yer a Nuthener, an' the' all take nat'rally ter freedum,
+excep' th' d----d dough-faces, an' ye aren't one on 'em, I'll swar."
+
+"Well, I'm not. Do many of your neighbors think as you do?"
+
+"Reckon not many round har; but op in Cart'ret, whar I cum from, heaps
+on 'em do, though the' darn't say so."
+
+By this time we had reached the still, and, directing his attention to
+the enormous quantity of rosin that had been run into the pit which I
+have spoken of, I asked him why he threw so much valuable material away.
+
+"Wal, 'tain't wuth nothin' har. Thet's th' common, an' it won't bring in
+York, now, more'n a dollar forty-five. It costs a dollar an' two bits
+ter get it thar, and pay fur sellin' on it, an' th' barr'l's wuth th'
+diff'rence. I doan't ship nuthin wuss nor No. 2."
+
+"What is No. 2?"
+
+He took the head from one of the barrels, and with an adze cut out a
+small piece, then handing me the specimen, replied:
+
+"Now hole thet up ter th' sun. Ye'll see though its yaller, it's clean
+and clar. Thet's good No. 2, what brings now two dollars and two bits,
+in York, an' pays me 'bout a dollar a barr'l, its got eout o' second yar
+dip, an' as it comes eout uv th' still, is run through thet ar
+strainer," pointing to a coarse wire seive that lay near. "Th' common
+rosum, thet th' still's runnin' on now, is made eout on th' yaller
+dip--thet's th' kine o' turpentine thet runs from th' tree arter two
+yars' tappin'--we call it yallar dip ca'se it's allers dark. We doant
+strain common 't all, an' it's full uv chips and dirt. It's low now, but
+ef it shud ever git up, I'd tap thet ar' heap, barr'l it up, run a
+little fresh stilled inter it, an' 'twould be a'most so good as new."
+
+"Then it is injured by being in the ground."
+
+"Not much; it's jest as good fur ev'rything but makin' ile, puttin it in
+the 'arth sort o' takes th' sap eout on it, an' th' sap's th' ile.
+Natur' sucks thet eout, I s'pose, ter make th' trees grow--I expec' my
+bones 'ill fodder 'em one on these days."
+
+"Rosin is put to very many uses?"
+
+"Yes, but common's used mainly for ile and soap, th' Yankees put it
+inter hard yaller soap, 'case it makes it weigh, an' yer folks is up
+ter them doin's," and he looked at me and gave a sly laugh. I could not
+deny the "hard" impeachment, and said nothing. Taking a specimen of very
+clear light-colored rosin from a shelf in the still-house, I asked him
+what that quality was worth.
+
+"Thet ar brought seven dollars, for two hundred an' eighty pounds, in
+York, airly this yar. It's th' very best No. 1; an' its hard ter make,
+'case ef th' still gets overhet it turns it a tinge. Thet sort is run
+through two sieves, the coarse 'un, an' thet ar," pointing to another
+wire strainer, the meshes of which were as fine as those of the flour
+sieve used by housewives.
+
+"Do your seven field hands produce enough 'dip' to keep your still a
+running?"
+
+"No, I buys th' rest uv my naboors who haint no stills; an' th' Cunnel's
+down on me 'case I pay 'em more'n he will; but I go on Franklin's
+princerpel: 'a nimble sixpence's better'n a slow shillin.' A great ole
+feller thet, warn't he? I've got his life."
+
+"And you practice on his precepts; that's the reason you've got on so
+well."
+
+"Yas, thet, an' hard knocks. The best o' doctrin's am't wuth a d----n
+ef ye doan't work on 'em."
+
+"That is true."
+
+We shortly afterward went to the house, and there I passed several hours
+in conversation with my new friend and his excellent wife. The lady,
+after a while, showed me over the building. It was well-built,
+well-arranged, and had many conveniences I did not expect to find in a
+back-woods dwelling. She told me its timbers and covering were of
+well-seasoned yellow pine--which will last for centuries--and that it
+was built by a Yankee carpenter, whom they had "'ported" from
+Charleston, paying his fare, and giving him his living, and two dollars
+and a half a day. It had cost as near as she "cud reckon, 'bout two
+thousan' dollars."
+
+It was five o'clock, when, shaking them warmly by the hand, I bade my
+pleasant friends "good-bye," and mounting my horse rode off to the
+Colonel's.
+
+[Footnote J: The whiskey was kept in a back room, above ground, because the
+dwelling had no cellar. The fluid was kept safely, under lock and key,
+and the farmer accounted for that, by saying that his negroes would
+steal nothing but whiskey. Few country houses at the South have a
+cellar--that apartment deemed so essential by Northern housekeepers. The
+intervening space between the ground and the floor is there left open,
+to allow of a free circulation of air.]
+
+[Footnote K: No regular dinner-hour is allowed the blacks on most
+turpentine plantations. Their food is usually either taken with them to
+the woods, or carried there by house servants, at stated times.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE BURIAL OF "JULE."
+
+
+The family were at supper when I returned to the mansion, and, entering
+the room, I took my accustomed place at the table. None present seemed
+disposed to conversation. The little that was said was spoken in a low,
+subdued tone, and no allusion was made to the startling event of the
+day. At last the octoroon woman asked me if I had met Mrs. Barnes at the
+farmer's.
+
+"Yes," I replied, "and I was greatly pleased with her. She seems one of
+those rare women who would lend grace to even the lowest station."
+
+"She _is_ a rare woman; a true, sincere Christian. Every one loves her;
+but few know all her worth; only those do who have gone to her in sorrow
+and trial, as--" and her voice trembled, and her eyes moistened--"as I
+have."
+
+And so that poor, outcast, despised, dishonored woman, scorned and
+cast-off by all the world, had found one sympathizing, pitying friend.
+Truly, "He tempers the wind to the shorn lamb."
+
+When the meal was over, all but Madam P---- retired to the library.
+Tommy and I fell to reading, but the Colonel shortly rose and continued
+pacing up and down the apartment till the clock sounded eight. The lady
+then entered, and said to him.
+
+"The negroes are ready, David; will _you_ go, Mr. K----?"
+
+"I think not, madam," I replied; "at least not now."
+
+I continued reading, for a time, when, tiring of the book, I laid it
+down, and followed them to the little burial-ground.
+
+The grave of Sam was open, and the plantation blacks were gathered
+around it. In the centre of the group, and at the head of the rude
+coffin, the Colonel was seated, and near him the octoroon woman and her
+son. The old preacher was speaking.
+
+"My chil'ren," he said: "she hab gone ter Him, wid har chile: gone up
+dar, whar dey doan't sorrer no more, whar dey doan't weep no more, whar
+all tears am wiped from dar eyes foreber. I knows she lay han's on
+harseff, and dat, my chil'ren, am whot none ob us shud do, 'case we'm de
+Lord's; He put us har, an' he'll take us 'way when we's fru wid our
+work, not afore. We hab no right ter gwo afore. Pore Juley did--but
+p'raps she cudn't help it. P'raps de great sorrer war so big in har
+heart, dat she cudn't fine rest nowhar but in de cole, dark riber.
+P'raps she warn't ter blame--p'raps," and here his eyes filled: "p'raps
+ole Pomp war all ter blame, for I tole har, my chil'ren"--he could say
+no more, and sinking down on a rude seat, he covered his face, and
+sobbed audibly. Even the Colonel's strong frame heaved with emotion, and
+not a dry eye was near. After a time the old man rose again, and with
+streaming eyes, and upturned face, continued:
+
+"Dars One up dar, my chil'ren, dat say: 'Come unter Me, all ye dat am a
+weary an' a heaby laden, an' I will gib you ress.' He, de good Lord, He
+say dat; and p'raps Juley hard Him say it, an' dat make har gwo." Again
+his voice failed, and he sank down, weeping and moaning as if his heart
+would break.
+
+A pause followed, when the Colonel rose, and aided by Jim and two other
+blacks, with his own hands nailed down the lid, and lowered the rude
+coffin into the ground. Then the earth was thrown upon it, and then the
+long, low chant which the negroes raise over the dead, mingling now with
+sobs and moans, and breaking into a strange wild wail, went up among the
+pines, and floating off on the still night air, echoed through the dark
+woods, till it sounded like music from the grave. I have been in the
+chamber of the dying; I have seen the young and the beautiful laid away
+in the earth; but I never felt the solemn awfulness of death, as I did,
+when, in the stillness and darkness of night, I listened to the wild
+grief of that negro group, and saw the bodies of that slave mother and
+her child, lowered to their everlasting rest by the side of Sam.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+HOMEWARD.
+
+
+The morning broke bright and mellow with the rays of the winter sun,
+which in Carolina lends the warmth of October to the chills of January,
+when, with my portmanteau strapped, and my thin overcoat on my arm, I
+gave my last "God bless you" to the octoroon woman, and turned my face
+toward home.
+
+Jim shouted "all ready," the driver cracked his whip, and we were on our
+way to Georgetown.
+
+The recent rains had hardened the roads, the bridges were repaired, and
+we were whirled rapidly forward, and, at one o'clock, reached
+Bucksville. There we met a cordial welcome, and remained to dinner. Our
+host pressed us to pass the night at his house, but the Colonel had
+business with one of his secession friends residing down the road--my
+wayside acquaintance, Colonel A----, and desired to stay overnight with
+him. At three o'clock, bidding a kindly farewell to Captain B---- and his
+excellent family, we were again on our way.
+
+The sun was just sinking among the western pines, when we turned into a
+broad avenue, lined with stately old trees, and rode up to the door-way
+of the rice-planter. It was a large, square, dingy old house, seated on
+a gentle knoll, a short half-mile from the river, along whose banks
+stretched the rice-fields. We entered, and were soon welcomed by its
+proprietor.
+
+He received my friend warmly, and gave me a courteous greeting,
+remarking, when I mentioned that I was homeward bound, that it was wise
+to go. "Things are very unsettled; there's no telling what a day may
+bring forth; feeling is running very high, and a Northern man, whatever
+his principles, is not safe here. By-the-way," he added, "did you not
+meet with some little obstruction at Conwayboro', on your way up?"
+
+"Yes, I did; a person there ordered me back, but when things began to
+look serious, Scipio, the negro whom you saw with me, got me out of the
+hobble."
+
+"Didn't he tell the gentleman that you were a particular friend of mine,
+and had met me by appointment at Captain B----'s?" he asked, smiling.
+
+"I believe he did, sir; but I assure you, _I_ said nothing of the kind,
+and I think the black should not be blamed, under the circumstances."
+
+"Oh, no; I don't blame him. I think he did a smart thing. He might have
+said you were my grandmother, if it would have served you, for that low
+fellow is as fractious as the devil, and dead sure on the trigger."
+
+"You are very good, sir," I replied: "how did you hear of it?"
+
+"A day or two afterward, B---- passed here on his way to Georgetown. I
+had been riding out, and happened to be at the head of my avenue when
+he was going by. He stopped, and asked if I knew you. Not knowing, then,
+the circumstances, I said that I had met you casually at Bucksville, but
+had no particular acquaintance with you. He rode on, saying nothing
+further. The next morning, I had occasion to go to Georgetown, and at
+Mr. Fraser's office, accidentally heard that Scip--who is well-known and
+universally liked there--was to have a public whipping that evening.
+Something prompted me to inquire into it, and I was told that he had
+been charged by B---- with shielding a well-known abolitionist at
+Conwayboro'--a man who was going through the up-country, distributing
+such damnable publications as the New York _Independent_ and _Tribune_.
+I knew, of course, it referred to you, and that it wasn't true. I went
+to Scip and got the facts, and by stretching the truth a little, finally
+got him off. There was a slight discrepancy between my two accounts of
+you" (and here he laughed heartily), "and B----, when we were before the
+Justice, remarked on it, and came d----d near calling me a liar. It was
+lucky he didn't, for if he had, he'd have gone to h--l before the place
+was hot enough for him."
+
+"I cannot tell you, my dear sir, how grateful I am to you for this. It
+would have pained me more than I can express, if Scip had suffered for
+doing a disinterested kindness to me."
+
+Early in the morning we were again on our way, and twelve o'clock found
+us seated at a dinner of bacon, corn-bread, and waffles, in the "first
+hotel" of Georgetown. The Charleston boat was to leave at three o'clock;
+and, as soon as dinner was over, I sallied out to find Scip. After a
+half-hour's search I found him on "Shackelford's wharf," engaged in
+loading a schooner bound for New York with a cargo of cotton and
+turpentine.
+
+He was delighted to see me, and when I had told him I was going home,
+and might never see him again, I took his hand warmly in mine, and said:
+
+"Scip, I have heard of the disgrace that was near being put upon you on
+my account, and I feel deeply the disinterested service you did to me;
+now, I _can not_ go away without doing _something_ for you--showing you
+in _some_ way that I appreciate and _like_ you."
+
+"I like's _you_, massa," he replied, the tears coming to his eyes: "I
+tuk ter you de bery fuss day I seed you, 'case, I s'pose," and he wrung
+my hand till it ached: "you pitied de pore brack man. But you karnt do
+nuffin fur _me_, massa; I doant want nuffin; I doant want ter leab har,
+'case de Lord dat put me har, arn't willin' I shud gwo. But you kin do
+suffin, massa, fur de pore brack man,--an' dat'll be doin' it fur _me_,
+'case my heart am all in dat. You kin tell dem folks up dar, whar you
+lib, massa, dat we'm not like de brutes, as dey tink we is. Dat we's got
+souls, an' telligence, an' feelin's, an' am men like demselfs. You kin
+tell 'em, too, massa,--'case you's edication, and kin talk--how de pore
+wite man 'am kep' down har; how he'm ragged, an' starvin', an' ob no
+account, 'case de brack man am a slave. How der chil'ren can't get no
+schulein', how eben de grow'd up ones doan't know nuffin--not eben so
+much as de pore brack slave, 'case de 'stockracy wan't dar votes, an
+cudn't get 'em ef dey 'low'd 'em larning. Ef your folks know'd all de
+trufh--ef dey know'd how both de brack an' de pore w'ite man, am on de
+groun', and can't git up, ob demselfs--dey'd do _suffin'_--dey'd break
+de Constertution--dey'd do suffin' ter help us. I doant want no one
+hurted, I doant want no one wronged; but jess tink ob it, massa, four
+million ob bracks, and nigh so many pore wites, wid de bressed gospil
+shinin' down on 'em, an' dey not knowin' on it. All dem--ebry one of
+'em--made in de image ob de great God, an' dey driven roun', an' 'bused
+wuss dan de brutes. You's seed dis, massa, wid your own eyes, an' you
+kin tell 'em on it; an' you _will_ tell 'em on it, massa;" and again he
+took my hand while the tears rolled down his cheeks; "an' Scip will
+bress you fur it, massa; wid his bery lass breaf he'll bress you; an' de
+good Lord will bress you, too, massa; He will foreber bress you, for
+He'm on de side ob de pore, an' de 'flicted: His own book say dat, an'
+it am true, I knows it, fur I feels it _har_;" and he laid his hand on
+his heart, and was silent.
+
+I could not speak for a moment. When I mastered my feelings, I said, "I
+_will_ do it Scip; as God gives me strength, I _will_."
+
+Reader, I am keeping my word.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+
+This is not a work of fiction. It is a record of facts, and therefore
+the reader will not expect me to dispose of its various characters on
+artistic principles--that is, lay them away in one of those final
+receptacles for the creations of the romancer--the grave and matrimony.
+Death has been among them, but nearly all are yet doing their work in
+this breathing, busy world.
+
+The characters I have introduced are real. They are not drawn with the
+pencil of fancy, nor, I trust, colored with the tints of prejudice. The
+scenes I have described are true. I have taken some liberties with the
+names of persons and places, and, in a few instances, altered dates; but
+the events themselves occurred under my own observation. No one
+acquainted with the section of country I have described, or familiar
+with the characters I have delineated, will question this statement.
+Lest some one who has not seen the slave and the poor white man of the
+South, as he actually is, should deem my picture overdrawn, I will say
+that "the half has not been told!" If the whole were related--if the
+Southern system, in all its naked ugliness, were fully exposed--the
+truth would read like fiction, and the baldest relation of fact like
+the wildest dream, of romance.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The overseer was never taken. A letter which I received from Colonel
+J----, shortly prior to the stoppage of the mails, informed me that Moye
+had succeeded in crossing the mountains into Tennessee, where, in an
+interior town, he disposed of the horse, and then made his way by an
+inland route to the free states. The horse the Colonel had recovered,
+but the overseer he never expected to see. Moye is now, no doubt,
+somewhere in the North, and is probably at this present writing a
+zealous Union man, of somewhat the same "stripe" as the conductors of
+the New York _Herald_ and the Boston _Courier_.
+
+I have not heard directly from Scipio, but one day last July, after a
+long search, I found on one of the wharves of South Street, a coasting
+captain, who knew him well, and who had seen him the month previous at
+Georgetown. He was at that time pursuing his usual avocations, and was
+as much respected and trusted, as when I met him.
+
+A few days after the tidings of the fall of Sumter were received in New
+York, and when I had witnessed the spontaneous and universal uprising of
+the North, which followed that event, I dispatched letters to several of
+my Southern friends, giving them as near as I could an account of the
+true state of feeling here, and representing the utter madness of the
+course the South was pursuing. One of these letters went to my Union
+acquaintance whom I have called, in the preceding pages, "Andy Jones."
+
+He promptly replied, and a pretty regular correspondence ensued between
+us, which has continued, at intervals, even since the suspension of
+intercourse between the North and the South.
+
+Andy has stood firmly and nobly by the old flag. At the risk of every
+thing, he has boldly expressed his sentiments everywhere. With his life
+in his hand, and--a revolver in each of his breeches-pockets, he walked
+the streets of Wilmington when the secession fever was at its height,
+openly proclaiming his undying loyalty to the Union, and "no man dared
+gainsay him."
+
+But with all his patriotism, Andy keeps a bright eye on the "main
+chance." Like his brother, the Northern Yankee, whom he somewhat
+resembles and greatly admires, he never omits an opportunity of "turning
+an honest penny." In defiance of custom-house regulations, and of our
+strict blockade, he has carried on a more or less regular traffic with
+New York and Boston (_via_ Halifax and other neutral ports), ever since
+North Carolina seceded. His turpentine--while it was still his
+property--has been sold in the New York market, under the very eyes of
+the government officials--and, honest reader, _I_ have known of it.
+
+By various roundabout means, I have recently received letters from him.
+His last, dated in April, and brought to a neutral port by a shipmaster
+whom he implicitly trusts, has reached me since the previous chapters
+were written. It covers six pages of foolscap, and is written in
+defiance of all grammatical and orthographical principles; but as it
+conveys important intelligence, in regard to some of the persons
+mentioned in this narrative, I will transcribe a portion of it.
+
+It gave me the melancholy tidings of the death of Colonel J----. He had
+joined the Confederate army, and fell, bravely meeting a charge of the
+Massachusetts troops, at Roanoke.
+
+On receiving the news of his friend's death, Andy rode over to the
+plantation, and found Madam P---- plunged in the deepest grief. While he
+was there a letter arrived from Charleston, with intelligence of the
+dangerous illness of her son. This second blow crushed her. For several
+days she was delirious, and her life despaired of; but throughout the
+whole the noble corn-cracker, neglecting every thing, remained beside
+her.
+
+When she returned to herself, and had in a measure recovered her
+strength, she learned that the Colonel had left no will; that she was
+still a slave; and soon to be sold, with the rest of the Colonel's
+_personal property_, according to law.
+
+This is what Andy writes about the affair. I give the letter as he wrote
+it, merely correcting the punctuation, and enough of the spelling, to
+make it intelligible.
+
+"W'en I hard thet th' Cunel hadent leff no wil, I was hard put what ter
+dew; but arter thinkin' on it over a spell, I knowed shede har on it
+sumhow; so I 'cluded to tel har miseff. She tuk on d----d hard at
+fust, but arter a bit, grew more calm like, and then she sed it war
+God's wil, an' she wudent komplane. Ye nows I've got a wife, but wen the
+ma'am sed thet, she luk'd so like an angel, thet d----d eff I cud help
+puttin' my arms round har, an' hugin' on har, till she a'moste
+screeched. Wal, I toled har, Id stan' by har eff evrithing went ter
+h--l--an I wil, by ----.
+
+"I made up mi minde to onst, what ter dew. It war darned harde work tur
+bee'way from hum jess then, but I war in fur it; soe I put ter
+Charleston, ter see th' Cunel's 'oman. Wal, I seed har, an' I toled har
+how th' ma'am felte, an' how mutch shede dun at makein' th' Cunel's
+money--(she made nigh th' hul on it, 'case he war alers keerles, an' tuk
+no 'count uv things; eff tadent ben fur thet, hede made a wil,) an' I
+axed har ter see thet the ma'am had free papers ter onst. An' whot der
+ye 'spoze she sed? Nuthin, by ---- 'cept she dident no nuthin' 'bout
+bisniss, an' leff all uv sech things ter har loryer. Wal, then I went
+ter him--he ar one on them slick, ily, seceshun houn's, who'd sell thar
+soles fur a kountterfit dollar--an' he toled me, th' 'ministratur hadent
+sot yit, an' he cudent dew nuthin til he hed. Ses I: 'ye mean th'
+'ooman's got ter gwo ter th' hi'est bider?' 'Yas,' he sed, 'the Cunel's
+got dets, an' the've got ter bee pade, an' th' persoonel prop'ty muste
+bee sold ter dew it.' Then I sed, 'twud bee sum time fore thet war dun,
+an' the 'ooman's 'most ded an' uv no use now; 'what'll ye _hire_ har tur
+me fur.' He sed a hun'red for sicks months. I planked down the money
+ter onst, an' put off.
+
+"I war bilin' over, but it sumhow cum inter my hed thet the Cunnel's
+'ooman cudn't bee _all_ stun; so I gose thar agin; an' I toled har what
+the loryer sed, an' made a reg'lar stump-'peal tew har bettar natur. I
+axed har eff she'd leff the 'ooman who'd made har husban's fortun, who
+war the muther ov his chil'ren, who fur twenty yar, hed nussed him in
+sickness, an' cheered him in healtf; ef shede let _thet 'ooman_, bee
+auckyund off ter th' hi'est bider. I axed al thet, an' what der ye think
+she sed, Why jest this. '_I_ doant no nuthin' bout it, Mister Jones. Ye
+raily must talke ter mi loryer; them maters I leaves 'tirely ter him.'
+Then, I sed, I 'spozed the niggers war ter bee advertist. 'O, yas!' she
+sed, (an' ye see, she know'd a d----d site 'bout _thet_), 'all on 'em
+muss be solde, 'case, ye knows, I never did luv the kuntry,--'sides _I_
+cud'ent karry on the plantashun, no how.' Then, sed I: 'the Orlean's
+traders 'ill be thar--an' she wunt sell fur but one use, fur she's
+hansum yit; an' ma'am, ye wunt leff a 'ooman as white as you is, who fur
+twenty yar, hes ben a tru an' fatheful _wife_ tar yer own ded husban,'
+(I shudn't hev put thet in, but d----d ef I cud help it,) ye wunt put
+_har_ up on the block, an' hev har struck down ter the hi'est bider, ter
+bee made a d---- d---- on?'
+
+"Wal, I s'pose she hadent forgot thet, fur more'n twelve yar, the Cunnel
+hed _luv'd_ t'other 'ooman, an' onely _liked_ har; fur w'en I sed thet,
+har ize snapped like h--l, an' she screetched eout thet she dident 'low
+no sech wurds in har hous', an' ordurd me ter leave. Mi'tey sqeemish
+thet, warn't it? bein' as shede ben fur so mony yar the Cunnel's ----,
+an' th' tuther one his raal wife.
+
+"Wal, I _did_ leav'; but I left a piece of mi mind a-hind. I toled har
+I'de buy that ar 'ooman ef she cost all I war wuth and I had ter pawne
+my sole ter git the money; an' I added, jess by way ov sweet'nin' the
+pill, thet I ow'd all I hed ter har husband, an' dident furget _my_
+debts ef she did _her'n_, an' ef his own wife disgraced him, I'd be
+d----d ef _I_ wud.
+
+"Wal, I've got th' ma'am an' har boy ter hum, an' my 'ooman hes tuk ter
+har a heep. I doant no w'en the sale's ter cum off, but ye may bet hi'
+on my beein' thar; an' I'll buy har ef I hev ter go my hull pile on har,
+an' borrer th' money fur ole Pomp. But _he'll_ go cheap, 'case the
+Cunnel's deth nigh dun him up. It clean killed Ante Lucey. She never
+held her hed up arter she heerd 'Masser Davy' war dead, fur she sot har
+vary life on him. Don't ye fele consarned 'bout the ma'am--I knows ye
+sot hi' on har--_I'll buy har_, shore. Thet an' deth ar th' onely things
+thet I knows on, in this wurld, jess now, that ar SARTIN."
+
+Such is Andy's letter. Mis-spelled and profane though it be, I would not
+alter a word or a syllable of it. It deserves to be written in
+characters of gold, and hung up in the sky, where it might be read by
+all the world. And it _is_ written in the sky--in the great
+record-book--and it will be read when you and I, reader, meet the
+assembled universe, to give account of what _we_ have done and written.
+God grant that our record may show some such deed as that!
+
+
+
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+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Among the Pines, by James R. Gilmore</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: Among the Pines</p>
+<p>       or, South in Secession Time</p>
+<p>Author: James R. Gilmore</p>
+<p>Release Date: October 11, 2007  [eBook #22960]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMONG THE PINES***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>E-text prepared by David Garcia, Annie McGuire,<br />
+    and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
+    (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net/c/">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br />
+    from page images generously made available by the<br />
+    Kentuckiana Digital Library<br />
+    (<a href="http://kdl.kyvl.org/">http://kdl.kyvl.org/</a>)</h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="10" style="background-color: #ccccff;">
+  <tr>
+    <td valign="top">
+      Note:
+    </td>
+    <td>
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Kentuckiana Digital Library. See
+      <a href="http://kdl.kyvl.org/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=kyetexts;cc=kyetexts;xc=1&amp;idno=B96-8-34456937&amp;view=toc">
+      http://kdl.kyvl.org/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=kyetexts;cc=kyetexts;xc=1&amp;idno=B96-8-34456937&amp;view=toc</a>
+    </td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
+
+<h1>AMONG THE PINES.</h1>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p>
+
+<hr style="width: 95%;" />
+
+
+
+
+<h4>A NEW WORK, Descriptive of Southern Social Life,</h4>
+
+<h4>BY THE AUTHOR OF AMONG THE PINES,</h4>
+
+<h4>Is now in course of publication in THE "CONTINENTAL MONTHLY,"</h4>
+
+<h4>PUBLISHED BY J. R. GILMORE, 532 Broadway, NEW YORK.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></h4>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h4><a name="AMONG_THE_PINES" id="AMONG_THE_PINES"></a>AMONG THE PINES:</h4>
+
+<h4>or,</h4>
+
+<h4>SOUTH IN SECESSION TIME.</h4>
+
+<h4>BY</h4>
+
+<h4>EDMUND KIRKE.</h4>
+
+<hr style="width: 95%;" />
+
+<h4>TENTH THOUSAND.</h4>
+
+<h4>NEW YORK: J. R. GILMORE, 532 BROADWAY.</h4>
+
+<h4>CHARLES T. EVANS.</h4>
+
+<h4>1862.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span></h4>
+
+<h4>Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1862,</h4>
+
+<h4>BY J. R. GILMORE,</h4>
+
+<h4>In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States,</h4>
+
+<h4>for the Southern District of New York.</h4>
+
+<h4>M'CREA &amp; MILLER, STEREOTYPERS.      C. A. ALVORD, PRINTER<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></h4>
+
+<hr style="width: 95%;" />
+
+
+
+
+<h4>TO</h4>
+
+<h4>RICHARD B. KIMBALL,</h4>
+
+<h4>THE ACCOMPLISHED AUTHOR, THE POLISHED GENTLEMAN,</h4>
+
+<h4>AND</h4>
+
+<h4>MY OLD AND EVER-VALUED FRIEND,</h4>
+
+<h4>THESE SKETCHES ARE DEDICATED</h4>
+
+<h4>BY THE</h4>
+
+<h4><span class="smcap">Author</span>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></h4>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS.</h2>
+
+<ul class="TOC" style="list-style-type:upper-roman;">
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_I"><b>On The Road.</b></a><br />
+<p>Arrival at Georgetown.&mdash;The Village Inn.&mdash;Nocturnal Adventures.&mdash;My
+African Driver.&mdash;His Strange History.&mdash;Genuine Negro Songs.&mdash;Arrival
+at Bucksville.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_II"><b>Wayside Hospitality.</b></a><br />
+<p>A Strange Meeting.&mdash;A Well Ordered Plantation.&mdash;A Thunder-storm.&mdash;A
+Guest.&mdash;The Hidden Springs or Secession Exposed.&mdash;On the Way
+Again.&mdash;Intelligence of the Negro.&mdash;Renconter with a Secessionist.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_III"><b>Crossing the Runs.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Black Declines His Freedom.&mdash;His Reasons for so Doing.&mdash;A "native" Abolitionist.&mdash;Swimming
+the Run.&mdash;Black Spirits and White.&mdash;Shelter.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IV"><b>Poor Whites.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Mills House.&mdash;South Carolina Clay-Eaters.&mdash;Political
+Discussion.&mdash;President Lincoln a Negro.&mdash;"Three in a Bed and one in the
+Middle."&mdash;$250 reward.&mdash;A Secret League.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_V"><b>On the Plantation.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Planter's Dwelling.&mdash;His House-Keeper.&mdash;The Process of Turpentine
+Making.&mdash;Loss to Carolina by Secession.&mdash;The Dying Boy.&mdash;The Story
+of Jim.&mdash;A Northern Man with Southern Principles.&mdash;Sam Murdered.&mdash;Pursuit
+of the Overseer.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VI"><b>The Planter's Family.</b></a><br />
+<p>The old Nurse.&mdash;Her Story.&mdash;A White Slave-Woman's Opinion of Slavery.&mdash;The Stables.&mdash;The
+Negro-Quarters.&mdash;Sunday Exercises.&mdash;The Taking of Moye.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VII"><b>Plantation Discipline.</b></a><br />
+<p>The "Ole Cabin."&mdash;The Mode of Negro Punishment.&mdash;The "Thumb-Screw."&mdash;A
+Ministering Angel.&mdash;A Negro Trial.&mdash;A Rebellion.&mdash;A Turpentine Dealer.&mdash;A
+Boston Dray on its Travels.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII"><b>The Negro Hunter.</b></a><br />
+<p>Young Democrats.&mdash;Political Discussion.&mdash;Startling Statistics.&mdash;A Freed Negro.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IX"><b>The Country Church.</b></a><br />
+<p>Its Description.&mdash;The "Corn-Cracker."&mdash;The News.&mdash;Strange Disclosure.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_X"><b>The Negro Funeral.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Burial Ground.&mdash;A Negro Sermon.&mdash;The Appearance of Juley.&mdash;The
+Colonel's Heartlessness.&mdash;The Octoroon's Explanation of it.&mdash;The Escape of Moye.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XI"><b>The Pursuit.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Start.&mdash;"Carolina Race-Horses."&mdash;A Race.&mdash;We Lose the Trail.&mdash;A
+Tornado.&mdash;A Narrow Escape.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XII"><b>The Yankee Schoolmistress.</b></a><br />
+<p>Our Ne Apparel.&mdash;"Kissing Goes by Favor."&mdash;Schools at the South.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII"><b>The Railway Station.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Village.&mdash;A Drunken Yankee.&mdash;A Narrow Escape.&mdash;Andy Jones.&mdash;A Light-Wood
+Fire.&mdash;The Colonel's Departure.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV"><b>The Barbacue.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Camp-Ground.&mdash;The Stump-Speaker.&mdash;A Stump Speech.&mdash;Almost a
+Fight.&mdash;The Manner of Roasting the Ox.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XV"><b>The Return.</b></a><br />
+<p>Arrival at the Plantation.&mdash;Disappearance of Juley and her child.&mdash;The Old Preacher's Story.&mdash;Scene
+Between the Master and the Slave.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI"><b>"One More Unfortunate."</b></a><br />
+<p>Attempted Whipping of Jim.&mdash;Appearance of the "Corn-Cracker."&mdash;"Drowned.&mdash;Drowned."
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII"><b>The Small Planter.</b></a><br />
+<p>His House.&mdash;His Wife.&mdash;His Negroes.&mdash;A Juvenile Darky.&mdash;Lazarus in "Ab'ram's
+Buzzum."&mdash;White and Black Labor Compared.&mdash;The Mysteries of "Rosum"
+manufacture.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII"><b>The Burial of Jule.</b></a><br />
+<p>"He Tempers the Wind to the Shorn Lamb."&mdash;The Funeral.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX"><b>Homeward Bound.</b></a><br />
+<p>Colonel A&mdash;&mdash; Again.&mdash;Parting with Scipio.&mdash;Why this Book was Written.
+</p>
+</li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XX"><b>Conclusion.</b></a><br />
+<p>The Author's Explanations.&mdash;Last News from Moye and Scipio.&mdash;Affecting Letter from
+Andy Jones.&mdash;The End.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span>
+</p>
+</li>
+</ul>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+
+<h3>ON THE ROAD.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Some winters ago I passed several weeks at Tallahassee, Florida, and
+while there made the acquaintance of Colonel J&mdash;&mdash;, a South Carolina
+planter. Accident, some little time later, threw us together again at
+Charleston, when I was gratified to learn that he would be my <i>compagnon
+du voyage</i> as far north as New York.</p>
+
+<p>He was accompanied by his body-servant, "Jim," a fine specimen of the
+genus darky, about thirty years of age, and born and reared in his
+master's family. As far as possible we made the journey by day, stopping
+at some convenient resting-place by night; on which occasions the
+Colonel, Jim, and myself would occupy the same or adjoining apartments,
+"we white folks" sleeping on four posts, while the more democratic negro
+spread his blanket on the floor. Thrown together thus<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> intimately, it
+was but natural that we should learn much of each other.</p>
+
+<p>The "Colonel" was a highly cultivated and intelligent gentleman, and
+during this journey a friendship sprung up between us&mdash;afterward kept
+alive by a regular correspondence&mdash;which led him, with his wife and
+daughter, and the man Jim, to my house on his next visit at the North,
+one year later. I then promised&mdash;if I should ever again travel in South
+Carolina&mdash;to visit him on his plantation in the extreme north-eastern
+part of the state.</p>
+
+<p>In December last, about the time of the passage of the ordinance of
+secession, I had occasion to visit Charleston, and, previous to setting
+out, dispatched a letter to the Colonel with the information that I was
+ready to be led of him "into the wilderness." On arriving at the
+head-quarters of secession, I found a missive awaiting me, in which my
+friend cordially renewed his previous tender of hospitality, gave me
+particular directions how to proceed, and stated that his "man Jim"
+would meet me with a carriage at Georgetown, and convey me thence,
+seventy miles, to "the plantation."</p>
+
+<p>Having performed the business which led me to Charleston, I set out for
+the rendezvous five days before the date fixed for the meeting,
+intending to occupy the intervening time in an exploration of the
+ancient town and its surroundings.</p>
+
+<p>The little steamer Nina (a cross between a full-grown<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> nautilus and a
+half-grown tub), which a few weeks later was enrolled as the first
+man-of-war of the Confederate navy, then performed the carrying trade
+between the two principal cities of South Carolina. On her, together
+with sundry boxes and bales, and certain human merchandise, I embarked
+at Charleston, and on a delicious morning, late in December, landed at
+Georgetown.</p>
+
+<p>As the embryo war-steamer rounded up to the long, low, rickety dock,
+lumbered breast-high with cotton, turpentine, and rosin, not a white
+face was to be seen. A few half-clad, shiftless-looking negroes,
+lounging idly about, were the only portion of the population in waiting
+to witness our landing.</p>
+
+<p>"Are all the people dead?" I inquired of one of them, thinking it
+strange that an event so important as the arrival of the Charleston
+packet should excite no greater interest in so quiet a town. "Not dead,
+massa," replied the black, with a knowing chuckle, "but dey'm gettin'
+ready for a fun'ral." "What funeral?" I asked. "Why, dey'm gwine to
+shoot all de boblition darkies at de Norf, and hab a brack burying; he!
+he!" and the sable gentleman expanded the opening in his countenance to
+an enormous extent, doubtless at the brilliancy of his wit.</p>
+
+<p>I asked him to take my portmanteau, and conduct me to the best hotel. He
+readily assented, "Yas, yas, massa, I show you whar de <i>big-bugs</i> stop;"
+but at once turning to another darky standing near, he accosted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> him
+with, "Here, Jim, you lazy nigga, tote de gemman's tings."</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you take them yourself?" I asked; "you will then get all the
+pay." "No, no, massa; dat nigga and me in partenship; he do de work, and
+I keeps de change," was the grinning reply, and it admirably illustrates
+a peculiarity I have observed to be universal with the negro. When left
+to his own direction, he invariably "goes into partenship" with some one
+poorer than himself, and no matter how trivial the task, shirks all the
+labor he can.</p>
+
+<p>The silent darky and my portmanteau in the van, and the garrulous old
+negro guarding my flank, I wended my way through the principal street to
+the hotel. On the route I resumed the conversation:</p>
+
+<p>"So, uncle, you say the people here are getting ready for a black
+burying?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, gwine to bury all dem mis'able free niggas at de Norf."</p>
+
+<p>"Why? What will you do that for?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why for, massa! you ax why for!" he exclaimed in surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," I rejoined; "I'm a stranger here."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you see, massa, dem boblition niggas up dar hab gone and 'lected
+a ole darky, dey call Uncle Abe; and Old Abe he'se gwine to come down
+Souf, and cut de decent niggas' troats. He'll hab a good time&mdash;<i>he
+will</i>! My young massa's captin ob de sogers, and he'll cotch de ole
+coon, and string him up so high de crows<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> won't scent him; yas, he
+will;" and again the old darky's face opened till it looked like the
+entrance to the Mammoth Cave. He, evidently, had read the Southern
+papers.</p>
+
+<p>Depositing my luggage at the hotel, which I found on a side street&mdash;a
+dilapidated, unpainted wooden building, with a female landlord&mdash;I
+started out to explore the town, till the hour for dinner. Retracing my
+steps in the direction of the steamboat landing, I found the streets
+nearly deserted, although it was the hour when the business of the day
+is usually transacted. Soon I discovered the cause. The militia of the
+place were out on parade. Preceded by a colored band, playing national
+airs&mdash;in doleful keeping with the occasion&mdash;and followed by a motley
+collection of negroes of all sexes and ages, the company was entering
+the principal thoroughfare. As it passed me, I could judge of the
+prowess of the redoubtable captain, who, according to Pompey, will hang
+the President "so high de crows won't scent him." He was a
+harmless-looking young man, with long, spindle legs, admirably adapted
+to running. Though not formidable in other respects, there <i>was</i> a
+certain martial air about an enormous sabre which hung at his side, and
+occasionally got entangled in his nether integuments, and a fiery,
+warlike look to the heavy tuft of reddish hair which sprouted in
+bristling defiance from his upper lip.</p>
+
+<p>The company numbered about seventy, some with uniforms and some without,
+and bearing all sorts of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> arms, from the old flint-lock musket to the
+modern revolving rifle. They were, however, sturdy fellows, and looked
+as if they might do service at "the imminent deadly breach." Their full
+ranks taken from a population of less than five hundred whites, told
+unmistakably the intense war feeling of the community.</p>
+
+<p>Georgetown is one of the oldest towns in South Carolina, and it has a
+decidedly <i>finished</i> appearance. Not a single building, I was informed,
+had been erected there in five years. Turpentine is one of the chief
+productions of the district; yet the cost of white lead and chrome
+yellow has made paint a scarce commodity, and the houses, consequently,
+all wear a dingy, decayed look. Though situated on a magnificent bay, a
+little below the confluence of three noble rivers, which drain a country
+of surpassing richness, and though the centre of the finest rice-growing
+district in the world, the town is dead. Every thing about it wears an
+air of dilapidation. The few white men you meet in its streets, or see
+lounging lazily around its stores and warehouses, appear to lack all
+purpose and energy. Long contact with the negro seems to have given them
+his shiftless, aimless character.</p>
+
+<p>The ordinance of secession passed the legislature shortly prior to my
+arrival, and, as might be expected, the political situation was the
+all-engrossing topic of thought and conversation. In the estimation of
+the whites a glorious future was about to open on the little state.
+Whether she stood alone, or supported<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> by the other slave states, she
+would assume a high rank among the nations of the earth; her cotton and
+rice would draw trade and wealth from every land, and when she spoke,
+creation would tremble. Such overweening state pride in <i>such</i> a
+people&mdash;shiftless, indolent, and enervated as they are&mdash;strikes a
+stranger as in the last degree ludicrous; but when they tell you, in the
+presence of the black, whose strong brawny arm and sinewy frame show
+that in him lies the real strength of the state, that this great empire
+is to be built on the shoulders of the slave, your smile of incredulity
+gives way to an expression of pity, and you are tempted to ask if those
+sinewy machines may not <span class="smcap">THINK</span>, and some day rise, and topple down the
+mighty fabric which is to be reared on their backs!</p>
+
+<p>Among the "peculiar institutions" of the South are its inns. I do not
+refer to the pinchbeck, imitation St. Nicholas establishments, which
+flourish in the larger cities, but to those home-made affairs, noted for
+hog and hominy, corn-cake and waffles, which crop out here and there in
+the smaller towns, the natural growth of Southern life and institutions.
+A model of this class is the one at Georgetown. Hog, hominy, and
+corn-cake for breakfast; waffles, hog, and hominy for dinner; and hog,
+hominy, and corn-cake for supper&mdash;and such corn-cake, baked in the ashes
+of the hearth, a plentiful supply of the grayish condiment still
+clinging to it!&mdash;is its never-varying bill of fare. I endured this fare
+for a day, <i>how</i>, has ever since been a mystery to me, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> when night
+came my experiences were indescribable. Retiring early, to get the rest
+needed to fit me for a long ride on the morrow, I soon realized that
+"there is no rest for the wicked," none, at least, for sinners at the
+South. Scarcely had my head touched the pillow when I was besieged by an
+army of red-coated secessionists, who set upon me without mercy. I
+withstood the assault manfully, till "bleeding at every pore," and then
+slowly and sorrowfully beat a retreat. Ten thousand to one is greater
+odds than the gallant Anderson encountered at Sumter. Yet I determined
+not to fully abandon the field. Placing three chairs in a row, I mounted
+upon them, and in that seemingly impregnable position hurled defiance at
+the enemy, in the words of Scott (slightly altered to suit the
+occasion):</p>
+
+<p>
+"Come one, come all, these chairs shall fly<br />
+From their firm base as soon as I."<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>My exultation, however, was of short duration. The persistent foe,
+scaling my intrenchments, soon returned to the assault with redoubled
+vigor, and in utter despair I finally fled. Groping my way through the
+hall, and out of the street-door, I departed. The Sable Brother&mdash;alias
+the Son of Ham&mdash;alias the Image of GOD carved in Ebony&mdash;alias the
+Oppressed Type&mdash;alias the Contraband&mdash;alias the Irrepressible
+Nigger&mdash;alias the Chattel&mdash;alias the Darky&mdash;alias the Cullud Pusson&mdash;had
+informed me that I should find the Big Bugs at that hotel. I had found
+them.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Staying longer in such a place was out of the question, and I determined
+to make my way to the up-country without longer waiting for Jim. With
+the first streak of day I sallied out to find the means of locomotion.</p>
+
+<p>The ancient town boasts no public conveyance, except a one-horse gig
+that carries the mail in tri-weekly trips to Charleston. That vehicle,
+originally used by some New England doctor, in the early part of the
+past century, had but one seat, and besides, was not going the way I
+intended to take, so I was forced to seek a conveyance at a
+livery-stable. At the only livery establishment in the place, kept by a
+"cullud pusson," who, though a slave, owns a stud of horses that might,
+among a people more <i>movingly</i> inclined, yield a respectable income, I
+found what I wanted&mdash;a light Newark buggy, and a spanking gray. Provided
+with these, and a darky driver, who was to accompany me to my
+destination, and return alone, I started. A trip of seventy miles is
+something of an undertaking in that region, and quite a crowd gathered
+around to witness our departure, not a soul of whom, I will wager, will
+ever hear the rumble of a stage-coach, or the whistle of a steam-car, in
+those sandy, deserted streets.</p>
+
+<p>We soon left the village, and struck a broad avenue, lined on either
+side by fine old trees, and extending in an air-line for several miles.
+The road is skirted by broad rice-fields, and these are dotted here and
+there by large antiquated houses, and little collections of negro huts.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>
+It was Christmas week; no hands were busy in the fields, and every thing
+wore the aspect of Sunday. We had ridden a few miles when suddenly the
+road sunk into a deep, broad stream, called, as the driver told me, the
+Black River. No appliance for crossing being at hand, or in sight, I was
+about concluding that some modern Moses accommodated travellers by
+passing them over its bed dry-shod, when a flat-boat shot out from the
+jungle on the opposite bank, and pulled toward us. It was built of
+two-inch plank, and manned by two infirm darkies, with frosted wool, who
+seemed to need all their strength to sit upright. In that leaky craft,
+kept afloat by incessant baling, we succeeded, at the end of an hour, in
+crossing the river. And this, be it understood, is travelling in one of
+the richest districts of South Carolina!</p>
+
+<p>We soon left the region of the rice-fields, and plunged into dense
+forests of the long-leafed pine, where for miles not a house, or any
+other evidence of human occupation, is to be seen. Nothing could well be
+more dreary than a ride through such a region, and to while away the
+tedium of the journey I opened a conversation with the driver, who up to
+that time had maintained a respectful silence.</p>
+
+<p>He was a genuine native African, and a most original and interesting
+specimen of his race. His thin, close-cut lips, straight nose and
+European features contrasted strangely with a skin of ebon blackness,
+and the quiet, simple dignity of his manner betokened superior
+intelligence.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> His story was a strange one. When a boy, he was with his
+mother, kidnapped by a hostile tribe, and sold to the traders at Cape
+Lopez, on the western coast of Africa. There, in the slave-pen, the
+mother died, and he, a child of seven years, was sent in the slave-ship
+to Cuba. At Havana, when sixteen, he attracted the notice of a gentleman
+residing in Charleston, who bought him and took him to "the States." He
+lived as house-servant in the family of this gentleman till 1855, when
+his master died, leaving him a legacy to a daughter. This lady, a kind,
+indulgent mistress, had since allowed him to "hire his time," and he
+then carried on an "independent business," as porter, and doer of all
+work around the wharves and streets of Georgetown. He thus gained a
+comfortable living, besides paying to his mistress one hundred and fifty
+dollars yearly for the privilege of earning his own support. In every
+way he was a remarkable negro, and my three days' acquaintance with him
+banished from my mind all doubt as to the capacity of the black for
+freedom, and all question as to the disposition of the slave to strike
+off his chains when the favorable moment arrives. From him I learned
+that the blacks, though pretending ignorance, are fully acquainted with
+the questions at issue in the pending contest. He expressed the opinion,
+that war would come in consequence of the stand South Carolina had
+taken; and when I said to him: "But if it comes you will be no better
+off. It will end in a compromise, and leave you where you are." He
+answered:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> "No, massa, 't wont do dat. De Souf will fight hard, and de
+Norf will get de blood up, and come down har, and do 'way wid de <i>cause</i>
+ob all de trubble&mdash;and dat am de nigga."</p>
+
+<p>"But," I said, "perhaps the South will drive the North back; as you say,
+they will fight hard."</p>
+
+<p>"Dat dey will, massa, dey'm de fightin' sort, but dey can't whip de
+Norf, 'cause you see dey'll fight wid only one hand. When dey fight de
+Norf wid de right hand, dey'll hev to hold de nigga wid de leff."</p>
+
+<p>"But," I replied, "the blacks wont rise; most of you have kind masters
+and fare well."</p>
+
+<p>"Dat's true, massa, but dat an't freedom, and de black lub freedom as
+much as de white. De same blessed LORD made dem both, and HE made dem
+all 'like, 'cep de skin. De blacks hab strong hands, and when de day
+come you'll see dey hab heads, too!"</p>
+
+<p>Much other conversation, showing him possessed of a high degree of
+intelligence, passed between us. In answer to my question if he had a
+family, he said: "No, sar. My blood shall neber be slaves! Ole massa
+flog me and threaten to kill me 'cause I wouldn't take to de wimmin; but
+I tole him to kill, dat 't would be more his loss dan mine."</p>
+
+<p>I asked if the negroes generally felt as he did, and he told me that
+many did; that nearly all would fight for their freedom if they had the
+opportunity, though some preferred slavery because they were sure of
+being cared for when old and infirm, not considering that if their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>
+labor, while they were strong, made their masters rich, the same labor
+would afford <i>them</i> provision against old age. He told me that there are
+in the <i>district</i> of Georgetown twenty thousand blacks, and not more
+than two thousand whites, and "Suppose," he added, "dat one-quarter ob
+dese niggas rise&mdash;de rest keep still&mdash;whar den would de white folks be?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," I replied, "they would be taken at a disadvantage; but it
+would not be long before aid came from Charleston, and you would be
+overpowered."</p>
+
+<p>"No, massa, de chivarly, as you call dem, would be 'way in Virginny, and
+'fore dey hard of it Massa Seward would hab troops 'nough in Georgetown
+to chaw up de hull state in less dan no time."</p>
+
+<p>"But you have no leaders," I said, "no one to direct the movement. Your
+race is not a match for the white in generalship, and without generals,
+whatever your numbers, you would fare hardly."</p>
+
+<p>To this he replied, an elevated enthusiasm lighting up his face, "De
+<span class="smcap">Lord</span>, massa, made generals ob Gideon and David, and de brack man know as
+much 'bout war as dey did; p'raps," he added, with a quiet humor, "de
+brack aint equal to de white. I knows most ob de great men, like
+Washington and John and James and Paul, and dem ole fellers war white,
+but dar war Two Sand (Tousaint L'Overture), de Brack Douglass, and de
+Nigga Demus (Nicodemus), dey war brack."</p>
+
+<p>The argument was unanswerable, and I said nothing. If the day which sees
+the rising of the Southern blacks<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> comes to this generation, that negro
+will be among the leaders. He sang to me several of the songs current
+among the negroes of the district, and though of little poetic value,
+they interested me, as indicating the feelings of the slaves. The blacks
+are a musical race, and the readiness with which many of them improvise
+words and melody is wonderful; but I had met none who possessed the
+readiness of my new acquaintance. Several of the tunes he repeated
+several times, and each time with a new accompaniment of words. I will
+try to render the sentiment of a few of these songs into as good negro
+dialect as I am master of, but I cannot hope to repeat the precise
+words, or to convey the indescribable humor and pathos which my darky
+friend threw into them, and which made our long, solitary ride through
+those dreary pine-barrens pass rapidly and pleasantly away. The first
+referred to an old darky who was transplanted from the cotton-fields of
+"ole Virginny" to the rice-swamps of Carolina, and who did not like the
+change, but found consolation in the fact that rice is not grown on "the
+other side of Jordan."</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Come listen, all you darkies, come listen to my song,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">It am about ole Massa, who use me bery wrong.</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">In de cole, frosty mornin', it an't so bery nice,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Wid de water to de middle to hoe among de rice;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">When I neber hab forgotten</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">How I used to hoe de cotton,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">How I used to hoe de cotton,</span><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 9em;">On de ole Virginny shore;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">But I'll neber hoe de cotton,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">Oh! neber hoe de cotton</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 9em;">Any more.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"If I feel de drefful hunger, he tink it am a vice,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And he gib me for my dinner a little broken rice,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">A little broken rice and a bery little fat&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And he grumble like de debil if I eat too much of dat;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">When I neber hab forgotten, etc.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"He tore me from my <span class="smcap">Dinah</span>; I tought my heart would burst&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">He made me lub anoder when my lub was wid de first,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">He sole my picaninnies becase he got dar price,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And shut me in de marsh-field to hoe among de rice;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">When I neber had forgotten, etc.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"And all de day I hoe dar, in all de heat and rain,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And as I hoe away dar, my heart go back again,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Back to de little cabin dat stood among de corn,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And to de ole plantation where she and I war born!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">Oh! I wish I had forgotten, etc.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Den <span class="smcap">Dinah</span> am beside me, de chil'ren on my knee,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And dough I am a slave dar, it 'pears to me I'm free,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Till I wake up from my dreaming, and wife and chil'ren gone,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">I hoe away and weep dar, and weep dar all alone!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">Oh! I wish I had forgotten, etc.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"But soon a day am comin, a day I long to see,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When dis darky in de cole ground, foreber will be free,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When wife and chil'ren wid me, I'll sing in Paradise,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">How <span class="smcap">He</span>, de blessed <span class="smcap">Jesus</span>, hab bought me wid a price.</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">How de <span class="smcap">Lord</span> hab not forgotten</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">How well I hoed de cotton,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">How well I hoed de cotton</span><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 10.5em;">On de ole Virginny shore;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">Dar I'll neber hoe de cotton,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">Oh! neber hoe de cotton</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 10.5em;">Any more."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>The politics of the following are not exactly those of the rulers at
+Washington, but we all may come to this complexion at last:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Hark! darkies, hark! it am de drum</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Dat calls ole Massa 'way from hum,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Wid powder-pouch and loaded gun,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">To drive ole <span class="smcap">Abe</span> from Washington;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Oh! Massa's gwine to Washington,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">So clar de way to Washington&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Oh! wont dis darky hab sum fun</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">When Massa's gwine to Washington!</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Dis darky know what Massa do;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">He take him long to brack him shoe,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">To brack him shoe and tote him gun,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When he am 'way to Washington.</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Oh! Massa's gwine to Washington,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">So clar de way to Washington,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Oh! long afore de mornin' sun</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Ole Massa's gwine to Washington!</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Ole Massa say ole <span class="smcap">Abe</span> will eat</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">De niggas all excep' de feet&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">De feet, may be, will cut and run,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When Massa gets to Washington,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">When Massa gets to Washington;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">So clar de way to Washington&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Oh! wont dis darky cut and run</span><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">When Massa gets to Washington!</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Dis nigga know ole <span class="smcap">Abe</span> will save</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">His brudder man, de darky slave,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And dat he'll let him cut and run</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When Massa gets to Washington,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">When Massa gets to Washington;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">So clar de way to Washington,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">Ole <span class="smcap">Abe</span> will let the darkies run</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">When Massa gets to Washington."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>The next is in a similar vein:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"A storm am brewin' in de Souf,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">A storm am brewin' now,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Oh! hearken den and shut your mouf,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And I will tell you how:</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And I will tell you how, ole boy,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">De storm of fire will pour,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And make de darkies dance for joy,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">As dey neber danced afore:</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">So shut your mouf as close as deafh,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And all you niggas hole your breafh,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And I will tell you how.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"De darkies at de Norf am ris,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And dey am comin' down&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Am comin' down, I know dey is,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">To do de white folks brown!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Dey'll turn ole Massa out to grass,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And set de niggas free,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And when dat day am come to pass</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">We'll all be dar to see!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">So shut your mouf as close as deafh,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And all you niggas hole your breafh,</span><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And do de white folks brown!</span><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Den all de week will be as gay</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">As am de Chris'mas time;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">We'll dance all night and all de day,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And make de banjo chime&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And make de banjo chime, I tink,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And pass de time away,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Wid 'nuf to eat and 'nuf to drink,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And not a bit to pay!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">So shut your mouf as dose as deafh.</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And all you niggas hole your breaf,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And make de banjo chime.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"Oh! make de banjo chime, you nigs,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And sound de tamborin,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And shuffle now de merry jigs,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">For Massa's 'gwine in'&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">For Massa's 'gwine in,' I know,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And won't he hab de shakes,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When Yankee darkies show him how</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">Dey cotch de rattle-snakes!<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a></span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">So shut your mouf as close as deafh,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And all you niggas hole your breaf,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">For Massa's 'gwine in'&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">For Massa's 'gwine in,' I know,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">And won't he hab de shakes</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">When Yankee darkies show him how</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">Dey cotch de rattle-snakes!"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>The reader must not conclude that my darky acquaintance is an average
+specimen of his class. Far from it. Such instances of intelligence are
+very rare, and are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>never found except in the cities. There, constant
+intercourse with the white renders the black shrewd and intelligent, but
+on the plantations, the case is different. And besides, my musical
+friend, as I have said, is a native African. Fifteen years of
+observation have convinced me that the imported negro, after being
+brought in contact with the white, is far more intelligent than the
+ordinary Southern-born black. Slavery cramps the intellect and dwarfs
+the nature of a man, and where the dwarfing process has gone on, in
+father and son, for two centuries, it must surely be the case&mdash;as surely
+as that the qualities of the parent are transmitted to the child&mdash;that
+the later generations are below the first. This deterioration in the
+better nature of the slave is the saddest result of slavery. His moral
+and intellectual degradation, which is essential to its very existence,
+constitutes the true argument against it. It feeds the body but starves
+the soul. It blinds the reason, and shuts the mind to truth. It degrades
+and brutalizes the whole being, and does it purposely. In that lies its
+strength, and in that, too, lurks the weakness which will one day topple
+it down with a crash that will shake the Continent. Let us hope the
+direful upheaving, which is now felt throughout the Union, is the
+earthquake that will bury it forever.</p>
+
+<p>The sun was wheeling below the trees which skirted the western horizon,
+when we halted in the main road, abreast of one of those by-paths, which
+every traveller<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> at the South recognizes as leading to a planter's
+house. Turning our horse's head, we pursued this path for a short
+distance, when emerging from the pine-forest, over whose sandy barrens
+we had ridden all the day, a broad plantation lay spread out before us.
+On one side was a row of perhaps forty small but neat cabins; and on the
+other, at the distance of about a third of a mile, a huge building,
+which, from the piles of timber near it, I saw was a lumber-mill. Before
+us was a smooth causeway, extending on for a quarter of a mile, and
+shaded by large live-oaks and pines, whose moss fell in graceful drapery
+from the gnarled branches. This led to the mansion of the proprietor, a
+large, antique structure, exhibiting the dingy appearance which all
+houses near the lowlands of the South derive from the climate, but with
+a generous, hospitable air about its wide doors and bulky windows, that
+seemed to invite the traveller to the rest and shelter within. I had
+stopped my horse, and was absorbed in contemplation of a scene as
+beautiful as it was new to me, when an old negro approached, and
+touching his hat, said: "Massa send his complimens to de gemman, and
+happy to hab him pass de night at Bucksville."</p>
+
+<p>"Bucks<i>ville</i>!" I exclaimed, "and where is the village?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dis am it, massa; and it am eight mile and a hard road to de 'Boro"
+(meaning Conwayboro, a one-horse village at which I had designed to
+spend the night). "Will de gemman please ride up to de piazza?"
+continued the old negro.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Yes, uncle, and thank you," and in a moment I had received the cordial
+welcome of the host, an elderly gentleman, whose easy and polished
+manners reminded me of the times of our grandfathers in glorious New
+England. A few minutes put me on a footing of friendly familiarity with
+him and his family, and I soon found myself in a circle of daughters and
+grandchildren, and as much at home as if I had been a long-expected
+guest.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> The emblem of South Carolina.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+
+<h3>WAYSIDE HOSPITALITY.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Years ago&mdash;how many it would not interest the reader to know, and might
+embarrass me to mention&mdash;accompanied by a young woman&mdash;a blue-eyed,
+golden-haired daughter of New-England&mdash;I set out on a long journey; a
+journey so long that it will not end till one or the other of us has
+laid off forever the habiliments of travel.</p>
+
+<p>One of the first stations on our route was&mdash;Paris. While there,
+strolling out one morning alone, accident directed my steps to the <i>Arc
+d'Etoile</i>, that magnificent memorial of the greatness of a great man.
+Ascending its gloomy staircase to the roof, I seated myself, to enjoy
+the fine view it affords of the city and its environs.</p>
+
+<p>I was shortly joined by a lady and gentleman, whose appearance indicated
+that they were Americans. Some casual remark led us into a conversation,
+and soon, to our mutual surprise and gratification, we learned that the
+lady was a dear and long-time friend of my travelling-companion. The
+acquaintance thus begun, has since grown into a close and abiding
+friendship.</p>
+
+<p>The reader, with this preamble, can readily imagine my pleasure on
+learning, as we were seated after our evening meal, around that pleasant
+fireside in far-off<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> Carolina, that my Paris acquaintance was a favorite
+niece, or, as he warmly expressed it, "almost a daughter" of my host.
+This discovery dispelled any lingering feeling of "strangeness" that had
+not vanished with the first cordial greeting of my new-found friends,
+and made me perfectly "at home."</p>
+
+<p>The evening wore rapidly away in a free interchange of "news," opinions,
+and "small-talk," and I soon gathered somewhat of the history of my
+host. He was born at the North, and his career affords a striking
+illustration of the marvellous enterprise of our Northern character. A
+native of the State of Maine, he emigrated thence when a young man, and
+settled down, amid the pine-forest in that sequestered part of
+Cottondom. Erecting a small saw-mill, and a log shanty to shelter
+himself and a few "hired" negroes, he attacked, with his own hands, the
+mighty pines, whose brothers still tower in gloomy magnificence around
+his dwelling.</p>
+
+<p>From such beginnings he had risen to be one of the wealthiest land and
+slave owners of his district, with vessels trading to nearly every
+quarter of the globe, to the Northern and Eastern ports, Cadiz, the West
+Indies, South America, and if I remember aright, California. It seemed
+to me a marvel that this man, alone, and unaided by the usual appliances
+of commerce, had created a business, rivalling in extent the
+transactions of many a princely merchant of New York and Boston.</p>
+
+<p>His "family" of slaves numbered about three hundred, and a more healthy,
+and to all appearance, happy set of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> laboring people, I had never seen.
+Well fed, comfortably and almost neatly clad, with tidy and well-ordered
+homes, exempt from labor in childhood and advanced age, and cared for in
+sickness by a kind and considerate mistress, who is the physician and
+good Samaritan of the village, they seemed to share as much physical
+enjoyment as ordinarily falls to the lot of the "hewer of wood and
+drawer of water." Looking at them, I began to question if Slavery is, in
+reality, the damnable thing that some untravelled philanthropists have
+pictured it. If&mdash;and in that "<i>if</i>" my good Abolition friend, is the
+only unanswerable argument against the institution&mdash;if they were taught,
+if they knew their nature and their destiny, the slaves of such an owner
+might unprofitably exchange situations with many a white man, who, with
+nothing in the present or the future, is desperately struggling for a
+miserable hand-to-mouth existence in our Northern cities. I say "of such
+an owner," for in the Southern Arcadia such masters are "few and far
+between"&mdash;rather fewer and farther between than "spots upon the sun."</p>
+
+<p>But they are <i>not</i> taught. Public sentiment, as well as State law,
+prevents the enlightened master, who would fit the slave by knowledge
+for greater usefulness, from letting a ray of light in upon his darkened
+mind. The black knows his task, his name, and his dinner-hour. He knows
+there is a something within him&mdash;he does not understand precisely
+what&mdash;that the white man calls his soul, which he is told will not rest
+in the ground when his body is laid away in the grave, but will&mdash;if he
+is a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> "good nigger," obeys his master, and does the task allotted
+him&mdash;travel off to some unknown region, and sing hallelujahs to the
+<span class="smcap">Lord</span>, forever. He rather sensibly imagines that such everlasting singing
+may in time produce hoarseness, so he prepares his vocal organs for the
+long concert by a vigorous discipline while here, and at the same time
+cultivates instrumental music, having a dim idea that the <span class="smcap">Lord</span> has an
+ear for melody, and will let him, when he is tired of singing, vary the
+exercise "wid de banjo and de bones." This is all he knows; and his
+owner, however well-disposed he may be, cannot teach him more. Noble,
+Christian masters whom I have met&mdash;have told me that they did not <i>dare</i>
+instruct their slaves. Some of their negroes were born in their houses,
+nursed in their families, and have grown up the playmates of their
+children, and yet they are forced to see them live and die like the
+brutes. One need not be accused of fanatical abolitionism if he deems
+such a system a <i>little</i> in conflict with the spirit of the nineteenth
+century!</p>
+
+<p>The sun had scarcely turned his back upon the world, when a few drops of
+rain, sounding on the piazza-roof over our heads, announced a coming
+storm. Soon it burst upon us in magnificent fury&mdash;a real, old-fashioned
+thunderstorm, such as I used to lie awake and listen to when a boy,
+wondering all the while if the angels were keeping a Fourth of July in
+heaven. In the midst of it, when the earth and the sky appeared to have
+met in true Waterloo fashion, and the dark branches of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> pines seemed
+writhing and tossing in a sea of flame, a loud knock came at the
+hall-door (bells are not the fashion in Dixie), and a servant soon
+ushered into the room a middle-aged, unassuming gentleman, whom my host
+received with a respect and cordiality which indicated that he was no
+ordinary guest. There was in his appearance and manner that indefinable
+something which denotes the man of mark; but my curiosity was soon
+gratified by an introduction. It was "Colonel" A&mdash;&mdash;. This title, I
+afterward learned, was merely honorary: and I may as well remark here,
+that nearly every one at the South who has risen to the ownership of a
+negro, is either a captain, a major, or a colonel, or, as my ebony
+driver expressed it: "Dey'm all captins and mates, wid none to row de
+boat but de darkies." On hearing the name, I recognized it as that of
+one of the oldest and most aristocratic South Carolina families, and the
+new guest as a near relative to the gentleman who married the beautiful
+and ill-fated Theodosia Burr.</p>
+
+<p>In answer to an inquiry of my host, the new-comer explained that he had
+left Colonel J&mdash;&mdash;'s (the plantation toward which I was journeying),
+shortly before noon, and being overtaken by the storm after leaving
+Conwayboro, had, at the solicitation of his "boys" (a familiar term for
+slaves), who were afraid to proceed, called to ask shelter for the
+night.</p>
+
+<p>Shortly after his entrance, the lady members of the family retired; and
+then the "Colonel," the "Captain," and myself, drawing our chairs near
+the fire, and each lighting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> a fragrant Havana, placed on the table by
+our host, fell into a long conversation, of which the following was a
+part:</p>
+
+<p>"It must have been urgent business, Colonel, that took you so far into
+the woods at this season," remarked our host.</p>
+
+<p>"These are urgent times, Captain B&mdash;&mdash;," replied the guest. "All who
+have any thing at stake, should be <i>doing</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"These <i>are</i> unhappy times, truly," said my friend; "has any thing new
+occurred?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing of moment, sir; but we are satisfied Buchanan is playing us
+false, and are preparing for the worst."</p>
+
+<p>"I should be sorry to know that a President of the United States had
+resorted to underhand measures! Has he really given you pledges?"</p>
+
+<p>"He promised to preserve the <i>statu quo</i> in Charleston harbor, and we
+have direct information that he intends to send out reinforcements,"
+rejoined Colonel A&mdash;&mdash;.</p>
+
+<p>"Can that be true? You know, Colonel, I never admired your friend, Mr.
+Buchanan, but I cannot see how, if he does his duty, he can avoid
+enforcing the laws in Charleston, as well as in the other cities of the
+Union."</p>
+
+<p>"The 'Union,' sir, does not exist. Buchanan has now no more right to
+quarter a soldier in South Carolina than I have to march an armed force
+on to Boston Common.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> If he persists in keeping troops near Charleston,
+we shall dislodge them."</p>
+
+<p>"But that would make war! and war, Colonel," replied our host, "would be
+a terrible thing. Do you realize what it would bring upon us? And what
+could our little State do in a conflict with nearly thirty millions?"</p>
+
+<p>"We should not fight with thirty millions. The other Cotton States are
+with us, and the leaders in the Border States are pledged to Secession.
+They will wheel into line when we give the word. But the North will not
+fight. The Democratic party sympathizes with us, and some of its
+influential leaders are pledged to our side. They will sow division
+there, and paralyze the Free States; besides, the trading and
+manufacturing classes will never consent to a war that will work their
+ruin. With the Yankees, sir, the dollar is almighty."</p>
+
+<p>"That may be true," replied our host; "but I think if we go too far,
+they will fight. What think you, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;?" he continued, appealing to
+me, and adding: "This gentleman, Colonel, is very recently from the
+North."</p>
+
+<p>Up to that moment, I had avoided taking part in the conversation. Enough
+had been said to satisfy me that while my host was a staunch
+Unionist,<a name="FNanchor_B_2" id="FNanchor_B_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a> his visitor was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>not only a rank Secessionist, but one of
+the leaders of the movement, and even then preparing for desperate
+measures. Discretion, therefore, counselled silence. To this direct
+appeal, however, I was forced to reply, and answered: "I think, sir, the
+North does not yet realize that the South is in earnest. When it wakes
+up to that fact, its course will be decisive."</p>
+
+<p>"Will the Yankees <i>fight</i>, sir?" rather impatiently and imperiously
+asked the Colonel, who evidently thought I intended to avoid a direct
+answer to the question.</p>
+
+<p>Rather nettled by his manner, I quickly responded: "Undoubtedly they
+will, sir. They have fought before, and it would not be wise to count
+them cowards."</p>
+
+<p>A true gentleman, he at once saw that his manner had given offence, and
+instantly moderating his tone, rather apologetically replied: "Not
+cowards, sir, but too much absorbed in the 'occupations of peace,' to go
+to war for an idea."</p>
+
+<p>"But what you call an 'idea,'" said our host, "<i>they</i> may think a great
+fact on which their existence depends. <i>I</i> can see that we will lose
+vastly by even a peaceful separation. Tell me, Colonel, what we will
+gain?"</p>
+
+<p>"Gain!" warmly responded the guest. "Everything! Security, freedom, room
+for the development of our institutions,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> and each progress in wealth as
+the world has never seen."</p>
+
+<p>"All that is very fine," rejoined the "Captain," "but where there is
+wealth, there must be work; and who will do the work in your new
+Empire&mdash;I do not mean the agricultural labor; you will depend for that,
+of coarse, on the blacks&mdash;but who will run your manufactories and do
+your mechanical labor? The Southern gentleman would feel degraded by
+such occupation; and if you put the black to any work requiring
+intelligence, you must let him <i>think</i>, and when he <span class="smcap">THINKS</span>, <i>he is
+free</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>"All that is easily provided for," replied the Secessionist. "We shall
+form intimate relations with England. She must have our cotton, and we
+in return will take her manufactures."</p>
+
+<p>"That would be all very well at present, and so long as you should keep
+on good terms with her; but suppose, some fine morning, Exeter Hall got
+control of the English Government, and hinted to you, in John Bull
+fashion, that cotton produced by free labor would be more acceptable,
+what could three, or even eight millions, cut off from the sympathy and
+support of the North, do in opposition to the power of the British
+empire?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing, perhaps, if we <i>were</i> three or even eight millions, but we
+shall be neither one nor the other. Mexico and Cuba are ready, now, to
+fall into our hands, and before two years have passed, with or without
+the Border States, we shall count twenty millions. Long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> before England
+is abolitionized, our population will outnumber hers, and our territory
+extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and as far south as the
+Isthmus. We are founding, sir, an empire that will be able to defy all
+Europe&mdash;one grander than the world has seen since the age of Pericles!"</p>
+
+<p>"You say, with or without the Border States," remarked our host. "I
+thought you counted on their support."</p>
+
+<p>"We do if the North makes war upon us, but if allowed to go in peace, we
+can do better without them. They will be a wall between us and the
+abolitionized North."</p>
+
+<p>"You mistake," I said, "in thinking the North is abolitionized. The
+Abolitionists are but a handful there. The great mass of our people are
+willing the South should have undisturbed control of its domestic
+concerns."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, then, do you send such men as Seward, Sumner, Wilson, and Grow to
+Congress? Why have you elected a President who approves of
+nigger-stealing? and why do you tolerate such incendiaries as Greeley,
+Garrison, and Phillips?"</p>
+
+<p>"Seward, and the others you name," I replied, "are not Abolitionists;
+neither does Lincoln approve of nigger-stealing. He is an honest man,
+and I doubt not, when inaugurated, will do exact justice by the South.
+As to incendiaries, you find them in both sections. Phillips and
+Garrison are only the opposite poles of Yancey and Wise."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Not so, sir; they are more. Phillips, Greeley, and Garrison create and
+control your public opinion. They are mighty powers, while Yancey and
+Wise have no influence whatever. Yancey is a mere bag-pipe; we play upon
+him, and like the music, but smile when he attempts to lead us. Wise is
+a harlequin; we let him dance because he is good at it, and it amuses
+us. Lincoln may be honest, but if made President he will be controlled
+by Seward, who hates the South. Seward will whine, and wheedle, and
+attempt to cajole us back, but mark what I say, sir, I <i>know</i> him; he is
+physically, morally, and constitutionally a <span class="smcap">COWARD</span>, and will never
+strike a blow for the <span class="smcap">Union</span>. If hard pressed by public sentiment, he
+may, to save appearances, bluster a little, and make a show of getting
+ready for a fight; but he will find some excuse at the last moment, and
+avoid coming to blows. For our purposes, we had rather have the North
+under his control than under that of the old renegade, Buchanan!"</p>
+
+<p>"All this may he very true," I replied, "but perhaps you attach too much
+weight to what Mr. Seward or Mr. Lincoln may or may not do. You seem to
+forget that there are twenty intelligent millions at the North, who will
+have something to say on this subject, and who may not consent to be
+driven into disunion by the South, or wheedled into it by Mr. Seward."</p>
+
+<p>"I do not forget," replied the Secessionist, "that you have four
+millions of brave, able-bodied men, while we have not, perhaps, more
+than two millions; but bear in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> mind that you are divided, and therefore
+weak; we united, and therefore strong!"</p>
+
+<p>"But," I inquired, "<i>have</i> you two millions without counting your
+blacks; and are <i>they</i> not as likely to fight on the wrong as on the
+right side?"</p>
+
+<p>"They will fight on the right side, sir. We can trust them. You have
+travelled somewhat here. Have you not been struck with the contentment
+and cheerful subjection of the slaves?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir, I have not been! On the contrary, their discontent is evident.
+You are smoking a cigar on a powder-barrel."</p>
+
+<p>An explosion of derisive laughter from the Colonel followed this remark,
+and turning to the Captain, he good-humoredly exclaimed: "Hasn't the
+gentleman used his eyes and ears industriously!"</p>
+
+<p>"I am afraid he is more than half right," was the reply. "If this thing
+should go on, I would not trust my own slaves, and I think they are
+truly attached to me. If the fire once breaks out, the negroes will rush
+into it, like horses into a burning barn."</p>
+
+<p>"Think you so!" exclaimed the Colonel in an excited manner. "By Heaven,
+if I believed it, I would cut the throat of every slave in Christendom!
+What," addressing me, "have you seen or heard, sir, that gives you that
+opinion?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing but a sullen discontent and an eagerness for news, which show
+they feel intense interest in what is going on, and know it concerns
+<i>them</i>."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I haven't remarked that," he said rather musingly, "but it <i>may</i> be so.
+Does the North believe it? If we came to blows, would they try to excite
+servile insurrection among us?"</p>
+
+<p>"The North, beyond a doubt, believes it," I replied, "yet I think even
+the Abolitionists would aid you in putting down an insurrection; but
+war, in my opinion, would not leave you a slave between the Rio Grande
+and the Potomac."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel at this rose, remarking: "You are mistaken. You are
+mistaken, sir!" then turning to our host, said: "Captain, it is late:
+had we not better retire?" Bidding me "good-night," he was gone.</p>
+
+<p>Our host soon returned from showing the guest to his apartment, and with
+a quiet but deliberate manner, said to me: "You touched him, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;,
+on a point where he knows we are weakest; but allow me to caution you
+about expressing your opinions so freely. The Colonel is a gentleman,
+and what you have said will do no harm, but, long as I have lived here,
+<i>I</i> dare not say to many what you have said to him to-night."</p>
+
+<p>Thanking the worthy gentleman for the caution, I followed him up stairs,
+and soon lost, in a sweet oblivion, all thoughts of Abolitionists,
+niggers, and the "grand empire."</p>
+
+<p>I was awakened in the morning by music under my window, and looking out
+discovered about a dozen darkies gathered around my ebony driver, who
+was clawing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> away with all his might at a dilapidated banjo, while his
+auditory kept time to his singing, by striking the hand on the knee, and
+by other gesticulations too numerous to mention. The songs were not much
+to boast of, but the music was the genuine, dyed-in-the-wool, darky
+article. The following was the refrain of one of the songs, which the
+reader will perceive was an exhortation to early rising:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"So up, good massa, let's be gwoin',</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Let's be scratchin' ob de grabble;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">For soon de wind may be a blowin',</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">An' we'se a sorry road to trabble."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>The storm of the previous night had ceased, but the sky was overcast,
+and looked as if "soon de wind might be a-blowin'." Prudence counselled
+an early start, for, doubtless, the runs, or small creeks, had become
+swollen by the heavy rain, and would be unsafe to cross after dark.
+Besides, beyond Conwayboro, our route lay for thirty miles through a
+country without a solitary house where we could get decent shelter, were
+we overtaken by a storm.</p>
+
+<p>Hurriedly performing my toilet, I descended to the drawing-room, where I
+found the family assembled. After the usual morning salutations were
+exchanged, a signal from the mistress caused the sounding of a bell in
+the hall, and some ten or twelve men and women house-servants, of
+remarkably neat and tidy appearance, among whom was my darky driver,
+entered the apartment.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> They took a stand at the remote end of the room,
+and our host, opening a large, well-worn family <span class="smcap">Bible</span>, read the
+fifty-fourth chapter of Isaiah. Then, all kneeling, he made a short
+extemporaneous petition, closing with the <span class="smcap">Lord's</span> Prayer; all present,
+black as well as white, joining in it. Then Heber's beautiful hymn,
+"From Greenland's icy mountains," was sung; the negroes, to my ear,
+making much better music than the whites.</p>
+
+<p>The services over, we adjourned to the dining-room, and after we were
+seated, the "Colonel" remarked to me: "Did you notice how finely that
+negro 'boy' (he was fully forty years old) sung?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," I replied, "I did. Do you know him, sir?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! yes, very well. His mistress wishes to sell him, but finds
+difficulty in doing so. Though a likely negro, people will not buy him.
+He's too smart."</p>
+
+<p>"That strikes me as a singular objection," I remarked.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! no, not at all! These <i>knowing</i> niggers frequently make a world of
+trouble on a plantation."</p>
+
+<p>It was after ten o'clock before we were ready to start. The mills, the
+negro-quarters, and various other parts of the plantation, and then
+several vessels moored at the wharf, had to be seen before I could get
+away. Finally, I bade my excellent host and his family farewell, and
+with nearly as much regret as I ever felt at leaving my own home. I had
+experienced the much-heard-of Southern hospitality, and had found the
+report far below the reality.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The other guest had taken his leave some time before, but not till he
+had given me a cordial invitation to return by the way I came, and spend
+a day or two with him, at his plantation on the river, some twenty miles
+below.</p>
+
+<p>The sky was lowery, and the sandy road heavy with the recent rain, when
+we started. The gloomy weather seemed to have infected the driver as
+well as myself. He had lost the mirthfulness and loquacity of the
+previous day, and we rode on for a full hour in silence. Tiring at last
+of my own thoughts, I said to him: "Scip, what is the matter with you?
+what makes you so gloomy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nuffin, massa; I war only tinkin'," he abstractedly replied.</p>
+
+<p>"And what are you thinking about?"</p>
+
+<p>"I's wond'rin', massa, if de <span class="smcap">Lord</span> mean de darkies in dose words of HIS
+dat Massa B&mdash;&mdash; read dis mornin'."</p>
+
+<p>"What words do you mean?</p>
+
+<p>"Dese, massa: 'O dou 'fflicted! tossed wid de tempest, and habin no
+comfort, behold, I will make you hous'n ob de fair colors, and lay dar
+foundations wid safomires. All dy chil'ren shill be taught ob de <span class="smcap">Lord</span>,
+and great shill be dar peace. In de right shill dey be 'stablished; dey
+shill hab no fear, no terror; it shan't come nigh 'em, and who come
+against dem shill fall. Behold! I hab make de blacksmif dat blow de
+coals, and make de weapons; and I hab make de waster dat shill destroy
+de oppressors.'"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>If he had repeated one of Webster's orations I could not have been more
+astonished. I did not remember the exact words of the passage, but I
+knew he had caught its spirit. Was this his recollection of the reading
+heard in the morning? or had he previously committed it to memory? These
+questions I asked myself; but, restraining my curiosity, I answered:
+"Undoubtedly they are meant for both the black and the white."</p>
+
+<p>"Do dey mean, massa, dat we shall be like de wite folks&mdash;wid our own
+hous'n, our chil'ren taught in de schools, and wid weapons to strike
+back when dey strike us?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, Scipio, they don't mean that. They refer principally to spiritual
+matters. They were a promise to <i>all the world</i> that when the <span class="smcap">Saviour</span>
+came, all, even the greatly oppressed and afflicted, should hear the
+great truths of the <span class="smcap">Bible</span> about <span class="smcap">God</span>, <span class="smcap">Redemption</span>, and the <span class="smcap">Future</span>."</p>
+
+<p>"But de <span class="smcap">Saviour</span> hab come, massa; and dose tings an't taught to de black
+chil'ren. We hab no peace, no rights; nuffin but fear, 'pression, and
+terror."</p>
+
+<p>"That is true, Scipio. The <span class="smcap">Lord</span> takes <span class="smcap">His</span> own time, but <span class="smcap">His</span> time will
+<i>surely</i> come."</p>
+
+<p>"De <span class="smcap">Lord</span> bless you, massa, for saying dat; and de <span class="smcap">Lord</span> bless you for
+telling dat big Cunnel, dat if dey gwo to war de brack man will be
+<span class="smcap">Free</span>!"</p>
+
+<p>"Did you hear what we said?" I inquired, greatly surprised, for I
+remembered remarking, during the interview<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> of the previous evening,
+that our host carefully kept the doors closed.</p>
+
+<p>"Ebery word, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"But how <i>could</i> you hear? The doors and windows were shut. Where were
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"On de piazzer; and when I seed fru de winder dat de ladies war gwine, I
+know'd you'd talk 'bout politics and de darkies&mdash;gemmen allers do. So I
+opened de winder bery softly&mdash;you didn't har 'cause it rained and blowed
+bery hard, and made a mighty noise. Den I stuffed my coat in de crack,
+so de wind could'nt blow in and lef you know I was dar, but I lef a hole
+big 'nough to har. My ear froze to dat hole, massa, bery tight, I 'shore
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"But you must have got very wet and very cold."</p>
+
+<p>"Wet, massa! wetter dan a 'gator dat's been in de riber all de week, but
+I didn't keer for de rain or de cold. What I hard made me warm all de
+way fru."</p>
+
+<p>To my mind there was a rough picture of true heroism in that poor darky
+standing for hours in his shirt-sleeves, in the cold, stormy night, the
+lightning playing about him, and the rain drenching him to the
+skin&mdash;that he might hear something he thought would benefit his
+down-trodden race.</p>
+
+<p>I noticed his clothing though bearing evident marks of a drenching, was
+then dry, and I inquired: "How did you dry your clothes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I staid wid some ob de cullud folks, and arter you gwoes up stars, I
+went to dar cabin, and dey gabe me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> some dry cloes. We made up a big
+fire, and hung mine up to dry, and de ole man and woman and me sot up
+all night and talked ober what you and de oder gemmen said."</p>
+
+<p>"Will not those folks tell what you did, and thus get you into trouble?"</p>
+
+<p>"Tell! <span class="smcap">Lord</span> bless you, massa, <i>de bracks am all freemasons</i>; dat ar ole
+man and woman wud die 'fore dey'd tell."</p>
+
+<p>"But are not Captain B&mdash;-'s negroes contented?" I asked; "they seem to
+be well treated."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! yas, dey am. All de brack folks 'bout har want de Captin to buy
+'em. He bery nice man&mdash;one ob de LORD'S own people. He better man dan
+David, 'cause David did wrong, and I don't b'lieve de Captin eber did."</p>
+
+<p>"I should think he was a very good man," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Bery good man, massa, but de white folks don't like him, 'cause dey say
+he treats him darkies so well, all dairn am uncontented."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me, Scipio," I resumed after a while, "how it is you can repeat
+that passage from Isaiah so well?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, bless you, massa, I know Aziar and Job and de Psalms 'most all by
+heart. Good many years ago, when I lib'd in Charles'on, the gub'ness
+learned me to read, and I hab read dat BOOK fru good many times."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you read any others?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"None but dat and Doctor Watts. I hab <i>dem</i>, but wite folks wont sell
+books to de bracks, and I wont steal 'em. I read de papers sometimes."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>I opened my portmanteau, that lay on the floor of the wagon, and handed
+him a copy of Whittier's poems. It happened to be the only book,
+excepting the <span class="smcap">Bible</span>, that I had with me.</p>
+
+<p>"Read that, Scipio," I said. "It is a book of poetry, but written by a
+good man at the North, who greatly pities the slave."</p>
+
+<p>He took the book, and the big tears rolled down his cheeks, as he said:
+"Tank you, massa, tank you. Nobody war neber so good to me afore."</p>
+
+<p>During our conversation, the sky, which had looked threatening all the
+morning, began to let fall the big drops of rain; and before we reached
+Conwayboro, it poured down much after the fashion of the previous night.
+It being cruelty to both man and beast to remain out in such a deluge,
+we pulled up at the village hotel (kept, like the one at Georgetown, by
+a lady), and determined to remain overnight, unless the rain should
+abate in time to allow us to reach our destination before dark.</p>
+
+<p>Dinner being ready soon after our arrival (the people of Conwayboro,
+like the "common folks" that Davy Crockett told about, dine at twelve),
+I sat down to it, first hanging my outer garments, which were somewhat
+wet, before the fire in the sitting-room. The house seemed to be a sort
+of public boarding-house, as well as hotel, for quite a number of
+persons, evidently town's-people were at the dinner-table. My appearance
+attracted some attention, though not more, I thought, than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> would be
+naturally excited in so quiet a place by the arrival of a stranger; but
+"as nobody said nothing to me, I said nothing to nobody."</p>
+
+<p>Dinner over, I adjourned to the "sitting-room," and seating myself by
+the fire, watched the drying of my "outer habiliments." While thus
+engaged, the door opened, and three men&mdash;whom I should have taken for
+South Carolina gentlemen, had not a further acquaintance convinced me to
+the contrary&mdash;entered the room. Walking directly up to where I was
+sitting, the foremost one accosted me something after this manner:</p>
+
+<p>"I see you are from the North, sir."</p>
+
+<p>Taken a little aback by the abruptness of the "salute," but guessing his
+object, I answered: "No, sir; I am from the South."</p>
+
+<p>"From what part of the South?"</p>
+
+<p>"I left Georgetown yesterday, and Charleston two days before that," I
+replied, endeavoring to seem entirely oblivious to his meaning.</p>
+
+<p>"We don't want to know whar you war yesterday; we want to know whar you
+<i>belong</i>," he said, with a little impatience.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! that's it. Well, sir, I belong <i>here</i> just at present, or rather I
+shall, when I have paid the landlady for my dinner."</p>
+
+<p>Annoyed by my coolness, and getting somewhat excited, he replied
+quickly: "You mustn't trifle with us, sir. We know you. You're from the
+North. We've seen it on your valise, and we can't allow a man who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>
+carries the New York <i>Independent</i> to travel in South Carolina."</p>
+
+<p>The scoundrels had either broken into my portmanteau, or else a copy of
+that paper had dropped from it on to the floor of the wagon when I gave
+the book to Scipio. At any rate, they had seen it, and it was evident
+"Brother Beecher" was getting me into a scrape. I felt indignant at the
+impudence of the fellow, but determined to keep cool, and, a little
+sarcastically, replied to the latter part of his remark:</p>
+
+<p>"That's a pity, sir. South Carolina will lose by it."</p>
+
+<p>"This game wont work, sir. We don't want such people as you har, and the
+sooner you make tracks the better."</p>
+
+<p>"I intend to leave, sir, as soon as the rain is over, and shall travel
+thirty miles on your sandy roads to-day, if you don't coax me to stay
+here by your hospitality," I quietly replied.</p>
+
+<p>The last remark was just the one drop needed to make his wrath "bile
+over," and he savagely exclaimed: "I tell you, sir, we will not be
+trifled with. You must be off to Georgetown at once. You can have just
+half an hour to leave the Boro', not a second more."</p>
+
+<p>His tone and manner aroused what little combativeness there is in me.
+Rising from my chair, and taking up my outside-coat, in which was one of
+Colt's six-shooters, I said to him: "Sir, I am here, a peaceable man, on
+peaceable, private business. I have started to go up the country, and go
+there I shall; and I shall leave this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> place at my convenience&mdash;not
+before. I have endured your impertinence long enough, and shall have no
+more of it. If you attempt to interfere with my movements, you will do
+so at your peril."</p>
+
+<p>My blood was up, and I was fast losing that better part of valor called
+discretion; and <i>he</i> evidently understood my movement, and did not
+dislike the turn affairs were taking. There is no telling what might
+have followed had not Scip just at that instant inserted his woolly head
+between us, excitedly exclaiming: "Lord bless you, Massa B&mdash;&mdash;ll; what
+<i>am</i> you 'bout? Why, dis gemman am a 'ticlar friend of Cunnel A&mdash;&mdash;.
+He'm a reg'lar sesherner. He hates de ablisherners worser dan de debble.
+I hard him swar a clar, blue streak 'bout dem only yesterday."</p>
+
+<p>"Massa B&mdash;&mdash;ll" was evidently taken aback by the announcement of the
+negro, but did not seem inclined to "give it up so" at once, for he
+asked: "How do you know he's the Colonel's friend, Scip? Who told you
+so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Who told me so?" exclaimed the excited negro, "why, didn't he stay at
+Captin B&mdash;&mdash;'s, wid de Cunnel, all night last night; and didn't dey set
+up dar doin' politic business togedder till arter midnight? Didn't de
+Cunnel come dar in all de storm 'pressly to see dis gemman?"</p>
+
+<p>The ready wit and rude eloquence of the darky amused me, and the idea of
+the "Cunnel" travelling twenty miles through the terrible storm of the
+previous night to meet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> a man who had the New York <i>Independent</i> about
+him, was so perfectly ludicrous, that I could not restrain my laughter.
+That laugh did the business for "Massa B&mdash;&mdash;ll." What the negro had
+said staggered, but did not convince him; but my returning good-humor
+brought him completely round. Extending his hand to me, he said: "I see,
+sir, I've woke up the wrong passenger. Hope you'll take no offence. In
+these times we need to know who come among us."</p>
+
+<p>"No offence whatever, sir," I replied. "It is easy to be mistaken; but,"
+I added smilingly, "I hope, for the sake of the next traveller, you'll
+be less precipitate another time."</p>
+
+<p>"I <i>am</i> rather hasty; that's a fact," he said. "But no harm is done. So
+let's take a drink, and say no more about it. The old lady har keeps
+nary a thing, but we can get the <i>raal stuff</i> close by."</p>
+
+<p>Though not a member of a "Total Abstinence Society," I have always
+avoided indulging in the quality of fluid that is the staple beverage at
+the South. I therefore hesitated a moment before accepting the
+gentleman's invitation; but the alternative seemed to be squarely
+presented, pistols or drinks; cold lead or poor whiskey, and&mdash;I am
+ashamed to confess it&mdash;I took the whiskey.</p>
+
+<p>Returning to the hotel, I found Scip awaiting me. "Massa," he said, "we
+better be gwine. Dat dar sesherner am ugly as de bery ole debble; and
+soon as he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> knows I cum de possum ober him 'bout de Cunnel, he'll be
+down on you <i>shore</i>."</p>
+
+<p>The rain had dwindled to a drizzle, which the sun was vigorously
+struggling to get through with a tolerable prospect of success, and I
+concluded to take the African's advice. Wrapping myself in an
+India-rubber overcoat, and giving the darky a blanket of the same
+material, I started.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_B_2" id="Footnote_B_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_B_2"><span class="label">[B]</span></a> I very much regret to learn, that since my meeting with this most
+excellent gentleman, being obnoxious to the Secession leaders for his
+well-known Union sentiments, he has been very onerously assessed by them
+for contributions for carrying on the war. The sum he has been forced to
+pay, is stated as high as forty thousand dollars, but that may be, and I
+trust is, an exaggeration. In addition&mdash;and this fact is within my own
+knowledge&mdash;five of his vessels have been seized in the Northern ports by
+our Government. This exposure of true Union men to a double fire, is one
+of the most unhappy circumstances attendant upon this most unhappy war.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+
+<h3>CROSSING THE "RUNS."</h3>
+
+
+<p>The long, tumble-down bridge which spans the Waccamaw at Conwayboro,
+trembled beneath our horse's tread, as with lengthened stride he shook
+the secession mud from his feet, and whirled us along into the dark,
+deep forest. It may have been the exhilaration of a hearty dinner of
+oats, or it may have been sympathy with the impatience of his
+fellow-travellers that spurred him on; whichever it was, away he went as
+if Lucifer&mdash;that first Secessionist&mdash;were following close at his heels.</p>
+
+<p>The sun, which for a time had been industriously wedging his way into
+the dark masses of cloud, finally slunk out of sight and left us
+enveloped in a thick fog, which shut from view all of Cottondom, except
+a narrow belting of rough pines, and a few rods of sandy road that
+stretched out in dim perspective before us. There being nothing in the
+outside creation to attract my attention, I drew the apron of the
+carriage about me, and settling myself well back on the seat to avoid
+the thick-falling mist, fell into a train of dreamy reflection.</p>
+
+<p>Niggers, slave-auctions, cotton-fields, rice-swamps, and King Cotton
+himself, that blustering old despot, with his swarthy arms and
+"under-pinning," his face of brass,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> and body of "raw material," passed
+through my mind, like Georgia trains through the Oconee Swamp, till
+finally my darky friend came into view. He seemed at first a little
+child, amid the blazing ruins of his wilderness home, gazing in stupid
+horror on the burning bodies of his father and his kindred. Then he was
+kneeling at the side of his dying mother in the slave-pen at Cape Lopez,
+and&mdash;still a child&mdash;cooped in the "Black-hole" of the accursed
+slave-ship, his little frame burning with the fever-fire, and his
+child-heart longing for death. Then he seemed mounting the Cuban
+slave-block, and as the "going! going! gone!" rung in my ear, he was
+hurried away, and driven to the cruel task&mdash;still a child&mdash;on the hot,
+unhealthy sugar-field. Again he appeared, stealing away at night to a
+lonely hut, and by the light of a pine-knot, wearily poring over the
+<span class="smcap">Book</span> of <span class="smcap">Books</span>, slowly putting letters into words, and words into
+sentences, that he might know "<i>What God says to the black man</i>." Then
+he seemed a man&mdash;splendid of frame, noble of soul&mdash;suspended in the
+whipping-rack, his arms bound above his head, his body resting on the
+tips of his toes, and the merciless lash falling on his bare back, till
+the red stream ran from it like a river&mdash;scourged because he would not
+aid in creating beings as wretched as himself, and make merchandise of
+his own blood to gorge the pocket of an incarnate white devil.</p>
+
+<p>As these things passed before me, and I thought of his rare
+intelligence, of his fine traits of character, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> of the true heroism
+he had shown in risking, perhaps, his own life to get me&mdash;a
+stranger&mdash;out of an ugly hobble, I felt a certain spot in my left side
+warming toward him, very much as it might have done had his blood been
+as pure as my own. It seemed to me a pity&mdash;anti-Abolitionist and
+Southern-sympathizer though I was&mdash;that a man of such rare natural
+talent, such character and energy, should have his large nature dwarfed,
+be tethered for life to a cotton-stalk, and made to wear his soul out in
+a tread-mill, merely because his skin had a darker tinge and his shoe a
+longer heel than mine.</p>
+
+<p>As I mused over his "strange, eventful history," and thought of the
+handy way nature has of putting the <i>right</i> man in the <i>wrong</i> place, it
+occurred to me how "Brother Beecher" one evening, not a long time
+before, had charmed the last dollar from my waistcoat pocket by
+exhibiting, <i>&agrave; la</i> Barnum, a remarkably ugly "cullud pusson" on his
+pulpit stairs, and by picturing the awful doom which awaited her&mdash;that
+of being reduced from baby-tending to some less useful employment&mdash;if
+his audience did not at once "do the needful." Then it occurred to me
+how much finer a spectacle my ebony friend would make; how well his six
+feet of manly sinew would grace those pulpit stairs; how eloquently the
+reverend gentleman might expatiate on the burning sin of shrouding the
+light of such an intellect in the mists of niggerdom, only to see it
+snuffed out in darkness; how he might enlarge on what the black could do
+in elevating his race, either as "cullud" assistant to "Brother<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> Pease"
+at the Five-Points, or as co-laborer with Fred Douglass at abolition
+conventions, or, if that didn't <i>pay</i>, how, put into the minstrel
+business, he might run the white "troupes" off the track, and yield a
+liberal revenue to the "Cause of Freedom." As I thought of the probable
+effect of this last appeal, it seemed to me that the thing was already
+done, and that <span class="smcap">Scip</span> was <span class="smcap">Free</span>.</p>
+
+<p>I got back from dreamland by the simple act of opening my eyes, and
+found myself still riding along in that Jersey wagon, over that heavy,
+sandy road, and drenched with the mists of that dreary December day. The
+reverie made, however, a deep impression on me, and I gave vent to it
+somewhat as follows:</p>
+
+<p>"Colonel A&mdash;&mdash; tells me, Scip, that your mistress wants to sell you. Do
+you know what she asks?"</p>
+
+<p>"She ax fifteen hundred dollar, massa, but I an't worth dat now. Nigger
+property's mighty low."</p>
+
+<p>"What is your value now?"</p>
+
+<p>"P'raps eight hundred, p'raps a thousand dollar, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Would your mistress take a thousand for you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't know, sar, but reckon she would. She'd be glad to get shut of me.
+She don't like me on de plantation, 'cause she say de oder darkies tink
+too much ob me; and she don't like me in de city, 'cause she 'fraid I
+run away."</p>
+
+<p>"Why afraid you'll runaway? Did you ever try to?"</p>
+
+<p>"Try to! <span class="smcap">Lor</span> bless you, massa, I neber taught ob such a ting&mdash;wouldn't
+gwo ef I could."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"But wouldn't you?" I asked, thinking he had conscientious scruples
+about running away; "wouldn't you if you could buy yourself, and go
+honestly, as a <i>free</i> man?"</p>
+
+<p>"Buy myself, sar!" he exclaimed in surprise; "buy <i>my own</i> flesh and
+blood dat de <span class="smcap">Lord</span> hissef gabe me! No, no! massa; I'd likes to be free,
+but I'd neber do <i>dat</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why not do that?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause 't would be owning dat de white folks hab a right to de brack;
+and 'cause, sar, if I war free I couldn't stay har."</p>
+
+<p>"Why should you stay here? You have no wife nor child; why not go where
+the black man is respected and useful?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'se 'spected and useful har, massa. I hab no wife nor child, and dat
+make me feel, I s'pose, like as ef all de brack people war my chil'ren."</p>
+
+<p>"But they are not your children; and you can be of no service to them.
+At the North you might learn, and put your talents to some use."</p>
+
+<p>"Sar," he replied, a singular enthusiasm lighting up his face, "de <span class="smcap">Lord</span>,
+dat make me what I ar, put me har, and I must stay. Sometimes when tings
+look bery brack, and I feel a'most 'scouraged, I goes to <span class="smcap">Him</span>, and I say,
+'<span class="smcap">Lord</span>, I's ob no use, take me 'way; let me get fru wid dis; let me no
+more see de suffrin' and 'pression ob de pore cullud race;' den <span class="smcap">He</span> say
+to me, just so plain as I say it to you, 'Keep up good courage, Scipio,
+de time<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> will come;'<a name="FNanchor_C_3" id="FNanchor_C_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_C_3" class="fnanchor">[C]</a> and now, bless de <span class="smcap">Lord</span>, de time am coming!"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>What</i> time is coming, Scipio?"</p>
+
+<p>He gave me a quick, suspicious glance, but his face in a moment resumed
+its usual expression, as he replied: "I'se sure, massa, dat I could
+trust you. I feel you am my friend, but I can't say no more."</p>
+
+<p>"You need not, Scip&mdash;I can guess. What you have said is safe with me.
+But let me counsel you&mdash;wait for the white man. Do not let your freedom
+come in blood!"</p>
+
+<p>"It will come, massa, as de <span class="smcap">Lord</span> will. When <span class="smcap">He</span> war freed <i>de earth
+shook, and de vail ob de temple war rent in twain</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>We said no more, but rode on in silence; the darky absorbed in his own
+reflections, I musing over the black volcano, whose muffled echoes I
+then heard "away down South in Dixie."</p>
+
+<p>We had ridden on for about an hour, when an opening in the trees
+disclosed a by-path, leading to a plantation. Following it for a short
+distance, we came upon a small clearing, in the midst of which, flanked
+by a ragged corn and potato patch, squatted a dilapidated, unpainted
+wooden building, a sort of "half-way house" <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>between a hut and a shanty.
+In its door-way, seated on a chair which wanted one leg and a back, was
+a suit of linsey-woolsey, adorned by enormous metal buttons, and
+surmounted by a queer-looking headpiece that might have passed for
+either a hat or an umbrella. I was at a loss to determine whether the
+object were a human being or a scarecrow, when, at the sound of our
+approach, the umbrella-like article lifted, and a pair of sunken eyes, a
+nose, and an enormous beard, disclosed themselves. Addressing myself to
+the singular figure, I inquired how far we were from our destination,
+and the most direct route to it.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, stranger," was the reply, "it's a right smart twenty mile to the
+Cunnel's, but I reckon ye'll get thar, if ye follow yer critter's nose,
+and ar good at swimming."</p>
+
+<p>"Why good at swimming?" I inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause the 'runs' have ris, and ar considerable deep by this time."</p>
+
+<p>"That's comforting news."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, to a man as seems in a hurry," he replied, looking at my horse,
+which was covered with foam.</p>
+
+<p>"How far is it to the nearest run?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, it mought be six mile; it mought be seven, but you've one or two
+all-fired ones to cross arter that."</p>
+
+<p>Here was a pleasant predicament. It was nearly five o'clock, and our
+horse, though a noble animal, could not make the distance on an
+unobstructed route, in the then heavy state of the roads, in less than
+three hours. Long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> before that time it would be dark, and no doubt
+stormy, for the sky, which had lowered all the afternoon, every now and
+then uttered an ominous growl, and seemed ready to fall down upon us.
+But turning back was out of the question, so, thanking the "native," I
+was about to proceed, when he hailed me as follows:</p>
+
+<p>"I say, stranger, what's the talk in the city?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing, sir," I replied, "but fight and Secession."</p>
+
+<p>"D&mdash;n Secession!" was the decidedly energetic answer.</p>
+
+<p>"Why so, my friend? That doctrine seems to be popular hereabouts."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, pop'lar with them South Car'lina chaps. They'd be oneasy in heaven
+if Gabriel was cook, and the <span class="smcap">Lord</span> head-waiter."</p>
+
+<p>"They must be hard to suit," I said; "I 'kalkerlate' <i>you're</i> not a
+South Carolinian."</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir-ee! not by several mile. My mother moved over the line to born
+me a decent individual."</p>
+
+<p>"But why are you for the Union, when your neighbors go the other way?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause it's allers carried us 'long as slick as a cart with new-greased
+wheels; and 'cause, stranger, my grand'ther was one of Marion's boys,
+and spilt a lettle claret at Yewtaw for the old consarn, and I reckon
+he'd be oneasy in his grave if I turned my back on it now."</p>
+
+<p>"But, my friend," I said, "they say Lincoln is an Abolitionist, and if
+inaugurated, he will free every darky you've got."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"He can't do that, stranger, 'cordin' to the Constetution, and
+grand'ther used to say that ar dokermunt would hold the d&mdash;l himself;
+but, for my part, I'd like to see the niggers free."</p>
+
+<p>"See the niggers free!" I replied in undisguised astonishment; "why, my
+good sir, that is rank treason and abolition."</p>
+
+<p>"Call it what yer a mind to, them's my sentiments; but I say, stranger,
+if thar's ony thing on airth that I uttarly dispise it ar a Northern
+dough-face, and it's clar yer one on 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"There, my friend, you're mistaken. I'm neither an Abolitionist nor a
+dough-face. But <i>why</i> do you go for freeing the niggers?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause the white folks would be better off. You see, I have to feed and
+clothe my niggers, and pay a hundred and twenty and a hundred and fifty
+a year for 'em, and if the niggers war free, they'd work for 'bout half
+that."</p>
+
+<p>Continuing the conversation, I learned that the umbrella-hatted
+gentleman worked twenty hired negroes in the gathering of turpentine;
+and that the district we were entering was occupied by persons in the
+same pursuit, who nearly all employed "hired hands," and entertained
+similar sentiments; Colonel J&mdash;&mdash;, whom I was about to visit, and who
+was a large slave-<i>owner</i>, being about the only exception. This, the
+reader will please remember, was the state of things at the date of
+which I am writing, in the <i>very heart</i> of Secessiondom.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Bidding the turpentine-getter a rather reluctant "good-by," I rode on
+into the rain.</p>
+
+<p>It was nearly dark when we reached the first "run," but, fortunately, it
+was less swollen than our way-side acquaintance had represented, and we
+succeeded in crossing without difficulty. Hoping that the others might
+be equally as fordable, we pushed rapidly on, the darkness meanwhile
+gathering thickly about us, and the rain continuing to fall. Our way lay
+through an unbroken forest, and as the wind swept fiercely through it,
+the tall dark pines which towered on either side, moaned and sighed like
+a legion of unhappy spirits let loose from the dark abodes below.
+Occasionally we came upon a patch of woods where the turpentine-gatherer
+had been at work, and the white faces of the "tapped" trees, gleaming
+through the darkness, seemed an army of "sheeted ghosts" closing
+steadily around us. The darkness, the rain, and the hideous noises in
+the forest, called up unpleasant associations, and I inwardly determined
+to ask hospitality from the first human being, black or white, whom we
+should meet.</p>
+
+<p>We had ridden on for about an hour after dark, when suddenly our horse's
+feet plashed in the water, and he sank to his middle in a stream. My
+first thought was that we were in the second "run," but as he pushed
+slowly on, the water momentarily growing deeper, and spreading on either
+side as far as we could see, it flashed upon me that we had missed the
+road in the darkness, and were fairly launched into the Waccamaw river!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>
+Turning to the darky, who was then driving, I said quickly:</p>
+
+<p>"Scip, stop the horse. Where are we?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't know, massa; reckon we'se in de riber."</p>
+
+<p>"A comfortable situation this. We can't turn round. The horse can't swim
+such a stream in harness. What shall we do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Can you swim, massa?" he quietly asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, like an eel."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, den, we'd better gwo on. De hoss'll swim. But, massa, you might
+take off your boots and overcoat, and be ready for a spring ef he gwo
+down."</p>
+
+<p>I did as he directed, while he let down the apron and top of the wagon,
+and fastened the reins loosely to the dash-board, saying as he did so,
+"You must allers gib a hoss his head when he swim, massa; if you rein
+him, he gwo down, shore." Then, undoing a portion of the harness, to
+give the horse the free use of his legs, he shouted, "Gee up, ole Gray,"
+and we started.</p>
+
+<p>The noble animal stepped off slowly and cautiously, as if fully aware of
+the danger of the passage, but had proceeded only about fifty yards when
+he lost his footing, and plunged us into an entirely new and decidedly
+cold hip-bath. "Now's de time, ole Gray," "show your broughten up, ole
+boy," "let de gemman see you swim, ole feller," and similar remarks
+proceeded rapidly from the darky, who all the time avoided touching the
+reins.</p>
+
+<p>It may have been one minute, it may have been five minutes&mdash;I took "no
+note of <i>time</i>"&mdash;before the horse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> again struck bottom, and halted from
+sheer exhaustion, the water still almost level with his back, and the
+opposite bank too far-off to be seen through the darkness. After a short
+rest, he again "breasted the waters," and in a few moments landed us on
+the shore; not, unfortunately, in the road, but in the midst of the
+pine-trees, there so entangled with under-growth, that not even a man,
+much less a horse, could make his way through them. Wet to the skin, and
+shivering with the cold, we had no time to lose "in gittin' out of dat,"
+if we would avoid greater dangers than those we had escaped. So,
+springing from the wagon, the darky waded up the stream, near its bank,
+to reconnoitre. Returning in a few minutes, he reported that we were
+about a hundred yards below the road. We had been carried that far down
+stream by the strength of the current. Our only course was to follow the
+"run" up along its bank; this we did, and in a short time had the
+satisfaction of striking the high road. Arranging the harness, we were
+soon under way again, the horse bounding along as if he felt the
+necessity of vigorous exercise to restore his chilled circulation. We
+afterward learned that it was not the Waccamaw we had crossed, but the
+second "run" our native friend had told us of, and that the water in the
+middle of its stream was fifteen feet deep!</p>
+
+<p>Half-dead with cold and wet, we hurried on, but still no welcome light
+beckoned us to a human habitation. The darkness grew denser till we
+could not even distinguish the road, much less our horse's nose, which
+we had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> been directed to follow. Inwardly cursing the folly which
+brought me into such a wilderness, I said to the darky:</p>
+
+<p>"Scip, I'm sorry I took you on such a trip as this."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! neber mind me, massa; I ruther like de dark night and de storm."</p>
+
+<p>"Like the night and the storm! why so?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause den de wild spirits come out, and talk in de trees. Dey make me
+feel bery strong <i>har</i>," he replied, striking his hand on his breast.</p>
+
+<p>"The night and the storm, Scip, make <i>me</i> feel like cultivating another
+sort of <i>spirits</i>. There are some in the wagon-box; suppose we stop and
+see what they are."</p>
+
+<p>We stopped, and I took out a small willow-flask, which held the "spirits
+of Otard," and offered it to the darky.</p>
+
+<p>"No, massa," he said, laughing, "I neber touch dem sort ob spirits; dey
+raise de bery ole deble."</p>
+
+<p>Not heeding the darky's example, I took "a long and a strong pull,"
+and&mdash;felt the better for it.</p>
+
+<p>Again we rode on, and again and again I "communed with the spirits,"
+till a sudden exclamation from Scip aroused me from the half-stupor into
+which I was falling. "What's the matter?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"A light, massa, a light!"</p>
+
+<p>"Where?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dar, way off in de trees&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure enough, glory, hallelujah, there it is! We're all right now,
+Scip."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>We rode on till we came to the inevitable opening in the trees, and were
+soon at the door of what I saw, by the light which came through the
+crevices in the logs, was a one-story shanty, about twenty feet square.
+"Will you let us come in out of de rain?" asked Scip of a
+wretched-looking, half-clad, dirt-bedraggled woman, who thrust her head
+from the doorway.</p>
+
+<p>"Who ar ye?" was the reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Only massa and me, and de hoss, and we'm half dead wid de cold,"
+replied Scip; "can we cum in out ob de rain?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, strangers," replied the woman, eyeing us as closely as the
+darkness would permit, "you'll find mighty poor fixins har, but I reckon
+ye can come in."</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_C_3" id="Footnote_C_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_C_3"><span class="label">[C]</span></a> The Southern blacks, like all ignorant people, are intensely
+fanatical on religious subjects. The most trifling occurrences have to
+their minds a hidden significance, and they believe the <span class="smcap">Lord</span> speaks to
+them in signs and dreams, and in almost every event of nature. This
+superstition, which has been handed down from their savage ancestry, has
+absolute sway over them, and one readily sees what immense power it
+would give to some leading, adroit mind, that knew how to use it. By
+means of it they might be led to the most desperate deeds, fully
+believing all the while that they were "led ob de <span class="smcap">Lord</span>."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+
+<h3>POOR WHITES.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Entering the house, we saw, by the light of a blazing pile of
+pine-knots, which roared and crackled on the hearth, that it contained
+only a single apartment. In front of the fire-place, which occupied the
+better half of one side of this room, the floor was of the bare earth,
+littered over with pine chips, dead cinders, live coals, broken pots,
+and a lazy spaniel dog. Opposite to this, at the other end of the room,
+were two low beds, which looked as if they had been "slept in forever,
+and never made up." Against the wall, between the beds and the
+fire-place, stood a small pine table, and on it was a large wooden bowl,
+from whose mouth protruded the handles of several unwashed pewter
+spoons. On the right of the fire was a razeed rocking-chair, evidently
+the peculiar property of the mistress of the mansion, and three blocks
+of pine log, sawn off smoothly, and made to serve for seats. Over
+against these towered a high-backed settle, something like that on which</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 6em;">"sot Huldy all alone,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">When Zeke peeked thru the winder;"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>and on it, her head resting partly on her arm, partly on the end of the
+settle, one small, bare foot pressing the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> ground, the other, with the
+part of the person which is supposed to require stockings, extended in a
+horizontal direction&mdash;reclined, not Huldy, but her Southern cousin, who,
+I will wager, was decidedly the prettier and dirtier of the two. Our
+entrance did not seem to disconcert her in the least, for she lay there
+as unmoved as a marble statue, her large black eyes riveted on my face,
+as if seeing some nondescript animal for the first time. I stood for a
+moment transfixed with admiration. In a somewhat extensive observation
+of her sex in both hemispheres, I had never witnessed such a form, such
+eyes, such faultless features, and such wavy, black, luxuriant hair. A
+glance at her dress&mdash;a soiled, greasy, grayish linsey-woolsey gown,
+apparently her only garment&mdash;and a second look at her face, which, on
+closer inspection, had precisely the hue of a tallow candle, recalled me
+to myself, and allowed me to complete the survey of the premises.</p>
+
+<p>The house was built of unhewn logs, separated by wide interstices,
+through which the cold air came, in decidedly fresh if not health-giving
+currents, while a large rent in the roof, that let in the rain, gave the
+inmates an excellent opportunity for indulging in a shower-bath, of
+which they seemed greatly in need. The chimney, which had intruded a
+couple of feet into the room, as if to keep out of the cold, and
+threatened momentarily to tumble down, was of sticks, built up in clay,
+while the windows were of thick, unplaned boards.</p>
+
+<p>Two pretty girls, one of perhaps ten and the other of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> fourteen years,
+evidently sisters of the unadorned beauty, the middle-aged woman who had
+admitted us, and the dog&mdash;the only male member of the
+household&mdash;composed the family. I had seen negro cabins, but these
+people were whites, and these whites were <i>South Carolinians</i>. When such
+counterparts of the feudal serfs still exist, who will say that the days
+of chivalry are over!</p>
+
+<p>After I had seated myself by the fire, and the driver had gone out to
+stow the horse away under the tumble-down shed at the back of the house,
+the elder woman said to me&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon yer wet. Ben in the rain!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, madam, we've been out most of the day, and got in the river below
+here."</p>
+
+<p>"Did ye? Ye mean the 'run.' I reckon it's right deep now."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, our horse had to swim," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye orter strip and put on dry cloes to onst."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, madam, I will."</p>
+
+<p>Going to my portmanteau, which the darky had placed near the door, I
+found it dripping with wet, and opening it I discovered that every
+article had undergone the rite of immersion.</p>
+
+<p>"Every thing is thoroughly soaked, madam. I shall have to dry myself by
+your fire. Can you get me a cup of tea?"</p>
+
+<p>"Right sorry, stranger, but I can't. Haint a morsel to eat or drink in
+the house."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Remembering that our excellent hostess of the night before had insisted
+on filling the wagon-box with a quantity of "chicken fixins," to serve
+us in an emergency, and that my brandy flask was in my India-rubber
+coat, I sent Scip out for them.</p>
+
+<p>The stores disclosed boiled chicken, bacon, sandwiches, sweet potatoes,
+short cake, corn-bread, buttered waffles, and 'common doin's' too
+numerous to mention, enough to last a family of one for a fortnight, but
+all completely saturated with water. Wet or dry, however, the provisions
+were a godsend to the half-starved family, and their hearts seemed to
+open to me with amazing rapidity. The dog got up and wagged his tail,
+and even the marble-like beauty rose from her reclining posture and
+invited me to a seat with her on the bench.</p>
+
+<p>The kettle was soon steaming over the fire, and the boiling water, mixed
+with a little brandy, served as a capital substitute for tea. After the
+chicken was recooked, and the other edibles "warmed up," the little pine
+table was brought out, and I learned&mdash;what I had before suspected&mdash;that
+the big wooden bowl and the half dozen pewter spoons were the only
+"crockery" the family possessed.</p>
+
+<p>I declined the proffered seat at the table, the cooking utensils being
+any thing but inviting, and contented myself with the brandy and water;
+but, forgetting for a moment his color, I motioned to the darky&mdash;who was
+as wet and jaded, and much more hungry than I was&mdash;to take the place
+offered to me. The negro did not seem<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> inclined to do so, but the woman,
+observing my gesture, yelled out, her eyes flashing with anger:</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar! No darkies eats with us. Hope you don't reckon <i>yerself</i> no
+better than a good-for-nothin', no account nigger!"</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon, madam; I intended no offence. Scipio has served me
+very faithfully for two days, and is very tired and hungry. I forgot
+myself."</p>
+
+<p>This mollified the lady, and she replied:</p>
+
+<p>"Niggers is good enuff in thar place, but warn't meant to 'sociate with
+white folks."</p>
+
+<p>There may have been some ground for a distinction in that case; there
+certainly was a difference between the specimens of the two races then
+before me; but, not being one of the chivalry, it struck me that the
+odds were on the side of the black man. The whites were shiftless,
+ragged, and starving; the black well clad, cleanly, energetic, and as
+much above the others in intellect as Jupiter is above a church steeple.
+To be sure, color was against him, and he was, after all, a servant in
+the land of chivalry and of servant-owners. Of course the woman was
+right.</p>
+
+<p>She soon resumed the conversation with this remark:</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon yer a stranger in these parts; whar d'ye come from?"</p>
+
+<p>"From New York, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"New York! whar's that?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's a city at the North."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Oh! yas; I've heern tell on it: that's whar the Cunnel sells his
+turpentime. Quite a place, arnt it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, quite a place. Something larger than all South Carolina."</p>
+
+<p>"What d'ye say? Larger nor South Carolina. Kinder reckon tain't, is't?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, madam, it is."</p>
+
+<p>"Du tell! 'Taint so large as Charles'n, is't?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, twenty times larger than Charleston."</p>
+
+<p>"Lord o'massy! How does all the folks live thar?"</p>
+
+<p>"Live quite as well as they do here."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye don't have no niggers thar, does ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but none that are slaves."</p>
+
+<p>"Have Ablisherners thar, don't ye? them people that go agin the South?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, some of them."</p>
+
+<p>"What do they go agin the South for?"</p>
+
+<p>"They go for freeing the slaves. Some of them think a black man as good
+as a white one."</p>
+
+<p>"Quar, that; yer an Ablisherner, arnt ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'm an old-fashioned Whig."</p>
+
+<p>"What's that? Never heerd on them afore."</p>
+
+<p>"An old-fashioned Whig, madam, is a man whose political principles are
+perfect, and who is as perfect as his principles."</p>
+
+<p>That was a "stumper" for the poor woman, who evidently did not
+understand one-half of the sentence.</p>
+
+<p>"Right sort of folks, them," she said, in a half inquiring tone.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but they're all dead now."</p>
+
+<p>"Dead?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, dead, beyond the hope of resurrection."</p>
+
+<p>"Iv'e heern all the dead war to be resurrected. Didn't ye say ye war one
+on 'em? <i>Ye</i> aint dead yet," said the woman, chuckling at having
+cornered me.</p>
+
+<p>"But I'm more than <i>half</i> dead just now."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah," replied the woman, still laughing, "yer a chicken."</p>
+
+<p>"A chicken! what's that?"</p>
+
+<p>"A thing that goes on tu legs, and karkles," was the ready reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, my dear madam, you can out-talk me."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I reckon I kin outrun ye, tu. Ye arnt over rugged." Then, after a
+pause, she added&mdash;"What d'ye 'lect that darky, Linkum, President for?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't elect him. <i>I</i> voted for Douglas. But Lincoln is not a darky."</p>
+
+<p>"He's a mullater, then; I've heern he war," she replied.</p>
+
+<p>"No, he's not a mulatto; he's a rail-splitter."</p>
+
+<p>"Rail-splitter? <i>Then he's a nigger, shore.</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"No, madam; white men at the North split rails."</p>
+
+<p>"An' white wimmin tu, p'raps," said the woman, with a contemptuous toss
+of the head.</p>
+
+<p>"No, they don't," I replied, "but white women <i>work</i> there."</p>
+
+<p>"White wimmin work thar!" chimed in the hitherto speechless beauty,
+showing a set of teeth of the exact color of her skin&mdash;<i>yaller</i>. "What
+du the' du?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Some of them attend in stores, some set type, some teach school, and
+some work in factories."</p>
+
+<p>"Du tell! Dress nice, and make money?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," I replied, "they make money, and dress like fine ladies; in fact,
+<i>are</i> fine ladies. I know one young woman, of about your age, that had
+to get her own education, who earns a thousand dollars a year by
+teaching, and I've heard of many factory-girls who support their
+parents, and lay by a great deal of money, by working in the mills."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal!" replied the young woman, with a contemptuous curl of her
+matchless upper lip; "schule-marms arn't fine ladies; fine ladies don't
+work; only niggers works <i>har</i>. I reckon I'd rather be 'spectable than
+work for a livin'."</p>
+
+<p>I could but think how magnificently the lips of some of our glorious
+Yankee girls would have curled had they have heard that remark, and have
+seen the poor girl that made it, with her torn, worn, greasy dress; her
+bare, dirty legs and feet, and her arms, neck, and face so thickly
+encrusted with a layer of clayey mud that there was danger of
+hydrophobia if she went near a wash-tub. Restraining my involuntary
+disgust, I replied:</p>
+
+<p>"We at the North think work is respectable. We do not look down on a man
+or a woman for earning their daily bread. We all work."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, and that's the why ye'r all sech cowards," said the old woman.</p>
+
+<p>"Cowards!" I said; "who tells you that?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"My old man; he says one on our <i>boys</i> can lick five of your Yankee
+<i>men</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps so. Is your husband away from home?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, him and our Cal. ar down to Charles'n."</p>
+
+<p>"Cal. is your son, is he?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, he's my oldest, and a likely lad he ar tu&mdash;he's twenty-one, and
+his name are <span class="smcap">John Cal'oun Mills</span>. He's gone a troopin' it with his
+fader."</p>
+
+<p>"What, both gone and left you ladies here alone?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, the Cunnel sed every man orter go, and they warn't to be ahind the
+rest. The Cunnel&mdash;Cunnel J.&mdash;looks arter us while they is away."</p>
+
+<p>"But I should think the Colonel looked after you poorly&mdash;giving you
+nothing to eat."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! it's ben sech a storm to-day, the gals couldn't go for the vittles,
+though 'tain't a great way. We'r on his plantation; this house is
+his'n."</p>
+
+<p>This last was agreeable news, and it occurred to me that if we were so
+near the Colonel's we might push on, in spite of the storm, and get
+there that night; so I said:</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed; I'm going to the Colonel's. How far is his house from here?"</p>
+
+<p>"A right smart six mile; it's at the Cross roads. Ye know the Cunnel, du
+ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, I know him well. If his home is not more than six miles off, I
+think we had better go on to-night. What do you say, Scip?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon we'd better gwo, massa," replied the darky,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> who had spread my
+travelling-shawl in the chimney-corner, and was seated on it, drying his
+clothes.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye'd better not," said the woman; "ye'd better stay har; thar's a right
+smart run twixt har and the Cunnel's, and 'tain't safe to cross arter
+dark."</p>
+
+<p>"If that is so we'd better stay, Scip; don't you think so?" I said to
+the darky.</p>
+
+<p>"Jess as you say, massa. We got fru wid de oder one, and I reckon taint
+no wuss nor dat."</p>
+
+<p>"The bridge ar carried away, and ye'll hev to swim <i>shore</i>," said the
+woman. "Ye'd better stay."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, madam, I think we will," I replied, after a moment's
+thought; "our horse has swum one of your creeks to-night, and I dare not
+try another."</p>
+
+<p>Having taken off my coat, I had been standing, during the greater part
+of this conversation, in my shirt-sleeves before the fire, turning round
+occasionally to facilitate the drying process, and taking every now and
+then a sip from the gourd containing our brandy and water; aided in the
+latter exercise by the old woman and the eldest girl, who indulged quite
+as freely as I did.</p>
+
+<p>"Mighty good brandy that," at last said the woman. "Ye like brandy,
+don't ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not very much, madam. I take it to-night because I've been exposed to
+the storm, and it stimulates the circulation. But Scip, here, don't like
+spirits. He'll get the rheumatism because he don't."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't like dem sort of sperits, massa; but rumatics neber trubble me."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"But I've got it mighty bad," said the woman, "<i>and I take 'em whenever
+I kin get 'em</i>."</p>
+
+<p>I rather thought she did, but I "reckoned" her principal beverage was
+whiskey.</p>
+
+<p>"You have the rheumatism, madam, because your house is so open; a
+draught of air is always unhealthy."</p>
+
+<p>"I allers reckoned 'twar <i>healthy</i>," she replied. "Ye Yankee folks have
+quar notions."</p>
+
+<p>I looked at my watch, and found it was nearly ten o'clock, and, feeling
+very tired, said to the hostess:</p>
+
+<p>"Where do you mean we shall sleep?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ye can take that ar bed," pointing to the one nearer the wall, "the
+darky can sleep har;" motioning to the settle on which she was seated.</p>
+
+<p>"But where will you and your daughters sleep? I don't wish to turn you
+out of your beds."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! don't ye keer for us; we kin all bunk together; dun it afore. Like
+to turn in now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, thank you, I would;" and without more ceremony I adjourned to the
+further part of the room, and commenced disrobing. Doffing my boots,
+waistcoat, and cravat, and placing my watch and purse under the pillow,
+I gave a moment's thought to what a certain not very old lady, whom I
+had left at home, might say when she heard of my lodging with a
+grass-widow and three young girls, and sprang into bed. There I removed
+my under-mentionables, which were still too damp to sleep in, and in
+about two minutes and thirty seconds sunk into oblivion.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>A few streaks of grayish light were beginning to creep through the
+crevices in the logs, when a movement at the foot of the bed awakened
+me, and glancing downward I beheld the youngest girl emerging from under
+the clothes at my feet. She had slept there, "cross-wise," all night. A
+stir in the adjoining bed soon warned me that the other feminines were
+preparing to follow her example; so, turning my face to the wall, I
+feigned to be sleeping. Their toilet was soon made, when they quietly
+left Scip and myself in possession of the premises.</p>
+
+<p>The darky rose as soon as they were gone, and, coming to me, said:</p>
+
+<p>"Massa, we'd better be gwine. I'se got your cloes all dry, and you can
+rig up and breakfust at de Cunnel's."</p>
+
+<p>The storm had cleared away, and the sun was struggling to get through
+the distant pines, when Scip brought the horse to the door, and we
+prepared to start. Turning to the old woman, I said:</p>
+
+<p>"I feel greatly obliged to you, madam, for the shelter you have given
+us, and would like to make you some recompense for your trouble. Please
+to tell me what I shall pay you."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, stranger, we don't gin'rally take in lodgers, but seein' as how as
+thar ar tu on ye, and ye've had a good night on it, I don't keer if ye
+pay me tu dollars."</p>
+
+<p>That struck me as "rather steep" for "common doin's," particularly as we
+had furnished the food and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> "the drinks;" yet, saying nothing, I handed
+her a two-dollar bank-note. She took it, and held it up curiously to the
+sun for a moment, then handed it back, saying, "I don't know nuthin'
+'bout that ar sort o' money; haint you got no silver?"</p>
+
+<p>I fumbled in my pocket a moment, and found a quarter-eagle, which I gave
+her.</p>
+
+<p>"Haint got nary a fip o' change," she said, as she took it.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! never mind the change, madam; I shall want to stop and <i>look</i> at
+you when I return," I replied, good-humoredly.</p>
+
+<p>"Ha! ha! yer a chicken," said the woman, at the same time giving me a
+gentle poke in the ribs. Fearing she might, in the exuberance of her joy
+at the sight of the money, proceed to some more decided demonstration of
+affection, I hastily stepped into the wagon, bade her good-by, and was
+off.</p>
+
+<p>We were still among the pines, which towered gigantically all around us,
+but were no longer alone. Every tree was scarified for turpentine, and
+the forest was alive with negro men and women gathering the "last
+dipping," or clearing away the stumps and underbrush preparatory to the
+spring work. It was Christmas week; but, as I afterward learned, the
+Colonel's negroes were accustomed to doing "half tasks" at that season,
+being paid for their labor as if they were free. They stopped their work
+as we rode by, and stared at us with a stupid, half-frightened
+curiosity, very much<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> like the look of a cow when a railway train is
+passing. It needed but little observation to convince me that their
+<i>status</i> was but one step above the level of the brutes.</p>
+
+<p>As we rode along I said to the driver, "Scip, what did you think of our
+lodgings?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mighty pore, massa. Niggas lib better'n dat."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," I replied, "but these folks despise you blacks; they seem to be
+both poor and proud."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, dey'm pore 'cause dey wont work, and dey'm proud 'cause
+dey'r white. Dey wont work 'cause dey see de darky slaves doin' it, and
+tink it am beneaf white folks to do as de darkies do. Dis habin' slaves
+keeps dis hull country pore."</p>
+
+<p>"Who told you that?" I asked, astonished at hearing a remark showing so
+much reflection from a negro.</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody, massa; I see it myseff."</p>
+
+<p>"Are there many of these poor whites around Georgetown?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not many 'round Georgetown, sar, but great many in de up-country har,
+and dey'm all 'like&mdash;pore and no account; none ob 'em kin read, and dey
+all eat clay."</p>
+
+<p>"Eat clay!" I said; "what do you mean by that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you see, massa, how yaller all dem wimmin war? Dat's 'cause dey
+eat clay. De little children begin 'fore dey kin walk, and dey eat it
+till dey die; dey chaw it like 'backer. It makes all dar stumacs big,
+like as you seed 'em, and spiles dar 'gestion. It'm mighty onhealfy."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Can it be possible that human beings do such things! The brutes
+wouldn't do that."</p>
+
+<p>"No, massa, but <i>dey</i> do it; dey'm pore trash. Dat's what de big folks
+call 'em, and it am true; dey'm long way lower down dan de darkies."</p>
+
+<p>By this time we had arrived at the "run." We found the bridge carried
+away, as the woman had told us; but its abutments were still standing,
+and over these planks had been laid, which afforded a safe crossing for
+foot-passengers. To reach these planks, however, it was necessary to
+wade into the stream for full fifty yards, the "run" having overflowed
+its banks for that distance on either side of the bridge. The water was
+evidently receding, but, as we could not well wait, like the man in the
+fable, for it all to run by, we alighted, and counselled as to the best
+mode of making the passage.</p>
+
+<p>Scip proposed that he should wade in to the first abutment, ascertain
+the depth of the stream, and then, if it was not too deep for the horse
+to ford to that point, drive that far, get out, and walk to the end of
+the planking, leading the horse, and then again mount the wagon at the
+further end of the bridge. We were sure the horse would have to swim in
+the middle of the current, and perhaps for a considerable distance
+beyond; but, having witnessed his proficiency in aquatic performances,
+we had no doubt he would get safely across.</p>
+
+<p>The darky's plan was decided on, and divesting himself of his trowsers,
+he waded into the "run" to take the soundings.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>While he was in the water my attention was attracted to a printed paper,
+posted on one of the pines near the roadside. Going up to it, I read as
+follows:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"$250 REWARD.</p>
+
+<p>"Ran away from the subscriber, on Monday, November 12th, his
+mulatto man, <span class="smcap">Sam</span>. Said boy is stout-built, five feet nine inches
+high, 31 years old, weighs 170 lbs., and walks very erect, and with
+a quick, rapid gait. The American flag is tattooed on his right arm
+above the elbow. There is a knife-cut over the bridge of his nose,
+a fresh bullet-wound in his left thigh, and his back bears marks of
+a recent whipping. He is supposed to have made his way back to
+Dinwiddie County, Va., where he was raised, or to be lurking in the
+swamps in this vicinity.</p>
+
+<p>"The above reward will be paid for his confinement in any jail in
+North or South Carolina, or Virginia, or for his delivery to the
+subscriber on his plantation at &mdash;&mdash;.</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;&mdash;, December 2, 1860."</p></div>
+
+<p>The name signed to this hand-bill was that of the planter I was about to
+visit.</p>
+
+<p>Scip having returned, and reported the stream fordable to the bridge, I
+said to him, pointing to the "notice:"</p>
+
+<p>"Read that, Scip."</p>
+
+<p>He read it, but made no remark.</p>
+
+<p>"What does it mean&mdash;that fresh bullet wound, and the marks of a recent
+whipping?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"It mean, massa, dat de darky hab run away, and ben took; and dat when
+dey took him dey shot him, and flogged him arter dat. Now, he hab run
+away agin. De Cunnel's mighty hard on his niggas!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Is he? I can scarcely believe that."</p>
+
+<p>"He am, massa; but he arnt so much to blame, nuther; dey'm awful bad,
+most ob 'em&mdash;so dey say."</p>
+
+<p>Our conversation was here interrupted by our reaching the bridge. After
+safely "walking the plank," and making our way to the opposite bank, I
+resumed it by asking:</p>
+
+<p>"Why are the Colonel's negroes so particularly bad?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause, you see, massa, de turpentime business hab made great profits
+for sum yars now, and de Cunnel hab been gettin' rich bery fass. He put
+all his money, jes so fass as he make it, into darkies, so to make more;
+for he's got bery big plantation, and need nuffin' but darkies to work
+it to make money jess like a gold mine. He goes up to Virginny to buy
+niggas; and up dar <i>now</i> dey don't sell none less dey'm bad uns, 'cep
+when sum massa die or git pore. Virginny darkies dat cum down har aint
+gin'rally ob much account. Dey'm either kinder good-for-nuffin, or dey'm
+ugly; and de Cunnel'd ruther hab de ugly dan de no-account niggas."</p>
+
+<p>"How many negroes has he?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Bout two hundred, men and wimmin, I b'lieve, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"It can't be pleasant for his family to remain in such an out-of-the-way
+place, with so bad a gang of negroes about them, and no white people
+near."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"No, massa, not in dese times; but de missus and de young lady arnt dar
+now."</p>
+
+<p>"Not there now? The Colonel said nothing to me about that. Are you
+sure?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yas, massa; I seed 'em gwo off on de boat to Charles'n most two
+weeks ago. Dey don't mean to cum back till tings am more settled; dey'm
+'fraid to stay dar."</p>
+
+<p>"Would it be safe for the Colonel there, if a disturbance broke out
+among the slaves."</p>
+
+<p>"'T wouldn't be safe den anywhar, sar; but de Cunnel am a bery brave
+man. He'm better dan twenty of <i>his</i> niggas."</p>
+
+<p>"Why better than twenty of <i>his</i> niggers?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause dem ugly niggas am gin'rally cowards. De darky dat is quiet,
+'spectful, and does his duty, am de brave sort; <i>dey'll</i> fight, massa,
+till dey'm cut down."</p>
+
+<p>We had here reached a turn in the road, and passing it, came suddenly
+upon a coach, attached to which were a pair of magnificent grays, driven
+by a darky in livery.</p>
+
+<p>"Hallo, dar!" said Scip to the driver, as we came nearly abreast of the
+carriage. "Am you Cunnel J&mdash;&mdash;'s man?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I is dat," replied the darky.</p>
+
+<p>At this moment a woolly head, which I recognized at once as that of the
+Colonel's man "Jim," was thrust from the window of the vehicle.</p>
+
+<p>"Hallo, Jim," I said. "How do you do? I'm glad to see you."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Lor bress me, Massa K&mdash;&mdash;, am dat you?" exclaimed the astonished negro,
+hastily opening the door, and coming to me. "Whar <i>did</i> you cum from?
+I'se mighty glad to see you;" at the same time giving my hand a hearty
+shaking. I must here say, in justice to the reputation of South
+Carolina, that no respectable Carolinian refuses to shake hands with a
+black man, unless&mdash;the black happens to be free.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought I wouldn't wait for you," I replied. "But how did you expect
+to get on? the 'runs' have swollen into rivers."</p>
+
+<p>"We got a 'flat' made for dis one&mdash;it's down by dis time&mdash;de oders we
+tought we'd get ober sumhow."</p>
+
+<p>"Jim, this is Scip," I said, seeing the darkies took no notice of each
+other.</p>
+
+<p>"How d'ye do, Scip<i>io?</i>" said Jim, extending his hand to him. A look of
+singular intelligence passed over the faces of the two negroes as their
+hands met; it vanished in an instant, and was so slight that none but a
+close observer would have detected it, but some words that Scip had
+previously let drop had put me on the alert, and I felt sure it had a
+hidden significance.</p>
+
+<p>"Wont you get into de carriage, massa?" inquired Jim.</p>
+
+<p>"No, thank you, Jim. I'll ride on with Scip. Our horse is jaded, and you
+had better go ahead."</p>
+
+<p>Jim mounted the driver's seat, turned the carriage, and drove off at a
+brisk pace to announce our coming<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> at the plantation, while Scip and I
+rode on at a slower gait.</p>
+
+<p>"Scip, did you know Jim before?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Hab seed him afore, massa, but neber know'd him."</p>
+
+<p>"How is it that you have lived in Georgetown five years, and have not
+known him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I cud hab know'd him, massa, good many time, ef I'd liked, but darkies
+hab to be careful."</p>
+
+<p>"Careful of what?"</p>
+
+<p>"Careful ob who dey knows; good many bad niggas 'bout."</p>
+
+<p>"Pshaw, Scip, you're 'coming de possum'; there isn't a better nigger
+than Jim in all South Carolina. I know him well."</p>
+
+<p>"P'raps he am; reckon he <i>am</i> a good 'nuff nigga."</p>
+
+<p>"Good enough nigga, Scip! Why, I tell you he's a splendid fellow; just
+as true as steel. He's been North with the Colonel, often, and the
+Abolitionists have tried to get him away; he knew he could go, but
+wouldn't budge an inch."</p>
+
+<p>"I knew he wouldn't," said the darky, a pleasurable gleam passing
+through his eyes; "dat sort don't run; dey face de music!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't they run? What do you mean by facing the music?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nuffin' massa&mdash;only dey'd rather stay har."</p>
+
+<p>"Come, Scip, you've played this game long enough. Tell me, now, what
+that look you gave each other when you shook hands meant."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"What look, massa? Oh! I s'pose 'twar 'cause we'd both <i>heerd</i> ob each
+oder afore."</p>
+
+<p>"'Twas more than that, Scip. Be frank; you know you can trust <i>me</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, den, massa," he replied hesitatingly, adding, after a short pause,
+"de ole woman called you a Yankee, sar&mdash;you can guess."</p>
+
+<p>"If I should guess, 't would be that it meant <i>mischief</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"It don't mean mischief, sar," said the darky, with a tone and air that
+would not have disgraced a Cabinet officer; "it mean only <span class="smcap">Right</span> and
+<span class="smcap">Justice</span>."</p>
+
+<p>"It means that there is some secret understanding between you."</p>
+
+<p>"I toled you, massa," he replied, relapsing into his usual manner, "dat
+de blacks am all Freemasons. I gabe Jim de grip, and he knowd me. He'd
+ha knowd my name ef you hadn't toled him."</p>
+
+<p>"Why would he have known your name?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause I gabe de grip, dat tole him."</p>
+
+<p>"Why did he call you Scip<i>io</i>? I called you <i>Scip</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! de darkies all do dat. Nobody but de white folks call me <i>Scip</i>. I
+can't say no more, massa; <span class="smcap">I shud break de oath ef I did</span>!"</p>
+
+<p>"You have said enough to satisfy me that there is a secret league among
+the blacks, and that you are a leader in it. Now, I tell you, you'll get
+yourself into a scrape. I've taken a liking to you, Scip, and I should
+be <i>very sorry</i> to see you run yourself into danger."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I tank you, massa, from de bottom ob my soul I tank you," he said, as
+the tears moistened his eyes. "You bery kind, massa; it do me good to
+talk wid you. But what am my life wuth? What am any <i>slave's</i> life wuth?
+<i>Ef you war me you'd do like me!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>I could not deny it, and I made no reply.</p>
+
+<p>The writer is aware that he is here making an important statement, and
+one that may be called in question by those persons who are accustomed
+to regard the Southern blacks as only reasoning brutes. The great mass
+of them <i>are</i> but a little above the brutes in their habits and
+instincts, but a large body are fully on a par, except in mere
+book-education, with their white masters.</p>
+
+<p>The conversation above recorded is, <i>verbatim et literatim</i>, <span class="smcap">TRUE</span>. It
+took place at the time indicated, and was taken down, as were other
+conversations recorded in this book, within twenty-four hours after its
+occurrence. The name and the locality, only, I have, for very evident
+reasons, disguised.</p>
+
+<p>From this conversation, together with others, held with the same negro,
+and from after developments made to me at various places, and at
+different times, extending over a period of six weeks, I became
+acquainted with the fact that there exists among the blacks a secret and
+wide-spread organization of a Masonic character, having its grip,
+pass-word, and oath. It has various grades of leaders, who are
+competent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> and <i>earnest</i> men, and its ultimate object is <span class="smcap">Freedom</span>. It is
+quite as secret and wide-spread as the order of the "Knights of the
+Golden Circle," the kindred league among the whites.</p>
+
+<p>This latter organization, which was instituted by John C. Calhoun,
+William L. Porcher, and others, as far back as 1835, has for its sole
+object the dissolution of the Union, and the establishment of a Southern
+Empire&mdash;Empire is the word, not Confederacy, or Republic; and it was
+solely by means of its secret but powerful machinery that the Southern
+States were plunged into revolution, in defiance of the will of a
+majority of their voting population.</p>
+
+<p>Nearly every man of influence at the South (and many a pretended Union
+man at the North) is a member of this organization, and sworn, under the
+penalty of assassination, to labor "in season and out of season, by fair
+means and by foul, at all times, and all occasions," for the
+accomplishment of its object. The blacks are bound together by a similar
+oath, and only <i>bide their time</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The knowledge of the real state of political affairs which the negroes
+have acquired through this organization is astonishingly accurate; their
+leaders possess every essential of leadership&mdash;except, it may be,
+military skill&mdash;and they are fully able to cope with the whites.</p>
+
+<p>The negro whom I call Scipio, on the day when Major Anderson evacuated
+Fort Moultrie, and before he or I knew of that event, which set all
+South Carolina in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> blaze, foretold to me the breaking out of this war
+in Charleston harbor, and as confidently predicted that it would result
+in the freedom of the slaves!</p>
+
+<p>The fact of this organization existing is not positively known (for the
+black is more subtle and crafty than any thing human), but it is
+suspected by many of the whites, the more moderate of whom are disposed
+to ward off the impending blow by some system of gradual
+emancipation&mdash;declaring all black children born after a certain date
+free&mdash;or by some other action that will pacify and keep down the slaves.
+These persons, however, are but a small minority, and possess no
+political power, and the South is rushing blindly on to a catastrophe,
+which, if not averted by the action of our government, will make the
+horrors of San Domingo and the French Revolution grow pale in history.</p>
+
+<p>I say the action of our government, for with it rests the
+responsibility. What the black wants is freedom. Give him that, and he
+will have no incentive to insurrection. If emancipation is proclaimed at
+the head of our armies&mdash;emancipation for <i>all</i>&mdash;confiscation for the
+slaves of rebels, compensation for the slaves of loyal citizens&mdash;the
+blacks will rush to the aid of our troops, the avenging angel will pass
+over the homes of the many true and loyal men who are still left at the
+South, and the thunderbolts of this war will fall only&mdash;where they
+should fall&mdash;on the heads of its blood-stained authors. If this is not
+done, after we have put down the whites we shall have to meet the
+blacks, and after we<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> have waded knee-deep in the blood of both, we
+shall end the war where it began, but with the South desolated by fire
+and sword, the North impoverished and loaded down with an everlasting
+debt, and our once proud, happy, and glorious country the by-word and
+scorn of the civilized world.</p>
+
+<p>Slavery is the very bones, marrow, and life-blood of this rebellion, and
+it cannot be crushed till we have destroyed that accursed institution.
+If a miserable peace is patched up before a death-stroke is given to
+slavery, it will gather new strength, and drive freedom from this
+country forever. In the nature of things it cannot exist in the same
+hemisphere with liberty. Then let every man who loves his country
+determine that if this war must needs last for twenty years, it shall
+not end until this root of all our political evils is weeded out
+forever.</p>
+
+<p>A short half-hour took us to the plantation, where I found the Colonel
+on the piazza awaiting me. After our greeting was over, noticing my
+soiled and rather dilapidated condition, he inquired where I had passed
+the night. I told him, when he burst into a hearty fit of laughter, and
+for several days good-naturedly bantered me about "putting up" at the
+most aristocratic hotel in South Carolina&mdash;the "Mills House."</p>
+
+<p>We soon entered the mansion, and the reader will, I trust, pardon me, if
+I leave him standing in its door-way till another chapter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+
+<h3>ON THE PLANTATION.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The last chapter left the reader in the door-way of the Colonel's
+mansion. Before entering, we will linger there awhile and survey the
+outside of the premises.</p>
+
+<p>The house stands where two roads meet, and, unlike most planters'
+dwellings, is located in full view of the highway. It is a rambling,
+disjointed structure, thrown together with no regard to architectural
+rules, and yet there is a rude harmony in its very irregularities that
+has a pleasing effect. The main edifice, with a frontage of nearly
+eighty feet, is only one and a half stories high, and is overshadowed by
+a broad projecting roof, which somehow, though in a very natural way,
+drops down at the eaves, and forms the covering of a piazza, twenty feet
+wide, and extending across the entire front of the house. At its
+south-easterly angle, the roof is truncated, and made again to form a
+covering for the piazza, which there extends along a line of irregular
+buildings for sixty yards. A portion of the verandah on this side being
+enclosed, forms a bowling-alley and smoking-room, two essential
+appendages to a planter's residence. The whole structure is covered with
+yellow-pine weather boarding, which in some former age was covered with
+paint of a grayish brown color. This, in many places, has peeled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> off
+and allowed the sap to ooze from the pine, leaving every here and there
+large blotches on the surface, somewhat resembling the "warts" I have
+seen on the trunks of old trees.</p>
+
+<p>The house is encircled by grand old pines, whose tall, upright stems,
+soaring eighty and ninety feet in the air, make the low hamlet seem
+lower by the contrast. They have stood there for centuries, their rough,
+shaggy coats buttoned close to their chins, and their long green locks
+waving in the wind; but the long knife has been thrust into their veins,
+and their life-blood is now fast oozing away.</p>
+
+<p>With the exception of the negro huts, which are scattered at irregular
+intervals through the woods in the rear of the mansion, there is not a
+human habitation within an hour's ride; but such a cosy, inviting,
+hospitable atmosphere surrounds the whole place, that a stranger does
+not realize he has happened upon it in a wilderness.</p>
+
+<p>The interior of the dwelling is in keeping with the exterior, though in
+the drawing-rooms, where rich furniture and fine paintings actually
+lumber the apartments, there is evident the lack of a nice perception of
+the "fitness of things," and over the whole hangs a "dusty air," which
+reminds one that the Milesian Bridget does not "flourish" in South
+Carolina.</p>
+
+<p>I was met in the entrance-way by a tall, fine-looking woman, to whom the
+Colonel introduced me as follows:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;, this is Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, my housekeeper; she will try to make
+you forget that Mrs. J&mdash;&mdash; is absent."</p>
+
+<p>After a few customary courtesies were exchanged, I was shown to a
+dressing-room, and with the aid of Jim, a razor, and one of the
+Colonel's shirts&mdash;all of mine having undergone a drenching&mdash;soon made a
+tolerably presentable appearance. The negro then conducted me to the
+breakfast-room, where I found the family assembled.</p>
+
+<p>It consisted, besides the housekeeper, of a tall, raw-boned,
+sandy-haired personage, with a low brow, a blear eye, and a sneaking
+look&mdash;the overseer of the plantation; and of a well-mannered,
+intelligent lad&mdash;with the peculiarly erect carriage and uncommon
+blending of good-natured ease and dignity which distinguished my
+host&mdash;who was introduced to me as the housekeeper's son.</p>
+
+<p>Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, who presided over the "tea-things," was a person of perhaps
+thirty-five, but a rich olive complexion, enlivened by a delicate red
+tint, and relieved by thick masses of black hair, made her appear to a
+casual observer several years younger. Her face bore vestiges of great
+beauty, which time, and, perhaps, care, had mellowed but not
+obliterated, and her conversation indicated high cultivation. She had
+evidently mingled in refined society in this country and in Europe, and
+it was a strange freak of fortune that had reduced her to a menial
+condition in the family of a backwoods planter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>After some general conversation, the Colonel remarked that his wife and
+daughter would pass the winter in Charleston.</p>
+
+<p>"And do <i>you</i> remain on the plantation?" I inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, I am needed here," he replied; "but Madam's son is with my
+family."</p>
+
+<p>"Madam's son!" I exclaimed in astonishment, forgetting in my surprise
+that the lady was present.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir," she remarked, "my oldest boy is twenty."</p>
+
+<p>"Excuse me, Madam; I forgot that in your climate one never grows old."</p>
+
+<p>"There you are wrong, sir; I'm sure I <i>feel</i> old when I think how soon
+my boys will be men."</p>
+
+<p>"Not old yet, Alice," said the Colonel, in a singularly familiar tone;
+"you seem to me no older than when you were fifteen."</p>
+
+<p>"You have been long acquainted," I remarked, not knowing exactly what to
+say.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes," replied my host, "we were children together."</p>
+
+<p>"Your Southern country, Madam, affords a fine field for young men of
+enterprise."</p>
+
+<p>"My eldest son resides in Germany," replied the lady. "He expects to
+make that country his home. He would have passed his examination at
+Heidelberg this autumn had not circumstances called him here."</p>
+
+<p>"You are widely separated," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir; his father thinks it best, and I suppose it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> is. Thomas,
+here, is to return with his brother, and I may live to see neither of
+them again."</p>
+
+<p>My curiosity was naturally much excited to learn more, but nothing
+further being volunteered, and the conversation soon turning to other
+topics, I left the table with it unsatisfied.</p>
+
+<p>After enjoying a quiet hour with the Colonel in the smoking-room, he
+invited me to join him in a ride over the plantation. I gladly assented,
+and Jim shortly announced the horses were in waiting. That darky, who
+invariably attended his master when the latter proceeded from home,
+accompanied us. As we were mounting I bethought me of Scip, and asked
+where he was.</p>
+
+<p>"He'm gwine to gwo, massa, and want to say good-by to you."</p>
+
+<p>It seemed madness for Scip to start on a journey of seventy miles
+without rest, so I requested the Colonel to let him remain till the next
+day. He cheerfully assented, and sent Jim to find him. While waiting for
+the darky, I spoke of how faithfully he had served me during my journey.</p>
+
+<p>"He's a splendid nigger," replied the Colonel; "worth his weight in
+gold. If affairs were more settled I would buy him."</p>
+
+<p>"But Colonel A&mdash;&mdash; tells me he is too intelligent. He objects to
+'knowing' niggers."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>I</i> do not," replied my host, "if they are honest, and I would trust
+Scip with uncounted gold. Look at him,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> he continued, as the negro
+approached; "were flesh and bones ever better put together?"</p>
+
+<p>The darky <i>was</i> a fine specimen of sable humanity, and I readily
+understood why the practiced eye of the Colonel appreciated his physical
+developments.</p>
+
+<p>"Scip," I said, "you must not think of going to-day; the Colonel will be
+glad to let you remain until you are fully rested."</p>
+
+<p>"Tank you, massa, tank you bery much, but de ole man will spec' me, and
+I orter gwo."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, never mind old&mdash;&mdash;," said the Colonel, "I'll take care of him."</p>
+
+<p>"Tank you, Cunnel, den I'll stay har till de mornin'."</p>
+
+<p>Taking a by-path which led through the forest in the rear of the
+mansion, we soon reached a small stream, and, following its course for a
+short distance, came upon a turpentine distillery, which the Colonel
+explained to me was one of three that prepared the product of his
+plantation for market, and provided for his family of nearly three
+hundred souls.</p>
+
+<p>It was enclosed, or rather roofed, by a rude structure of rough boards,
+which was open at the sides, and sustained on a number of pine poles
+about thirty feet in height, and bore a strong resemblance to the usual
+covering of a New England haystack.</p>
+
+<p>Three stout negro men, divested of all clothing excepting a pair of
+coarse gray trowsers and a red shirt&mdash;it was a raw, cold, wintry
+day&mdash;and with cotton bandannas bound about their heads, were "tending
+the still." The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> foreman stood on a raised platform level with its top,
+but as we approached very quietly seated himself on a turpentine barrel
+which a moment before he had rolled over the mouth of the boiler.
+Another negro was below, feeding the fire with "light wood," and a third
+was tending the trough by which the liquid rosin found its way into the
+semicircle of rough barrels intended for its reception.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Junius, what in creation are you doing there?" asked the
+Colonel, as we approached, of the negro on the turpentine barrel.</p>
+
+<p>"Holein' her down, Cunnel; de ole ting got a mine to blow up dis
+mornin'; I'se got dis barrl up har to hole her down."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, you everlasting nigger, if the top leaks you'll be blown to
+eternity in half a second."</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon not, massa; be barrl and me kin hole her. We'll take de risk."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps <i>you</i> will," said the Colonel, laughing, "but I wont. Nigger
+property isn't of much account, but you're too good a darky, June, to be
+sent to the devil for a charge of turpentine."</p>
+
+<p>"Tank you, massa, but you dun kno' dis ole ting like I do. You cudn't
+blow her up nohow; I'se tried her afore dis way."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you do it again; now mind; if you do I'll make a white man of
+you." (This I suppose referred to a process of flaying with a whip;
+though the whip is generally thought to <i>redden</i>, not <i>whiten</i>, the
+negro.)<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The black did not seem at all alarmed, for he showed his ivories in a
+broad grin as he replied, "Jess as you say, massa; you'se de boss in dis
+shanty."</p>
+
+<p>Directing the fire to be raked out, and the still to stand unused until
+it was repaired, the Colonel turned his horse to go, when he observed
+that the third negro was shoeless, and his feet chapped and swollen with
+the cold. "Jake," he said, "where are your shoes?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wored out, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Worn out! Why haven't you been to me?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause, massa, I know'd you'd jaw; you tole me I wears 'em out mighty
+fass."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you do, that's a fact; but go to Madam and get a pair; and you,
+June, you've been a decent nigger, you can ask for a dress for Rosy. How
+is little June?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mighty pore, massa; de ma'am war dar lass night and dis mornin', and
+she reckun he'm gwine to gwo, sartain."</p>
+
+<p>"Sorry to hear that," said the Colonel. "I'll go and see him. Don't feel
+badly, June," he continued, for the tears welled up to the eyes of the
+black man as he spoke of his child; "we all must die."</p>
+
+<p>"I knows dat, massa, but it am hard to hab 'em gwo."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it is, June, but we may save him."</p>
+
+<p>"Ef you cud, massa! Oh, ef you cud!" and the poor darky covered his face
+with his great hands and sobbed like a child.</p>
+
+<p>We rode on to another "still," and there dismounting,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> the Colonel
+explained to me the process of gathering and manufacturing turpentine.
+The trees are "boxed" and "tapped" early in the year, while the frost is
+still in the ground. "Boxing" is the process of scooping a cavity in the
+trunk of the tree by means of a peculiarly shaped axe, made for the
+purpose; "tapping" is scarifying the rind of the wood above the boxes.
+This is never done until the trees have been worked one season, but it
+is then repeated year after year, till on many plantations they present
+the marks of twenty and frequently thirty annual "tappings," and are
+often denuded of bark for a distance of thirty feet from the ground. The
+necessity for this annual tapping arises from the fact that the scar on
+the trunk heals at the end of a season, and the sap will no longer run
+from it; a fresh wound is therefore made each spring. The sap flows down
+the scarified surface and collects in the boxes, which are emptied six
+or eight times in a year, according to the length of the season. This is
+the process of "dipping," and it is done with a tin or iron vessel
+constructed to fit the cavity in the tree.</p>
+
+<p>The turpentine gathered from the newly boxed or virgin tree is very
+valuable, on account of its producing a peculiarly clear and white
+rosin, which is used in the manufacture of the finer kinds of soap, and
+by "Rosin the Bow." It commands, ordinarily, nearly five times the price
+of the common article. When barrelled, the turpentine is frequently sent
+to market in its crude state, but more often is distilled on the
+plantation, the gatherers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> generally possessing means sufficient to own
+a still.</p>
+
+<p>In the process of distilling, the crude turpentine is "dumped" into the
+boiler through an opening in the top&mdash;the same as that on which we saw
+Junius composedly seated&mdash;water is then poured upon it, the aperture
+made tight by screwing down the cover and packing it with clay, a fire
+built underneath, and when the heat reaches several hundred degrees
+Fahrenheit, the process of manufacture begins. The volatile and more
+valuable part of the turpentine, by the action of the heat, rises as
+vapor, then condensing flows off through a pipe in the top of the still,
+and comes out spirits of turpentine, while the heavier portion finds
+vent at a lower aperture, and comes out rosin.</p>
+
+<p>No article of commerce is so liable to waste and leakage as turpentine.
+The spirits can only be preserved in tin cans, or in thoroughly seasoned
+oak barrels, made tight by a coating of glue on the inner side. Though
+the material for these barrels exists at the South in luxuriant
+abundance, they are all procured from the North, and the closing of the
+Southern ports has now entirely cut off the supply; for while the
+turpentine farmer may improvise coopers, he can by no process give the
+oak timber the seasoning which is needed to render the barrel
+spirit-tight. Hence it is certain that a large portion of the last crop
+of turpentine must have gone to waste. When it is remembered that the
+one State of North Carolina exports annually nearly twenty millions in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>
+value of this product, and employs fully two-thirds of its negroes in
+its production, it will be seen how dearly the South is paying for the
+mad freak of secession. Putting out of view his actual loss of produce,
+how does the turpentine farmer feed and employ his negroes? and pressed
+as these blacks inevitably are by both hunger and idleness, those
+prolific breeders of sedition, what will keep them quiet?</p>
+
+<p>"What effect will secession have on your business?" I asked the Colonel,
+after a while.</p>
+
+<p>"A favorable one. I shall ship my crop direct to Liverpool and London,
+instead of selling it to New York middle-men."</p>
+
+<p>"But is not the larger portion of the turpentine crop consumed at the
+North?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes. We shall have to deal with the Yankees anyhow, but we shall do
+as little with them as possible."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose the Yankees object to your setting up by yourselves, and put
+your ports under lock and key?"</p>
+
+<p>"They wont do that, and if they do, England will break the blockade."</p>
+
+<p>"We may rap John Bull over the knuckles in that event," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, suppose you do; what then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Merely, England would not have a ship in six months to carry your
+cotton. A war with her would ruin the shipping trade of the North. Our
+marine would seek employment at privateering, and soon sweep every<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span>
+British merchant ship from the ocean. We could afford to give up ten
+years' trade with you, and to put secession down by force, for the sake
+of a year's brush with John Bull."</p>
+
+<p>"But, my good friend, where would the British navy be all this while?"</p>
+
+<p>"Asleep. The English haven't a steamer that can catch a Brookhaven
+schooner. The last war proved that government vessels are no match for
+privateers."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, well! but the Yankees wont fight."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose they do. Suppose they shut up your ports, and leave you with
+your cotton and turpentine unsold? You raise scarcely any thing
+else&mdash;what would you eat?"</p>
+
+<p>"We would turn our cotton fields into corn and wheat. Turpentine-makers,
+of course, would suffer."</p>
+
+<p>"Then why are not <i>you</i> a Union man?"</p>
+
+<p>"My friend, I have nearly three hundred mouths to feed. I depend on the
+sale of my crop to give them food. If our ports are closed, I cannot do
+it&mdash;they will starve, and I be ruined. But sooner than submit to the
+domination of the cursed Yankees, I will see my negroes starving, and my
+child a beggar!"</p>
+
+<p>At this point in the conversation we arrived at the negro shanty where
+the sick child was. Dismounting, the Colonel and I entered.</p>
+
+<p>The cabin was almost a counterpart of the "Mills House," described in
+the previous chapter, but it had a plank flooring, and was scrupulously
+neat and clean.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> The logs were stripped of bark, and whitewashed. A
+bright, cheerful fire was blazing on the hearth, and an air of rude
+comfort pervaded the whole interior. On a low bed in the farther corner
+of the room lay the sick child. He was a boy of about twelve years, and
+evidently in the last stages of consumption. By his side, bending over
+him as if to catch his almost inaudible words, sat a tidy,
+youthful-looking colored woman, his mother, and the wife of the negro we
+had met at the "still." Playing on the floor, was a younger child,
+perhaps five years old, but while the faces of the mother and the sick
+lad were of the hue of charcoal, <i>his</i> skin by a process well understood
+at the South, had been bleached to a bright yellow.</p>
+
+<p>The woman took no notice of our entrance, but the little fellow ran to
+the Colonel and caught hold of the skirts of his coat in a free-and-easy
+way, saying, "Ole massa, you got suffin' for Dicky?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, you little nig," replied the Colonel, patting his woolly head as I
+might have done a white child's, "Dicky isn't a good boy."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I is," said the little darky; "you'se ugly ole massa to gib
+nuffin' to Dick."</p>
+
+<p>Aroused by the Colonel's voice, the woman turned toward us. Her eyes
+were swollen, and her face bore traces of deep emotion.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh massa!" she said, "de chile am dyin'! It'm all along ob his workin'
+in de swamp&mdash;no <i>man</i> orter work dar, let alone a chile like dis."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Do you think he is dying, Rosy?" asked the Colonel, approaching the
+bed-side.</p>
+
+<p>"Shore, massa, he'm gwine fass. Look at 'im."</p>
+
+<p>The boy had dwindled to a skeleton, and the skin lay on his face in
+crimpled folds, like a mask of black crape. His eyes were fixed, and he
+was evidently going.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you know massa, my boy?" said the Colonel, taking his hand
+tenderly in his.</p>
+
+<p>The child's lips slightly moved, but I could hear no sound. The Colonel
+put his ear down to him for a moment, then, turning to me, said:</p>
+
+<p>"He <i>is</i> dying. Will you be so good as to step to the house and ask
+Madam P&mdash;&mdash; here, and please tell Jim to go for Junius and the old man."</p>
+
+<p>I returned in a short while with the lady, but found the boy's father
+and "the old man"&mdash;the darky preacher of the plantation&mdash;there before
+us. The preacher was a venerable old negro, much bowed by years, and
+with thin wool as white as snow. When we entered, he was bending over
+the dying boy, but shortly turning to my host, said:</p>
+
+<p>"Massa, de blessed Lord am callin' for de chile&mdash;shall we pray?"</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel nodded assent, and we all, blacks and whites, knelt down on
+the floor, while the old preacher made a short, heart-touching prayer.
+It was a simple, humble acknowledgment of the dependence of the creature
+on the Creator&mdash;of His right to give and to take away, and was uttered
+in a free, conversational tone, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> if long communion with his Maker had
+placed the old negro on a footing of friendly familiarity with Him, and
+given the black slave the right to talk with the Deity as one man talks
+with another.</p>
+
+<p>As we rose from our knees my host said to me, "It is <i>my</i> duty to stay
+here, but I will not detain <i>you</i>. Jim will show you over the
+plantation. I will join you at the house when this is over." The scene
+was a painful one, and I gladly availed myself of the Colonel's
+suggestion.</p>
+
+<p>Mounting our horses, Jim and I rode off to the negro house where Scip
+was staying.</p>
+
+<p>Scip was not at the cabin, and the old negro woman told us he had been
+away for several hours.</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon he'll be 'way all day, sar," said Jim, as we turned our horses
+to go.</p>
+
+<p>"He ought to be resting against the ride of to-morrow. Where has he
+gone?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dunno, sar, but reckon he'm gwine to fine Sam."</p>
+
+<p>"Sam? Oh, he's the runaway the Colonel has advertised."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, sar, he'm 'way now more'n a monfh."</p>
+
+<p>"How can Scip find him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dunno, sar. Scipio know most ebery ting&mdash;reckon he'll track him. He
+know him well, and Sam'll cum back ef he say he orter."</p>
+
+<p>"Where do you think Sam is?"</p>
+
+<p>"P'raps in de swamp."</p>
+
+<p>"Where is the swamp?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"'Bout ten mile from har."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes! the shingles are cut there. I should think a runaway would be
+discovered where so many men are at work."</p>
+
+<p>"No, massa, dar'm places dar whar de ole debble cudn't fine him, nor de
+dogs nudder."</p>
+
+<p>"I thought the bloodhounds would track a man anywhere."</p>
+
+<p>"Not fru de water, massa; dey lose de scent in de swamp."</p>
+
+<p>"But how can a man live there&mdash;how get food?"</p>
+
+<p>"De darkies dat work dar take 'em nuff."</p>
+
+<p>"Then the other negroes know where the runaways are; don't they
+sometimes betray them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Neber, massa; a darky neber tells on anoder. De Cunnel had a boy in dat
+swamp once good many years."</p>
+
+<p>"Is it possible! Did he come back?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, he died dar. Sum ob de hands found him dead one mornin' in de hut
+whar he lib'd, and buried him dar."</p>
+
+<p>"Why did Sam run away?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause de oberseer flog him. He use him bery hard, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"What had Sam done?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nuffin, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Then why was he flogged? Did the Colonel know it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yas; Moye cum de possum ober de Cunnel, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> make him b'lieve Sam
+war bad. De Cunnel dunno de hull ob dat story."</p>
+
+<p>"Why didn't <i>you</i>, tell him? The Colonel trusts <i>you</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"'T wudn't hab dun no good; de Cunnel wud hab flogged me for tellin' on
+a wite man. Nigga's word aint ob no account."</p>
+
+<p>"What is the story about, Sam?"</p>
+
+<p>"You wont tell dat <i>I</i> tole you, massa?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, but I'll tell the Colonel the truth."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal den, sar, you see Sam's wife am bery good-lookin', her skin's most
+wite&mdash;her mudder war a mulatter, her fader a wite man&mdash;she lub'd Sam
+'bout as well as de wimmin ginrally lub dar husbands" (Jim was a
+bachelor, and his observation of plantation morals had given him but
+little faith in the sex), "but most ob 'em, ef dey'm married or no, tink
+dey must smile on de wite men, so Jule she smiled on de oberseer&mdash;so Sam
+tought&mdash;and it made him bery jealous. He war sort o' sassy, and de
+oberseer strung him up, and flog him bery hard. Den Sam took to de
+swamp, but he didn't know whar to gwo, and de dogs tracked him; he'd ha'
+got 'way dough ef ole Moye hadn't a shot him; den he cudn't run. Den
+Moye flogged him till he war 'most dead, and arter dat chained him down
+in de ole cabin, and gave him 'most nuffin' to eat. De Cunnel war gwine
+to take Sam to Charles'on and sell him, but somehow he got a file and
+sawed fru de chain and got 'way in de night to de 'still.' Den when de
+oberseer come dar in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> de mornin', Sam jump on him and 'most kill him.
+He'd hab sent him whar dar aint no niggas, ef Junius hadn't a holed him.
+<i>I'd</i> a let de ole debble gwo."</p>
+
+<p>"Junius, then, is a friend of the overseer."</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar; <i>he</i> haint no friends, 'cep de debble; but June am a good
+nigga, and he said 'twarn't right to kill ole Moye so sudden, for den
+dar'd be no chance for de Lord to forgib him."</p>
+
+<p>"Then Sam got away again?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yas; nary one but darkies war round, and dey wouldn't hole him. Ef
+dey'd cotched him den, dey'd hung him, shore."</p>
+
+<p>"Why hung him?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause he'd struck a wite man; it'm shore death to do dat."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think Scip will bring him back?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas; 'cause he'm gwine to tell massa de hull story. De Cunnel will
+b'lieve Scipio ef he <i>am</i> brack. Sam'll know dat, so he'll come back. De
+Cunnel'll make de State too hot to hole ole Moye, when he fine him out."</p>
+
+<p>"Does Sam's wife 'smile' on the overseer now?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; she see de trubble she bring on Sam, and she bery sorry. She wont
+look at a wite man now."</p>
+
+<p>During the foregoing conversation, we had ridden for several miles over
+the western half of the plantation, and were again near the house. My
+limbs being decidedly stiff and sore from the effect of the previous
+day's journey, I decided to alight and rest until the hour for dinner.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>I mentioned my jaded condition to Jim, who said:</p>
+
+<p>"Dat's right, massa; come in de house. I'll cure de rumatics; I knows
+how to fix dem."</p>
+
+<p>Fastening the horses at the door, Jim accompanied me to my
+sleeping-room, where he lighted a fire of pine knots, which in a moment
+blazed up on the hearth and sent a cheerful glow through the apartment;
+then, saying he would return after stabling the horses, the darky left
+me.</p>
+
+<p>I took off my boots, drew the sofa near the fire, and stretched myself
+at full length upon it. If ever mortal was tired, "I reckon" I was. It
+seemed as though every joint and bone in my body had lost the power of
+motion, and sharp, acute pains danced along my nerves, as I have seen
+the lightning play along the telegraph wires. My entire system had the
+toothache.</p>
+
+<p>Jim soon returned, bearing in one hand a decanter of "Otard," and in the
+other a mug of hot water and a crash towel.</p>
+
+<p>"I'se got de stuff dat'll fix de rumatics, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, Jim; a glass will do me good. Where did you get it?" I
+asked, thinking it strange the Colonel should leave his brandy-bottle
+within reach of the negroes, who have an universal weakness for spirits.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I keeps de keys; de Cunnel hissef hab to come to me when he want
+suffin' to warm hissef."</p>
+
+<p>It was the fact; Jim had exclusive charge of the wine-cellar; in short,
+was butler, barber, porter, footman, and body-servant, all combined.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Now, massa, you lay right whar you is, and I'll make you ober new in
+less dan no time."</p>
+
+<p>And he did; but I emptied the brandy-bottle. Lest my temperance friends
+should be horror-stricken, I will mention, however, that I took the
+fluid by external absorption. For all rheumatic sufferers, I would
+prescribe hot brandy, in plentiful doses, a coarse towel, and an active
+Southern darky, and if on the first application the patient is not
+cured, the fault will not be the negro's. Out of mercy to the chivalry,
+I hope our government, in saving the Union, will not annihilate the
+order of body-servants. They are the only perfect institution in the
+Southern country, and, so far as I have seen, about the only one worth
+saving.</p>
+
+<p>The dinner-bell sounded a short while after Jim had finished the
+scrubbing operation, and I went to the table with an appetite I had not
+felt for a week. My whole system was rejuvenated, and I am not sure that
+I should, at that moment, have declined a wrestling match with Heenan
+himself.</p>
+
+<p>I found at dinner only the overseer and the young son of Madam P&mdash;&mdash;,
+the Colonel and the lady being still at the cabin of the dying boy. The
+dinner, though a queer mixture of viands, would not have disgraced,
+except, perhaps, in the cooking, the best of our Northern hotels.
+Venison, bacon, wild fowl, hominy, poultry, corn bread, French
+"made-dishes," and Southern "common doin's," with wines and brandies of
+the choicest brands, were placed on the table together.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Dis, massa," said Jim, "am de raal juice; it hab been in de cellar eber
+since de house war built. Massa tole me to gib you some, wid him
+complimen's."</p>
+
+<p>Passing it to my companions, I drank the Colonel's health in as fine
+wine as I ever tasted.</p>
+
+<p>I had taken an instinctive dislike to the overseer at the
+breakfast-table, and my aversion was not lessened by learning his
+treatment of Sam; curiosity to know what manner of man he was, however,
+led me, toward the close of our meal, to "draw him out," as follows:</p>
+
+<p>"What is the political sentiment, sir, of this section of the State?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I reckon most of the folks 'bout har' is Union; they'm from the
+'old North,' and gin'rally pore trash."</p>
+
+<p>"I have heard that the majority of the turpentine-farmers are
+enterprising men and good citizens&mdash;more enterprising, even, than the
+cotton and rice planters."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, they is enterprisin', 'cause they don't keer for nuthin' 'cep'
+money."</p>
+
+<p>"The man who is absorbed in money-getting is generally a quiet citizen."</p>
+
+<p>"P'raps that's so. But I think a man sh'u'd hev a soul suthin' 'bove
+dollars. Them folks will take any sort o' sarce from the Yankees, ef
+they'll only buy thar truck."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you suffer from the Yankees?"</p>
+
+<p>"Suffer from the Yankees? Don't they steal our niggers, and haint they
+'lected an ab'lishener for President?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I've been at the North lately, but I am not aware that is so."</p>
+
+<p>"So! it's damnably so, sir. I knows it. We don't mean to stand it eny
+longer."</p>
+
+<p>"What will you do?"</p>
+
+<p>"We'll give 'em h&mdash;l, ef they want it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Will it not be necessary to agree among yourselves before you do that?
+I met a turpentine farmer below here who openly declared that he is
+friendly to abolishing slavery. He thinks the masters can make more
+money by hiring than by owning the negroes."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, that's the talk of them North County<a name="FNanchor_D_4" id="FNanchor_D_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_D_4" class="fnanchor">[D]</a> fellers, who've squatted
+round har. We'll hang every mother's son on 'em, by &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't do that: in a free country every man has a right to his
+opinions."</p>
+
+<p>"Not to sech opinions as them. A man may think, but he mustn't think
+onraasonable."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know, but it seems to me reasonable, that if <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span>the negroes cost
+these farmers now one hundred and fifty dollars a year, and they could
+hire them, if free, for seventy-five or a hundred, that they would make
+by abolition."</p>
+
+<p>"Ab'lish'n! By&mdash;, sir, ye aint an ab'lishener, is ye?" exclaimed the
+fellow, in an excited manner, bringing his hand down on the table in a
+way that set the crockery a-dancing.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, come, my friend," I replied, in a mild tone, and as unruffled as
+a pool of water that has been out of a December night; "you'll knock off
+the dinner things, and I'm not quite through."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, sir, I've heerd yer from the North, and I'd like to know if yer an
+ab'lishener."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear sir, you surprise me. You certainly can't expect a modest man
+like me to speak of himself."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye can speak of what ye d&mdash; please, but ye can't talk ab'lish'n har,
+by&mdash;," he said, again applying his hand to the table, till the plates
+and saucers jumped up, performed several jigs, then several reels, and
+then rolled over in graceful somersaults to the floor.</p>
+
+<p>At this juncture, the Colonel and Madam P&mdash;&mdash; entered.</p>
+
+<p>Observing the fall in his crockery, and the general confusion of things,
+my host quietly asked, "What's to pay?"</p>
+
+<p>I said nothing, but burst into a fit of laughter at the awkward
+predicament of the overseer. That gentleman also said nothing, but
+looked as if he would like to find<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> vent through a rat-hole or a
+window-pane. Jim, however, who stood at the back of my chair, gave <i>his</i>
+eloquent thoughts utterance, very much as follows:</p>
+
+<p>"Moye hab 'sulted Massa K&mdash;&mdash;, Cunnel, awful bad. He hab swore a blue
+streak at him, and called him a d&mdash; ab'lishener, jess 'cause Massa K&mdash;&mdash;
+wudn't get mad and sass him back. He hab disgrace your hosspital,
+Cunnel, wuss dan a nigga."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel turned white with rage, and striding up to Moye, seized him
+by the throat, yelling, rather than speaking, these words: "You
+d&mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash;, have you dared to insult a guest in my
+house?"</p>
+
+<p>"I did'nt mean to 'sult him," faltered out the overseer, his voice
+running through an entire octave, and changing with the varying pressure
+of the Colonel's fingers on his throat; "but he said he war an
+ab'lishener."</p>
+
+<p>"No matter what he said, he is my guest, and in my house he shall say
+what he pleases, by&mdash;. Apologize to him, or I'll send you to h&mdash;in a
+second."</p>
+
+<p>The fellow turned cringingly to me, and ground out something like this,
+every word seeming to give him the face-ache:</p>
+
+<p>"I meant no offence, sar; I hope ye'll excuse me."</p>
+
+<p>This satisfied me, but, before I could reply, the Colonel again seized
+him by the throat and yelled:</p>
+
+<p>"None of your sulkiness; you d&mdash; white-livered hound, ask the gentleman's
+pardon like a man."</p>
+
+<p>The fellow then got out, with less effort than before:</p>
+
+<p>"I 'umbly ax yer pardon, sar, very 'umbly, indeed."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I am satisfied, sir," I replied. "I bear you no ill-will."</p>
+
+<p>"Now go," said the Colonel; "and in future take your meals in your
+cabin. I have none but gentlemen at my table."</p>
+
+<p>The fellow went. As soon as he closed the door, the Colonel said to me:</p>
+
+<p>"Now, my dear friend, I hope you will pardon <i>me</i> for this occurrence. I
+sincerely regret you have been insulted in my house."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't speak of it, my dear sir; the fellow is ignorant, and really
+thinks I am an abolitionist. His zeal in politics led to his warmth. I
+blame him very little," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"But he lied, Massa K&mdash;&mdash;," chimed in Jim, very warmly; "you neber said
+you war an ab'lishener."</p>
+
+<p>"You know what <i>they</i> are, Jim, don't you?" said the Colonel, laughing,
+and taking no notice of his breach of decorum in wedging black ideas
+into a white conversation.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I does dat," said the darky, grinning.</p>
+
+<p>"Jim," said his master, "you're a prince of a nigger, but you talk too
+much; ask me for something to-day, and I reckon you'll get it; but go
+now, and tell Chloe (the cook) to get us some dinner."</p>
+
+<p>The negro left, and, excusing myself, I soon followed suit.</p>
+
+<p>I went to my room, laid down on the lounge, and soon fell asleep. It was
+nearly five o'clock when a slight<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> noise in the apartment awoke me, and,
+looking up, I saw the Colonel quietly seated by the fire, smoking a
+cigar. His feet were elevated above his head, and he appeared absorbed
+in no very pleasant reflections.</p>
+
+<p>"How is the sick boy, Colonel?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"It's all over with him, my friend. He died easy; but 'twas very painful
+to me; I feel I have done him wrong."</p>
+
+<p>"How so?"</p>
+
+<p>"I was away all summer, and that cursed Moye sent him to the swamp to
+tote for the shinglers. It killed him."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you are not to blame," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish I could feel so."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel remained with me till supper-time, evidently much depressed
+by the events of the morning, which had affected him more than I should
+have thought possible. I endeavored, by directing his mind to other
+topics, to cheer him, and in a measure succeeded.</p>
+
+<p>While we were seated at the supper table, the black cook entered from
+the kitchen&mdash;a one-story shanty, detached from, and in the rear of the
+house&mdash;and, with a face expressive of every conceivable emotion a negro
+can feel&mdash;joy, sorrow, wonder, and fear all combined&mdash;exclaimed, "O
+massa, massa! dear massa! Sam, O Sam!"</p>
+
+<p>"Sam!" said the Colonel; "what about Sam?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, he hab&mdash;dear, dear massa, don't yer, don't yer hurt him&mdash;he hab
+come back!"</p>
+
+<p>If a bombshell had fallen in the room, a greater sensation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> could not
+have been produced. Every individual arose from the table, and the
+Colonel, striding up and down the apartment, exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p>"Is he mad? The everlasting fool! Why in h&mdash;has he come back?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, don't ye hurt him massa," said the black cook, wringing her hands.
+"Sam hab been bad, bery bad, but he won't be so no more."</p>
+
+<p>"Stop your noise, aunty," said the Colonel, but with no harshness in his
+tone. "I shall do what I think right."</p>
+
+<p>"Send for him, David," said Madame P&mdash;&mdash;; "let us hear what he has to
+say. He would not come back if he meant to be ugly."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Send</i> for him, Alice!" replied my host. "He's prouder than Lucifer,
+and would send me word to come to <i>him</i>. I will go. Will you accompany
+me, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;? You'll hear what a runaway nigger thinks of slavery: Sam
+has the gift of speech, and uses it regardless of persons."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir, I'll go with pleasure."</p>
+
+<p>It was about an hour after nightfall when we emerged from the door of
+the mansion and took our way to the negro quarters. The full moon had
+risen half way above the horizon, and the dark pines cast their shadows
+around the little collection of negro huts, which straggled about
+through the woods for the distance of a third of a mile. It was dark,
+but I could distinguish the figure of a man striding along at a rapid
+pace a few hundred yards in advance of us.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Is'nt that Moye?" I asked the Colonel, directing his attention to the
+receding figure.</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon so; that's his gait. He's had a lesson to-day that'll do him
+good."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't like that man's looks," I replied, carelessly; "but I've heard
+of singed cats."</p>
+
+<p>"He <i>is</i> a sneaking d&mdash;l," said the Colonel; "but he's very valuable to
+me. I never had an overseer who got so much work out of the hands."</p>
+
+<p>"Is he severe with them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I reckon he is; but a nigger is like a dog&mdash;you must flog him to
+make him like you."</p>
+
+<p>"I judge your niggers haven't been flogged into liking Moye."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, have you heard any of them speak of him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; though, of course, I've made no effort to draw gossip from them. I
+had to hear."</p>
+
+<p>"O yes; I know; there's no end to their gabble; niggers will talk. But
+what have you heard?"</p>
+
+<p>"That Moye is to blame in this affair of Sam, and that you don't know
+the whole story."</p>
+
+<p>"What <i>is</i> the whole story?" he asked, stopping short in the road; "tell
+me before I see Sam."</p>
+
+<p>I then told him what Jim had recounted to me. He heard me through
+attentively, then laughingly exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p>"Is that all! Lord bless you, he didn't seduce her. There's no seducing
+these women; with them it's a thing of course. It was Sam's d&mdash; high
+blood that made the trouble. His father was the proudest man in
+Virginia,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> and Sam is as like him as a nigger can be like a white man."</p>
+
+<p>"No matter what the blood is, it seems to me such an injury justifies
+revenge."</p>
+
+<p>"Pshaw, my good fellow, you don't know these people. I'll stake my
+plantation against a glass of whiskey there's not a virtuous woman with
+a drop of black blood in her veins in all South Carolina. They prefer
+the white men; their husbands know it, and take it as a matter of
+course."</p>
+
+<p>We had here reached the negro cabin. It was one of the more remote of
+the collection, and stood deep in the woods, an enormous pine growing up
+directly beside the doorway. In all respects it was like the other huts
+on the plantation. A bright fire lit up its interior, and through the
+crevices in the logs we saw, as we approached, a scene that made us
+pause involuntarily, when within a few rods of the house. The mulatto
+man, whose clothes were torn and smeared with swamp mud, stood near the
+fire. On a small pine table near him lay a large carving-knife, which
+glittered in the blaze, as if recently sharpened. His wife was seated on
+the side of the low bed at his back, weeping. She was two or three
+shades lighter than the man, and had the peculiar brown, kinky hair,
+straight, flat nose, and speckled, gray eyes which mark the metif.
+Tottling on the floor at the feet of the man, and caressing his knees,
+was a child of perhaps two years.</p>
+
+<p>As we neared the house, we heard the voice of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> overseer issuing from
+the doorway on the other side of the pine-tree.</p>
+
+<p>"Come out, ye black rascal."</p>
+
+<p>"Come in, you wite hound, ef you dar," responded the negro, laying his
+hand on the carving-knife.</p>
+
+<p>"Come out, I till ye; I sha'n't ax ye agin."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll hab nuffin' to do wid you. G'way and send your massa har," replied
+the mulatto man, turning his face away with a lordly, contemptuous
+gesture, that spoke him a true descendant of Pocahontas. This movement
+exposed his left side to the doorway, outside of which, hidden from us
+by the tree, stood the overseer.</p>
+
+<p>"Come away, Moye," said the Colonel, advancing with me toward the door;
+"<i>I'll</i> speak to him."</p>
+
+<p>Before all of the words had escaped the Colonel's lips, a streak of fire
+flashed from where the overseer stood, and took the direction of the
+negro. One long, wild shriek&mdash;one quick, convulsive bound in the
+air&mdash;and Sam fell lifeless to the floor, the dark life-stream pouring
+from his side. The little child also fell with him, and its greasy,
+grayish shirt was dyed with its father's blood. Moye, at the distance of
+ten feet, had discharged the two barrels of a heavily-loaded shot-gun
+directly through the negro's heart.</p>
+
+<p>"You incarnate son of h&mdash;," yelled the Colonel, as he sprang on the
+overseer, bore him to the ground, and wrenched the shot-gun from his
+hand. Clubbing the weapon, he raised it to brain him. The movement
+occupied but a second; the gun was descending, and in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> another instant
+Moye would have met Sam in eternity, had not a brawny arm caught the
+Colonel's, and, winding itself around his body, pinned his limbs to his
+side so that motion was impossible. The woman, half frantic with
+excitement, thrust open the door when her husband fell, and the light
+which came through it revealed the face of the new-comer. But his voice,
+which rang out on the night air as clear as a bugle, had there been no
+light, would have betrayed him. It was Scip. Spurning the prostrate
+overseer with his foot, he shouted:</p>
+
+<p>"Run, you wite debble, run for your life!"</p>
+
+<p>"Let me go, you black scoundrel," shrieked the Colonel, wild with rage.</p>
+
+<p>"When he'm out ob reach, you'd kill him," replied the negro, as cool as
+if he was doing an ordinary thing.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll kill you, you black&mdash;hound, if you don't let me go," again
+screamed the Colonel, struggling violently in the negro's grasp, and
+literally foaming at the mouth.</p>
+
+<p>"I shan't lef you gwo, Cunnel, till you 'gree not to do dat."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel was a stout, athletic man, in the very prime of life, and
+his rage gave him more than his ordinary strength, but Scip held him as
+I might have held a child.</p>
+
+<p>"Here, Jim," shouted the Colonel to his body-servant, who just then
+emerged from among the trees, "'rouse the plantation&mdash;shoot this
+d&mdash; nigger."</p>
+
+<p>"Dar aint one on 'em wud touch him, massa. He'd send <i>me</i> to de debble
+wid one fist."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"You ungrateful dog," groaned his master. "Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;, will you stand by
+and see me handcuffed by a miserable slave?"</p>
+
+<p>"The black means well, my friend; he has saved you from murder. Say he
+is safe, and I'll answer for his being away in an hour."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel made one more ineffectual attempt to free himself from the
+vice-like grip of the negro, then relaxing his efforts, and, gathering
+his broken breath, he said, "You're safe <i>now</i>, but if you're found
+within ten miles of my plantation by sunrise, by&mdash;you're a dead man."</p>
+
+<p>The negro relinquished his hold, and, without saying a word, walked
+slowly away.</p>
+
+<p>"Jim, you&mdash;rascal," said the Colonel to that courageous darky, who was
+skulking off, "raise every nigger on the plantation, catch Moye, or I'll
+flog you within an inch of your life."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do dat, Cunnel; I'll kotch de ole debble, ef he's dis side de hot
+place."</p>
+
+<p>His words were echoed by about twenty other darkies, who, attracted by
+the noise of the fracas, had gathered within a safe distance of the
+cabin. They went off with Jim, to raise the other plantation hands, and
+inaugurate the hunt.</p>
+
+<p>"If that &mdash; nigger hadn't held me, I'd had Moye in &mdash; by this time," said
+the Colonel to me, still livid with excitement.</p>
+
+<p>"The law will deal with him, my friend. The negro has saved you from
+murder."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"The law be d&mdash;; it's too good for such a&mdash;hound; and that the d&mdash; nigger
+should have dared to hold me&mdash;by&mdash;he'll rue it."</p>
+
+<p>He then turned, exhausted with the recent struggle, and, with a weak,
+uncertain step, entered the cabin. Kneeling down by the dead body of the
+negro, he attempted to raise it; but his strength was gone. He motioned
+to me to aid him, and we placed the corpse on the bed. Tearing open the
+clothing, we wiped away the still flowing blood, and saw the terrible
+wound which had sent the negro to his account. It was sickening to look
+on, and I turned to go.</p>
+
+<p>The negro woman, who was weeping and wringing her hands, now approached,
+and, in a voice nearly choked with sobs, said:</p>
+
+<p>"Massa, oh massa, I done it! it's me dat killed him!"</p>
+
+<p>"I know you did, you d&mdash;&mdash;. Get out of my sight."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, massa," sobbed the woman, falling on her knees, "I'se so sorry; oh,
+forgib me!"</p>
+
+<p>"Go to &mdash;&mdash;, you &mdash;&mdash;, that's the place for you," said the Colonel, striking
+the kneeling woman with his foot, and felling her to the floor.</p>
+
+<p>Unwilling to see or hear more, I left the master with the slave.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_D_4" id="Footnote_D_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_D_4"><span class="label">[D]</span></a> The "North Counties" are the north-eastern portion of North
+Carolina, and include the towns of Washington and Newbern. They are an
+old turpentine region, and the trees are nearly exhausted. The finer
+virgin forests of South Carolina, and other cotton States, have tempted
+many of the North County farmers to emigrate thither, within the past
+ten years, and they now own nearly all the trees that are worked in
+South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. They generally have few slaves of
+their own, their hands being hired of wealthier men in their native
+districts. The "hiring" is an annual operation, and is done at Christmas
+time, when the negroes are frequently allowed to go home. They treat the
+slaves well, give them an allowance of meat (salt pork or beef), as much
+corn as they can eat, and a gill of whiskey daily. No class of men at
+the South are so industrious, energetic, and enterprising. Though not so
+well informed, they have many of the traits of our New England farmers;
+in fact, are frequently called "North Carolina Yankees." It was these
+people the overseer proposed to hang. The reader will doubtless think
+that "hanging was not good enough for them."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PLANTER'S "FAMILY."</h3>
+
+
+<p>A quarter of a mile through the woods brought me to the cabin of the old
+negress where Scip lodged. I rapped at the door, and was admitted by the
+old woman. Scip, nearly asleep, was lying on a pile of blankets in the
+corner.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you mad?" I said to him. "The Colonel is frantic with rage, and
+swears he will kill you. You must be off at once."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no, massa; neber fear; I knows him. He'd keep his word, ef he loss
+his life by it. I'm gwine afore sunrise; till den I'm safe."</p>
+
+<p>"Der ye tink Massa Davy wud broke his word, sar?" said the old negress,
+bridling up her bent form, and speaking in a tone in which indignation
+mingled with wounded dignity; "p'raps gemmen do dat at de Norf&mdash;dey
+neber does it har."</p>
+
+<p>"Excuse me, Aunty; I know your master is a man of honor; but he's very
+much excited, and very angry with Scip."</p>
+
+<p>"No matter for dat, sar; Massa Davy neber done a mean ting sense he war
+born."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span></p><p>"Massa K&mdash;&mdash; tinks a heap ob de Cunnel, Aunty; but he reckon he'm sort
+o' crazy now; dat make him afeard," said Scip, in an apologetic tone.</p>
+
+<p>"What ef he am crazy? You'se safe <i>har</i>," rejoined the old woman,
+dropping her aged limbs into a chair, and rocking away with much the air
+which ancient white ladies occasionally assume.</p>
+
+<p>"Wont you ax Massa K&mdash;&mdash; to a cheer?" said Scip; "he hab ben bery kine
+to me."</p>
+
+<p>The negress then offered me a seat; but it was some minutes before I
+rendered myself sufficiently agreeable to thaw out the icy dignity of
+her manner. Meanwhile I glanced around the apartment.</p>
+
+<p>Though the exterior of the cabin was like the others on the plantation,
+the interior had a rude, grotesque elegance about it far in advance of
+any negro hut I had ever seen. The logs were chinked with clay, and the
+one window, though destitute of glass, and ornamented with the
+inevitable board-shutter, had a green moreen curtain, which kept out the
+wind and the rain. A worn but neat and well swept carpet partly covered
+the floor, and on the low bed was spread a patch-work counter-pane.
+Against the side of the room opposite the door stood an antique,
+brass-handled bureau, and an old-fashioned table, covered with a faded
+woollen cloth, occupied the centre of the apartment. In the corner near
+the fire was a curiously-contrived sideboard, made of narrow strips of
+yellow pine, tongued and grooved together, and oiled so as to bring out
+the beautiful grain of the wood. On it were several broken and cracked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span>
+glasses, and an array of irregular crockery. The rocking chair, in which
+the old negress passed the most of her time, was of mahogany, wadded and
+covered with chintz, and the arm-seat I occupied, though old and patched
+in many places, had evidently moved in good society.</p>
+
+<p>The mistress of this second-hand furniture establishment was arrayed in
+a mass of cast-off finery, whose gay colors were in striking contrast
+with her jet-black skin and bent, decrepit form. Her gown, which was
+very short, was of flaming red and yellow worsted stuff, and the
+enormous turban that graced her head and hid all but a few tufts of her
+frizzled, "pepper-and-salt" locks, was evidently a contribution from the
+family stock of worn-out pillow-cases. She was very aged&mdash;upward of
+seventy&mdash;and so thin that, had she not been endowed with speech and
+motion, she might have passed for a bundle of whalebone thrown into
+human shape, and covered with a coating of gutta-percha. It was evident
+she had been a valued house-servant, whose few remaining years were
+being soothed and solaced by the kind and indulgent care of a grateful
+master.</p>
+
+<p>Scip, I soon saw, was a favorite with the old negress, and the marked
+respect he showed me quickly dispelled the angry feeling my doubts of
+"Massa Davy" had excited, and opened her heart and her mouth at the same
+moment. She was terribly garrulous; her tongue, as soon as it got under
+way, ran on as if propelled by machinery and acquainted with the secret
+of perpetual motion;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> but she was an interesting study. The
+single-hearted attachment she showed for her master and his family gave
+me a new insight into the practical working of "the peculiar
+institution," and convinced me that even slavery, in some of its
+aspects, is not so black as it is painted.</p>
+
+<p>When we were seated, I said to Scip, "What induced you to lay hands on
+the Colonel? It is death, you know, if he enforces the law."</p>
+
+<p>"I knows dat, massa; I knows dat; but I had to do it. Dat Moye am de ole
+debble, but de folks round har wud hab turned on de Cunnel, shore, ef
+he'd killed him. Dey don't like de Cunnel; dey say he'm a stuck-up
+seshener."</p>
+
+<p>"The Colonel, then, has befriended you at some time?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, no, sar; 'twarn't dat; dough I'se know'd him a long w'ile&mdash;eber
+sense my ole massa fotched me from Habana&mdash;but 'twarn't dat."</p>
+
+<p>"Then <i>why</i> did you do it?"</p>
+
+<p>The black hesitated a moment, and glanced at the old negress, then said:</p>
+
+<p>"You see, massa, w'en I fuss come to Charles'n, a pore little ting, wid
+no friend in all de worle, dis ole aunty war a mudder to me. She nussed
+de Cunnel; he am jess like her own chile, and I know'd 'twud kill her ef
+he got hissef enter trubble."</p>
+
+<p>I noticed certain convulsive twitchings about the corners of the old
+woman's mouth as she rose from her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> seat, threw her arms around Scip,
+and, in words broken by sobs, faltered out:</p>
+
+<p>"<i>You</i> am my chile; I loves you better dan Massa Davy&mdash;better dan all de
+worle."</p>
+
+<p>The scene, had they not been black, would have been one for a painter.</p>
+
+<p>"You were the Colonel's nurse, Aunty," I said, when she had regained her
+composure. "Have you always lived with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, sar, allers; I nussed him, and den de chil'ren&mdash;all ob 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>All</i> the children? I thought the Colonel had but one&mdash;Miss Clara."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, he habn't, massa, only de boys."</p>
+
+<p>"What boys? I never heard he had sons."</p>
+
+<p>"Neber heerd of young Massa Davy, nor Massa Tommy! Haint you <i>seed</i>
+Massa Tommy, sar?"</p>
+
+<p>"Tommy! I was told he was Madam P&mdash;&mdash;'s son."</p>
+
+<p>"So he am; Massa Davy had <i>her</i> long afore he had missus."</p>
+
+<p>The truth flashed upon me; but could it be possible? Was I in South
+Carolina or in Utah?</p>
+
+<p>"Who <i>is</i> Madam P&mdash;&mdash;?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>The old woman hesitated a moment as if in doubt whether she had not said
+too much; but Scip quietly replied:</p>
+
+<p>"She'm jess what aunty am&mdash;<i>de Cunnel's slave!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"His <i>slave!</i> it can't be possible; she is white!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"No, massa; she am brack, and de Cunnel's slave!"</p>
+
+<p>Not to weary the reader with a long repetition of negro-English, I will
+tell in brief what I gleaned from an hour's conversation with the two
+blacks.</p>
+
+<p>Madam P&mdash;&mdash; was the daughter of Ex-Gov. &mdash;&mdash;, of Virginia, by a quarteron
+woman. She was born a slave, but was acknowledged as her father's child,
+and reared in his family with his legitimate children. When she was ten
+years old her father died, and his estate proving insolvent, the land
+and negroes were brought under the hammer. His daughter, never having
+been manumitted, was inventoried and sold with the other property. The
+Colonel, then just of age, and a young man of fortune, bought her and
+took her to the residence of his mother in Charleston. A governess was
+provided for her, and a year or two afterward she was taken to the North
+to be educated. There she was frequently visited by the Colonel; and
+when fifteen her condition became such that she was obliged to return
+home. He conveyed her to the plantation, where her elder son, David, was
+soon after born, "Aunt Lucy" officiating on the occasion. When the child
+was two years old, leaving it in charge of the aged negress, she
+accompanied the Colonel to Europe, where they remained for a year.
+Subsequently she passed another year at a Northern seminary; and then,
+returning to the homestead, was duly installed as its mistress, and had
+ever since presided over its domestic affairs. She was kind and good to
+the negroes, who were greatly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> attached to her, and much of the
+Colonel's wealth was due to her excellent management of the plantation.</p>
+
+<p>Six years after the birth of "young Massa Davy," the Colonel married his
+present wife, that lady having full knowledge of his left-handed
+connection with Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, and consenting that the "bond-woman" should
+remain on the plantation, as its mistress. The legitimate wife resided,
+during most of the year, in Charleston, and when at the homestead took
+little interest in domestic matters. On one of her visits to the
+plantation, twelve years before, her daughter, Miss Clara, was born, and
+within a week, under the same roof, Madam P&mdash;&mdash; presented the Colonel
+with a son&mdash;the lad Thomas, of whom I have spoken. As the mother was
+slave, the children were so also at birth, but <i>they</i> had been
+manumitted by their father. One of them was being educated in Germany;
+and it was intended that both should spend their lives in that country,
+the taint in their blood being an insuperable bar to their ever
+acquiring social position at the South.</p>
+
+<p>As she finished the story, the old woman said, "Massa Davy am bery kind
+to the missus, sar, but he <i>love</i> de ma'am; an' he can't help it, 'cause
+she'm jess so good as de angels."<a name="FNanchor_E_5" id="FNanchor_E_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_E_5" class="fnanchor">[E]</a></p>
+
+<p>In conversation with a well-known Southern gentleman, not long since, I
+mentioned these two cases, and commented on them as a man educated with
+New England ideas might be supposed to do. The gentleman admitted that
+he knew of twenty such instances, and gravely defended the practice as
+being infinitely more moral and respectable than the <i>more common
+relation</i> existing between masters and slaves.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>I looked at my watch&mdash;it was nearly ten o'clock, and I rose to go. As I
+did so the old negress said:</p>
+
+<p>"Don't yer gwo, massa, 'fore you hab sum ob aunty's wine; you'm good
+friends wid Scip, and I knows <i>you'se</i> not too proud to drink wid brack
+folks, ef you am from de Norf."</p>
+
+<p>Being curious to know what quality of wine a plantation slave indulged
+in, I accepted the invitation. She went to the side-board, and brought
+out a cut-glass decanter, and three cracked tumblers, which she placed
+on the table. Filling the glasses to the brim, she passed one to Scip,
+and one to me, and, with the other in her hand, resumed her seat.
+Wishing her a good many happy years, and Scip a pleasant journey home, I
+emptied my glass. It was Scuppernong, and the pure juice of the grape!</p>
+
+<p>"Aunty," I said, "this wine is as fine as I ever tasted."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yas, massa, it am de raal stuff. I growed de grapes myseff."</p>
+
+<p>"You grew them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, sar, an' Massa Davy make de wine. He do it ebery yar for de ole
+nuss."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"The Colonel is very good. Do you raise any thing else?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I hab collards and taters, a little corn, and most ebery ting."</p>
+
+<p>"But who does your work? <i>You</i> certainly can't do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, de ma'am looks arter dat, sar; she'm bery good to de ole aunty."</p>
+
+<p>Shaking hands with both the negroes, I left the cabin, fully convinced
+that all the happiness in this world is not found within plastered
+apartments.</p>
+
+<p>The door of the mansion was bolted and barred; but, rapping for
+admission, I soon heard the Colonel's voice asking, "Who is there?"
+Giving a satisfactory answer, I was admitted. Explaining that he
+supposed I had retired to my room, he led the way to the library.</p>
+
+<p>That apartment was much more elegantly furnished than the drawing-rooms.
+Three of its sides were lined with books, and on the centre-table,
+papers, pamphlets, and manuscripts were scattered in promiscuous
+confusion. In an arm-chair near the fire, Madame P&mdash;&mdash; was seated,
+reading. The Colonel's manner was as composed as if nothing had
+disturbed the usual routine of the plantation; no trace of the recent
+terrible excitement was visible; in fact, had I not been a witness to
+the late tragedy, I should have thought it incredible that he, within
+two hours, had been an actor in a scene which had cost a human being his
+life.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Where in creation have you been, my dear fellow?" he asked, as we took
+our seats.</p>
+
+<p>"At old Lucy's cabin, with Scip," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed. I supposed the darky had gone."</p>
+
+<p>"No, he doesn't go till the morning."</p>
+
+<p>"I told you he wouldn't, David," said Madame P&mdash;&mdash;; "now, send for
+him&mdash;make friends with him before he goes."</p>
+
+<p>"No, Alice, it wont do. I bear him no ill-will, but it wont do. It would
+be all over the plantation in an hour."</p>
+
+<p>"No matter for that; our people would like you the better for it."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no. I can't do it. I mean him no harm, but I can't do that."</p>
+
+<p>"He told me <i>why</i> he interfered between you and Moye," I remarked.</p>
+
+<p>"Why did he?"</p>
+
+<p>"He says old Lucy, years ago, was a mother to him; that she is greatly
+attached to you, and it would kill her if any harm happened to you; and
+that your neighbors bear you no good-will, and would have enforced the
+law had you killed Moye."</p>
+
+<p>"It is true, David; you would have had to answer for it."</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense! what influence could this North County scum have against
+<i>me</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps none. But that makes no difference; Scipio did right, and you
+should tell him you forgive him."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel then rang a small bell, and a negro woman<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> soon appeared.
+"Sue," he said, "go to Aunt Lucy's, and ask Scip to come here. Bring him
+in at the front door, and, mind, let no one know he comes."</p>
+
+<p>The woman in a short time returned with Scip. There was not a trace of
+fear or embarrassment in the negro's manner as he entered the room.
+Making a respectful bow, he bade us "good evening."</p>
+
+<p>"Good evening, Scip," said the Colonel, rising and giving the black his
+hand; "let us be friends. Madam tells me I should forgive you, and I
+do."</p>
+
+<p>"Aunt Lucy say ma'am am an angel, sar, and it am tru&mdash;<i>it am tru</i>, sar,"
+replied the negro with considerable feeling.</p>
+
+<p>The lady rose, also, and took Scip's hand, saying, "<i>I</i> not only forgive
+you, but I <i>thank</i> you for what you have done. I shall never forget it."</p>
+
+<p>"You'se too good, ma'am; you'se too good to say dat," replied the darky,
+the moisture coming to his eyes; "but I meant nuffin' wrong&mdash;I meant
+nuffin' dis'specful to de Cunnel."</p>
+
+<p>"I know you didn't, Scip; but we'll say no more about it;&mdash;good-by,"
+said the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>Shaking hands with each one of us, the darky left the apartment.</p>
+
+<p>One who does not know that the high-bred Southern gentleman considers
+the black as far below him as the horse he drives, or the dog he kicks,
+cannot realize the amazing sacrifice of pride which the Colonel made in
+seeking a reconciliation with Scip. It was the cutting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> off of his right
+hand. The circumstance showed the powerful influence held over him by
+the octoroon woman. Strange that she, his slave, cast out from society
+by her blood and her life, despised, no doubt, by all the world, save by
+him and a few ignorant blacks, should thus control a proud, self-willed,
+passionate man, and control him, too, only for good.</p>
+
+<p>After the black had gone, I said to the Colonel, "I was much interested
+in old Lucy. A few more such instances of cheerful and contented old
+age, might lead me to think better of slavery."</p>
+
+<p>"Such cases are not rare, sir. They show the paternal character of our
+'institution.' We are <i>forced</i> to care for our servants in their old
+age."</p>
+
+<p>"But have your other aged slaves the same comforts that Aunt Lucy has?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; they don't need them. She has been accustomed to live in my house,
+and to fare better than the plantation hands; she therefore requires
+better treatment."</p>
+
+<p>"Is not the support of that class a heavy tax upon you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it <i>is</i> heavy. We have, of course, to deduct it from the labor of
+the able-bodied hands."</p>
+
+<p>"What is the usual proportion of sick and infirm on your plantation?"</p>
+
+<p>"Counting in the child-bearing women, I reckon about twenty per cent."</p>
+
+<p>"And what does it cost you to support each hand?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Well, it costs <i>me</i>, for children and all, about seventy-five dollars a
+year. In some places it costs less. <i>I</i> have to buy all my provisions."</p>
+
+<p>"What proportion of your slaves are able-bodied hands?"</p>
+
+<p>"Somewhere about sixty per cent. I have, all told, old and young&mdash;men,
+women, and children&mdash;two hundred and seventy. Out of that number I have
+now equal to a hundred and fifty-four <i>full</i> hands. You understand that
+we classify them: some do only half tasks, some three-quarters. I have
+<i>more</i> than a hundred and fifty-four working-men and women, but they do
+only that number of full tasks."</p>
+
+<p>"What does the labor of a <i>full</i> hand yield?"</p>
+
+<p>"At the present price of turpentine, my calculation is about two hundred
+dollars a year."</p>
+
+<p>"Then your crop brings you about thirty-one thousand dollars, and the
+support of your negroes costs you twenty thousand."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"If that's the case, my friend, let me advise you to sell your
+plantation, free your niggers, and go North."</p>
+
+<p>"Why so, my dear fellow?" asked the Colonel laughing.</p>
+
+<p>"Because you'd make money by the operation."</p>
+
+<p>"I never was good at arithmetic; go into the figures," he replied, still
+laughing, while Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, who had laid aside her book, listened very
+attentively.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you have two hundred and seventy negroes,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> whom you value, we'll
+say, with your mules, 'stills,' and movable property, at two hundred
+thousand dollars; and twenty thousand acres of land, worth about three
+dollars and a half an acre; all told, two hundred and seventy thousand
+dollars. A hundred and fifty-four able-bodied hands produce you a yearly
+profit of eleven thousand dollars, which, saying nothing about the cost
+of keeping your live stock, the wear and tear of your mules and
+machinery, and the yearly loss of your slaves by death, is only four per
+cent. on your capital. Now, with only the price of your land, say
+seventy thousand dollars, invested in safe stocks at the North, you
+could realize eight per cent.&mdash;five thousand six hundred dollars&mdash;and
+live at ease; and that, I judge, if you have many runaways, or many die
+on your hands, is as much as you really <i>clear</i> now. Besides, if you
+should invest seventy thousand dollars in almost any legitimate business
+at the North, and should add to it, <i>as you now do</i>, your <i>time</i> and
+<i>labor</i>, you would realize far more than you do at present from your
+entire capital."</p>
+
+<p>"I never looked at the matter in that light. But I have given you my
+profits as they <i>now</i> are; some years I make more; six years ago I made
+twenty-five thousand dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; and six years hence you may make nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true. But it would cost me more to live at the North."</p>
+
+<p>"There you are mistaken. What do you pay for your corn, your pork, and
+your hay, for instance?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Well, my corn I have to bring round by vessel from Washington (North
+Carolina), and it costs me high when it gets here&mdash;about ten bits (a
+dollar and twenty-five cents), I think."</p>
+
+<p>"And in New York you could buy it now at sixty to seventy cents. What
+does your hay cost?"</p>
+
+<p>"Thirty-five dollars. I pay twenty for it in New York&mdash;the balance is
+freight and hauling."</p>
+
+<p>"Your pork costs you two or three dollars, I suppose, for freight and
+hauling."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; about that."</p>
+
+<p>"Then in those items you might save nearly a hundred per cent.; and they
+are the principal articles you consume."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; there's no denying that. But another thing is just as certain: it
+costs less to support one of my niggers than one of your laboring men."</p>
+
+<p>"That may be true. But it only shows that our laborers fare better than
+your slaves."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not sure of that. I <i>am</i> sure, however, that our slaves are more
+contented than the run of laboring men at the North."</p>
+
+<p>"That proves nothing. Your blacks have no hope, no chance to rise; and
+they submit&mdash;though I judge not cheerfully&mdash;to an iron necessity. The
+Northern laborer, if very poor, may be discontented; but discontent
+urges him to effort, and leads to the bettering of his condition. I tell
+you, my friend, slavery is an expensive luxury.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> You Southern nabobs
+<i>will</i> have it; and you have to <i>pay for it</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, we don't complain. But, seriously, my good fellow, I feel that I
+am carrying out the design of the Almighty in holding my niggers. I
+think he made the black to serve the white."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>I</i> think," I replied, "that whatever He designs works perfectly. Your
+institution certainly does not. It keeps the producer, who, in every
+society, is the really valuable citizen, in the lowest poverty, while it
+allows those who do nothing to be 'clad in fine linen, and to fare
+sumptuously every day.'"</p>
+
+<p>"It does more than that, sir," said Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, with animation; "it
+brutalizes and degrades the <i>master</i> and the <i>slave</i>; it separates
+husband and wife, parent and child; it sacrifices virtuous women to the
+lust of brutal men; and it shuts millions out from the knowledge of
+their duty and their destiny. A good and just God could not have
+designed it; and it <i>must</i> come to an end."</p>
+
+<p>If lightning had struck in the room I could not have been more startled
+than I was by the abrupt utterance of such language in a planter's
+house, in his very presence, and <i>by his slave</i>. The Colonel, however,
+expressed no surprise and no disapprobation. It was evidently no new
+thing to him.</p>
+
+<p>"It is rare, madam," I said, "to hear such sentiments from a Southern
+lady&mdash;one reared among slaves."</p>
+
+<p>Before she could reply, the Colonel laughingly said:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Bless you, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;, madam is an out-and-out abolitionist, worse by
+fifty per cent. than Garrison or Wendell Phillips. If she were at the
+North she would take to pantaloons, and 'stump' the entire free States;
+wouldn't you, Alice?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have no doubt of it," rejoined the lady, smiling. "But I fear I
+should have poor success. I've tried for ten years to convert <i>you</i>, and
+Mr. K&mdash;&mdash; can see the result."</p>
+
+<p>It had grown late; and with my head full of working niggers and white
+slave-women, I went to my apartment.</p>
+
+<p>The next day was Sunday. It was near the close of December, yet the air
+was as mild and the sun as warm as in our Northern October. It was
+arranged at the breakfast-table that we all should attend service at
+"the meeting-house," a church of the Methodist persuasion, located some
+eight miles away; but as it wanted some hours of the time for religious
+exercises to commence, I strolled out after breakfast, with the Colonel,
+to inspect the stables of the plantation. "Massa Tommy" accompanied us,
+without invitation; and in the Colonel's intercourse with him I observed
+as much freedom and familiarity as he would have shown to an
+acknowledged son. The youth's manners and conversation showed that great
+attention had been given to his education and training, and made it
+evident that the mother whose influence was forming his character,
+whatever a false system of society had made her life, possessed some of
+the best traits of her sex.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The stables, a collection of one-story framed buildings, about a hundred
+rods from the house, were well lighted and ventilated, and contained all
+"the modern improvements." They were better built, warmer, more
+commodious, and in every way more comfortable than the shanties occupied
+by the human cattle of the plantation. I remarked as much to the
+Colonel, adding that one who did not know would infer that he valued his
+horses more than his slaves.</p>
+
+<p>"That may be true," he replied, laughing. "Two of my horses are worth
+more than any eight of my slaves;" at the same time calling my attention
+to two magnificent thorough-breds, one of which had made "2.32" on the
+Charleston course. The establishment of a Southern gentleman is not
+complete until it includes one or two of these useless appendages. I had
+an argument with my host as to their value compared with that of the
+steam-engine, in which I forced him to admit that the iron horse is the
+better of the two, because it performs more work, eats less, has greater
+speed, and is not liable to the spavin or the heaves; but he wound up by
+saying, "After all, I go for the thorough-breds. You Yankees have but
+one test of value&mdash;use."</p>
+
+<p>A ramble through the negro-quarters, which followed our visit to the
+stables, gave me some further glimpses of plantation life. Many of the
+hands were still away in pursuit of Moye, but enough remained to make it
+evident that Sunday is the happiest day in the darky calendar. Groups of
+all ages and colors were gathered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> in front of several of the cabins,
+some singing, some dancing, and others chatting quietly together, but
+all enjoying themselves as heartily as so many young animals let loose
+in a pasture. They saluted the Colonel and me respectfully, but each one
+had a free, good-natured word for "Massa Tommy," who seemed an especial
+favorite with them. The lad took their greetings in good part, but
+preserved an easy, unconscious dignity of manner that plainly showed he
+did not know that <i>he</i> too was of their despised, degraded race.</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel, in a rapid way, gave me the character and peculiarities of
+nearly every one we met. The titles of some of them amused me greatly.
+At every step we encountered individuals whose names have become
+household words in every civilized country.<a name="FNanchor_F_6" id="FNanchor_F_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_F_6" class="fnanchor">[F]</a> Julius C&aelig;sar, slightly
+stouter than when he swam the Tiber, and somewhat tanned from long
+exposure to a Southern sun, was seated on a wood-pile, quietly smoking a
+pipe; while near him, Washington, divested of regimentals, and clad in a
+modest suit of reddish-gray, his thin locks frosted by time, and his
+fleshless visage showing great age, was gazing, in rapt admiration, at a
+group of dancers in front of old Lucy's cabin.</p>
+
+<p>In this group about thirty men and women were making the ground quake
+and the woods ring with their unrestrained jollity. Marc Antony was
+rattling away<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> at the bones, Nero fiddling as if Rome were burning, and
+Hannibal clawing at a banjo as if the fate of Carthage hung on its
+strings. Napoleon, as young and as lean as when he mounted the bridge of
+Lodi, with the battle-smoke still on his face, was moving his legs even
+faster than in the Russian retreat; and Wesley was using his heels in a
+way that showed <i>they</i> didn't belong to the Methodist church. But the
+central figures of the group were Cato and Victoria. The lady had a face
+like a thunder-cloud, and a form that, if whitewashed, would have
+outsold the "Greek Slave." She was built on springs, and "floated in the
+dance" like a feather in a high wind. Cato's mouth was like an
+alligator's, but when it opened, it issued notes that would draw the
+specie even in this time of general suspension. As we approached he was
+singing a song, but he paused on perceiving us, when the Colonel,
+tossing a handful of coin among them, called out, "Go on, boys; let the
+gentleman have some music; and you, Vic, show your heels like a beauty."</p>
+
+<p>A general scramble followed, in which "Vic's" sense of decorum forbade
+her to join, and she consequently got nothing. Seeing that, I tossed her
+a silver piece, which she caught. Grinning her thanks, she shouted,
+"Now, clar de track, you nigs; start de music. I'se gwine to gib de
+gemman de breakdown."</p>
+
+<p>And she did; and such a breakdown! "We w'ite folks," though it was no
+new thing to the Colonel or Tommy, almost burst with laughter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In a few minutes nearly every negro on the plantation, attracted by the
+presence of the Colonel and myself, gathered around the performers; and
+a shrill voice at my elbow called out, "Look har, ye lazy,
+good-for-nuffin' niggers, carn't ye fotch a cheer for Massa Davy and de
+strange gemman?"</p>
+
+<p>"Is that you, Aunty?" said the Colonel. "How d'ye do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sort o' smart, Massa Davy; sort o' smart; how is ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Pretty well, Aunty; pretty well. Have a seat." And the Colonel helped
+her to one of the chairs that were brought for us, with as much
+tenderness as he would have shown to an aged white lady.</p>
+
+<p>The "exercises," which had been suspended for a moment, recommenced, and
+the old negress entered into them as heartily as the youngest present. A
+song from Cato followed the dance, and then about twenty "gentleman and
+lady" darkies joined, two at a time, in a half "walk-round" half
+breakdown, which the Colonel told me was the original of the well-known
+dance and song of Lucy Long. Other performances succeeded, and the whole
+formed a scene impossible to describe. Such uproarious jollity, such
+full and perfect enjoyment, I had never seen in humanity, black or
+white. The little nigs, only four or five years old, would rush into the
+ring and shuffle away at the breakdowns till I feared their short legs
+would come off; while all the darkies joined in the songs, till the
+branches of the old pines above shook as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> if they too had caught the
+spirit of the music. In the midst of it, the Colonel said to me, in an
+exultant tone:</p>
+
+<p>"Well, my friend, what do you think of slavery <i>now</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"About the same that I thought yesterday. I see nothing to change my
+views."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, are not these people happy? Is not this perfect enjoyment?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; just the same enjoyment that aunty's pigs are having; don't you
+hear <i>them</i> singing to the music? I'll wager they are the happier of the
+two."</p>
+
+<p>"No; you are wrong. The higher faculties of the darkies are being
+brought out here."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know that," I replied. "Within the sound of their voices, two
+of their fellows&mdash;victims to the inhumanity of slavery&mdash;are lying dead,
+and yet they make <i>Sunday</i> "hideous" with wild jollity, while Sam's fate
+may be theirs to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>Spite of his genuine courtesy and high breeding, a shade of displeasure
+passed over the Colonel's face as I made this remark. Rising to go, he
+said, a little impatiently, "Ah, I see how it is; that d&mdash;&mdash; Garrison's
+sentiments have impregnated even you. How can the North and the South
+hold together when moderate men like you and me are so far apart?"</p>
+
+<p>"But you," I rejoined, good-humoredly, "are not a moderate man. You and
+Garrison are of the same stripe, both extremists. <i>You</i> have mounted one
+hobby, <i>he</i> another; that is all the difference."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I should be sorry," he replied, recovering his good nature, "to think
+myself like Garrison. I consider him the &mdash;&mdash; scoundrel unhung."</p>
+
+<p>"No; I think he means well. But you are both fanatics, both 'bricks' of
+the same material; we conservatives, like mortar, will hold you together
+and yet keep you apart."</p>
+
+<p>"I, for one, <i>won't</i> be held. If I can't get out of this cursed Union in
+any other way, I'll emigrate to Cuba."</p>
+
+<p>I laughed, and just then, looking up, caught a glimpse of Jim, who
+stood, hat in hand, waiting to speak to the Colonel, but not daring to
+interrupt a white conversation.</p>
+
+<p>"Hallo, Jim," I said; "have you got back?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, sar," replied Jim, grinning all over as if he had some agreeable
+thing to communicate.</p>
+
+<p>"Where is Moye?" asked the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Kotched, massa; I'se got de padlocks on him."</p>
+
+<p>"Kotched," echoed half a dozen darkies, who stood near enough to hear;
+"Ole Moye is kotched," ran through the crowd, till the music ceased, and
+a shout went up from two hundred black throats that made the old trees
+tremble.</p>
+
+<p>"Now gib him de lashes, Massa Davy," cried the old nurse. "Gib him what
+he gabe pore Sam; but mine dat you keeps widin de law."</p>
+
+<p>"Never fear, Aunty," said the Colonel; "I'll give him &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>How the Colonel kept his word will be told in another chapter.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_E_5" id="Footnote_E_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_E_5"><span class="label">[E]</span></a> Instances are frequent where Southern gentlemen form these
+left-handed connections, and rear two sets of differently colored
+children; but it is not often that the two families occupy the same
+domicil. The only other case within my <i>personal</i> knowledge was that of
+the well-known President of the Bank of St. M&mdash;&mdash;, at Columbus, Ga. That
+gentleman, whose note ranked in Wall Street, when the writer was
+acquainted with that locality, as "A No. 1," lived for fifteen years
+with two "wives" under one roof. One, an accomplished white woman, and
+the mother of several children&mdash;did the honors of his table, and moved
+with him in "the best society;" the other&mdash;a beautiful quadroon, also
+the mother of several children&mdash;filled the humbler office of nurse to
+her own and the other's offspring.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_F_6" id="Footnote_F_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_F_6"><span class="label">[F]</span></a> Among the things of which slavery has deprived the black is a
+<i>name</i>. A slave has no family designation. It may be for that reason
+that a high-sounding appellation is usually selected for the single one
+he is allowed to appropriate.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+
+<h3>PLANTATION DISCIPLINE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The "Ole Cabin" to which Jim had alluded as the scene of Sam's
+punishment by the overseer, was a one-story shanty in the vicinity of
+the stables. Though fast falling to decay, it had more the appearance of
+a human habitation than the other huts on the plantation. Its thick
+plank door was ornamented with a mouldy brass knocker, and its four
+windows contained sashes, to which here and there clung a broken pane,
+the surviving relic of its better days. It was built of large unhewn
+logs, notched at the ends and laid one upon the other, with the bark
+still on. The thick, rough coat which yet adhered in patches to the
+timber had opened in the sun, and let the rain and the worm burrow in
+its sides, till some parts had crumbled entirely away. At one corner the
+process of decay had gone on till roof, superstructure, and foundation
+had rotted down and left an opening large enough to admit a coach and
+four horses. The huge chimneys which had graced the gable ends of the
+building were fallen in, leaving only a mass of sticks and clay to tell
+of their existence, and two wide openings to show how great a figure
+they had once made in the world. A small space in front of the cabin
+would have been a lawn, had the grass been willing to grow upon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> it; and
+a few acres of cleared land in its rear might have passed for a garden,
+had it not been entirely overgrown with young pines and stubble. This
+primitive structure was once the "mansion" of that broad plantation,
+and, before the production of turpentine came into fashion in that
+region, its rude owner drew his support from its few surrounding acres,
+more truly independent than the present aristocratic proprietor, who,
+raising only one article, and buying all his provisions, was forced to
+draw his support from the Yankee or the Englishman.</p>
+
+<p>Only one room, about forty feet square, occupied the interior of the
+cabin. It once contained several apartments, vestiges of which still
+remained, but the partitions had been torn away to fit it for its
+present uses. What those uses were, a moment's observation showed me.</p>
+
+<p>In the middle of the floor, a space about fifteen feet square was
+covered with thick pine planking, strongly nailed to the beams. In the
+centre of this planking, an oaken block was firmly bolted, and to it was
+fastened a strong iron staple that held a log-chain, to which was
+attached a pair of shackles. Above this, was a queer frame-work of oak,
+somewhat resembling the contrivance for drying fruit I have seen in
+Yankee farmhouses. Attached to the rafters by stout pieces of timber,
+were two hickory poles, placed horizontally, and about four feet apart,
+the lower one rather more than eight feet from the floor. This was the
+whipping-rack, and hanging to it were several stout whips with short<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span>
+hickory handles, and long triple lashes. I took one down for closer
+inspection, and found burned into the wood, in large letters, the words
+"Moral Suasion." I questioned the appropriateness of the label, but the
+Colonel insisted with great gravity, that the whip is the only "moral
+suasion" a darky is capable of understanding.</p>
+
+<p>When punishment is inflicted on one of the Colonel's negroes, his feet
+are confined in the shackles, his arms tied above his head, and drawn by
+a stout cord up to one of the horizontal poles; then, his back bared to
+the waist, and standing on tip-toe, with every muscle stretched to its
+utmost tension, he takes "de lashes."</p>
+
+<p>A more severe but more unusual punishment is the "thumb-screw." In this
+a noose is passed around the negro's thumb and fore-finger, while the
+cord is thrown over the upper cross-pole, and the culprit is drawn up
+till his toes barely touch the ground. In this position the whole weight
+of the body rests on the thumb and fore-finger. The torture is
+excruciating, and strong, able-bodied men can endure it but a few
+moments. The Colonel naively told me that he had discontinued its
+practice, as several of his <i>women</i> had nearly lost the use of their
+hands, and been incapacitated for field labor, by its too frequent
+repetition. "My &mdash;&mdash; drivers,"<a name="FNanchor_G_7" id="FNanchor_G_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_G_7" class="fnanchor">[G]</a> he added, "have no discretion, and no
+humanity; if they have a pique against a nigger, they show him no
+mercy."</p>
+
+<p>The old shanty I have described was now the place of the overseer's
+confinement. Open as it was at top, bottom, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>and sides, it seemed an
+unsafe prison-house; but Jim had secured its present occupant by placing
+"de padlocks on him."</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you catch him?" asked the Colonel, as, followed by every
+darky on the plantation, we took our way to the old building.</p>
+
+<p>"In de swamp, massa. We got Sandy and de dogs arter him&mdash;dey treed him,
+but he fit like de debble."</p>
+
+<p>"Any one hurt?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, Cunnel; he knifed Yaller Jake, and ef I hadn't a gibin him a
+wiper, you'd a had anudder nigger short dis mornin'&mdash;shore."</p>
+
+<p>"How was it? tell me," said his master, while we paused, and the darkies
+gathered around.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, yer see, massa, we got de ole debble's hat dat he drapped wen you
+had him down; den we went to Sandy's fur de dogs&mdash;dey scented him to
+onst, and off dey put for de swamp. 'Bout twenty on us follored 'em.
+He'd a right smart start on us, and run like a deer, but de hounds
+kotched up wid him 'bout whar he shot pore Sam. He fit 'em and cut up de
+Lady awful, but ole C&aelig;sar got a hole ob him, and sliced a breakfuss out
+ob his legs. Somehow, dough, he got 'way from de ole dog, and clum a
+tree. 'Twar more'n an hour afore we kotched up; but dar he war, and de
+houns baying 'way as ef dey know'd what an ole debble he am. I'd tuk one
+ob de guns&mdash;you warn't in de house, massa, so I cudn't ax you."</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind that; go on," said the Colonel.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I up wid de gun, and tole him ef he didn't cum down I'd gib him
+suffin' dat 'ud sot hard on de stummuk. It tuk him a long w'ile, but&mdash;he
+<i>cum down</i>." Here the darky showed a row of ivory that would have been a
+fair capital for a metropolitan dentist.</p>
+
+<p>"When he war down," he resumed, "Jake war gwine to tie him, but de ole
+'gator, quicker dan a flash, put a knife enter him."</p>
+
+<p>"Is Jake much hurt?" interrupted the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Not bad, massa; de knife went fru his arm, and enter his ribs, but de
+ma'am hab fix him, and she say he'll be 'round bery sudden."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what then?" inquired the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Wen de ole debble seed he hadn't finished Jake, he war gwine to gib him
+anudder dig, but jus den I drap de gun on his cocoanut, and he neber
+trubble us no more. 'Twar mons'rous hard work to git him out ob de
+swamp, 'cause he war jess like a dead man, and had to be toted de hull
+way; but he'm dar now, massa (pointing to the old cabin), and de
+bracelets am on him."</p>
+
+<p>"Where is Jake?" asked the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Dunno, massa, but reckon he'm to hum."</p>
+
+<p>"One of you boys go and bring him to the cabin," said the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>A negro man went off on the errand, while we and the darkies resumed our
+way to the overseer's quarters. Arrived there, I witnessed a scene that
+words cannot picture.</p>
+
+<p>Stretched at full length on the floor, his clothes torn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> to shreds, his
+coarse carroty hair matted with blood, and his thin, ugly visage pale as
+death, lay the overseer. Bending over him, wiping away the blood from
+his face, and swathing a ghastly wound on his forehead, was the negress
+Sue; while at his shackled feet, binding up his still bleeding legs,
+knelt the octoroon woman!</p>
+
+<p>"Is <i>she</i> here?" I said, involuntarily, as I caught sight of the group.</p>
+
+<p>"It's her nature," said the Colonel, with a pleasant smile; "if Moye
+were the devil himself, she'd do him good if she could; another such
+woman never lived."</p>
+
+<p>And yet this woman, with all the instincts that make her sex
+angel-ministers to man, lived in daily violation of the most sacred of
+all laws&mdash;because she was a slave. Can Mr. Caleb Cushing or Charles
+O'Conor tell us why the Almighty invented a system which forces his
+creatures to break laws of His own making?</p>
+
+<p>"Don't waste your time on him, Alice," said the Colonel, kindly; "he
+isn't worth the rope that'll hang him."</p>
+
+<p>"He was bleeding to death; unless he has care he'll die," said the
+octoroon woman.</p>
+
+<p>"Then let him die, d&mdash;&mdash; him," replied the Colonel, advancing to where
+the overseer lay, and bending down to satisfy himself of his condition.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile more than two hundred dusky forms crowded around and filled
+every opening of the old building. Every conceivable emotion, except
+pity, was depicted on their dark faces. The same individuals<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> whose
+cloudy visages a half hour before I had seen distended with a wild mirth
+and careless jollity, that made me think them really the docile,
+good-natured animals they are said to be, now glared on the prostrate
+overseer with the infuriated rage of aroused beasts when springing on
+their prey.</p>
+
+<p>"You can't come the possum here. Get up, you &mdash;&mdash; hound," said the
+Colonel, rising and striking the bleeding man with his foot.</p>
+
+<p>The fellow raised himself on one elbow and gazed around with a stupid,
+vacant look. His eye wandered unsteadily for a moment from the Colonel
+to the throng of cloudy faces in the doorway; then, his recent
+experience flashing upon him, he shrieked out, clinging wildly to the
+skirts of the octoroon woman, who was standing near, "Keep off them
+cursed hounds&mdash;keep them off, I say&mdash;they'll kill me! they'll kill me!"</p>
+
+<p>One glance satisfied me that his mind was wandering. The blow on the
+head had shattered his reason, and made the strong man less than a
+child.</p>
+
+<p>"You wont be killed yet," said the Colonel. "You've a small account to
+settle with me before you reckon with the devil."</p>
+
+<p>At this moment the dark crowd in the doorway parted, and Jake entered,
+his arm bound up and in a sling.</p>
+
+<p>"Jake, come here," said the Colonel; "this man would have killed you.
+What shall we do with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Taint for a darky to say dat, massa," said the negro, evidently
+unaccustomed to the rude administration of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> justice which the Colonel
+was about to inaugurate; "he did wuss dan dat to Sam, massa&mdash;he orter
+swing for shootin' him."</p>
+
+<p>"That's <i>my</i> affair; we'll settle your account first," replied the
+Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>The darky looked undecidedly at his master, and then at the overseer,
+who, overcome by weakness, had sunk again to the floor. The little
+humanity in him was evidently struggling with his hatred of Moye and his
+desire for revenge, when the old nurse yelled out from among the crowd,
+"Gib him fifty lashes, Massa Davy, and den you wash him down.<a name="FNanchor_H_8" id="FNanchor_H_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_H_8" class="fnanchor">[H]</a> Be a
+man, Jake, and say dat."</p>
+
+<p>Jake still hesitated, and when at last he was about to speak, the eye of
+the octoroon caught his, and chained the words to his tongue, as if by
+magnetic power.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you say that, boys;" said the Colonel, turning to the other negroes;
+"shall he have fifty lashes?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, fifty lashes&mdash;gib de ole debble fifty lashes," shouted
+about fifty voices.</p>
+
+<p>"He shall have them," quietly said the master.</p>
+
+<p>The mad shout that followed, which was more like the yell of demons than
+the cry of men, seemed to arouse Moye to a sense of his real position.
+Springing to his feet, he gazed wildly around; then, sinking on his
+knees before the octoroon, and clutching the folds of her dress, he
+shrieked, "Save me, good lady, save me! as you hope for mercy, save me!"</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Not a muscle of her face moved, but, turning to the excited crowd, she
+mildly said, "Fifty lashes would kill him. <i>Jake</i> does not say
+that&mdash;your master leaves it to him, and <i>he</i> will not whip a dying
+man&mdash;will you, Jake?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, ma'am&mdash;not&mdash;not ef you gwo agin it," replied the negro, with very
+evident reluctance.</p>
+
+<p>"But he whipped Sam, ma'am, when Sam war nearer dead than <i>he</i> am," said
+Jim, whose station as house-servant allowed him a certain freedom of
+speech.</p>
+
+<p>"Because he was brutal to Sam, should you be brutal to him? Can you
+expect me to tend you when you are sick, if you beat a dying man? Does
+Pompey say you should do such things?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, good ma'am," said the old preacher, stepping out, with the freedom
+of an old servant, from the black mass, and taking his stand beside me
+in the open space left for the "w'ite folks;" "de ole man dusn't say
+dat, ma'am; he tell 'em dat de Lord want 'em to forgib dar en'mies&mdash;to
+lub dem dat pursyskute 'em;" and, turning to the Colonel, he added, as
+he passed his hand meekly over his thin crop of white wool and threw his
+long heel back, "ef massa'll 'low me I'll talk to 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"Fire away," said the Colonel, with evident chagrin. "This is a nigger
+trial; if you want to screen the d&mdash;&mdash; hound you can do it."</p>
+
+<p>"I dusn't want to screed him, massa, but I'se bery ole and got soon to
+gwo, and I dusn't want de blessed Lord to ax me wen I gets dar why I
+'lowed dese pore<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> ig'nant brack folks to mudder a man 'fore my bery
+face. I toted you, massa, 'fore you cud gwo, I'se worked for you till I
+can't work no more; and I dusn't want to tell de Lord dat <i>my</i> massa let
+a brudder man be killed in cole blood."</p>
+
+<p>"He is no brother of mine, you old fool; preach to the nigs, don't
+preach to me," said the Colonel, stifling his displeasure, and striding
+off through the black crowd, without saying another word.</p>
+
+<p>Here and there in the dark mass a face showed signs of relenting; but
+much the larger number of that strange jury, had the question been put,
+would have voted&mdash;DEATH.</p>
+
+<p>The old preacher turned to them as the Colonel passed out, and said, "My
+chil'ren, would you hab dis man whipped, so weak, so dyin' as he am, ef
+he war brack?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, not ef he war a darky&mdash;fer den he wouldn't be such an ole debble,"
+replied Jim, and about a dozen of the other negroes.</p>
+
+<p>"De w'ite aint no wuss dan de brack&mdash;we'm all 'like&mdash;pore sinners all on
+us. De Lord wudn't whip a w'ite man no sooner dan a brack one&mdash;He tinks
+de w'ite juss so good as de brack (good Southern doctrine, I thought).
+De porest w'ite trash wudn't strike a man wen he war down."</p>
+
+<p>"We'se had 'nough of dis, ole man," said a large, powerful negro (one of
+the drivers), stepping forward, and, regardless of the presence of Madam
+P&mdash;&mdash; and myself, pressing close to where the overseer lay, now<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> totally
+unconscious of what was passing around him. "You needn't preach no more;
+de Cunnel hab say we'm to whip ole Moye, and we'se gwine to do it,
+by &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>I felt my fingers closing on the palm of my hand, and in a second more
+they might have cut the darky's profile, had not Madam P&mdash;&mdash; cried out,
+"Stand back, you impudent fellow: say another word, and I'll have you
+whipped on the spot."</p>
+
+<p>"De Cunnel am my massa, ma'am&mdash;<i>he</i> say ole Moye am to be whipped, and
+I'se gwine to do it&mdash;shore."</p>
+
+<p>I have seen a storm at sea&mdash;I have seen the tempest tear up great
+trees&mdash;I have seen the lightning strike in a dark night&mdash;but I never saw
+any thing half so grand, half so terrible, as the glance and tone of
+that woman as she cried out, "Jim, take this man&mdash;give him fifty lashes
+this instant."</p>
+
+<p>Quicker than thought, a dozen darkies were on him. His hands and feet
+were tied and he was under the whipping-rack in a second. Turning then
+to the other negroes, the brave woman said, "Some of you carry Moye to
+the house, and you, Jim, see to this man&mdash;if fifty lashes don't make him
+sorry, give him fifty more."</p>
+
+<p>This summary change of programme was silently acquiesced in by the
+assembled negroes, but many a cloudy face scowled sulkily on the
+octoroon, as, leaning on my arm, she followed Junius and the other
+negroes, who bore Moye to the mansion. It was plain that under<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> those
+dark faces a fire was burning that a breath would have fanned into a
+flame.</p>
+
+<p>We entered the house by its rear door, and placed Moye in a small room
+on the ground floor. He was laid on a bed, and stimulants being given
+him, his senses and reason shortly returned. His eyes opened, and his
+real position seemed suddenly to flash upon him, for he turned to Madam
+P&mdash;&mdash;, and in a weak voice, half choked with emotion, faltered out: "May
+God in heaven bless ye, ma'am; God <i>will</i> bless ye for bein' so good to
+a wicked man like me. I doesn't desarve it, but ye woant leave me&mdash;ye
+woant leave me&mdash;they'll kill me ef ye do!"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't fear," said the Madam; "you shall have a fair trial. No harm
+shall come to you here."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank ye, thank ye," gasped the overseer, raising himself on one arm,
+and clutching at the lady's hand, which he tried to lift to his lips.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't say any more now," said Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, quietly; "you must rest and
+be quiet, or you wont get well."</p>
+
+<p>"Shan't I get well? Oh, I can't die&mdash;I can't die <i>now</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>The lady made a soothing reply, and giving him an opiate, and arranging
+the bedding so that he might rest more easily, she left the room with
+me.</p>
+
+<p>As we stepped into the hall, I saw through the front door, which was
+open, the horses harnessed in readiness for "meeting," and the Colonel
+pacing to and fro on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> the piazza, smoking a cigar. He perceived us, and
+halted in the doorway.</p>
+
+<p>"So you've brought that d&mdash;&mdash; bloodthirsty villain into my house!" he
+said to Madam P&mdash;&mdash; in a tone of strong displeasure.</p>
+
+<p>"How could I help it? The negroes are mad, and would kill him anywhere
+else," replied the lady, with a certain self-confidence that showed she
+knew her power over the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Why should <i>you</i> interfere between them and him? Has he not insulted
+you enough to make you let him alone? Can you so easily forgive his
+taunting you with"&mdash;He did not finish the sentence, but what I had
+learned on the previous evening from the old nurse gave me a clue to its
+meaning. A red flame flushed the face and neck of the octoroon
+woman&mdash;her eyes literally flashed fire, and her very breath seemed to
+come with pain; in a moment, however, this emotion passed away, and she
+quietly said, "Let me settle that in my own way. He has served <i>you</i>
+well&mdash;<i>you</i> have nothing against him that the law will not punish."</p>
+
+<p>"By &mdash;&mdash;, you are the most unaccountable woman I ever knew," exclaimed
+the Colonel, striding up and down the piazza, the angry feeling passing
+from his face, and giving way to a mingled expression of wonder and
+admiration. The conversation was here interrupted by Jim, who just then
+made his appearance, hat in hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Jim, what is it?" asked his master.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"We'se gib'n Sam twenty lashes, ma'am, but he beg so hard, and say he so
+sorry, dat I tole him I'd ax you 'fore we gabe him any more."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, if he's sorry, that's enough; but tell him he'll get fifty
+another time," said the lady.</p>
+
+<p>"What Sam is it?" asked the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Big Sam, the driver," said Jim.</p>
+
+<p>"Why was he whipped?"</p>
+
+<p>"He told me <i>you</i> were his master, and insisted on whipping Moye,"
+replied the lady.</p>
+
+<p>"Did he dare to do that? Give him a hundred, Jim, not one less," roared
+the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa," said Jim, turning to go.</p>
+
+<p>The lady looked significantly at the negro and shook her head, but said
+nothing, and he left.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, Alice, it is nearly time for meeting, and I want to stop and see
+Sandy on the way."</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon I wont go," said Madam P&mdash;&mdash;.</p>
+
+<p>"You stay to take care of Moye, I suppose," said the Colonel, with a
+slight sneer.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," replied the lady, "he is badly hurt, and in danger of
+inflammation."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, suit yourself. Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;, come, <i>we'll</i> go&mdash;you'll meet some of
+the <i>natives</i>."</p>
+
+<p>The lady retired to the house, and the Colonel and I were soon ready.
+The driver brought the horses to the door, and as we were about to enter
+the carriage, I noticed Jim taking his accustomed seat on the box.</p>
+
+<p>"Who's looking after Sam?" asked the Colonel.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Nobody, Cunnel; de ma'am leff him gwo."</p>
+
+<p>"How dare you disobey me? Didn't I tell you to give him a hundred?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, but de ma'am tole me notter."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, another time you mind what <i>I</i> say&mdash;do you hear?" said his
+master.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa," said the negro, with a broad grin, "I allers do dat."</p>
+
+<p>"You <i>never</i> do it, you d&mdash;&mdash; nigger; I ought to have flogged you long
+ago."</p>
+
+<p>Jim said nothing, but gave a quiet laugh, showing no sort of fear, and
+we entered the carriage. I afterward learned from him that he had never
+been whipped, and that all the negroes on the plantation obeyed the lady
+when, which was seldom, her orders came in conflict with their master's.
+They knew if they did not, the Colonel would whip them.</p>
+
+<p>As we rode slowly along the Colonel said to me, "Well, you see that the
+best people have to flog niggers sometimes."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, <i>I</i> should have given that fellow a hundred lashes, at least. I
+think the effect on the others would have been bad if Madam P&mdash;&mdash; had
+not had him flogged."</p>
+
+<p>"But she generally goes against it. I don't remember of her having it
+done in ten years before. And yet, though I've the worst gang of niggers
+in the district, they obey her like so many children."</p>
+
+<p>"Why is that?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Well, there's a kind of magnetism about her that makes everybody love
+her; and then she tends them in sickness, and is constantly doing little
+things for their comfort; <i>that</i> attaches them to her. She is an
+extraordinary woman."</p>
+
+<p>"Whose negroes are those, Colonel?" I asked, as, after a while, we
+passed a gang of about a dozen, at work near the roadside. Some were
+tending a tar-kiln, and some engaged in cutting into fire-wood the pines
+which a recent tornado had thrown to the ground.</p>
+
+<p>"They are mine, but they are working now for themselves. I let such as
+will, work on Sunday. I furnish the "raw material," and pay them for
+what they do, as I would a white man."</p>
+
+<p>"Wouldn't it be better to make them go to hear the old preacher;
+couldn't they learn something from him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not much; Old Pomp never read any thing but the Bible, and he doesn't
+understand that; besides, they can't be taught. You can't make 'a
+whistle out of a pig's tail;' you can't make a nigger into a white man."</p>
+
+<p>Just here the carriage stopped suddenly, and we looked out to see the
+cause. The road by which we had come was a mere opening through the
+pines; no fences separated it from the wooded land, and being seldom
+travelled, the track was scarcely visible. In many places it widened to
+a hundred feet, but in others tall trees had grown up on its opposite
+sides, leaving scarcely width enough for a single carriage to pass<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span>
+along. In one of these narrow passages, just before us, a queer-looking
+vehicle had upset, and scattered its contents in the road. We had no
+alternative but to wait till it got out of the way; and we all alighted
+to reconnoitre.</p>
+
+<p>The vehicle was a little larger than an ordinary handcart, and was
+mounted on wheels that had probably served their time on a Boston dray
+before commencing their travels in Secessiondom. Its box of pine
+boarding and its shafts of rough oak poles were evidently of Southern
+home manufacture. Attached to it by a rope harness, with a primitive
+bridle of decidedly original construction, was&mdash;not a horse, nor a mule,
+nor even an alligator, but a "three-year-old heifer."</p>
+
+<p>The wooden linch-pin of the cart had given way, and the weight of a
+half-dozen barrels of turpentine had thrown the box off its balance, and
+rolled the contents about in all directions.</p>
+
+<p>The appearance of the proprietor of this nondescript vehicle was in
+keeping with his establishment. His coat, which was much too short in
+the waist and much too long in the skirts, was of the common reddish
+gray linsey, and his nether garments, which stopped just below the
+knees, were of the same material. From there downwards, he wore only the
+covering that is said to have been the fashion in Paradise before Adam
+took to fig-leaves. His hat had a rim broader than a political platform,
+and his skin a color half way between tobacco-juice and a tallow
+candle.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Wal, Cunnul, how dy'ge?" said the stranger, as we stepped from the
+carriage.</p>
+
+<p>"Very well, Ned; how are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Purty wal, Cunnul; had the nagur lately, right smart, but'm gittin'
+'roun'."</p>
+
+<p>"You're in a bad fix here, I see. Can Jim help you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, p'raps he moight. Jim, how dy'ge?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sort o' smart, ole feller. But come, stir yerseff; we want ter gwo
+'long," replied Jim, with a lack of courtesy that showed he regarded the
+white man as altogether too "trashy" to be treated with much ceremony.</p>
+
+<p>With the aid of Jim, a new linch-pin was soon whittled out, the
+turpentine rolled on to the cart, and the vehicle put in a moving
+condition.</p>
+
+<p>"Where are you hauling your turpentine?" asked the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"To Sam Bell's, at the 'Boro'."</p>
+
+<p>"What will he pay you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I've four barr'ls of 'dip,' and tu of 'hard.' For the hull, I
+reckon he'll give three dollar a barr'l."</p>
+
+<p>"By tale?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, for tu hun'red and eighty pound."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, <i>I'll</i> give you two dollars and a half, by weight."</p>
+
+<p>"Can't take it, Cunnel; must get three dollar."</p>
+
+<p>"What, will you go sixty miles with this team, and waste five or six
+days, for fifty cents on six barrels&mdash;three dollars!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Can't 'ford the time, Cunnel, but must git three dollar a barr'l."</p>
+
+<p>"That fellow is a specimen of our 'natives,'" said the Colonel, as we
+resumed our seats in the carriage. "You'll see more of them before we
+get back to the plantation."</p>
+
+<p>"He puts a young cow to a decidedly original use," I remarked.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh no, not original here; the ox and the cow with us are both used for
+labor."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't mean to say that cows are generally worked here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course I do. Our breeds are good for nothing as milkers, and we put
+them to the next best use. I never have cow's milk on my plantation."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't! I could have sworn it was in my coffee this morning."</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't trust you to buy brandy for me, if your organs of taste are
+not keener than that. It was goat's milk."</p>
+
+<p>"Then how do you get your butter?"</p>
+
+<p>"From the North. I've had mine from my New York factors for over ten
+years."</p>
+
+<p>We soon arrived at Sandy, the negro-hunter's, and halted to allow the
+Colonel to inquire as to the health of his family of children and
+dogs&mdash;the latter the less numerous, but, if I might judge by
+appearances, the more valued of the two.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_G_7" id="Footnote_G_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_G_7"><span class="label">[G]</span></a> The negro-whippers and field overseers.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_H_8" id="Footnote_H_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_H_8"><span class="label">[H]</span></a> Referring to the common practice of bathing the raw and bleeding
+backs of the punished slaves with a strong solution of salt and water.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE NEGRO HUNTER.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Alighting from the carriage, I entered, with my host, the cabin of the
+negro-hunter. So far as external appearance went, the shanty was a
+slight improvement on the "Mills House," described in a previous
+chapter; but internally, it was hard to say whether it resembled more a
+pig-sty or a dog-kennel. The floor was of the bare earth, covered in
+patches with loose plank of various descriptions, and littered over with
+billets of "lightwood," unwashed cooking utensils, two or three cheap
+stools, a pine settee&mdash;made from the rough log and hewn smooth on the
+upper side&mdash;a full-grown bloodhound, two younger canines, and nine
+half-clad juveniles of the flax-head species. Over against the
+fire-place three low beds afforded sleeping accommodation to nearly a
+dozen human beings (of assorted sizes, and dove-tailed together with
+heads and feet alternating), and in the opposite corner a lower couch,
+whose finer furnishings told plainly it was the peculiar property of the
+"wee ones" of the family&mdash;a mother's tenderness for her youngest thus
+cropping out even in the midst of filth and degradation&mdash;furnished
+quarters for an unwashed, uncombed, unclothed, saffron-hued little
+fellow about fifteen months old, and&mdash;the dog "Lady." She was of a dark
+hazel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> color&mdash;a cross between a pointer and a bloodhound&mdash;and one of the
+most beautiful creatures I ever saw. Her neck and breast were bound
+about with a coarse cotton cloth, saturated with blood, and emitting a
+strong odor of bad whiskey; and her whole appearance showed the
+desperate nature of the encounter with the overseer.</p>
+
+<p>The nine young democrats who were lolling about the room in various
+attitudes, rose as we entered, and with a familiar but rather
+deferential "How-dy'ge," to the Colonel, huddled around and stared at me
+with open mouths and distended eyes, as if I were some strange being,
+dropped from another sphere. The two eldest were of the male gender, as
+was shown by their clothes&mdash;cast-off suits of the inevitable
+reddish-gray, much too large, and out at the elbows and the knees&mdash;but
+the sex of the others I was at a loss to determine, for they wore only a
+single robe, reaching, like their mother's, from the neck to the knees.
+Not one of the occupants of the cabin boasted a pair of stockings, but
+the father and mother did enjoy the luxury of shoes&mdash;coarse, stout
+brogans, untanned, and of the color of the legs which they encased.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Sandy, how is 'Lady?'" asked the Colonel, as he stepped to the
+bed of the wounded dog.</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon she's a goner, Cunnel; the d&mdash;&mdash; Yankee orter swing fur it."</p>
+
+<p>This intimation that the overseer was a countryman of mine, took me by
+surprise, nothing I had observed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> in his speech or manners having
+indicated it, but I consoled myself with the reflection that Connecticut
+had reared him&mdash;as she makes wooden hams and nutmegs&mdash;expressly for the
+Southern market.</p>
+
+<p>"He <i>shall</i> swing for it, by &mdash;&mdash;. But are you sure the slut will die?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not shore, Cunnel, but she can't stand, and the blood <i>will</i> run. I
+reckon a hun'red and fifty ar done for thar, sartin."</p>
+
+<p>"D&mdash;&mdash; the money&mdash;I'll make that right. Go to the house and get some
+ointment from Madam&mdash;she can save her&mdash;go at once," said my host.</p>
+
+<p>"I will, Cunnel," replied the dirt-eater, taking his broad-brim from a
+wooden peg, and leisurely leaving the cabin. Making our way then over
+the piles of rubbish and crowds of children that cumbered the apartment,
+the Colonel and I returned to the carriage.</p>
+
+<p>"Dogs must be rare in this region," I remarked, as we resumed our seats.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, well-trained bloodhounds are scarce everywhere. That dog is well
+worth a hundred and fifty dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"The business of nigger-catching, then, is brisk, just now?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, not more brisk than usual. We always have more or less runaways."</p>
+
+<p>"Do most of them take to the swamps?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, nine out of ten do, though now and then one gets off on a trading
+vessel. It is almost impossible for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> a strange nigger to make his way by
+land from here to the free states."</p>
+
+<p>"Then why do you Carolinians make such an outcry about the violation of
+the Fugitive Slave Law?"</p>
+
+<p>"For the same reason that dogs quarrel over a naked bone. We should be
+unhappy if we couldn't growl at the Yankees," replied the Colonel,
+laughing.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>We</i>, you say; you mean by that, the hundred and eighty thousand nabobs
+who own five-sixths of your slaves?"<a name="FNanchor_I_9" id="FNanchor_I_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_I_9" class="fnanchor">[I]</a></p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I mean them, and the three millions of poor whites&mdash;the ignorant,
+half-starved, lazy vermin you have just seen. <i>They</i> are the real basis
+of our Southern oligarchy, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span>as you call it," continued my host, still
+laughing.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought the negroes were the serfs in your feudal system?"</p>
+
+<p>"Both the negroes and the poor whites are the serfs, but the white trash
+are its real support. Their votes give the small minority of
+slave-owners all their power. You say we control the Union. We do, and
+we do it by the votes of these people, who are as far below our niggers
+as the niggers are below decent white men. Who that reflects that this
+country has been governed for fifty years by such scum, would give a
+d&mdash;&mdash; for republican institutions?"</p>
+
+<p>"It does speak badly for <i>your</i> institutions. A system that reduces
+nearly half of a white population to the level of slaves cannot stand in
+this country. The late election shows that the power of your 'white
+trash' is broken."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it does, that's a fact. If the states should remain together, the
+West would in future control the Union. We see that, and are therefore
+determined on dissolution. It is our only way to keep our niggers."</p>
+
+<p>"The West will have to consent to that project. My opinion is, your
+present policy will, if carried out, free every one of your slaves."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see how. Even if we are put down&mdash;which we cannot be&mdash;and are
+held in the Union against our will, government cannot, by the
+constitution, interfere with slavery in the states."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I admit that, but it can confiscate the property of traitors. Every
+large slave-holder is to-day, at heart, a traitor. If this movement goes
+on, you will commit overt acts against the government, and in
+self-defence it will punish treason by taking from you the means of
+future mischief."</p>
+
+<p>"The Republicans and Abolitionists might do that if they had the power,
+but nearly one-half of the North is on our side, and will not fight us."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps so; but if <i>I</i> had this thing to manage, I would put you down
+without fighting."</p>
+
+<p>"How would you do it&mdash;by preaching abolition where even the niggers
+would mob you? There's not a slave in all South Carolina but would shoot
+Garrison or Greeley on sight."</p>
+
+<p>"That may be, but if so, it is because you keep them in ignorance. Build
+a free-school at every cross-road, and teach the poor whites, and what
+would become of slavery? If these people were on a par with the farmers
+of New England, would it last for an hour? Would they not see that it
+stands in the way of their advancement, and vote it out of existence as
+a nuisance?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, perhaps they would; but the school-houses are not at the
+cross-roads, and, thank God, they will not be there in this generation."</p>
+
+<p>"The greater the pity; but that which will not flourish alongside of a
+school-house, cannot, in the nature of things, outlast this century. Its
+time must soon come."</p>
+
+<p>"Enough for the day is the evil thereof. I'll risk the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> future of
+slavery, if the South, in a body, goes out of the Union."</p>
+
+<p>"In other words, you'll shut out schools and knowledge, in order to keep
+slavery in existence. The Abolitionists claim it to be a relic of
+barbarism, and you admit it could not exist with general education among
+the people."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course it could not. If Sandy, for instance, knew he were as good a
+man as I am&mdash;and he would be if he were educated&mdash;do you suppose he
+would vote as I tell him, go and come at my bidding, and live on my
+charity? No, sir! give a man knowledge, and, however poor he may be,
+he'll act for himself."</p>
+
+<p>"Then free-schools and general education would destroy slavery?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course they would. The few cannot rule when the many know their
+rights. If the poor whites realized that slavery kept them poor, would
+they not vote it down? But the South and the world are a long way off
+from general education. When it comes to that, we shall need no laws,
+and no slavery, for the millennium will have arrived."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad you think slavery will not exist during the millennium," I
+replied, good-humoredly; "but how is it that you insist the negro is
+naturally inferior to the white, and still admit that the 'white trash,'
+are far below the black slaves?"</p>
+
+<p>"Education makes the difference. We educate the negro enough to make him
+useful to us; but the poor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> white man knows nothing. He can neither read
+nor write, and not only that, he is not trained to any useful
+employment. Sandy, here, who is a fair specimen of the tribe, obtains
+his living just like an Indian, by hunting, fishing, and stealing,
+interspersed with nigger-catching. His whole wealth consists of two
+hounds and pups; his house&mdash;even the wooden trough his miserable
+children eat from&mdash;belongs to me. If he didn't catch a runaway-nigger
+once in a while, he wouldn't see a dime from one year to another."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you have to support this man and his family?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, what I don't give him he steals. Half a dozen others poach on me
+in the same way."</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you set them at work?"</p>
+
+<p>"They can't be made to work. I have hired them time and again, hoping to
+make something of them, but I never got one to work more than half a day
+at a time. It's their nature to lounge and to steal."</p>
+
+<p>"Then why do you keep them about you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, to be candid, their presence is of use in keeping the blacks in
+subordination, and they are worth all they cost me, because I control
+their votes."</p>
+
+<p>"I thought the blacks were said to be entirely contented?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, not contented. I do not claim that. I only say that they are unfit
+for freedom. I might cite a hundred instances in which it has been their
+ruin."</p>
+
+<p>"I have not heard of one. It seems strange to me that a man who can
+support another cannot support himself."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Oh! no, it's not at all strange. The slave has hands, and when the
+master gives him brains, he works well enough; but to support himself he
+needs both hands and brains, and he has only hands. I'll give you a case
+in point: At Wilmington, N. C., some years ago, there lived a negro by
+the name of Jack Campbell. He was a slave, and was employed, before the
+river was deepened so as to admit of the passage of large vessels up to
+the town, in lightering cargoes to the wharves. He hired his time of his
+master, and carried on business on his own account. Every one knew him,
+and his character for honesty, sobriety, and punctuality stood so high
+that his word was considered among merchants as good as that of the
+first business-men of the place. Well, Jack's wife and children were
+free, and he finally took it into his head to be free himself. He
+arranged with his master to purchase himself within a specified time, at
+eight hundred dollars, and he was to deposit his earnings in the hands
+of a certain merchant till they reached the required sum. He went on,
+and in three years had accumulated nearly seven hundred dollars, when
+his owner failed in business. As the slave has no right of property,
+Jack's earnings belonged by law to his master, and they were attached by
+the Northern creditors (mark that, <i>by Northern creditors</i>), and taken
+to pay the master's debts. Jack, too, was sold. His new owner also
+consented to his buying himself, at about the price previously agreed
+on. Nothing discouraged, he went to work again. Night and day he toiled,
+and it surprised<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> every one to see so much energy and firmness of
+purpose in a negro. At last, after four more years of labor, he
+accomplished his purpose, and received his free-papers. He had worked
+seven years&mdash;as long as Jacob toiled for Rachel&mdash;for his freedom, and
+like the old patriarch he found himself cheated at last. I was present
+when he received his papers from his owner&mdash;a Mr. William H. Lippitt,
+who still resides at Wilmington&mdash;and I shall never forget the ecstasy of
+joy which he showed on the occasion. He sung and danced, and laughed,
+and wept, till my conscience smote me for holding my own niggers, when
+freedom might give them so much happiness. Well, he went off that day
+and treated some friends, and for three days afterward lay in the
+gutter, the entreaties of his wife and children having no effect on him.
+He swore he was free, and would do as he 'd&mdash;&mdash; pleased.' He had
+previously been a class-leader in the church, but after getting his
+freedom he forsook his previous associates, and spent his Sundays and
+evenings in a bar-room. He neglected his business; people lost
+confidence in him, and step by step he went down, till in five years he
+sunk into a wretched grave. That was the effect of freedom on <i>him</i>, and
+it would be the same on all of his race."</p>
+
+<p>"It is clear," I replied, "<i>he</i> could not bear freedom, but that does
+not prove he might not have 'endured' it if he had never been a slave.
+His overjoy at obtaining liberty, after so long a struggle for it, led
+to his excesses and his ruin. According to your view, neither the black
+nor the poor white is competent to take care of himself.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> The Almighty,
+therefore, has laid upon <i>you</i> a triple burden; you not only have to
+provide for yourself and your children, but for two races beneath you,
+the black and the clay-eater. The poor nigger has a hard time, but it
+seems to me you have a harder one."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it's a fact, we do. I often think that if it wasn't for the color
+and the odor, I'd willingly exchange places with my man Jim."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel made this last remark in a half-serious, half-comic way,
+that excited my risibilities, but before I could reply, the carriage
+stopped, and Jim, opening the door, announced:</p>
+
+<p>"We's har, massa, and de prayin' am gwine on."</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_I_9" id="Footnote_I_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_I_9"><span class="label">[I]</span></a> The foregoing statistics are correct. That small number of
+slave-holders sustains the system of slavery, and has caused this
+terrible rebellion. They are, almost to a man, rebels and secessionists,
+and we may cover the South with armies, and keep a file of soldiers upon
+every plantation, and not smother this insurrection, unless we break
+down the power of that class. Their wealth gives them their power, and
+their wealth is in their slaves. Free their negroes by an act of
+emancipation, or confiscation, and the rebellion will crumble to pieces
+in a day. Omit to do it, and it will last till doomsday.
+</p><p>
+The power of this dominant class once broken, with landed property at
+the South more equally divided, a new order of things will arise there.
+Where now, with their large plantations, not one acre in ten is tilled,
+a system of small farms will spring into existence, and the whole
+country be covered with cultivation. The six hundred thousand men who
+have gone there to fight our battles, will see the amazing fertility of
+the Southern soil&mdash;into which the seed is thrown and springs up without
+labor into a bountiful harvest&mdash;and many of them, if slavery is crushed
+out, will remain there. Thus a new element will be introduced into the
+South, an element that will speedily make it a loyal, prosperous, and
+<i>intelligent</i> section of the Union.
+</p><p>
+I would interfere with no one's rights, but a rebel in arms against his
+country has no rights; all that he has "is confiscate." Will the loyal
+people of the North submit to be ground to the earth with taxes to pay
+the expenditures of a war, brought upon them by these Southern
+oligarchists, while the traitors are left in undisturbed possession of
+every thing, and even their slaves are exempted from taxation? It were
+well that our legislators should ask this question now, and not wait
+till it's asked of them by <span class="smcap">THE PEOPLE</span>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE COUNTRY CHURCH.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Had we not been absorbed in conversation, we might have discovered, some
+time previous to our arrival at the church door, that the services had
+commenced, for the preacher was shouting at the top of his lungs. He
+evidently thought the Lord either a long way off, or very hard of
+hearing. Not wishing to disturb the congregation while at their
+devotions, we loitered near the doorway until the prayer was over, and
+in the mean time I glanced around the vicinity.</p>
+
+<p>The "meeting-house," of large unhewn logs, was a story and a half in
+height, and about large enough to seat comfortably a congregation of two
+hundred persons. It was covered with shingles, with a roof projecting
+some four feet over the walls, and was surmounted at the front gable by
+a tower, about twelve feet square. This also was built of logs, and
+contained a bell "to call the erring to the house of prayer," though,
+unfortunately, all of that character thereabouts dwelt beyond the sound
+of its voice. The building was located at a cross-roads, about equally
+distant from two little hamlets (the nearer nine miles off), neither of
+which was populous enough to singly support a church and a preacher. The
+trees in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> the vicinity had been thinned out, so that carriages could
+drive into the woods, and find under the branches shelter from the rain
+and the sun; and at the time of my visit, about twenty vehicles of all
+sorts and descriptions, from the Colonel's magnificent barouche to the
+rude cart drawn by a single two-horned quadruped, filled the openings.
+There was a rustic simplicity about the whole scene that charmed me. The
+low, rude church, the grand old pines that towered in leafy magnificence
+around it, and the soft, low wind, that sung a morning hymn in the
+green, wavy woods, seemed to lift the soul up to Him who inhabiteth
+eternity, but who deigns to visit the erring children of men.</p>
+
+<p>The preacher was about to "line out" one of Watts' psalms when we
+entered the church, but he stopped short on perceiving us, and, bowing
+low, waited till we had taken our seats. This action, and the
+sycophantic air which accompanied it, disgusted me, and turning to the
+Colonel, I asked, jocosely:</p>
+
+<p>"Do the chivalry exact so much obsequiousness from the country clergy?
+Do you require to be bowed up to heaven?"</p>
+
+<p>In a low voice, but high enough, I thought, for the preacher to hear,
+for we sat very near, the Colonel replied:</p>
+
+<p>"He's a renegade Yankee&mdash;the meanest thing on earth."</p>
+
+<p>I said no more, but entered into the services as seriously as the
+strange gymnastic performances of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> preacher would allow of my doing;
+for he was quite as amusing as a circus clown.</p>
+
+<p>With the exception of the Colonel's, and a few other pews in the
+vicinity of the pulpit, all of the seats were mere rough benches,
+without backs, and placed so closely together as to interfere
+uncomfortably with the knees of the sitters. The house was full, and the
+congregation as attentive as any I ever saw. All classes were there; the
+black serving-man away off by the doorway, the poor white a little
+higher up, the small turpentine-farmer a little higher still, and the
+wealthy planter, of the class to which the Colonel belonged, on "the
+highest seats of the synagogue," and in close proximity to the preacher.</p>
+
+<p>The "man of prayer" was a tall, lean, raw-boned, angular-built
+individual, with a thin, sharp, hatchet-face, a small sunken eye, and
+long, loose hair, brushed back and falling over the collar of a seedy
+black coat. He looked like a dilapidated scare-crow, and his pale,
+sallow face, and cracked, wheezy voice, were in odd and comic keeping
+with his discourse. His text was: "Speak unto the children of Israel,
+that they go forward." And addressing the motley gathering of poor
+whites and small planters before him as the "chosen people of God," he
+urged them to press on in the mad course their state had taken. It was a
+political harangue, a genuine stump-speech, but its frequent allusions
+to the auditory as the legitimate children of the old patriarch, and the
+rightful heirs of all the promises, struck me as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> out of place in a
+rural district of South Carolina, however appropriate it might have been
+in one of the large towns, before an audience of merchants and traders,
+who are, almost to a man, Jews.</p>
+
+<p>The services over, the congregation slowly left the church. Gathered in
+groups in front of the "meeting-house," they were engaged in a general
+discussion of the affairs of the day, when the Colonel and I emerged
+from the doorway. The better class greeted my host with considerable
+cordiality, but I noticed that the well-to-do small planters, who
+composed the greater part of the assemblage, received him with decided
+coolness. These people were the "North County folks," on whom the
+overseer had invoked a hanging. Except that their clothing was more
+uncouth and ill-fashioned, and their faces generally less "cute" of
+expression, they did not materially differ in appearance from the rustic
+citizens who may be seen on any pleasant Sunday gathered around the
+doorways of the rural meeting-houses of New England.</p>
+
+<p>One of them, who was leaning against a tree, quietly lighting a pipe,
+was a fair type of the whole, and as he took a part in the scene which
+followed, I will describe him. He was tall and spare, with a swinging,
+awkward gait, and a wiry, athletic frame. His hair, which he wore almost
+as long as a woman's, was coarse and black, and his face strongly
+marked, and of the precise color of two small rivulets of tobacco-juice
+that escaped from the corners of his mouth. He had an easy,
+self-possessed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> manner, and a careless, devil-may-care way about him,
+that showed he had measured his powers, and was accustomed to "rough it"
+with the world. He wore a broadcloth coat of the fashion of some years
+ago, but his waistcoat and nether garments of the common, reddish
+homespun, were loose and ill-shaped, as if their owner did not waste
+thought on such trifles. His hat, as shockingly bad as Horace Greeley's,
+had the inevitable broad brim, and fell over his face like a
+calash-awning over a shop-window. As I approached him he extended his
+hand with a pleasant "How are ye, stranger?"</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," I replied, returning his grasp with equal warmth, "how are
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Right smart, right smart, thank ye. You're&mdash;&mdash;" the rest of the
+sentence was cut short by a gleeful exclamation from Jim, who, mounted
+on the box of the carriage, which was drawn up on the cleared plot in
+front of the meeting-house, waved an open newspaper over his head, and
+called out, as he caught sight of the Colonel:</p>
+
+<p>"Great news, massa&mdash;great news from Charls'on!"</p>
+
+<p>(The darky, while we were in church, had gone to the post-office, some
+four miles away, and got the Colonel's mail, which consisted of letters
+from his New York and Charleston factors, the Charleston <i>Courier</i> and
+<i>Mercury</i> and the New York <i>Journal of Commerce</i>. The latter sheet, at
+the date of which I am writing, was in wide circulation at the South,
+its piety (!) and its politics<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> being then calculated with mathematical
+precision for secession latitudes.)</p>
+
+<p>"What is it, Jim?" shouted his master. "Give it to us."</p>
+
+<p>The darky had somehow learned to read, but holding the paper at arm's
+length, and throwing himself into a theatrical attitude, he cried out,
+with any amount of gesticulation:</p>
+
+<p>"De news am, massa, and gemmen and ladies, dat de ole fort fore
+Charls'on hab ben devacuated by Major Andersin and de sogers, and dey
+hab stole 'way in de dark night and gone to Sumter, whar dey can't be
+took; and dat de ole Gubner hab got out a procdemation dat all dat don't
+lub de Aberlishen Yankees shill cum up dar and clar 'em out; and de
+paper say dat lots ob sogers hab cum from Georgi and Al'bama, and 'way
+down Souf, to help 'em. Dis am w'at de <i>Currer</i> say," he continued,
+holding the paper up to his eyes and reading: "Major Andersin, ob de
+United States army hab 'chieved de 'stinction ob op'ning cibil war
+'tween American citizens; he hab desarted Moulfrie, and by false
+fretexts hab took dat ole Garrison and all his millinery stores to Fort
+Sumter."</p>
+
+<p>"Get down, you d&mdash;&mdash;d nigger," said the Colonel, laughing, and mounting
+the carriage-box beside him. "You can't read. Old Garrison isn't
+there&mdash;he's the d&mdash;&mdash;d Northern Abolitionist."</p>
+
+<p>"I knows dat, Cunnel, but see dar," replied Jim, holding the paper out
+to his master, "don't dat say he'm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> dar? It'm him dat make all de
+trubble. P'raps dis nig can't read, but ef dat aint readin' I'd like to
+know it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Clear out," said the Colonel, now actually roaring with laughter; "it's
+the garrison of soldiers that the <i>Courier</i> speaks of, not the
+Abolitionist."</p>
+
+<p>"Read it yoursef, den, massa, I don't seed it dat way."</p>
+
+<p>Jim was altogether wiser than he appeared, but while equally as well
+pleased with the news as his master, he was so for an entirely different
+reason. In the crisis which these tidings announced, he saw hope for his
+race.</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel then read the paper to the assemblage. The news was received
+with a variety of manifestations by the auditory, the larger portion, I
+thought, hearing it, as I did, with sincere regret.</p>
+
+<p>"Now is the time to stand by the state, my friends," said my host, as he
+finished the reading. "I hope every man here is ready to do his duty by
+old South Carolina."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, <i>sar</i>! if she does <i>har</i> duty by the Union. We'll go to the death
+for har just so long as she's in the right, but not a d&mdash;&mdash;d step if
+she arn't," said the long-legged native I have introduced to the reader.</p>
+
+<p>"And what have <i>you</i> to say about South Carolina? What does she owe to
+<i>you</i>?" asked the Colonel, turning on the speaker with a proud and angry
+look.</p>
+
+<p>"More, a darned sight, than she'll pay, if ye cursed 'ristocrats run her
+to h&mdash;&mdash; as ye'r doin'. She owes me, and 'bout ten as likely niggers as
+ye ever seed, a living,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> and we've d&mdash;&mdash;d hard work to get it out on
+her <i>now</i>, let alone what's comin'."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't talk to me, you ill-mannered cur," said my host, turning his back
+on his neighbor, and directing his attention to the remainder of the
+assemblage.</p>
+
+<p>"Look har, Cunnel," replied the native, "if ye'll jest come down from
+thar, and throw 'way yer shootin'-irons, I'll give ye the all-firedest
+thrashing ye ever did get."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel gave no further heed to him, but the speaker mounted the
+steps of the meeting-house and harangued the natives in a strain of rude
+and passionate declamation, in which my host, the aristocrats, and the
+secessionists came in for about equal shares of abuse. Seeing that the
+native (who, it appeared, was quite popular as a stump-speaker) was
+drawing away his audience, the Colonel descended from the driver's seat,
+and motioning for me to follow, entered the carriage. Turning the horses
+homeward, we rode off at a brisk pace.</p>
+
+<p>"Not much secession about that fellow, Colonel," I remarked, after a
+while.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he replied, "he's a North Carolina 'corn-cracker,' one of the
+ugliest specimens of humanity extant. They're as thick as fleas in this
+part of the state, and about all of them are traitors."</p>
+
+<p>"Traitors to the state, but true to the Union. As far as I've seen, that
+is the case with the middling class throughout the South."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> "Well, it
+may be, but they generally go with us, and I reckon they will now, when
+it comes to the rub. Those in the towns&mdash;the traders and
+mechanics&mdash;will, certain; its only these half-way independent planters
+that ever kick the traces. By the way," continued my host, in a jocose
+way, "what did you think of the preaching?"</p>
+
+<p>"I thought it very poor. I'd rather have heard the stump-speech, had it
+not been a little too personal on you."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it was the better of the two," he replied, laughing, "but the old
+devil can't afford any thing good, he don't get enough pay."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, how much does he get?"</p>
+
+<p>"Only a hundred dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"That <i>is</i> small. How does the man live?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, he teaches the daughter of my neighbor, Captain Randall, who
+believes in praying, and gives him his board. Randall thinks that
+enough. The rest of the parish can't afford to pay him, and I <i>wont</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Why wont you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because he's a d&mdash;&mdash;d old hypocrite. He believes in the Union with all
+his heart&mdash;at least so Randall, who's a sincere Union man, says&mdash;and
+yet, he never sees me at meeting but he preaches a red-hot secession
+sermon."</p>
+
+<p>"He wants to keep you in the faith," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>A few more miles of sandy road took us to the mansion, where we found
+dinner in waiting. Meeting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> "Massa Tommy"&mdash;who had staid at home with
+his mother&mdash;as we entered the doorway, the Colonel asked after the
+overseer.</p>
+
+<p>"He seems well enough, sir; I believe he's coming the possum over
+mother."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll bet on it, Tommy; but he wont fool you and me, will he, my boy?"
+said his father, slapping him affectionately on the back.</p>
+
+<p>After dinner I went, with my host to the room of the wounded man. His
+head was still bound up, and he was groaning piteously, as if in great
+pain; but I thought there was too fresh a color in his face to be
+entirely natural in one who had lost so much blood, and been so severely
+wounded as he affected to have been.</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel mentioned our suspicions to Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, and suggested that
+the shackles should be put on him.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! no, don't do that; it would be inhuman," said the lady; "the color
+is the effect of fever. If you fear he is plotting to get away, let him
+be watched."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel consented, but with evident reluctance, to the arrangement,
+and retired to his room to take a <i>siesta</i>, while I lit a segar, and
+strolled out to the negro quarters.</p>
+
+<p>Making my way through the woods to the scene of the morning's
+jollification, I found about a hundred darkies gathered around Jim, on
+the little plot in front of old Lucy's cabin. He had evidently been
+giving them the news. Pausing when I came near, he exclaimed:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Har's Massa K&mdash;&mdash;, he'll say dat I tells you de trufh;" and turning to
+me, he said: "Massa K&mdash;&mdash;, dese darkies say dat Massa Andersin am an
+ab'lisherner, and dat none but de ab'lisherners will fight for de Union;
+am dat so, sar?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I reckon not, Jim; I think the whole North would fight for it if it
+were necessary."</p>
+
+<p>"Am dat so, massa? am dat so?" eagerly inquired a dozen of the darkies;
+"and am dar great many folks at de Norf&mdash;more dan dar am down har?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, you fools, didn't I tell you dat?" said Jim, as I, not exactly
+relishing the idea of preaching treason, in the Colonel's absence, to
+his slaves, hesitated to reply. "Haint I tole you," he continued, "dat
+in de big city ob New York dar'm more folks dan in all Car'lina? I'se
+been dar, and I knows; and Massa K&mdash;&mdash;'ll tell you dat dey&mdash;most on
+'em&mdash;feel mighty sorry for de brack man."</p>
+
+<p>"No he wont," I replied, "and besides, Jim, you should not talk in this
+way before me; I might tell your master."</p>
+
+<p>"No! you wont do dat; I knows you wont, massa. Scipio tole us he'd trust
+his bery life wid <i>you</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, perhaps he might; it's true I would not injure you;" saying that,
+I turned away, though my curiosity was greatly excited to hear more.</p>
+
+<p>I wandered farther into the woods, and a half-hour found me near one of
+the turpentine distilleries. Seating myself on a rosin barrel, I quietly
+finished my segar,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> and was about lighting another, when Jim made his
+appearance.</p>
+
+<p>"Beg pardon, Massa K&mdash;&mdash;," said the negro, bowing very low, "but I wants
+to ax you one or two tings, ef you please, sar."</p>
+
+<p>"Well," I replied, "I'll tell you any thing that I ought to."</p>
+
+<p>"Der yer tink, den, massa, dat dey'll git to fightin' at Charl'son?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, judging by the tone of the Charleston papers you've read to-day, I
+think they will."</p>
+
+<p>"And der yer tink dat de rest ob de Souf will jine wid Souf Car'lina, if
+she go at it fust?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Jim, I'm inclined to think so."</p>
+
+<p>"I hard you say to massa, dat ef dey goes to war, 'twill free all de
+niggers&mdash;der you raily b'lieve dat, sar?"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>You</i> heard me say that; how did you hear it?" I exclaimed, in
+surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, sar, de front winder ob de carriage war down jess a crack, so I
+hard all you said."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you let it down on purpose?"</p>
+
+<p>"P'r'aps so, massa. Whot's de use ob habin' ears, ef you don't har?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I suppose not much; and you tell all you hear to the other
+negroes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon so, massa," said the darky, looking very demure.</p>
+
+<p>"That's the use of having a tongue, eh?" I replied, laughing.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Dat's it 'zactly, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Jim, I do think the slaves will be finally freed; but it will
+cost more white blood to do it than all the niggers in creation are
+worth. Do you think the darkies would fight for their freedom?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fight, sar!" exclaimed the negro, straightening up his fine form, while
+his usual good-natured look passed from his face, and gave way to an
+expression that made him seem more like an incarnate devil than a human
+being; "<span class="smcap">fight</span>, sar; gib dem de chance, and den see."</p>
+
+<p>"Why are you discontented? You have been at the North, and you know the
+blacks are as well off as the majority of the poor laboring men there."</p>
+
+<p>"You says dat to <i>me</i>, Massa K&mdash;&mdash;; you don't say it to de <i>Cunnel</i>. We
+am <i>not</i> so well off as de pore man at de Norf! You knows dat, sar. He
+hab his wife and chil'ren, and his own home. What hab we, sar? No wife,
+no chil'ren, no home; all am de white man's. Der yer tink we wouldn't
+fight to be free?" and he pressed his teeth together, and there passed
+again over his face the same look it wore the moment before.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, come, Jim, this may be true of your race; but it don't apply to
+yourself. Your master is kind and indulgent to <i>you</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"He am kine to me, sar; he orter be," said the negro, the savage
+expression coming again into his eyes. For a moment he hesitated; then,
+taking a step toward me, he placed his face down to mine, and hissed out
+these words, every syllable seeming to come from the very<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> bottom of his
+being. "I tell you he orter be, sar, <span class="smcap">fur I am his own father's son</span>!"</p>
+
+<p>"His brother!" I exclaimed, springing to my feet, and looking at him in
+blank amazement. "It can't be true!"</p>
+
+<p>"It am true, sar&mdash;as true as there's a hell! His father had my
+mother&mdash;when he got tired of her, he sold her Souf. <i>I war too young den
+eben to know her!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"This is horrible&mdash;too horrible!" I said.</p>
+
+<p>"It am slavery, sar! Shouldn't we be contented?" replied the negro with
+a grim smile. Drawing, then, a large spring-knife from his pocket, he
+waved it above his head, and added: "Ef I had de hull white race
+dar&mdash;right dar under dat knife, don't yer tink I'd take all dar
+lives&mdash;all at one blow&mdash;to be <span class="smcap">free</span>!"</p>
+
+<p>"And yet you refused to run away when the Abolitionists tempted you, at
+the North. Why didn't you go then?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Cause I had promised, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Promised the Colonel before you went?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar; he neber axed me; but <i>I</i> can't tell you no more. P'raps
+Scipio will, ef you ax him."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! I see; you're in that league of which Scip is a leader. You'll get
+into trouble, <i>sure</i>," I replied, in a quick, decided tone, which
+startled him.</p>
+
+<p>"You tole Scipio dat, sar, and what did <i>he</i> tell you?"</p>
+
+<p>"That he didn't care for his life."</p>
+
+<p>"No more do I, sar," said the negro, turning on his heel with a proud,
+almost defiant gesture, and starting to go.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"A moment, Jim. You are very imprudent; never say these things to any
+other mortal; promise me that."</p>
+
+<p>"You'se bery good, massa, bery good. Scipio say you's true, and he'm
+allers right. I ortent to hab said what I hab; but sumhow, sar, dat news
+brought it all up <i>har</i>" (laying his hand on his breast), "and it wud
+come out."</p>
+
+<p>The tears filled his eyes as he said this, and turning away without
+another word, he disappeared among the trees.</p>
+
+<p>I was almost stunned by this strange revelation, but the more I
+reflected on it, the more probable it appeared. Now too, that my
+thoughts were turned in that direction, I called to mind a certain
+resemblance between the colonel and the negro that I had not heeded
+before. Though one was a high-bred Southern gentleman, claiming an old
+and proud descent, and the other a poor African slave, they had some
+striking peculiarities which might indicate a common origin. The
+likeness was not in their features, for Jim's face was of the
+unmistakable negro type, and his skin of a hue so dark that it seemed
+impossible he could be the son of a white man (I afterward learned that
+his mother was a black of the deepest dye), but it was in their form and
+general bearing. They had the same closely-knit and sinewy frame, the
+same erect, elastic step, the same rare blending of good-natured ease
+and dignity&mdash;to which I have already alluded as characteristic of the
+Colonel&mdash;and in the wild burst of passion that accompanied the negro's
+disclosure<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> of their relationship, I saw the same fierce, unbridled
+temper, whose outbreaks I had witnessed in my host.</p>
+
+<p>What a strange fate was theirs! Two brothers&mdash;the one the owner of three
+hundred slaves, and the first man of his district&mdash;the other, a bonded
+menial, and so poor that the very bread he ate, and the clothes he wore,
+were another's!</p>
+
+<p>I passed the remainder of the afternoon in my room, and did not again
+meet my host until the family assembled at the tea-table. Jim then
+occupied his accustomed seat behind the Colonel's chair, and that
+gentleman was in more than his usual spirits, though Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, I
+thought, wore a sad and absent look.</p>
+
+<p>The conversation rambled over a wide range of subjects, and was carried
+on mainly by the Colonel and myself; but toward the close of the meal
+the lady said to me:</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;, Sam and young Junius are to be buried this evening; if you
+have never seen a negro funeral, perhaps you'd like to attend."</p>
+
+<p>"I will be happy to accompany you, Madam, if you go," I replied,</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," said the lady.</p>
+
+<p>"Pshaw! Alice, you'll not go into the woods on so cold a night as this!"
+said the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I think I ought to. Our people will expect me."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE NEGRO FUNERAL.</h3>
+
+
+<p>It was about an hour after nightfall when we took our way to the
+burial-ground. The moon had risen, but the clouds which gathered when
+the sun went down, covered its face, and were fast spreading their
+thick, black shadows over the little collection of negro-houses. Near
+two new-made graves were gathered some two hundred men and women, as
+dark as the night that was setting around them. As we entered the circle
+the old preacher pointed to seats reserved for us, and the sable crowd
+fell back a few paces, as if, even in the presence of death, they did
+not forget the difference between their race and ours.</p>
+
+<p>Scattered here and there among the trees, torches of lightwood threw a
+wild and fitful light over the little cluster of graves, revealing the
+long, straight boxes of rough pine that held the remains of the two
+negroes, and lighting up the score or two of russet mounds where slept
+the dusky kinsmen who had gone before them.</p>
+
+<p>The simple head-boards that marked these humble graves chronicled no bad
+biography or senseless rhyme, and told no false tales of lives that
+might better not have been, but "<span class="smcap">Sam, age 22</span>;" "<span class="smcap">Pompey</span>;" "<span class="smcap">Jake's
+Eliza</span>;"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> "<span class="smcap">Aunt Sue</span>;" "<span class="smcap">Aunt Lucy's Tom</span>;" "<span class="smcap">Joe</span>;" and other like
+inscriptions, scratched in rough characters on the unplaned boards, were
+all the records there. The rude tenants had passed away and "left no
+sign;" their birth, their age, their deeds, were alike unknown&mdash;unknown,
+but not forgotten! for are they not written in the book of His
+remembrance&mdash;and when he counteth up his jewels, may not some of them be
+there?</p>
+
+<p>The queer, grotesque dress, and sad, earnest looks of the black group;
+the red, fitful glare of the blazing pine, and the white faces of the
+tapped trees, gleaming through the gloom like so many sheeted ghosts
+gathered to some death-carnival, made up a strange, wild scene&mdash;the
+strangest and the wildest I had ever witnessed.</p>
+
+<p>The covers of the rude coffins were not yet nailed down, and when we
+arrived, the blacks were, one by one, taking a last look at the faces of
+the dead. Soon, Junius, holding his weeping wife by the hand, approached
+the smaller of the two boxes, which held all that was left of their
+first-born. The mother, kneeling by its side, kissed again and again the
+cold, shrunken lips, and sobbed as if her heart would break; and the
+strong frame of the father shook convulsively, as he choked down the
+great sorrow which welled up in his throat, and turned away from his boy
+forever. As he did so, old Pompey said:</p>
+
+<p>"Don't grebe, June, he'm whar de wicked cease from trubling, whar de
+weary am at rest."</p>
+
+<p>"I knows it; I knows it, Uncle. I knows de Lord<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> am bery good to take
+'im 'way; but why did he take de young chile, and leab de ole man har?"</p>
+
+<p>"De little sapling dat grow in de shade may die while it'm young; de
+great tree dat grow in de sun must lib till he'm rotted down."</p>
+
+<p>These words were the one drop wanting to make the great grief which was
+swelling in the negro's heart overflow. Giving one low, wild cry, he
+folded his wife in his arms, and burst into a paroxysm of tears.</p>
+
+<p>"Come now, my chil'ren," said the old preacher, kneeling down, "let us
+pray."</p>
+
+<p>The whole assemblage then knelt on the cold ground, while the old man
+prayed, and a more sincere, heart-touching prayer never went up from
+human lips to that God "who hath made of one blood all nations that
+dwell on the face of the earth." Though clothed in rags, and in feeble
+age at the mercy of a cruel taskmaster, that old slave was richer far
+than his master. His simple faith, which saw through the darkness around
+him into the clear and radiant light of the unseen day, was of far more
+worth than all the wealth and glory of this world. I know not why it
+was, but as I looked at him in the dim red light, which fell on his bent
+form and cast a strange halo around his upturned face, I thought of
+Stephen, as he gazed upward and behold heaven open, and "the Son of Man
+seated at the right hand of the throne of God."</p>
+
+<p>Rising from his knees, the old preacher turned slowly to the black mass
+that encircled him, and said:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"My dear brederin and sisters, de Lord say dat 'de dust shill return to
+de earth as it war, and de spirit to Him who gabe it,' and now, 'cordin'
+to dat text, my friends, we'm gwine to put dis dust (pointing to the two
+coffins) in de groun' whar it cum from, and whar it shill lay till de
+bressed Lord blow de great trumpet on de resumrection mornin'. De
+spirits of our brudders har de Lord hub already took to hisseff. 'Our
+brudders,' I say, my chil'ren, 'case ebery one dat de Lord hab made am
+brudders to you and to me, whedder dey'm bad or good, white or brack.</p>
+
+<p>"Dis young chile, who hab gone 'way and leff his pore fader and mudder
+suffrin' all ober wid grief, <i>he</i> hab gone to de Lord, <i>shore</i>. <i>He</i>
+neber done no wrong; he allers 'bey'd his massa, and neber said no hard
+word, nor found no fault, not eben w'en de cruel, bad oberseer put de
+load so heaby on him dat it kill him. Yes, my brederin and sisters, <i>he</i>
+hab gone to de Lord; gone whar dey don't work in de swamps; whar de
+little chil'ren don't tote de big shingles fru de water up to dar knees.
+No swamps am dar; no shingles am dar; dey doan't need 'em, 'case dar de
+hous'n haint builded wid hands, for dey'm all builded by de Lord, and
+gib'n to de good niggers, ready-made, and for nuffin'. De Lord don't
+say, like as ded massa say, 'Pomp, dar's de logs and de shingles' (dey'm
+allers pore shingles, de kine dat woant sell; but massa say, 'dey'm good
+'nuff for niggers,' ef de roof do leak). De Lord doan't say: 'Now, Pomp,
+you go to work and build you' own house; but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> mine dat you does you,
+task all de time, jess de same!' But de Lord&mdash;de bressed Lord&mdash;He say,
+w'en we goes up dar, 'Dar, Pomp, dar's de house dat I'se been a buildin'
+for you eber sence 'de foundation ob de worle.' It'm done now, and you
+kin cum in; your room am jess ready, and ole Sal and de chil'ren dat I
+tuk 'way from you eber so long ago, and dat you mourned ober and cried
+ober as ef you'd neber see dem agin, dey'm dar too, all on 'em, a
+waitin' for you. Dey'm been fixin' up de house 'spressly for you all
+dese long years, and dey'b got it all nice and comfible now.' Yas, my
+friends, glory be to Him, dat's what our Heabenly massa say, and who ob
+you wouldn't hab sich a massa as dat? A massa dat doan't set you no hard
+tasks, and dat gibs you 'nuff to eat, and time to rest and to sing and
+to play! A massa dat doan't keep no Yankee oberseer to foller you 'bout
+wid de big free-lashed whip; but dat leads you hisseff to de green
+pastures and de still waters; and w'en you'm a-faint and a-tired, and
+can't go no furder, dat takes you up in his arms, and carries you in his
+bosom! What pore darky am dar dat wudn't hab sich a massa? What one ob
+us, eben ef he had to work jess so hard as we works now, wudn't tink
+heseff de happiest nigger in de hull worle, ef he could hab sich hous'n
+to lib in as dem? dem hous'n 'not made wid hands, eternal in de
+heabens!'</p>
+
+<p>"But glory, glory to de Lord! my chil'ren, wese all got dat massa, ef we
+only knowd it, and He'm buildin' dem hous'n up dar, now, for ebery one
+ob us dat am tryin'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> to be good and to lub one anoder. <i>For ebery one ob
+us</i>, I say, and we kin all git de fine hous'n ef we try.</p>
+
+<p>"Recolember, too, my brudders, dat our great Massa am rich, bery rich,
+and he kin do all he promise. <i>He</i> doant say, w'en wese worked ober time
+to git some little ting to comfort de sick chile, 'I knows, Pomp, you'se
+done de work, an' I did 'gree to gib you de pay; but de fact am, Pomp,
+de frost hab come so sudden dis yar, dat I'se loss de hull ob de sebenfh
+dippin', and I'se pore, so pore, de chile muss go widout dis time.' No,
+no, brudders, de bressed Lord He neber talk so. He neber break, 'case de
+sebenfh dip am shet off, or 'case de price of turpentime gwo down at de
+Norf. He neber sell his niggers down Souf, 'case he lose his money on he
+hoss-race. No, my chil'ren, our <span class="smcap">Heabenly</span> Massa am rich, <span class="smcap">rich</span>, I say. He
+own all dis worle, and all de oder worles dat am shinin' up dar in de
+sky. He own dem all; but he tink more ob one ob you, more ob one ob
+you&mdash;pore, ign'rant brack folks dat you am&mdash;dan ob all dem great worles!
+Who wouldn't belong to sich a Massa as dat? Who wouldn't be his
+nigger&mdash;not his slave&mdash;He doant hab no slaves&mdash;but his chile; and 'ef
+his chile, den his heir, de heir ob God, and de jined heir wid de
+bressed Jesus.' O my chil'ren! tink of dat! de heir ob de Lord ob all de
+'arth and all de sky! What white man kin be more'n dat?</p>
+
+<p>"Don't none ob you say you'm too wicked to be His chile; 'ca'se you
+haint. He lubs de wicked ones de best,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> 'ca'se dey need his lub de most.
+Yas, my brudders, eben de wickedest, ef dey's only sorry, and turn roun'
+and leab off dar bad ways, he lub de bery best ob all, 'ca'se he'm all
+lub and pity.</p>
+
+<p>"Sam, har, my chil'ren, war wicked, but don't <i>we</i> pity him; don't <i>we</i>
+tink he hab a hard time, and don't we tink de bad oberseer, who'm layin'
+dar in de house jess ready to gwo and answer for it&mdash;don't we tink he
+gabe Sam bery great probincation?</p>
+
+<p>"Dat's so," said a dozen of the auditors.</p>
+
+<p>"Den don't you 'spose dat de bressed Lord know all dat, and dat He pity
+Sam too. If we pore sinners feel sorrer for him, haint de Lord's heart
+bigger'n our'n, and haint he more sorrer for him? Don't you tink dat ef
+He lub and pity de bery worse whites, dat He lub and pity pore Sam, who
+warn't so bery bad, arter all? Don't you tink He'll gib Sam a house?
+P'r'aps' 'twont be one ob de fine hous'n, but wont it be a comfible
+house, dat hain't no cracks, and one dat'll keep out de wind and de
+rain? And don't you s'pose, my chil'ren, dat it'll be big 'nuff for
+Jule, too&mdash;dat pore, repentin' chile, whose heart am clean broke, 'ca'se
+she hab broughten dis on Sam&mdash;and won't de Lord&mdash;de good Lord&mdash;de
+tender-hearted Lord&mdash;won't He touch Sam's heart, and coax him to forgib
+Jule, and to take her inter his house up dar? I knows he will, my
+chil'ren. I knows&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>The old negro paused abruptly; there was a quick swaying in the black
+crowd&mdash;a hasty rush&mdash;a wild cry&mdash;and Sam's wife burst into the open
+space around the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> preacher, and fell at his feet. Throwing her arms
+wildly about him, she shrieked out:</p>
+
+<p>"Say dat agin, Uncle Pomp! for de lub ob de good Lord, oh! say dat
+agin!"</p>
+
+<p>Bending down, the old man raised her gently in his arms, and folding her
+there, as he would have folded a child, he said, in a voice thick with
+emotion:</p>
+
+<p>"It am so, Juley. I knows dat Sam will forgib you, and take you wid him
+up dar."</p>
+
+<p>Fastening her arms frantically around Pompey's neck, the poor woman
+burst into a paroxysm of grief, while the old man's tears fell in great
+drops on her upturned face, and many a dark cheek was wet, as with rain.</p>
+
+<p>The scene had lasted a few minutes, and I was turning away to hide the
+emotion that fast filled my eyes, and was creeping up, with a choking
+feeling, to my throat, when the Colonel, from the farther edge of the
+group, called out:</p>
+
+<p>"Take that d&mdash;&mdash; d&mdash;&mdash; away&mdash;take her away, Pomp!"</p>
+
+<p>The old negro turned toward his master with a sad, grieved look, but
+gave no heed to the words.</p>
+
+<p>"Take her away, some of you, I say," again cried the Colonel. "Pomp, you
+mustn't keep these niggers all night in the cold."</p>
+
+<p>At the sound of her master's voice the metif woman fell to the ground as
+if struck by a Minie-ball. Soon several negroes lifted her up to bear
+her off; but she struggled violently, and rent the woods with her wild
+cries for "one more look at Sam."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Look at him, you d&mdash;&mdash; d&mdash;&mdash;; then go, and don't let me see you again."</p>
+
+<p>She threw herself on the face of the dead, and covered the cold lips
+with her kisses; then she rose, and with a weak, uncertain step,
+staggered out into the darkness.</p>
+
+<p>Was not the system which had so seared and hardened that man's heart,
+begotten in the lowest hell?</p>
+
+<p>The old preacher said no more, but four stout negro men stepped forward,
+nailed down the lids, and lowered the rough boxes into the ground.
+Turning to Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, I saw her face was red with weeping. She turned
+to go as the first earth fell, with a dull, heavy sound, on the rude
+coffins; and giving her my arm, I led her from the scene.</p>
+
+<p>As we walked slowly back to the house, a low wail&mdash;half a chant, half a
+dirge&mdash;rose from the black crowd, and floated off on the still night
+air, till it died away amid the far woods, in a strange, unearthly moan.
+With that sad, wild music in our ears, we entered the mansion.</p>
+
+<p>As we seated ourselves by the bright wood-fire on the library hearth,
+obeying a sudden impulse which I could not restrain, I said to Madam
+P&mdash;&mdash;:</p>
+
+<p>"The Colonel's treatment of that poor woman is inexplicable to me. Why
+is he so hard with her? It is not in keeping with what I have seen of
+his character."</p>
+
+<p>"The Colonel is a peculiar man," replied the lady. "Noble, generous, and
+a true friend, he is also a bitter, implacable enemy. When he once
+conceives a dislike,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> his feelings become even vindictive. Never having
+had an ungratified wish, he does not know how to feel for the sorrows of
+those beneath him. Sam, though a proud, headstrong, unruly character,
+was a great favorite with him; he felt his death much; and as he
+attributes it to Jule, he feels terribly bitter toward her. She will
+have to be sold to get her out of his way, for he will <i>never</i> forgive
+her."</p>
+
+<p>It was some time before the Colonel joined us, and when at last he made
+his appearance, he seemed in no mood for conversation. The lady soon
+retired; but feeling unlike sleep, I took down a book from the shelves,
+drew my chair near the fire, and fell to reading. The Colonel, too, was
+deep in the newspapers, till, after a while, Jim entered the room:</p>
+
+<p>"I'se cum to ax ef you've nuffin more to-night, Cunnel?" said the negro.</p>
+
+<p>"No, nothing, Jim," replied his master; "but, stay&mdash;hadn't you better
+sleep in front of Moye's door?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dunno, sar; jess as you say."</p>
+
+<p>"I think you'd better," returned the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa," and the darky left the apartment.</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel shortly rose, and bade me "good-night." I continued reading
+till the clock struck eleven, when I laid the book aside and went to my
+room.</p>
+
+<p>I lodged, as I have said before, on the first floor, and was obliged to
+pass by the overseer's apartment in going to mine. Wrapped in his
+blanket, and stretched at full length on the ground, Jim lay there, fast
+asleep.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> I passed on, thinking of the wisdom of placing a tired negro on
+guard over an acute and desperate Yankee.</p>
+
+<p>I rose in the morning with the sun, and had partly donned my clothing,
+when I heard a loud uproar in the hall. Opening my door, I saw Jim
+pounding vehemently at the Colonel's room, and looking as pale as is
+possible with a person of his complexion.</p>
+
+<p>"What the d&mdash;l is the matter?" asked his master, who now, partly
+dressed, stepped into the hall.</p>
+
+<p>"Moye hab gone, sar&mdash;he'm gone and took Firefly (my host's
+five-thousand-dollar thorough-bred) wid him."</p>
+
+<p>For a moment the Colonel stood stupified; then, his face turning to a
+cold, clayey white, he seized the black by the throat, and hurled him to
+the floor. With his thick boot raised, he seemed about to dash out the
+man's brains with its ironed heel, when, on the instant, the octoroon
+woman rushed, in her night-clothes, from his room, and, with desperate
+energy, pushed him aside, exclaiming: "What would you do? Remember <span class="smcap">who
+he is</span>!"</p>
+
+<p>The negro rose, and the Colonel, without a word, passed into his own
+apartment.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PURSUIT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>I sauntered out, after the events recorded in the last chapter, to
+inhale the fresh air of the morning. A slight rain had fallen during the
+night, and it still moistened the dead leaves which carpeted the woods,
+making an extended walk out of the question; so, seating myself on the
+trunk of a fallen tree, in the vicinity of the house, I awaited the hour
+for breakfast. I had not remained there long before I heard the voices
+of my host and Madam P&mdash;&mdash; on the front piazza:</p>
+
+<p>"I tell you, Alice, I cannot&mdash;must not do it. If I overlook this, the
+discipline of the plantation is at an end."</p>
+
+<p>"Do what you please with him when you return," replied the lady, "but do
+not chain him up, and leave me, at such a time, alone. You know Jim is
+the only one I can depend on."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, have your own way. You know, my darling, I would not cause you a
+moment's uneasiness, but I must follow up this d&mdash;&mdash;d Moye."</p>
+
+<p>I was seated where I could hear, though I could not see the speakers,
+but it was evident from the tone of the last remark, that an action
+accompanied it quite as tender<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> as the words. Being unwilling to
+overhear more of a private conversation, I rose and approached them.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! my dear fellow," said the Colonel, on perceiving me, "are you
+stirring so early? I was about to send to your room to ask if you'll go
+with me up the country. My d&mdash;&mdash;d overseer has got away, and I must
+follow him at once."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll go with pleasure," I replied. "Which way do you think Moye has
+gone?"</p>
+
+<p>"The shortest cut to the railroad, probably; but old C&aelig;sar will track
+him."</p>
+
+<p>A servant then announced breakfast&mdash;an early one having been prepared.
+We hurried through the meal with all speed, and the other preparations
+being soon over, were in twenty minutes in our saddles, and ready for
+the journey. The mulatto coachman, with a third horse, was at the door,
+ready to accompany us. As we mounted, the Colonel said to him:</p>
+
+<p>"Go and call Sam, the driver."</p>
+
+<p>The darky soon returned with the heavy, ugly-visaged black who had been
+whipped, by Madam P&mdash;&mdash;'s order, the day before.</p>
+
+<p>"Sam," said his master, "I shall be gone some days, and I leave the
+field-work in your hands. Let me have a good account of you when I
+return."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, you shill dat," replied the negro.</p>
+
+<p>"Put Jule&mdash;Sam's Jule&mdash;into the woods, and see that she does full
+tasks," continued the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Haint she wanted 'mong de nusses, massa?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Put some one else there&mdash;give her field-work; she needs it."</p>
+
+<p>On large plantations the young children of the field-women are left with
+them only at night, and are herded together during the day, in a
+separate cabin, in charge of nurses. These nurses are feeble, sickly
+women, or recent mothers; and the fact of Jule's being employed in that
+capacity was evidence that she was unfit for outdoor labor.</p>
+
+<p>Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, who was waiting on the piazza to see us off, seemed about
+to remonstrate against this arrangement, but she hesitated a moment, and
+in that moment we had bidden her "Good-bye," and galloped away.</p>
+
+<p>We were soon at the cabin of the negro-hunter, and the coachman,
+dismounting, called him out.</p>
+
+<p>"Hurry up, hurry up," said the Colonel, as Sandy appeared, "we haven't a
+moment to spare."</p>
+
+<p>"Jest so&mdash;jest so, Cunnel; I'll jine ye in a jiffin," replied he of the
+reddish extremities.</p>
+
+<p>Emerging from the shanty with provoking deliberation&mdash;the impatience of
+my host had infected me&mdash;the clay-eater slowly proceeded to mount the
+horse of the negro, while his dirt-bedraggled wife, and clay-encrusted
+children, followed close at his heels, the younger ones huddling around
+for the tokens of paternal affection usual at parting. Whether it was
+the noise they made, or their frightful aspect, I know not, but the
+horse, a spirited animal, took fright on their appearance, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> nearly
+broke away from the negro, who was holding him. Seeing this, the Colonel
+said:</p>
+
+<p>"Clear out, you young scare-crows. Into the house with you."</p>
+
+<p>"They arn't no more scare-crows than yourn, Cunnel J&mdash;&mdash;," said the
+mother, in a decidedly belligerent tone. "You may 'buse my old man&mdash;he
+kin stand it&mdash;but ye shan't blackguard my young 'uns!"</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel laughed, and was about to make a good-natured reply, when
+Sandy yelled out:</p>
+
+<p>"Gwo enter the house and shet up, ye &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>With this affectionate farewell, he turned his horse and led the way up
+the road.</p>
+
+<p>The dog, who was a short distance in advance, soon gave a piercing howl,
+and started off at the speed of a reindeer. He had struck the trail, and
+urging our horses to their fastest speed, we followed.</p>
+
+<p>We were all well mounted, but the mare the Colonel had given me was a
+magnificent animal, as fleet as the wind, and with a gait so easy that
+her back seemed a rocking-chair. Saddle-horses at the South are trained
+to the gallop&mdash;Southern riders not deeming it necessary that one's
+breakfast should be churned into a Dutch cheese by a trotting nag, in
+order that he may pass for a horseman.</p>
+
+<p>We had ridden on at a perfect break-neck pace for half an hour, when the
+Colonel shouted to our companion:</p>
+
+<p>"Sandy, call the dog in; the horses wont last ten miles at this
+gait&mdash;we've a long ride before us."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The dirt-eater did as he was bidden, and we soon settled into a gentle
+gallop.</p>
+
+<p>We had passed through a dense forest of pines, but were emerging into a
+"bottom country," where some of the finest deciduous trees&mdash;then brown
+and leafless, but bearing promise of the opening beauty of
+spring&mdash;reared, along with the unfading evergreen, their tall stems in
+the air. The live-oak, the sycamore, the Spanish mulberry, the holly,
+and the persimmon&mdash;gaily festooned with wreaths of the white and yellow
+jessamine, the woodbine and the cypress-moss, and bearing here and there
+a bouquet of the mistletoe, with its deep green and glossy leaves
+upturned to the sun&mdash;flung their broad arms over the road, forming an
+archway grander and more beautiful than any the hand of man ever wove
+for the greatest hero the world has worshipped.</p>
+
+<p>The woods were free from underbrush, and a coarse, wiry grass, unfit for
+fodder, and scattered through them in detached patches, was the only
+vegetation visible. The ground was mainly covered with the leaves and
+burrs of the pine.</p>
+
+<p>We passed great numbers of swine, feeding on these burrs, and now and
+then a horned animal browsing on the cypress-moss where it hung low on
+the trees. I observed that nearly all the swine were marked, though they
+seemed too wild to have ever seen an owner, or a human habitation. They
+were a long, lean, slab-sided race, with legs and shoulders like deer,
+and bearing no sort of resemblance to the ordinary hog, except in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> the
+snout, and that feature was so much longer and sharper than the nose of
+the Northern swine, that I doubt if Agassiz would class the two as one
+species. However, they have their uses&mdash;they make excellent bacon, and
+are "death on snakes." Ireland itself is not more free from the
+serpentine race than are the districts frequented by these long-nosed
+quadrupeds.</p>
+
+<p>"We call them Carolina race-horses," said the Colonel, as he finished an
+account of their peculiarities.</p>
+
+<p>"Race-horses! Why, are they fleet of foot?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fleet as deer. I'd match one against an ordinary horse at any time."</p>
+
+<p>"Come, my friend, you're practising on my ignorance of natural history."</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bit of it. See! there's a good specimen yonder. If we can get him
+into the road, and fairly started, I'll bet you a dollar he'll beat
+Sandy's mare on a half-mile stretch&mdash;Sandy to hold the stakes and have
+the winnings."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, agreed," I said, laughing, "and I'll give the pig ten rods the
+start."</p>
+
+<p>"No," replied the Colonel, "you can't afford it. He'll <i>have</i> to start
+ahead, but you'll need that in the count. Come, Sandy, will you go in
+for the pile?"</p>
+
+<p>I'm not sure that the native would not have run a race with Old Nicholas
+himself, for the sake of so much money. To him it was a vast sum; and as
+he thought of it, his eyes struck small sparks, and his enormous beard
+and mustachio vibrated with something that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> faintly resembled a laugh.
+Replying to the question, he said:</p>
+
+<p>"Kinder reckon I wull, Cunnel; howsomdever, I keeps the stakes, ony
+how?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," said the planter, "but be honest&mdash;win if you can."</p>
+
+<p>Sandy halted his horse in the road, while the planter and I took to the
+woods on either side of the way. The Colonel soon man[oe]uvred to
+separate the selected animal from the rest of the herd, and, without
+much difficulty, got him into the road, where, by closing down on each
+flank, we kept him till he and Sandy were fairly under way.</p>
+
+<p>"He'll keep to the road when once started," said the Colonel, laughing:
+"and he'll show you some of the tallest running you ever saw in your
+life."</p>
+
+<p>Away they went. At first the pig, seeming not exactly to comprehend the
+programme, cantered off at a leisurely pace, though he held his own.
+Soon, however, he cast an eye behind him&mdash;halted a moment to collect his
+thoughts and reconnoitre&mdash;and then, lowering his head and elevating his
+tail, put forth all his speed. And such speed! Talk of a deer, the wind,
+or a steam-engine&mdash;they are not to be compared with it. Nothing in
+nature I ever saw run&mdash;except, it may be, a Southern tornado, or a Sixth
+Ward politician&mdash;could hope to distance that pig. He gained on the horse
+at every step, and it was soon evident that my dollar was gone!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"'In for a shilling, in for a pound,' is the adage, so, turning to the
+Colonel, I said, as intelligibly as my horse's rapid pace and my excited
+risibilities would allow:</p>
+
+<p>"I see I've lost, but I'll go you another dollar that <i>you</i> can't beat
+the pig!"</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;sir!" the Colonel got out in the breaks of his laughing explosions;
+"you can't hedge on me in that manner. I'll go a dollar that <i>you</i> can't
+do it, and your mare is the fastest on the road. She won me a thousand
+not a month ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'll do it&mdash;Sandy to have the stakes."</p>
+
+<p>"Agreed," said the Colonel, and away <i>we</i> went.</p>
+
+<p>The swinish racer was about a hundred yards ahead when I gave the mare
+the reins, and told her to go. And she <i>did</i> go. She flew against the
+wind with a motion so rapid that my face, as it clove the air, felt as
+if cutting its way through a solid body, and the trees, as we passed,
+seemed struck with panic, and running for dear life in the opposite
+direction.</p>
+
+<p>For a few moments I thought the mare was gaining, and I turned to the
+Colonel with an exultant look.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't shout till you win, my boy," he called out from the distance
+where I was fast leaving him and Sandy.</p>
+
+<p>I <i>did not shout</i>, for spite of all my efforts the space between me and
+the pig seemed to widen. Yet I kept on, determined to win, till, at the
+end of a short half-mile, we reached the Waccamaw&mdash;the swine still a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span>
+hundred yards ahead! There his pigship halted, turned coolly around,
+eyed me for a moment, then with a quiet, deliberate trot, turned off
+into the woods.</p>
+
+<p>A bend in the road kept my companions out of sight for a few moments,
+and when they came up I had somewhat recovered my breath, though the
+mare was blowing hard, and reeking with foam.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," said the Colonel, "what do you think of our bacon 'as it runs?'"</p>
+
+<p>"I think the Southern article can't be beat, whether raw or cooked,
+standing or running."</p>
+
+<p>At this moment the hound, who had been leisurely jogging along in the
+rear, disdaining to join in the race in which his dog of a master and I
+had engaged, came up, and dashing quickly on to the river's edge, set up
+a most dismal howling. The Colonel dismounted, and clambering down the
+bank, which was there twenty feet high, and very steep, shouted:</p>
+
+<p>"The d&mdash;&mdash;d Yankee has swum the stream!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why so?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"To cover his tracks and delay pursuit; but he has overshot the mark.
+There is no other road within ten miles, and he must have taken to this
+one again beyond here. He's lost twenty minutes by this man[oe]uvre.
+Come, Sandy, call in the dog, we'll push on a little faster."</p>
+
+<p>"But he tuk to t'other bank, Cunnel. Shan't we trail him thar?" asked
+Sandy.</p>
+
+<p>"And suppose he found a boat here," I suggested, "and made the shore
+some ways down?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"He couldn't get Firefly into a flat&mdash;we should only waste time in
+scouring the other bank. The swamp this side the next run has forced him
+into the road within five miles. The trick is transparent. He took me
+for a fool," replied the Colonel, answering both questions at once.</p>
+
+<p>I had reined my horse out of the road, and when my companions turned to
+go, was standing at the edge of the bank, overlooking the river.
+Suddenly I saw, on one of the abutments of the bridge, what seemed a
+long, black log&mdash;strange to say, <i>in motion</i>!</p>
+
+<p>"Colonel," I shouted, "see there! a live log as I'm a white man!"</p>
+
+<p>"Lord bless you," cried the planter, taking an observation, "it's an
+alligator!"</p>
+
+<p>I said no more, but pressing on after the hound, soon left my companions
+out of sight. For long afterward, the Colonel, in a doleful way, would
+allude to my lamentable deficiency in natural history&mdash;particularly in
+such branches as bacon and "live logs."</p>
+
+<p>I had ridden about five miles, keeping well up with the hound, and had
+reached the edge of the swamp, when suddenly the dog darted to the side
+of the road, and began to yelp in the most frantic manner. Dismounting,
+and leading my horse to the spot, I made out plainly the print of
+Firefly's feet in the sand. There was no mistaking it&mdash;that round shoe
+on the off forefoot. (The horse had, when a colt, a cracked hoof, and
+though the wound was outgrown, the foot was still tender.)<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> These prints
+were dry, while the tracks we had seen at the river were filled with
+water, thus proving that the rain had ceased while the overseer was
+passing between the two places. He was therefore not far off.</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel and Sandy soon rode up.</p>
+
+<p>"Caught a live log! eh, my good fellow?" asked my host, with a laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"No; but here's the overseer as plain as daylight; and his tracks not
+wet!"</p>
+
+<p>Quickly dismounting, he examined the ground, and then exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p>"The d&mdash;l&mdash;&mdash;it's a fact&mdash;here not four hours ago! He has doubled on
+his tracks since, I'll wager, and not made twenty miles&mdash;we'll have him
+before night, sure! Come, mount&mdash;quick."</p>
+
+<p>We sprang into our saddles, and again pressed rapidly on after the dog,
+who followed the scent at the top of his speed.</p>
+
+<p>Some three miles more of wet, miry road took us to the run of which the
+Colonel had spoken. Arrived there, we found the hound standing on the
+bank, wet to the skin, and looking decidedly chop-fallen.</p>
+
+<p>"Death and d&mdash;&mdash;n!" shouted the Colonel; "the dog has swum the run, and
+lost the trail on the other side! The d&mdash;d scoundrel has taken to the
+water, and balked us after all! Take up the dog, Sandy, and try him
+again over there."</p>
+
+<p>The native spoke to C&aelig;sar, who bounded on to the horse's back in front
+of his master. They then crossed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> the stream, which there was about
+fifty yards wide, and so shallow that in the deepest part the water
+merely touched the horse's breast; but it was so roiled by the recent
+rain that we could not distinguish the foot-prints of the horse beneath
+the surface.</p>
+
+<p>The dog ranged up and down the opposite bank, but all to no purpose: the
+overseer had not been there. He had gone either up or down the
+stream&mdash;in which direction, was now the question. Calling Sandy back to
+our side of the run, the Colonel proceeded to hold a 'council of war.'
+Each one gave his opinion, which was canvassed by the others, with as
+much solemnity as if the fate of the Union hung on the decision.</p>
+
+<p>The native proposed we should separate&mdash;one go up, another down the
+stream, and the third, with the dog, follow the road; to which he
+thought Moye had finally returned. Those who should explore the run
+would easily detect the horse's tracks where he had left it, and then
+taking a straight course to the road, all might meet some five miles
+further on, at a place indicated.</p>
+
+<p>I gave my adhesion to Sandy's plan, but the Colonel overruled it on the
+ground of the waste of time that would be incurred in thus recovering
+the overseer's trail.</p>
+
+<p>"Why not," he said, "strike at once for the end of his route? Why follow
+the slow steps he took in order to throw us off the track? He has not
+come back to this road. Ten miles below there is another one leading
+also<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> to the railway. He has taken that. We might as well send Sandy and
+the dog back and go on by ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>"But if bound for the Station, why should he wade through the creek
+here, ten miles out of his way? Why not go straight on by the road?" I
+asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Because he knew the dog would track him, and he hoped by taking to the
+run to make me think he had crossed the country instead of striking for
+the railroad."</p>
+
+<p>I felt sure the Colonel was wrong, but knowing him to be tenacious of
+his own opinions, I made no further objection.</p>
+
+<p>Directing Sandy to call on Madam P&mdash;&mdash; and acquaint her with our
+progress, he then dismissed the negro-hunter, and once more led the way
+up the road.</p>
+
+<p>The next twenty miles, like our previous route, lay through an unbroken
+forest. As we left the watercourses, we saw only the gloomy pines, which
+there&mdash;the region being remote from the means of transportation&mdash;were
+seldom tapped, and presented few of the openings that invite the weary
+traveller to the dwelling of the hospitable planter.</p>
+
+<p>After a time the sky, which had been bright and cloudless all the
+morning, grew overcast, and gave out tokens of a coming storm. A black
+cloud gathered in the west, and random flashes darted from it far off in
+the distance; then gradually it neared us; low mutterings sounded in the
+air, and the tops of the tall pines a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> few miles away, were lit up now
+and then with a fitful blaze, all the brighter for the deeper gloom that
+succeeded. Then a terrific flash and peal broke directly over us, and a
+great tree, struck by a red-hot bolt, fell with a deafening crash, half
+way across our path. Peal after peal followed, and then the rain&mdash;not
+filtered into drops as it falls from our colder sky, but in broad,
+blinding sheets&mdash;poured full and heavy on our shelterless heads.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! there it comes!" shouted the Colonel. "God have mercy upon us!"</p>
+
+<p>As he spoke, a crashing, crackling, thundering roar rose above the
+storm, filling the air, and shaking the solid earth till it trembled
+beneath our horses' feet, as if upheaved by a volcano. Nearer and nearer
+the sound came, till it seemed that all the legions of darkness were
+unloosed in the forest, and were mowing down the great pines as the
+mower mows the grass with his scythe. Then an awful, sweeping crash
+thundered directly at our backs, and turning round, as if to face a foe,
+my horse, who had borne the roar and the blinding flash till then
+unmoved, paralyzed with dread, and panting for breath, sunk to the
+ground; while close at my side the Colonel, standing erect in his
+stirrups, his head uncovered to the pouring sky, cried out:</p>
+
+<p>"<span class="smcap">Thank God, we are saved!</span>"</p>
+
+<p>There&mdash;not three hundred yards in our rear, had passed the
+<span class="smcap">TORNADO</span>&mdash;uprooting trees, prostrating dwellings, and sending many a soul
+to its last account, but sparing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> <i>us</i> for another day! For thirty miles
+through the forest it had mowed a swath of two hundred feet, and then
+moved on to stir the ocean to its briny depths.</p>
+
+<p>With a full heart, I remounted, and turning my horse, pressed on in the
+rain. We said not a word till a friendly opening pointed the way to a
+planter's dwelling. Then calling to me to follow, the Colonel dashed up
+the by-path which led to the mansion, and in five minutes we were
+warming our chilled limbs before the cheerful fire that roared and
+crackled on its broad hearth-stone.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE YANKEE-SCHOOL-MISTRESS.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The house was a large, old-fashioned frame building, square as a
+packing-box, and surrounded, as all country dwellings at the South are,
+by a broad, open piazza. Our summons was answered by its owner, a
+well-to-do, substantial, middle-aged planter, wearing the ordinary
+homespun of the district, but evidently of a station in life much above
+the common "corn-crackers" I had seen at the country meeting-house. The
+Colonel was an acquaintance, and greeting us with great cordiality, our
+host led the way directly to the sitting-room. There we found a bright,
+blazing fire, and a pair of bright sparkling eyes, the latter belonging
+to a blithesome young woman of about twenty, with a cheery face, and a
+half-rustic, half-cultivated air, whom our new friend introduced to us
+as his wife.</p>
+
+<p>"I regret not having had the pleasure of meeting Mrs. S&mdash;&mdash; before, but
+am very happy to meet her now," said the Colonel, with all the
+well-bred, gentlemanly ease that distinguished him.</p>
+
+<p>"The pleasure is mutual, Colonel J&mdash;&mdash;," replied the lady, "but thirty
+miles in this wild country, should not have made a neighbor so distant
+as you have been."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Business, madam, is at fault, as your husband knows. I have much to do;
+and besides, all my connections are in the other direction&mdash;with
+Charleston."</p>
+
+<p>"It's a fact, Sally, the Colonel is the d&mdash;&mdash; busy man in these parts.
+Not content with a big plantation and three hundred niggers, he looks
+after all South Carolina, and the rest of creation to boot," said our
+host.</p>
+
+<p>"Tom will have his joke, Madam, but he's not far from the truth."</p>
+
+<p>Seeing we were dripping wet, the lady offered us a change of clothing,
+and retiring to a chamber, we each appropriated a suit belonging to our
+host, giving our own to a servant, to be dried.</p>
+
+<p>Arrayed in our fresh apparel, we soon rejoined our friends in the
+sitting-room. The new garments fitted the Colonel tolerably well, but,
+though none too long, they were a world too wide for me, and as my wet
+hair hung in smooth flat folds down my cheeks, and my limp shirt-collar
+fell over my linsey coat, I looked for all the world like a cross
+between a theatrical Aminodab Sleek and Sir John Falstaff, with the
+stuffing omitted. When our hostess caught sight of me in this new garb,
+she rubbed her hands together in great glee, and, springing to her feet,
+gave vent to a perfect storm of laughter&mdash;jerking out between the
+explosions:</p>
+
+<p>"Why&mdash;you&mdash;you&mdash;look jest like&mdash;a scare-crow."</p>
+
+<p>There was no mistaking that hearty, hoydenish manner; and seizing both
+of her hands in mine, I shouted:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> "I've found you out&mdash;you're a
+"country-woman" of mine&mdash;a clear-blooded Yankee!"</p>
+
+<p>"What! <i>you</i> a Yankee!" she exclaimed, still laughing, "and here with
+this horrid 'secesherner,' as they call him."</p>
+
+<p>"True as preachin', Ma'am," I replied, adopting the drawl&mdash;"all the way
+from Down East, and Union, tu, stiff as buckram."</p>
+
+<p>"Du tell!" she exclaimed, swinging my hands together as she held them in
+hers. "If I warn't hitched to this 'ere feller, I'd give ye a smack
+right on the spot. I'm <i>so</i> glad to see ye."</p>
+
+<p>"Do it, Sally&mdash;never mind <i>me</i>," cried her husband, joining heartily in
+the merriment.</p>
+
+<p>Seizing the collar of my coat with both hands, she drew my face down
+till my lips almost touched hers (I was preparing to blush, and the
+Colonel shouted, "Come, come, I shall tell his wife"): but then turning
+quickly on her heel, she threw herself into a chair, exclaiming, "<i>I</i>
+wouldn't mind, but the <i>old man would be jealous</i>." Addressing the
+Colonel, she added, "<i>You</i> needn't be troubled, sir, no Yankee girl will
+kiss <i>you</i> till you change your politics."</p>
+
+<p>"Give me that inducement, and I'll change them on the spot," said the
+Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"No, no, Dave, 'twouldn't do," replied the planter; "the conversion
+wouldn't be genuwine&mdash;besides such things arn't proper, except 'mong
+blood-relations&mdash;and all the Yankees, you know are first-cousins."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The conversation then subsided into a more placid mood, but lost none of
+its genial, good humor. Refreshments were soon set before us, and while
+partaking of them I gathered from our hostess that she was a Vermont
+country-girl, who, some three years before, had been induced by liberal
+pay to come South as a teacher. A sister accompanied her, and about a
+year after their arrival, she married a neighboring planter. Wishing to
+be near her sister, our hostess had also married and settled down for
+life in that wild region. "I like the country very well," she added;
+"it's a great sight easier living here than in Vermont; but I do hate
+these lazy, shiftless, good-for-nothing niggers; they are <i>so</i> slow, and
+<i>so</i> careless, and <i>so</i> dirty, that I sometimes think they will worry
+the very life out of me. I do believe I'm the hardest mistress in all
+the district."</p>
+
+<p>I learned from her that a majority of the teachers at the South are from
+the North, and principally, too, from New England. Teaching is a very
+laborious employment there, far more so than with us, for the
+Southerners have no methods like ours, and the same teacher usually has
+to hear lessons in branches all the way from Greek and Latin to the
+simple A B C. The South has no system of public instruction; no common
+schools; no means of placing within the reach of the sons and daughters
+of the poor even the elements of knowledge. While the children of the
+wealthy are most carefully educated, it is the policy of the ruling
+class to keep the great mass of the people in ignorance; and so long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> as
+this policy continues, so long will that section be as far behind the
+North as it now is, in all that constitutes true prosperity and
+greatness.</p>
+
+<p>The afternoon wore rapidly and pleasantly away in the genial society of
+our wayside-friends. Politics were discussed (our host was a Union man),
+the prospects of the turpentine crop talked over, the recent news
+canvassed, the usual neighborly topics touched upon, and&mdash;I hesitate to
+confess it&mdash;a considerable quantity of corn whiskey disposed of, before
+the Colonel discovered, all at once, that it was six o'clock, and we
+were still seventeen miles from the railway station. Arraying ourselves
+again in our dried garments, we bade a hasty but regretful "good-bye" to
+our hospitable entertainers, and once more took to the road.</p>
+
+<p>The storm had cleared away, but the ground was heavy with the recent
+rain, and our horses were sadly jaded with the ride of the morning. We
+gave them the reins, and, jogging on at their leisure, it was ten
+o'clock at night before they landed us at the little hamlet of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span>W&mdash;&mdash;
+Station, in the state of North Carolina.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE RAILWAY STATION.</h3>
+
+
+<p>A large hotel, or station-house, and about a dozen log shanties made up
+the village. Two of these structures were negro-cabins; two were small
+groceries, in which the vilest alcoholic compounds were sold at a bit
+(ten cents) a glass; one was a lawyer's office, in which was the
+post-office, and a justice's court, where, once a month, the small
+offenders of the vicinity "settled up their accounts;" one was a
+tailoring and clothing establishment, where breeches were patched at a
+dime a stitch, and payment taken in tar and turpentine; and the rest
+were private dwellings of one apartment, occupied by the grocers, the
+tailor, the switch-tenders, the postmaster, and the negro <i>attach&eacute;s</i> of
+the railroad. The church and the school-house&mdash;the first buildings to go
+up in a Northern village&mdash;I have omitted to enumerate, because&mdash;they
+were not there.</p>
+
+<p>One of the natives told me that the lawyer was a "stuck-up critter;" "he
+don't live; he don't&mdash;he puts-up at th' hotel." And the hotel! Would
+Shakspeare, had he have known it, have written of taking one's <i>ease</i> at
+his inn? It was a long, framed building, two stories<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> high, with a
+piazza extending across the side and a front door crowded as closely
+into one corner as the width of the joist would permit. Under the
+piazza, ranged along the wall, was a low bench, occupied by about forty
+tin wash-basins and water-pails, and with coarse, dirty crash towels
+suspended on rollers above it. By the side of each of these towels hung
+a comb and a brush, to which a lock of everybody's hair was clinging,
+forming in the total a stock sufficient to establish any barber in the
+wig business.</p>
+
+<p>It was, as I have said, ten o'clock when we reached the Station.
+Throwing the bridles of our horses over the hitching-posts at the door,
+we at once made our way to the bar-room. That apartment, which was in
+the rear of the building, and communicated with by a long, narrow
+passage, was filled almost to suffocation, when we entered, by a cloud
+of tobacco smoke, the fumes of bad whiskey, and a crowd of drunken
+chivalry, through whom the Colonel with great difficulty elbowed his way
+to the counter, where "mine host" and two assistants were dispensing
+"liquid death," at the rate of ten cents a glass, and of ten glasses a
+minute.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Cunnel, how ar' ye," cried the red-faced liquor-vender, as he
+caught sight of my companion, and, relinquishing his lucrative
+employment for a moment, took the Colonel's hand, "how ar' ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite well, thank you, Miles," said the Colonel, with a certain
+patronizing air, "have you seen my man, Moye?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Moye, no! What's up with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's run away with my horse, Firefly&mdash;I thought he would have made for
+this station. At what time does the next train go up?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, it's due half arter 'leven, but 'taint gin'rally 'long till nigh
+one."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel was turning to join me at the door, when a well-dressed
+young man of very unsteady movements, who was filling a glass at the
+counter, and staring at him with a sort of dreamy amazement, stammered
+out, "Moye&mdash;run&mdash;run a&mdash;way, zir! that&mdash;k&mdash;kant be&mdash;by G&mdash;. I know&mdash;him,
+zir&mdash;he's a&mdash;a friend of mine, and&mdash;I'm&mdash;I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d if he ain't
+hon&mdash;honest."</p>
+
+<p>"About as honest as the Yankees run," replied the Colonel, "he's a
+d&mdash;&mdash;d thief, sir!"</p>
+
+<p>"Look here&mdash;here, zir&mdash;don't&mdash;don't you&mdash;you zay any&mdash;thing 'gainst&mdash;the
+Yankees. D&mdash;&mdash;d if&mdash;if I aint&mdash;one of 'em mezelf&mdash;zir," said the fellow
+staggering toward the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>I</i> don't care <i>what</i> you are; you're drunk."</p>
+
+<p>"You lie&mdash;you&mdash;you d&mdash;&mdash;d 'ris&mdash;'ristocrat," was the reply, as the
+inebriated gentleman aimed a blow, with all his unsteady might, at the
+Colonel's face.</p>
+
+<p>The South Carolinian stepped quickly aside, and dexterously threw his
+foot before the other, who&mdash;his blow not meeting the expected
+resistance&mdash;was unable to recover himself, and fell headlong to the
+floor. The planter turned on his heel, and was walking quietly away,
+when the sharp report of a pistol sounded through the apartment,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> and a
+ball tore through the top of his boot, and lodged in the wall within two
+feet of where I was standing. With a spring, quick and sure as the
+tiger's, the Colonel was on the drunken man. Wrenching away the weapon,
+he seized the fellow by the neck-tie, and drawing him up to nearly his
+full height, dashed him at one throw to the other end of the room. Then
+raising the revolver he coolly levelled it to fire!</p>
+
+<p>But a dozen strong men were on him. The pistol was out of his hand, and
+his arms were pinioned in an instant; while cries of "Fair play, sir!"
+"He's drunk!" "Don't hit a man when he's down," and other like
+exclamations, came from all sides.</p>
+
+<p>"Give <i>me</i> fair play, you d&mdash;&mdash;d North Carolina hounds," cried the
+Colonel, struggling violently to get away, "and I'll fight the whole
+posse of you."</p>
+
+<p>"One's 'nuff for <i>you</i>, ye d&mdash;&mdash;d fire-eatin' 'ristocrat;" said a long,
+lean, bushy-haired, be-whiskered individual, who was standing near the
+counter: "ef ye want to fight, <i>I'll</i> 'tend to yer case to onst. Let him
+go, boys," he continued as he stepped toward the Colonel, and parted the
+crowd that had gathered around him: "give him the shootin'-iron, and
+let's see ef he'll take a man thet's sober."</p>
+
+<p>I saw serious trouble was impending, and stepping forward, I said to the
+last speaker, "My friend, you have no quarrel with this gentleman. He
+has treated that man only as you would have done."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span></p><p>"P'raps thet's so; but he's a d&mdash;&mdash;d hound of a Secesherner thet's
+draggin' us all to h&mdash;ll; it'll du the country good to git quit of one
+on 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"Whatever his politics are, he's a gentleman, sir, and has done you no
+harm&mdash;let me beg of you to let him alone."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't beg any thing for me, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;," growled the Colonel through his
+barred teeth, "I'll fight the d&mdash;&mdash;d corn-cracker, and his whole race,
+at once."</p>
+
+<p>"No you won't, my friend. For the sake of those at home you won't;" I
+said, taking him by the arm, and partly leading, partly forcing him,
+toward the door.</p>
+
+<p>"And who in h&mdash;ll ar you?" asked the corn-cracker, planting himself
+squarely in my way.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm on the same side of politics with you, Union to the core!" I
+replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye ar! Union! Then give us yer fist," said he, grasping me by the hand;
+"by &mdash;&mdash; it does a feller good to see a man dressed in yer cloes thet
+haint 'fraid to say he's Union, so close to South Car'lina, tu, as this
+ar! Come, hev a drink: come boys&mdash;all round&mdash;let's liquor!"</p>
+
+<p>"Excuse me now, my dear fellow&mdash;some other time I'll be glad to join
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"Jest as ye say, but thar's my fist, enyhow."</p>
+
+<p>He gave me another hearty shake of the hand, and the crowd parting, I
+made my way with the Colonel out of the room. We were followed by Miles,
+the landlord, who, when we had reached the front of the entrance-way,
+said, "I'm right sorry for this row, gentlemen; the boys will hev a time
+when they gets together."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Oh, never mind;" said the Colonel, who had recovered his coolness; "but
+why are all these people here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Thar's a barbacue cumin' off to-morrer on the camp-ground, and the
+house is cram full."</p>
+
+<p>"Is that so?" said the Colonel, then turning to me he added, "Moye has
+taken the railroad somewhere else; I must get to a telegraph office at
+once, to head him off. The nearest one is Wilmington. With all these
+rowdies here, it will not do to leave the horses alone&mdash;will you stay
+and keep an eye on them over to-morrow?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I will, cheerfully."</p>
+
+<p>"Thar's a mighty hard set, round har now, Cunnel," said the landlord;
+"and the most peaceable get enter scrapes ef they hain't no friends.
+Hadn't ye better show the gentleman some of your'n, 'fore you go?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, yes, I didn't think of that. Who is here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, thar's Cunnel Taylor, Bill Barnes, Sam Heddleson, Jo Shackelford,
+Andy Jones, Rob Brown, and lots of others."</p>
+
+<p>"Where's Andy Jones?"</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon he's turned in; I'll see."</p>
+
+<p>As the landlord opened a door which led from the hall, the Colonel said
+to me, "Andy is a Union man; but he'd fight to the death for me."</p>
+
+<p>"Sal!" called out the hotel keeper.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, I'se har," was the answer from a slatternly woman, awfully
+black in the face, who soon thrust her head from the door-way.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Is Andy Jones har?" asked Miles.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, he'm turned in up thar on de table."</p>
+
+<p>We followed the landlord into the apartment. It was the dining-room of
+the hotel, and by the dim light which came from a smoky fire on the
+hearth, I saw it contained about a hundred people, who, wrapped in
+blankets, bed-quilts and travelling-shawls, were disposed in all
+conceivable attitudes, and scattered about on the hard floor and tables,
+sleeping soundly. The room was a long, low apartment&mdash;extending across
+the entire front of the house&mdash;and had a wretched, squalid look. The
+fire, which was tended by the negro-woman&mdash;(she had spread a blanket on
+the floor, and was keeping a drowsy watch over it for the night)&mdash;had
+been recently replenished with green wood, and was throwing out thick
+volumes of black smoke, which, mixing with the effluvia from the lungs
+of a hundred sleepers, made up an atmosphere next to impossible to
+breathe. Not a window was open, and not an aperture for ventilation
+could be seen!</p>
+
+<p>Carefully avoiding the arms and legs of the recumbent chivalry, we
+picked our way, guided by the negro-girl, to the corner of the room
+where the Unionist was sleeping. Shaking him briskly by the shoulder,
+the Colonel called out: "Andy! Andy! wake up!"</p>
+
+<p>"What&mdash;what the d&mdash;&mdash;l is the matter?" stammered the sleeper, gradually
+opening his eyes, and raising himself on one elbow, "Lord bless you,
+Cunnel, is that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span>you? what in &mdash;&mdash; brought <i>you</i> har?"</p>
+
+<p>"Business, Andy. Come, get up, I want to see you, and I can't talk
+here."</p>
+
+<p>The North Carolinian slowly rose, and throwing his blanket over his
+shoulders, followed us from the room. When we had reached the open air
+the Colonel introduced me to his friend, who expressed surprise, and a
+great deal of pleasure, at meeting a Northern Union man in the Colonel's
+company.</p>
+
+<p>"Look after our horses, now, Miles; Andy and I want to talk," said the
+planter to the landlord, with about as little ceremony as he would have
+shown to a negro.</p>
+
+<p>I thought the white man did not exactly relish the Colonel's manner, but
+saying, "All right, all right, sir," he took himself away.</p>
+
+<p>The night was raw and cold, but as all the rooms of the hotel were
+occupied, either by sleepers or carousers, we had no other alternative
+than to hold our conference in the open air. Near the railway-track a
+light-wood fire was blazing, and, obeying the promptings of the frosty
+atmosphere, we made our way to it. Lying on the ground around it,
+divested of all clothing except a pair of linsey trousers and a flannel
+shirt, and with their naked feet close to its blaze&mdash;roasting at one
+extremity, and freezing at the other&mdash;were several blacks, the
+switch-tenders and woodmen of the Station&mdash;fast asleep. How human beings
+could sleep in such circumstances seemed a marvel, but further
+observation convinced me that the Southern negro has a natural aptitude
+for that exercise, and will, indeed, bear more exposure than any<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> other
+living thing. Nature in giving him such powers of endurance, appears to
+have specially fitted him for the life of hardship and privation to
+which he is born.</p>
+
+<p>The fire-light enabled me to scan the appearance of my new acquaintance.
+He was rather above the medium height, squarely and somewhat stoutly
+built, and had an easy and self-possessed, though rough and unpolished
+manner. His face, or so much of it as was visible from underneath a
+thick mass of reddish gray hair, denoted a firm, decided character; but
+there was a manly, open, honest expression about it that gained one's
+confidence in a moment. He wore a slouched hat and a suit of the
+ordinary "sheep's-grey," cut in the "sack" fashion, and hanging loosely
+about him. He seemed a man who had made his own way in the world, and I
+subsequently learned that appearances did not belie him. The son of a
+"poor white" man, with scarcely the first rudiments of book-education,
+he had, by sterling worth, natural ability, and great force of
+character, accumulated a handsome property, and acquired a leading
+position in his district. Though on "the wrong side of politics," his
+personal popularity was so great that for several successive years he
+had been elected to represent the county in the state legislature. The
+Colonel, though opposed to him in politics&mdash;and party feeling at the
+South runs so high that political opponents are seldom personal
+friends&mdash;had, in the early part of his career, aided him by his
+endorsements; and Andy had not forgotten the service. It was easy to see
+that while<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> two men could not be more unlike in character and appearance
+than my host and the North Carolinian, they were warm and intimate
+friends.</p>
+
+<p>"So, Moye has been raising h&mdash;ll gin'rally, Colonel," said my new
+acquaintance after a time. "I'm not surprised. I never did b'lieve in
+Yankee nigger-drivers&mdash;sumhow it's agin natur' for a Northern man to go
+Southern principles quite so strong as Moye did."</p>
+
+<p>"Which route do you think he has taken?" asked the Colonel.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I reckon arter he tuk to the run, he made fur the mountings. He
+know'd you'd head him on the travelled routes; so he's put, I think, fur
+the Missussippe, where he'll sell the horse and make North."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll follow him," said the Colonel, "to the ends of the earth. If it
+costs me five thousand dollars, I'll see him hung."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal," replied Andy, laughing, "if he's gone North you'll need a
+extradition treaty to kotch him. South Car'lina, I b'lieve, has set up
+fur a furrin country."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true," said the Colonel, also laughing, "she's "furrin" to the
+Yankees, but not to the old North State."</p>
+
+<p>"D&mdash;&mdash;d if she haint," replied the North Carolinian, "and now she's got
+out on our company, I swear she must keep out. We'd as soon think of
+goin' to h&mdash;&mdash;ll in summer time, as of jining partnership with her.
+Cunnel, you'r the only decent man in the State&mdash;d&mdash;&mdash;d if you
+haint&mdash;and <i>your</i> politics are a'most bad 'nuff to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> spile a township. It
+allers seemed sort o'queer to me, that a man with such a mighty good
+heart as your'n, could be so short in the way of brains."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you're complimentary," replied the Colonel, with the utmost
+good-nature, "but let's drop politics; we never could agree, you know.
+What shall I do about Moye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Go to Wilmington and telegraph all creation: wait a day to har, then if
+you don't har, go home, hire a native overseer, and let Moye go to the
+d&mdash;&mdash;l. Ef it'll do you any good I'll go to Wilmington with you, though
+I did mean to give you Secesherners a little h&mdash;har to-morrer."</p>
+
+<p>"No, Andy, I'll go alone. 'Twouldn't be patriotic to take you away from
+the barbacue. You'd 'spile' if you couldn't let off some gas soon."</p>
+
+<p>"I do b'lieve I shud. Howsumdever, thar's nary a thing I wouldn't do for
+you&mdash;you knows that."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I do, and I wish you'd keep an eye on my Yankee friend here, and
+see he don't get into trouble with any of the boys&mdash;there'll be a hard
+set 'round, I reckon."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I will," said Andy, "but all he's to do is to keep his mouth
+shet."</p>
+
+<p>"That seems easy enough," I replied, laughing.</p>
+
+<p>A desultory conversation followed for about an hour, when the
+steam-whistle sounded, and the up-train arrived. The Colonel got on
+board and bidding us "good-night," went on to Wilmington. Andy then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span>
+proposed we should look up sleeping accommodations. It was useless to
+seek quarters at the hotel, but an empty car was on the turn-out, and
+bribing one of the negroes we got access to it, and were soon stretched
+at full length on two of its hard-bottomed seats.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> CHAPTER XIV.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER_XIV</a></h2>
+
+<h3>THE BARBACUE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The camp-ground was about a mile from the station, and pleasantly
+situated in a grove, near a stream of water. It was in frequent use by
+the camp-meetings of the Methodist denomination&mdash;which sect at the South
+is partial to these rural religious gatherings. Scattered over it, with
+an effort at regularity, were about forty small but neat log cottages,
+thatched with the long leaves of the turpentine pine, and chinked with
+branches of the same tree. Each of these houses was floored with leaves
+or straw, and large enough to afford sleeping accommodations for about
+ten persons, provided they spread their bedding on the ground, and lay
+tolerably close together. Interspersed among the cabins were about a
+dozen canvas tents which had been erected for this especial occasion.</p>
+
+<p>Nearly in the centre of the group of huts a rude sort of scaffold, four
+or five feet high, and surrounded by a rustic railing, served for the
+speaker's stand. It would seat about a dozen persons, and was protected
+by a roof of pine-boughs, interlaced together so as to keep off the sun,
+without affording protection from the rain. In the rear of this stand
+were two long tables, made of rough<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> boards, and supported on stout
+joists, crossed on each other in the form of the letter X. A canopy of
+green leaves shaded the grounds, and the whole grove, which was
+perfectly free from underbrush, was carpeted with the soft, brown
+tassels of the pine.</p>
+
+<p>Being fatigued with the ride of the previous day, I did not awake till
+the morning was far advanced, and it was nearly ten o'clock when Andy
+and I took our way to the camp-ground. Avoiding the usual route, we
+walked on through the forest. It was mid-winter, and vegetation lay dead
+all around us, awaiting the time when spring should breathe into it the
+breath of life, and make it a living thing. There was silence and rest
+in the deep woods. The birds were away on their winter wanderings; the
+leaves hung motionless on the tall trees, and nature seemed resting from
+her ceaseless labors, and listening to the soft music of the little
+stream which sung a cheerful song as it rambled on over the roots and
+fallen branches that blocked its way. Soon a distant murmur arose, and
+we had not proceeded far before as many sounds as were heard at Babel
+made a strange concert about our ears. The lowing of the ox, the
+neighing of the horse, and the deep braying of another animal, mingled
+with a thousand human voices, came through the woods. But above and over
+all rose the stentorian tones of the stump speaker,</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"As he trod the shaky platform,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4em;">With the sweat upon his brow."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>About a thousand persons were already assembled on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> the ground, and a
+more motley gathering I never witnessed. All sorts of costumes and all
+classes of people were there; but the genuine back-woods corn-crackers
+composed the majority of the assemblage. As might be expected much the
+larger portion of the audience were men, still I saw some women and not
+a few children; many of the country people having taken advantage of the
+occasion to give their families a holiday. Some occupied benches in
+front of the stand, though a larger number were seated around in groups,
+within hearing of the speaker, but paying very little attention to what
+he was saying. A few were whittling&mdash;a few pitching quoits, or playing
+leap-frog, and quite a number were having a quiet game of whist, euchre
+or "seven-up."</p>
+
+<p>The speaker was a well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking man and a tolerably
+good orator. He seemed accustomed to addressing a jury, for he displayed
+all the adroitness in handling his subject, and in appealing to the
+prejudices of his hearers, that we see in successful special pleaders.
+But he overshot his mark. To nine out of ten of his audience, his words
+and similes, though correct, and sometimes beautiful, were as
+unintelligible as the dead languages. He advocated immediate,
+unconditional secession; and I thought from the applause which met his
+remarks, whenever he seemed to make himself understood, that the large
+majority of those present were of the same way of thinking.</p>
+
+<p>He was succeeded by a heavy-browed, middle-aged man, slightly bent, and
+with hair a little turned to gray,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> but still hale, athletic, and in the
+prime and vigor of manhood. His pantaloons and waistcoat were of the
+common homespun, and he used, now and then, a word of the country
+dialect, but as a stump-speaker he was infinitely superior to the more
+polished orator who had preceded him.</p>
+
+<p>He, too, advocated secession, as a right and a duty&mdash;separation, now and
+forever, from the dirt-eating, money-loving Yankees, who, he was ashamed
+to say, had the same ancestry, and worshipped the same God, as himself.
+He took the bold ground that slavery is a curse to both the black and
+the white, but that it was forced upon this generation before its birth,
+by these same greedy, grasping Yankees, who would sell not only the
+bones and sinews of their fellow men, but&mdash;worse than that&mdash;their own
+souls, for gold. It was forced upon them without their consent, and now
+that it had become interwoven with all their social life, and was a
+necessity of their very existence, the hypocritical Yankees would take
+it from them, because, forsooth, it is a sin and a wrong&mdash;as if <i>they</i>
+had to bear its responsibility, or the South could not settle its own
+affairs with its <span class="smcap">Maker</span>!</p>
+
+<p>"Slavery is now," he continued, "indispensable to us. Without it,
+cotton, rice, and sugar will cease to grow, and the South will starve.
+What if it works abuses? What if the black, at times, is overburdened,
+and his wife and daughters debauched? Man is not perfect anywhere&mdash;there
+are wrongs in every society. It is for each one to give his account, in
+such matters, to his God.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> But in this are we worse than they? Are there
+not abuses in society at the North? Are not their laborers overworked?
+While sin here hides itself under cover of the night, does it not there
+stalk abroad at noon-day? If the wives and daughters of blacks are
+debauched here, are not the wives and daughters of whites debauched
+there? and will not a Yankee barter away the chastity of his own mother
+for a dirty dollar? Who fill our brothels? Yankee women! Who load our
+penitentiaries, crowd our whipping-posts, debauch our slaves, and cheat
+and defraud us all? Yankee men! And I say unto you, fellow-citizens,"
+and here the speaker's form seemed to dilate with the wild enthusiasm
+which possessed him, "'come out from among them; be ye separate, and
+touch not the unclean thing,' and thus saith the Lord God of Hosts, who
+will guide you, and lead you, if need be, to battle and to victory!"</p>
+
+<p>A perfect storm of applause followed. The assemblage rose, and one long,
+wild shout rent the old woods, and made the tall trees tremble. It was
+some minutes before the uproar subsided; when it did, a voice near the
+speaker's stand called out, "Andy Jones!" The call was at once echoed by
+another voice, and soon a general shout for "Andy!" "Union Andy!" "Bully
+Andy!" went up from the same crowd which a moment before had so wildly
+applauded the secession speaker.</p>
+
+<p>Andy rose from where he was seated beside me, and quietly ascended the
+steps of the platform. Removing his hat, and passing to his mouth a huge
+quid of tobacco<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> from a tin box in his pantaloons-pocket, he made
+several rapid strides up and down the speaker's stand, and then turned
+squarely to the audience.</p>
+
+<p>The reader has noticed a tiger pacing up and down in his cage, with his
+eyes riveted on the human faces before him. He has observed how he will
+single out some individual, and finally stopping short in his rounds,
+turn on him with a look of such intense ferocity as makes a man's blood
+stand still, and his very breath come thick and hard, as he momentarily
+expects the beast will tear away the bars of the cage and leap forth on
+the obnoxious person. Now, Andy's fine, open, manly face had nothing of
+the tiger in it, but, for a moment, I could not divest myself of the
+impression, as he halted in his walk up and down the stage, and turned
+full and square on the previous speaker&mdash;who had taken a seat among the
+audience near me&mdash;that he was about to spring upon him. Riveting his eye
+on the man's face, he at last slowly said:</p>
+
+<p>"A man stands har and quotes Scriptur agin his feller man, and forgets
+that 'God made of one blood all nations that dwell on the face of the
+'arth.' A man stands har and calls his brother a thief, and his mother a
+harlot, and axes us to go his doctrin's! I don't mean his brother in the
+Scriptur sense, nor his mother in a fig'rative sense, but I mean the
+brother of his own blood, and the mother that bore him; for <span class="smcap">he</span>,
+gentlemen (and he pointed his finger directly at the recent speaker,
+while his words came slow and heavy with intense scorn), <span class="smcap">he</span> is a Yankee!
+And now, I say, gentlemen, d&mdash;n sech<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> doctrin's; d&mdash;&mdash;n sech
+principles, and d&mdash;&mdash;n the man that's got a soul so black as to utter
+'em!"</p>
+
+<p>A breathless silence fell on the assemblage, while the person alluded to
+sprang to his feet, his face on fire, and his voice thick and broken
+with intense rage, as he yelled out: "Andy Jones, by&mdash;&mdash;, you shall
+answer for this!"</p>
+
+<p>"Sartin," said Andy, coolly inserting his thumbs in the armholes of his
+waistcoat; "enywhar you likes&mdash;har&mdash;now&mdash;ef 'greeable to you."</p>
+
+<p>"I've no weapon here, sir, but I'll give you a chance mighty sudden,"
+was the fierce reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Suit yourself," said Andy, with perfect imperturbability; "but as you
+haint jest ready, s'pose you set down, and har me tell 'bout your
+relations: they're a right decent set&mdash;them as I knows&mdash;and I'll swar
+they're 'shamed of you."</p>
+
+<p>A buzz went through the crowd, and a dozen voices called out: "Be civil,
+Andy"&mdash;"Let him blow"&mdash;"Shut up"&mdash;"Go in, Jones"&mdash;with other like
+elegant exclamations.</p>
+
+<p>A few of his friends took the aggrieved gentleman aside, and, soon
+quieting him, restored order.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, gentlemen," resumed Andy, "all on you know whar I was raised&mdash;over
+thar in South Car'lina. I'm sorry to say it, but it's true. And you all
+know my father was a pore man, who couldn't give his boys no chance&mdash;and
+ef he could, thar warn't no schules in the district&mdash;so we couldn't hev
+got no book-larning ef we'd<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> been a minded to. Wal, the next plantation
+to whar we lived was old Cunnel J&mdash;&mdash;'s, the father of this cunnel. He
+was a d&mdash;&mdash;d old nullifier, jest like his son&mdash;but not half so decent a
+man. Wal, on his plantation was an old nigger called Uncle Pomp, who'd
+sumhow larned to read. He was a mighty good nigger, and he'd hev been in
+heaven long afore now ef the Lord hadn't a had sum good use for him down
+har&mdash;but he'll be thar yet a d&mdash;&mdash;d sight sooner than sum on us white
+folks&mdash;that's sartin. Wal, as I was saying, Pomp could read, and when I
+was 'bout sixteen, and had never seen the inside of a book, the old
+darky said to me one day&mdash;he was old then, and that was thirty years
+ago&mdash;wal, he said to me, 'Andy, chile, ye orter larn to read, 'twill be
+ob use to ye when you'se grow'd up, and it moight make you a good and
+'spected man&mdash;now, come to ole Pomp's cabin, and he'll larn you, Andy,
+chile.' Wal, I reckon I went. He'd nothin' but a Bible and Watts' Hymns;
+but we used to stay thar all the long winter evenin's, and by the light
+o' the fire&mdash;we war both so darned pore we couldn't raise a candle
+atween us&mdash;wal, by the light o' the fire he larned me, and fore long I
+could spell right smart.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, jest think on that, gentlemen. I, a white boy, and, 'cordin' to
+the Declaration of Independence, with jest as good blood in me as the
+old Cunnel had in him, bein' larned to read by an old slave, and that
+old slave a'most worked to death, and takin' his nights, when he orter
+hev been a restin' his old bones, to larn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> me! I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d if he don't
+get to heaven for that one thing, if for nothin' else.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, you all know the rest&mdash;how, when I'd grow'd up, I settled har, in
+the old North State, and how the young Cunnel backed my paper, and set
+me a runnin' at turpentining. P'raps you don't think this has much to do
+with the Yankees, but it has a durned sight, as ye'll see rather sudden.
+Wal, arter a while, when I'd got a little forehanded, I begun shipping
+my truck to York and Bostin'; and at last my Yankee factor, he come out
+har, inter the back woods, to see me, and says he, 'Jones, come North
+and take a look at us.' I'd sort o' took to him. I'd lots o' dealin's
+with him afore ever I seed him, and I allers found him straight as a
+shingle. Wal, I went North, and he took me round, and showed me how the
+Yankees does things. Afore I know'd him, I allers thought&mdash;as p'raps
+most on you do&mdash;that the Yankees war a sort o' cross atween the devil
+and a Jew; but how do you s'pose I found 'em? I found that they <i>sent
+the pore man's children to schule</i>, <span class="smcap">free</span>&mdash;and that the schule-houses war
+a d&mdash;&mdash;d sight thicker than the bugs in Miles Privett's beds! and
+that's sayin' a heap, for ef eny on you kin sleep in his house, excep'
+he takes to the soft side of the floor, I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d. Yas, the pore man's
+children are larned thar, <span class="smcap">free</span>!&mdash;all on 'em&mdash;and they've jest so good a
+chance as the sons of the rich man! Now, arter that, do you think that
+I&mdash;as got all my schulein, from an old slave, by the light of a borrored
+pine-knot&mdash;der you think that <i>I</i> kin say any thing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> agin the Yankees?
+P'r'aps they <i>do</i> steal&mdash;though I doant know it&mdash;p'r'aps they <i>do</i>
+debauch thar wives and darters, and sell thar mothers' vartue for
+dollars&mdash;but, ef they do, I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d if they doant send pore children
+to schule&mdash;and that's more'n we do&mdash;and let me tell you, until we do
+thet, we must expec' they'll be cuter and smarter nor we are.</p>
+
+<p>"This gentleman, too, my friends, who's been a givin' sech a hard
+settin' down ter his own relation, arter they've broughten him up, and
+given him sech a schulein for nuthin', he says the Yankees want to
+interfere with our niggers. Now, thet haint so, and they couldn't ef
+they would, 'case it's agin the Constertution. And they stand on the
+Constertution a durned sight solider nor we do. Didn't thar big
+gun&mdash;Daniel Webster&mdash;didn't he make mince-meat of South Car'lina Hayne
+on thet ar' subjec'? But I tell you they haint a mind ter meddle with
+the niggers; they're a goin' to let us go ter h&mdash;l our own way, and
+we're goin' thar mighty fast, or I haint read the last census."</p>
+
+<p>"P'r'aps you haint heerd on the ab'lsh'ners, Andy?" cried a voice from
+among the audience.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I reckon I hev," responded the orator, "I've heerd on 'em, and
+seed 'em, too. When I was North I went to one on thar conventions, and
+I'll tell you how they look. They've all long, wimmin's har, and thin,
+shet lips, with big, bawlin' mouths, and long, lean, tommerhawk faces,
+as white as vargin dip&mdash;and they all talk through the nose (giving a
+specimen), and they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> all look for all the world jest like the South
+Car'lina fire-eaters&mdash;and they <i>are</i> as near like 'em as two peas,
+excep' they don't swar quite so bad, but they make up for thet in
+prayin'&mdash;and prayin' too much, I reckon, when a man's a d&mdash;&mdash;d
+hippercrit, is 'bout as bad as swearin'. But, I tell you, the decent
+folks up North haint ablisheners. They look on <i>'em</i> jest as we do on
+mad dogs, the itch, or the nigger traders.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, 'bout this secession bis'ness&mdash;though 'taint no use to talk on
+that subjec', 'case this state never'll secede&mdash;South Car'lina has done
+it, and I'm raather glad she has, for though I was born thar&mdash;and say it
+as hadn't orter say it&mdash;she orter hev gone to h&mdash;l long ago, and now
+she's got thar, why&mdash;<i>let her stay</i>! But, 'bout thet bis'ness, I'll tell
+you a story.</p>
+
+<p>"I know'd an old gentleman once by the name of Uncle Sam, and he'd a
+heap of sons. They war all likely boys&mdash;but strange ter tell, though
+they'd all the same mother, and she was a white woman, 'bout half on 'em
+war colored&mdash;not black, but sorter half-and-half. Now, the white sons
+war well-behaved, industrious, hard-workin' boys, who got 'long well,
+edicated thar children, and allers treated the old man decently; but the
+mulatter fellers war a pesky set&mdash;though some on 'em war better nor
+others. They wouldn't work, but set up for airystocracy&mdash;rode in
+kerriges, kept fast horses, bet high, and chawed tobaccer like the
+devil. Wal, the result was, <i>they</i> got out at the elbows, and 'case they
+warn't gettin' 'long quite so fast as the white 'uns&mdash;though<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> that war
+all thar own fault&mdash;they got jealous, and one on 'em who was blacker nor
+all the rest&mdash;a little feller, but terrible big on braggin'&mdash;he packed
+up his truck one night, and left the old man's house, and swore he'd
+never come back. He tried to make the other mulatters go with him, but
+they put thar fingers to thar nose, and says they, 'No you doant.' I was
+in favor of lettin' on him stay out in the cold, but the old man was a
+bernevolent old critter, and so <i>he</i> says: 'Now, sonny, you jest come
+back and behave yourself, and I'll forgive you all your old pranks, and
+treat you jest as I allers used ter; but, ef you wont, why&mdash;I'll make
+you, thet's all!'</p>
+
+<p>"Now, gentlemen, thet quarrelsome, oneasy, ongrateful, tobaccer-chawin',
+hoss-racin', high-bettin', big-braggin', nigger-stealin',
+wimmin-whippin', yaller son of the devil, is South Car'lina, and ef she
+doant come back and behave herself in futur', I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d ef she wont be
+ploughed with fire, and sowed with salt, and Andy Jones will help ter do
+it."</p>
+
+<p>The speaker was frequently interrupted in the course of his remarks by
+uproarious applause&mdash;but as he closed and descended from the platform,
+the crowd sent up cheer after cheer, and a dozen strong men, making a
+seat of their arms, lifted him from the ground and bore him off to the
+head of the table, where dinner was in waiting.</p>
+
+<p>The whole of the large assemblage then fell to eating. The dinner was
+made up of the barbacued beef and the usual mixture of viands found on a
+planter's table, with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> water from the little brook hard by, and a
+plentiful supply of corn-whiskey. (The latter beverage had, I thought,
+been subjected to the rite of immersion, for it tasted wonderfully of
+water.)</p>
+
+<p>Songs and speeches were intermingled with the masticating exercises, and
+the whole company was soon in the best of humor.</p>
+
+<p>During the meal I was introduced by Andy to a large number of the
+"natives," he taking special pains to tell each one that I was a Yankee,
+and a Union man, but always adding, as if to conciliate all parties,
+that I also was a guest and a friend of <i>his</i> very particular friend,
+"thet d&mdash;&mdash;d seceshener, Cunnel J&mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>Before we left the table, the secession orator happening near where we
+were seated, Andy rose from his seat, and, extending his hand to him,
+said: "Tom, you think I 'sulted you; p'r'aps I did, but you 'sulted my
+Yankee friend har, and your own relation, and I hed to take it up, jest
+for the looks o' the thing. Come, there's my hand; I'll fight you ef you
+want ter, or we'll say no more 'bout it&mdash;jest as you like."</p>
+
+<p>"Say no more about it, Andy," said the gentleman, very cordially; "let's
+drink and be friends."</p>
+
+<p>They drank a glass of whiskey together, and then leaving the table,
+proceeded to where the ox had been barbacued, to show me how cooking on
+a large scale is done at the South.</p>
+
+<p>In a pit about eight feet deep, twenty feet long, and ten feet wide,
+laid up on the sides with stones, a fire of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> hickory had been made, over
+which, after the wood had burned down to coals, a whole ox, divested of
+its hide and entrails, had been suspended on an enormous spit. Being
+turned often in the process of cooking, the beef had finally been "done
+brown." It was then cut up and served on the table, and I must say, for
+the credit of Southern cookery, that it made as delicious eating as any
+meat I ever tasted.</p>
+
+<p>I had then been away from my charge&mdash;the Colonel's horses&mdash;as long as
+seemed to be prudent. I said as much to Andy, when he proposed to return
+with me, and, turning good-humoredly to his reconciled friend, he said:
+"Now, Tom, no secession talk while I'm off."</p>
+
+<p>"Nary a word," said "Tom," and we left.</p>
+
+<p>The horses had been well fed by the negro whom I had left in charge of
+them, but had not been groomed. Seeing that, Andy stripped off his coat,
+and setting the black at work on one, with a handful of straw and pine
+leaves, commenced operations on the other, whose hair was soon as smooth
+and glossy as if it had been rubbed by an English groom.</p>
+
+<p>The remainder of the day passed without incident till eleven at night,
+when the Colonel returned from Wilmington.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV.</a></h2>
+
+<h3>THE RETURN.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Moye had not been seen or heard of, and the Colonel's trip was
+fruitless. While at Wilmington he sent telegrams, directing the
+overseer's arrest, to the various large cities of the South, and then
+decided to return home, make arrangements preliminary to a protracted
+absence from the plantation, and proceed at once to Charleston, where he
+would await replies to his dispatches. Andy agreed with him in the
+opinion that Moye, in his weak state of health, would not take an
+overland route to the free states, but would endeavor to reach some town
+on the Mississippi, where he might dispose of the horse, and secure a
+passage up the river.</p>
+
+<p>As no time was to be lost, we decided to return to the plantation on the
+following morning. Accordingly, with the first streak of day we bade
+"good-bye" to our Union friend, and started homeward.</p>
+
+<p>No incident worthy of mention occurred on the way, till about ten
+o'clock, when we arrived at the house of the Yankee schoolmistress,
+where we had been so hospitably entertained two days before. The lady
+received us with great cordiality, forced upon us a lunch to serve our
+hunger on the road, and when we parted, enjoined on me to leave the
+South at the earliest possible moment.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> She was satisfied it would not
+for a much longer time be safe quarters for a man professing Union
+sentiments. Notwithstanding the strong manifestations of loyalty I had
+observed among the people, I was convinced the advice of my pretty
+"countrywoman" was judicious, and I determined to be governed by it.</p>
+
+<p>Our horses, unaccustomed to lengthy journeys, had not entirely recovered
+from the fatigues of their previous travel, and we did not reach our
+destination till an hour after dark. We were most cordially welcomed by
+Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, who soon set before us a hot supper, which, as we were
+jaded by the long ride, and had fasted for twelve hours, on
+bacon-sandwiches and cold hoe-cake, was the one thing needful to us.</p>
+
+<p>While seated at the table the Colonel asked:</p>
+
+<p>"Has every thing gone right, Alice, since we left home?"</p>
+
+<p>"Every thing," replied the lady, "except"&mdash;and she hesitated, as if she
+dreaded the effect of the news; "except that Jule and her child have
+gone."</p>
+
+<p>"Gone!" exclaimed my host; "gone where?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. We have searched everywhere, but have found no clue to
+them. The morning you left Sam set Jule at work among the pines; she
+tried hard, but could not do a full task, and at night was taken to the
+cabin to be whipped. I heard of it, and forbade it. It did not seem to
+me that she ought to be punished for not doing what she had not strength
+to do. When released from the cabin, she came and thanked me for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> having
+interfered for her, and talked with me awhile. She cried and took on
+fearfully about Sam, and was afraid you would punish her when you
+returned. I promised you would not, and she left me seeming more
+cheerful. I supposed she would go directly home after getting her child
+from the nurse's quarters; but it appears she went to Pompey's, where
+she staid till after ten o'clock. Neither she nor the child have been
+seen since."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you get no trace of her in the morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but soon lost it. When she did not appear at work, Sam went to her
+cabin to learn the cause, and found the door open, and her bed
+undisturbed. She had not slept there. Knowing that Sandy had returned, I
+sent for him, and, with Jim and his dog, he commenced a search. The dog
+tracked her directly from Pompey's cabin to the bank of the run near the
+lower still. There all trace of her disappeared. We dragged the stream,
+but discovered nothing. Jim and Sandy then scoured the woods for miles
+in all directions, but the hound could not recover the trail. I hope
+otherwise, but I fear some evil has befallen her."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no! there's no fear of that," said the Colonel: "she is smart: she
+waded up the run far enough to baffle the dog, and then made for the
+swamp. That is why you lost her tracks at the stream. Rely upon it, I am
+right: but she shall not escape me."</p>
+
+<p>We shortly afterward adjourned to the library. After being seated there
+a while the Colonel, rising quickly,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> as if a sudden thought had struck
+him, sent for the old preacher.</p>
+
+<p>The old negro soon appeared, hat in hand, and taking a stand near the
+door, made a respectful bow to each one of us.</p>
+
+<p>"Take a chair, Pompey," said Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, kindly.</p>
+
+<p>The black meekly seated himself, when the Colonel asked: "Well, Pomp,
+what do you know about Jule's going off?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nuffin', massa&mdash;I shures you, nuffin'. De pore chile say nuffin to ole
+Pomp 'bout dat."</p>
+
+<p>"What did she say?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, you see, massa, de night arter you gwo 'way, and arter she'd
+worked hard in de brush all de day, and been a strung up in de ole cabin
+fur to be whipped, she come ter me wid har baby in har arms, all a-faint
+and a-tired, and har pore heart clean broke, and she say dat she'm jess
+ready ter drop down and die. Den I tries ter comfut har, massa; I takes
+har up from de floor, and I say ter har dat de good Lord He pity
+har&mdash;dat He woant bruise de broken reed, and woant put no more on her
+dan she kin b'ar&mdash;dat He'd touch you' heart, and I toled har you'se a
+good, kine heart at de bottom, massa&mdash;and I knows it, 'case I toted you
+'fore you could gwo, and when you's a bery little chile, not no great
+sight bigger'n har'n, you'd put your little arms round ole Pomp's neck,
+and say dat when you war grow'd up you'd be bery kine ter de pore brack
+folks, and not leff 'em be 'bused like dey war in dem days."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Never mind what <i>you</i> said," interrupted the Colonel, a little
+impatiently, but showing no displeasure; "what did <i>she</i> say?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, massa, she tuk on bery hard 'bout Sam, and axed me ef I raaily
+reckoned de Lord had forgib'n him, and took'n him ter Heself, and gibin'
+him one o' dem hous'n up dar, in de sky. I toled her dat I <i>know'd</i> it;
+but she say it didn't 'pear so ter har, 'case Sam had a been wid har out
+dar in de woods, all fru de day; dat she'd a <i>seed</i> him, massa, and
+dough he handn't a said nuffin', he'd lukd at har wid sech a sorry,
+grebed luk, dat it gwo clean fru har heart, till she'd no strength leff,
+and fall down on de ground a'most dead. Den she say big Sam come 'long
+and fine har dar, and struck har great, heaby blows wid de big whip!"</p>
+
+<p>"The brute!" exclaimed the Colonel, rising from his chair, and pacing
+rapidly up and down the room.</p>
+
+<p>"But p'r'aps he warn't so much ter blame, massa," continued the old
+negro, in a deprecatory tone; "maybe he 'spose she war shirkin' de work.
+Wal, den she say she know'd nuffin' more, till byme-by, when she come
+to, and fine big Sam dar, and he struck har agin, and make har gwo ter
+de work; and she did gwo, but she feel like as ef she'd die. I toled har
+de good ma'am wudn't leff big Sam 'buse har no more 'fore you cum hum,
+and dat you'd hab 'passion on har, and not leff har gwo out in de woods,
+but put har 'mong de nusses, like as afore.</p>
+
+<p>"Den she say it 'twarn't de work dat trubble har&mdash;dat<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> she orter work,
+and orter be 'bused, 'case she'd been bad, bery bad. All she axed war
+dat Sam would forgib har, and cum to har in de oder worle, and tell har
+so. Den she cried, and tuk on awful; but de good Lord, massa, dat am so
+bery kine ter de bery wuss sinners, He put de words inter my mouf, and I
+tink dey gib har comfut, fur she say dat it sort o' 'peared to har den
+dat Sam <i>would</i> forgib har, and take har inter his house up dar, and she
+warn't afeard ter die no more.</p>
+
+<p>"Den she takes up de chile and gwo 'way, 'pearin' sort o' happy, and
+more cheerful like dan I'd a seed har eber sense pore Sam war shot."</p>
+
+<p>My host was sensibly affected by the old man's simple tale, but
+continued pacing up and down the room, and said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"It's plain to me, Colonel," I remarked, as Pompey concluded, "she has
+drowned herself and the child&mdash;the dog lost the scent at the creek."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no!" he replied; "I think not. I never heard of a negro committing
+suicide&mdash;they've not the courage to do it."</p>
+
+<p>"I fear she <i>has</i>, David," said the lady. "The thought of going to Sam
+has led her to it; yet, we dragged the run, and found nothing. What do
+you think about it, Pompey?"</p>
+
+<p>"I dunno, ma'am, but I'se afeard of dat; and now dat I tinks ob it, I'se
+afeard dat what I tole har put har up ter it," replied the old preacher,
+bursting into tears. "She 'peared so happy like, when I say she'd be
+'long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> wid Sam in de oder worle, dat I'se afeard she's a gone and done
+it wid har own hands. I tole har, too, dat de Lord would oberlook good
+many tings dat pore sinners do when dey can't help 'emselfs&mdash;and it make
+har do it! Oh! it make har do it!" and the old black buried his face in
+his hands, and wept bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't feel so, Pomp," said his master, <i>very</i> kindly. "You did the best
+you could; no one blames you."</p>
+
+<p>"I knows <i>you</i> doant, massa&mdash;I knows you doant, and you'se bery good
+nottur&mdash;but oh! massa, de Lord!" and his body swayed to and fro with the
+great grief; "I fears de Lord do, massa, for I'se sent har ter Him wid
+har own blood, and de blood of dat pore innercent chile, on har hands.
+Oh, I fears de Lord neber'll forgib me&mdash;neber'll forgib me for <i>dat</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"He will, my good Pomp&mdash;He will!" said the Colonel, laying his hand
+tenderly on the old man's shoulder. "The Lord will forgive you, for the
+sake of the Christian example you've set your master, if for nothing
+else;" and here the proud, strong man's feelings overpowering him, his
+tears fell in great drops on the breast of the old slave, as they had
+fallen there in his childhood.</p>
+
+<p>Such scenes are not for the eye of a stranger, and turning away, I left
+the room.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2>
+
+<h3>"ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE."</h3>
+
+
+<p>The family met at the breakfast-table at the usual hour on the following
+morning; but I noticed that Jim was not in his accustomed place behind
+the Colonel's chair. That gentleman exhibited his usual good spirits,
+but Madam P&mdash;&mdash; looked sad and anxious, and <i>I</i> had not forgotten the
+scene of the previous evening.</p>
+
+<p>While we were seated at the meal, the negro Junius hastily entered the
+room, and in an excited manner exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, massa, massa, you muss cum ter de cabin&mdash;Jim hab draw'd his knife,
+and he swar he'll kill de fuss 'un dat touch him!"</p>
+
+<p>"He does, does he!" said his master, springing from his seat, and
+abruptly leaving the apartment.</p>
+
+<p>Remembering the fierce burst of passion I had seen in the negro, and
+fearing there was danger a-foot, I rose to follow, saying, as I did so:</p>
+
+<p>"Madam, cannot you prevent this?"</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot, sir; I have already done all I can. Go and try to pacify the
+Colonel&mdash;Jim will die before he'll be whipped."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> Jim was standing at the
+farther end of the old cabin, with his back to the wall, and the large
+spring knife in his hand. Some half-dozen negroes were in the centre of
+the room, apparently cowed by his fierce and desperate looks, and his
+master was within a few feet of him.</p>
+
+<p>"I tell you, Cunnel," cried the negro, as I entered, "you touch me at
+your peril!"</p>
+
+<p>"You d&mdash;&mdash;d nigger, do you dare to speak so to me?" said his master,
+taking a step toward him.</p>
+
+<p>The knife rose in the air, and the black, in a cool, sneering tone,
+replied: "Say your prayers 'fore you come nigher, for, so help me God,
+you'm a dead man!"</p>
+
+<p>I laid my hand on the Colonel's arm, to draw him back, saying, as I did
+so: "There's danger in him! I <i>know</i> it. Let him go, and he shall ask
+your pardon."</p>
+
+<p>"I shan't ax his pardon," cried the black; "leff him an' me be, sir;
+we'll fix dis ourselfs."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't interfere, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;," said my host, with perfect coolness, but
+with a face pallid with rage. "Let me govern my own plantation."</p>
+
+<p>"As you say, sir," I replied, stepping back a few paces; "but I warn
+you&mdash;there is danger in him!"</p>
+
+<p>Taking no notice of my remark, the Colonel turning to the trembling
+negroes, said: "One of you go to the house and bring my pistols."</p>
+
+<p>"You kin shoot me, ef you likes," said Jim, with a fierce, grim smile;
+"but I'll take you ter h&mdash;l wid me, <i>shore</i>. You knows <span class="smcap">we</span> wont stand a
+blow!"</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel, at the allusion to their relationship,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> started as if shot,
+and turning furiously on the negro, yelled out: "I'll shoot you for
+that, you d&mdash;&mdash;d nigger, by &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>"It 'pears ter me, Cunnel, ye've hed 'bout nuff shootin' round har,
+lately; better stop thet sort o' bis'ness; it moight give ye a sore
+throat," said the long, lean, loose-jointed stump-speaker of the
+previous Sunday, as he entered the cabin and strode directly up to my
+host.</p>
+
+<p>"What brought you here, you d&mdash;&mdash;d insolent hound?" cried the Colonel,
+turning fiercely on the new-comer.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I cum ter du ye a naaboorly turn&mdash;I've kotched two on yer niggers
+down ter my still, and I want ye ter take 'em 'way," returned the
+corn-cracker, with the utmost coolness.</p>
+
+<p>"Two of my niggers!" exclaimed the Colonel, perceptibly moderating his
+tone&mdash;"which ones?"</p>
+
+<p>"A yaller gal, and a chile."</p>
+
+<p>"I thank you, Barnes; excuse my hard words&mdash;I was excited."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, Cunnel; say no more 'bout thet. Will ye send fur 'em? I'd
+hev fotched 'em 'long, but my waggin's off jest now."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I'll send at once. Have you got them safe?"</p>
+
+<p>"Safe? I reckon so! Kotched 'em last night, arter dark, and they've kept
+right still ever sense, I 'sure ye&mdash;but th' gal holds on ter th' young
+'un ter kill&mdash;we cudn't get it 'way no how."</p>
+
+<p>"How did you catch them?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"They got 'gainst my turpentime raft&mdash;the curren' driv 'em down, I
+s'pose."</p>
+
+<p>"What! are they dead?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dead? deader'n drownded rats!" replied the native,</p>
+
+<p>"My God! drowned herself and her child!" exclaimed the Colonel, with
+deep emotion.</p>
+
+<p>"It is terrible, my friend. Come, let us go to them, at once," I said,
+laying my hand on his arm, and drawing him unresistingly away.</p>
+
+<p>A pair of mules was speedily harnessed to a large turpentine wagon, and
+the horses we had ridden the day before were soon at the door. When the
+Colonel, who had been closeted for a few minutes with Madam P&mdash;&mdash;, came
+out of the house, we mounted, and rode off with the "corn-cracker."</p>
+
+<p>The native's farm was located on the stream which watered my friend's
+plantation, and was about ten miles distant. Taking a by-road which led
+to it through the woods, we rode rapidly on in advance of the wagon.</p>
+
+<p>"Sort o' likely gal, thet, warn't she?" remarked the turpentine-maker,
+after a while.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, she was," replied the Colonel, in a half-abstracted manner;
+"<i>very</i> likely."</p>
+
+<p>"Kill harself 'case har man war shot by thet han'som overseer uv
+your'n?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not altogether for that, I reckon," replied my host; "I fear the main
+reason was her being put at field-work, and abused by the driver."</p>
+
+<p>"Thet comes uv not lookin' arter things yerself, Cunnel.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> I tend ter my
+niggers parsonally, and they keer a durned sight more fur this world
+then fur kingdom-cum. Ye cudn't hire 'em ter kill 'emselves fur no
+price."</p>
+
+<p>"Well," replied the Colonel, in a low tone, "I <i>did</i> look after her. I
+put her at full field-work, myself!"</p>
+
+<p>"By&mdash;&mdash;!" cried the native, reining his horse to a dead stop, and
+speaking in an excited manner: "I doant b'lieve it&mdash;'taint 't all like
+ye&mdash;yer a d&mdash;&mdash;d seceshener; thet comes uv yer bringin'-up&mdash;but ye've a
+soul bigger'n a meetin'-house, and ye cudn't hev put thet slim, weakly
+gal inter th' woods, no how!"</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel and I instinctively halted our horses, as the "corn-cracker"
+stopped his, and were then standing abreast of him in the road.</p>
+
+<p>"It's true, Barnes," said my host, in a voice that showed deep
+dejection; "I <i>did</i> do it!"</p>
+
+<p>"May God Almighty furgive ye, Cunnel," said the native, starting his
+horse forward; "<i>I</i> wudn't hev dun it fur all yer niggers, by &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+
+<p>The Colonel made no reply, and we rode on the rest of the way in
+silence.</p>
+
+<p>The road was a mere wagon-track through the trees, and it being but
+little travelled, and encumbered with the roots and stumps of the pine,
+our progress was slow, and we were nearly two hours in reaching the
+plantation of the native.</p>
+
+<p>The corn-cracker's house&mdash;a low, unpainted wooden building&mdash;stood near
+the little stream, and in the centre of a cleared plot of some ten
+acres. This plot was surrounded<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> by a post-and-rail fence, and in its
+front portion was a garden, which grew a sufficient supply of vegetables
+to serve a family of twenty persons. In the rear, and at the sides of
+the dwelling, were about seven acres, devoted mainly to corn and
+potatoes. In one corner of the lot were three tidy-looking negro-houses,
+and close beside them I noticed a low shed, near which a large quantity
+of the stalks of the tall, white corn, common to that section, was
+stacked in the New England fashion. Browsing on the corn-stalks were
+three sleek, well-kept milch cows, and a goat.</p>
+
+<p>About four hundred yards from the farmer's house, and on the bank of the
+little run, which there was quite wide and deep, stood a turpentine
+distillery; and around it were scattered a large number of rosin and
+turpentine barrels, some filled and some empty. A short distance higher
+up, and far enough from the "still" to be safe in the event of a fire,
+was a long, low, wooden shed, covered with rough, unjointed boards,
+placed upright, and unbattened. This was the "spirit-house," used for
+the storage of the spirits of turpentine when barrelled for market, and
+awaiting shipment. In the creek, and filling nearly one-half of the
+channel in front of the spirit-shed, was a raft of pine timber, on which
+were laden some two hundred barrels of rosin. On such rude conveyances
+the turpentine-maker sent his produce to Conwayboro'. There the
+timber-raft was sold to my way-side friend, Captain B&mdash;&mdash;, and its
+freight shipped on board vessel for New York.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> Two "prime" negro men,
+dressed in the usual costume, were "tending the still;" and a negro
+woman, as stout and strong as the men, and clad in a short, loose,
+linsey gown, from beneath which peeped out a pair of coarse leggins, was
+adjusting a long wooden trough, which conveyed the liquid rosin from the
+"still" to a deep excavation in the earth, at a short distance. In the
+pit was a quantity of rosin sufficient to fill a thousand barrels.</p>
+
+<p>"Here, Bill," said Barnes to one of the negro men, as we pulled up at
+the distillery, "put these critters up, and give 'em sum oats, and when
+they've cooled off a bit, water 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, yas, massa," replied the negro, springing nimbly forward, and
+taking the horses by the bridles, "an' rub 'em down, massa?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, rub 'em down right smart," replied the corn-cracker; then turning
+to me, as we dismounted, he said: "Stranger, thet's th' sort o' niggers
+fur ye; all uv mine ar' jess like him&mdash;smart and lively as kittens."</p>
+
+<p>"He does seem to go about his work cheerfully," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Cheerfully! d&mdash;&mdash;d ef he doant&mdash;all on 'em du! They like me better'n
+thar own young 'uns, an' it's 'cause I use 'em like human bein's;" and
+he looked slyly toward the Colonel, who just then was walking silently
+away, in the direction of the run, as if in search of the browned
+"chattels."</p>
+
+<p>"Not thar, Cunnel," cried the native; "they're inter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> th' shed;" and he
+started to lead the way to the "spirit-house."</p>
+
+<p>"Not now, Barnes," I said, putting my hand on his arm: "leave him alone
+for a little while. He is feeling badly, and we'd better not disturb him
+just yet."</p>
+
+<p>The native motioned me to a seat on a rosin-barrel, as he replied:</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, he 'pears ter&mdash;thet's a fact, and he orter. D&mdash;&mdash;d ef it arn't
+wicked to use niggers like cattle, as he do."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think he means to ill-treat them&mdash;he's a kind-hearted man."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, he ar sort o' so; but he's left ev'ry thing ter thet d&mdash;&mdash;d
+overseer uv his'n. I wudn't ha' trusted him to feed my hogs."</p>
+
+<p>"Hogs!" I exclaimed, laughing; "I supposed you didn't <i>feed</i> hogs in
+these diggins. I supposed you 'let 'em run.'"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>I</i> doant; an' I've got th' tallest porkys round har."</p>
+
+<p>"I've been told that they get a good living in the woods."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, p'r'aps the' du jest make eout ter live thar; but my ole 'oman
+likes 'em ter hum&mdash;they clean up a place like&mdash;eat up all th' leavin's,
+an' give th' young nigs suthin' ter du."</p>
+
+<p>"It seems to me," I said, resuming the previous thread of the
+conversation; "that overseers are a necessity on a large plantation."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span>
+"Wal, the' ar', an' thet's why thar ortent ter be no big plantations;
+God Almighty didn't make human bein's ter be herded togethar in th'
+woods like hogs. No man orter ter hev more'n twenty on 'em&mdash;he can't
+look arter no more himself, an' its agin natur ter set a feller over 'em
+what hain't no int'rest in 'em, an' no feelin' fur 'em, an' who'll drive
+'em round like brutes. I never struck one on 'em in my life, an' my ten
+du more'n ony fifteen th' Cunnel's got."</p>
+
+<p>"I thought they needed occasional correction. How do you manage them
+without whipping?"</p>
+
+<p>"Manage them! why 'cordin' ter scriptur&mdash;do ter 'em as I'd like ter be
+dun ter, ef I war a nigger. Every one on 'em knows I'd part with my last
+shirt, an' live on taters an' cow-fodder, fore I'd sell em; an' then I
+give 'em Saturdays for 'emselfs&mdash;but thet's cute dealin' in me (tho' th'
+pore, simple souls doant see it), fur ye knows the' work thet day for
+'emselfs, an' raise nigh all thar own feed, 'cept th' beef and
+whiskey&mdash;an' it sort o' makes 'em feel like folks, too, more like as ef
+the' war <i>free</i>&mdash;the' work th' better fur it all th' week."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you think the blacks would work better if free?"</p>
+
+<p>"In <i>course</i> I does&mdash;its agin man's natur to be a slave. Thet lousy
+parson ye herd ter meetin, a Sunday, makes slavery eout a divine
+institooshun, but my wife's a Bible 'oman, and she says 'taint so; an'
+I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d ef she arn't right."</p>
+
+<p>"Is your wife a South Carolina women?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"No, she an' me's from th' old North&mdash;old Car'tret, nigh on ter Newbern;
+an' we doant take nat'rally to these fire-eaters."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you been here long?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, nigh on ter six yar. I cum har with nuthin' but a thousan' ter my
+back&mdash;slapped thet inter fifteen hun'red acres&mdash;paid it down&mdash;and then
+hired ten likely, North Car'lina niggers&mdash;hired 'em with th' chance uv
+buyin' ef the' liked eout har. Wal, th' nigs all know'd me, and the'
+sprung ter it like blazes; so every yar I've managed ter buy two on 'em,
+and now I've ten grow'd up, and thar young'uns; th' still and all th'
+traps paid fur, an' ef this d&mdash;&mdash;d secesh bis'ness hadn't a come 'long,
+I'd hev hed a right smart chance o' doin' well."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm satisfied secession will ruin the turpentine business; you'll be
+shut up here, unable to sell your produce, and it will go to waste."</p>
+
+<p>"Thet's my 'pinion; but I reckon I kin' manage now witheout turpentime.
+I've talked it over 'long with my nigs, and we kalkerlate, ef these ar
+doin's go eny furder, ter tap no more trees, but clar land an' go ter
+raisin' craps."</p>
+
+<p>"What! do you talk politics with your negroes?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nary a politic&mdash;but I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d ef th' critters doan't larn 'em sumhow;
+the' knows 'bout as much uv what's goin' on as I du&mdash;but plantin arn't
+politics; its bisness, an' they've more int'rest in it nor I hev, 'cause
+they've sixteen mouths ter feed agin my four."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad, my friend, that you treat them like men:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> but I have supposed
+they were not well enough informed to have intelligent opinions on such
+subjects."</p>
+
+<p>"Informed! wal, I reckon the' is; all uv mine kin read, an' sum on 'em
+kin write, too. D'ye see thet little nig thar?" pointing to a juvenile
+coal-black darky of about six years, who was standing before the "still"
+fire; "thet ar little devil kin read an' speak like a parson. He's got
+hold, sumhow, uv my little gal's book o' pieces, an' larned a dozen on
+'em. I make him cum inter th' house, once in a while uv an evenin', an'
+speechify, an' 'twould do yer soul good ter har him, in his shirt tail,
+with a old sheet wound round him fur a toger (I've told him th'
+play-acters du it so down ter Charles'on), an' spoutin' out: 'My name am
+Norval; on de Gruntin' hills my fader feed him hogs!' The little coon
+never seed a sheep, an' my wife's told him a flock's a herd, an' he
+thinks 'hog' <i>sounds</i> better'n 'flock,' so, contra'y ter th' book, he
+puts in 'hogs,' and hogs, you knows, hev ter grunt, so he gits 'em on
+th' 'Gruntin hills;" and here the kind-hearted native burst into a fit
+of uproarious laughter, in which, in spite of myself, I had to join.</p>
+
+<p>When the merriment had somewhat subsided, the turpentine-maker called
+out to the little darky:</p>
+
+<p>"Come here, Jim."</p>
+
+<p>The young chattel ran to him with alacrity, and wedging in between his
+legs, placed his little black hands, in a free-and-easy way, on his
+master's knees, and, looking up trustfully in his face, said:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Wal, massa?"</p>
+
+<p>"What's yer name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dandy Jim, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"Thet arn't all&mdash;what's th' rest?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dandy Jim of ole Car'lina."</p>
+
+<p>"Who made ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"De good God, massa."</p>
+
+<p>"No, He didn't: God doant make little nigs. He makes none but white
+folks;" said the master, laughing.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas He'm do; Missus say He'm do; dat He make dis nig jess like He done
+little Totty."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, He did, Jim. I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d ef <i>He</i> didn't, fur nobody else cud make
+<i>ye</i>!" replied the man, patting the little woolly head with undisguised
+affection.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Jim, say th' creed fur 'de gemman.'"</p>
+
+<p>The young darky then repeated the Apostle's Creed and the Ten
+Commandments.</p>
+
+<p>"Is thet all ye knows?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, massa, I knows a heap 'sides dat."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, say suthin' more&mdash;sum on 'em pieces thet jingle."</p>
+
+<p>The little fellow then repeated with entire correctness, and with
+appropriate gestures, and emphasis, though in the genuine darky
+dialect&mdash;which seems to be inborn with the pure-Southern black&mdash;Mrs.
+Hemans' poem:</p>
+
+<p>
+"The boy stood on the burning deck."<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"Mrs. Hemans draped in black!" I exclaimed, laughing heartily: "How
+would the good lady feel, could she look<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> down from where she is, and
+hear a little darky doing up her poetry in that style?"</p>
+
+<p>"D&mdash;&mdash;d ef I doant b'lieve 'twud make her love th' little nig like I
+do;" replied the corn-cracker, taking him up on his knee as tenderly as
+he would have taken up his own child.</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me, my little man," I said: "who taught you all these things?"</p>
+
+<p>"I larned 'em, myseff, sar," was the prompt reply.</p>
+
+<p>"You learned them, yourself! but who taught you to read?"</p>
+
+<p>"I larned 'em myseff, sar!"</p>
+
+<p>"You couldn't have learned <i>that</i> yourself; didn't your 'massa' teach
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! your 'missus' did."</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar."</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar!" I repeated; then suspecting the real state of the case, I
+looked him sternly in the eye, and said: "My little man, it's wrong to
+tell lies&mdash;you must <i>always</i> speak the truth; now, tell me truly, did
+not your 'missus' teach you these things?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar, I larned 'em myseff."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye can't cum it, Stranger; ye moight roast him over a slow fire, an'
+not git nary a thing eout on him but thet," said the corn-cracker,
+leaning forward, and breaking into a boisterous fit of laughter. "It's
+agin th' law, an' I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d ef I teached him. Reckon he <i>did</i> larn
+himself!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I must know your wife, my friend. She's a good woman."</p>
+
+<p>"Good! ye kin bet high on thet; she's uv th' stuff th' Lord makes angels
+eout on."</p>
+
+<p>I had no doubt of it, and was about to say so, when the Colonel's
+turpentine wagon drove up, and I remembered I had left him too long
+alone.</p>
+
+<p>The coachman was driving, and Jim sat on the wagon beside him.</p>
+
+<p>"Massa K&mdash;&mdash;," said the latter, getting down and coming to me: "Whar am
+dey?"</p>
+
+<p>"In the spirit-shed."</p>
+
+<p>He was turning to go there, when I called him back, saying: "Jim, you
+must not see your master now; you'd better keep out of sight for the
+present."</p>
+
+<p>"No, massa; de ma'am say de Cunnel take dis bery hard, and dat I orter
+tell him I'se sorry for what I'se done."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, wait a while. Let me go in first."</p>
+
+<p>Accompanied by the corn-cracker, I entered the turpentine-shed. A row of
+spirit-barrels were ranged along each of its sides, and two tiers
+occupied the centre of the building. On these a number of loose planks
+were placed, and on the planks lay the bodies of the metif woman and her
+child. The Colonel was seated on a barrel near them, with his head
+resting on his hands, and his eyes fixed on the ground. He did not seem
+to notice our entrance, and, passing him without speaking, I stepped to
+the side of the dead.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The woman's dress, the common linsey gown worn by her class, was still
+wet, and her short, kinky, brown hair fell in matted folds around her
+face. One arm hung loosely by her side; the other was clasped tightly
+around her child, which lay as if asleep on her bosom. One of its small
+hands clung to its mother's breast, and around its little lips played a
+smile. But how shall I describe the pale, sweet beauty of the face of
+the drowned girl, as she lay there, her eyes closed, and her lips
+parted, as in prayer? Never but once have I seen on human features the
+strange radiance that shone upon it, or the mingled expression of hope,
+and peace, and resignation that rested there&mdash;and that was in the
+long-gone time, when, standing by her bedside, I watched the passing
+away of one who is now an angel in heaven!</p>
+
+<p>"Come, my dear friend, let us go," I said, turning and gently taking the
+Colonel by the arm, "the negroes are here, and will take charge of the
+dead."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no!" he replied, rising, and looking around, as if aroused from a
+troubled dream; "that is for <i>me</i> to do!" Then he added, after a
+moment's pause, "Will you help me to get them into the wagon?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I will, certainly."</p>
+
+<p>He made one step toward the body of the dead girl, then sinking down
+again on the barrel, covered his face with his hands, and cried out: "My
+God! this is terrible! Did you ever see such a look as that? It will
+haunt me forever!"</p>
+
+<p>"Come, my friend, rouse yourself&mdash;this is weakness;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> you are tired with
+the long ride and excitement of the past few days. Come, go home&mdash;I will
+look after them."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no! I must do it. I will be a man again;" and he rose and walked
+steadily to the dead bodies. "Is there any one here to help?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>Jim was standing in the door-way, and I motioned to him to come forward.
+The great tears were streaming down his face as he stepped timidly
+towards his master, and said: "I'll do dis, massa, don't you trubble
+yerself no more."</p>
+
+<p>"It's good of you, Jim. You'll forgive me for being so cruel to you,
+wont you?" said the Colonel, taking the black by the hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Forgib ye, massa! <i>I</i> war all ter blame&mdash;but ye'll forgib me,
+massa&mdash;ye'll forgib me!" cried the black, with strong emotion.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, yes; but say no more about it. Come, let us get Julie home."</p>
+
+<p>But the poor girl was already <i>home</i>&mdash;home where her sufferings and her
+sorrows were over, and all her tears were wiped away forever!</p>
+
+<p>We four bore away the mother and the child. A number of blankets were in
+the bottom of the wagon, and we laid the bodies carefully upon them.
+When all seemed ready, the Colonel, who was still standing by the side
+of the dead, turned to my new friend, and said: "Barnes, will you loan
+me a pillow? I will send it back to-night."</p>
+
+<p>"Sartin, Cunnel;" and the farmer soon brought one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> from the house.
+Lifting tenderly the head of the drowned girl, the Colonel placed it
+beneath her, and smoothing back her tangled hair, he gently covered her
+face with his handkerchief, as if she could still feel his kindness, or
+longer cared for the pity or the love of mortal. Yet, who knows but that
+her parted soul, from the high realm to which it had soared, may not
+then have looked down, have seen that act, and have forgiven him!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE SMALL PLANTER.</h3>
+
+
+<p>In the first moments of grief the sympathy of friends, and the words of
+consolation bring no relief. How much more harshly do such words grate
+on the ear when the soul is bowed down by remorse and unavailing regret!
+Then the wounded spirit finds peace nowhere but with God.</p>
+
+<p>I saw that the Colonel would be alone, and turning to him, as he
+prepared to follow the strange vehicle, which, with its load of death,
+was already jolting its way over the rough forest road, I said,</p>
+
+<p>"Will you pardon me, if I remain with your friend here for awhile? I
+will be at the mansion before dark."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, certainly, my friend, come when you feel disposed," he replied, and
+mounting his horse he was soon out of sight among the trees.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Barnes," I said, shaking off the gloomy feelings that had
+oppressed me: "come, I must see that wife of yours, and get a glimpse of
+how you live?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sartin, stranger; come in; I'll give ye th' tallest dinner my 'oman can
+scare up, an' she's sum pumkins in th' cookin' line;" and he led the way
+to the farm-house.</p>
+
+<p>As I turned to follow, I slipped a half-dollar into the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span> hand of the
+darky who was holding my horse, and asked him to put her again into the
+stable.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do dat, sar, but I karn't take dis; masaa doant 'low it nohow;" he
+replied, tendering me back the money.</p>
+
+<p>"Barnes, your negroes have strange ways; I never met one before who'd
+refuse money."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, stranger, 'taint hosspetality to take money on yer friends, and
+Bill gets all he wants from me."</p>
+
+<p>I took the silver and gave it to the first darky I met, who happened to
+be an old centenarian belonging to the Colonel. As I tossed it to him,
+he grinned out: "Ah, massa, I'll git sum 'backer wid dis; 'pears like I
+hadn't nary a chaw in forty yar." With more than one leg in the grave
+the old negro had not lost his appetite for the weed&mdash;in fact, that and
+whiskey are the only "luxuries" ever known to the plantation black.</p>
+
+<p>As we went nearer, I took a closer survey of the farm-house. It was, as
+I have said, a low, unpainted wooden building, located in the middle of
+a ten acre lot. It was approached by a straight walk, paved with a
+mixture of sand and tar, similar to that which the reader may have seen
+in the Champs Elysees. I do not know whether my back-woods friend, or
+the Parisian pavior, was the first inventor of this composition, but I
+am satisfied the corn-cracker had not stolen it from the stone-cracker.
+The walk was lined with fruit-bearing shrubs, and directly in front of
+the house, were two small flower-beds.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The dwelling itself, though of a dingy brown wood-color, was neat and
+inviting. It may have been forty feet square on the ground, and was only
+a story and a half high, but a projecting roof, and a front
+dormer-window, relieved it from the appearance of disproportion. Its
+gable ends were surmounted by two enormous brick chimneys, carried up on
+the outside, in the fashion of the South, and its high, broad windows
+were ornamented with Venetian blinds. Its front door opened directly
+into the "living-room," and at the threshold we met its mistress.</p>
+
+<p>As the image of that lady has still a warm place in a pleasant corner of
+my memory, I will describe her. She was about thirty years of age, and
+had a fresh, cheerful face. To say that she was handsome, would not be
+strictly true; though she had that pleasant, gentle, kindly expression
+that sometimes makes even a homely person seem beautiful. But she was
+not homely. Her features were regular, her hair, glossy and brown, and
+her eyes, black and brilliant, and, for their color, the mildest and
+softest I had ever seen. Her figure was tall, and in its outline
+somewhat sharp and angular, but she had an ease and grace about her that
+made one forget she was not moulded as softly and roundly as others. She
+seemed just the woman on whose bosom a tired, worn, over-burdened man
+might lay his weary head, and find rest and forgetfulness.</p>
+
+<p>She wore a neat calico dress, fitting closely to the neck, and an apron
+of spotless white muslin. A little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> lace cap perched cosily on the back
+of her head, hiding a portion of her wavy, dark hair, and on her feet&mdash;a
+miracle, reader, in one of her class&mdash;were stockings and shoes! Giving
+me her hand&mdash;which, at the risk of making her husband jealous, I held
+for a moment&mdash;she said, making a gentle courtesy:</p>
+
+<p>"Ye ar welcome, stranger."</p>
+
+<p>"I sincerely thank you, madam; I <i>am</i> a stranger in these parts."</p>
+
+<p>She tendered me a chair, while her husband opened a sideboard, and
+brought forth a box of Havanas, and a decanter of Scuppernong. As I took
+the proffered seat, he offered me the refreshments. I drank the lady's
+health in the wine, but declined the cigars. Seeing this, she remarked:</p>
+
+<p>"Yer from th' North, sir; arn't ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, madam, I live in New York, but I was born in New-England."</p>
+
+<p>"I reckoned so; I knew ye didn't belong in Car'lina."</p>
+
+<p>"How did you know that, madam?" I asked, laughing.</p>
+
+<p>"I seed ye doan't smoke 'fore wimmin. But ye musn't mind me; I sort o'
+likes it; its a great comfut to John, and may be it ar to ye."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I do relish a good cigar, but I never smoke before any lady
+except my wife, and though she's only 'a little lower than the angels,'
+she <i>does</i>, once in awhile, say it's a shame to make the <i>house</i> smell
+like a tobacco factory."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Barnes handed me the box again, and I took one. As I was lighting it, he
+said:</p>
+
+<p>"Ye've got a good 'oman, hev ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"There's none better; at least, I think so."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I'm 'zactly uv thet 'pinion 'bout mine: I wouldn't trade her fur
+all this worle, an' th' best half uv 'tother."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't ye talk so, John," said the lady; then addressing me, she added:
+"It's a good husband thet makes a good wife, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Sometimes, madam, but not always. I've known some of the best of wives
+who had miserable husbands."</p>
+
+<p>"An' I'm d&mdash;&mdash;d ef I made my wife th' 'oman she ar'," said the
+corn-cracker.</p>
+
+<p>"Hush, John; ye musn't sw'ar so; ye knows how often ye've said ye
+wouldn't."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I du, an' I wont agin, by &mdash;&mdash;. But Sukey, whar's th' young 'uns?"</p>
+
+<p>"Out in the lot, I reckon; but ye musn't holler'm in&mdash;they'r all dirt."</p>
+
+<p>"No matter for that, madam," I said; "dirt is healthy for little ones;
+rolling in the mud makes them grow."</p>
+
+<p>"Then our'n orter grow right smart, fur they'r in it allers."</p>
+
+<p>"How many have you, madam?"</p>
+
+<p>"Two; a little boy, four, and a little gal, six."</p>
+
+<p>"They're of interesting ages."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, the' is int'restin'; ev'ry 'uns own chil'ren is smart; but the'
+does know a heap. John was off ter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> Charl'ston no great while back, an'
+the little boy used ter pray ev'ry mornin' an' ev'nin' fur his fader ter
+cum hum. I larned 'em thet jest so soon as the' talked, 'cause thar's no
+tellin' how quick the' moight be tooken 'way. Wal, the little feller
+prayed ev'ry mornin' an' ev'nin' fur his fader ter cum back; an' John
+didn't cum; so finarly he got sort o' provoked with th' Lord; an' he
+said God war aither deaf, an' couldn't har, or he war naughty, an'
+wouldn't tell fader thet little Johnny wanted to seed 'im 'werry
+mooch'"&mdash;and here the good lady laughed pleasantly, and I joined in most
+heartily.</p>
+
+<p>Blessed are the children that have such a mother.</p>
+
+<p>Soon the husband returned with the little girl and boy, and four young
+ebonies, all bare-headed, and dressed alike, in thick trousers, and a
+loose linsey shirt. Among them was my new acquaintance, "Dandy Jim, of
+ole Car'lina."</p>
+
+<p>The little girl came to me, and soon I had two white children on one
+knee, and two black on the other, and Dandy Jim between my legs, playing
+with my watch-chain. The family made no distinction between the colors,
+and as the children were all equally clean I did not see why <i>I</i> should
+do so.</p>
+
+<p>The lady renewed the conversation by remarking; "P'raps ye reckon it's
+quar, sir, that we 'low our'n to 'sociate 'long with th' black chil'ren;
+but we karn't help it. On big plantations it works sorry bad, fur th'
+white young 'ons larn all manner of evil from the black 'uns; but I've
+laboored ter teach our'n so one wont do no harm ter 'tother."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I suppose, madam, that is one of the greatest evils of slavery. The low
+black poisons the mind of the white child, and the bad influence lasts
+through life."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, it's so, stranger; an' it's the biggest keer I hev. It often
+'pears strange ter me thet our grow'd up men arn't no wuss then the'
+is."</p>
+
+<p>In those few words that unlettered woman had said, what would&mdash;if men
+were but wise enough to hear and heed the great truth which she
+spoke&mdash;banish slavery from this continent forever!</p>
+
+<p>After awhile the farmer told the juvenile delineator of Mrs. Hemans, and
+the other poets, to give us a song; and planting himself in the middle
+of the floor, the little darky sang "Dixie," and several other negro
+songs, which his master had taught him, but into which he had introduced
+some amusing variations of his own. The other children joined in the
+choruses; and then Jim danced breakdowns, "walk-along-Joes," and other
+darky dances, his master accompanying him on a cracked fiddle, till my
+sides were sore with laughter, and the hostess begged them to stop.
+Finally the clock struck twelve, and the farmer, going to the door, gave
+a long, loud blast on a cow's horn. In about five minutes one after
+another of the field hands came in, till the whole ten had seated
+themselves on the verandah. Each carried a bowl, a tin-cup, or a gourd,
+into which my host&mdash;who soon emerged from a back room<a name="FNanchor_J_10" id="FNanchor_J_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_J_10" class="fnanchor">[J]</a> with a pail of
+whiskey in his hand&mdash;poured <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span>a gill of the beverage. This was the day's
+allowance, and the farmer, in answer to a question of mine, told me he
+thought negroes were healthier, and worked better for a small quantity
+of alcohol daily. "The' work hard, and salt feed doant set 'em up
+'nough," was his remark.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile the hostess busied herself with preparations for dinner, and
+it was soon spread on a bright cherry table, covered by a spotless white
+cloth. The little darkies had scattered to the several cabins, and we
+soon sat down to as good a meal as I ever ate at the South.</p>
+
+<p>We were waited on by a tidy negro woman, neatly clad in a calico gown,
+with shoes on her feet, and a flaming red and yellow 'kerchief on her
+head. This last was worn in the form of a turban, and one end escaping
+from behind, and hanging down her back, it looked for all the world like
+a flag hung out from a top turret. Observing it, my host said:</p>
+
+<p>"Aggy&mdash;showin' yer colors? Ye'r Union gal&mdash;hey?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I is dat, massa; Union ter de back bone;" responded the negress,
+grinning widely.</p>
+
+<p>"All th' Union <i>ye</i> knows on," replied the master, winking slyly at me,
+"is th' union yer goin' ter hitch up 'long with black Cale over ter
+Squire Taylor's."</p>
+
+<p>"No, 'taint, massa; takes more'n tu ter make de Union."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I knows&mdash;it gin'rally takes ten or a dozen: reckon it'll take a
+dozen with ye."</p>
+
+<p>"John, ye musn't talk so ter th' sarvents; it spiles 'em," said his
+wife.</p>
+
+<p>"No it doant&mdash;do it, Aggy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Lor', missus, I doant keer what massa say; but I doant leff no oder man
+run on so ter me!"</p>
+
+<p>"No more'n ye doant, gal! only Cale."</p>
+
+<p>"Nor him, massa; I makes him stan' roun' <i>I</i> reckon."</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon ye du; ye wudn't be yer massa's gal ef ye didn't."</p>
+
+<p>When the meal was over, I visited, with my host, the negro houses. The
+hour allowed for dinner<a name="FNanchor_K_11" id="FNanchor_K_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_K_11" class="fnanchor">[K]</a> was about expiring, and the darkies were
+preparing to return to the field. Entering one of the cabins, where were
+two stout negro men and a woman, my host said to them, with a perfectly
+serious face:</p>
+
+<p>"Har, boys, I've fotched ye a live Yankee ab'lishener; now, luk at 'im
+all roun'. Did ye ever see sech a critter?"</p>
+
+<p>"Doant see nuffin' quar in dat gemman, massa," replied one of the
+blacks. "Him 'pears like bery nice gemman; doant 'pear like
+ab'lishener;" and he laughed, and scraped his head in the manner
+peculiar to the negro, as he added: "kinder reckon he wudn't be har ef
+he war one of <i>dem</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"What der <i>ye</i> knows 'bout th' ab'lisheners? Ye never seed one&mdash;what
+d'ye 'spose the' luk like?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Dey say dey luk likes de bery ole debil, massa, but reckon taint so."</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, the' doant; the' luk wusa then thet: they'm bottled up thunder an'
+lightnin', an' ef the' cum down har, they'll chaw ye all ter hash."</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon!" replied the darky, manipulating his wool, and distending his
+face into a decidedly incredulous grin.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you tell them such things for?" I asked, good-humoredly.</p>
+
+<p>"Lor, bless ye, stranger, the' knows th' ab'lisheners ar thar friends,
+jest so well as ye du; and so fur as thet goes, d&mdash;&mdash;d ef the' doan't
+know I'm one on 'em myseff, fur I tells 'em, ef the' want to put, the'
+kin put, an' I'll throw thar trav'lin 'spences inter th' bargin. Doan't
+I tell ye thet, Lazarus."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, but none ob massa's nigs am gwine ter put&mdash;lesswise, not so
+long as you an' de good missus, am 'bove groun'."</p>
+
+<p>The darky's name struck me as peculiar, and I asked him where he got it.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>'Tain't</i> my name, sar; but you see, sar, w'en massa fuss hire me ob
+ole Capt'in &mdash;&mdash;, up dar ter Newbern-way, I war sort o' sorry
+like&mdash;hadn't no bery good cloes&mdash;an' massa, he den call me Lazarus,
+'case he say I war all ober rags and holes, an' it hab sort o' stuck ter
+me eber sense. I war a'mighty bad off 'fore dat, but w'en I cum down har
+I gets inter Abr'am's buzzum, I does;" and here the darky actually
+reeled on his seat with laughter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Is this woman your wife?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar; my wife 'longs to Cunnel J&mdash;&mdash;; dat am my new wife&mdash;my ole
+wife am up dar whar I cum from!"</p>
+
+<p>"What! have you two wives?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, I'se two."</p>
+
+<p>"But that's contrary to Scripture."</p>
+
+<p>"No, sar; de Cunnel say 'tain't. He say in Scriptur' dey hab a heap ob'
+'em, and dat niggers kin hab jess so many as dey likes&mdash;a hun'red ef dey
+want ter."</p>
+
+<p>"Does the Colonel teach that to his negroes?" I asked, turning to the
+native.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, I reckon he do&mdash;an' sits 'em th' 'zample, too," he replied,
+laughing; "but th' old sinner knows better'n thet; he kin read."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you find that in the Bible, Lazarus?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa; whar I reads it. Dat's whar it tell 'bout David and Sol'mon
+and all dem&mdash;dey hab a heap ob wives. A pore ole darky karn't hab
+'nuffin 'sides dem, an' he <i>orter</i> be 'low'd jess so many as he likes."</p>
+
+<p>Laughing at the reasoning of the negro, I asked:</p>
+
+<p>"How would <i>you</i> like it, if your wife over at Colonel J&mdash;&mdash;'s, had as
+many husbands as <i>she</i> liked?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I couldn't fine no fault, massa: an' I s'pose she do; dough I
+doan't knows it, 'case I'se dar only Sundays."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you any children?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, sar; I'se free 'longin' ter de Cunnel, an' four or five&mdash;I doant
+'zactly know&mdash;up ter hum; but <i>dey'se</i> grow'd up."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Is your wife, up there, married again?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, massa, she got anoder man jess w'en I cum 'way; har ole massa make
+har do it."</p>
+
+<p>We then left the cabin, and when out of hearing of the blacks, I said to
+the corn-cracker: "That <i>may be</i> Scripture doctrine, but <i>I</i> have not
+been taught so!"</p>
+
+<p>"Scriptur or no Scriptur, stranger, it's d&mdash;&mdash;d heathenism," replied
+the farmer, who, take him all in all, is a superior specimen of the
+class of small-planters at the South; and yet, seeing polygamy practised
+by his own slaves, he made no effort to prevent it. He told me that if
+he should object to his darky cohabiting with the Colonel's negress, it
+would be regarded as unneighborly, and secure him the enmity of the
+whole district! And still we are told that slavery is a <i>Divine</i>
+institution!</p>
+
+<p>After this, we strolled off into the woods, where the hands were at
+work. They were all stout, healthy and happy-looking, and in answer to
+my comments on their appearance, the native said that the negroes on the
+turpentine farms are always stronger and longer-lived, than those on the
+rice and cotton-fields. Unless carried off by the fevers incident to the
+climate, they generally reach a good old age, while the rice-negro
+seldom lives to be over forty, and the cotton-slave very rarely attains
+sixty. Cotton-growing, however, my host thought, is not, in itself, much
+more unhealthy than turpentine-gathering, though cotton-hands work in
+the sun, while the turpentine slaves labor altogether in the shade.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span>
+"But," he said, "the' work 'em harder nor we does, an' doan't feed 'em
+so well. We give our'n meat and whiskey ev'ry day, but them articles is
+skarse 'mong th' cotton blacks, an' th' rice niggers never get 'em
+excep' ter Chris'mas time, an' thet cums but onst a yar."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think the white could labor as well as the black, on the rice
+and cotton-fields?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, an' better&mdash;better onywhar; but, in coorse, 'tain't natur' fur
+black nor white ter stand long a workin' in th' mud and water up ter
+thar knees; sech work wud kill off th' very devil arter a while. But th'
+white kin stand it longer nor the black, and its' 'cordin' ter reason
+that he shud; fur, I reckon, stranger, that the sperit and pluck uv a
+man hev a durned sight ter du with work. They'll hole a man up when he's
+clean down, an' how kin we expec' thet the pore nig', who's nary a thing
+ter work fur, an' who's been kept under an' 'bused ever sense Adam was a
+young un'&mdash;how kin we expec' he'll work like men thet own 'emselfs, an'
+whose faders hev been free ever sense creation? I reckon that the
+parient has a heap ter du with makin' th' chile. He puts the sperit
+inter 'im: doan't we see it in hosses an' critters an' sech like? It
+mayn't crap eout ter onst, but it's shore ter in th' long run, and
+thet's th' why th' black hain't no smarter nor he is. He's been a-ground
+down an' kept under fur so long thet it'll take more'n 'un gin'ration
+ter bring him up. 'Tain't his fault thet he's no more sperit, an'
+p'raps<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> 'tain't ourn&mdash;thet is, them on us as uses 'em right&mdash;but it war
+the fault uv yer fader an' mine&mdash;yer fader stole 'em, and mine bought
+'em, an' the' both made cattle uv 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"But I had supposed the black was better fitted by nature for hard
+labor, in a hot climate, than the white?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, he arn't, an' I knows it. Th' d&mdash;&mdash;d parsons an' pol'tishuns say
+thet, but 'tain't so. I kin do half agin more work in a day then th'
+best nig' I've got, an' I've dun it, tu, time an' agin, an' it didn't
+hurt me nuther. Ye knows ef a man hev a wife and young 'uns 'pendin' on
+him, an' arn't much 'forehanded, he'll work like th' devil. I've dun it,
+and ye hev ef ye war ever put ter it; but th' nig's, why the' hain't got
+no wives and young 'uns ter work fur&mdash;the law doan't 'low 'em ter hev
+any&mdash;the' hain't nary a thing but thar carcasses, an' them's thar
+masters'."</p>
+
+<p>"You say a man works better for being free; then you must think 'twould
+be well to free the negroes?"</p>
+
+<p>"In coorse, I does. Jest luk at them nig's o' mine; they're ter all
+'tents an' purposes free, 'case I use 'em like men, an' the' knows the'
+kin go whenever the' d&mdash;&mdash;d please. See how the' work&mdash;why, one on 'em
+does half as much agin as ony hard-driv' nigger in creation."</p>
+
+<p>"What would you do with them, if they were <i>really</i> free?"</p>
+
+<p>"Du with 'em? why, hire 'em, an' make twice as much eout on 'em as I
+does now."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"But I don't think the two races were meant to live together."</p>
+
+<p>"No more'n the' warn't. But 'tain't thar fault thet they's har. We
+hain't no right ter send 'em off. We orter stand by our'n an' our
+faders' doin's. The nig' keers more fur his hum, so durned pore as it
+ar', then ye or I does fur our'n. I'd pack sech off ter Libraria or th'
+devil, as wanted ter go, but I'd hev no 'pulsion 'bout it."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, my good friend, you're half-brother to Garrison. You don't talk to
+your neighbors in this way?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wal; I doan't;" he replied, laughing. "Ef I dun it, they'd treat me to
+a coat uv tar, and ride me out uv th' deestrict raather sudden, I
+reckon; but yer a Nuthener, an' the' all take nat'rally ter freedum,
+excep' th' d&mdash;&mdash;d dough-faces, an' ye aren't one on 'em, I'll swar."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'm not. Do many of your neighbors think as you do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Reckon not many round har; but op in Cart'ret, whar I cum from, heaps
+on 'em do, though the' darn't say so."</p>
+
+<p>By this time we had reached the still, and, directing his attention to
+the enormous quantity of rosin that had been run into the pit which I
+have spoken of, I asked him why he threw so much valuable material away.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, 'tain't wuth nothin' har. Thet's th' common, an' it won't bring in
+York, now, more'n a dollar forty-five. It costs a dollar an' two bits
+ter get it thar, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> pay fur sellin' on it, an' th' barr'l's wuth th'
+diff'rence. I doan't ship nuthin wuss nor No. 2."</p>
+
+<p>"What is No. 2?"</p>
+
+<p>He took the head from one of the barrels, and with an adze cut out a
+small piece, then handing me the specimen, replied:</p>
+
+<p>"Now hole thet up ter th' sun. Ye'll see though its yaller, it's clean
+and clar. Thet's good No. 2, what brings now two dollars and two bits,
+in York, an' pays me 'bout a dollar a barr'l, its got eout o' second yar
+dip, an' as it comes eout uv th' still, is run through thet ar
+strainer," pointing to a coarse wire seive that lay near. "Th' common
+rosum, thet th' still's runnin' on now, is made eout on th' yaller
+dip&mdash;thet's th' kine o' turpentine thet runs from th' tree arter two
+yars' tappin'&mdash;we call it yallar dip ca'se it's allers dark. We doant
+strain common 't all, an' it's full uv chips and dirt. It's low now, but
+ef it shud ever git up, I'd tap thet ar' heap, barr'l it up, run a
+little fresh stilled inter it, an' 'twould be a'most so good as new."</p>
+
+<p>"Then it is injured by being in the ground."</p>
+
+<p>"Not much; it's jest as good fur ev'rything but makin' ile, puttin it in
+the 'arth sort o' takes th' sap eout on it, an' th' sap's th' ile.
+Natur' sucks thet eout, I s'pose, ter make th' trees grow&mdash;I expec' my
+bones 'ill fodder 'em one on these days."</p>
+
+<p>"Rosin is put to very many uses?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but common's used mainly for ile and soap, th' Yankees put it
+inter hard yaller soap, 'case it makes it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> weigh, an' yer folks is up
+ter them doin's," and he looked at me and gave a sly laugh. I could not
+deny the "hard" impeachment, and said nothing. Taking a specimen of very
+clear light-colored rosin from a shelf in the still-house, I asked him
+what that quality was worth.</p>
+
+<p>"Thet ar brought seven dollars, for two hundred an' eighty pounds, in
+York, airly this yar. It's th' very best No. 1; an' its hard ter make,
+'case ef th' still gets overhet it turns it a tinge. Thet sort is run
+through two sieves, the coarse 'un, an' thet ar," pointing to another
+wire strainer, the meshes of which were as fine as those of the flour
+sieve used by housewives.</p>
+
+<p>"Do your seven field hands produce enough 'dip' to keep your still a
+running?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I buys th' rest uv my naboors who haint no stills; an' th' Cunnel's
+down on me 'case I pay 'em more'n he will; but I go on Franklin's
+princerpel: 'a nimble sixpence's better'n a slow shillin.' A great ole
+feller thet, warn't he? I've got his life."</p>
+
+<p>"And you practice on his precepts; that's the reason you've got on so
+well."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, thet, an' hard knocks. The best o' doctrin's am't wuth a d&mdash;&mdash;n
+ef ye doan't work on 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"That is true."</p>
+
+<p>We shortly afterward went to the house, and there I passed several hours
+in conversation with my new friend and his excellent wife. The lady,
+after a while, showed me over the building. It was well-built,
+well-arranged, and had many conveniences I did not expect to find in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span>
+back-woods dwelling. She told me its timbers and covering were of
+well-seasoned yellow pine&mdash;which will last for centuries&mdash;and that it
+was built by a Yankee carpenter, whom they had "'ported" from
+Charleston, paying his fare, and giving him his living, and two dollars
+and a half a day. It had cost as near as she "cud reckon, 'bout two
+thousan' dollars."</p>
+
+<p>It was five o'clock, when, shaking them warmly by the hand, I bade my
+pleasant friends "good-bye," and mounting my horse rode off to the
+Colonel's.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_J_10" id="Footnote_J_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_J_10"><span class="label">[J]</span></a> The whiskey was kept in a back room, above ground, because the
+dwelling had no cellar. The fluid was kept safely, under lock and key,
+and the farmer accounted for that, by saying that his negroes would
+steal nothing but whiskey. Few country houses at the South have a
+cellar&mdash;that apartment deemed so essential by Northern housekeepers. The
+intervening space between the ground and the floor is there left open,
+to allow of a free circulation of air.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_K_11" id="Footnote_K_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_K_11"><span class="label">[K]</span></a> No regular dinner-hour is allowed the blacks on most turpentine
+plantations. Their food is usually either taken with them to the woods,
+or carried there by house servants, at stated times.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span></p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE BURIAL OF "JULE."</h3>
+
+
+<p>The family were at supper when I returned to the mansion, and, entering
+the room, I took my accustomed place at the table. None present seemed
+disposed to conversation. The little that was said was spoken in a low,
+subdued tone, and no allusion was made to the startling event of the
+day. At last the octoroon woman asked me if I had met Mrs. Barnes at the
+farmer's.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," I replied, "and I was greatly pleased with her. She seems one of
+those rare women who would lend grace to even the lowest station."</p>
+
+<p>"She <i>is</i> a rare woman; a true, sincere Christian. Every one loves her;
+but few know all her worth; only those do who have gone to her in sorrow
+and trial, as&mdash;" and her voice trembled, and her eyes moistened&mdash;"as I
+have."</p>
+
+<p>And so that poor, outcast, despised, dishonored woman, scorned and
+cast-off by all the world, had found one sympathizing, pitying friend.
+Truly, "He tempers the wind to the shorn lamb."</p>
+
+<p>When the meal was over, all but Madam P&mdash;&mdash; retired to the library.
+Tommy and I fell to reading, but the Colonel shortly rose and continued
+pacing up and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> down the apartment till the clock sounded eight. The lady
+then entered, and said to him.</p>
+
+<p>"The negroes are ready, David; will <i>you</i> go, Mr. K&mdash;&mdash;?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think not, madam," I replied; "at least not now."</p>
+
+<p>I continued reading, for a time, when, tiring of the book, I laid it
+down, and followed them to the little burial-ground.</p>
+
+<p>The grave of Sam was open, and the plantation blacks were gathered
+around it. In the centre of the group, and at the head of the rude
+coffin, the Colonel was seated, and near him the octoroon woman and her
+son. The old preacher was speaking.</p>
+
+<p>"My chil'ren," he said: "she hab gone ter Him, wid har chile: gone up
+dar, whar dey doan't sorrer no more, whar dey doan't weep no more, whar
+all tears am wiped from dar eyes foreber. I knows she lay han's on
+harseff, and dat, my chil'ren, am whot none ob us shud do, 'case we'm de
+Lord's; He put us har, an' he'll take us 'way when we's fru wid our
+work, not afore. We hab no right ter gwo afore. Pore Juley did&mdash;but
+p'raps she cudn't help it. P'raps de great sorrer war so big in har
+heart, dat she cudn't fine rest nowhar but in de cole, dark riber.
+P'raps she warn't ter blame&mdash;p'raps," and here his eyes filled: "p'raps
+ole Pomp war all ter blame, for I tole har, my chil'ren"&mdash;he could say
+no more, and sinking down on a rude seat, he covered his face, and
+sobbed audibly. Even the Colonel's strong frame heaved with emotion, and
+not a dry eye was near. After a time<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> the old man rose again, and with
+streaming eyes, and upturned face, continued:</p>
+
+<p>"Dars One up dar, my chil'ren, dat say: 'Come unter Me, all ye dat am a
+weary an' a heaby laden, an' I will gib you ress.' He, de good Lord, He
+say dat; and p'raps Juley hard Him say it, an' dat make har gwo." Again
+his voice failed, and he sank down, weeping and moaning as if his heart
+would break.</p>
+
+<p>A pause followed, when the Colonel rose, and aided by Jim and two other
+blacks, with his own hands nailed down the lid, and lowered the rude
+coffin into the ground. Then the earth was thrown upon it, and then the
+long, low chant which the negroes raise over the dead, mingling now with
+sobs and moans, and breaking into a strange wild wail, went up among the
+pines, and floating off on the still night air, echoed through the dark
+woods, till it sounded like music from the grave. I have been in the
+chamber of the dying; I have seen the young and the beautiful laid away
+in the earth; but I never felt the solemn awfulness of death, as I did,
+when, in the stillness and darkness of night, I listened to the wild
+grief of that negro group, and saw the bodies of that slave mother and
+her child, lowered to their everlasting rest by the side of Sam.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2>
+
+<h3>HOMEWARD.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The morning broke bright and mellow with the rays of the winter sun,
+which in Carolina lends the warmth of October to the chills of January,
+when, with my portmanteau strapped, and my thin overcoat on my arm, I
+gave my last "God bless you" to the octoroon woman, and turned my face
+toward home.</p>
+
+<p>Jim shouted "all ready," the driver cracked his whip, and we were on our
+way to Georgetown.</p>
+
+<p>The recent rains had hardened the roads, the bridges were repaired, and
+we were whirled rapidly forward, and, at one o'clock, reached
+Bucksville. There we met a cordial welcome, and remained to dinner. Our
+host pressed us to pass the night at his house, but the Colonel had
+business with one of his secession friends residing down the road&mdash;my
+wayside acquaintance, Colonel A&mdash;&mdash;, and desired to stay overnight with
+him. At three o'clock, bidding a kindly farewell to Captain B&mdash;&mdash; and his
+excellent family, we were again on our way.</p>
+
+<p>The sun was just sinking among the western pines, when we turned into a
+broad avenue, lined with stately old trees, and rode up to the door-way
+of the rice-planter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> It was a large, square, dingy old house, seated on
+a gentle knoll, a short half-mile from the river, along whose banks
+stretched the rice-fields. We entered, and were soon welcomed by its
+proprietor.</p>
+
+<p>He received my friend warmly, and gave me a courteous greeting,
+remarking, when I mentioned that I was homeward bound, that it was wise
+to go. "Things are very unsettled; there's no telling what a day may
+bring forth; feeling is running very high, and a Northern man, whatever
+his principles, is not safe here. By-the-way," he added, "did you not
+meet with some little obstruction at Conwayboro', on your way up?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I did; a person there ordered me back, but when things began to
+look serious, Scipio, the negro whom you saw with me, got me out of the
+hobble."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't he tell the gentleman that you were a particular friend of mine,
+and had met me by appointment at Captain B&mdash;&mdash;'s?" he asked, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"I believe he did, sir; but I assure you, <i>I</i> said nothing of the kind,
+and I think the black should not be blamed, under the circumstances."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no; I don't blame him. I think he did a smart thing. He might have
+said you were my grandmother, if it would have served you, for that low
+fellow is as fractious as the devil, and dead sure on the trigger."</p>
+
+<p>"You are very good, sir," I replied: "how did you hear of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"A day or two afterward, B&mdash;&mdash; passed here on his way to Georgetown. I
+had been riding out, and happened<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> to be at the head of my avenue when
+he was going by. He stopped, and asked if I knew you. Not knowing, then,
+the circumstances, I said that I had met you casually at Bucksville, but
+had no particular acquaintance with you. He rode on, saying nothing
+further. The next morning, I had occasion to go to Georgetown, and at
+Mr. Fraser's office, accidentally heard that Scip&mdash;who is well-known and
+universally liked there&mdash;was to have a public whipping that evening.
+Something prompted me to inquire into it, and I was told that he had
+been charged by B&mdash;&mdash; with shielding a well-known abolitionist at
+Conwayboro'&mdash;a man who was going through the up-country, distributing
+such damnable publications as the New York <i>Independent</i> and <i>Tribune</i>.
+I knew, of course, it referred to you, and that it wasn't true. I went
+to Scip and got the facts, and by stretching the truth a little, finally
+got him off. There was a slight discrepancy between my two accounts of
+you" (and here he laughed heartily), "and B&mdash;&mdash;, when we were before the
+Justice, remarked on it, and came d&mdash;&mdash;d near calling me a liar. It was
+lucky he didn't, for if he had, he'd have gone to h&mdash;l before the place
+was hot enough for him."</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot tell you, my dear sir, how grateful I am to you for this. It
+would have pained me more than I can express, if Scip had suffered for
+doing a disinterested kindness to me."</p>
+
+<p>Early in the morning we were again on our way, and twelve o'clock found
+us seated at a dinner of bacon,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> corn-bread, and waffles, in the "first
+hotel" of Georgetown. The Charleston boat was to leave at three o'clock;
+and, as soon as dinner was over, I sallied out to find Scip. After a
+half-hour's search I found him on "Shackelford's wharf," engaged in
+loading a schooner bound for New York with a cargo of cotton and
+turpentine.</p>
+
+<p>He was delighted to see me, and when I had told him I was going home,
+and might never see him again, I took his hand warmly in mine, and said:</p>
+
+<p>"Scip, I have heard of the disgrace that was near being put upon you on
+my account, and I feel deeply the disinterested service you did to me;
+now, I <i>can not</i> go away without doing <i>something</i> for you&mdash;showing you
+in <i>some</i> way that I appreciate and <i>like</i> you."</p>
+
+<p>"I like's <i>you</i>, massa," he replied, the tears coming to his eyes: "I
+tuk ter you de bery fuss day I seed you, 'case, I s'pose," and he wrung
+my hand till it ached: "you pitied de pore brack man. But you karnt do
+nuffin fur <i>me</i>, massa; I doant want nuffin; I doant want ter leab har,
+'case de Lord dat put me har, arn't willin' I shud gwo. But you kin do
+suffin, massa, fur de pore brack man,&mdash;an' dat'll be doin' it fur <i>me</i>,
+'case my heart am all in dat. You kin tell dem folks up dar, whar you
+lib, massa, dat we'm not like de brutes, as dey tink we is. Dat we's got
+souls, an' telligence, an' feelin's, an' am men like demselfs. You kin
+tell 'em, too, massa,&mdash;'case you's edication, and kin talk&mdash;how de pore
+wite man 'am kep' down har; how he'm ragged, an' starvin', an' ob no
+account, 'case de brack man am a slave. How der<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span> chil'ren can't get no
+schulein', how eben de grow'd up ones doan't know nuffin&mdash;not eben so
+much as de pore brack slave, 'case de 'stockracy wan't dar votes, an
+cudn't get 'em ef dey 'low'd 'em larning. Ef your folks know'd all de
+trufh&mdash;ef dey know'd how both de brack an' de pore w'ite man, am on de
+groun', and can't git up, ob demselfs&mdash;dey'd do <i>suffin'</i>&mdash;dey'd break
+de Constertution&mdash;dey'd do suffin' ter help us. I doant want no one
+hurted, I doant want no one wronged; but jess tink ob it, massa, four
+million ob bracks, and nigh so many pore wites, wid de bressed gospil
+shinin' down on 'em, an' dey not knowin' on it. All dem&mdash;ebry one of
+'em&mdash;made in de image ob de great God, an' dey driven roun', an' 'bused
+wuss dan de brutes. You's seed dis, massa, wid your own eyes, an' you
+kin tell 'em on it; an' you <i>will</i> tell 'em on it, massa;" and again he
+took my hand while the tears rolled down his cheeks; "an' Scip will
+bress you fur it, massa; wid his bery lass breaf he'll bress you; an' de
+good Lord will bress you, too, massa; He will foreber bress you, for
+He'm on de side ob de pore, an' de 'flicted: His own book say dat, an'
+it am true, I knows it, fur I feels it <i>har</i>;" and he laid his hand on
+his heart, and was silent.</p>
+
+<p>I could not speak for a moment. When I mastered my feelings, I said, "I
+<i>will</i> do it Scip; as God gives me strength, I <i>will</i>."</p>
+
+<p>Reader, I am keeping my word.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX.</a></h2>
+
+<h3>CONCLUSION.</h3>
+
+
+<p>This is not a work of fiction. It is a record of facts, and therefore
+the reader will not expect me to dispose of its various characters on
+artistic principles&mdash;that is, lay them away in one of those final
+receptacles for the creations of the romancer&mdash;the grave and matrimony.
+Death has been among them, but nearly all are yet doing their work in
+this breathing, busy world.</p>
+
+<p>The characters I have introduced are real. They are not drawn with the
+pencil of fancy, nor, I trust, colored with the tints of prejudice. The
+scenes I have described are true. I have taken some liberties with the
+names of persons and places, and, in a few instances, altered dates; but
+the events themselves occurred under my own observation. No one
+acquainted with the section of country I have described, or familiar
+with the characters I have delineated, will question this statement.
+Lest some one who has not seen the slave and the poor white man of the
+South, as he actually is, should deem my picture overdrawn, I will say
+that "the half has not been told!" If the whole were related&mdash;if the
+Southern system, in all its naked ugliness, were fully exposed&mdash;the
+truth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> would read like fiction, and the baldest relation of fact like
+the wildest dream, of romance.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>The overseer was never taken. A letter which I received from Colonel
+J&mdash;&mdash;, shortly prior to the stoppage of the mails, informed me that Moye
+had succeeded in crossing the mountains into Tennessee, where, in an
+interior town, he disposed of the horse, and then made his way by an
+inland route to the free states. The horse the Colonel had recovered,
+but the overseer he never expected to see. Moye is now, no doubt,
+somewhere in the North, and is probably at this present writing a
+zealous Union man, of somewhat the same "stripe" as the conductors of
+the New York <i>Herald</i> and the Boston <i>Courier</i>.</p>
+
+<p>I have not heard directly from Scipio, but one day last July, after a
+long search, I found on one of the wharves of South Street, a coasting
+captain, who knew him well, and who had seen him the month previous at
+Georgetown. He was at that time pursuing his usual avocations, and was
+as much respected and trusted, as when I met him.</p>
+
+<p>A few days after the tidings of the fall of Sumter were received in New
+York, and when I had witnessed the spontaneous and universal uprising of
+the North, which followed that event, I dispatched letters to several of
+my Southern friends, giving them as near as I could an account of the
+true state of feeling here, and representing the utter madness of the
+course the South was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> pursuing. One of these letters went to my Union
+acquaintance whom I have called, in the preceding pages, "Andy Jones."</p>
+
+<p>He promptly replied, and a pretty regular correspondence ensued between
+us, which has continued, at intervals, even since the suspension of
+intercourse between the North and the South.</p>
+
+<p>Andy has stood firmly and nobly by the old flag. At the risk of every
+thing, he has boldly expressed his sentiments everywhere. With his life
+in his hand, and&mdash;a revolver in each of his breeches-pockets, he walked
+the streets of Wilmington when the secession fever was at its height,
+openly proclaiming his undying loyalty to the Union, and "no man dared
+gainsay him."</p>
+
+<p>But with all his patriotism, Andy keeps a bright eye on the "main
+chance." Like his brother, the Northern Yankee, whom he somewhat
+resembles and greatly admires, he never omits an opportunity of "turning
+an honest penny." In defiance of custom-house regulations, and of our
+strict blockade, he has carried on a more or less regular traffic with
+New York and Boston (<i>via</i> Halifax and other neutral ports), ever since
+North Carolina seceded. His turpentine&mdash;while it was still his
+property&mdash;has been sold in the New York market, under the very eyes of
+the government officials&mdash;and, honest reader, <i>I</i> have known of it.</p>
+
+<p>By various roundabout means, I have recently received letters from him.
+His last, dated in April, and brought to a neutral port by a shipmaster
+whom he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> implicitly trusts, has reached me since the previous chapters
+were written. It covers six pages of foolscap, and is written in
+defiance of all grammatical and orthographical principles; but as it
+conveys important intelligence, in regard to some of the persons
+mentioned in this narrative, I will transcribe a portion of it.</p>
+
+<p>It gave me the melancholy tidings of the death of Colonel J&mdash;&mdash;. He had
+joined the Confederate army, and fell, bravely meeting a charge of the
+Massachusetts troops, at Roanoke.</p>
+
+<p>On receiving the news of his friend's death, Andy rode over to the
+plantation, and found Madam P&mdash;&mdash; plunged in the deepest grief. While he
+was there a letter arrived from Charleston, with intelligence of the
+dangerous illness of her son. This second blow crushed her. For several
+days she was delirious, and her life despaired of; but throughout the
+whole the noble corn-cracker, neglecting every thing, remained beside
+her.</p>
+
+<p>When she returned to herself, and had in a measure recovered her
+strength, she learned that the Colonel had left no will; that she was
+still a slave; and soon to be sold, with the rest of the Colonel's
+<i>personal property</i>, according to law.</p>
+
+<p>This is what Andy writes about the affair. I give the letter as he wrote
+it, merely correcting the punctuation, and enough of the spelling, to
+make it intelligible.</p>
+
+<p>"W'en I hard thet th' Cunel hadent leff no wil, I was hard put what ter
+dew; but arter thinkin' on it over a spell, I knowed shede har on it
+sumhow; so I 'cluded to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span> tel har miseff. She tuk on d&mdash;&mdash;d hard at
+fust, but arter a bit, grew more calm like, and then she sed it war
+God's wil, an' she wudent komplane. Ye nows I've got a wife, but wen the
+ma'am sed thet, she luk'd so like an angel, thet d&mdash;&mdash;d eff I cud help
+puttin' my arms round har, an' hugin' on har, till she a'moste
+screeched. Wal, I toled har, Id stan' by har eff evrithing went ter
+h&mdash;l&mdash;an I wil, by &mdash;&mdash;.</p>
+
+<p>"I made up mi minde to onst, what ter dew. It war darned harde work tur
+bee'way from hum jess then, but I war in fur it; soe I put ter
+Charleston, ter see th' Cunel's 'oman. Wal, I seed har, an' I toled har
+how th' ma'am felte, an' how mutch shede dun at makein' th' Cunel's
+money&mdash;(she made nigh th' hul on it, 'case he war alers keerles, an' tuk
+no 'count uv things; eff tadent ben fur thet, hede made a wil,) an' I
+axed har ter see thet the ma'am had free papers ter onst. An' whot der
+ye 'spoze she sed? Nuthin, by &mdash;&mdash; 'cept she dident no nuthin' 'bout
+bisniss, an' leff all uv sech things ter har loryer. Wal, then I went
+ter him&mdash;he ar one on them slick, ily, seceshun houn's, who'd sell thar
+soles fur a kountterfit dollar&mdash;an' he toled me, th' 'ministratur hadent
+sot yit, an' he cudent dew nuthin til he hed. Ses I: 'ye mean th'
+'ooman's got ter gwo ter th' hi'est bider?' 'Yas,' he sed, 'the Cunel's
+got dets, an' the've got ter bee pade, an' th' persoonel prop'ty muste
+bee sold ter dew it.' Then I sed, 'twud bee sum time fore thet war dun,
+an' the 'ooman's 'most ded an' uv no use now; 'what'll ye <i>hire</i> har tur
+me fur.' He sed a hun'red for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> sicks months. I planked down the money
+ter onst, an' put off.</p>
+
+<p>"I war bilin' over, but it sumhow cum inter my hed thet the Cunnel's
+'ooman cudn't bee <i>all</i> stun; so I gose thar agin; an' I toled har what
+the loryer sed, an' made a reg'lar stump-'peal tew har bettar natur. I
+axed har eff she'd leff the 'ooman who'd made har husban's fortun, who
+war the muther ov his chil'ren, who fur twenty yar, hed nussed him in
+sickness, an' cheered him in healtf; ef shede let <i>thet 'ooman</i>, bee
+auckyund off ter th' hi'est bider. I axed al thet, an' what der ye think
+she sed, Why jest this. '<i>I</i> doant no nuthin' bout it, Mister Jones. Ye
+raily must talke ter mi loryer; them maters I leaves 'tirely ter him.'
+Then, I sed, I 'spozed the niggers war ter bee advertist. 'O, yas!' she
+sed, (an' ye see, she know'd a d&mdash;&mdash;d site 'bout <i>thet</i>), 'all on 'em
+muss be solde, 'case, ye knows, I never did luv the kuntry,&mdash;'sides <i>I</i>
+cud'ent karry on the plantashun, no how.' Then, sed I: 'the Orlean's
+traders 'ill be thar&mdash;an' she wunt sell fur but one use, fur she's
+hansum yit; an' ma'am, ye wunt leff a 'ooman as white as you is, who fur
+twenty yar, hes ben a tru an' fatheful <i>wife</i> tar yer own ded husban,'
+(I shudn't hev put thet in, but d&mdash;&mdash;d ef I cud help it,) ye wunt put
+<i>har</i> up on the block, an' hev har struck down ter the hi'est bider, ter
+bee made a d&mdash;&mdash; d&mdash;&mdash; on?'</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I s'pose she hadent forgot thet, fur more'n twelve yar, the Cunnel
+hed <i>luv'd</i> t'other 'ooman, an' onely <i>liked</i> har; fur w'en I sed thet,
+har ize snapped<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> like h&mdash;l, an' she screetched eout thet she dident 'low
+no sech wurds in har hous', an' ordurd me ter leave. Mi'tey sqeemish
+thet, warn't it? bein' as shede ben fur so mony yar the Cunnel's &mdash;&mdash;,
+an' th' tuther one his raal wife.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I <i>did</i> leav'; but I left a piece of mi mind a-hind. I toled har
+I'de buy that ar 'ooman ef she cost all I war wuth and I had ter pawne
+my sole ter git the money; an' I added, jess by way ov sweet'nin' the
+pill, thet I ow'd all I hed ter har husband, an' dident furget <i>my</i>
+debts ef she did <i>her'n</i>, an' ef his own wife disgraced him, I'd be
+d&mdash;&mdash;d ef <i>I</i> wud.</p>
+
+<p>"Wal, I've got th' ma'am an' har boy ter hum, an' my 'ooman hes tuk ter
+har a heep. I doant no w'en the sale's ter cum off, but ye may bet hi'
+on my beein' thar; an' I'll buy har ef I hev ter go my hull pile on har,
+an' borrer th' money fur ole Pomp. But <i>he'll</i> go cheap, 'case the
+Cunnel's deth nigh dun him up. It clean killed Ante Lucey. She never
+held her hed up arter she heerd 'Masser Davy' war dead, fur she sot har
+vary life on him. Don't ye fele consarned 'bout the ma'am&mdash;I knows ye
+sot hi' on har&mdash;<i>I'll buy har</i>, shore. Thet an' deth ar th' onely things
+thet I knows on, in this wurld, jess now, that ar <span class="smcap">sartin</span>."</p>
+
+<p>Such is Andy's letter. Mis-spelled and profane though it be, I would not
+alter a word or a syllable of it. It deserves to be written in
+characters of gold, and hung up in the sky, where it might be read by
+all the world. And it <i>is</i> written in the sky&mdash;in the great
+record-book&mdash;and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> it will be read when you and I, reader, meet the
+assembled universe, to give account of what <i>we</i> have done and written.
+God grant that our record may show some such deed as that!</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMONG THE PINES***</p>
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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Among the Pines, by James R. Gilmore
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Among the Pines
+       or, South in Secession Time
+
+
+Author: James R. Gilmore
+
+
+
+Release Date: October 11, 2007  [eBook #22960]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMONG THE PINES***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Garcia, Annie McGuire, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page
+images generously made available by the Kentuckiana Digital Library
+(http://kdl.kyvl.org/)
+
+
+
+Note: Images of the original pages are available through
+      Kentuckiana Digital Library. See
+      http://kdl.kyvl.org/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=kyetexts;cc=kyetexts;xc=1&idno=B96-8-34456937&view=toc
+
+
+
+
+
+AMONG THE PINES.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+A NEW WORK, Descriptive of Southern Social Life,
+BY THE AUTHOR OF AMONG THE PINES,
+Is now in course of publication in THE "CONTINENTAL MONTHLY,"
+PUBLISHED BY J. R. GILMORE, 532 Broadway, NEW YORK.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+AMONG THE PINES:
+
+or, South in Secession Time.
+
+by
+
+EDMUND KIRKE.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Tenth Thousand.
+New York: J. R. Gilmore, 532 Broadway.
+Charles T. Evans.
+1862.
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1862,
+by J. R. Gilmore,
+In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for
+the Southern District of New York.
+
+M'crea & Miller, Stereotypers.      C. A. Alvord, Printer
+
+
+
+
+TO
+RICHARD B. KIMBALL,
+
+THE ACCOMPLISHED AUTHOR, THE POLISHED GENTLEMAN,
+AND
+MY OLD AND EVER-VALUED FRIEND,
+
+THESE SKETCHES ARE DEDICATED
+BY THE
+AUTHOR.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                                                    PAGE.
+
+CHAPTER I.--ON THE ROAD.--Arrival at Georgetown.--The Village
+  Inn.--Nocturnal Adventures.--My African Driver.--His Strange
+  History.--Genuine Negro Songs.--Arrival at Bucksville.              10
+
+CHAPTER II.--WAYSIDE HOSPITALITY.--A Strange Meeting.--A Well
+  Ordered Plantation.--A Thunder-storm.--A New Guest.--The Hidden
+  Springs or Secession Exposed.--On the Way Again.--Intelligence
+  of the Negro.--Renconter with a Secessionist.                       30
+
+CHAPTER III.--CROSSING THE RUNS.--The Black Declines His
+  Freedom.--His Reasons for so Doing.--A "native"
+  Abolitionist.--Swimming the Run.--Black Spirits and
+  White.--Shelter.                                                    55
+
+CHAPTER IV.--POOR WHITES.--The Mills House.--South Carolina
+  Clay-Eaters.--Political Discussion.--President Lincoln a
+  Negro.--"Three in a Bed and one in the Middle."--$250 reward.--A
+  Secret League.                                                      69
+
+CHAPTER V.--ON THE PLANTATION.--The Planter's Dwelling.--His
+  House-Keeper.--The Process of Turpentine Making.--Loss to Carolina
+  by Secession.--The Dying Boy.--The Story of Jim.--A Northern Man
+  with Southern Principles.--Sam Murdered.--Pursuit of the Overseer.  94
+
+CHAPTER VI.--THE PLANTER'S FAMILY.--The old Nurse.--Her Story.--A
+  White Slave-Woman's Opinion of Slavery.--The Stables.--The
+  Negro-Quarters.--Sunday Exercises.--The Taking of Moye.            127
+
+CHAPTER VII.--PLANTATION DISCIPLINE.--The "Ole Cabin."--The Mode of
+  Negro Punishment.--The "Thumb-Screw."--A Ministering Angel.--A Negro
+  Trial.--A Rebellion.--A Turpentine Dealer.--A Boston Dray on its
+  Travels.                                                           150
+
+CHAPTER VIII.--THE NEGRO HUNTER.--Young Democrats.--Political
+  Discussion.--Startling Statistics.--A Freed Negro.                 169
+
+CHAPTER IX.--THE COUNTRY CHURCH.--Its Description.--The
+  "Corn-Cracker."--The News.--Strange Disclosure.                    180
+
+CHAPTER X.--THE NEGRO FUNERAL.--The Burial Ground.--A Negro
+  Sermon.--The Appearance of Juley.--The Colonel's
+  Heartlessness.--The Octoroon's Explanation of it.--The Escape
+  of Moye.                                                           196
+
+CHAPTER XI.--THE PURSUIT.--The Start.--"Carolina Race-Horses."--A
+  Race.--We Lose the Trail.--A Tornado.--A Narrow Escape.--          207
+
+CHAPTER XII.--THE YANKEE SCHOOLMISTRESS.--Our New
+  Apparel.--"Kissing Goes by Favor."--Schools at the South.          222
+
+CHAPTER XIII.--THE RAILWAY STATION.--The Village.--A Drunken
+  Yankee.--A Narrow Escape.--Andy Jones.--A Light-Wood Fire.--The
+  Colonel's Departure.                                               227
+
+CHAPTER XIV.--THE BARBACUE.--The Camp-Ground.--The
+  Stump-Speaker.--A Stump Speech.--Almost a Fight.--The
+  Manner of Roasting the Ox.                                         239
+
+CHAPTER XV.--THE RETURN.--Arrival at the Plantation.--Disappearance
+  of Juley and her child.--The Old Preacher's Story.--Scene Between
+  the Master and the Slave.                                          253
+
+CHAPTER XVI.--"ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE."--Attempted Whipping of
+  Jim.--Appearance of the "Corn-Cracker."--"Drowned.--Drowned."      260
+
+CHAPTER XVII.--THE SMALL PLANTER.--His House.--His
+  Wife.--His Negroes.--A Juvenile Darky.--Lazarus in "Ab'ram's
+  Buzzum."--White and Black Labor Compared.--The Mysteries
+  of "Rosum" manufacture.                                            277
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.--THE BURIAL OF JULE.--"He Tempers the Wind to the
+  Shorn Lamb."--The Funeral.                                         295
+
+CHAPTER XIX.--HOMEWARD BOUND.--Colonel A---- Again.--Parting with
+  Scipio.--Why this Book was Written.                                298
+
+CHAPTER XX.--CONCLUSION.--The Author's Explanations.--Last
+  News from Moye and Scipio.--Affecting Letter from
+  Andy Jones.--The End.                                              303
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+ON THE ROAD.
+
+
+Some winters ago I passed several weeks at Tallahassee, Florida, and
+while there made the acquaintance of Colonel J----, a South Carolina
+planter. Accident, some little time later, threw us together again at
+Charleston, when I was gratified to learn that he would be my _compagnon
+du voyage_ as far north as New York.
+
+He was accompanied by his body-servant, "Jim," a fine specimen of the
+genus darky, about thirty years of age, and born and reared in his
+master's family. As far as possible we made the journey by day, stopping
+at some convenient resting-place by night; on which occasions the
+Colonel, Jim, and myself would occupy the same or adjoining apartments,
+"we white folks" sleeping on four posts, while the more democratic negro
+spread his blanket on the floor. Thrown together thus intimately, it
+was but natural that we should learn much of each other.
+
+The "Colonel" was a highly cultivated and intelligent gentleman, and
+during this journey a friendship sprung up between us--afterward kept
+alive by a regular correspondence--which led him, with his wife and
+daughter, and the man Jim, to my house on his next visit at the North,
+one year later. I then promised--if I should ever again travel in South
+Carolina--to visit him on his plantation in the extreme north-eastern
+part of the state.
+
+In December last, about the time of the passage of the ordinance of
+secession, I had occasion to visit Charleston, and, previous to setting
+out, dispatched a letter to the Colonel with the information that I was
+ready to be led of him "into the wilderness." On arriving at the
+head-quarters of secession, I found a missive awaiting me, in which my
+friend cordially renewed his previous tender of hospitality, gave me
+particular directions how to proceed, and stated that his "man Jim"
+would meet me with a carriage at Georgetown, and convey me thence,
+seventy miles, to "the plantation."
+
+Having performed the business which led me to Charleston, I set out for
+the rendezvous five days before the date fixed for the meeting,
+intending to occupy the intervening time in an exploration of the
+ancient town and its surroundings.
+
+The little steamer Nina (a cross between a full-grown nautilus and a
+half-grown tub), which a few weeks later was enrolled as the first
+man-of-war of the Confederate navy, then performed the carrying trade
+between the two principal cities of South Carolina. On her, together
+with sundry boxes and bales, and certain human merchandise, I embarked
+at Charleston, and on a delicious morning, late in December, landed at
+Georgetown.
+
+As the embryo war-steamer rounded up to the long, low, rickety dock,
+lumbered breast-high with cotton, turpentine, and rosin, not a white
+face was to be seen. A few half-clad, shiftless-looking negroes,
+lounging idly about, were the only portion of the population in waiting
+to witness our landing.
+
+"Are all the people dead?" I inquired of one of them, thinking it
+strange that an event so important as the arrival of the Charleston
+packet should excite no greater interest in so quiet a town. "Not dead,
+massa," replied the black, with a knowing chuckle, "but dey'm gettin'
+ready for a fun'ral." "What funeral?" I asked. "Why, dey'm gwine to
+shoot all de boblition darkies at de Norf, and hab a brack burying; he!
+he!" and the sable gentleman expanded the opening in his countenance to
+an enormous extent, doubtless at the brilliancy of his wit.
+
+I asked him to take my portmanteau, and conduct me to the best hotel. He
+readily assented, "Yas, yas, massa, I show you whar de _big-bugs_ stop;"
+but at once turning to another darky standing near, he accosted him
+with, "Here, Jim, you lazy nigga, tote de gemman's tings."
+
+"Why don't you take them yourself?" I asked; "you will then get all the
+pay." "No, no, massa; dat nigga and me in partenship; he do de work, and
+I keeps de change," was the grinning reply, and it admirably illustrates
+a peculiarity I have observed to be universal with the negro. When left
+to his own direction, he invariably "goes into partenship" with some one
+poorer than himself, and no matter how trivial the task, shirks all the
+labor he can.
+
+The silent darky and my portmanteau in the van, and the garrulous old
+negro guarding my flank, I wended my way through the principal street to
+the hotel. On the route I resumed the conversation:
+
+"So, uncle, you say the people here are getting ready for a black
+burying?"
+
+"Yas, massa, gwine to bury all dem mis'able free niggas at de Norf."
+
+"Why? What will you do that for?"
+
+"Why for, massa! you ax why for!" he exclaimed in surprise.
+
+"I don't know," I rejoined; "I'm a stranger here."
+
+"Well, you see, massa, dem boblition niggas up dar hab gone and 'lected
+a ole darky, dey call Uncle Abe; and Old Abe he'se gwine to come down
+Souf, and cut de decent niggas' troats. He'll hab a good time--_he
+will_! My young massa's captin ob de sogers, and he'll cotch de ole
+coon, and string him up so high de crows won't scent him; yas, he
+will;" and again the old darky's face opened till it looked like the
+entrance to the Mammoth Cave. He, evidently, had read the Southern
+papers.
+
+Depositing my luggage at the hotel, which I found on a side street--a
+dilapidated, unpainted wooden building, with a female landlord--I
+started out to explore the town, till the hour for dinner. Retracing my
+steps in the direction of the steamboat landing, I found the streets
+nearly deserted, although it was the hour when the business of the day
+is usually transacted. Soon I discovered the cause. The militia of the
+place were out on parade. Preceded by a colored band, playing national
+airs--in doleful keeping with the occasion--and followed by a motley
+collection of negroes of all sexes and ages, the company was entering
+the principal thoroughfare. As it passed me, I could judge of the
+prowess of the redoubtable captain, who, according to Pompey, will hang
+the President "so high de crows won't scent him." He was a
+harmless-looking young man, with long, spindle legs, admirably adapted
+to running. Though not formidable in other respects, there _was_ a
+certain martial air about an enormous sabre which hung at his side, and
+occasionally got entangled in his nether integuments, and a fiery,
+warlike look to the heavy tuft of reddish hair which sprouted in
+bristling defiance from his upper lip.
+
+The company numbered about seventy, some with uniforms and some without,
+and bearing all sorts of arms, from the old flint-lock musket to the
+modern revolving rifle. They were, however, sturdy fellows, and looked
+as if they might do service at "the imminent deadly breach." Their full
+ranks taken from a population of less than five hundred whites, told
+unmistakably the intense war feeling of the community.
+
+Georgetown is one of the oldest towns in South Carolina, and it has a
+decidedly _finished_ appearance. Not a single building, I was informed,
+had been erected there in five years. Turpentine is one of the chief
+productions of the district; yet the cost of white lead and chrome
+yellow has made paint a scarce commodity, and the houses, consequently,
+all wear a dingy, decayed look. Though situated on a magnificent bay, a
+little below the confluence of three noble rivers, which drain a country
+of surpassing richness, and though the centre of the finest rice-growing
+district in the world, the town is dead. Every thing about it wears an
+air of dilapidation. The few white men you meet in its streets, or see
+lounging lazily around its stores and warehouses, appear to lack all
+purpose and energy. Long contact with the negro seems to have given them
+his shiftless, aimless character.
+
+The ordinance of secession passed the legislature shortly prior to my
+arrival, and, as might be expected, the political situation was the
+all-engrossing topic of thought and conversation. In the estimation of
+the whites a glorious future was about to open on the little state.
+Whether she stood alone, or supported by the other slave states, she
+would assume a high rank among the nations of the earth; her cotton and
+rice would draw trade and wealth from every land, and when she spoke,
+creation would tremble. Such overweening state pride in _such_ a
+people--shiftless, indolent, and enervated as they are--strikes a
+stranger as in the last degree ludicrous; but when they tell you, in the
+presence of the black, whose strong brawny arm and sinewy frame show
+that in him lies the real strength of the state, that this great empire
+is to be built on the shoulders of the slave, your smile of incredulity
+gives way to an expression of pity, and you are tempted to ask if those
+sinewy machines may not THINK, and some day rise, and topple down the
+mighty fabric which is to be reared on their backs!
+
+Among the "peculiar institutions" of the South are its inns. I do not
+refer to the pinchbeck, imitation St. Nicholas establishments, which
+flourish in the larger cities, but to those home-made affairs, noted for
+hog and hominy, corn-cake and waffles, which crop out here and there in
+the smaller towns, the natural growth of Southern life and institutions.
+A model of this class is the one at Georgetown. Hog, hominy, and
+corn-cake for breakfast; waffles, hog, and hominy for dinner; and hog,
+hominy, and corn-cake for supper--and such corn-cake, baked in the ashes
+of the hearth, a plentiful supply of the grayish condiment still
+clinging to it!--is its never-varying bill of fare. I endured this fare
+for a day, _how_, has ever since been a mystery to me, but when night
+came my experiences were indescribable. Retiring early, to get the rest
+needed to fit me for a long ride on the morrow, I soon realized that
+"there is no rest for the wicked," none, at least, for sinners at the
+South. Scarcely had my head touched the pillow when I was besieged by an
+army of red-coated secessionists, who set upon me without mercy. I
+withstood the assault manfully, till "bleeding at every pore," and then
+slowly and sorrowfully beat a retreat. Ten thousand to one is greater
+odds than the gallant Anderson encountered at Sumter. Yet I determined
+not to fully abandon the field. Placing three chairs in a row, I mounted
+upon them, and in that seemingly impregnable position hurled defiance at
+the enemy, in the words of Scott (slightly altered to suit the
+occasion):
+
+"Come one, come all, these chairs shall fly
+From their firm base as soon as I."
+
+My exultation, however, was of short duration. The persistent foe,
+scaling my intrenchments, soon returned to the assault with redoubled
+vigor, and in utter despair I finally fled. Groping my way through the
+hall, and out of the street-door, I departed. The Sable Brother--alias
+the Son of Ham--alias the Image of GOD carved in Ebony--alias the
+Oppressed Type--alias the Contraband--alias the Irrepressible
+Nigger--alias the Chattel--alias the Darky--alias the Cullud Pusson--had
+informed me that I should find the Big Bugs at that hotel. I had found
+them.
+
+Staying longer in such a place was out of the question, and I determined
+to make my way to the up-country without longer waiting for Jim. With
+the first streak of day I sallied out to find the means of locomotion.
+
+The ancient town boasts no public conveyance, except a one-horse gig
+that carries the mail in tri-weekly trips to Charleston. That vehicle,
+originally used by some New England doctor, in the early part of the
+past century, had but one seat, and besides, was not going the way I
+intended to take, so I was forced to seek a conveyance at a
+livery-stable. At the only livery establishment in the place, kept by a
+"cullud pusson," who, though a slave, owns a stud of horses that might,
+among a people more _movingly_ inclined, yield a respectable income, I
+found what I wanted--a light Newark buggy, and a spanking gray. Provided
+with these, and a darky driver, who was to accompany me to my
+destination, and return alone, I started. A trip of seventy miles is
+something of an undertaking in that region, and quite a crowd gathered
+around to witness our departure, not a soul of whom, I will wager, will
+ever hear the rumble of a stage-coach, or the whistle of a steam-car, in
+those sandy, deserted streets.
+
+We soon left the village, and struck a broad avenue, lined on either
+side by fine old trees, and extending in an air-line for several miles.
+The road is skirted by broad rice-fields, and these are dotted here and
+there by large antiquated houses, and little collections of negro huts.
+It was Christmas week; no hands were busy in the fields, and every thing
+wore the aspect of Sunday. We had ridden a few miles when suddenly the
+road sunk into a deep, broad stream, called, as the driver told me, the
+Black River. No appliance for crossing being at hand, or in sight, I was
+about concluding that some modern Moses accommodated travellers by
+passing them over its bed dry-shod, when a flat-boat shot out from the
+jungle on the opposite bank, and pulled toward us. It was built of
+two-inch plank, and manned by two infirm darkies, with frosted wool, who
+seemed to need all their strength to sit upright. In that leaky craft,
+kept afloat by incessant baling, we succeeded, at the end of an hour, in
+crossing the river. And this, be it understood, is travelling in one of
+the richest districts of South Carolina!
+
+We soon left the region of the rice-fields, and plunged into dense
+forests of the long-leafed pine, where for miles not a house, or any
+other evidence of human occupation, is to be seen. Nothing could well be
+more dreary than a ride through such a region, and to while away the
+tedium of the journey I opened a conversation with the driver, who up to
+that time had maintained a respectful silence.
+
+He was a genuine native African, and a most original and interesting
+specimen of his race. His thin, close-cut lips, straight nose and
+European features contrasted strangely with a skin of ebon blackness,
+and the quiet, simple dignity of his manner betokened superior
+intelligence. His story was a strange one. When a boy, he was with his
+mother, kidnapped by a hostile tribe, and sold to the traders at Cape
+Lopez, on the western coast of Africa. There, in the slave-pen, the
+mother died, and he, a child of seven years, was sent in the slave-ship
+to Cuba. At Havana, when sixteen, he attracted the notice of a gentleman
+residing in Charleston, who bought him and took him to "the States." He
+lived as house-servant in the family of this gentleman till 1855, when
+his master died, leaving him a legacy to a daughter. This lady, a kind,
+indulgent mistress, had since allowed him to "hire his time," and he
+then carried on an "independent business," as porter, and doer of all
+work around the wharves and streets of Georgetown. He thus gained a
+comfortable living, besides paying to his mistress one hundred and fifty
+dollars yearly for the privilege of earning his own support. In every
+way he was a remarkable negro, and my three days' acquaintance with him
+banished from my mind all doubt as to the capacity of the black for
+freedom, and all question as to the disposition of the slave to strike
+off his chains when the favorable moment arrives. From him I learned
+that the blacks, though pretending ignorance, are fully acquainted with
+the questions at issue in the pending contest. He expressed the opinion,
+that war would come in consequence of the stand South Carolina had
+taken; and when I said to him: "But if it comes you will be no better
+off. It will end in a compromise, and leave you where you are." He
+answered: "No, massa, 't wont do dat. De Souf will fight hard, and de
+Norf will get de blood up, and come down har, and do 'way wid de _cause_
+ob all de trubble--and dat am de nigga."
+
+"But," I said, "perhaps the South will drive the North back; as you say,
+they will fight hard."
+
+"Dat dey will, massa, dey'm de fightin' sort, but dey can't whip de
+Norf, 'cause you see dey'll fight wid only one hand. When dey fight de
+Norf wid de right hand, dey'll hev to hold de nigga wid de leff."
+
+"But," I replied, "the blacks wont rise; most of you have kind masters
+and fare well."
+
+"Dat's true, massa, but dat an't freedom, and de black lub freedom as
+much as de white. De same blessed LORD made dem both, and HE made dem
+all 'like, 'cep de skin. De blacks hab strong hands, and when de day
+come you'll see dey hab heads, too!"
+
+Much other conversation, showing him possessed of a high degree of
+intelligence, passed between us. In answer to my question if he had a
+family, he said: "No, sar. My blood shall neber be slaves! Ole massa
+flog me and threaten to kill me 'cause I wouldn't take to de wimmin; but
+I tole him to kill, dat 't would be more his loss dan mine."
+
+I asked if the negroes generally felt as he did, and he told me that
+many did; that nearly all would fight for their freedom if they had the
+opportunity, though some preferred slavery because they were sure of
+being cared for when old and infirm, not considering that if their
+labor, while they were strong, made their masters rich, the same labor
+would afford _them_ provision against old age. He told me that there are
+in the _district_ of Georgetown twenty thousand blacks, and not more
+than two thousand whites, and "Suppose," he added, "dat one-quarter ob
+dese niggas rise--de rest keep still--whar den would de white folks be?"
+
+"Of course," I replied, "they would be taken at a disadvantage; but it
+would not be long before aid came from Charleston, and you would be
+overpowered."
+
+"No, massa, de chivarly, as you call dem, would be 'way in Virginny, and
+'fore dey hard of it Massa Seward would hab troops 'nough in Georgetown
+to chaw up de hull state in less dan no time."
+
+"But you have no leaders," I said, "no one to direct the movement. Your
+race is not a match for the white in generalship, and without generals,
+whatever your numbers, you would fare hardly."
+
+To this he replied, an elevated enthusiasm lighting up his face, "De
+LORD, massa, made generals ob Gideon and David, and de brack man know as
+much 'bout war as dey did; p'raps," he added, with a quiet humor, "de
+brack aint equal to de white. I knows most ob de great men, like
+Washington and John and James and Paul, and dem ole fellers war white,
+but dar war Two Sand (Tousaint L'Overture), de Brack Douglass, and de
+Nigga Demus (Nicodemus), dey war brack."
+
+The argument was unanswerable, and I said nothing. If the day which sees
+the rising of the Southern blacks comes to this generation, that negro
+will be among the leaders. He sang to me several of the songs current
+among the negroes of the district, and though of little poetic value,
+they interested me, as indicating the feelings of the slaves. The blacks
+are a musical race, and the readiness with which many of them improvise
+words and melody is wonderful; but I had met none who possessed the
+readiness of my new acquaintance. Several of the tunes he repeated
+several times, and each time with a new accompaniment of words. I will
+try to render the sentiment of a few of these songs into as good negro
+dialect as I am master of, but I cannot hope to repeat the precise
+words, or to convey the indescribable humor and pathos which my darky
+friend threw into them, and which made our long, solitary ride through
+those dreary pine-barrens pass rapidly and pleasantly away. The first
+referred to an old darky who was transplanted from the cotton-fields of
+"ole Virginny" to the rice-swamps of Carolina, and who did not like the
+change, but found consolation in the fact that rice is not grown on "the
+other side of Jordan."
+
+        "Come listen, all you darkies, come listen to my song,
+         It am about ole Massa, who use me bery wrong.
+         In de cole, frosty mornin', it an't so bery nice,
+         Wid de water to de middle to hoe among de rice;
+               When I neber hab forgotten
+               How I used to hoe de cotton,
+               How I used to hoe de cotton,
+                  On de ole Virginny shore;
+               But I'll neber hoe de cotton,
+               Oh! neber hoe de cotton
+                  Any more.
+
+        "If I feel de drefful hunger, he tink it am a vice,
+         And he gib me for my dinner a little broken rice,
+         A little broken rice and a bery little fat--
+         And he grumble like de debil if I eat too much of dat;
+                 When I neber hab forgotten, etc.
+
+        "He tore me from my DINAH; I tought my heart would burst--
+         He made me lub anoder when my lub was wid de first,
+         He sole my picaninnies becase he got dar price,
+         And shut me in de marsh-field to hoe among de rice;
+                 When I neber had forgotten, etc.
+
+        "And all de day I hoe dar, in all de heat and rain,
+         And as I hoe away dar, my heart go back again,
+         Back to de little cabin dat stood among de corn,
+         And to de ole plantation where she and I war born!
+                 Oh! I wish I had forgotten, etc.
+
+        "Den DINAH am beside me, de chil'ren on my knee,
+         And dough I am a slave dar, it 'pears to me I'm free,
+         Till I wake up from my dreaming, and wife and chil'ren gone,
+         I hoe away and weep dar, and weep dar all alone!
+                 Oh! I wish I had forgotten, etc.
+
+        "But soon a day am comin, a day I long to see,
+         When dis darky in de cole ground, foreber will be free,
+         When wife and chil'ren wid me, I'll sing in Paradise,
+         How HE, de blessed JESUS, hab bought me wid a price.
+                 How de LORD hab not forgotten
+                 How well I hoed de cotton,
+                 How well I hoed de cotton
+                     On de ole Virginny shore;
+                 Dar I'll neber hoe de cotton,
+                 Oh! neber hoe de cotton
+                     Any more."
+
+The politics of the following are not exactly those of the rulers at
+Washington, but we all may come to this complexion at last:
+
+        "Hark! darkies, hark! it am de drum
+         Dat calls ole Massa 'way from hum,
+         Wid powder-pouch and loaded gun,
+         To drive ole ABE from Washington;
+             Oh! Massa's gwine to Washington,
+             So clar de way to Washington--
+             Oh! wont dis darky hab sum fun
+             When Massa's gwine to Washington!
+
+        "Dis darky know what Massa do;
+         He take him long to brack him shoe,
+         To brack him shoe and tote him gun,
+         When he am 'way to Washington.
+             Oh! Massa's gwine to Washington,
+             So clar de way to Washington,
+             Oh! long afore de mornin' sun
+             Ole Massa's gwine to Washington!
+
+        "Ole Massa say ole ABE will eat
+         De niggas all excep' de feet--
+         De feet, may be, will cut and run,
+         When Massa gets to Washington,
+             When Massa gets to Washington;
+             So clar de way to Washington--
+             Oh! wont dis darky cut and run
+             When Massa gets to Washington!
+
+        "Dis nigga know ole ABE will save
+         His brudder man, de darky slave,
+         And dat he'll let him cut and run
+         When Massa gets to Washington,
+             When Massa gets to Washington;
+             So clar de way to Washington,
+             Ole ABE will let the darkies run
+             When Massa gets to Washington."
+
+The next is in a similar vein:
+
+        "A storm am brewin' in de Souf,
+           A storm am brewin' now,
+         Oh! hearken den and shut your mouf,
+           And I will tell you how:
+         And I will tell you how, ole boy,
+           De storm of fire will pour,
+         And make de darkies dance for joy,
+           As dey neber danced afore:
+         So shut your mouf as close as deafh,
+         And all you niggas hole your breafh,
+           And I will tell you how.
+
+        "De darkies at de Norf am ris,
+           And dey am comin' down--
+         Am comin' down, I know dey is,
+           To do de white folks brown!
+         Dey'll turn ole Massa out to grass,
+           And set de niggas free,
+         And when dat day am come to pass
+           We'll all be dar to see!
+         So shut your mouf as close as deafh,
+         And all you niggas hole your breafh,
+           And do de white folks brown!
+
+
+        "Den all de week will be as gay
+           As am de Chris'mas time;
+         We'll dance all night and all de day,
+           And make de banjo chime--
+         And make de banjo chime, I tink,
+           And pass de time away,
+         Wid 'nuf to eat and 'nuf to drink,
+           And not a bit to pay!
+         So shut your mouf as dose as deafh.
+         And all you niggas hole your breaf,
+           And make de banjo chime.
+
+        "Oh! make de banjo chime, you nigs,
+           And sound de tamborin,
+         And shuffle now de merry jigs,
+           For Massa's 'gwine in'--
+         For Massa's 'gwine in,' I know,
+           And won't he hab de shakes,
+         When Yankee darkies show him how
+           Dey cotch de rattle-snakes![A]
+         So shut your mouf as close as deafh,
+         And all you niggas hole your breaf,
+           For Massa's 'gwine in'--
+         For Massa's 'gwine in,' I know,
+           And won't he hab de shakes
+         When Yankee darkies show him how
+           Dey cotch de rattle-snakes!"
+
+The reader must not conclude that my darky acquaintance is an average
+specimen of his class. Far from it. Such instances of intelligence are
+very rare, and are never found except in the cities. There, constant
+intercourse with the white renders the black shrewd and intelligent, but
+on the plantations, the case is different. And besides, my musical
+friend, as I have said, is a native African. Fifteen years of
+observation have convinced me that the imported negro, after being
+brought in contact with the white, is far more intelligent than the
+ordinary Southern-born black. Slavery cramps the intellect and dwarfs
+the nature of a man, and where the dwarfing process has gone on, in
+father and son, for two centuries, it must surely be the case--as surely
+as that the qualities of the parent are transmitted to the child--that
+the later generations are below the first. This deterioration in the
+better nature of the slave is the saddest result of slavery. His moral
+and intellectual degradation, which is essential to its very existence,
+constitutes the true argument against it. It feeds the body but starves
+the soul. It blinds the reason, and shuts the mind to truth. It degrades
+and brutalizes the whole being, and does it purposely. In that lies its
+strength, and in that, too, lurks the weakness which will one day topple
+it down with a crash that will shake the Continent. Let us hope the
+direful upheaving, which is now felt throughout the Union, is the
+earthquake that will bury it forever.
+
+The sun was wheeling below the trees which skirted the western horizon,
+when we halted in the main road, abreast of one of those by-paths, which
+every traveller at the South recognizes as leading to a planter's
+house. Turning our horse's head, we pursued this path for a short
+distance, when emerging from the pine-forest, over whose sandy barrens
+we had ridden all the day, a broad plantation lay spread out before us.
+On one side was a row of perhaps forty small but neat cabins; and on the
+other, at the distance of about a third of a mile, a huge building,
+which, from the piles of timber near it, I saw was a lumber-mill. Before
+us was a smooth causeway, extending on for a quarter of a mile, and
+shaded by large live-oaks and pines, whose moss fell in graceful drapery
+from the gnarled branches. This led to the mansion of the proprietor, a
+large, antique structure, exhibiting the dingy appearance which all
+houses near the lowlands of the South derive from the climate, but with
+a generous, hospitable air about its wide doors and bulky windows, that
+seemed to invite the traveller to the rest and shelter within. I had
+stopped my horse, and was absorbed in contemplation of a scene as
+beautiful as it was new to me, when an old negro approached, and
+touching his hat, said: "Massa send his complimens to de gemman, and
+happy to hab him pass de night at Bucksville."
+
+"Bucks_ville_!" I exclaimed, "and where is the village?"
+
+"Dis am it, massa; and it am eight mile and a hard road to de 'Boro"
+(meaning Conwayboro, a one-horse village at which I had designed to
+spend the night). "Will de gemman please ride up to de piazza?"
+continued the old negro.
+
+"Yes, uncle, and thank you," and in a moment I had received the cordial
+welcome of the host, an elderly gentleman, whose easy and polished
+manners reminded me of the times of our grandfathers in glorious New
+England. A few minutes put me on a footing of friendly familiarity with
+him and his family, and I soon found myself in a circle of daughters and
+grandchildren, and as much at home as if I had been a long-expected
+guest.
+
+[Footnote A: The emblem of South Carolina.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+WAYSIDE HOSPITALITY.
+
+
+Years ago--how many it would not interest the reader to know, and might
+embarrass me to mention--accompanied by a young woman--a blue-eyed,
+golden-haired daughter of New-England--I set out on a long journey; a
+journey so long that it will not end till one or the other of us has
+laid off forever the habiliments of travel.
+
+One of the first stations on our route was--Paris. While there,
+strolling out one morning alone, accident directed my steps to the _Arc
+d'Etoile_, that magnificent memorial of the greatness of a great man.
+Ascending its gloomy staircase to the roof, I seated myself, to enjoy
+the fine view it affords of the city and its environs.
+
+I was shortly joined by a lady and gentleman, whose appearance indicated
+that they were Americans. Some casual remark led us into a conversation,
+and soon, to our mutual surprise and gratification, we learned that the
+lady was a dear and long-time friend of my travelling-companion. The
+acquaintance thus begun, has since grown into a close and abiding
+friendship.
+
+The reader, with this preamble, can readily imagine my pleasure on
+learning, as we were seated after our evening meal, around that pleasant
+fireside in far-off Carolina, that my Paris acquaintance was a favorite
+niece, or, as he warmly expressed it, "almost a daughter" of my host.
+This discovery dispelled any lingering feeling of "strangeness" that had
+not vanished with the first cordial greeting of my new-found friends,
+and made me perfectly "at home."
+
+The evening wore rapidly away in a free interchange of "news," opinions,
+and "small-talk," and I soon gathered somewhat of the history of my
+host. He was born at the North, and his career affords a striking
+illustration of the marvellous enterprise of our Northern character. A
+native of the State of Maine, he emigrated thence when a young man, and
+settled down, amid the pine-forest in that sequestered part of
+Cottondom. Erecting a small saw-mill, and a log shanty to shelter
+himself and a few "hired" negroes, he attacked, with his own hands, the
+mighty pines, whose brothers still tower in gloomy magnificence around
+his dwelling.
+
+From such beginnings he had risen to be one of the wealthiest land and
+slave owners of his district, with vessels trading to nearly every
+quarter of the globe, to the Northern and Eastern ports, Cadiz, the West
+Indies, South America, and if I remember aright, California. It seemed
+to me a marvel that this man, alone, and unaided by the usual appliances
+of commerce, had created a business, rivalling in extent the
+transactions of many a princely merchant of New York and Boston.
+
+His "family" of slaves numbered about three hundred, and a more healthy,
+and to all appearance, happy set of laboring people, I had never seen.
+Well fed, comfortably and almost neatly clad, with tidy and well-ordered
+homes, exempt from labor in childhood and advanced age, and cared for in
+sickness by a kind and considerate mistress, who is the physician and
+good Samaritan of the village, they seemed to share as much physical
+enjoyment as ordinarily falls to the lot of the "hewer of wood and
+drawer of water." Looking at them, I began to question if Slavery is, in
+reality, the damnable thing that some untravelled philanthropists have
+pictured it. If--and in that "_if_" my good Abolition friend, is the
+only unanswerable argument against the institution--if they were taught,
+if they knew their nature and their destiny, the slaves of such an owner
+might unprofitably exchange situations with many a white man, who, with
+nothing in the present or the future, is desperately struggling for a
+miserable hand-to-mouth existence in our Northern cities. I say "of such
+an owner," for in the Southern Arcadia such masters are "few and far
+between"--rather fewer and farther between than "spots upon the sun."
+
+But they are _not_ taught. Public sentiment, as well as State law,
+prevents the enlightened master, who would fit the slave by knowledge
+for greater usefulness, from letting a ray of light in upon his darkened
+mind. The black knows his task, his name, and his dinner-hour. He knows
+there is a something within him--he does not understand precisely
+what--that the white man calls his soul, which he is told will not rest
+in the ground when his body is laid away in the grave, but will--if he
+is a "good nigger," obeys his master, and does the task allotted
+him--travel off to some unknown region, and sing hallelujahs to the
+LORD, forever. He rather sensibly imagines that such everlasting singing
+may in time produce hoarseness, so he prepares his vocal organs for the
+long concert by a vigorous discipline while here, and at the same time
+cultivates instrumental music, having a dim idea that the LORD has an
+ear for melody, and will let him, when he is tired of singing, vary the
+exercise "wid de banjo and de bones." This is all he knows; and his
+owner, however well-disposed he may be, cannot teach him more. Noble,
+Christian masters whom I have met--have told me that they did not _dare_
+instruct their slaves. Some of their negroes were born in their houses,
+nursed in their families, and have grown up the playmates of their
+children, and yet they are forced to see them live and die like the
+brutes. One need not be accused of fanatical abolitionism if he deems
+such a system a _little_ in conflict with the spirit of the nineteenth
+century!
+
+The sun had scarcely turned his back upon the world, when a few drops of
+rain, sounding on the piazza-roof over our heads, announced a coming
+storm. Soon it burst upon us in magnificent fury--a real, old-fashioned
+thunderstorm, such as I used to lie awake and listen to when a boy,
+wondering all the while if the angels were keeping a Fourth of July in
+heaven. In the midst of it, when the earth and the sky appeared to have
+met in true Waterloo fashion, and the dark branches of the pines seemed
+writhing and tossing in a sea of flame, a loud knock came at the
+hall-door (bells are not the fashion in Dixie), and a servant soon
+ushered into the room a middle-aged, unassuming gentleman, whom my host
+received with a respect and cordiality which indicated that he was no
+ordinary guest. There was in his appearance and manner that indefinable
+something which denotes the man of mark; but my curiosity was soon
+gratified by an introduction. It was "Colonel" A----. This title, I
+afterward learned, was merely honorary: and I may as well remark here,
+that nearly every one at the South who has risen to the ownership of a
+negro, is either a captain, a major, or a colonel, or, as my ebony
+driver expressed it: "Dey'm all captins and mates, wid none to row de
+boat but de darkies." On hearing the name, I recognized it as that of
+one of the oldest and most aristocratic South Carolina families, and the
+new guest as a near relative to the gentleman who married the beautiful
+and ill-fated Theodosia Burr.
+
+In answer to an inquiry of my host, the new-comer explained that he had
+left Colonel J----'s (the plantation toward which I was journeying),
+shortly before noon, and being overtaken by the storm after leaving
+Conwayboro, had, at the solicitation of his "boys" (a familiar term for
+slaves), who were afraid to proceed, called to ask shelter for the
+night.
+
+Shortly after his entrance, the lady members of the family retired; and
+then the "Colonel," the "Captain," and myself, drawing our chairs near
+the fire, and each lighting a fragrant Havana, placed on the table by
+our host, fell into a long conversation, of which the following was a
+part:
+
+"It must have been urgent business, Colonel, that took you so far into
+the woods at this season," remarked our host.
+
+"These are urgent times, Captain B----," replied the guest. "All who
+have any thing at stake, should be _doing_."
+
+"These _are_ unhappy times, truly," said my friend; "has any thing new
+occurred?"
+
+"Nothing of moment, sir; but we are satisfied Buchanan is playing us
+false, and are preparing for the worst."
+
+"I should be sorry to know that a President of the United States had
+resorted to underhand measures! Has he really given you pledges?"
+
+"He promised to preserve the _statu quo_ in Charleston harbor, and we
+have direct information that he intends to send out reinforcements,"
+rejoined Colonel A----.
+
+"Can that be true? You know, Colonel, I never admired your friend, Mr.
+Buchanan, but I cannot see how, if he does his duty, he can avoid
+enforcing the laws in Charleston, as well as in the other cities of the
+Union."
+
+"The 'Union,' sir, does not exist. Buchanan has now no more right to
+quarter a soldier in South Carolina than I have to march an armed force
+on to Boston Common. If he persists in keeping troops near Charleston,
+we shall dislodge them."
+
+"But that would make war! and war, Colonel," replied our host, "would be
+a terrible thing. Do you realize what it would bring upon us? And what
+could our little State do in a conflict with nearly thirty millions?"
+
+"We should not fight with thirty millions. The other Cotton States are
+with us, and the leaders in the Border States are pledged to Secession.
+They will wheel into line when we give the word. But the North will not
+fight. The Democratic party sympathizes with us, and some of its
+influential leaders are pledged to our side. They will sow division
+there, and paralyze the Free States; besides, the trading and
+manufacturing classes will never consent to a war that will work their
+ruin. With the Yankees, sir, the dollar is almighty."
+
+"That may be true," replied our host; "but I think if we go too far,
+they will fight. What think you, Mr. K----?" he continued, appealing to
+me, and adding: "This gentleman, Colonel, is very recently from the
+North."
+
+Up to that moment, I had avoided taking part in the conversation. Enough
+had been said to satisfy me that while my host was a staunch
+Unionist,[B] his visitor was not only a rank Secessionist, but one of
+the leaders of the movement, and even then preparing for desperate
+measures. Discretion, therefore, counselled silence. To this direct
+appeal, however, I was forced to reply, and answered: "I think, sir, the
+North does not yet realize that the South is in earnest. When it wakes
+up to that fact, its course will be decisive."
+
+"Will the Yankees _fight_, sir?" rather impatiently and imperiously
+asked the Colonel, who evidently thought I intended to avoid a direct
+answer to the question.
+
+Rather nettled by his manner, I quickly responded: "Undoubtedly they
+will, sir. They have fought before, and it would not be wise to count
+them cowards."
+
+A true gentleman, he at once saw that his manner had given offence, and
+instantly moderating his tone, rather apologetically replied: "Not
+cowards, sir, but too much absorbed in the 'occupations of peace,' to go
+to war for an idea."
+
+"But what you call an 'idea,'" said our host, "_they_ may think a great
+fact on which their existence depends. _I_ can see that we will lose
+vastly by even a peaceful separation. Tell me, Colonel, what we will
+gain?"
+
+"Gain!" warmly responded the guest. "Everything! Security, freedom, room
+for the development of our institutions, and each progress in wealth as
+the world has never seen."
+
+"All that is very fine," rejoined the "Captain," "but where there is
+wealth, there must be work; and who will do the work in your new
+Empire--I do not mean the agricultural labor; you will depend for that,
+of coarse, on the blacks--but who will run your manufactories and do
+your mechanical labor? The Southern gentleman would feel degraded by
+such occupation; and if you put the black to any work requiring
+intelligence, you must let him _think_, and when he THINKS, _he is
+free_!"
+
+"All that is easily provided for," replied the Secessionist. "We shall
+form intimate relations with England. She must have our cotton, and we
+in return will take her manufactures."
+
+"That would be all very well at present, and so long as you should keep
+on good terms with her; but suppose, some fine morning, Exeter Hall got
+control of the English Government, and hinted to you, in John Bull
+fashion, that cotton produced by free labor would be more acceptable,
+what could three, or even eight millions, cut off from the sympathy and
+support of the North, do in opposition to the power of the British
+empire?"
+
+"Nothing, perhaps, if we _were_ three or even eight millions, but we
+shall be neither one nor the other. Mexico and Cuba are ready, now, to
+fall into our hands, and before two years have passed, with or without
+the Border States, we shall count twenty millions. Long before England
+is abolitionized, our population will outnumber hers, and our territory
+extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and as far south as the
+Isthmus. We are founding, sir, an empire that will be able to defy all
+Europe--one grander than the world has seen since the age of Pericles!"
+
+"You say, with or without the Border States," remarked our host. "I
+thought you counted on their support."
+
+"We do if the North makes war upon us, but if allowed to go in peace, we
+can do better without them. They will be a wall between us and the
+abolitionized North."
+
+"You mistake," I said, "in thinking the North is abolitionized. The
+Abolitionists are but a handful there. The great mass of our people are
+willing the South should have undisturbed control of its domestic
+concerns."
+
+"Why, then, do you send such men as Seward, Sumner, Wilson, and Grow to
+Congress? Why have you elected a President who approves of
+nigger-stealing? and why do you tolerate such incendiaries as Greeley,
+Garrison, and Phillips?"
+
+"Seward, and the others you name," I replied, "are not Abolitionists;
+neither does Lincoln approve of nigger-stealing. He is an honest man,
+and I doubt not, when inaugurated, will do exact justice by the South.
+As to incendiaries, you find them in both sections. Phillips and
+Garrison are only the opposite poles of Yancey and Wise."
+
+"Not so, sir; they are more. Phillips, Greeley, and Garrison create and
+control your public opinion. They are mighty powers, while Yancey and
+Wise have no influence whatever. Yancey is a mere bag-pipe; we play upon
+him, and like the music, but smile when he attempts to lead us. Wise is
+a harlequin; we let him dance because he is good at it, and it amuses
+us. Lincoln may be honest, but if made President he will be controlled
+by Seward, who hates the South. Seward will whine, and wheedle, and
+attempt to cajole us back, but mark what I say, sir, I _know_ him; he is
+physically, morally, and constitutionally a COWARD, and will never
+strike a blow for the UNION. If hard pressed by public sentiment, he
+may, to save appearances, bluster a little, and make a show of getting
+ready for a fight; but he will find some excuse at the last moment, and
+avoid coming to blows. For our purposes, we had rather have the North
+under his control than under that of the old renegade, Buchanan!"
+
+"All this may he very true," I replied, "but perhaps you attach too much
+weight to what Mr. Seward or Mr. Lincoln may or may not do. You seem to
+forget that there are twenty intelligent millions at the North, who will
+have something to say on this subject, and who may not consent to be
+driven into disunion by the South, or wheedled into it by Mr. Seward."
+
+"I do not forget," replied the Secessionist, "that you have four
+millions of brave, able-bodied men, while we have not, perhaps, more
+than two millions; but bear in mind that you are divided, and therefore
+weak; we united, and therefore strong!"
+
+"But," I inquired, "_have_ you two millions without counting your
+blacks; and are _they_ not as likely to fight on the wrong as on the
+right side?"
+
+"They will fight on the right side, sir. We can trust them. You have
+travelled somewhat here. Have you not been struck with the contentment
+and cheerful subjection of the slaves?"
+
+"No, sir, I have not been! On the contrary, their discontent is evident.
+You are smoking a cigar on a powder-barrel."
+
+An explosion of derisive laughter from the Colonel followed this remark,
+and turning to the Captain, he good-humoredly exclaimed: "Hasn't the
+gentleman used his eyes and ears industriously!"
+
+"I am afraid he is more than half right," was the reply. "If this thing
+should go on, I would not trust my own slaves, and I think they are
+truly attached to me. If the fire once breaks out, the negroes will rush
+into it, like horses into a burning barn."
+
+"Think you so!" exclaimed the Colonel in an excited manner. "By Heaven,
+if I believed it, I would cut the throat of every slave in Christendom!
+What," addressing me, "have you seen or heard, sir, that gives you that
+opinion?"
+
+"Nothing but a sullen discontent and an eagerness for news, which show
+they feel intense interest in what is going on, and know it concerns
+_them_."
+
+"I haven't remarked that," he said rather musingly, "but it _may_ be so.
+Does the North believe it? If we came to blows, would they try to excite
+servile insurrection among us?"
+
+"The North, beyond a doubt, believes it," I replied, "yet I think even
+the Abolitionists would aid you in putting down an insurrection; but
+war, in my opinion, would not leave you a slave between the Rio Grande
+and the Potomac."
+
+The Colonel at this rose, remarking: "You are mistaken. You are
+mistaken, sir!" then turning to our host, said: "Captain, it is late:
+had we not better retire?" Bidding me "good-night," he was gone.
+
+Our host soon returned from showing the guest to his apartment, and with
+a quiet but deliberate manner, said to me: "You touched him, Mr. K----,
+on a point where he knows we are weakest; but allow me to caution you
+about expressing your opinions so freely. The Colonel is a gentleman,
+and what you have said will do no harm, but, long as I have lived here,
+_I_ dare not say to many what you have said to him to-night."
+
+Thanking the worthy gentleman for the caution, I followed him up stairs,
+and soon lost, in a sweet oblivion, all thoughts of Abolitionists,
+niggers, and the "grand empire."
+
+I was awakened in the morning by music under my window, and looking out
+discovered about a dozen darkies gathered around my ebony driver, who
+was clawing away with all his might at a dilapidated banjo, while his
+auditory kept time to his singing, by striking the hand on the knee, and
+by other gesticulations too numerous to mention. The songs were not much
+to boast of, but the music was the genuine, dyed-in-the-wool, darky
+article. The following was the refrain of one of the songs, which the
+reader will perceive was an exhortation to early rising:
+
+        "So up, good massa, let's be gwoin',
+           Let's be scratchin' ob de grabble;
+         For soon de wind may be a blowin',
+           An' we'se a sorry road to trabble."
+
+The storm of the previous night had ceased, but the sky was overcast,
+and looked as if "soon de wind might be a-blowin'." Prudence counselled
+an early start, for, doubtless, the runs, or small creeks, had become
+swollen by the heavy rain, and would be unsafe to cross after dark.
+Besides, beyond Conwayboro, our route lay for thirty miles through a
+country without a solitary house where we could get decent shelter, were
+we overtaken by a storm.
+
+Hurriedly performing my toilet, I descended to the drawing-room, where I
+found the family assembled. After the usual morning salutations were
+exchanged, a signal from the mistress caused the sounding of a bell in
+the hall, and some ten or twelve men and women house-servants, of
+remarkably neat and tidy appearance, among whom was my darky driver,
+entered the apartment. They took a stand at the remote end of the room,
+and our host, opening a large, well-worn family BIBLE, read the
+fifty-fourth chapter of Isaiah. Then, all kneeling, he made a short
+extemporaneous petition, closing with the LORD'S Prayer; all present,
+black as well as white, joining in it. Then Heber's beautiful hymn,
+"From Greenland's icy mountains," was sung; the negroes, to my ear,
+making much better music than the whites.
+
+The services over, we adjourned to the dining-room, and after we were
+seated, the "Colonel" remarked to me: "Did you notice how finely that
+negro 'boy' (he was fully forty years old) sung?"
+
+"Yes," I replied, "I did. Do you know him, sir?"
+
+"Oh! yes, very well. His mistress wishes to sell him, but finds
+difficulty in doing so. Though a likely negro, people will not buy him.
+He's too smart."
+
+"That strikes me as a singular objection," I remarked.
+
+"Oh! no, not at all! These _knowing_ niggers frequently make a world of
+trouble on a plantation."
+
+It was after ten o'clock before we were ready to start. The mills, the
+negro-quarters, and various other parts of the plantation, and then
+several vessels moored at the wharf, had to be seen before I could get
+away. Finally, I bade my excellent host and his family farewell, and
+with nearly as much regret as I ever felt at leaving my own home. I had
+experienced the much-heard-of Southern hospitality, and had found the
+report far below the reality.
+
+The other guest had taken his leave some time before, but not till he
+had given me a cordial invitation to return by the way I came, and spend
+a day or two with him, at his plantation on the river, some twenty miles
+below.
+
+The sky was lowery, and the sandy road heavy with the recent rain, when
+we started. The gloomy weather seemed to have infected the driver as
+well as myself. He had lost the mirthfulness and loquacity of the
+previous day, and we rode on for a full hour in silence. Tiring at last
+of my own thoughts, I said to him: "Scip, what is the matter with you?
+what makes you so gloomy?"
+
+"Nuffin, massa; I war only tinkin'," he abstractedly replied.
+
+"And what are you thinking about?"
+
+"I's wond'rin', massa, if de LORD mean de darkies in dose words of HIS
+dat Massa B---- read dis mornin'."
+
+"What words do you mean?
+
+"Dese, massa: 'O dou 'fflicted! tossed wid de tempest, and habin no
+comfort, behold, I will make you hous'n ob de fair colors, and lay dar
+foundations wid safomires. All dy chil'ren shill be taught ob de LORD,
+and great shill be dar peace. In de right shill dey be 'stablished; dey
+shill hab no fear, no terror; it shan't come nigh 'em, and who come
+against dem shill fall. Behold! I hab make de blacksmif dat blow de
+coals, and make de weapons; and I hab make de waster dat shill destroy
+de oppressors.'"
+
+If he had repeated one of Webster's orations I could not have been more
+astonished. I did not remember the exact words of the passage, but I
+knew he had caught its spirit. Was this his recollection of the reading
+heard in the morning? or had he previously committed it to memory? These
+questions I asked myself; but, restraining my curiosity, I answered:
+"Undoubtedly they are meant for both the black and the white."
+
+"Do dey mean, massa, dat we shall be like de wite folks--wid our own
+hous'n, our chil'ren taught in de schools, and wid weapons to strike
+back when dey strike us?"
+
+"No, Scipio, they don't mean that. They refer principally to spiritual
+matters. They were a promise to _all the world_ that when the SAVIOUR
+came, all, even the greatly oppressed and afflicted, should hear the
+great truths of the BIBLE about GOD, REDEMPTION, and the FUTURE."
+
+"But de SAVIOUR hab come, massa; and dose tings an't taught to de black
+chil'ren. We hab no peace, no rights; nuffin but fear, 'pression, and
+terror."
+
+"That is true, Scipio. The LORD takes HIS own time, but HIS time will
+_surely_ come."
+
+"De LORD bless you, massa, for saying dat; and de LORD bless you for
+telling dat big Cunnel, dat if dey gwo to war de brack man will be
+FREE!"
+
+"Did you hear what we said?" I inquired, greatly surprised, for I
+remembered remarking, during the interview of the previous evening,
+that our host carefully kept the doors closed.
+
+"Ebery word, massa."
+
+"But how _could_ you hear? The doors and windows were shut. Where were
+you?"
+
+"On de piazzer; and when I seed fru de winder dat de ladies war gwine, I
+know'd you'd talk 'bout politics and de darkies--gemmen allers do. So I
+opened de winder bery softly--you didn't har 'cause it rained and blowed
+bery hard, and made a mighty noise. Den I stuffed my coat in de crack,
+so de wind could'nt blow in and lef you know I was dar, but I lef a hole
+big 'nough to har. My ear froze to dat hole, massa, bery tight, I 'shore
+you."
+
+"But you must have got very wet and very cold."
+
+"Wet, massa! wetter dan a 'gator dat's been in de riber all de week, but
+I didn't keer for de rain or de cold. What I hard made me warm all de
+way fru."
+
+To my mind there was a rough picture of true heroism in that poor darky
+standing for hours in his shirt-sleeves, in the cold, stormy night, the
+lightning playing about him, and the rain drenching him to the
+skin--that he might hear something he thought would benefit his
+down-trodden race.
+
+I noticed his clothing though bearing evident marks of a drenching, was
+then dry, and I inquired: "How did you dry your clothes?"
+
+"I staid wid some ob de cullud folks, and arter you gwoes up stars, I
+went to dar cabin, and dey gabe me some dry cloes. We made up a big
+fire, and hung mine up to dry, and de ole man and woman and me sot up
+all night and talked ober what you and de oder gemmen said."
+
+"Will not those folks tell what you did, and thus get you into trouble?"
+
+"Tell! LORD bless you, massa, _de bracks am all freemasons_; dat ar ole
+man and woman wud die 'fore dey'd tell."
+
+"But are not Captain B---'s negroes contented?" I asked; "they seem to
+be well treated."
+
+"Oh! yas, dey am. All de brack folks 'bout har want de Captin to buy
+'em. He bery nice man--one ob de LORD'S own people. He better man dan
+David, 'cause David did wrong, and I don't b'lieve de Captin eber did."
+
+"I should think he was a very good man," I replied.
+
+"Bery good man, massa, but de white folks don't like him, 'cause dey say
+he treats him darkies so well, all dairn am uncontented."
+
+"Tell me, Scipio," I resumed after a while, "how it is you can repeat
+that passage from Isaiah so well?"
+
+"Why, bless you, massa, I know Aziar and Job and de Psalms 'most all by
+heart. Good many years ago, when I lib'd in Charles'on, the gub'ness
+learned me to read, and I hab read dat BOOK fru good many times."
+
+"Have you read any others?" I asked.
+
+"None but dat and Doctor Watts. I hab _dem_, but wite folks wont sell
+books to de bracks, and I wont steal 'em. I read de papers sometimes."
+
+I opened my portmanteau, that lay on the floor of the wagon, and handed
+him a copy of Whittier's poems. It happened to be the only book,
+excepting the BIBLE, that I had with me.
+
+"Read that, Scipio," I said. "It is a book of poetry, but written by a
+good man at the North, who greatly pities the slave."
+
+He took the book, and the big tears rolled down his cheeks, as he said:
+"Tank you, massa, tank you. Nobody war neber so good to me afore."
+
+During our conversation, the sky, which had looked threatening all the
+morning, began to let fall the big drops of rain; and before we reached
+Conwayboro, it poured down much after the fashion of the previous night.
+It being cruelty to both man and beast to remain out in such a deluge,
+we pulled up at the village hotel (kept, like the one at Georgetown, by
+a lady), and determined to remain overnight, unless the rain should
+abate in time to allow us to reach our destination before dark.
+
+Dinner being ready soon after our arrival (the people of Conwayboro,
+like the "common folks" that Davy Crockett told about, dine at twelve),
+I sat down to it, first hanging my outer garments, which were somewhat
+wet, before the fire in the sitting-room. The house seemed to be a sort
+of public boarding-house, as well as hotel, for quite a number of
+persons, evidently town's-people were at the dinner-table. My appearance
+attracted some attention, though not more, I thought, than would be
+naturally excited in so quiet a place by the arrival of a stranger; but
+"as nobody said nothing to me, I said nothing to nobody."
+
+Dinner over, I adjourned to the "sitting-room," and seating myself by
+the fire, watched the drying of my "outer habiliments." While thus
+engaged, the door opened, and three men--whom I should have taken for
+South Carolina gentlemen, had not a further acquaintance convinced me to
+the contrary--entered the room. Walking directly up to where I was
+sitting, the foremost one accosted me something after this manner:
+
+"I see you are from the North, sir."
+
+Taken a little aback by the abruptness of the "salute," but guessing his
+object, I answered: "No, sir; I am from the South."
+
+"From what part of the South?"
+
+"I left Georgetown yesterday, and Charleston two days before that," I
+replied, endeavoring to seem entirely oblivious to his meaning.
+
+"We don't want to know whar you war yesterday; we want to know whar you
+_belong_," he said, with a little impatience.
+
+"Oh! that's it. Well, sir, I belong _here_ just at present, or rather I
+shall, when I have paid the landlady for my dinner."
+
+Annoyed by my coolness, and getting somewhat excited, he replied
+quickly: "You mustn't trifle with us, sir. We know you. You're from the
+North. We've seen it on your valise, and we can't allow a man who
+carries the New York _Independent_ to travel in South Carolina."
+
+The scoundrels had either broken into my portmanteau, or else a copy of
+that paper had dropped from it on to the floor of the wagon when I gave
+the book to Scipio. At any rate, they had seen it, and it was evident
+"Brother Beecher" was getting me into a scrape. I felt indignant at the
+impudence of the fellow, but determined to keep cool, and, a little
+sarcastically, replied to the latter part of his remark:
+
+"That's a pity, sir. South Carolina will lose by it."
+
+"This game wont work, sir. We don't want such people as you har, and the
+sooner you make tracks the better."
+
+"I intend to leave, sir, as soon as the rain is over, and shall travel
+thirty miles on your sandy roads to-day, if you don't coax me to stay
+here by your hospitality," I quietly replied.
+
+The last remark was just the one drop needed to make his wrath "bile
+over," and he savagely exclaimed: "I tell you, sir, we will not be
+trifled with. You must be off to Georgetown at once. You can have just
+half an hour to leave the Boro', not a second more."
+
+His tone and manner aroused what little combativeness there is in me.
+Rising from my chair, and taking up my outside-coat, in which was one of
+Colt's six-shooters, I said to him: "Sir, I am here, a peaceable man, on
+peaceable, private business. I have started to go up the country, and go
+there I shall; and I shall leave this place at my convenience--not
+before. I have endured your impertinence long enough, and shall have no
+more of it. If you attempt to interfere with my movements, you will do
+so at your peril."
+
+My blood was up, and I was fast losing that better part of valor called
+discretion; and _he_ evidently understood my movement, and did not
+dislike the turn affairs were taking. There is no telling what might
+have followed had not Scip just at that instant inserted his woolly head
+between us, excitedly exclaiming: "Lord bless you, Massa B----ll; what
+_am_ you 'bout? Why, dis gemman am a 'ticlar friend of Cunnel A----.
+He'm a reg'lar sesherner. He hates de ablisherners worser dan de debble.
+I hard him swar a clar, blue streak 'bout dem only yesterday."
+
+"Massa B----ll" was evidently taken aback by the announcement of the
+negro, but did not seem inclined to "give it up so" at once, for he
+asked: "How do you know he's the Colonel's friend, Scip? Who told you
+so?"
+
+"Who told me so?" exclaimed the excited negro, "why, didn't he stay at
+Captin B----'s, wid de Cunnel, all night last night; and didn't dey set
+up dar doin' politic business togedder till arter midnight? Didn't de
+Cunnel come dar in all de storm 'pressly to see dis gemman?"
+
+The ready wit and rude eloquence of the darky amused me, and the idea of
+the "Cunnel" travelling twenty miles through the terrible storm of the
+previous night to meet a man who had the New York _Independent_ about
+him, was so perfectly ludicrous, that I could not restrain my laughter.
+That laugh did the business for "Massa B----ll." What the negro had
+said staggered, but did not convince him; but my returning good-humor
+brought him completely round. Extending his hand to me, he said: "I see,
+sir, I've woke up the wrong passenger. Hope you'll take no offence. In
+these times we need to know who come among us."
+
+"No offence whatever, sir," I replied. "It is easy to be mistaken; but,"
+I added smilingly, "I hope, for the sake of the next traveller, you'll
+be less precipitate another time."
+
+"I _am_ rather hasty; that's a fact," he said. "But no harm is done. So
+let's take a drink, and say no more about it. The old lady har keeps
+nary a thing, but we can get the _raal stuff_ close by."
+
+Though not a member of a "Total Abstinence Society," I have always
+avoided indulging in the quality of fluid that is the staple beverage at
+the South. I therefore hesitated a moment before accepting the
+gentleman's invitation; but the alternative seemed to be squarely
+presented, pistols or drinks; cold lead or poor whiskey, and--I am
+ashamed to confess it--I took the whiskey.
+
+Returning to the hotel, I found Scip awaiting me. "Massa," he said, "we
+better be gwine. Dat dar sesherner am ugly as de bery ole debble; and
+soon as he knows I cum de possum ober him 'bout de Cunnel, he'll be
+down on you _shore_."
+
+The rain had dwindled to a drizzle, which the sun was vigorously
+struggling to get through with a tolerable prospect of success, and I
+concluded to take the African's advice. Wrapping myself in an
+India-rubber overcoat, and giving the darky a blanket of the same
+material, I started.
+
+[Footnote B: I very much regret to learn, that since my meeting with
+this most excellent gentleman, being obnoxious to the Secession leaders
+for his well-known Union sentiments, he has been very onerously assessed
+by them for contributions for carrying on the war. The sum he has been
+forced to pay, is stated as high as forty thousand dollars, but that may
+be, and I trust is, an exaggeration. In addition--and this fact is
+within my own knowledge--five of his vessels have been seized in the
+Northern ports by our Government. This exposure of true Union men to a
+double fire, is one of the most unhappy circumstances attendant upon
+this most unhappy war.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+CROSSING THE "RUNS."
+
+
+The long, tumble-down bridge which spans the Waccamaw at Conwayboro,
+trembled beneath our horse's tread, as with lengthened stride he shook
+the secession mud from his feet, and whirled us along into the dark,
+deep forest. It may have been the exhilaration of a hearty dinner of
+oats, or it may have been sympathy with the impatience of his
+fellow-travellers that spurred him on; whichever it was, away he went as
+if Lucifer--that first Secessionist--were following close at his heels.
+
+The sun, which for a time had been industriously wedging his way into
+the dark masses of cloud, finally slunk out of sight and left us
+enveloped in a thick fog, which shut from view all of Cottondom, except
+a narrow belting of rough pines, and a few rods of sandy road that
+stretched out in dim perspective before us. There being nothing in the
+outside creation to attract my attention, I drew the apron of the
+carriage about me, and settling myself well back on the seat to avoid
+the thick-falling mist, fell into a train of dreamy reflection.
+
+Niggers, slave-auctions, cotton-fields, rice-swamps, and King Cotton
+himself, that blustering old despot, with his swarthy arms and
+"under-pinning," his face of brass, and body of "raw material," passed
+through my mind, like Georgia trains through the Oconee Swamp, till
+finally my darky friend came into view. He seemed at first a little
+child, amid the blazing ruins of his wilderness home, gazing in stupid
+horror on the burning bodies of his father and his kindred. Then he was
+kneeling at the side of his dying mother in the slave-pen at Cape Lopez,
+and--still a child--cooped in the "Black-hole" of the accursed
+slave-ship, his little frame burning with the fever-fire, and his
+child-heart longing for death. Then he seemed mounting the Cuban
+slave-block, and as the "going! going! gone!" rung in my ear, he was
+hurried away, and driven to the cruel task--still a child--on the hot,
+unhealthy sugar-field. Again he appeared, stealing away at night to a
+lonely hut, and by the light of a pine-knot, wearily poring over the
+BOOK of BOOKS, slowly putting letters into words, and words into
+sentences, that he might know _"What God says to the black man."_ Then
+he seemed a man--splendid of frame, noble of soul--suspended in the
+whipping-rack, his arms bound above his head, his body resting on the
+tips of his toes, and the merciless lash falling on his bare back, till
+the red stream ran from it like a river--scourged because he would not
+aid in creating beings as wretched as himself, and make merchandise of
+his own blood to gorge the pocket of an incarnate white devil.
+
+As these things passed before me, and I thought of his rare
+intelligence, of his fine traits of character, and of the true heroism
+he had shown in risking, perhaps, his own life to get me--a
+stranger--out of an ugly hobble, I felt a certain spot in my left side
+warming toward him, very much as it might have done had his blood been
+as pure as my own. It seemed to me a pity--anti-Abolitionist and
+Southern-sympathizer though I was--that a man of such rare natural
+talent, such character and energy, should have his large nature dwarfed,
+be tethered for life to a cotton-stalk, and made to wear his soul out in
+a tread-mill, merely because his skin had a darker tinge and his shoe a
+longer heel than mine.
+
+As I mused over his "strange, eventful history," and thought of the
+handy way nature has of putting the _right_ man in the _wrong_ place, it
+occurred to me how "Brother Beecher" one evening, not a long time
+before, had charmed the last dollar from my waistcoat pocket by
+exhibiting, _a la_ Barnum, a remarkably ugly "cullud pusson" on his
+pulpit stairs, and by picturing the awful doom which awaited her--that
+of being reduced from baby-tending to some less useful employment--if
+his audience did not at once "do the needful." Then it occurred to me
+how much finer a spectacle my ebony friend would make; how well his six
+feet of manly sinew would grace those pulpit stairs; how eloquently the
+reverend gentleman might expatiate on the burning sin of shrouding the
+light of such an intellect in the mists of niggerdom, only to see it
+snuffed out in darkness; how he might enlarge on what the black could do
+in elevating his race, either as "cullud" assistant to "Brother Pease"
+at the Five-Points, or as co-laborer with Fred Douglass at abolition
+conventions, or, if that didn't _pay_, how, put into the minstrel
+business, he might run the white "troupes" off the track, and yield a
+liberal revenue to the "Cause of Freedom." As I thought of the probable
+effect of this last appeal, it seemed to me that the thing was already
+done, and that SCIP was FREE.
+
+I got back from dreamland by the simple act of opening my eyes, and
+found myself still riding along in that Jersey wagon, over that heavy,
+sandy road, and drenched with the mists of that dreary December day. The
+reverie made, however, a deep impression on me, and I gave vent to it
+somewhat as follows:
+
+"Colonel A---- tells me, Scip, that your mistress wants to sell you. Do
+you know what she asks?"
+
+"She ax fifteen hundred dollar, massa, but I an't worth dat now. Nigger
+property's mighty low."
+
+"What is your value now?"
+
+"P'raps eight hundred, p'raps a thousand dollar, massa."
+
+"Would your mistress take a thousand for you?"
+
+"Don't know, sar, but reckon she would. She'd be glad to get shut of me.
+She don't like me on de plantation, 'cause she say de oder darkies tink
+too much ob me; and she don't like me in de city, 'cause she 'fraid I
+run away."
+
+"Why afraid you'll runaway? Did you ever try to?"
+
+"Try to! LOR, massa, I neber taught ob such a ting--wouldn't
+gwo ef I could."
+
+"But wouldn't you?" I asked, thinking he had conscientious scruples
+about running away; "wouldn't you if you could buy yourself, and go
+honestly, as a _free_ man?"
+
+"Buy myself, sar!" he exclaimed in surprise; "buy _my own_ flesh and
+blood dat de LORD hissef gabe me! No, no! massa; I'd likes to be free,
+but I'd neber do _dat_!"
+
+"Why not do that?" I asked.
+
+"'Cause 't would be owning dat de white folks hab a right to de brack;
+and 'cause, sar, if I war free I couldn't stay har."
+
+"Why should you stay here? You have no wife nor child; why not go where
+the black man is respected and useful?"
+
+"I'se 'spected and useful har, massa. I hab no wife nor child, and dat
+make me feel, I s'pose, like as ef all de brack people war my chil'ren."
+
+"But they are not your children; and you can be of no service to them.
+At the North you might learn, and put your talents to some use."
+
+"Sar," he replied, a singular enthusiasm lighting up his face, "de LORD,
+dat make me what I ar, put me har, and I must stay. Sometimes when tings
+look bery brack, and I feel a'most 'scouraged, I goes to HIM, and I say,
+'LORD, I's ob no use, take me 'way; let me get fru wid dis; let me no
+more see de suffrin' and 'pression ob de pore cullud race;' den HE say
+to me, just so plain as I say it to you, 'Keep up good courage, Scipio,
+de time will come;'[C] and now, bless de LORD, de time am coming!"
+
+"_What_ time is coming, Scipio?"
+
+He gave me a quick, suspicious glance, but his face in a moment resumed
+its usual expression, as he replied: "I'se sure, massa, dat I could
+trust you. I feel you am my friend, but I can't say no more."
+
+"You need not, Scip--I can guess. What you have said is safe with me.
+But let me counsel you--wait for the white man. Do not let your freedom
+come in blood!"
+
+"It will come, massa, as de LORD will. When HE war freed _de earth
+shook, and de vail ob de temple war rent in twain_!"
+
+We said no more, but rode on in silence; the darky absorbed in his own
+reflections, I musing over the black volcano, whose muffled echoes I
+then heard "away down South in Dixie."
+
+We had ridden on for about an hour, when an opening in the trees
+disclosed a by-path, leading to a plantation. Following it for a short
+distance, we came upon a small clearing, in the midst of which, flanked
+by a ragged corn and potato patch, squatted a dilapidated, unpainted
+wooden building, a sort of "half-way house" between a hut and a shanty.
+In its door-way, seated on a chair which wanted one leg and a back, was
+a suit of linsey-woolsey, adorned by enormous metal buttons, and
+surmounted by a queer-looking headpiece that might have passed for
+either a hat or an umbrella. I was at a loss to determine whether the
+object were a human being or a scarecrow, when, at the sound of our
+approach, the umbrella-like article lifted, and a pair of sunken eyes, a
+nose, and an enormous beard, disclosed themselves. Addressing myself to
+the singular figure, I inquired how far we were from our destination,
+and the most direct route to it.
+
+"Wal, stranger," was the reply, "it's a right smart twenty mile to the
+Cunnel's, but I reckon ye'll get thar, if ye follow yer critter's nose,
+and ar good at swimming."
+
+"Why good at swimming?" I inquired.
+
+"'Cause the 'runs' have ris, and ar considerable deep by this time."
+
+"That's comforting news."
+
+"Yas, to a man as seems in a hurry," he replied, looking at my horse,
+which was covered with foam.
+
+"How far is it to the nearest run?" I asked.
+
+"Wal, it mought be six mile; it mought be seven, but you've one or two
+all-fired ones to cross arter that."
+
+Here was a pleasant predicament. It was nearly five o'clock, and our
+horse, though a noble animal, could not make the distance on an
+unobstructed route, in the then heavy state of the roads, in less than
+three hours. Long before that time it would be dark, and no doubt
+stormy, for the sky, which had lowered all the afternoon, every now and
+then uttered an ominous growl, and seemed ready to fall down upon us.
+But turning back was out of the question, so, thanking the "native," I
+was about to proceed, when he hailed me as follows:
+
+"I say, stranger, what's the talk in the city?"
+
+"Nothing, sir," I replied, "but fight and Secession."
+
+"D--n Secession!" was the decidedly energetic answer.
+
+"Why so, my friend? That doctrine seems to be popular hereabouts."
+
+"Yas, pop'lar with them South Car'lina chaps. They'd be oneasy in heaven
+if Gabriel was cook, and the LORD head-waiter."
+
+"They must be hard to suit," I said; "I 'kalkerlate' _you're_ not a
+South Carolinian."
+
+"No, sir-ee! not by several mile. My mother moved over the line to born
+me a decent individual."
+
+"But why are you for the Union, when your neighbors go the other way?"
+
+"'Cause it's allers carried us 'long as slick as a cart with new-greased
+wheels; and 'cause, stranger, my grand'ther was one of Marion's boys,
+and spilt a lettle claret at Yewtaw for the old consarn, and I reckon
+he'd be oneasy in his grave if I turned my back on it now."
+
+"But, my friend," I said, "they say Lincoln is an Abolitionist, and if
+inaugurated, he will free every darky you've got."
+
+"He can't do that, stranger, 'cordin' to the Constetution, and
+grand'ther used to say that ar dokermunt would hold the d--l himself;
+but, for my part, I'd like to see the niggers free."
+
+"See the niggers free!" I replied in undisguised astonishment; "why, my
+good sir, that is rank treason and abolition."
+
+"Call it what yer a mind to, them's my sentiments; but I say, stranger,
+if thar's ony thing on airth that I uttarly dispise it ar a Northern
+dough-face, and it's clar yer one on 'em."
+
+"There, my friend, you're mistaken. I'm neither an Abolitionist nor a
+dough-face. But _why_ do you go for freeing the niggers?"
+
+"'Cause the white folks would be better off. You see, I have to feed and
+clothe my niggers, and pay a hundred and twenty and a hundred and fifty
+a year for 'em, and if the niggers war free, they'd work for 'bout half
+that."
+
+Continuing the conversation, I learned that the umbrella-hatted
+gentleman worked twenty hired negroes in the gathering of turpentine;
+and that the district we were entering was occupied by persons in the
+same pursuit, who nearly all employed "hired hands," and entertained
+similar sentiments; Colonel J----, whom I was about to visit, and who
+was a large slave-_owner_, being about the only exception. This, the
+reader will please remember, was the state of things at the date of
+which I am writing, in the _very heart_ of Secessiondom.
+
+Bidding the turpentine-getter a rather reluctant "good-by," I rode on
+into the rain.
+
+It was nearly dark when we reached the first "run," but, fortunately, it
+was less swollen than our way-side acquaintance had represented, and we
+succeeded in crossing without difficulty. Hoping that the others might
+be equally as fordable, we pushed rapidly on, the darkness meanwhile
+gathering thickly about us, and the rain continuing to fall. Our way lay
+through an unbroken forest, and as the wind swept fiercely through it,
+the tall dark pines which towered on either side, moaned and sighed like
+a legion of unhappy spirits let loose from the dark abodes below.
+Occasionally we came upon a patch of woods where the turpentine-gatherer
+had been at work, and the white faces of the "tapped" trees, gleaming
+through the darkness, seemed an army of "sheeted ghosts" closing
+steadily around us. The darkness, the rain, and the hideous noises in
+the forest, called up unpleasant associations, and I inwardly determined
+to ask hospitality from the first human being, black or white, whom we
+should meet.
+
+We had ridden on for about an hour after dark, when suddenly our horse's
+feet plashed in the water, and he sank to his middle in a stream. My
+first thought was that we were in the second "run," but as he pushed
+slowly on, the water momentarily growing deeper, and spreading on either
+side as far as we could see, it flashed upon me that we had missed the
+road in the darkness, and were fairly launched into the Waccamaw river!
+Turning to the darky, who was then driving, I said quickly:
+
+"Scip, stop the horse. Where are we?"
+
+"Don't know, massa; reckon we'se in de riber."
+
+"A comfortable situation this. We can't turn round. The horse can't swim
+such a stream in harness. What shall we do?"
+
+"Can you swim, massa?" he quietly asked.
+
+"Yes, like an eel."
+
+"Wal, den, we'd better gwo on. De hoss'll swim. But, massa, you might
+take off your boots and overcoat, and be ready for a spring ef he gwo
+down."
+
+I did as he directed, while he let down the apron and top of the wagon,
+and fastened the reins loosely to the dash-board, saying as he did so,
+"You must allers gib a hoss his head when he swim, massa; if you rein
+him, he gwo down, shore." Then, undoing a portion of the harness, to
+give the horse the free use of his legs, he shouted, "Gee up, ole Gray,"
+and we started.
+
+The noble animal stepped off slowly and cautiously, as if fully aware of
+the danger of the passage, but had proceeded only about fifty yards when
+he lost his footing, and plunged us into an entirely new and decidedly
+cold hip-bath. "Now's de time, ole Gray," "show your broughten up, ole
+boy," "let de gemman see you swim, ole feller," and similar remarks
+proceeded rapidly from the darky, who all the time avoided touching the
+reins.
+
+It may have been one minute, it may have been five minutes--I took "no
+note of _time_"--before the horse again struck bottom, and halted from
+sheer exhaustion, the water still almost level with his back, and the
+opposite bank too far-off to be seen through the darkness. After a short
+rest, he again "breasted the waters," and in a few moments landed us on
+the shore; not, unfortunately, in the road, but in the midst of the
+pine-trees, there so entangled with under-growth, that not even a man,
+much less a horse, could make his way through them. Wet to the skin, and
+shivering with the cold, we had no time to lose "in gittin' out of dat,"
+if we would avoid greater dangers than those we had escaped. So,
+springing from the wagon, the darky waded up the stream, near its bank,
+to reconnoitre. Returning in a few minutes, he reported that we were
+about a hundred yards below the road. We had been carried that far down
+stream by the strength of the current. Our only course was to follow the
+"run" up along its bank; this we did, and in a short time had the
+satisfaction of striking the high road. Arranging the harness, we were
+soon under way again, the horse bounding along as if he felt the
+necessity of vigorous exercise to restore his chilled circulation. We
+afterward learned that it was not the Waccamaw we had crossed, but the
+second "run" our native friend had told us of, and that the water in the
+middle of its stream was fifteen feet deep!
+
+Half-dead with cold and wet, we hurried on, but still no welcome light
+beckoned us to a human habitation. The darkness grew denser till we
+could not even distinguish the road, much less our horse's nose, which
+we had been directed to follow. Inwardly cursing the folly which
+brought me into such a wilderness, I said to the darky:
+
+"Scip, I'm sorry I took you on such a trip as this."
+
+"Oh! neber mind me, massa; I ruther like de dark night and de storm."
+
+"Like the night and the storm! why so?"
+
+"'Cause den de wild spirits come out, and talk in de trees. Dey make me
+feel bery strong _har_," he replied, striking his hand on his breast.
+
+"The night and the storm, Scip, make _me_ feel like cultivating another
+sort of _spirits_. There are some in the wagon-box; suppose we stop and
+see what they are."
+
+We stopped, and I took out a small willow-flask, which held the "spirits
+of Otard," and offered it to the darky.
+
+"No, massa," he said, laughing, "I neber touch dem sort ob spirits; dey
+raise de bery ole deble."
+
+Not heeding the darky's example, I took "a long and a strong pull,"
+and--felt the better for it.
+
+Again we rode on, and again and again I "communed with the spirits,"
+till a sudden exclamation from Scip aroused me from the half-stupor into
+which I was falling. "What's the matter?" I asked.
+
+"A light, massa, a light!"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Dar, way off in de trees--"
+
+"Sure enough, glory, hallelujah, there it is! We're all right now,
+Scip."
+
+We rode on till we came to the inevitable opening in the trees, and were
+soon at the door of what I saw, by the light which came through the
+crevices in the logs, was a one-story shanty, about twenty feet square.
+"Will you let us come in out of de rain?" asked Scip of a
+wretched-looking, half-clad, dirt-bedraggled woman, who thrust her head
+from the doorway.
+
+"Who ar ye?" was the reply.
+
+"Only massa and me, and de hoss, and we'm half dead wid de cold,"
+replied Scip; "can we cum in out ob de rain?"
+
+"Wal, strangers," replied the woman, eyeing us as closely as the
+darkness would permit, "you'll find mighty poor fixins har, but I reckon
+ye can come in."
+
+[Footnote C: The Southern blacks, like all ignorant people, are intensely
+fanatical on religious subjects. The most trifling occurrences have to
+their minds a hidden significance, and they believe the LORD speaks to
+them in signs and dreams, and in almost every event of nature. This
+superstition, which has been handed down from their savage ancestry, has
+absolute sway over them, and one readily sees what immense power it
+would give to some leading, adroit mind, that knew how to use it. By
+means of it they might be led to the most desperate deeds, fully
+believing all the while that they were "led ob de LORD."]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+POOR WHITES.
+
+
+Entering the house, we saw, by the light of a blazing pile of
+pine-knots, which roared and crackled on the hearth, that it contained
+only a single apartment. In front of the fire-place, which occupied the
+better half of one side of this room, the floor was of the bare earth,
+littered over with pine chips, dead cinders, live coals, broken pots,
+and a lazy spaniel dog. Opposite to this, at the other end of the room,
+were two low beds, which looked as if they had been "slept in forever,
+and never made up." Against the wall, between the beds and the
+fire-place, stood a small pine table, and on it was a large wooden bowl,
+from whose mouth protruded the handles of several unwashed pewter
+spoons. On the right of the fire was a razeed rocking-chair, evidently
+the peculiar property of the mistress of the mansion, and three blocks
+of pine log, sawn off smoothly, and made to serve for seats. Over
+against these towered a high-backed settle, something like that on which
+
+                    "sot Huldy all alone,
+        When Zeke peeked thru the winder;"
+
+and on it, her head resting partly on her arm, partly on the end of the
+settle, one small, bare foot pressing the ground, the other, with the
+part of the person which is supposed to require stockings, extended in a
+horizontal direction--reclined, not Huldy, but her Southern cousin, who,
+I will wager, was decidedly the prettier and dirtier of the two. Our
+entrance did not seem to disconcert her in the least, for she lay there
+as unmoved as a marble statue, her large black eyes riveted on my face,
+as if seeing some nondescript animal for the first time. I stood for a
+moment transfixed with admiration. In a somewhat extensive observation
+of her sex in both hemispheres, I had never witnessed such a form, such
+eyes, such faultless features, and such wavy, black, luxuriant hair. A
+glance at her dress--a soiled, greasy, grayish linsey-woolsey gown,
+apparently her only garment--and a second look at her face, which, on
+closer inspection, had precisely the hue of a tallow candle, recalled me
+to myself, and allowed me to complete the survey of the premises.
+
+The house was built of unhewn logs, separated by wide interstices,
+through which the cold air came, in decidedly fresh if not health-giving
+currents, while a large rent in the roof, that let in the rain, gave the
+inmates an excellent opportunity for indulging in a shower-bath, of
+which they seemed greatly in need. The chimney, which had intruded a
+couple of feet into the room, as if to keep out of the cold, and
+threatened momentarily to tumble down, was of sticks, built up in clay,
+while the windows were of thick, unplaned boards.
+
+Two pretty girls, one of perhaps ten and the other of fourteen years,
+evidently sisters of the unadorned beauty, the middle-aged woman
+who had admitted us, and the dog--the only male member of the
+household--composed the family. I had seen negro cabins, but these
+people were whites, and these whites were _South Carolinians_. When such
+counterparts of the feudal serfs still exist, who will say that the days
+of chivalry are over!
+
+After I had seated myself by the fire, and the driver had gone out to
+stow the horse away under the tumble-down shed at the back of the house,
+the elder woman said to me--
+
+"Reckon yer wet. Ben in the rain!"
+
+"Yes, madam, we've been out most of the day, and got in the river below
+here."
+
+"Did ye? Ye mean the 'run.' I reckon it's right deep now."
+
+"Yes, our horse had to swim," I replied.
+
+"Ye orter strip and put on dry cloes to onst."
+
+"Thank you, madam, I will."
+
+Going to my portmanteau, which the darky had placed near the door, I
+found it dripping with wet, and opening it I discovered that every
+article had undergone the rite of immersion.
+
+"Every thing is thoroughly soaked, madam. I shall have to dry myself by
+your fire. Can you get me a cup of tea?"
+
+"Right sorry, stranger, but I can't. Haint a morsel to eat or drink in
+the house."
+
+Remembering that our excellent hostess of the night before had insisted
+on filling the wagon-box with a quantity of "chicken fixins," to serve
+us in an emergency, and that my brandy flask was in my India-rubber
+coat, I sent Scip out for them.
+
+The stores disclosed boiled chicken, bacon, sandwiches, sweet potatoes,
+short cake, corn-bread, buttered waffles, and 'common doin's' too
+numerous to mention, enough to last a family of one for a fortnight, but
+all completely saturated with water. Wet or dry, however, the provisions
+were a godsend to the half-starved family, and their hearts seemed to
+open to me with amazing rapidity. The dog got up and wagged his tail,
+and even the marble-like beauty rose from her reclining posture and
+invited me to a seat with her on the bench.
+
+The kettle was soon steaming over the fire, and the boiling water, mixed
+with a little brandy, served as a capital substitute for tea. After the
+chicken was recooked, and the other edibles "warmed up," the little pine
+table was brought out, and I learned--what I had before suspected--that
+the big wooden bowl and the half dozen pewter spoons were the only
+"crockery" the family possessed.
+
+I declined the proffered seat at the table, the cooking utensils being
+any thing but inviting, and contented myself with the brandy and water;
+but, forgetting for a moment his color, I motioned to the darky--who was
+as wet and jaded, and much more hungry than I was--to take the place
+offered to me. The negro did not seem inclined to do so, but the woman,
+observing my gesture, yelled out, her eyes flashing with anger:
+
+"No, sar! No darkies eats with us. Hope you don't reckon _yerself_ no
+better than a good-for-nothin', no account nigger!"
+
+"I beg your pardon, madam; I intended no offence. Scipio has served me
+very faithfully for two days, and is very tired and hungry. I forgot
+myself."
+
+This mollified the lady, and she replied:
+
+"Niggers is good enuff in thar place, but warn't meant to 'sociate with
+white folks."
+
+There may have been some ground for a distinction in that case; there
+certainly was a difference between the specimens of the two races then
+before me; but, not being one of the chivalry, it struck me that the
+odds were on the side of the black man. The whites were shiftless,
+ragged, and starving; the black well clad, cleanly, energetic, and as
+much above the others in intellect as Jupiter is above a church steeple.
+To be sure, color was against him, and he was, after all, a servant in
+the land of chivalry and of servant-owners. Of course the woman was
+right.
+
+She soon resumed the conversation with this remark:
+
+"Reckon yer a stranger in these parts; whar d'ye come from?"
+
+"From New York, madam."
+
+"New York! whar's that?"
+
+"It's a city at the North."
+
+"Oh! yas; I've heern tell on it: that's whar the Cunnel sells his
+turpentime. Quite a place, arnt it?"
+
+"Yes, quite a place. Something larger than all South Carolina."
+
+"What d'ye say? Larger nor South Carolina. Kinder reckon tain't, is't?"
+
+"Yes, madam, it is."
+
+"Du tell! 'Taint so large as Charles'n, is't?"
+
+"Yes, twenty times larger than Charleston."
+
+"Lord o'massy! How does all the folks live thar?"
+
+"Live quite as well as they do here."
+
+"Ye don't have no niggers thar, does ye?"
+
+"Yes, but none that are slaves."
+
+"Have Ablisherners thar, don't ye? them people that go agin the South?"
+
+"Yes, some of them."
+
+"What do they go agin the South for?"
+
+"They go for freeing the slaves. Some of them think a black man as good
+as a white one."
+
+"Quar, that; yer an Ablisherner, arnt ye?"
+
+"No, I'm an old-fashioned Whig."
+
+"What's that? Never heerd on them afore."
+
+"An old-fashioned Whig, madam, is a man whose political principles are
+perfect, and who is as perfect as his principles."
+
+That was a "stumper" for the poor woman, who evidently did not
+understand one-half of the sentence.
+
+"Right sort of folks, them," she said, in a half inquiring tone.
+
+"Yes, but they're all dead now."
+
+"Dead?"
+
+"Yes, dead, beyond the hope of resurrection."
+
+"Iv'e heern all the dead war to be resurrected. Didn't ye say ye war one
+on 'em? _Ye_ aint dead yet," said the woman, chuckling at having
+cornered me.
+
+"But I'm more than _half_ dead just now."
+
+"Ah," replied the woman, still laughing, "yer a chicken."
+
+"A chicken! what's that?"
+
+"A thing that goes on tu legs, and karkles," was the ready reply.
+
+"Ah, my dear madam, you can out-talk me."
+
+"Yas, I reckon I kin outrun ye, tu. Ye arnt over rugged." Then, after a
+pause, she added--"What d'ye 'lect that darky, Linkum, President for?"
+
+"I didn't elect him. _I_ voted for Douglas. But Lincoln is not a darky."
+
+"He's a mullater, then; I've heern he war," she replied.
+
+"No, he's not a mulatto; he's a rail-splitter."
+
+"Rail-splitter? _Then he's a nigger, shore._"
+
+"No, madam; white men at the North split rails."
+
+"An' white wimmin tu, p'raps," said the woman, with a contemptuous toss
+of the head.
+
+"No, they don't," I replied, "but white women _work_ there."
+
+"White wimmin work thar!" chimed in the hitherto speechless beauty,
+showing a set of teeth of the exact color of her skin--_yaller_. "What
+du the' du?"
+
+"Some of them attend in stores, some set type, some teach school, and
+some work in factories."
+
+"Du tell! Dress nice, and make money?"
+
+"Yes," I replied, "they make money, and dress like fine ladies; in fact,
+_are_ fine ladies. I know one young woman, of about your age, that had
+to get her own education, who earns a thousand dollars a year by
+teaching, and I've heard of many factory-girls who support their
+parents, and lay by a great deal of money, by working in the mills."
+
+"Wal!" replied the young woman, with a contemptuous curl of her
+matchless upper lip; "schule-marms arn't fine ladies; fine ladies don't
+work; only niggers works _har_. I reckon I'd rather be 'spectable than
+work for a livin'."
+
+I could but think how magnificently the lips of some of our glorious
+Yankee girls would have curled had they have heard that remark, and have
+seen the poor girl that made it, with her torn, worn, greasy dress; her
+bare, dirty legs and feet, and her arms, neck, and face so thickly
+encrusted with a layer of clayey mud that there was danger of
+hydrophobia if she went near a wash-tub. Restraining my involuntary
+disgust, I replied:
+
+"We at the North think work is respectable. We do not look down on a man
+or a woman for earning their daily bread. We all work."
+
+"Yas, and that's the why ye'r all sech cowards," said the old woman.
+
+"Cowards!" I said; "who tells you that?"
+
+"My old man; he says one on our _boys_ can lick five of your Yankee
+_men_."
+
+"Perhaps so. Is your husband away from home?"
+
+"Yas, him and our Cal. ar down to Charles'n."
+
+"Cal. is your son, is he?"
+
+"Yas, he's my oldest, and a likely lad he ar tu--he's twenty-one, and
+his name are JOHN CAL'OUN MILLS. He's gone a troopin' it with his
+fader."
+
+"What, both gone and left you ladies here alone?"
+
+"Yas, the Cunnel sed every man orter go, and they warn't to be ahind the
+rest. The Cunnel--Cunnel J.--looks arter us while they is away."
+
+"But I should think the Colonel looked after you poorly--giving you
+nothing to eat."
+
+"Oh! it's ben sech a storm to-day, the gals couldn't go for the vittles,
+though 'tain't a great way. We'r on his plantation; this house is
+his'n."
+
+This last was agreeable news, and it occurred to me that if we were so
+near the Colonel's we might push on, in spite of the storm, and get
+there that night; so I said:
+
+"Indeed; I'm going to the Colonel's. How far is his house from here?"
+
+"A right smart six mile; it's at the Cross roads. Ye know the Cunnel, du
+ye?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I know him well. If his home is not more than six miles off, I
+think we had better go on to-night. What do you say, Scip?"
+
+"I reckon we'd better gwo, massa," replied the darky, who had spread my
+travelling-shawl in the chimney-corner, and was seated on it, drying his
+clothes.
+
+"Ye'd better not," said the woman; "ye'd better stay har; thar's a right
+smart run twixt har and the Cunnel's, and 'tain't safe to cross arter
+dark."
+
+"If that is so we'd better stay, Scip; don't you think so?" I said to
+the darky.
+
+"Jess as you say, massa. We got fru wid de oder one, and I reckon taint
+no wuss nor dat."
+
+"The bridge ar carried away, and ye'll hev to swim _shore_," said the
+woman. "Ye'd better stay."
+
+"Thank you, madam, I think we will," I replied, after a moment's
+thought; "our horse has swum one of your creeks to-night, and I dare not
+try another."
+
+Having taken off my coat, I had been standing, during the greater part
+of this conversation, in my shirt-sleeves before the fire, turning round
+occasionally to facilitate the drying process, and taking every now and
+then a sip from the gourd containing our brandy and water; aided in the
+latter exercise by the old woman and the eldest girl, who indulged quite
+as freely as I did.
+
+"Mighty good brandy that," at last said the woman. "Ye like brandy,
+don't ye?"
+
+"Not very much, madam. I take it to-night because I've been exposed to
+the storm, and it stimulates the circulation. But Scip, here, don't like
+spirits. He'll get the rheumatism because he don't."
+
+"Don't like dem sort of sperits, massa; but rumatics neber trubble me."
+
+"But I've got it mighty bad," said the woman, "_and I take 'em whenever
+I kin get 'em_."
+
+I rather thought she did, but I "reckoned" her principal beverage was
+whiskey.
+
+"You have the rheumatism, madam, because your house is so open; a
+draught of air is always unhealthy."
+
+"I allers reckoned 'twar _healthy_," she replied. "Ye Yankee folks have
+quar notions."
+
+I looked at my watch, and found it was nearly ten o'clock, and, feeling
+very tired, said to the hostess:
+
+"Where do you mean we shall sleep?"
+
+"Ye can take that ar bed," pointing to the one nearer the wall, "the
+darky can sleep har;" motioning to the settle on which she was seated.
+
+"But where will you and your daughters sleep? I don't wish to turn you
+out of your beds."
+
+"Oh! don't ye keer for us; we kin all bunk together; dun it afore. Like
+to turn in now?"
+
+"Yes, thank you, I would;" and without more ceremony I adjourned to the
+further part of the room, and commenced disrobing. Doffing my boots,
+waistcoat, and cravat, and placing my watch and purse under the pillow,
+I gave a moment's thought to what a certain not very old lady, whom I
+had left at home, might say when she heard of my lodging with a
+grass-widow and three young girls, and sprang into bed. There I removed
+my under-mentionables, which were still too damp to sleep in, and in
+about two minutes and thirty seconds sunk into oblivion.
+
+A few streaks of grayish light were beginning to creep through the
+crevices in the logs, when a movement at the foot of the bed awakened
+me, and glancing downward I beheld the youngest girl emerging from under
+the clothes at my feet. She had slept there, "cross-wise," all night. A
+stir in the adjoining bed soon warned me that the other feminines were
+preparing to follow her example; so, turning my face to the wall, I
+feigned to be sleeping. Their toilet was soon made, when they quietly
+left Scip and myself in possession of the premises.
+
+The darky rose as soon as they were gone, and, coming to me, said:
+
+"Massa, we'd better be gwine. I'se got your cloes all dry, and you can
+rig up and breakfust at de Cunnel's."
+
+The storm had cleared away, and the sun was struggling to get through
+the distant pines, when Scip brought the horse to the door, and we
+prepared to start. Turning to the old woman, I said:
+
+"I feel greatly obliged to you, madam, for the shelter you have given
+us, and would like to make you some recompense for your trouble. Please
+to tell me what I shall pay you."
+
+"Wal, stranger, we don't gin'rally take in lodgers, but seein' as how as
+thar ar tu on ye, and ye've had a good night on it, I don't keer if ye
+pay me tu dollars."
+
+That struck me as "rather steep" for "common doin's," particularly as we
+had furnished the food and "the drinks;" yet, saying nothing, I handed
+her a two-dollar bank-note. She took it, and held it up curiously to the
+sun for a moment, then handed it back, saying, "I don't know nuthin'
+'bout that ar sort o' money; haint you got no silver?"
+
+I fumbled in my pocket a moment, and found a quarter-eagle, which I gave
+her.
+
+"Haint got nary a fip o' change," she said, as she took it.
+
+"Oh! never mind the change, madam; I shall want to stop and _look_ at
+you when I return," I replied, good-humoredly.
+
+"Ha! ha! yer a chicken," said the woman, at the same time giving me a
+gentle poke in the ribs. Fearing she might, in the exuberance of her joy
+at the sight of the money, proceed to some more decided demonstration of
+affection, I hastily stepped into the wagon, bade her good-by, and was
+off.
+
+We were still among the pines, which towered gigantically all around us,
+but were no longer alone. Every tree was scarified for turpentine, and
+the forest was alive with negro men and women gathering the "last
+dipping," or clearing away the stumps and underbrush preparatory to the
+spring work. It was Christmas week; but, as I afterward learned, the
+Colonel's negroes were accustomed to doing "half tasks" at that season,
+being paid for their labor as if they were free. They stopped their work
+as we rode by, and stared at us with a stupid, half-frightened
+curiosity, very much like the look of a cow when a railway train is
+passing. It needed but little observation to convince me that their
+_status_ was but one step above the level of the brutes.
+
+As we rode along I said to the driver, "Scip, what did you think of our
+lodgings?"
+
+"Mighty pore, massa. Niggas lib better'n dat."
+
+"Yes," I replied, "but these folks despise you blacks; they seem to be
+both poor and proud."
+
+"Yas, massa, dey'm pore 'cause dey wont work, and dey'm proud 'cause
+dey'r white. Dey wont work 'cause dey see de darky slaves doin' it, and
+tink it am beneaf white folks to do as de darkies do. Dis habin' slaves
+keeps dis hull country pore."
+
+"Who told you that?" I asked, astonished at hearing a remark showing so
+much reflection from a negro.
+
+"Nobody, massa; I see it myseff."
+
+"Are there many of these poor whites around Georgetown?"
+
+"Not many 'round Georgetown, sar, but great many in de up-country har,
+and dey'm all 'like--pore and no account; none ob 'em kin read, and dey
+all eat clay."
+
+"Eat clay!" I said; "what do you mean by that?"
+
+"Didn't you see, massa, how yaller all dem wimmin war? Dat's 'cause dey
+eat clay. De little children begin 'fore dey kin walk, and dey eat it
+till dey die; dey chaw it like 'backer. It makes all dar stumacs big,
+like as you seed 'em, and spiles dar 'gestion. It'm mighty onhealfy."
+
+"Can it be possible that human beings do such things! The brutes
+wouldn't do that."
+
+"No, massa, but _dey_ do it; dey'm pore trash. Dat's what de big folks
+call 'em, and it am true; dey'm long way lower down dan de darkies."
+
+By this time we had arrived at the "run." We found the bridge carried
+away, as the woman had told us; but its abutments were still standing,
+and over these planks had been laid, which afforded a safe crossing for
+foot-passengers. To reach these planks, however, it was necessary to
+wade into the stream for full fifty yards, the "run" having overflowed
+its banks for that distance on either side of the bridge. The water was
+evidently receding, but, as we could not well wait, like the man in the
+fable, for it all to run by, we alighted, and counselled as to the best
+mode of making the passage.
+
+Scip proposed that he should wade in to the first abutment, ascertain
+the depth of the stream, and then, if it was not too deep for the horse
+to ford to that point, drive that far, get out, and walk to the end of
+the planking, leading the horse, and then again mount the wagon at the
+further end of the bridge. We were sure the horse would have to swim in
+the middle of the current, and perhaps for a considerable distance
+beyond; but, having witnessed his proficiency in aquatic performances,
+we had no doubt he would get safely across.
+
+The darky's plan was decided on, and divesting himself of his trowsers,
+he waded into the "run" to take the soundings.
+
+While he was in the water my attention was attracted to a printed paper,
+posted on one of the pines near the roadside. Going up to it, I read as
+follows:
+
+     "$250 REWARD.
+
+     "Ran away from the subscriber, on Monday, November 12th, his
+     mulatto man, SAM. Said boy is stout-built, five feet nine inches
+     high, 31 years old, weighs 170 lbs., and walks very erect, and with
+     a quick, rapid gait. The American flag is tattooed on his right arm
+     above the elbow. There is a knife-cut over the bridge of his nose,
+     a fresh bullet-wound in his left thigh, and his back bears marks of
+     a recent whipping. He is supposed to have made his way back to
+     Dinwiddie County, Va., where he was raised, or to be lurking in the
+     swamps in this vicinity.
+
+     "The above reward will be paid for his confinement in any jail in
+     North or South Carolina, or Virginia, or for his delivery to the
+     subscriber on his plantation at ----.
+
+     "----, December 2, 1860."
+
+The name signed to this hand-bill was that of the planter I was about to
+visit.
+
+Scip having returned, and reported the stream fordable to the bridge, I
+said to him, pointing to the "notice:"
+
+"Read that, Scip."
+
+He read it, but made no remark.
+
+"What does it mean--that fresh bullet wound, and the marks of a recent
+whipping?" I asked.
+
+"It mean, massa, dat de darky hab run away, and ben took; and dat when
+dey took him dey shot him, and flogged him arter dat. Now, he hab run
+away agin. De Cunnel's mighty hard on his niggas!"
+
+"Is he? I can scarcely believe that."
+
+"He am, massa; but he arnt so much to blame, nuther; dey'm awful bad,
+most ob 'em--so dey say."
+
+Our conversation was here interrupted by our reaching the bridge. After
+safely "walking the plank," and making our way to the opposite bank, I
+resumed it by asking:
+
+"Why are the Colonel's negroes so particularly bad?"
+
+"'Cause, you see, massa, de turpentime business hab made great profits
+for sum yars now, and de Cunnel hab been gettin' rich bery fass. He put
+all his money, jes so fass as he make it, into darkies, so to make more;
+for he's got bery big plantation, and need nuffin' but darkies to work
+it to make money jess like a gold mine. He goes up to Virginny to buy
+niggas; and up dar _now_ dey don't sell none less dey'm bad uns, 'cep
+when sum massa die or git pore. Virginny darkies dat cum down har aint
+gin'rally ob much account. Dey'm either kinder good-for-nuffin, or dey'm
+ugly; and de Cunnel'd ruther hab de ugly dan de no-account niggas."
+
+"How many negroes has he?"
+
+"'Bout two hundred, men and wimmin, I b'lieve, massa."
+
+"It can't be pleasant for his family to remain in such an out-of-the-way
+place, with so bad a gang of negroes about them, and no white people
+near."
+
+"No, massa, not in dese times; but de missus and de young lady arnt dar
+now."
+
+"Not there now? The Colonel said nothing to me about that. Are you
+sure?"
+
+"Oh yas, massa; I seed 'em gwo off on de boat to Charles'n most two
+weeks ago. Dey don't mean to cum back till tings am more settled; dey'm
+'fraid to stay dar."
+
+"Would it be safe for the Colonel there, if a disturbance broke out
+among the slaves."
+
+"'T wouldn't be safe den anywhar, sar; but de Cunnel am a bery brave
+man. He'm better dan twenty of _his_ niggas."
+
+"Why better than twenty of _his_ niggers?"
+
+"'Cause dem ugly niggas am gin'rally cowards. De darky dat is quiet,
+'spectful, and does his duty, am de brave sort; _dey'll_ fight, massa,
+till dey'm cut down."
+
+We had here reached a turn in the road, and passing it, came suddenly
+upon a coach, attached to which were a pair of magnificent grays, driven
+by a darky in livery.
+
+"Hallo, dar!" said Scip to the driver, as we came nearly abreast of the
+carriage. "Am you Cunnel J----'s man?"
+
+"Yas, I is dat," replied the darky.
+
+At this moment a woolly head, which I recognized at once as that of the
+Colonel's man "Jim," was thrust from the window of the vehicle.
+
+"Hallo, Jim," I said. "How do you do? I'm glad to see you."
+
+"Lor bress me, Massa K----, am dat you?" exclaimed the astonished negro,
+hastily opening the door, and coming to me. "Whar _did_ you cum from?
+I'se mighty glad to see you;" at the same time giving my hand a hearty
+shaking. I must here say, in justice to the reputation of South
+Carolina, that no respectable Carolinian refuses to shake hands with a
+black man, unless--the black happens to be free.
+
+"I thought I wouldn't wait for you," I replied. "But how did you expect
+to get on? the 'runs' have swollen into rivers."
+
+"We got a 'flat' made for dis one--it's down by dis time--de oders we
+tought we'd get ober sumhow."
+
+"Jim, this is Scip," I said, seeing the darkies took no notice of each
+other.
+
+"How d'ye do, Scip_io?_" said Jim, extending his hand to him. A look of
+singular intelligence passed over the faces of the two negroes as their
+hands met; it vanished in an instant, and was so slight that none but a
+close observer would have detected it, but some words that Scip had
+previously let drop had put me on the alert, and I felt sure it had a
+hidden significance.
+
+"Wont you get into de carriage, massa?" inquired Jim.
+
+"No, thank you, Jim. I'll ride on with Scip. Our horse is jaded, and you
+had better go ahead."
+
+Jim mounted the driver's seat, turned the carriage, and drove off at a
+brisk pace to announce our coming at the plantation, while Scip and I
+rode on at a slower gait.
+
+"Scip, did you know Jim before?" I asked.
+
+"Hab seed him afore, massa, but neber know'd him."
+
+"How is it that you have lived in Georgetown five years, and have not
+known him?"
+
+"I cud hab know'd him, massa, good many time, ef I'd liked, but darkies
+hab to be careful."
+
+"Careful of what?"
+
+"Careful ob who dey knows; good many bad niggas 'bout."
+
+"Pshaw, Scip, you're 'coming de possum'; there isn't a better nigger
+than Jim in all South Carolina. I know him well."
+
+"P'raps he am; reckon he _am_ a good 'nuff nigga."
+
+"Good enough nigga, Scip! Why, I tell you he's a splendid fellow; just
+as true as steel. He's been North with the Colonel, often, and the
+Abolitionists have tried to get him away; he knew he could go, but
+wouldn't budge an inch."
+
+"I knew he wouldn't," said the darky, a pleasurable gleam passing
+through his eyes; "dat sort don't run; dey face de music!"
+
+"Why don't they run? What do you mean by facing the music?"
+
+"Nuffin' massa--only dey'd rather stay har."
+
+"Come, Scip, you've played this game long enough. Tell me, now, what
+that look you gave each other when you shook hands meant."
+
+"What look, massa? Oh! I s'pose 'twar 'cause we'd both _heerd_ ob each
+oder afore."
+
+"'Twas more than that, Scip. Be frank; you know you can trust _me_."
+
+"Wal, den, massa," he replied hesitatingly, adding, after a short pause,
+"de ole woman called you a Yankee, sar--you can guess."
+
+"If I should guess, 't would be that it meant _mischief_."
+
+"It don't mean mischief, sar," said the darky, with a tone and air that
+would not have disgraced a Cabinet officer; "it mean only RIGHT and
+JUSTICE."
+
+"It means that there is some secret understanding between you."
+
+"I toled you, massa," he replied, relapsing into his usual manner, "dat
+de blacks am all Freemasons. I gabe Jim de grip, and he knowd me. He'd
+ha knowd my name ef you hadn't toled him."
+
+"Why would he have known your name?"
+
+"'Cause I gabe de grip, dat tole him."
+
+"Why did he call you Scip_io_? I called you _Scip_."
+
+"Oh! de darkies all do dat. Nobody but de white folks call me _Scip_. I
+can't say no more, massa; I SHUD BREAK DE OATH EF I DID!"
+
+"You have said enough to satisfy me that there is a secret league among
+the blacks, and that you are a leader in it. Now, I tell you, you'll get
+yourself into a scrape. I've taken a liking to you, Scip, and I should
+be _very sorry_ to see you run yourself into danger."
+
+"I tank you, massa, from de bottom ob my soul I tank you," he said, as
+the tears moistened his eyes. "You bery kind, massa; it do me good to
+talk wid you. But what am my life wuth? What am any _slave's_ life wuth?
+_Ef you war me you'd do like me!_"
+
+I could not deny it, and I made no reply.
+
+The writer is aware that he is here making an important statement, and
+one that may be called in question by those persons who are accustomed
+to regard the Southern blacks as only reasoning brutes. The great mass
+of them _are_ but a little above the brutes in their habits and
+instincts, but a large body are fully on a par, except in mere
+book-education, with their white masters.
+
+The conversation above recorded is, _verbatim et literatim_, TRUE. It
+took place at the time indicated, and was taken down, as were other
+conversations recorded in this book, within twenty-four hours after its
+occurrence. The name and the locality, only, I have, for very evident
+reasons, disguised.
+
+From this conversation, together with others, held with the same negro,
+and from after developments made to me at various places, and at
+different times, extending over a period of six weeks, I became
+acquainted with the fact that there exists among the blacks a secret and
+wide-spread organization of a Masonic character, having its grip,
+pass-word, and oath. It has various grades of leaders, who are
+competent and _earnest_ men, and its ultimate object is FREEDOM. It is
+quite as secret and wide-spread as the order of the "Knights of the
+Golden Circle," the kindred league among the whites.
+
+This latter organization, which was instituted by John C. Calhoun,
+William L. Porcher, and others, as far back as 1835, has for its sole
+object the dissolution of the Union, and the establishment of a Southern
+Empire--Empire is the word, not Confederacy, or Republic; and it was
+solely by means of its secret but powerful machinery that the Southern
+States were plunged into revolution, in defiance of the will of a
+majority of their voting population.
+
+Nearly every man of influence at the South (and many a pretended Union
+man at the North) is a member of this organization, and sworn, under the
+penalty of assassination, to labor "in season and out of season, by fair
+means and by foul, at all times, and all occasions," for the
+accomplishment of its object. The blacks are bound together by a similar
+oath, and only _bide their time_.
+
+The knowledge of the real state of political affairs which the negroes
+have acquired through this organization is astonishingly accurate; their
+leaders possess every essential of leadership--except, it may be,
+military skill--and they are fully able to cope with the whites.
+
+The negro whom I call Scipio, on the day when Major Anderson evacuated
+Fort Moultrie, and before he or I knew of that event, which set all
+South Carolina in a blaze, foretold to me the breaking out of this war
+in Charleston harbor, and as confidently predicted that it would result
+in the freedom of the slaves!
+
+The fact of this organization existing is not positively known (for the
+black is more subtle and crafty than any thing human), but it is
+suspected by many of the whites, the more moderate of whom are disposed
+to ward off the impending blow by some system of gradual
+emancipation--declaring all black children born after a certain date
+free--or by some other action that will pacify and keep down the slaves.
+These persons, however, are but a small minority, and possess no
+political power, and the South is rushing blindly on to a catastrophe,
+which, if not averted by the action of our government, will make the
+horrors of San Domingo and the French Revolution grow pale in history.
+
+I say the action of our government, for with it rests the
+responsibility. What the black wants is freedom. Give him that, and he
+will have no incentive to insurrection. If emancipation is proclaimed at
+the head of our armies--emancipation for _all_--confiscation for the
+slaves of rebels, compensation for the slaves of loyal citizens--the
+blacks will rush to the aid of our troops, the avenging angel will pass
+over the homes of the many true and loyal men who are still left at the
+South, and the thunderbolts of this war will fall only--where they
+should fall--on the heads of its blood-stained authors. If this is not
+done, after we have put down the whites we shall have to meet the
+blacks, and after we have waded knee-deep in the blood of both, we
+shall end the war where it began, but with the South desolated by fire
+and sword, the North impoverished and loaded down with an everlasting
+debt, and our once proud, happy, and glorious country the by-word and
+scorn of the civilized world.
+
+Slavery is the very bones, marrow, and life-blood of this rebellion, and
+it cannot be crushed till we have destroyed that accursed institution.
+If a miserable peace is patched up before a death-stroke is given to
+slavery, it will gather new strength, and drive freedom from this
+country forever. In the nature of things it cannot exist in the same
+hemisphere with liberty. Then let every man who loves his country
+determine that if this war must needs last for twenty years, it shall
+not end until this root of all our political evils is weeded out
+forever.
+
+A short half-hour took us to the plantation, where I found the Colonel
+on the piazza awaiting me. After our greeting was over, noticing my
+soiled and rather dilapidated condition, he inquired where I had passed
+the night. I told him, when he burst into a hearty fit of laughter, and
+for several days good-naturedly bantered me about "putting up" at the
+most aristocratic hotel in South Carolina--the "Mills House."
+
+We soon entered the mansion, and the reader will, I trust, pardon me, if
+I leave him standing in its door-way till another chapter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+ON THE PLANTATION.
+
+
+The last chapter left the reader in the door-way of the Colonel's
+mansion. Before entering, we will linger there awhile and survey the
+outside of the premises.
+
+The house stands where two roads meet, and, unlike most planters'
+dwellings, is located in full view of the highway. It is a rambling,
+disjointed structure, thrown together with no regard to architectural
+rules, and yet there is a rude harmony in its very irregularities that
+has a pleasing effect. The main edifice, with a frontage of nearly
+eighty feet, is only one and a half stories high, and is overshadowed by
+a broad projecting roof, which somehow, though in a very natural way,
+drops down at the eaves, and forms the covering of a piazza, twenty feet
+wide, and extending across the entire front of the house. At its
+south-easterly angle, the roof is truncated, and made again to form a
+covering for the piazza, which there extends along a line of irregular
+buildings for sixty yards. A portion of the verandah on this side being
+enclosed, forms a bowling-alley and smoking-room, two essential
+appendages to a planter's residence. The whole structure is covered with
+yellow-pine weather boarding, which in some former age was covered with
+paint of a grayish brown color. This, in many places, has peeled off
+and allowed the sap to ooze from the pine, leaving every here and there
+large blotches on the surface, somewhat resembling the "warts" I have
+seen on the trunks of old trees.
+
+The house is encircled by grand old pines, whose tall, upright stems,
+soaring eighty and ninety feet in the air, make the low hamlet seem
+lower by the contrast. They have stood there for centuries, their rough,
+shaggy coats buttoned close to their chins, and their long green locks
+waving in the wind; but the long knife has been thrust into their veins,
+and their life-blood is now fast oozing away.
+
+With the exception of the negro huts, which are scattered at irregular
+intervals through the woods in the rear of the mansion, there is not a
+human habitation within an hour's ride; but such a cosy, inviting,
+hospitable atmosphere surrounds the whole place, that a stranger does
+not realize he has happened upon it in a wilderness.
+
+The interior of the dwelling is in keeping with the exterior, though in
+the drawing-rooms, where rich furniture and fine paintings actually
+lumber the apartments, there is evident the lack of a nice perception of
+the "fitness of things," and over the whole hangs a "dusty air," which
+reminds one that the Milesian Bridget does not "flourish" in South
+Carolina.
+
+I was met in the entrance-way by a tall, fine-looking woman, to whom the
+Colonel introduced me as follows:
+
+"Mr. K----, this is Madam P----, my housekeeper; she will try to make
+you forget that Mrs. J---- is absent."
+
+After a few customary courtesies were exchanged, I was shown to a
+dressing-room, and with the aid of Jim, a razor, and one of the
+Colonel's shirts--all of mine having undergone a drenching--soon made a
+tolerably presentable appearance. The negro then conducted me to the
+breakfast-room, where I found the family assembled.
+
+It consisted, besides the housekeeper, of a tall, raw-boned,
+sandy-haired personage, with a low brow, a blear eye, and a sneaking
+look--the overseer of the plantation; and of a well-mannered,
+intelligent lad--with the peculiarly erect carriage and uncommon
+blending of good-natured ease and dignity which distinguished my
+host--who was introduced to me as the housekeeper's son.
+
+Madam P----, who presided over the "tea-things," was a person of perhaps
+thirty-five, but a rich olive complexion, enlivened by a delicate red
+tint, and relieved by thick masses of black hair, made her appear to a
+casual observer several years younger. Her face bore vestiges of great
+beauty, which time, and, perhaps, care, had mellowed but not
+obliterated, and her conversation indicated high cultivation. She had
+evidently mingled in refined society in this country and in Europe, and
+it was a strange freak of fortune that had reduced her to a menial
+condition in the family of a backwoods planter.
+
+After some general conversation, the Colonel remarked that his wife and
+daughter would pass the winter in Charleston.
+
+"And do _you_ remain on the plantation?" I inquired.
+
+"Oh yes, I am needed here," he replied; "but Madam's son is with my
+family."
+
+"Madam's son!" I exclaimed in astonishment, forgetting in my surprise
+that the lady was present.
+
+"Yes, sir," she remarked, "my oldest boy is twenty."
+
+"Excuse me, Madam; I forgot that in your climate one never grows old."
+
+"There you are wrong, sir; I'm sure I _feel_ old when I think how soon
+my boys will be men."
+
+"Not old yet, Alice," said the Colonel, in a singularly familiar tone;
+"you seem to me no older than when you were fifteen."
+
+"You have been long acquainted," I remarked, not knowing exactly what to
+say.
+
+"Oh, yes," replied my host, "we were children together."
+
+"Your Southern country, Madam, affords a fine field for young men of
+enterprise."
+
+"My eldest son resides in Germany," replied the lady. "He expects to
+make that country his home. He would have passed his examination at
+Heidelberg this autumn had not circumstances called him here."
+
+"You are widely separated," I replied.
+
+"Yes, sir; his father thinks it best, and I suppose it is. Thomas,
+here, is to return with his brother, and I may live to see neither of
+them again."
+
+My curiosity was naturally much excited to learn more, but nothing
+further being volunteered, and the conversation soon turning to other
+topics, I left the table with it unsatisfied.
+
+After enjoying a quiet hour with the Colonel in the smoking-room, he
+invited me to join him in a ride over the plantation. I gladly assented,
+and Jim shortly announced the horses were in waiting. That darky, who
+invariably attended his master when the latter proceeded from home,
+accompanied us. As we were mounting I bethought me of Scip, and asked
+where he was.
+
+"He'm gwine to gwo, massa, and want to say good-by to you."
+
+It seemed madness for Scip to start on a journey of seventy miles
+without rest, so I requested the Colonel to let him remain till the next
+day. He cheerfully assented, and sent Jim to find him. While waiting for
+the darky, I spoke of how faithfully he had served me during my journey.
+
+"He's a splendid nigger," replied the Colonel; "worth his weight in
+gold. If affairs were more settled I would buy him."
+
+"But Colonel A---- tells me he is too intelligent. He objects to
+'knowing' niggers."
+
+"_I_ do not," replied my host, "if they are honest, and I would trust
+Scip with uncounted gold. Look at him," he continued, as the negro
+approached; "were flesh and bones ever better put together?"
+
+The darky _was_ a fine specimen of sable humanity, and I readily
+understood why the practiced eye of the Colonel appreciated his physical
+developments.
+
+"Scip," I said, "you must not think of going to-day; the Colonel will be
+glad to let you remain until you are fully rested."
+
+"Tank you, massa, tank you bery much, but de ole man will spec' me, and
+I orter gwo."
+
+"Oh, never mind old----," said the Colonel, "I'll take care of him."
+
+"Tank you, Cunnel, den I'll stay har till de mornin'."
+
+Taking a by-path which led through the forest in the rear of the
+mansion, we soon reached a small stream, and, following its course for a
+short distance, came upon a turpentine distillery, which the Colonel
+explained to me was one of three that prepared the product of his
+plantation for market, and provided for his family of nearly three
+hundred souls.
+
+It was enclosed, or rather roofed, by a rude structure of rough boards,
+which was open at the sides, and sustained on a number of pine poles
+about thirty feet in height, and bore a strong resemblance to the usual
+covering of a New England haystack.
+
+Three stout negro men, divested of all clothing excepting a pair of
+coarse gray trowsers and a red shirt--it was a raw, cold, wintry
+day--and with cotton bandannas bound about their heads, were "tending
+the still." The foreman stood on a raised platform level with its top,
+but as we approached very quietly seated himself on a turpentine barrel
+which a moment before he had rolled over the mouth of the boiler.
+Another negro was below, feeding the fire with "light wood," and a third
+was tending the trough by which the liquid rosin found its way into the
+semicircle of rough barrels intended for its reception.
+
+"Hello, Junius, what in creation are you doing there?" asked the
+Colonel, as we approached, of the negro on the turpentine barrel.
+
+"Holein' her down, Cunnel; de ole ting got a mine to blow up dis
+mornin'; I'se got dis barrl up har to hole her down."
+
+"Why, you everlasting nigger, if the top leaks you'll be blown to
+eternity in half a second."
+
+"Reckon not, massa; be barrl and me kin hole her. We'll take de risk."
+
+"Perhaps _you_ will," said the Colonel, laughing, "but I wont. Nigger
+property isn't of much account, but you're too good a darky, June, to be
+sent to the devil for a charge of turpentine."
+
+"Tank you, massa, but you dun kno' dis ole ting like I do. You cudn't
+blow her up nohow; I'se tried her afore dis way."
+
+"Don't you do it again; now mind; if you do I'll make a white man of
+you." (This I suppose referred to a process of flaying with a whip;
+though the whip is generally thought to _redden_, not _whiten_, the
+negro.)
+
+The black did not seem at all alarmed, for he showed his ivories in a
+broad grin as he replied, "Jess as you say, massa; you'se de boss in dis
+shanty."
+
+Directing the fire to be raked out, and the still to stand unused until
+it was repaired, the Colonel turned his horse to go, when he observed
+that the third negro was shoeless, and his feet chapped and swollen with
+the cold. "Jake," he said, "where are your shoes?"
+
+"Wored out, massa."
+
+"Worn out! Why haven't you been to me?"
+
+"'Cause, massa, I know'd you'd jaw; you tole me I wears 'em out mighty
+fass."
+
+"Well, you do, that's a fact; but go to Madam and get a pair; and you,
+June, you've been a decent nigger, you can ask for a dress for Rosy. How
+is little June?"
+
+"Mighty pore, massa; de ma'am war dar lass night and dis mornin', and
+she reckun he'm gwine to gwo, sartain."
+
+"Sorry to hear that," said the Colonel. "I'll go and see him. Don't feel
+badly, June," he continued, for the tears welled up to the eyes of the
+black man as he spoke of his child; "we all must die."
+
+"I knows dat, massa, but it am hard to hab 'em gwo."
+
+"Yes, it is, June, but we may save him."
+
+"Ef you cud, massa! Oh, ef you cud!" and the poor darky covered his face
+with his great hands and sobbed like a child.
+
+We rode on to another "still," and there dismounting, the Colonel
+explained to me the process of gathering and manufacturing turpentine.
+The trees are "boxed" and "tapped" early in the year, while the frost is
+still in the ground. "Boxing" is the process of scooping a cavity in the
+trunk of the tree by means of a peculiarly shaped axe, made for the
+purpose; "tapping" is scarifying the rind of the wood above the boxes.
+This is never done until the trees have been worked one season, but it
+is then repeated year after year, till on many plantations they present
+the marks of twenty and frequently thirty annual "tappings," and are
+often denuded of bark for a distance of thirty feet from the ground. The
+necessity for this annual tapping arises from the fact that the scar on
+the trunk heals at the end of a season, and the sap will no longer run
+from it; a fresh wound is therefore made each spring. The sap flows down
+the scarified surface and collects in the boxes, which are emptied six
+or eight times in a year, according to the length of the season. This is
+the process of "dipping," and it is done with a tin or iron vessel
+constructed to fit the cavity in the tree.
+
+The turpentine gathered from the newly boxed or virgin tree is very
+valuable, on account of its producing a peculiarly clear and white
+rosin, which is used in the manufacture of the finer kinds of soap, and
+by "Rosin the Bow." It commands, ordinarily, nearly five times the price
+of the common article. When barrelled, the turpentine is frequently sent
+to market in its crude state, but more often is distilled on the
+plantation, the gatherers generally possessing means sufficient to own
+a still.
+
+In the process of distilling, the crude turpentine is "dumped" into the
+boiler through an opening in the top--the same as that on which we saw
+Junius composedly seated--water is then poured upon it, the aperture
+made tight by screwing down the cover and packing it with clay, a fire
+built underneath, and when the heat reaches several hundred degrees
+Fahrenheit, the process of manufacture begins. The volatile and more
+valuable part of the turpentine, by the action of the heat, rises as
+vapor, then condensing flows off through a pipe in the top of the still,
+and comes out spirits of turpentine, while the heavier portion finds
+vent at a lower aperture, and comes out rosin.
+
+No article of commerce is so liable to waste and leakage as turpentine.
+The spirits can only be preserved in tin cans, or in thoroughly seasoned
+oak barrels, made tight by a coating of glue on the inner side. Though
+the material for these barrels exists at the South in luxuriant
+abundance, they are all procured from the North, and the closing of the
+Southern ports has now entirely cut off the supply; for while the
+turpentine farmer may improvise coopers, he can by no process give the
+oak timber the seasoning which is needed to render the barrel
+spirit-tight. Hence it is certain that a large portion of the last crop
+of turpentine must have gone to waste. When it is remembered that the
+one State of North Carolina exports annually nearly twenty millions in
+value of this product, and employs fully two-thirds of its negroes in
+its production, it will be seen how dearly the South is paying for the
+mad freak of secession. Putting out of view his actual loss of produce,
+how does the turpentine farmer feed and employ his negroes? and pressed
+as these blacks inevitably are by both hunger and idleness, those
+prolific breeders of sedition, what will keep them quiet?
+
+"What effect will secession have on your business?" I asked the Colonel,
+after a while.
+
+"A favorable one. I shall ship my crop direct to Liverpool and London,
+instead of selling it to New York middle-men."
+
+"But is not the larger portion of the turpentine crop consumed at the
+North?"
+
+"Oh, yes. We shall have to deal with the Yankees anyhow, but we shall do
+as little with them as possible."
+
+"Suppose the Yankees object to your setting up by yourselves, and put
+your ports under lock and key?"
+
+"They wont do that, and if they do, England will break the blockade."
+
+"We may rap John Bull over the knuckles in that event," I replied.
+
+"Well, suppose you do; what then?"
+
+"Merely, England would not have a ship in six months to carry your
+cotton. A war with her would ruin the shipping trade of the North. Our
+marine would seek employment at privateering, and soon sweep every
+British merchant ship from the ocean. We could afford to give up ten
+years' trade with you, and to put secession down by force, for the sake
+of a year's brush with John Bull."
+
+"But, my good friend, where would the British navy be all this while?"
+
+"Asleep. The English haven't a steamer that can catch a Brookhaven
+schooner. The last war proved that government vessels are no match for
+privateers."
+
+"Well, well! but the Yankees wont fight."
+
+"Suppose they do. Suppose they shut up your ports, and leave you with
+your cotton and turpentine unsold? You raise scarcely any thing
+else--what would you eat?"
+
+"We would turn our cotton fields into corn and wheat. Turpentine-makers,
+of course, would suffer."
+
+"Then why are not _you_ a Union man?"
+
+"My friend, I have nearly three hundred mouths to feed. I depend on the
+sale of my crop to give them food. If our ports are closed, I cannot do
+it--they will starve, and I be ruined. But sooner than submit to the
+domination of the cursed Yankees, I will see my negroes starving, and my
+child a beggar!"
+
+At this point in the conversation we arrived at the negro shanty where
+the sick child was. Dismounting, the Colonel and I entered.
+
+The cabin was almost a counterpart of the "Mills House," described in
+the previous chapter, but it had a plank flooring, and was scrupulously
+neat and clean. The logs were stripped of bark, and whitewashed. A
+bright, cheerful fire was blazing on the hearth, and an air of rude
+comfort pervaded the whole interior. On a low bed in the farther corner
+of the room lay the sick child. He was a boy of about twelve years, and
+evidently in the last stages of consumption. By his side, bending over
+him as if to catch his almost inaudible words, sat a tidy,
+youthful-looking colored woman, his mother, and the wife of the negro we
+had met at the "still." Playing on the floor, was a younger child,
+perhaps five years old, but while the faces of the mother and the sick
+lad were of the hue of charcoal, _his_ skin by a process well understood
+at the South, had been bleached to a bright yellow.
+
+The woman took no notice of our entrance, but the little fellow ran to
+the Colonel and caught hold of the skirts of his coat in a free-and-easy
+way, saying, "Ole massa, you got suffin' for Dicky?"
+
+"No, you little nig," replied the Colonel, patting his woolly head as I
+might have done a white child's, "Dicky isn't a good boy."
+
+"Yas, I is," said the little darky; "you'se ugly ole massa to gib
+nuffin' to Dick."
+
+Aroused by the Colonel's voice, the woman turned toward us. Her eyes
+were swollen, and her face bore traces of deep emotion.
+
+"Oh massa!" she said, "de chile am dyin'! It'm all along ob his workin'
+in de swamp--no _man_ orter work dar, let alone a chile like dis."
+
+"Do you think he is dying, Rosy?" asked the Colonel, approaching the
+bed-side.
+
+"Shore, massa, he'm gwine fass. Look at 'im."
+
+The boy had dwindled to a skeleton, and the skin lay on his face in
+crimpled folds, like a mask of black crape. His eyes were fixed, and he
+was evidently going.
+
+"Don't you know massa, my boy?" said the Colonel, taking his hand
+tenderly in his.
+
+The child's lips slightly moved, but I could hear no sound. The Colonel
+put his ear down to him for a moment, then, turning to me, said:
+
+"He _is_ dying. Will you be so good as to step to the house and ask
+Madam P---- here, and please tell Jim to go for Junius and the old man."
+
+I returned in a short while with the lady, but found the boy's father
+and "the old man"--the darky preacher of the plantation--there before
+us. The preacher was a venerable old negro, much bowed by years, and
+with thin wool as white as snow. When we entered, he was bending over
+the dying boy, but shortly turning to my host, said:
+
+"Massa, de blessed Lord am callin' for de chile--shall we pray?"
+
+The Colonel nodded assent, and we all, blacks and whites, knelt down on
+the floor, while the old preacher made a short, heart-touching prayer.
+It was a simple, humble acknowledgment of the dependence of the creature
+on the Creator--of His right to give and to take away, and was uttered
+in a free, conversational tone, as if long communion with his Maker had
+placed the old negro on a footing of friendly familiarity with Him, and
+given the black slave the right to talk with the Deity as one man talks
+with another.
+
+As we rose from our knees my host said to me, "It is _my_ duty to stay
+here, but I will not detain _you_. Jim will show you over the
+plantation. I will join you at the house when this is over." The scene
+was a painful one, and I gladly availed myself of the Colonel's
+suggestion.
+
+Mounting our horses, Jim and I rode off to the negro house where Scip
+was staying.
+
+Scip was not at the cabin, and the old negro woman told us he had been
+away for several hours.
+
+"Reckon he'll be 'way all day, sar," said Jim, as we turned our horses
+to go.
+
+"He ought to be resting against the ride of to-morrow. Where has he
+gone?"
+
+"Dunno, sar, but reckon he'm gwine to fine Sam."
+
+"Sam? Oh, he's the runaway the Colonel has advertised."
+
+"Yas, sar, he'm 'way now more'n a monfh."
+
+"How can Scip find him?"
+
+"Dunno, sar. Scipio know most ebery ting--reckon he'll track him. He
+know him well, and Sam'll cum back ef he say he orter."
+
+"Where do you think Sam is?"
+
+"P'raps in de swamp."
+
+"Where is the swamp?"
+
+"'Bout ten mile from har."
+
+"Oh, yes! the shingles are cut there. I should think a runaway would be
+discovered where so many men are at work."
+
+"No, massa, dar'm places dar whar de ole debble cudn't fine him, nor de
+dogs nudder."
+
+"I thought the bloodhounds would track a man anywhere."
+
+"Not fru de water, massa; dey lose de scent in de swamp."
+
+"But how can a man live there--how get food?"
+
+"De darkies dat work dar take 'em nuff."
+
+"Then the other negroes know where the runaways are; don't they
+sometimes betray them?"
+
+"Neber, massa; a darky neber tells on anoder. De Cunnel had a boy in dat
+swamp once good many years."
+
+"Is it possible! Did he come back?"
+
+"No, he died dar. Sum ob de hands found him dead one mornin' in de hut
+whar he lib'd, and buried him dar."
+
+"Why did Sam run away?"
+
+"'Cause de oberseer flog him. He use him bery hard, massa."
+
+"What had Sam done?"
+
+"Nuffin, massa."
+
+"Then why was he flogged? Did the Colonel know it?"
+
+"Oh, yas; Moye cum de possum ober de Cunnel, and make him b'lieve Sam
+war bad. De Cunnel dunno de hull ob dat story."
+
+"Why didn't _you_, tell him? The Colonel trusts _you_."
+
+"'T wudn't hab dun no good; de Cunnel wud hab flogged me for tellin' on
+a wite man. Nigga's word aint ob no account."
+
+"What is the story about, Sam?"
+
+"You wont tell dat _I_ tole you, massa?"
+
+"No, but I'll tell the Colonel the truth."
+
+"Wal den, sar, you see Sam's wife am bery good-lookin', her skin's most
+wite--her mudder war a mulatter, her fader a wite man--she lub'd Sam
+'bout as well as de wimmin ginrally lub dar husbands" (Jim was a
+bachelor, and his observation of plantation morals had given him but
+little faith in the sex), "but most ob 'em, ef dey'm married or no, tink
+dey must smile on de wite men, so Jule she smiled on de oberseer--so Sam
+tought--and it made him bery jealous. He war sort o' sassy, and de
+oberseer strung him up, and flog him bery hard. Den Sam took to de
+swamp, but he didn't know whar to gwo, and de dogs tracked him; he'd ha'
+got 'way dough ef ole Moye hadn't a shot him; den he cudn't run. Den
+Moye flogged him till he war 'most dead, and arter dat chained him down
+in de ole cabin, and gave him 'most nuffin' to eat. De Cunnel war gwine
+to take Sam to Charles'on and sell him, but somehow he got a file and
+sawed fru de chain and got 'way in de night to de 'still.' Den when de
+oberseer come dar in de mornin', Sam jump on him and 'most kill him.
+He'd hab sent him whar dar aint no niggas, ef Junius hadn't a holed him.
+_I'd_ a let de ole debble gwo."
+
+"Junius, then, is a friend of the overseer."
+
+"No, sar; _he_ haint no friends, 'cep de debble; but June am a good
+nigga, and he said 'twarn't right to kill ole Moye so sudden, for den
+dar'd be no chance for de Lord to forgib him."
+
+"Then Sam got away again?"
+
+"Oh yas; nary one but darkies war round, and dey wouldn't hole him. Ef
+dey'd cotched him den, dey'd hung him, shore."
+
+"Why hung him?"
+
+"'Cause he'd struck a wite man; it'm shore death to do dat."
+
+"Do you think Scip will bring him back?"
+
+"Yas; 'cause he'm gwine to tell massa de hull story. De Cunnel will
+b'lieve Scipio ef he _am_ brack. Sam'll know dat, so he'll come back. De
+Cunnel'll make de State too hot to hole ole Moye, when he fine him out."
+
+"Does Sam's wife 'smile' on the overseer now?"
+
+"No; she see de trubble she bring on Sam, and she bery sorry. She wont
+look at a wite man now."
+
+During the foregoing conversation, we had ridden for several miles over
+the western half of the plantation, and were again near the house. My
+limbs being decidedly stiff and sore from the effect of the previous
+day's journey, I decided to alight and rest until the hour for dinner.
+
+I mentioned my jaded condition to Jim, who said:
+
+"Dat's right, massa; come in de house. I'll cure de rumatics; I knows
+how to fix dem."
+
+Fastening the horses at the door, Jim accompanied me to my
+sleeping-room, where he lighted a fire of pine knots, which in a moment
+blazed up on the hearth and sent a cheerful glow through the apartment;
+then, saying he would return after stabling the horses, the darky left
+me.
+
+I took off my boots, drew the sofa near the fire, and stretched myself
+at full length upon it. If ever mortal was tired, "I reckon" I was. It
+seemed as though every joint and bone in my body had lost the power of
+motion, and sharp, acute pains danced along my nerves, as I have seen
+the lightning play along the telegraph wires. My entire system had the
+toothache.
+
+Jim soon returned, bearing in one hand a decanter of "Otard," and in the
+other a mug of hot water and a crash towel.
+
+"I'se got de stuff dat'll fix de rumatics, massa."
+
+"Thank you, Jim; a glass will do me good. Where did you get it?" I
+asked, thinking it strange the Colonel should leave his brandy-bottle
+within reach of the negroes, who have an universal weakness for spirits.
+
+"Oh, I keeps de keys; de Cunnel hissef hab to come to me when he want
+suffin' to warm hissef."
+
+It was the fact; Jim had exclusive charge of the wine-cellar; in short,
+was butler, barber, porter, footman, and body-servant, all combined.
+
+"Now, massa, you lay right whar you is, and I'll make you ober new in
+less dan no time."
+
+And he did; but I emptied the brandy-bottle. Lest my temperance friends
+should be horror-stricken, I will mention, however, that I took the
+fluid by external absorption. For all rheumatic sufferers, I would
+prescribe hot brandy, in plentiful doses, a coarse towel, and an active
+Southern darky, and if on the first application the patient is not
+cured, the fault will not be the negro's. Out of mercy to the chivalry,
+I hope our government, in saving the Union, will not annihilate the
+order of body-servants. They are the only perfect institution in the
+Southern country, and, so far as I have seen, about the only one worth
+saving.
+
+The dinner-bell sounded a short while after Jim had finished the
+scrubbing operation, and I went to the table with an appetite I had not
+felt for a week. My whole system was rejuvenated, and I am not sure that
+I should, at that moment, have declined a wrestling match with Heenan
+himself.
+
+I found at dinner only the overseer and the young son of Madam P----,
+the Colonel and the lady being still at the cabin of the dying boy. The
+dinner, though a queer mixture of viands, would not have disgraced,
+except, perhaps, in the cooking, the best of our Northern hotels.
+Venison, bacon, wild fowl, hominy, poultry, corn bread, French
+"made-dishes," and Southern "common doin's," with wines and brandies of
+the choicest brands, were placed on the table together.
+
+"Dis, massa," said Jim, "am de raal juice; it hab been in de cellar eber
+since de house war built. Massa tole me to gib you some, wid him
+complimen's."
+
+Passing it to my companions, I drank the Colonel's health in as fine
+wine as I ever tasted.
+
+I had taken an instinctive dislike to the overseer at the
+breakfast-table, and my aversion was not lessened by learning his
+treatment of Sam; curiosity to know what manner of man he was, however,
+led me, toward the close of our meal, to "draw him out," as follows:
+
+"What is the political sentiment, sir, of this section of the State?"
+
+"Wal, I reckon most of the folks 'bout har' is Union; they'm from the
+'old North,' and gin'rally pore trash."
+
+"I have heard that the majority of the turpentine-farmers are
+enterprising men and good citizens--more enterprising, even, than the
+cotton and rice planters."
+
+"Wal, they is enterprisin', 'cause they don't keer for nuthin' 'cep'
+money."
+
+"The man who is absorbed in money-getting is generally a quiet citizen."
+
+"P'raps that's so. But I think a man sh'u'd hev a soul suthin' 'bove
+dollars. Them folks will take any sort o' sarce from the Yankees, ef
+they'll only buy thar truck."
+
+"What do you suffer from the Yankees?"
+
+"Suffer from the Yankees? Don't they steal our niggers, and haint they
+'lected an ab'lishener for President?"
+
+"I've been at the North lately, but I am not aware that is so."
+
+"So! it's damnably so, sir. I knows it. We don't mean to stand it eny
+longer."
+
+"What will you do?"
+
+"We'll give 'em h--l, ef they want it!"
+
+"Will it not be necessary to agree among yourselves before you do that?
+I met a turpentine farmer below here who openly declared that he is
+friendly to abolishing slavery. He thinks the masters can make more
+money by hiring than by owning the negroes."
+
+"Yes, that's the talk of them North County[D] fellers, who've squatted
+round har. We'll hang every mother's son on 'em, by ----."
+
+"I wouldn't do that: in a free country every man has a right to his
+opinions."
+
+"Not to sech opinions as them. A man may think, but he mustn't think
+onraasonable."
+
+"I don't know, but it seems to me reasonable, that if the negroes cost
+these farmers now one hundred and fifty dollars a year, and they could
+hire them, if free, for seventy-five or a hundred, that they would make
+by abolition."
+
+"Ab'lish'n! By--, sir, ye aint an ab'lishener, is ye?" exclaimed the
+fellow, in an excited manner, bringing his hand down on the table in a
+way that set the crockery a-dancing.
+
+"Come, come, my friend," I replied, in a mild tone, and as unruffled as
+a pool of water that has been out of a December night; "you'll knock off
+the dinner things, and I'm not quite through."
+
+"Wal, sir, I've heerd yer from the North, and I'd like to know if yer an
+ab'lishener."
+
+"My dear sir, you surprise me. You certainly can't expect a modest man
+like me to speak of himself."
+
+"Ye can speak of what ye d-- please, but ye can't talk ab'lish'n har,
+by--," he said, again applying his hand to the table, till the plates
+and saucers jumped up, performed several jigs, then several reels, and
+then rolled over in graceful somersaults to the floor.
+
+At this juncture, the Colonel and Madam P---- entered.
+
+Observing the fall in his crockery, and the general confusion of things,
+my host quietly asked, "What's to pay?"
+
+I said nothing, but burst into a fit of laughter at the awkward
+predicament of the overseer. That gentleman also said nothing, but
+looked as if he would like to find vent through a rat-hole or a
+window-pane. Jim, however, who stood at the back of my chair, gave _his_
+eloquent thoughts utterance, very much as follows:
+
+"Moye hab 'sulted Massa K----, Cunnel, awful bad. He hab swore a blue
+streak at him, and called him a d-- ab'lishener, jess 'cause Massa K----
+wudn't get mad and sass him back. He hab disgrace your hosspital,
+Cunnel, wuss dan a nigga."
+
+The Colonel turned white with rage, and striding up to Moye, seized him
+by the throat, yelling, rather than speaking, these words: "You
+d---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----, have you dared to insult a guest in
+my house?"
+
+"I did'nt mean to 'sult him," faltered out the overseer, his voice
+running through an entire octave, and changing with the varying pressure
+of the Colonel's fingers on his throat; "but he said he war an
+ab'lishener."
+
+"No matter what he said, he is my guest, and in my house he shall say
+what he pleases, by--. Apologize to him, or I'll send you to h--in a
+second."
+
+The fellow turned cringingly to me, and ground out something like this,
+every word seeming to give him the face-ache:
+
+"I meant no offence, sar; I hope ye'll excuse me."
+
+This satisfied me, but, before I could reply, the Colonel again seized
+him by the throat and yelled:
+
+"None of your sulkiness; you d-- white-livered hound, ask the gentleman's
+pardon like a man."
+
+The fellow then got out, with less effort than before:
+
+"I 'umbly ax yer pardon, sar, very 'umbly, indeed."
+
+"I am satisfied, sir," I replied. "I bear you no ill-will."
+
+"Now go," said the Colonel; "and in future take your meals in your
+cabin. I have none but gentlemen at my table."
+
+The fellow went. As soon as he closed the door, the Colonel said to me:
+
+"Now, my dear friend, I hope you will pardon _me_ for this occurrence. I
+sincerely regret you have been insulted in my house."
+
+"Don't speak of it, my dear sir; the fellow is ignorant, and really
+thinks I am an abolitionist. His zeal in politics led to his warmth. I
+blame him very little," I replied.
+
+"But he lied, Massa K----," chimed in Jim, very warmly; "you neber said
+you war an ab'lishener."
+
+"You know what _they_ are, Jim, don't you?" said the Colonel, laughing,
+and taking no notice of his breach of decorum in wedging black ideas
+into a white conversation.
+
+"Yas, I does dat," said the darky, grinning.
+
+"Jim," said his master, "you're a prince of a nigger, but you talk too
+much; ask me for something to-day, and I reckon you'll get it; but go
+now, and tell Chloe (the cook) to get us some dinner."
+
+The negro left, and, excusing myself, I soon followed suit.
+
+I went to my room, laid down on the lounge, and soon fell asleep. It was
+nearly five o'clock when a slight noise in the apartment awoke me, and,
+looking up, I saw the Colonel quietly seated by the fire, smoking a
+cigar. His feet were elevated above his head, and he appeared absorbed
+in no very pleasant reflections.
+
+"How is the sick boy, Colonel?" I asked.
+
+"It's all over with him, my friend. He died easy; but 'twas very painful
+to me; I feel I have done him wrong."
+
+"How so?"
+
+"I was away all summer, and that cursed Moye sent him to the swamp to
+tote for the shinglers. It killed him."
+
+"Then you are not to blame," I replied.
+
+"I wish I could feel so."
+
+The Colonel remained with me till supper-time, evidently much depressed
+by the events of the morning, which had affected him more than I should
+have thought possible. I endeavored, by directing his mind to other
+topics, to cheer him, and in a measure succeeded.
+
+While we were seated at the supper table, the black cook entered from
+the kitchen--a one-story shanty, detached from, and in the rear of the
+house--and, with a face expressive of every conceivable emotion a negro
+can feel--joy, sorrow, wonder, and fear all combined--exclaimed, "O
+massa, massa! dear massa! Sam, O Sam!"
+
+"Sam!" said the Colonel; "what about Sam?"
+
+"Why, he hab--dear, dear massa, don't yer, don't yer hurt him--he hab
+come back!"
+
+If a bombshell had fallen in the room, a greater sensation could not
+have been produced. Every individual arose from the table, and the
+Colonel, striding up and down the apartment, exclaimed:
+
+"Is he mad? The everlasting fool! Why in h--has he come back?"
+
+"Oh, don't ye hurt him massa," said the black cook, wringing her hands.
+"Sam hab been bad, bery bad, but he won't be so no more."
+
+"Stop your noise, aunty," said the Colonel, but with no harshness in his
+tone. "I shall do what I think right."
+
+"Send for him, David," said Madame P----; "let us hear what he has to
+say. He would not come back if he meant to be ugly."
+
+"_Send_ for him, Alice!" replied my host. "He's prouder than Lucifer,
+and would send me word to come to _him_. I will go. Will you accompany
+me, Mr. K----? You'll hear what a runaway nigger thinks of slavery: Sam
+has the gift of speech, and uses it regardless of persons."
+
+"Yes, sir, I'll go with pleasure."
+
+It was about an hour after nightfall when we emerged from the door of
+the mansion and took our way to the negro quarters. The full moon had
+risen half way above the horizon, and the dark pines cast their shadows
+around the little collection of negro huts, which straggled about
+through the woods for the distance of a third of a mile. It was dark,
+but I could distinguish the figure of a man striding along at a rapid
+pace a few hundred yards in advance of us.
+
+"Is'nt that Moye?" I asked the Colonel, directing his attention to the
+receding figure.
+
+"I reckon so; that's his gait. He's had a lesson to-day that'll do him
+good."
+
+"I don't like that man's looks," I replied, carelessly; "but I've heard
+of singed cats."
+
+"He _is_ a sneaking d--l," said the Colonel; "but he's very valuable to
+me. I never had an overseer who got so much work out of the hands."
+
+"Is he severe with them?"
+
+"Well, I reckon he is; but a nigger is like a dog--you must flog him to
+make him like you."
+
+"I judge your niggers haven't been flogged into liking Moye."
+
+"Why, have you heard any of them speak of him?"
+
+"Yes; though, of course, I've made no effort to draw gossip from them. I
+had to hear."
+
+"O yes; I know; there's no end to their gabble; niggers will talk. But
+what have you heard?"
+
+"That Moye is to blame in this affair of Sam, and that you don't know
+the whole story."
+
+"What _is_ the whole story?" he asked, stopping short in the road; "tell
+me before I see Sam."
+
+I then told him what Jim had recounted to me. He heard me through
+attentively, then laughingly exclaimed:
+
+"Is that all! Lord bless you, he didn't seduce her. There's no seducing
+these women; with them it's a thing of course. It was Sam's d-- high
+blood that made the trouble. His father was the proudest man in
+Virginia, and Sam is as like him as a nigger can be like a white man."
+
+"No matter what the blood is, it seems to me such an injury justifies
+revenge."
+
+"Pshaw, my good fellow, you don't know these people. I'll stake my
+plantation against a glass of whiskey there's not a virtuous woman with
+a drop of black blood in her veins in all South Carolina. They prefer
+the white men; their husbands know it, and take it as a matter of
+course."
+
+We had here reached the negro cabin. It was one of the more remote of
+the collection, and stood deep in the woods, an enormous pine growing up
+directly beside the doorway. In all respects it was like the other huts
+on the plantation. A bright fire lit up its interior, and through the
+crevices in the logs we saw, as we approached, a scene that made us
+pause involuntarily, when within a few rods of the house. The mulatto
+man, whose clothes were torn and smeared with swamp mud, stood near the
+fire. On a small pine table near him lay a large carving-knife, which
+glittered in the blaze, as if recently sharpened. His wife was seated on
+the side of the low bed at his back, weeping. She was two or three
+shades lighter than the man, and had the peculiar brown, kinky hair,
+straight, flat nose, and speckled, gray eyes which mark the metif.
+Tottling on the floor at the feet of the man, and caressing his knees,
+was a child of perhaps two years.
+
+As we neared the house, we heard the voice of the overseer issuing from
+the doorway on the other side of the pine-tree.
+
+"Come out, ye black rascal."
+
+"Come in, you wite hound, ef you dar," responded the negro, laying his
+hand on the carving-knife.
+
+"Come out, I till ye; I sha'n't ax ye agin."
+
+"I'll hab nuffin' to do wid you. G'way and send your massa har," replied
+the mulatto man, turning his face away with a lordly, contemptuous
+gesture, that spoke him a true descendant of Pocahontas. This movement
+exposed his left side to the doorway, outside of which, hidden from us
+by the tree, stood the overseer.
+
+"Come away, Moye," said the Colonel, advancing with me toward the door;
+"_I'll_ speak to him."
+
+Before all of the words had escaped the Colonel's lips, a streak of fire
+flashed from where the overseer stood, and took the direction of the
+negro. One long, wild shriek--one quick, convulsive bound in the
+air--and Sam fell lifeless to the floor, the dark life-stream pouring
+from his side. The little child also fell with him, and its greasy,
+grayish shirt was dyed with its father's blood. Moye, at the distance of
+ten feet, had discharged the two barrels of a heavily-loaded shot-gun
+directly through the negro's heart.
+
+"You incarnate son of h--," yelled the Colonel, as he sprang on the
+overseer, bore him to the ground, and wrenched the shot-gun from his
+hand. Clubbing the weapon, he raised it to brain him. The movement
+occupied but a second; the gun was descending, and in another instant
+Moye would have met Sam in eternity, had not a brawny arm caught the
+Colonel's, and, winding itself around his body, pinned his limbs to his
+side so that motion was impossible. The woman, half frantic with
+excitement, thrust open the door when her husband fell, and the light
+which came through it revealed the face of the new-comer. But his voice,
+which rang out on the night air as clear as a bugle, had there been no
+light, would have betrayed him. It was Scip. Spurning the prostrate
+overseer with his foot, he shouted:
+
+"Run, you wite debble, run for your life!"
+
+"Let me go, you black scoundrel," shrieked the Colonel, wild with rage.
+
+"When he'm out ob reach, you'd kill him," replied the negro, as cool as
+if he was doing an ordinary thing.
+
+"I'll kill you, you black--hound, if you don't let me go," again
+screamed the Colonel, struggling violently in the negro's grasp, and
+literally foaming at the mouth.
+
+"I shan't lef you gwo, Cunnel, till you 'gree not to do dat."
+
+The Colonel was a stout, athletic man, in the very prime of life, and
+his rage gave him more than his ordinary strength, but Scip held him as
+I might have held a child.
+
+"Here, Jim," shouted the Colonel to his body-servant, who just then
+emerged from among the trees, "'rouse the plantation--shoot this
+d-- nigger."
+
+"Dar aint one on 'em wud touch him, massa. He'd send _me_ to de debble
+wid one fist."
+
+"You ungrateful dog," groaned his master. "Mr. K----, will you stand by
+and see me handcuffed by a miserable slave?"
+
+"The black means well, my friend; he has saved you from murder. Say he
+is safe, and I'll answer for his being away in an hour."
+
+The Colonel made one more ineffectual attempt to free himself from the
+vice-like grip of the negro, then relaxing his efforts, and, gathering
+his broken breath, he said, "You're safe _now_, but if you're found
+within ten miles of my plantation by sunrise, by--you're a dead man."
+
+The negro relinquished his hold, and, without saying a word, walked
+slowly away.
+
+"Jim, you--rascal," said the Colonel to that courageous darky, who was
+skulking off, "raise every nigger on the plantation, catch Moye, or I'll
+flog you within an inch of your life."
+
+"I'll do dat, Cunnel; I'll kotch de ole debble, ef he's dis side de hot
+place."
+
+His words were echoed by about twenty other darkies, who, attracted by
+the noise of the fracas, had gathered within a safe distance of the
+cabin. They went off with Jim, to raise the other plantation hands, and
+inaugurate the hunt.
+
+"If that -- nigger hadn't held me, I'd had Moye in -- by this time," said
+the Colonel to me, still livid with excitement.
+
+"The law will deal with him, my friend. The negro has saved you from
+murder."
+
+"The law be d--; it's too good for such a--hound; and that the d-- nigger
+should have dared to hold me--by--he'll rue it."
+
+He then turned, exhausted with the recent struggle, and, with a weak,
+uncertain step, entered the cabin. Kneeling down by the dead body of the
+negro, he attempted to raise it; but his strength was gone. He motioned
+to me to aid him, and we placed the corpse on the bed. Tearing open the
+clothing, we wiped away the still flowing blood, and saw the terrible
+wound which had sent the negro to his account. It was sickening to look
+on, and I turned to go.
+
+The negro woman, who was weeping and wringing her hands, now approached,
+and, in a voice nearly choked with sobs, said:
+
+"Massa, oh massa, I done it! it's me dat killed him!"
+
+"I know you did, you d----. Get out of my sight."
+
+"Oh, massa," sobbed the woman, falling on her knees, "I'se so sorry; oh,
+forgib me!"
+
+"Go to ----, you ----, that's the place for you," said the Colonel, striking
+the kneeling woman with his foot, and felling her to the floor.
+
+Unwilling to see or hear more, I left the master with the slave.
+
+[Footnote D: The "North Counties" are the north-eastern portion of North
+Carolina, and include the towns of Washington and Newbern. They are an
+old turpentine region, and the trees are nearly exhausted. The finer
+virgin forests of South Carolina, and other cotton States, have tempted
+many of the North County farmers to emigrate thither, within the past
+ten years, and they now own nearly all the trees that are worked in
+South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. They generally have few slaves of
+their own, their hands being hired of wealthier men in their native
+districts. The "hiring" is an annual operation, and is done at Christmas
+time, when the negroes are frequently allowed to go home. They treat the
+slaves well, give them an allowance of meat (salt pork or beef), as much
+corn as they can eat, and a gill of whiskey daily. No class of men at
+the South are so industrious, energetic, and enterprising. Though not so
+well informed, they have many of the traits of our New England farmers;
+in fact, are frequently called "North Carolina Yankees." It was these
+people the overseer proposed to hang. The reader will doubtless think
+that "hanging was not good enough for them."]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE PLANTER'S "FAMILY."
+
+
+A quarter of a mile through the woods brought me to the cabin of the old
+negress where Scip lodged. I rapped at the door, and was admitted by the
+old woman. Scip, nearly asleep, was lying on a pile of blankets in the
+corner.
+
+"Are you mad?" I said to him. "The Colonel is frantic with rage, and
+swears he will kill you. You must be off at once."
+
+"No, no, massa; neber fear; I knows him. He'd keep his word, ef he loss
+his life by it. I'm gwine afore sunrise; till den I'm safe."
+
+"Der ye tink Massa Davy wud broke his word, sar?" said the old negress,
+bridling up her bent form, and speaking in a tone in which indignation
+mingled with wounded dignity; "p'raps gemmen do dat at de Norf--dey
+neber does it har."
+
+"Excuse me, Aunty; I know your master is a man of honor; but he's very
+much excited, and very angry with Scip."
+
+"No matter for dat, sar; Massa Davy neber done a mean ting sense he war
+born."
+
+"Massa K---- tinks a heap ob de Cunnel, Aunty; but he reckon he'm sort
+o' crazy now; dat make him afeard," said Scip, in an apologetic tone.
+
+"What ef he am crazy? You'se safe _har_," rejoined the old woman,
+dropping her aged limbs into a chair, and rocking away with much the air
+which ancient white ladies occasionally assume.
+
+"Wont you ax Massa K---- to a cheer?" said Scip; "he hab ben bery kine
+to me."
+
+The negress then offered me a seat; but it was some minutes before I
+rendered myself sufficiently agreeable to thaw out the icy dignity of
+her manner. Meanwhile I glanced around the apartment.
+
+Though the exterior of the cabin was like the others on the plantation,
+the interior had a rude, grotesque elegance about it far in advance of
+any negro hut I had ever seen. The logs were chinked with clay, and the
+one window, though destitute of glass, and ornamented with the
+inevitable board-shutter, had a green moreen curtain, which kept out the
+wind and the rain. A worn but neat and well swept carpet partly covered
+the floor, and on the low bed was spread a patch-work counter-pane.
+Against the side of the room opposite the door stood an antique,
+brass-handled bureau, and an old-fashioned table, covered with a faded
+woollen cloth, occupied the centre of the apartment. In the corner near
+the fire was a curiously-contrived sideboard, made of narrow strips of
+yellow pine, tongued and grooved together, and oiled so as to bring out
+the beautiful grain of the wood. On it were several broken and cracked
+glasses, and an array of irregular crockery. The rocking chair, in which
+the old negress passed the most of her time, was of mahogany, wadded and
+covered with chintz, and the arm-seat I occupied, though old and patched
+in many places, had evidently moved in good society.
+
+The mistress of this second-hand furniture establishment was arrayed in
+a mass of cast-off finery, whose gay colors were in striking contrast
+with her jet-black skin and bent, decrepit form. Her gown, which was
+very short, was of flaming red and yellow worsted stuff, and the
+enormous turban that graced her head and hid all but a few tufts of her
+frizzled, "pepper-and-salt" locks, was evidently a contribution from the
+family stock of worn-out pillow-cases. She was very aged--upward of
+seventy--and so thin that, had she not been endowed with speech and
+motion, she might have passed for a bundle of whalebone thrown into
+human shape, and covered with a coating of gutta-percha. It was evident
+she had been a valued house-servant, whose few remaining years were
+being soothed and solaced by the kind and indulgent care of a grateful
+master.
+
+Scip, I soon saw, was a favorite with the old negress, and the marked
+respect he showed me quickly dispelled the angry feeling my doubts of
+"Massa Davy" had excited, and opened her heart and her mouth at the same
+moment. She was terribly garrulous; her tongue, as soon as it got under
+way, ran on as if propelled by machinery and acquainted with the secret
+of perpetual motion; but she was an interesting study. The
+single-hearted attachment she showed for her master and his family gave
+me a new insight into the practical working of "the peculiar
+institution," and convinced me that even slavery, in some of its
+aspects, is not so black as it is painted.
+
+When we were seated, I said to Scip, "What induced you to lay hands on
+the Colonel? It is death, you know, if he enforces the law."
+
+"I knows dat, massa; I knows dat; but I had to do it. Dat Moye am de ole
+debble, but de folks round har wud hab turned on de Cunnel, shore, ef
+he'd killed him. Dey don't like de Cunnel; dey say he'm a stuck-up
+seshener."
+
+"The Colonel, then, has befriended you at some time?"
+
+"No, no, sar; 'twarn't dat; dough I'se know'd him a long w'ile--eber
+sense my ole massa fotched me from Habana--but 'twarn't dat."
+
+"Then _why_ did you do it?"
+
+The black hesitated a moment, and glanced at the old negress, then said:
+
+"You see, massa, w'en I fuss come to Charles'n, a pore little ting, wid
+no friend in all de worle, dis ole aunty war a mudder to me. She nussed
+de Cunnel; he am jess like her own chile, and I know'd 'twud kill her ef
+he got hissef enter trubble."
+
+I noticed certain convulsive twitchings about the corners of the old
+woman's mouth as she rose from her seat, threw her arms around Scip,
+and, in words broken by sobs, faltered out:
+
+"_You_ am my chile; I loves you better dan Massa Davy--better dan all de
+worle."
+
+The scene, had they not been black, would have been one for a painter.
+
+"You were the Colonel's nurse, Aunty," I said, when she had regained her
+composure. "Have you always lived with him?"
+
+"Yas, sar, allers; I nussed him, and den de chil'ren--all ob 'em."
+
+"_All_ the children? I thought the Colonel had but one--Miss Clara."
+
+"Wal, he habn't, massa, only de boys."
+
+"What boys? I never heard he had sons."
+
+"Neber heerd of young Massa Davy, nor Massa Tommy! Haint you _seed_
+Massa Tommy, sar?"
+
+"Tommy! I was told he was Madam P----'s son."
+
+"So he am; Massa Davy had _her_ long afore he had missus."
+
+The truth flashed upon me; but could it be possible? Was I in South
+Carolina or in Utah?
+
+"Who _is_ Madam P----?" I asked.
+
+The old woman hesitated a moment as if in doubt whether she had not said
+too much; but Scip quietly replied:
+
+"She'm jess what aunty am--_de Cunnel's slave!_"
+
+"His _slave!_ it can't be possible; she is white!"
+
+"No, massa; she am brack, and de Cunnel's slave!"
+
+Not to weary the reader with a long repetition of negro-English, I will
+tell in brief what I gleaned from an hour's conversation with the two
+blacks.
+
+Madam P---- was the daughter of Ex-Gov. ----, of Virginia, by a quarteron
+woman. She was born a slave, but was acknowledged as her father's child,
+and reared in his family with his legitimate children. When she was ten
+years old her father died, and his estate proving insolvent, the land
+and negroes were brought under the hammer. His daughter, never having
+been manumitted, was inventoried and sold with the other property. The
+Colonel, then just of age, and a young man of fortune, bought her and
+took her to the residence of his mother in Charleston. A governess was
+provided for her, and a year or two afterward she was taken to the North
+to be educated. There she was frequently visited by the Colonel; and
+when fifteen her condition became such that she was obliged to return
+home. He conveyed her to the plantation, where her elder son, David, was
+soon after born, "Aunt Lucy" officiating on the occasion. When the child
+was two years old, leaving it in charge of the aged negress, she
+accompanied the Colonel to Europe, where they remained for a year.
+Subsequently she passed another year at a Northern seminary; and then,
+returning to the homestead, was duly installed as its mistress, and had
+ever since presided over its domestic affairs. She was kind and good to
+the negroes, who were greatly attached to her, and much of the
+Colonel's wealth was due to her excellent management of the plantation.
+
+Six years after the birth of "young Massa Davy," the Colonel married his
+present wife, that lady having full knowledge of his left-handed
+connection with Madam P----, and consenting that the "bond-woman" should
+remain on the plantation, as its mistress. The legitimate wife resided,
+during most of the year, in Charleston, and when at the homestead took
+little interest in domestic matters. On one of her visits to the
+plantation, twelve years before, her daughter, Miss Clara, was born, and
+within a week, under the same roof, Madam P---- presented the Colonel
+with a son--the lad Thomas, of whom I have spoken. As the mother was
+slave, the children were so also at birth, but _they_ had been
+manumitted by their father. One of them was being educated in Germany;
+and it was intended that both should spend their lives in that country,
+the taint in their blood being an insuperable bar to their ever
+acquiring social position at the South.
+
+As she finished the story, the old woman said, "Massa Davy am bery kind
+to the missus, sar, but he _love_ de ma'am; an' he can't help it, 'cause
+she'm jess so good as de angels."[E]
+
+In conversation with a well-known Southern gentleman, not long since, I
+mentioned these two cases, and commented on them as a man educated with
+New England ideas might be supposed to do. The gentleman admitted that
+he knew of twenty such instances, and gravely defended the practice as
+being infinitely more moral and respectable than the _more common
+relation_ existing between masters and slaves.
+
+I looked at my watch--it was nearly ten o'clock, and I rose to go. As I
+did so the old negress said:
+
+"Don't yer gwo, massa, 'fore you hab sum ob aunty's wine; you'm good
+friends wid Scip, and I knows _you'se_ not too proud to drink wid brack
+folks, ef you am from de Norf."
+
+Being curious to know what quality of wine a plantation slave indulged
+in, I accepted the invitation. She went to the side-board, and brought
+out a cut-glass decanter, and three cracked tumblers, which she placed
+on the table. Filling the glasses to the brim, she passed one to Scip,
+and one to me, and, with the other in her hand, resumed her seat.
+Wishing her a good many happy years, and Scip a pleasant journey home, I
+emptied my glass. It was Scuppernong, and the pure juice of the grape!
+
+"Aunty," I said, "this wine is as fine as I ever tasted."
+
+"Oh, yas, massa, it am de raal stuff. I growed de grapes myseff."
+
+"You grew them?"
+
+"Yas, sar, an' Massa Davy make de wine. He do it ebery yar for de ole
+nuss."
+
+"The Colonel is very good. Do you raise any thing else?"
+
+"Yas, I hab collards and taters, a little corn, and most ebery ting."
+
+"But who does your work? _You_ certainly can't do it?"
+
+"Oh, de ma'am looks arter dat, sar; she'm bery good to de ole aunty."
+
+Shaking hands with both the negroes, I left the cabin, fully convinced
+that all the happiness in this world is not found within plastered
+apartments.
+
+The door of the mansion was bolted and barred; but, rapping for
+admission, I soon heard the Colonel's voice asking, "Who is there?"
+Giving a satisfactory answer, I was admitted. Explaining that he
+supposed I had retired to my room, he led the way to the library.
+
+That apartment was much more elegantly furnished than the drawing-rooms.
+Three of its sides were lined with books, and on the centre-table,
+papers, pamphlets, and manuscripts were scattered in promiscuous
+confusion. In an arm-chair near the fire, Madame P---- was seated,
+reading. The Colonel's manner was as composed as if nothing had
+disturbed the usual routine of the plantation; no trace of the recent
+terrible excitement was visible; in fact, had I not been a witness to
+the late tragedy, I should have thought it incredible that he, within
+two hours, had been an actor in a scene which had cost a human being his
+life.
+
+"Where in creation have you been, my dear fellow?" he asked, as we took
+our seats.
+
+"At old Lucy's cabin, with Scip," I replied.
+
+"Indeed. I supposed the darky had gone."
+
+"No, he doesn't go till the morning."
+
+"I told you he wouldn't, David," said Madame P----; "now, send for
+him--make friends with him before he goes."
+
+"No, Alice, it wont do. I bear him no ill-will, but it wont do. It would
+be all over the plantation in an hour."
+
+"No matter for that; our people would like you the better for it."
+
+"No, no. I can't do it. I mean him no harm, but I can't do that."
+
+"He told me _why_ he interfered between you and Moye," I remarked.
+
+"Why did he?"
+
+"He says old Lucy, years ago, was a mother to him; that she is greatly
+attached to you, and it would kill her if any harm happened to you; and
+that your neighbors bear you no good-will, and would have enforced the
+law had you killed Moye."
+
+"It is true, David; you would have had to answer for it."
+
+"Nonsense! what influence could this North County scum have against
+_me_?"
+
+"Perhaps none. But that makes no difference; Scipio did right, and you
+should tell him you forgive him."
+
+The Colonel then rang a small bell, and a negro woman soon appeared.
+"Sue," he said, "go to Aunt Lucy's, and ask Scip to come here. Bring him
+in at the front door, and, mind, let no one know he comes."
+
+The woman in a short time returned with Scip. There was not a trace of
+fear or embarrassment in the negro's manner as he entered the room.
+Making a respectful bow, he bade us "good evening."
+
+"Good evening, Scip," said the Colonel, rising and giving the black his
+hand; "let us be friends. Madam tells me I should forgive you, and I
+do."
+
+"Aunt Lucy say ma'am am an angel, sar, and it am tru--_it am tru_, sar,"
+replied the negro with considerable feeling.
+
+The lady rose, also, and took Scip's hand, saying, "_I_ not only forgive
+you, but I _thank_ you for what you have done. I shall never forget it."
+
+"You'se too good, ma'am; you'se too good to say dat," replied the darky,
+the moisture coming to his eyes; "but I meant nuffin' wrong--I meant
+nuffin' dis'specful to de Cunnel."
+
+"I know you didn't, Scip; but we'll say no more about it;--good-by,"
+said the Colonel.
+
+Shaking hands with each one of us, the darky left the apartment.
+
+One who does not know that the high-bred Southern gentleman considers
+the black as far below him as the horse he drives, or the dog he kicks,
+cannot realize the amazing sacrifice of pride which the Colonel made in
+seeking a reconciliation with Scip. It was the cutting off of his right
+hand. The circumstance showed the powerful influence held over him by
+the octoroon woman. Strange that she, his slave, cast out from society
+by her blood and her life, despised, no doubt, by all the world, save by
+him and a few ignorant blacks, should thus control a proud, self-willed,
+passionate man, and control him, too, only for good.
+
+After the black had gone, I said to the Colonel, "I was much interested
+in old Lucy. A few more such instances of cheerful and contented old
+age, might lead me to think better of slavery."
+
+"Such cases are not rare, sir. They show the paternal character of our
+'institution.' We are _forced_ to care for our servants in their old
+age."
+
+"But have your other aged slaves the same comforts that Aunt Lucy has?"
+
+"No; they don't need them. She has been accustomed to live in my house,
+and to fare better than the plantation hands; she therefore requires
+better treatment."
+
+"Is not the support of that class a heavy tax upon you?"
+
+"Yes, it _is_ heavy. We have, of course, to deduct it from the labor of
+the able-bodied hands."
+
+"What is the usual proportion of sick and infirm on your plantation?"
+
+"Counting in the child-bearing women, I reckon about twenty per cent."
+
+"And what does it cost you to support each hand?"
+
+"Well, it costs _me_, for children and all, about seventy-five dollars a
+year. In some places it costs less. _I_ have to buy all my provisions."
+
+"What proportion of your slaves are able-bodied hands?"
+
+"Somewhere about sixty per cent. I have, all told, old and young--men,
+women, and children--two hundred and seventy. Out of that number I have
+now equal to a hundred and fifty-four _full_ hands. You understand that
+we classify them: some do only half tasks, some three-quarters. I have
+_more_ than a hundred and fifty-four working-men and women, but they do
+only that number of full tasks."
+
+"What does the labor of a _full_ hand yield?"
+
+"At the present price of turpentine, my calculation is about two hundred
+dollars a year."
+
+"Then your crop brings you about thirty-one thousand dollars, and the
+support of your negroes costs you twenty thousand."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"If that's the case, my friend, let me advise you to sell your
+plantation, free your niggers, and go North."
+
+"Why so, my dear fellow?" asked the Colonel laughing.
+
+"Because you'd make money by the operation."
+
+"I never was good at arithmetic; go into the figures," he replied, still
+laughing, while Madam P----, who had laid aside her book, listened very
+attentively.
+
+"Well, you have two hundred and seventy negroes, whom you value, we'll
+say, with your mules, 'stills,' and movable property, at two hundred
+thousand dollars; and twenty thousand acres of land, worth about three
+dollars and a half an acre; all told, two hundred and seventy thousand
+dollars. A hundred and fifty-four able-bodied hands produce you a yearly
+profit of eleven thousand dollars, which, saying nothing about the cost
+of keeping your live stock, the wear and tear of your mules and
+machinery, and the yearly loss of your slaves by death, is only four per
+cent. on your capital. Now, with only the price of your land, say
+seventy thousand dollars, invested in safe stocks at the North, you
+could realize eight per cent.--five thousand six hundred dollars--and
+live at ease; and that, I judge, if you have many runaways, or many die
+on your hands, is as much as you really _clear_ now. Besides, if you
+should invest seventy thousand dollars in almost any legitimate business
+at the North, and should add to it, _as you now do_, your _time_ and
+_labor_, you would realize far more than you do at present from your
+entire capital."
+
+"I never looked at the matter in that light. But I have given you my
+profits as they _now_ are; some years I make more; six years ago I made
+twenty-five thousand dollars."
+
+"Yes; and six years hence you may make nothing."
+
+"That's true. But it would cost me more to live at the North."
+
+"There you are mistaken. What do you pay for your corn, your pork, and
+your hay, for instance?"
+
+"Well, my corn I have to bring round by vessel from Washington (North
+Carolina), and it costs me high when it gets here--about ten bits (a
+dollar and twenty-five cents), I think."
+
+"And in New York you could buy it now at sixty to seventy cents. What
+does your hay cost?"
+
+"Thirty-five dollars. I pay twenty for it in New York--the balance is
+freight and hauling."
+
+"Your pork costs you two or three dollars, I suppose, for freight and
+hauling."
+
+"Yes; about that."
+
+"Then in those items you might save nearly a hundred per cent.; and they
+are the principal articles you consume."
+
+"Yes; there's no denying that. But another thing is just as certain: it
+costs less to support one of my niggers than one of your laboring men."
+
+"That may be true. But it only shows that our laborers fare better than
+your slaves."
+
+"I am not sure of that. I _am_ sure, however, that our slaves are more
+contented than the run of laboring men at the North."
+
+"That proves nothing. Your blacks have no hope, no chance to rise; and
+they submit--though I judge not cheerfully--to an iron necessity. The
+Northern laborer, if very poor, may be discontented; but discontent
+urges him to effort, and leads to the bettering of his condition. I tell
+you, my friend, slavery is an expensive luxury. You Southern nabobs
+_will_ have it; and you have to _pay for it_."
+
+"Well, we don't complain. But, seriously, my good fellow, I feel that I
+am carrying out the design of the Almighty in holding my niggers. I
+think he made the black to serve the white."
+
+"_I_ think," I replied, "that whatever He designs works perfectly. Your
+institution certainly does not. It keeps the producer, who, in every
+society, is the really valuable citizen, in the lowest poverty, while it
+allows those who do nothing to be 'clad in fine linen, and to fare
+sumptuously every day.'"
+
+"It does more than that, sir," said Madam P----, with animation; "it
+brutalizes and degrades the _master_ and the _slave_; it separates
+husband and wife, parent and child; it sacrifices virtuous women to the
+lust of brutal men; and it shuts millions out from the knowledge of
+their duty and their destiny. A good and just God could not have
+designed it; and it _must_ come to an end."
+
+If lightning had struck in the room I could not have been more startled
+than I was by the abrupt utterance of such language in a planter's
+house, in his very presence, and _by his slave_. The Colonel, however,
+expressed no surprise and no disapprobation. It was evidently no new
+thing to him.
+
+"It is rare, madam," I said, "to hear such sentiments from a Southern
+lady--one reared among slaves."
+
+Before she could reply, the Colonel laughingly said:
+
+"Bless you, Mr. K----, madam is an out-and-out abolitionist, worse by
+fifty per cent. than Garrison or Wendell Phillips. If she were at the
+North she would take to pantaloons, and 'stump' the entire free States;
+wouldn't you, Alice?"
+
+"I have no doubt of it," rejoined the lady, smiling. "But I fear I
+should have poor success. I've tried for ten years to convert _you_, and
+Mr. K---- can see the result."
+
+It had grown late; and with my head full of working niggers and white
+slave-women, I went to my apartment.
+
+The next day was Sunday. It was near the close of December, yet the air
+was as mild and the sun as warm as in our Northern October. It was
+arranged at the breakfast-table that we all should attend service at
+"the meeting-house," a church of the Methodist persuasion, located some
+eight miles away; but as it wanted some hours of the time for religious
+exercises to commence, I strolled out after breakfast, with the Colonel,
+to inspect the stables of the plantation. "Massa Tommy" accompanied us,
+without invitation; and in the Colonel's intercourse with him I observed
+as much freedom and familiarity as he would have shown to an
+acknowledged son. The youth's manners and conversation showed that great
+attention had been given to his education and training, and made it
+evident that the mother whose influence was forming his character,
+whatever a false system of society had made her life, possessed some of
+the best traits of her sex.
+
+The stables, a collection of one-story framed buildings, about a hundred
+rods from the house, were well lighted and ventilated, and contained all
+"the modern improvements." They were better built, warmer, more
+commodious, and in every way more comfortable than the shanties occupied
+by the human cattle of the plantation. I remarked as much to the
+Colonel, adding that one who did not know would infer that he valued his
+horses more than his slaves.
+
+"That may be true," he replied, laughing. "Two of my horses are worth
+more than any eight of my slaves;" at the same time calling my attention
+to two magnificent thorough-breds, one of which had made "2.32" on the
+Charleston course. The establishment of a Southern gentleman is not
+complete until it includes one or two of these useless appendages. I had
+an argument with my host as to their value compared with that of the
+steam-engine, in which I forced him to admit that the iron horse is the
+better of the two, because it performs more work, eats less, has greater
+speed, and is not liable to the spavin or the heaves; but he wound up by
+saying, "After all, I go for the thorough-breds. You Yankees have but
+one test of value--use."
+
+A ramble through the negro-quarters, which followed our visit to the
+stables, gave me some further glimpses of plantation life. Many of the
+hands were still away in pursuit of Moye, but enough remained to make it
+evident that Sunday is the happiest day in the darky calendar. Groups of
+all ages and colors were gathered in front of several of the cabins,
+some singing, some dancing, and others chatting quietly together, but
+all enjoying themselves as heartily as so many young animals let loose
+in a pasture. They saluted the Colonel and me respectfully, but each one
+had a free, good-natured word for "Massa Tommy," who seemed an especial
+favorite with them. The lad took their greetings in good part, but
+preserved an easy, unconscious dignity of manner that plainly showed he
+did not know that _he_ too was of their despised, degraded race.
+
+The Colonel, in a rapid way, gave me the character and peculiarities of
+nearly every one we met. The titles of some of them amused me greatly.
+At every step we encountered individuals whose names have become
+household words in every civilized country.[F] Julius Caesar, slightly
+stouter than when he swam the Tiber, and somewhat tanned from long
+exposure to a Southern sun, was seated on a wood-pile, quietly smoking a
+pipe; while near him, Washington, divested of regimentals, and clad in a
+modest suit of reddish-gray, his thin locks frosted by time, and his
+fleshless visage showing great age, was gazing, in rapt admiration, at a
+group of dancers in front of old Lucy's cabin.
+
+In this group about thirty men and women were making the ground quake
+and the woods ring with their unrestrained jollity. Marc Antony was
+rattling away at the bones, Nero fiddling as if Rome were burning, and
+Hannibal clawing at a banjo as if the fate of Carthage hung on its
+strings. Napoleon, as young and as lean as when he mounted the bridge of
+Lodi, with the battle-smoke still on his face, was moving his legs even
+faster than in the Russian retreat; and Wesley was using his heels in a
+way that showed _they_ didn't belong to the Methodist church. But the
+central figures of the group were Cato and Victoria. The lady had a face
+like a thunder-cloud, and a form that, if whitewashed, would have
+outsold the "Greek Slave." She was built on springs, and "floated in the
+dance" like a feather in a high wind. Cato's mouth was like an
+alligator's, but when it opened, it issued notes that would draw the
+specie even in this time of general suspension. As we approached he was
+singing a song, but he paused on perceiving us, when the Colonel,
+tossing a handful of coin among them, called out, "Go on, boys; let the
+gentleman have some music; and you, Vic, show your heels like a beauty."
+
+A general scramble followed, in which "Vic's" sense of decorum forbade
+her to join, and she consequently got nothing. Seeing that, I tossed her
+a silver piece, which she caught. Grinning her thanks, she shouted,
+"Now, clar de track, you nigs; start de music. I'se gwine to gib de
+gemman de breakdown."
+
+And she did; and such a breakdown! "We w'ite folks," though it was no
+new thing to the Colonel or Tommy, almost burst with laughter.
+
+In a few minutes nearly every negro on the plantation, attracted by the
+presence of the Colonel and myself, gathered around the performers; and
+a shrill voice at my elbow called out, "Look har, ye lazy,
+good-for-nuffin' niggers, carn't ye fotch a cheer for Massa Davy and de
+strange gemman?"
+
+"Is that you, Aunty?" said the Colonel. "How d'ye do?"
+
+"Sort o' smart, Massa Davy; sort o' smart; how is ye?"
+
+"Pretty well, Aunty; pretty well. Have a seat." And the Colonel helped
+her to one of the chairs that were brought for us, with as much
+tenderness as he would have shown to an aged white lady.
+
+The "exercises," which had been suspended for a moment, recommenced, and
+the old negress entered into them as heartily as the youngest present. A
+song from Cato followed the dance, and then about twenty "gentleman and
+lady" darkies joined, two at a time, in a half "walk-round" half
+breakdown, which the Colonel told me was the original of the well-known
+dance and song of Lucy Long. Other performances succeeded, and the whole
+formed a scene impossible to describe. Such uproarious jollity, such
+full and perfect enjoyment, I had never seen in humanity, black or
+white. The little nigs, only four or five years old, would rush into the
+ring and shuffle away at the breakdowns till I feared their short legs
+would come off; while all the darkies joined in the songs, till the
+branches of the old pines above shook as if they too had caught the
+spirit of the music. In the midst of it, the Colonel said to me, in an
+exultant tone:
+
+"Well, my friend, what do you think of slavery _now_?"
+
+"About the same that I thought yesterday. I see nothing to change my
+views."
+
+"Why, are not these people happy? Is not this perfect enjoyment?"
+
+"Yes; just the same enjoyment that aunty's pigs are having; don't you
+hear _them_ singing to the music? I'll wager they are the happier of the
+two."
+
+"No; you are wrong. The higher faculties of the darkies are being
+brought out here."
+
+"I don't know that," I replied. "Within the sound of their voices, two
+of their fellows--victims to the inhumanity of slavery--are lying dead,
+and yet they make _Sunday_ "hideous" with wild jollity, while Sam's fate
+may be theirs to-morrow."
+
+Spite of his genuine courtesy and high breeding, a shade of displeasure
+passed over the Colonel's face as I made this remark. Rising to go, he
+said, a little impatiently, "Ah, I see how it is; that d---- Garrison's
+sentiments have impregnated even you. How can the North and the South
+hold together when moderate men like you and me are so far apart?"
+
+"But you," I rejoined, good-humoredly, "are not a moderate man. You and
+Garrison are of the same stripe, both extremists. _You_ have mounted one
+hobby, _he_ another; that is all the difference."
+
+"I should be sorry," he replied, recovering his good nature, "to think
+myself like Garrison. I consider him the ---- scoundrel unhung."
+
+"No; I think he means well. But you are both fanatics, both 'bricks' of
+the same material; we conservatives, like mortar, will hold you together
+and yet keep you apart."
+
+"I, for one, _won't_ be held. If I can't get out of this cursed Union in
+any other way, I'll emigrate to Cuba."
+
+I laughed, and just then, looking up, caught a glimpse of Jim, who
+stood, hat in hand, waiting to speak to the Colonel, but not daring to
+interrupt a white conversation.
+
+"Hallo, Jim," I said; "have you got back?"
+
+"Yas, sar," replied Jim, grinning all over as if he had some agreeable
+thing to communicate.
+
+"Where is Moye?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Kotched, massa; I'se got de padlocks on him."
+
+"Kotched," echoed half a dozen darkies, who stood near enough to hear;
+"Ole Moye is kotched," ran through the crowd, till the music ceased, and
+a shout went up from two hundred black throats that made the old trees
+tremble.
+
+"Now gib him de lashes, Massa Davy," cried the old nurse. "Gib him what
+he gabe pore Sam; but mine dat you keeps widin de law."
+
+"Never fear, Aunty," said the Colonel; "I'll give him ----."
+
+How the Colonel kept his word will be told in another chapter.
+
+[Footnote E: Instances are frequent where Southern gentlemen form these
+left-handed connections, and rear two sets of differently colored
+children; but it is not often that the two families occupy the same
+domicil. The only other case within my _personal_ knowledge was that of
+the well-known President of the Bank of St. M----, at Columbus, Ga. That
+gentleman, whose note ranked in Wall Street, when the writer was
+acquainted with that locality, as "A No. 1," lived for fifteen years
+with two "wives" under one roof. One, an accomplished white woman, and
+the mother of several children--did the honors of his table, and moved
+with him in "the best society;" the other--a beautiful quadroon, also
+the mother of several children--filled the humbler office of nurse to
+her own and the other's offspring.]
+
+[Footnote F: Among the things of which slavery has deprived the black is a
+_name_. A slave has no family designation. It may be for that reason
+that a high-sounding appellation is usually selected for the single one
+he is allowed to appropriate.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+PLANTATION DISCIPLINE.
+
+
+The "Ole Cabin" to which Jim had alluded as the scene of Sam's
+punishment by the overseer, was a one-story shanty in the vicinity of
+the stables. Though fast falling to decay, it had more the appearance of
+a human habitation than the other huts on the plantation. Its thick
+plank door was ornamented with a mouldy brass knocker, and its four
+windows contained sashes, to which here and there clung a broken pane,
+the surviving relic of its better days. It was built of large unhewn
+logs, notched at the ends and laid one upon the other, with the bark
+still on. The thick, rough coat which yet adhered in patches to the
+timber had opened in the sun, and let the rain and the worm burrow in
+its sides, till some parts had crumbled entirely away. At one corner the
+process of decay had gone on till roof, superstructure, and foundation
+had rotted down and left an opening large enough to admit a coach and
+four horses. The huge chimneys which had graced the gable ends of the
+building were fallen in, leaving only a mass of sticks and clay to tell
+of their existence, and two wide openings to show how great a figure
+they had once made in the world. A small space in front of the cabin
+would have been a lawn, had the grass been willing to grow upon it; and
+a few acres of cleared land in its rear might have passed for a garden,
+had it not been entirely overgrown with young pines and stubble. This
+primitive structure was once the "mansion" of that broad plantation,
+and, before the production of turpentine came into fashion in that
+region, its rude owner drew his support from its few surrounding acres,
+more truly independent than the present aristocratic proprietor, who,
+raising only one article, and buying all his provisions, was forced to
+draw his support from the Yankee or the Englishman.
+
+Only one room, about forty feet square, occupied the interior of the
+cabin. It once contained several apartments, vestiges of which still
+remained, but the partitions had been torn away to fit it for its
+present uses. What those uses were, a moment's observation showed me.
+
+In the middle of the floor, a space about fifteen feet square was
+covered with thick pine planking, strongly nailed to the beams. In the
+centre of this planking, an oaken block was firmly bolted, and to it was
+fastened a strong iron staple that held a log-chain, to which was
+attached a pair of shackles. Above this, was a queer frame-work of oak,
+somewhat resembling the contrivance for drying fruit I have seen in
+Yankee farmhouses. Attached to the rafters by stout pieces of timber,
+were two hickory poles, placed horizontally, and about four feet apart,
+the lower one rather more than eight feet from the floor. This was the
+whipping-rack, and hanging to it were several stout whips with short
+hickory handles, and long triple lashes. I took one down for closer
+inspection, and found burned into the wood, in large letters, the words
+"Moral Suasion." I questioned the appropriateness of the label, but the
+Colonel insisted with great gravity, that the whip is the only "moral
+suasion" a darky is capable of understanding.
+
+When punishment is inflicted on one of the Colonel's negroes, his feet
+are confined in the shackles, his arms tied above his head, and drawn by
+a stout cord up to one of the horizontal poles; then, his back bared to
+the waist, and standing on tip-toe, with every muscle stretched to its
+utmost tension, he takes "de lashes."
+
+A more severe but more unusual punishment is the "thumb-screw." In this
+a noose is passed around the negro's thumb and fore-finger, while the
+cord is thrown over the upper cross-pole, and the culprit is drawn up
+till his toes barely touch the ground. In this position the whole weight
+of the body rests on the thumb and fore-finger. The torture is
+excruciating, and strong, able-bodied men can endure it but a few
+moments. The Colonel naively told me that he had discontinued its
+practice, as several of his _women_ had nearly lost the use of their
+hands, and been incapacitated for field labor, by its too frequent
+repetition. "My ---- drivers,"[G] he added, "have no discretion, and no
+humanity; if they have a pique against a nigger, they show him no
+mercy."
+
+The old shanty I have described was now the place of the overseer's
+confinement. Open as it was at top, bottom, and sides, it seemed an
+unsafe prison-house; but Jim had secured its present occupant by placing
+"de padlocks on him."
+
+"Where did you catch him?" asked the Colonel, as, followed by every
+darky on the plantation, we took our way to the old building.
+
+"In de swamp, massa. We got Sandy and de dogs arter him--dey treed him,
+but he fit like de debble."
+
+"Any one hurt?"
+
+"Yas, Cunnel; he knifed Yaller Jake, and ef I hadn't a gibin him a
+wiper, you'd a had anudder nigger short dis mornin'--shore."
+
+"How was it? tell me," said his master, while we paused, and the darkies
+gathered around.
+
+"Wal, yer see, massa, we got de ole debble's hat dat he drapped wen you
+had him down; den we went to Sandy's fur de dogs--dey scented him to
+onst, and off dey put for de swamp. 'Bout twenty on us follored 'em.
+He'd a right smart start on us, and run like a deer, but de hounds
+kotched up wid him 'bout whar he shot pore Sam. He fit 'em and cut up de
+Lady awful, but ole Caesar got a hole ob him, and sliced a breakfuss out
+ob his legs. Somehow, dough, he got 'way from de ole dog, and clum a
+tree. 'Twar more'n an hour afore we kotched up; but dar he war, and de
+houns baying 'way as ef dey know'd what an ole debble he am. I'd tuk one
+ob de guns--you warn't in de house, massa, so I cudn't ax you."
+
+"Never mind that; go on," said the Colonel.
+
+"Wal, I up wid de gun, and tole him ef he didn't cum down I'd gib him
+suffin' dat 'ud sot hard on de stummuk. It tuk him a long w'ile, but--he
+_cum down_." Here the darky showed a row of ivory that would have been a
+fair capital for a metropolitan dentist.
+
+"When he war down," he resumed, "Jake war gwine to tie him, but de ole
+'gator, quicker dan a flash, put a knife enter him."
+
+"Is Jake much hurt?" interrupted the Colonel.
+
+"Not bad, massa; de knife went fru his arm, and enter his ribs, but de
+ma'am hab fix him, and she say he'll be 'round bery sudden."
+
+"Well, what then?" inquired the Colonel.
+
+"Wen de ole debble seed he hadn't finished Jake, he war gwine to gib him
+anudder dig, but jus den I drap de gun on his cocoanut, and he neber
+trubble us no more. 'Twar mons'rous hard work to git him out ob de
+swamp, 'cause he war jess like a dead man, and had to be toted de hull
+way; but he'm dar now, massa (pointing to the old cabin), and de
+bracelets am on him."
+
+"Where is Jake?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Dunno, massa, but reckon he'm to hum."
+
+"One of you boys go and bring him to the cabin," said the Colonel.
+
+A negro man went off on the errand, while we and the darkies resumed our
+way to the overseer's quarters. Arrived there, I witnessed a scene that
+words cannot picture.
+
+Stretched at full length on the floor, his clothes torn to shreds, his
+coarse carroty hair matted with blood, and his thin, ugly visage pale as
+death, lay the overseer. Bending over him, wiping away the blood from
+his face, and swathing a ghastly wound on his forehead, was the negress
+Sue; while at his shackled feet, binding up his still bleeding legs,
+knelt the octoroon woman!
+
+"Is _she_ here?" I said, involuntarily, as I caught sight of the group.
+
+"It's her nature," said the Colonel, with a pleasant smile; "if Moye
+were the devil himself, she'd do him good if she could; another such
+woman never lived."
+
+And yet this woman, with all the instincts that make her sex
+angel-ministers to man, lived in daily violation of the most sacred of
+all laws--because she was a slave. Can Mr. Caleb Cushing or Charles
+O'Conor tell us why the Almighty invented a system which forces his
+creatures to break laws of His own making?
+
+"Don't waste your time on him, Alice," said the Colonel, kindly; "he
+isn't worth the rope that'll hang him."
+
+"He was bleeding to death; unless he has care he'll die," said the
+octoroon woman.
+
+"Then let him die, d---- him," replied the Colonel, advancing to where
+the overseer lay, and bending down to satisfy himself of his condition.
+
+Meanwhile more than two hundred dusky forms crowded around and filled
+every opening of the old building. Every conceivable emotion, except
+pity, was depicted on their dark faces. The same individuals whose
+cloudy visages a half hour before I had seen distended with a wild mirth
+and careless jollity, that made me think them really the docile,
+good-natured animals they are said to be, now glared on the prostrate
+overseer with the infuriated rage of aroused beasts when springing on
+their prey.
+
+"You can't come the possum here. Get up, you ---- hound," said the
+Colonel, rising and striking the bleeding man with his foot.
+
+The fellow raised himself on one elbow and gazed around with a stupid,
+vacant look. His eye wandered unsteadily for a moment from the Colonel
+to the throng of cloudy faces in the doorway; then, his recent
+experience flashing upon him, he shrieked out, clinging wildly to the
+skirts of the octoroon woman, who was standing near, "Keep off them
+cursed hounds--keep them off, I say--they'll kill me! they'll kill me!"
+
+One glance satisfied me that his mind was wandering. The blow on the
+head had shattered his reason, and made the strong man less than a
+child.
+
+"You wont be killed yet," said the Colonel. "You've a small account to
+settle with me before you reckon with the devil."
+
+At this moment the dark crowd in the doorway parted, and Jake entered,
+his arm bound up and in a sling.
+
+"Jake, come here," said the Colonel; "this man would have killed you.
+What shall we do with him?"
+
+"'Taint for a darky to say dat, massa," said the negro, evidently
+unaccustomed to the rude administration of justice which the Colonel
+was about to inaugurate; "he did wuss dan dat to Sam, massa--he orter
+swing for shootin' him."
+
+"That's _my_ affair; we'll settle your account first," replied the
+Colonel.
+
+The darky looked undecidedly at his master, and then at the overseer,
+who, overcome by weakness, had sunk again to the floor. The little
+humanity in him was evidently struggling with his hatred of Moye and his
+desire for revenge, when the old nurse yelled out from among the crowd,
+"Gib him fifty lashes, Massa Davy, and den you wash him down.[H] Be a
+man, Jake, and say dat."
+
+Jake still hesitated, and when at last he was about to speak, the eye of
+the octoroon caught his, and chained the words to his tongue, as if by
+magnetic power.
+
+"Do you say that, boys;" said the Colonel, turning to the other negroes;
+"shall he have fifty lashes?"
+
+"Yas, massa, fifty lashes--gib de ole debble fifty lashes," shouted
+about fifty voices.
+
+"He shall have them," quietly said the master.
+
+The mad shout that followed, which was more like the yell of demons than
+the cry of men, seemed to arouse Moye to a sense of his real position.
+Springing to his feet, he gazed wildly around; then, sinking on his
+knees before the octoroon, and clutching the folds of her dress, he
+shrieked, "Save me, good lady, save me! as you hope for mercy, save me!"
+
+
+Not a muscle of her face moved, but, turning to the excited crowd, she
+mildly said, "Fifty lashes would kill him. _Jake_ does not say
+that--your master leaves it to him, and _he_ will not whip a dying
+man--will you, Jake?"
+
+"No, ma'am--not--not ef you gwo agin it," replied the negro, with very
+evident reluctance.
+
+"But he whipped Sam, ma'am, when Sam war nearer dead than _he_ am," said
+Jim, whose station as house-servant allowed him a certain freedom of
+speech.
+
+"Because he was brutal to Sam, should you be brutal to him? Can you
+expect me to tend you when you are sick, if you beat a dying man? Does
+Pompey say you should do such things?"
+
+"No, good ma'am," said the old preacher, stepping out, with the freedom
+of an old servant, from the black mass, and taking his stand beside me
+in the open space left for the "w'ite folks;" "de ole man dusn't say
+dat, ma'am; he tell 'em dat de Lord want 'em to forgib dar en'mies--to
+lub dem dat pursyskute 'em;" and, turning to the Colonel, he added, as
+he passed his hand meekly over his thin crop of white wool and threw his
+long heel back, "ef massa'll 'low me I'll talk to 'em."
+
+"Fire away," said the Colonel, with evident chagrin. "This is a nigger
+trial; if you want to screen the d---- hound you can do it."
+
+"I dusn't want to screed him, massa, but I'se bery ole and got soon to
+gwo, and I dusn't want de blessed Lord to ax me wen I gets dar why I
+'lowed dese pore ig'nant brack folks to mudder a man 'fore my bery
+face. I toted you, massa, 'fore you cud gwo, I'se worked for you till I
+can't work no more; and I dusn't want to tell de Lord dat _my_ massa let
+a brudder man be killed in cole blood."
+
+"He is no brother of mine, you old fool; preach to the nigs, don't
+preach to me," said the Colonel, stifling his displeasure, and striding
+off through the black crowd, without saying another word.
+
+Here and there in the dark mass a face showed signs of relenting; but
+much the larger number of that strange jury, had the question been put,
+would have voted--DEATH.
+
+The old preacher turned to them as the Colonel passed out, and said, "My
+chil'ren, would you hab dis man whipped, so weak, so dyin' as he am, ef
+he war brack?"
+
+"No, not ef he war a darky--fer den he wouldn't be such an ole debble,"
+replied Jim, and about a dozen of the other negroes.
+
+"De w'ite aint no wuss dan de brack--we'm all 'like--pore sinners all on
+us. De Lord wudn't whip a w'ite man no sooner dan a brack one--He tinks
+de w'ite juss so good as de brack (good Southern doctrine, I thought).
+De porest w'ite trash wudn't strike a man wen he war down."
+
+"We'se had 'nough of dis, ole man," said a large, powerful negro (one of
+the drivers), stepping forward, and, regardless of the presence of Madam
+P---- and myself, pressing close to where the overseer lay, now totally
+unconscious of what was passing around him. "You needn't preach no more;
+de Cunnel hab say we'm to whip ole Moye, and we'se gwine to do it,
+by ----."
+
+I felt my fingers closing on the palm of my hand, and in a second more
+they might have cut the darky's profile, had not Madam P---- cried out,
+"Stand back, you impudent fellow: say another word, and I'll have you
+whipped on the spot."
+
+"De Cunnel am my massa, ma'am--_he_ say ole Moye am to be whipped, and
+I'se gwine to do it--shore."
+
+I have seen a storm at sea--I have seen the tempest tear up great
+trees--I have seen the lightning strike in a dark night--but I never saw
+any thing half so grand, half so terrible, as the glance and tone of
+that woman as she cried out, "Jim, take this man--give him fifty lashes
+this instant."
+
+Quicker than thought, a dozen darkies were on him. His hands and feet
+were tied and he was under the whipping-rack in a second. Turning then
+to the other negroes, the brave woman said, "Some of you carry Moye to
+the house, and you, Jim, see to this man--if fifty lashes don't make him
+sorry, give him fifty more."
+
+This summary change of programme was silently acquiesced in by the
+assembled negroes, but many a cloudy face scowled sulkily on the
+octoroon, as, leaning on my arm, she followed Junius and the other
+negroes, who bore Moye to the mansion. It was plain that under those
+dark faces a fire was burning that a breath would have fanned into a
+flame.
+
+We entered the house by its rear door, and placed Moye in a small room
+on the ground floor. He was laid on a bed, and stimulants being given
+him, his senses and reason shortly returned. His eyes opened, and his
+real position seemed suddenly to flash upon him, for he turned to Madam
+P----, and in a weak voice, half choked with emotion, faltered out: "May
+God in heaven bless ye, ma'am; God _will_ bless ye for bein' so good to
+a wicked man like me. I doesn't desarve it, but ye woant leave me--ye
+woant leave me--they'll kill me ef ye do!"
+
+"Don't fear," said the Madam; "you shall have a fair trial. No harm
+shall come to you here."
+
+"Thank ye, thank ye," gasped the overseer, raising himself on one arm,
+and clutching at the lady's hand, which he tried to lift to his lips.
+
+"Don't say any more now," said Madam P----, quietly; "you must rest and
+be quiet, or you wont get well."
+
+"Shan't I get well? Oh, I can't die--I can't die _now_!"
+
+The lady made a soothing reply, and giving him an opiate, and arranging
+the bedding so that he might rest more easily, she left the room with
+me.
+
+As we stepped into the hall, I saw through the front door, which was
+open, the horses harnessed in readiness for "meeting," and the Colonel
+pacing to and fro on the piazza, smoking a cigar. He perceived us, and
+halted in the doorway.
+
+"So you've brought that d---- bloodthirsty villain into my house!" he
+said to Madam P---- in a tone of strong displeasure.
+
+"How could I help it? The negroes are mad, and would kill him anywhere
+else," replied the lady, with a certain self-confidence that showed she
+knew her power over the Colonel.
+
+"Why should _you_ interfere between them and him? Has he not insulted
+you enough to make you let him alone? Can you so easily forgive his
+taunting you with"--He did not finish the sentence, but what I had
+learned on the previous evening from the old nurse gave me a clue to its
+meaning. A red flame flushed the face and neck of the octoroon
+woman--her eyes literally flashed fire, and her very breath seemed to
+come with pain; in a moment, however, this emotion passed away, and she
+quietly said, "Let me settle that in my own way. He has served _you_
+well--_you_ have nothing against him that the law will not punish."
+
+"By ----, you are the most unaccountable woman I ever knew," exclaimed
+the Colonel, striding up and down the piazza, the angry feeling passing
+from his face, and giving way to a mingled expression of wonder and
+admiration. The conversation was here interrupted by Jim, who just then
+made his appearance, hat in hand.
+
+"Well, Jim, what is it?" asked his master.
+
+"We'se gib'n Sam twenty lashes, ma'am, but he beg so hard, and say he so
+sorry, dat I tole him I'd ax you 'fore we gabe him any more."
+
+"Well, if he's sorry, that's enough; but tell him he'll get fifty
+another time," said the lady.
+
+"What Sam is it?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Big Sam, the driver," said Jim.
+
+"Why was he whipped?"
+
+"He told me _you_ were his master, and insisted on whipping Moye,"
+replied the lady.
+
+"Did he dare to do that? Give him a hundred, Jim, not one less," roared
+the Colonel.
+
+"Yas, massa," said Jim, turning to go.
+
+The lady looked significantly at the negro and shook her head, but said
+nothing, and he left.
+
+"Come, Alice, it is nearly time for meeting, and I want to stop and see
+Sandy on the way."
+
+"I reckon I wont go," said Madam P----.
+
+"You stay to take care of Moye, I suppose," said the Colonel, with a
+slight sneer.
+
+"Yes," replied the lady, "he is badly hurt, and in danger of
+inflammation."
+
+"Well, suit yourself. Mr. K----, come, _we'll_ go--you'll meet some of
+the _natives_."
+
+The lady retired to the house, and the Colonel and I were soon ready.
+The driver brought the horses to the door, and as we were about to enter
+the carriage, I noticed Jim taking his accustomed seat on the box.
+
+"Who's looking after Sam?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Nobody, Cunnel; de ma'am leff him gwo."
+
+"How dare you disobey me? Didn't I tell you to give him a hundred?"
+
+"Yas, massa, but de ma'am tole me notter."
+
+"Well, another time you mind what _I_ say--do you hear?" said his
+master.
+
+"Yas, massa," said the negro, with a broad grin, "I allers do dat."
+
+"You _never_ do it, you d---- nigger; I ought to have flogged you long
+ago."
+
+Jim said nothing, but gave a quiet laugh, showing no sort of fear, and
+we entered the carriage. I afterward learned from him that he had never
+been whipped, and that all the negroes on the plantation obeyed the lady
+when, which was seldom, her orders came in conflict with their master's.
+They knew if they did not, the Colonel would whip them.
+
+As we rode slowly along the Colonel said to me, "Well, you see that the
+best people have to flog niggers sometimes."
+
+"Yes, _I_ should have given that fellow a hundred lashes, at least. I
+think the effect on the others would have been bad if Madam P---- had
+not had him flogged."
+
+"But she generally goes against it. I don't remember of her having it
+done in ten years before. And yet, though I've the worst gang of niggers
+in the district, they obey her like so many children."
+
+"Why is that?"
+
+"Well, there's a kind of magnetism about her that makes everybody love
+her; and then she tends them in sickness, and is constantly doing little
+things for their comfort; _that_ attaches them to her. She is an
+extraordinary woman."
+
+"Whose negroes are those, Colonel?" I asked, as, after a while, we
+passed a gang of about a dozen, at work near the roadside. Some were
+tending a tar-kiln, and some engaged in cutting into fire-wood the pines
+which a recent tornado had thrown to the ground.
+
+"They are mine, but they are working now for themselves. I let such as
+will, work on Sunday. I furnish the "raw material," and pay them for
+what they do, as I would a white man."
+
+"Wouldn't it be better to make them go to hear the old preacher;
+couldn't they learn something from him?"
+
+"Not much; Old Pomp never read any thing but the Bible, and he doesn't
+understand that; besides, they can't be taught. You can't make 'a
+whistle out of a pig's tail;' you can't make a nigger into a white man."
+
+Just here the carriage stopped suddenly, and we looked out to see the
+cause. The road by which we had come was a mere opening through the
+pines; no fences separated it from the wooded land, and being seldom
+travelled, the track was scarcely visible. In many places it widened to
+a hundred feet, but in others tall trees had grown up on its opposite
+sides, leaving scarcely width enough for a single carriage to pass
+along. In one of these narrow passages, just before us, a queer-looking
+vehicle had upset, and scattered its contents in the road. We had no
+alternative but to wait till it got out of the way; and we all alighted
+to reconnoitre.
+
+The vehicle was a little larger than an ordinary handcart, and was
+mounted on wheels that had probably served their time on a Boston dray
+before commencing their travels in Secessiondom. Its box of pine
+boarding and its shafts of rough oak poles were evidently of Southern
+home manufacture. Attached to it by a rope harness, with a primitive
+bridle of decidedly original construction, was--not a horse, nor a mule,
+nor even an alligator, but a "three-year-old heifer."
+
+The wooden linch-pin of the cart had given way, and the weight of a
+half-dozen barrels of turpentine had thrown the box off its balance, and
+rolled the contents about in all directions.
+
+The appearance of the proprietor of this nondescript vehicle was in
+keeping with his establishment. His coat, which was much too short in
+the waist and much too long in the skirts, was of the common reddish
+gray linsey, and his nether garments, which stopped just below the
+knees, were of the same material. From there downwards, he wore only the
+covering that is said to have been the fashion in Paradise before Adam
+took to fig-leaves. His hat had a rim broader than a political platform,
+and his skin a color half way between tobacco-juice and a tallow
+candle.
+
+"Wal, Cunnul, how dy'ge?" said the stranger, as we stepped from the
+carriage.
+
+"Very well, Ned; how are you?"
+
+"Purty wal, Cunnul; had the nagur lately, right smart, but'm gittin'
+'roun'."
+
+"You're in a bad fix here, I see. Can Jim help you?"
+
+"Wal, p'raps he moight. Jim, how dy'ge?"
+
+"Sort o' smart, ole feller. But come, stir yerseff; we want ter gwo
+'long," replied Jim, with a lack of courtesy that showed he regarded the
+white man as altogether too "trashy" to be treated with much ceremony.
+
+With the aid of Jim, a new linch-pin was soon whittled out, the
+turpentine rolled on to the cart, and the vehicle put in a moving
+condition.
+
+"Where are you hauling your turpentine?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"To Sam Bell's, at the 'Boro'."
+
+"What will he pay you?"
+
+"Wal, I've four barr'ls of 'dip,' and tu of 'hard.' For the hull, I
+reckon he'll give three dollar a barr'l."
+
+"By tale?"
+
+"No, for tu hun'red and eighty pound."
+
+"Well, _I'll_ give you two dollars and a half, by weight."
+
+"Can't take it, Cunnel; must get three dollar."
+
+"What, will you go sixty miles with this team, and waste five or six
+days, for fifty cents on six barrels--three dollars!"
+
+"Can't 'ford the time, Cunnel, but must git three dollar a barr'l."
+
+"That fellow is a specimen of our 'natives,'" said the Colonel, as we
+resumed our seats in the carriage. "You'll see more of them before we
+get back to the plantation."
+
+"He puts a young cow to a decidedly original use," I remarked.
+
+"Oh no, not original here; the ox and the cow with us are both used for
+labor."
+
+"You don't mean to say that cows are generally worked here?"
+
+"Of course I do. Our breeds are good for nothing as milkers, and we put
+them to the next best use. I never have cow's milk on my plantation."
+
+"You don't! I could have sworn it was in my coffee this morning."
+
+"I wouldn't trust you to buy brandy for me, if your organs of taste are
+not keener than that. It was goat's milk."
+
+"Then how do you get your butter?"
+
+"From the North. I've had mine from my New York factors for over ten
+years."
+
+We soon arrived at Sandy, the negro-hunter's, and halted to allow the
+Colonel to inquire as to the health of his family of children and
+dogs--the latter the less numerous, but, if I might judge by
+appearances, the more valued of the two.
+
+[Footnote G: The negro-whippers and field overseers.]
+
+[Footnote H: Referring to the common practice of bathing the raw and
+bleeding backs of the punished slaves with a strong solution of salt
+and water.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE NEGRO HUNTER.
+
+
+Alighting from the carriage, I entered, with my host, the cabin of the
+negro-hunter. So far as external appearance went, the shanty was a
+slight improvement on the "Mills House," described in a previous
+chapter; but internally, it was hard to say whether it resembled more a
+pig-sty or a dog-kennel. The floor was of the bare earth, covered in
+patches with loose plank of various descriptions, and littered over with
+billets of "lightwood," unwashed cooking utensils, two or three cheap
+stools, a pine settee--made from the rough log and hewn smooth on the
+upper side--a full-grown bloodhound, two younger canines, and nine
+half-clad juveniles of the flax-head species. Over against the
+fire-place three low beds afforded sleeping accommodation to nearly a
+dozen human beings (of assorted sizes, and dove-tailed together with
+heads and feet alternating), and in the opposite corner a lower couch,
+whose finer furnishings told plainly it was the peculiar property of the
+"wee ones" of the family--a mother's tenderness for her youngest thus
+cropping out even in the midst of filth and degradation--furnished
+quarters for an unwashed, uncombed, unclothed, saffron-hued little
+fellow about fifteen months old, and--the dog "Lady." She was of a dark
+hazel color--a cross between a pointer and a bloodhound--and one of the
+most beautiful creatures I ever saw. Her neck and breast were bound
+about with a coarse cotton cloth, saturated with blood, and emitting a
+strong odor of bad whiskey; and her whole appearance showed the
+desperate nature of the encounter with the overseer.
+
+The nine young democrats who were lolling about the room in various
+attitudes, rose as we entered, and with a familiar but rather
+deferential "How-dy'ge," to the Colonel, huddled around and stared at me
+with open mouths and distended eyes, as if I were some strange being,
+dropped from another sphere. The two eldest were of the male gender, as
+was shown by their clothes--cast-off suits of the inevitable
+reddish-gray, much too large, and out at the elbows and the knees--but
+the sex of the others I was at a loss to determine, for they wore only a
+single robe, reaching, like their mother's, from the neck to the knees.
+Not one of the occupants of the cabin boasted a pair of stockings, but
+the father and mother did enjoy the luxury of shoes--coarse, stout
+brogans, untanned, and of the color of the legs which they encased.
+
+"Well, Sandy, how is 'Lady?'" asked the Colonel, as he stepped to the
+bed of the wounded dog.
+
+"Reckon she's a goner, Cunnel; the d---- Yankee orter swing fur it."
+
+This intimation that the overseer was a countryman of mine, took me by
+surprise, nothing I had observed in his speech or manners having
+indicated it, but I consoled myself with the reflection that Connecticut
+had reared him--as she makes wooden hams and nutmegs--expressly for the
+Southern market.
+
+"He _shall_ swing for it, by ----. But are you sure the slut will die?"
+
+"Not shore, Cunnel, but she can't stand, and the blood _will_ run. I
+reckon a hun'red and fifty ar done for thar, sartin."
+
+"D---- the money--I'll make that right. Go to the house and get some
+ointment from Madam--she can save her--go at once," said my host.
+
+"I will, Cunnel," replied the dirt-eater, taking his broad-brim from a
+wooden peg, and leisurely leaving the cabin. Making our way then over
+the piles of rubbish and crowds of children that cumbered the apartment,
+the Colonel and I returned to the carriage.
+
+"Dogs must be rare in this region," I remarked, as we resumed our seats.
+
+"Yes, well-trained bloodhounds are scarce everywhere. That dog is well
+worth a hundred and fifty dollars."
+
+"The business of nigger-catching, then, is brisk, just now?"
+
+"No, not more brisk than usual. We always have more or less runaways."
+
+"Do most of them take to the swamps?"
+
+"Yes, nine out of ten do, though now and then one gets off on a trading
+vessel. It is almost impossible for a strange nigger to make his way by
+land from here to the free states."
+
+"Then why do you Carolinians make such an outcry about the violation of
+the Fugitive Slave Law?"
+
+"For the same reason that dogs quarrel over a naked bone. We should be
+unhappy if we couldn't growl at the Yankees," replied the Colonel,
+laughing.
+
+"_We_, you say; you mean by that, the hundred and eighty thousand nabobs
+who own five-sixths of your slaves?"[I]
+
+"Yes, I mean them, and the three millions of poor whites--the ignorant,
+half-starved, lazy vermin you have just seen. _They_ are the real basis
+of our Southern oligarchy, as you call it," continued my host, still
+laughing.
+
+"I thought the negroes were the serfs in your feudal system?"
+
+"Both the negroes and the poor whites are the serfs, but the white trash
+are its real support. Their votes give the small minority of
+slave-owners all their power. You say we control the Union. We do, and
+we do it by the votes of these people, who are as far below our niggers
+as the niggers are below decent white men. Who that reflects that this
+country has been governed for fifty years by such scum, would give a
+d---- for republican institutions?"
+
+"It does speak badly for _your_ institutions. A system that reduces
+nearly half of a white population to the level of slaves cannot stand in
+this country. The late election shows that the power of your 'white
+trash' is broken."
+
+"Well, it does, that's a fact. If the states should remain together, the
+West would in future control the Union. We see that, and are therefore
+determined on dissolution. It is our only way to keep our niggers."
+
+"The West will have to consent to that project. My opinion is, your
+present policy will, if carried out, free every one of your slaves."
+
+"I don't see how. Even if we are put down--which we cannot be--and are
+held in the Union against our will, government cannot, by the
+constitution, interfere with slavery in the states."
+
+"I admit that, but it can confiscate the property of traitors. Every
+large slave-holder is to-day, at heart, a traitor. If this movement goes
+on, you will commit overt acts against the government, and in
+self-defence it will punish treason by taking from you the means of
+future mischief."
+
+"The Republicans and Abolitionists might do that if they had the power,
+but nearly one-half of the North is on our side, and will not fight us."
+
+"Perhaps so; but if _I_ had this thing to manage, I would put you down
+without fighting."
+
+"How would you do it--by preaching abolition where even the niggers
+would mob you? There's not a slave in all South Carolina but would shoot
+Garrison or Greeley on sight."
+
+"That may be, but if so, it is because you keep them in ignorance. Build
+a free-school at every cross-road, and teach the poor whites, and what
+would become of slavery? If these people were on a par with the farmers
+of New England, would it last for an hour? Would they not see that it
+stands in the way of their advancement, and vote it out of existence as
+a nuisance?"
+
+"Yes, perhaps they would; but the school-houses are not at the
+cross-roads, and, thank God, they will not be there in this generation."
+
+"The greater the pity; but that which will not flourish alongside of a
+school-house, cannot, in the nature of things, outlast this century. Its
+time must soon come."
+
+"Enough for the day is the evil thereof. I'll risk the future of
+slavery, if the South, in a body, goes out of the Union."
+
+"In other words, you'll shut out schools and knowledge, in order to keep
+slavery in existence. The Abolitionists claim it to be a relic of
+barbarism, and you admit it could not exist with general education among
+the people."
+
+"Of course it could not. If Sandy, for instance, knew he were as good a
+man as I am--and he would be if he were educated--do you suppose he
+would vote as I tell him, go and come at my bidding, and live on my
+charity? No, sir! give a man knowledge, and, however poor he may be,
+he'll act for himself."
+
+"Then free-schools and general education would destroy slavery?"
+
+"Of course they would. The few cannot rule when the many know their
+rights. If the poor whites realized that slavery kept them poor, would
+they not vote it down? But the South and the world are a long way off
+from general education. When it comes to that, we shall need no laws,
+and no slavery, for the millennium will have arrived."
+
+"I'm glad you think slavery will not exist during the millennium," I
+replied, good-humoredly; "but how is it that you insist the negro is
+naturally inferior to the white, and still admit that the 'white trash,'
+are far below the black slaves?"
+
+"Education makes the difference. We educate the negro enough to make him
+useful to us; but the poor white man knows nothing. He can neither read
+nor write, and not only that, he is not trained to any useful
+employment. Sandy, here, who is a fair specimen of the tribe, obtains
+his living just like an Indian, by hunting, fishing, and stealing,
+interspersed with nigger-catching. His whole wealth consists of two
+hounds and pups; his house--even the wooden trough his miserable
+children eat from--belongs to me. If he didn't catch a runaway-nigger
+once in a while, he wouldn't see a dime from one year to another."
+
+"Then you have to support this man and his family?"
+
+"Yes, what I don't give him he steals. Half a dozen others poach on me
+in the same way."
+
+"Why don't you set them at work?"
+
+"They can't be made to work. I have hired them time and again, hoping to
+make something of them, but I never got one to work more than half a day
+at a time. It's their nature to lounge and to steal."
+
+"Then why do you keep them about you?"
+
+"Well, to be candid, their presence is of use in keeping the blacks in
+subordination, and they are worth all they cost me, because I control
+their votes."
+
+"I thought the blacks were said to be entirely contented?"
+
+"No, not contented. I do not claim that. I only say that they are unfit
+for freedom. I might cite a hundred instances in which it has been their
+ruin."
+
+"I have not heard of one. It seems strange to me that a man who can
+support another cannot support himself."
+
+"Oh! no, it's not at all strange. The slave has hands, and when the
+master gives him brains, he works well enough; but to support himself he
+needs both hands and brains, and he has only hands. I'll give you a case
+in point: At Wilmington, N. C., some years ago, there lived a negro by
+the name of Jack Campbell. He was a slave, and was employed, before the
+river was deepened so as to admit of the passage of large vessels up to
+the town, in lightering cargoes to the wharves. He hired his time of his
+master, and carried on business on his own account. Every one knew him,
+and his character for honesty, sobriety, and punctuality stood so high
+that his word was considered among merchants as good as that of the
+first business-men of the place. Well, Jack's wife and children were
+free, and he finally took it into his head to be free himself. He
+arranged with his master to purchase himself within a specified time, at
+eight hundred dollars, and he was to deposit his earnings in the hands
+of a certain merchant till they reached the required sum. He went on,
+and in three years had accumulated nearly seven hundred dollars, when
+his owner failed in business. As the slave has no right of property,
+Jack's earnings belonged by law to his master, and they were attached by
+the Northern creditors (mark that, _by Northern creditors_), and taken
+to pay the master's debts. Jack, too, was sold. His new owner also
+consented to his buying himself, at about the price previously agreed
+on. Nothing discouraged, he went to work again. Night and day he toiled,
+and it surprised every one to see so much energy and firmness of
+purpose in a negro. At last, after four more years of labor, he
+accomplished his purpose, and received his free-papers. He had worked
+seven years--as long as Jacob toiled for Rachel--for his freedom, and
+like the old patriarch he found himself cheated at last. I was present
+when he received his papers from his owner--a Mr. William H. Lippitt,
+who still resides at Wilmington--and I shall never forget the ecstasy of
+joy which he showed on the occasion. He sung and danced, and laughed,
+and wept, till my conscience smote me for holding my own niggers, when
+freedom might give them so much happiness. Well, he went off that day
+and treated some friends, and for three days afterward lay in the
+gutter, the entreaties of his wife and children having no effect on him.
+He swore he was free, and would do as he 'd---- pleased.' He had
+previously been a class-leader in the church, but after getting his
+freedom he forsook his previous associates, and spent his Sundays and
+evenings in a bar-room. He neglected his business; people lost
+confidence in him, and step by step he went down, till in five years he
+sunk into a wretched grave. That was the effect of freedom on _him_, and
+it would be the same on all of his race."
+
+"It is clear," I replied, "_he_ could not bear freedom, but that does
+not prove he might not have 'endured' it if he had never been a slave.
+His overjoy at obtaining liberty, after so long a struggle for it, led
+to his excesses and his ruin. According to your view, neither the black
+nor the poor white is competent to take care of himself. The Almighty,
+therefore, has laid upon _you_ a triple burden; you not only have to
+provide for yourself and your children, but for two races beneath you,
+the black and the clay-eater. The poor nigger has a hard time, but it
+seems to me you have a harder one."
+
+"Well, it's a fact, we do. I often think that if it wasn't for the color
+and the odor, I'd willingly exchange places with my man Jim."
+
+The Colonel made this last remark in a half-serious, half-comic way,
+that excited my risibilities, but before I could reply, the carriage
+stopped, and Jim, opening the door, announced:
+
+"We's har, massa, and de prayin' am gwine on."
+
+[Footnote I: The foregoing statistics are correct. That small number of
+slave-holders sustains the system of slavery, and has caused this
+terrible rebellion. They are, almost to a man, rebels and secessionists,
+and we may cover the South with armies, and keep a file of soldiers upon
+every plantation, and not smother this insurrection, unless we break
+down the power of that class. Their wealth gives them their power, and
+their wealth is in their slaves. Free their negroes by an act of
+emancipation, or confiscation, and the rebellion will crumble to pieces
+in a day. Omit to do it, and it will last till doomsday.
+
+The power of this dominant class once broken, with landed property at
+the South more equally divided, a new order of things will arise there.
+Where now, with their large plantations, not one acre in ten is tilled,
+a system of small farms will spring into existence, and the whole
+country be covered with cultivation. The six hundred thousand men who
+have gone there to fight our battles, will see the amazing fertility of
+the Southern soil--into which the seed is thrown and springs up without
+labor into a bountiful harvest--and many of them, if slavery is crushed
+out, will remain there. Thus a new element will be introduced into the
+South, an element that will speedily make it a loyal, prosperous, and
+_intelligent_ section of the Union.
+
+I would interfere with no one's rights, but a rebel in arms against his
+country has no rights; all that he has "is confiscate." Will the loyal
+people of the North submit to be ground to the earth with taxes to pay
+the expenditures of a war, brought upon them by these Southern
+oligarchists, while the traitors are left in undisturbed possession of
+every thing, and even their slaves are exempted from taxation? It were
+well that our legislators should ask this question now, and not wait
+till it's asked of them by THE PEOPLE.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE COUNTRY CHURCH.
+
+
+Had we not been absorbed in conversation, we might have discovered, some
+time previous to our arrival at the church door, that the services had
+commenced, for the preacher was shouting at the top of his lungs. He
+evidently thought the Lord either a long way off, or very hard of
+hearing. Not wishing to disturb the congregation while at their
+devotions, we loitered near the doorway until the prayer was over, and
+in the mean time I glanced around the vicinity.
+
+The "meeting-house," of large unhewn logs, was a story and a half in
+height, and about large enough to seat comfortably a congregation of two
+hundred persons. It was covered with shingles, with a roof projecting
+some four feet over the walls, and was surmounted at the front gable by
+a tower, about twelve feet square. This also was built of logs, and
+contained a bell "to call the erring to the house of prayer," though,
+unfortunately, all of that character thereabouts dwelt beyond the sound
+of its voice. The building was located at a cross-roads, about equally
+distant from two little hamlets (the nearer nine miles off), neither of
+which was populous enough to singly support a church and a preacher. The
+trees in the vicinity had been thinned out, so that carriages could
+drive into the woods, and find under the branches shelter from the rain
+and the sun; and at the time of my visit, about twenty vehicles of all
+sorts and descriptions, from the Colonel's magnificent barouche to the
+rude cart drawn by a single two-horned quadruped, filled the openings.
+There was a rustic simplicity about the whole scene that charmed me. The
+low, rude church, the grand old pines that towered in leafy magnificence
+around it, and the soft, low wind, that sung a morning hymn in the
+green, wavy woods, seemed to lift the soul up to Him who inhabiteth
+eternity, but who deigns to visit the erring children of men.
+
+The preacher was about to "line out" one of Watts' psalms when we
+entered the church, but he stopped short on perceiving us, and, bowing
+low, waited till we had taken our seats. This action, and the
+sycophantic air which accompanied it, disgusted me, and turning to the
+Colonel, I asked, jocosely:
+
+"Do the chivalry exact so much obsequiousness from the country clergy?
+Do you require to be bowed up to heaven?"
+
+In a low voice, but high enough, I thought, for the preacher to hear,
+for we sat very near, the Colonel replied:
+
+"He's a renegade Yankee--the meanest thing on earth."
+
+I said no more, but entered into the services as seriously as the
+strange gymnastic performances of the preacher would allow of my doing;
+for he was quite as amusing as a circus clown.
+
+With the exception of the Colonel's, and a few other pews in the
+vicinity of the pulpit, all of the seats were mere rough benches,
+without backs, and placed so closely together as to interfere
+uncomfortably with the knees of the sitters. The house was full, and the
+congregation as attentive as any I ever saw. All classes were there; the
+black serving-man away off by the doorway, the poor white a little
+higher up, the small turpentine-farmer a little higher still, and the
+wealthy planter, of the class to which the Colonel belonged, on "the
+highest seats of the synagogue," and in close proximity to the preacher.
+
+The "man of prayer" was a tall, lean, raw-boned, angular-built
+individual, with a thin, sharp, hatchet-face, a small sunken eye, and
+long, loose hair, brushed back and falling over the collar of a seedy
+black coat. He looked like a dilapidated scare-crow, and his pale,
+sallow face, and cracked, wheezy voice, were in odd and comic keeping
+with his discourse. His text was: "Speak unto the children of Israel,
+that they go forward." And addressing the motley gathering of poor
+whites and small planters before him as the "chosen people of God," he
+urged them to press on in the mad course their state had taken. It was a
+political harangue, a genuine stump-speech, but its frequent allusions
+to the auditory as the legitimate children of the old patriarch, and the
+rightful heirs of all the promises, struck me as out of place in a
+rural district of South Carolina, however appropriate it might have been
+in one of the large towns, before an audience of merchants and traders,
+who are, almost to a man, Jews.
+
+The services over, the congregation slowly left the church. Gathered in
+groups in front of the "meeting-house," they were engaged in a general
+discussion of the affairs of the day, when the Colonel and I emerged
+from the doorway. The better class greeted my host with considerable
+cordiality, but I noticed that the well-to-do small planters, who
+composed the greater part of the assemblage, received him with decided
+coolness. These people were the "North County folks," on whom the
+overseer had invoked a hanging. Except that their clothing was more
+uncouth and ill-fashioned, and their faces generally less "cute" of
+expression, they did not materially differ in appearance from the rustic
+citizens who may be seen on any pleasant Sunday gathered around the
+doorways of the rural meeting-houses of New England.
+
+One of them, who was leaning against a tree, quietly lighting a pipe,
+was a fair type of the whole, and as he took a part in the scene which
+followed, I will describe him. He was tall and spare, with a swinging,
+awkward gait, and a wiry, athletic frame. His hair, which he wore almost
+as long as a woman's, was coarse and black, and his face strongly
+marked, and of the precise color of two small rivulets of tobacco-juice
+that escaped from the corners of his mouth. He had an easy,
+self-possessed manner, and a careless, devil-may-care way about him,
+that showed he had measured his powers, and was accustomed to "rough it"
+with the world. He wore a broadcloth coat of the fashion of some years
+ago, but his waistcoat and nether garments of the common, reddish
+homespun, were loose and ill-shaped, as if their owner did not waste
+thought on such trifles. His hat, as shockingly bad as Horace Greeley's,
+had the inevitable broad brim, and fell over his face like a
+calash-awning over a shop-window. As I approached him he extended his
+hand with a pleasant "How are ye, stranger?"
+
+"Very well," I replied, returning his grasp with equal warmth, "how are
+you?"
+
+"Right smart, right smart, thank ye. You're----" the rest of the
+sentence was cut short by a gleeful exclamation from Jim, who, mounted
+on the box of the carriage, which was drawn up on the cleared plot in
+front of the meeting-house, waved an open newspaper over his head, and
+called out, as he caught sight of the Colonel:
+
+"Great news, massa--great news from Charls'on!"
+
+(The darky, while we were in church, had gone to the post-office, some
+four miles away, and got the Colonel's mail, which consisted of letters
+from his New York and Charleston factors, the Charleston _Courier_ and
+_Mercury_ and the New York _Journal of Commerce_. The latter sheet, at
+the date of which I am writing, was in wide circulation at the South,
+its piety (!) and its politics being then calculated with mathematical
+precision for secession latitudes.)
+
+"What is it, Jim?" shouted his master. "Give it to us."
+
+The darky had somehow learned to read, but holding the paper at arm's
+length, and throwing himself into a theatrical attitude, he cried out,
+with any amount of gesticulation:
+
+"De news am, massa, and gemmen and ladies, dat de ole fort fore
+Charls'on hab ben devacuated by Major Andersin and de sogers, and dey
+hab stole 'way in de dark night and gone to Sumter, whar dey can't be
+took; and dat de ole Gubner hab got out a procdemation dat all dat don't
+lub de Aberlishen Yankees shill cum up dar and clar 'em out; and de
+paper say dat lots ob sogers hab cum from Georgi and Al'bama, and 'way
+down Souf, to help 'em. Dis am w'at de _Currer_ say," he continued,
+holding the paper up to his eyes and reading: "Major Andersin, ob de
+United States army hab 'chieved de 'stinction ob op'ning cibil war
+'tween American citizens; he hab desarted Moulfrie, and by false
+fretexts hab took dat ole Garrison and all his millinery stores to Fort
+Sumter."
+
+"Get down, you d----d nigger," said the Colonel, laughing, and mounting
+the carriage-box beside him. "You can't read. Old Garrison isn't
+there--he's the d----d Northern Abolitionist."
+
+"I knows dat, Cunnel, but see dar," replied Jim, holding the paper out
+to his master, "don't dat say he'm dar? It'm him dat make all de
+trubble. P'raps dis nig can't read, but ef dat aint readin' I'd like to
+know it!"
+
+"Clear out," said the Colonel, now actually roaring with laughter; "it's
+the garrison of soldiers that the _Courier_ speaks of, not the
+Abolitionist."
+
+"Read it yoursef, den, massa, I don't seed it dat way."
+
+Jim was altogether wiser than he appeared, but while equally as well
+pleased with the news as his master, he was so for an entirely different
+reason. In the crisis which these tidings announced, he saw hope for his
+race.
+
+The Colonel then read the paper to the assemblage. The news was received
+with a variety of manifestations by the auditory, the larger portion, I
+thought, hearing it, as I did, with sincere regret.
+
+"Now is the time to stand by the state, my friends," said my host, as he
+finished the reading. "I hope every man here is ready to do his duty by
+old South Carolina."
+
+"Yes, _sar_! if she does _har_ duty by the Union. We'll go to the death
+for har just so long as she's in the right, but not a d----d step if
+she arn't," said the long-legged native I have introduced to the reader.
+
+"And what have _you_ to say about South Carolina? What does she owe to
+_you_?" asked the Colonel, turning on the speaker with a proud and angry
+look.
+
+"More, a darned sight, than she'll pay, if ye cursed 'ristocrats run her
+to h---- as ye'r doin'. She owes me, and 'bout ten as likely niggers as
+ye ever seed, a living, and we've d----d hard work to get it out on
+her _now_, let alone what's comin'."
+
+"Don't talk to me, you ill-mannered cur," said my host, turning his back
+on his neighbor, and directing his attention to the remainder of the
+assemblage.
+
+"Look har, Cunnel," replied the native, "if ye'll jest come down from
+thar, and throw 'way yer shootin'-irons, I'll give ye the all-firedest
+thrashing ye ever did get."
+
+The Colonel gave no further heed to him, but the speaker mounted the
+steps of the meeting-house and harangued the natives in a strain of rude
+and passionate declamation, in which my host, the aristocrats, and the
+secessionists came in for about equal shares of abuse. Seeing that the
+native (who, it appeared, was quite popular as a stump-speaker) was
+drawing away his audience, the Colonel descended from the driver's seat,
+and motioning for me to follow, entered the carriage. Turning the horses
+homeward, we rode off at a brisk pace.
+
+"Not much secession about that fellow, Colonel," I remarked, after a
+while.
+
+"No," he replied, "he's a North Carolina 'corn-cracker,' one of the
+ugliest specimens of humanity extant. They're as thick as fleas in this
+part of the state, and about all of them are traitors."
+
+"Traitors to the state, but true to the Union. As far as I've seen, that
+is the case with the middling class throughout the South." "Well, it
+may be, but they generally go with us, and I reckon they will now, when
+it comes to the rub. Those in the towns--the traders and
+mechanics--will, certain; its only these half-way independent planters
+that ever kick the traces. By the way," continued my host, in a jocose
+way, "what did you think of the preaching?"
+
+"I thought it very poor. I'd rather have heard the stump-speech, had it
+not been a little too personal on you."
+
+"Well, it was the better of the two," he replied, laughing, "but the old
+devil can't afford any thing good, he don't get enough pay."
+
+"Why, how much does he get?"
+
+"Only a hundred dollars."
+
+"That _is_ small. How does the man live?"
+
+"Well, he teaches the daughter of my neighbor, Captain Randall, who
+believes in praying, and gives him his board. Randall thinks that
+enough. The rest of the parish can't afford to pay him, and I _wont_."
+
+"Why wont you?"
+
+"Because he's a d----d old hypocrite. He believes in the Union with all
+his heart--at least so Randall, who's a sincere Union man, says--and
+yet, he never sees me at meeting but he preaches a red-hot secession
+sermon."
+
+"He wants to keep you in the faith," I replied.
+
+A few more miles of sandy road took us to the mansion, where we found
+dinner in waiting. Meeting "Massa Tommy"--who had staid at home with
+his mother--as we entered the doorway, the Colonel asked after the
+overseer.
+
+"He seems well enough, sir; I believe he's coming the possum over
+mother."
+
+"I'll bet on it, Tommy; but he wont fool you and me, will he, my boy?"
+said his father, slapping him affectionately on the back.
+
+After dinner I went, with my host to the room of the wounded man. His
+head was still bound up, and he was groaning piteously, as if in great
+pain; but I thought there was too fresh a color in his face to be
+entirely natural in one who had lost so much blood, and been so severely
+wounded as he affected to have been.
+
+The Colonel mentioned our suspicions to Madam P----, and suggested that
+the shackles should be put on him.
+
+"Oh! no, don't do that; it would be inhuman," said the lady; "the color
+is the effect of fever. If you fear he is plotting to get away, let him
+be watched."
+
+The Colonel consented, but with evident reluctance, to the arrangement,
+and retired to his room to take a _siesta_, while I lit a segar, and
+strolled out to the negro quarters.
+
+Making my way through the woods to the scene of the morning's
+jollification, I found about a hundred darkies gathered around Jim, on
+the little plot in front of old Lucy's cabin. He had evidently been
+giving them the news. Pausing when I came near, he exclaimed:
+
+"Har's Massa K----, he'll say dat I tells you de trufh;" and turning to
+me, he said: "Massa K----, dese darkies say dat Massa Andersin am an
+ab'lisherner, and dat none but de ab'lisherners will fight for de Union;
+am dat so, sar?"
+
+"No, I reckon not, Jim; I think the whole North would fight for it if it
+were necessary."
+
+"Am dat so, massa? am dat so?" eagerly inquired a dozen of the darkies;
+"and am dar great many folks at de Norf--more dan dar am down har?"
+
+"Yas, you fools, didn't I tell you dat?" said Jim, as I, not exactly
+relishing the idea of preaching treason, in the Colonel's absence, to
+his slaves, hesitated to reply. "Haint I tole you," he continued, "dat
+in de big city ob New York dar'm more folks dan in all Car'lina? I'se
+been dar, and I knows; and Massa K----'ll tell you dat dey--most on
+'em--feel mighty sorry for de brack man."
+
+"No he wont," I replied, "and besides, Jim, you should not talk in this
+way before me; I might tell your master."
+
+"No! you wont do dat; I knows you wont, massa. Scipio tole us he'd trust
+his bery life wid _you_."
+
+"Well, perhaps he might; it's true I would not injure you;" saying that,
+I turned away, though my curiosity was greatly excited to hear more.
+
+I wandered farther into the woods, and a half-hour found me near one of
+the turpentine distilleries. Seating myself on a rosin barrel, I quietly
+finished my segar, and was about lighting another, when Jim made his
+appearance.
+
+"Beg pardon, Massa K----," said the negro, bowing very low, "but I wants
+to ax you one or two tings, ef you please, sar."
+
+"Well," I replied, "I'll tell you any thing that I ought to."
+
+"Der yer tink, den, massa, dat dey'll git to fightin' at Charl'son?"
+
+"Yes, judging by the tone of the Charleston papers you've read to-day, I
+think they will."
+
+"And der yer tink dat de rest ob de Souf will jine wid Souf Car'lina, if
+she go at it fust?"
+
+"Yes, Jim, I'm inclined to think so."
+
+"I hard you say to massa, dat ef dey goes to war, 'twill free all de
+niggers--der you raily b'lieve dat, sar?"
+
+"_You_ heard me say that; how did you hear it?" I exclaimed, in
+surprise.
+
+"Why, sar, de front winder ob de carriage war down jess a crack, so I
+hard all you said."
+
+"Did you let it down on purpose?"
+
+"P'r'aps so, massa. Whot's de use ob habin' ears, ef you don't har?"
+
+"Well, I suppose not much; and you tell all you hear to the other
+negroes?"
+
+"I reckon so, massa," said the darky, looking very demure.
+
+"That's the use of having a tongue, eh?" I replied, laughing.
+
+"Dat's it 'zactly, massa."
+
+"Well, Jim, I do think the slaves will be finally freed; but it will
+cost more white blood to do it than all the niggers in creation are
+worth. Do you think the darkies would fight for their freedom?"
+
+"Fight, sar!" exclaimed the negro, straightening up his fine form, while
+his usual good-natured look passed from his face, and gave way to an
+expression that made him seem more like an incarnate devil than a human
+being; "FIGHT, sar; gib dem de chance, and den see."
+
+"Why are you discontented? You have been at the North, and you know the
+blacks are as well off as the majority of the poor laboring men there."
+
+"You says dat to _me_, Massa K----; you don't say it to de _Cunnel_. We
+am _not_ so well off as de pore man at de Norf! You knows dat, sar. He
+hab his wife and chil'ren, and his own home. What hab we, sar? No wife,
+no chil'ren, no home; all am de white man's. Der yer tink we wouldn't
+fight to be free?" and he pressed his teeth together, and there passed
+again over his face the same look it wore the moment before.
+
+"Come, come, Jim, this may be true of your race; but it don't apply to
+yourself. Your master is kind and indulgent to _you_."
+
+"He am kine to me, sar; he orter be," said the negro, the savage
+expression coming again into his eyes. For a moment he hesitated; then,
+taking a step toward me, he placed his face down to mine, and hissed out
+these words, every syllable seeming to come from the very bottom of his
+being. "I tell you he orter be, sar, FUR I AM HIS OWN FATHER'S SON!"
+
+"His brother!" I exclaimed, springing to my feet, and looking at him in
+blank amazement. "It can't be true!"
+
+"It am true, sar--as true as there's a hell! His father had my
+mother--when he got tired of her, he sold her Souf. _I war too young den
+eben to know her!_"
+
+"This is horrible--too horrible!" I said.
+
+"It am slavery, sar! Shouldn't we be contented?" replied the negro with
+a grim smile. Drawing, then, a large spring-knife from his pocket, he
+waved it above his head, and added: "Ef I had de hull white race
+dar--right dar under dat knife, don't yer tink I'd take all dar
+lives--all at one blow--to be FREE!"
+
+"And yet you refused to run away when the Abolitionists tempted you, at
+the North. Why didn't you go then?"
+
+"'Cause I had promised, massa."
+
+"Promised the Colonel before you went?"
+
+"No, sar; he neber axed me; but _I_ can't tell you no more. P'raps
+Scipio will, ef you ax him."
+
+"Oh! I see; you're in that league of which Scip is a leader. You'll get
+into trouble, _sure_," I replied, in a quick, decided tone, which
+startled him.
+
+"You tole Scipio dat, sar, and what did _he_ tell you?"
+
+"That he didn't care for his life."
+
+"No more do I, sar," said the negro, turning on his heel with a proud,
+almost defiant gesture, and starting to go.
+
+"A moment, Jim. You are very imprudent; never say these things to any
+other mortal; promise me that."
+
+"You'se bery good, massa, bery good. Scipio say you's true, and he'm
+allers right. I ortent to hab said what I hab; but sumhow, sar, dat news
+brought it all up _har_" (laying his hand on his breast), "and it wud
+come out."
+
+The tears filled his eyes as he said this, and turning away without
+another word, he disappeared among the trees.
+
+I was almost stunned by this strange revelation, but the more I
+reflected on it, the more probable it appeared. Now too, that my
+thoughts were turned in that direction, I called to mind a certain
+resemblance between the colonel and the negro that I had not heeded
+before. Though one was a high-bred Southern gentleman, claiming an old
+and proud descent, and the other a poor African slave, they had some
+striking peculiarities which might indicate a common origin. The
+likeness was not in their features, for Jim's face was of the
+unmistakable negro type, and his skin of a hue so dark that it seemed
+impossible he could be the son of a white man (I afterward learned that
+his mother was a black of the deepest dye), but it was in their form and
+general bearing. They had the same closely-knit and sinewy frame, the
+same erect, elastic step, the same rare blending of good-natured ease
+and dignity--to which I have already alluded as characteristic of the
+Colonel--and in the wild burst of passion that accompanied the negro's
+disclosure of their relationship, I saw the same fierce, unbridled
+temper, whose outbreaks I had witnessed in my host.
+
+What a strange fate was theirs! Two brothers--the one the owner of three
+hundred slaves, and the first man of his district--the other, a bonded
+menial, and so poor that the very bread he ate, and the clothes he wore,
+were another's!
+
+I passed the remainder of the afternoon in my room, and did not again
+meet my host until the family assembled at the tea-table. Jim then
+occupied his accustomed seat behind the Colonel's chair, and that
+gentleman was in more than his usual spirits, though Madam P----, I
+thought, wore a sad and absent look.
+
+The conversation rambled over a wide range of subjects, and was carried
+on mainly by the Colonel and myself; but toward the close of the meal
+the lady said to me:
+
+"Mr. K----, Sam and young Junius are to be buried this evening; if you
+have never seen a negro funeral, perhaps you'd like to attend."
+
+"I will be happy to accompany you, Madam, if you go," I replied,
+
+"Thank you," said the lady.
+
+"Pshaw! Alice, you'll not go into the woods on so cold a night as this!"
+said the Colonel.
+
+"Yes, I think I ought to. Our people will expect me."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+THE NEGRO FUNERAL.
+
+
+It was about an hour after nightfall when we took our way to the
+burial-ground. The moon had risen, but the clouds which gathered when
+the sun went down, covered its face, and were fast spreading their
+thick, black shadows over the little collection of negro-houses. Near
+two new-made graves were gathered some two hundred men and women, as
+dark as the night that was setting around them. As we entered the circle
+the old preacher pointed to seats reserved for us, and the sable crowd
+fell back a few paces, as if, even in the presence of death, they did
+not forget the difference between their race and ours.
+
+Scattered here and there among the trees, torches of lightwood threw a
+wild and fitful light over the little cluster of graves, revealing the
+long, straight boxes of rough pine that held the remains of the two
+negroes, and lighting up the score or two of russet mounds where slept
+the dusky kinsmen who had gone before them.
+
+The simple head-boards that marked these humble graves chronicled
+no bad biography or senseless rhyme, and told no false tales of
+lives that might better not have been, but "SAM, AGE 22;" "JAKE'S
+ELIZA;" "AUNT SUE;" "AUNT LUCY'S TOM;" "JOE;" and other like
+inscriptions, scratched in rough characters on the unplaned boards, were
+all the records there. The rude tenants had passed away and "left no
+sign;" their birth, their age, their deeds, were alike unknown--unknown,
+but not forgotten! for are they not written in the book of His
+remembrance--and when he counteth up his jewels, may not some of them be
+there?
+
+The queer, grotesque dress, and sad, earnest looks of the black group;
+the red, fitful glare of the blazing pine, and the white faces of the
+tapped trees, gleaming through the gloom like so many sheeted ghosts
+gathered to some death-carnival, made up a strange, wild scene--the
+strangest and the wildest I had ever witnessed.
+
+The covers of the rude coffins were not yet nailed down, and when we
+arrived, the blacks were, one by one, taking a last look at the faces of
+the dead. Soon, Junius, holding his weeping wife by the hand, approached
+the smaller of the two boxes, which held all that was left of their
+first-born. The mother, kneeling by its side, kissed again and again the
+cold, shrunken lips, and sobbed as if her heart would break; and the
+strong frame of the father shook convulsively, as he choked down the
+great sorrow which welled up in his throat, and turned away from his boy
+forever. As he did so, old Pompey said:
+
+"Don't grebe, June, he'm whar de wicked cease from trubling, whar de
+weary am at rest."
+
+"I knows it; I knows it, Uncle. I knows de Lord am bery good to take
+'im 'way; but why did he take de young chile, and leab de ole man har?"
+
+"De little sapling dat grow in de shade may die while it'm young; de
+great tree dat grow in de sun must lib till he'm rotted down."
+
+These words were the one drop wanting to make the great grief which was
+swelling in the negro's heart overflow. Giving one low, wild cry, he
+folded his wife in his arms, and burst into a paroxysm of tears.
+
+"Come now, my chil'ren," said the old preacher, kneeling down, "let us
+pray."
+
+The whole assemblage then knelt on the cold ground, while the old man
+prayed, and a more sincere, heart-touching prayer never went up from
+human lips to that God "who hath made of one blood all nations that
+dwell on the face of the earth." Though clothed in rags, and in feeble
+age at the mercy of a cruel taskmaster, that old slave was richer far
+than his master. His simple faith, which saw through the darkness around
+him into the clear and radiant light of the unseen day, was of far more
+worth than all the wealth and glory of this world. I know not why it
+was, but as I looked at him in the dim red light, which fell on his bent
+form and cast a strange halo around his upturned face, I thought of
+Stephen, as he gazed upward and behold heaven open, and "the Son of Man
+seated at the right hand of the throne of God."
+
+Rising from his knees, the old preacher turned slowly to the black mass
+that encircled him, and said:
+
+"My dear brederin and sisters, de Lord say dat 'de dust shill return to
+de earth as it war, and de spirit to Him who gabe it,' and now, 'cordin'
+to dat text, my friends, we'm gwine to put dis dust (pointing to the two
+coffins) in de groun' whar it cum from, and whar it shill lay till de
+bressed Lord blow de great trumpet on de resumrection mornin'. De
+spirits of our brudders har de Lord hub already took to hisseff. 'Our
+brudders,' I say, my chil'ren, 'case ebery one dat de Lord hab made am
+brudders to you and to me, whedder dey'm bad or good, white or brack.
+
+"Dis young chile, who hab gone 'way and leff his pore fader and mudder
+suffrin' all ober wid grief, _he_ hab gone to de Lord, _shore_. _He_
+neber done no wrong; he allers 'bey'd his massa, and neber said no hard
+word, nor found no fault, not eben w'en de cruel, bad oberseer put de
+load so heaby on him dat it kill him. Yes, my brederin and sisters, _he_
+hab gone to de Lord; gone whar dey don't work in de swamps; whar de
+little chil'ren don't tote de big shingles fru de water up to dar knees.
+No swamps am dar; no shingles am dar; dey doan't need 'em, 'case dar de
+hous'n haint builded wid hands, for dey'm all builded by de Lord, and
+gib'n to de good niggers, ready-made, and for nuffin'. De Lord don't
+say, like as ded massa say, 'Pomp, dar's de logs and de shingles' (dey'm
+allers pore shingles, de kine dat woant sell; but massa say, 'dey'm good
+'nuff for niggers,' ef de roof do leak). De Lord doan't say: 'Now, Pomp,
+you go to work and build you' own house; but mine dat you does you,
+task all de time, jess de same!' But de Lord--de bressed Lord--He say,
+w'en we goes up dar, 'Dar, Pomp, dar's de house dat I'se been a buildin'
+for you eber sence 'de foundation ob de worle.' It'm done now, and you
+kin cum in; your room am jess ready, and ole Sal and de chil'ren dat I
+tuk 'way from you eber so long ago, and dat you mourned ober and cried
+ober as ef you'd neber see dem agin, dey'm dar too, all on 'em, a
+waitin' for you. Dey'm been fixin' up de house 'spressly for you all
+dese long years, and dey'b got it all nice and comfible now.' Yas, my
+friends, glory be to Him, dat's what our Heabenly massa say, and who ob
+you wouldn't hab sich a massa as dat? A massa dat doan't set you no hard
+tasks, and dat gibs you 'nuff to eat, and time to rest and to sing and
+to play! A massa dat doan't keep no Yankee oberseer to foller you 'bout
+wid de big free-lashed whip; but dat leads you hisseff to de green
+pastures and de still waters; and w'en you'm a-faint and a-tired, and
+can't go no furder, dat takes you up in his arms, and carries you in his
+bosom! What pore darky am dar dat wudn't hab sich a massa? What one ob
+us, eben ef he had to work jess so hard as we works now, wudn't tink
+heseff de happiest nigger in de hull worle, ef he could hab sich hous'n
+to lib in as dem? dem hous'n 'not made wid hands, eternal in de
+heabens!'
+
+"But glory, glory to de Lord! my chil'ren, wese all got dat massa, ef we
+only knowd it, and He'm buildin' dem hous'n up dar, now, for ebery one
+ob us dat am tryin' to be good and to lub one anoder. _For ebery one ob
+us_, I say, and we kin all git de fine hous'n ef we try.
+
+"Recolember, too, my brudders, dat our great Massa am rich, bery rich,
+and he kin do all he promise. _He_ doant say, w'en wese worked ober time
+to git some little ting to comfort de sick chile, 'I knows, Pomp, you'se
+done de work, an' I did 'gree to gib you de pay; but de fact am, Pomp,
+de frost hab come so sudden dis yar, dat I'se loss de hull ob de sebenfh
+dippin', and I'se pore, so pore, de chile muss go widout dis time.' No,
+no, brudders, de bressed Lord He neber talk so. He neber break, 'case de
+sebenfh dip am shet off, or 'case de price of turpentime gwo down at de
+Norf. He neber sell his niggers down Souf, 'case he lose his money on he
+hoss-race. No, my chil'ren, our HEABENLY Massa am rich, RICH, I say. He
+own all dis worle, and all de oder worles dat am shinin' up dar in de
+sky. He own dem all; but he tink more ob one ob you, more ob one ob
+you--pore, ign'rant brack folks dat you am--dan ob all dem great worles!
+Who wouldn't belong to sich a Massa as dat? Who wouldn't be his
+nigger--not his slave--He doant hab no slaves--but his chile; and 'ef
+his chile, den his heir, de heir ob God, and de jined heir wid de
+bressed Jesus.' O my chil'ren! tink of dat! de heir ob de Lord ob all de
+'arth and all de sky! What white man kin be more'n dat?
+
+"Don't none ob you say you'm too wicked to be His chile; 'ca'se you
+haint. He lubs de wicked ones de best, 'ca'se dey need his lub de most.
+Yas, my brudders, eben de wickedest, ef dey's only sorry, and turn roun'
+and leab off dar bad ways, he lub de bery best ob all, 'ca'se he'm all
+lub and pity.
+
+"Sam, har, my chil'ren, war wicked, but don't _we_ pity him; don't _we_
+tink he hab a hard time, and don't we tink de bad oberseer, who'm layin'
+dar in de house jess ready to gwo and answer for it--don't we tink he
+gabe Sam bery great probincation?
+
+"Dat's so," said a dozen of the auditors.
+
+"Den don't you 'spose dat de bressed Lord know all dat, and dat He pity
+Sam too. If we pore sinners feel sorrer for him, haint de Lord's heart
+bigger'n our'n, and haint he more sorrer for him? Don't you tink dat ef
+He lub and pity de bery worse whites, dat He lub and pity pore Sam, who
+warn't so bery bad, arter all? Don't you tink He'll gib Sam a house?
+P'r'aps' 'twont be one ob de fine hous'n, but wont it be a comfible
+house, dat hain't no cracks, and one dat'll keep out de wind and de
+rain? And don't you s'pose, my chil'ren, dat it'll be big 'nuff for
+Jule, too--dat pore, repentin' chile, whose heart am clean broke, 'ca'se
+she hab broughten dis on Sam--and won't de Lord--de good Lord--de
+tender-hearted Lord--won't He touch Sam's heart, and coax him to forgib
+Jule, and to take her inter his house up dar? I knows he will, my
+chil'ren. I knows----"
+
+The old negro paused abruptly; there was a quick swaying in the black
+crowd--a hasty rush--a wild cry--and Sam's wife burst into the open
+space around the preacher, and fell at his feet. Throwing her arms
+wildly about him, she shrieked out:
+
+"Say dat agin, Uncle Pomp! for de lub ob de good Lord, oh! say dat
+agin!"
+
+Bending down, the old man raised her gently in his arms, and folding her
+there, as he would have folded a child, he said, in a voice thick with
+emotion:
+
+"It am so, Juley. I knows dat Sam will forgib you, and take you wid him
+up dar."
+
+Fastening her arms frantically around Pompey's neck, the poor woman
+burst into a paroxysm of grief, while the old man's tears fell in great
+drops on her upturned face, and many a dark cheek was wet, as with rain.
+
+The scene had lasted a few minutes, and I was turning away to hide the
+emotion that fast filled my eyes, and was creeping up, with a choking
+feeling, to my throat, when the Colonel, from the farther edge of the
+group, called out:
+
+"Take that d---- d---- away--take her away, Pomp!"
+
+The old negro turned toward his master with a sad, grieved look, but
+gave no heed to the words.
+
+"Take her away, some of you, I say," again cried the Colonel. "Pomp, you
+mustn't keep these niggers all night in the cold."
+
+At the sound of her master's voice the metif woman fell to the ground as
+if struck by a Minie-ball. Soon several negroes lifted her up to bear
+her off; but she struggled violently, and rent the woods with her wild
+cries for "one more look at Sam."
+
+"Look at him, you d---- d----; then go, and don't let me see you again."
+
+She threw herself on the face of the dead, and covered the cold lips
+with her kisses; then she rose, and with a weak, uncertain step,
+staggered out into the darkness.
+
+Was not the system which had so seared and hardened that man's heart,
+begotten in the lowest hell?
+
+The old preacher said no more, but four stout negro men stepped forward,
+nailed down the lids, and lowered the rough boxes into the ground.
+Turning to Madam P----, I saw her face was red with weeping. She turned
+to go as the first earth fell, with a dull, heavy sound, on the rude
+coffins; and giving her my arm, I led her from the scene.
+
+As we walked slowly back to the house, a low wail--half a chant, half a
+dirge--rose from the black crowd, and floated off on the still night
+air, till it died away amid the far woods, in a strange, unearthly moan.
+With that sad, wild music in our ears, we entered the mansion.
+
+As we seated ourselves by the bright wood-fire on the library hearth,
+obeying a sudden impulse which I could not restrain, I said to Madam
+P----:
+
+"The Colonel's treatment of that poor woman is inexplicable to me. Why
+is he so hard with her? It is not in keeping with what I have seen of
+his character."
+
+"The Colonel is a peculiar man," replied the lady. "Noble, generous, and
+a true friend, he is also a bitter, implacable enemy. When he once
+conceives a dislike, his feelings become even vindictive. Never having
+had an ungratified wish, he does not know how to feel for the sorrows of
+those beneath him. Sam, though a proud, headstrong, unruly character,
+was a great favorite with him; he felt his death much; and as he
+attributes it to Jule, he feels terribly bitter toward her. She will
+have to be sold to get her out of his way, for he will _never_ forgive
+her."
+
+It was some time before the Colonel joined us, and when at last he made
+his appearance, he seemed in no mood for conversation. The lady soon
+retired; but feeling unlike sleep, I took down a book from the shelves,
+drew my chair near the fire, and fell to reading. The Colonel, too, was
+deep in the newspapers, till, after a while, Jim entered the room:
+
+"I'se cum to ax ef you've nuffin more to-night, Cunnel?" said the negro.
+
+"No, nothing, Jim," replied his master; "but, stay--hadn't you better
+sleep in front of Moye's door?"
+
+"Dunno, sar; jess as you say."
+
+"I think you'd better," returned the Colonel.
+
+"Yas, massa," and the darky left the apartment.
+
+The Colonel shortly rose, and bade me "good-night." I continued reading
+till the clock struck eleven, when I laid the book aside and went to my
+room.
+
+I lodged, as I have said before, on the first floor, and was obliged to
+pass by the overseer's apartment in going to mine. Wrapped in his
+blanket, and stretched at full length on the ground, Jim lay there, fast
+asleep. I passed on, thinking of the wisdom of placing a tired negro on
+guard over an acute and desperate Yankee.
+
+I rose in the morning with the sun, and had partly donned my clothing,
+when I heard a loud uproar in the hall. Opening my door, I saw Jim
+pounding vehemently at the Colonel's room, and looking as pale as is
+possible with a person of his complexion.
+
+"What the d--l is the matter?" asked his master, who now, partly
+dressed, stepped into the hall.
+
+"Moye hab gone, sar--he'm gone and took Firefly (my host's
+five-thousand-dollar thorough-bred) wid him."
+
+For a moment the Colonel stood stupified; then, his face turning to a
+cold, clayey white, he seized the black by the throat, and hurled him to
+the floor. With his thick boot raised, he seemed about to dash out the
+man's brains with its ironed heel, when, on the instant, the octoroon
+woman rushed, in her night-clothes, from his room, and, with desperate
+energy, pushed him aside, exclaiming: "What would you do? Remember WHO
+HE IS!"
+
+The negro rose, and the Colonel, without a word, passed into his own
+apartment.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+THE PURSUIT.
+
+
+I sauntered out, after the events recorded in the last chapter, to
+inhale the fresh air of the morning. A slight rain had fallen during the
+night, and it still moistened the dead leaves which carpeted the woods,
+making an extended walk out of the question; so, seating myself on the
+trunk of a fallen tree, in the vicinity of the house, I awaited the hour
+for breakfast. I had not remained there long before I heard the voices
+of my host and Madam P---- on the front piazza:
+
+"I tell you, Alice, I cannot--must not do it. If I overlook this, the
+discipline of the plantation is at an end."
+
+"Do what you please with him when you return," replied the lady, "but do
+not chain him up, and leave me, at such a time, alone. You know Jim is
+the only one I can depend on."
+
+"Well, have your own way. You know, my darling, I would not cause you a
+moment's uneasiness, but I must follow up this d----d Moye."
+
+I was seated where I could hear, though I could not see the speakers,
+but it was evident from the tone of the last remark, that an action
+accompanied it quite as tender as the words. Being unwilling to
+overhear more of a private conversation, I rose and approached them.
+
+"Ah! my dear fellow," said the Colonel, on perceiving me, "are you
+stirring so early? I was about to send to your room to ask if you'll go
+with me up the country. My d----d overseer has got away, and I must
+follow him at once."
+
+"I'll go with pleasure," I replied. "Which way do you think Moye has
+gone?"
+
+"The shortest cut to the railroad, probably; but old Caesar will track
+him."
+
+A servant then announced breakfast--an early one having been prepared.
+We hurried through the meal with all speed, and the other preparations
+being soon over, were in twenty minutes in our saddles, and ready for
+the journey. The mulatto coachman, with a third horse, was at the door,
+ready to accompany us. As we mounted, the Colonel said to him:
+
+"Go and call Sam, the driver."
+
+The darky soon returned with the heavy, ugly-visaged black who had been
+whipped, by Madam P----'s order, the day before.
+
+"Sam," said his master, "I shall be gone some days, and I leave the
+field-work in your hands. Let me have a good account of you when I
+return."
+
+"Yas, massa, you shill dat," replied the negro.
+
+"Put Jule--Sam's Jule--into the woods, and see that she does full
+tasks," continued the Colonel.
+
+"Haint she wanted 'mong de nusses, massa?"
+
+"Put some one else there--give her field-work; she needs it."
+
+On large plantations the young children of the field-women are left with
+them only at night, and are herded together during the day, in a
+separate cabin, in charge of nurses. These nurses are feeble, sickly
+women, or recent mothers; and the fact of Jule's being employed in that
+capacity was evidence that she was unfit for outdoor labor.
+
+Madam P----, who was waiting on the piazza to see us off, seemed about
+to remonstrate against this arrangement, but she hesitated a moment, and
+in that moment we had bidden her "Good-bye," and galloped away.
+
+We were soon at the cabin of the negro-hunter, and the coachman,
+dismounting, called him out.
+
+"Hurry up, hurry up," said the Colonel, as Sandy appeared, "we haven't a
+moment to spare."
+
+"Jest so--jest so, Cunnel; I'll jine ye in a jiffin," replied he of the
+reddish extremities.
+
+Emerging from the shanty with provoking deliberation--the impatience of
+my host had infected me--the clay-eater slowly proceeded to mount the
+horse of the negro, while his dirt-bedraggled wife, and clay-encrusted
+children, followed close at his heels, the younger ones huddling around
+for the tokens of paternal affection usual at parting. Whether it was
+the noise they made, or their frightful aspect, I know not, but the
+horse, a spirited animal, took fright on their appearance, and nearly
+broke away from the negro, who was holding him. Seeing this, the Colonel
+said:
+
+"Clear out, you young scare-crows. Into the house with you."
+
+"They arn't no more scare-crows than yourn, Cunnel J----," said the
+mother, in a decidedly belligerent tone. "You may 'buse my old man--he
+kin stand it--but ye shan't blackguard my young 'uns!"
+
+The Colonel laughed, and was about to make a good-natured reply, when
+Sandy yelled out:
+
+"Gwo enter the house and shet up, ye---- ----."
+
+With this affectionate farewell, he turned his horse and led the way up
+the road.
+
+The dog, who was a short distance in advance, soon gave a piercing howl,
+and started off at the speed of a reindeer. He had struck the trail, and
+urging our horses to their fastest speed, we followed.
+
+We were all well mounted, but the mare the Colonel had given me was a
+magnificent animal, as fleet as the wind, and with a gait so easy that
+her back seemed a rocking-chair. Saddle-horses at the South are trained
+to the gallop--Southern riders not deeming it necessary that one's
+breakfast should be churned into a Dutch cheese by a trotting nag, in
+order that he may pass for a horseman.
+
+We had ridden on at a perfect break-neck pace for half an hour, when the
+Colonel shouted to our companion:
+
+"Sandy, call the dog in; the horses wont last ten miles at this
+gait--we've a long ride before us."
+
+The dirt-eater did as he was bidden, and we soon settled into a gentle
+gallop.
+
+We had passed through a dense forest of pines, but were emerging into a
+"bottom country," where some of the finest deciduous trees--then brown
+and leafless, but bearing promise of the opening beauty of
+spring--reared, along with the unfading evergreen, their tall stems in
+the air. The live-oak, the sycamore, the Spanish mulberry, the holly,
+and the persimmon--gaily festooned with wreaths of the white and yellow
+jessamine, the woodbine and the cypress-moss, and bearing here and there
+a bouquet of the mistletoe, with its deep green and glossy leaves
+upturned to the sun--flung their broad arms over the road, forming an
+archway grander and more beautiful than any the hand of man ever wove
+for the greatest hero the world has worshipped.
+
+The woods were free from underbrush, and a coarse, wiry grass, unfit for
+fodder, and scattered through them in detached patches, was the only
+vegetation visible. The ground was mainly covered with the leaves and
+burrs of the pine.
+
+We passed great numbers of swine, feeding on these burrs, and now and
+then a horned animal browsing on the cypress-moss where it hung low on
+the trees. I observed that nearly all the swine were marked, though they
+seemed too wild to have ever seen an owner, or a human habitation. They
+were a long, lean, slab-sided race, with legs and shoulders like deer,
+and bearing no sort of resemblance to the ordinary hog, except in the
+snout, and that feature was so much longer and sharper than the nose of
+the Northern swine, that I doubt if Agassiz would class the two as one
+species. However, they have their uses--they make excellent bacon, and
+are "death on snakes." Ireland itself is not more free from the
+serpentine race than are the districts frequented by these long-nosed
+quadrupeds.
+
+"We call them Carolina race-horses," said the Colonel, as he finished an
+account of their peculiarities.
+
+"Race-horses! Why, are they fleet of foot?"
+
+"Fleet as deer. I'd match one against an ordinary horse at any time."
+
+"Come, my friend, you're practising on my ignorance of natural history."
+
+"Not a bit of it. See! there's a good specimen yonder. If we can get him
+into the road, and fairly started, I'll bet you a dollar he'll beat
+Sandy's mare on a half-mile stretch--Sandy to hold the stakes and have
+the winnings."
+
+"Well, agreed," I said, laughing, "and I'll give the pig ten rods the
+start."
+
+"No," replied the Colonel, "you can't afford it. He'll _have_ to start
+ahead, but you'll need that in the count. Come, Sandy, will you go in
+for the pile?"
+
+I'm not sure that the native would not have run a race with Old Nicholas
+himself, for the sake of so much money. To him it was a vast sum; and as
+he thought of it, his eyes struck small sparks, and his enormous beard
+and mustachio vibrated with something that faintly resembled a laugh.
+Replying to the question, he said:
+
+"Kinder reckon I wull, Cunnel; howsomdever, I keeps the stakes, ony
+how?"
+
+"Of course," said the planter, "but be honest--win if you can."
+
+Sandy halted his horse in the road, while the planter and I took to the
+woods on either side of the way. The Colonel soon manoeuvred to
+separate the selected animal from the rest of the herd, and, without
+much difficulty, got him into the road, where, by closing down on each
+flank, we kept him till he and Sandy were fairly under way.
+
+"He'll keep to the road when once started," said the Colonel, laughing:
+"and he'll show you some of the tallest running you ever saw in your
+life."
+
+Away they went. At first the pig, seeming not exactly to comprehend the
+programme, cantered off at a leisurely pace, though he held his own.
+Soon, however, he cast an eye behind him--halted a moment to collect his
+thoughts and reconnoitre--and then, lowering his head and elevating his
+tail, put forth all his speed. And such speed! Talk of a deer, the wind,
+or a steam-engine--they are not to be compared with it. Nothing in
+nature I ever saw run--except, it may be, a Southern tornado, or a Sixth
+Ward politician--could hope to distance that pig. He gained on the horse
+at every step, and it was soon evident that my dollar was gone!
+
+"'In for a shilling, in for a pound,' is the adage, so, turning to the
+Colonel, I said, as intelligibly as my horse's rapid pace and my excited
+risibilities would allow:
+
+"I see I've lost, but I'll go you another dollar that _you_ can't beat
+the pig!"
+
+"No--sir!" the Colonel got out in the breaks of his laughing explosions;
+"you can't hedge on me in that manner. I'll go a dollar that _you_ can't
+do it, and your mare is the fastest on the road. She won me a thousand
+not a month ago."
+
+"Well, I'll do it--Sandy to have the stakes."
+
+"Agreed," said the Colonel, and away _we_ went.
+
+The swinish racer was about a hundred yards ahead when I gave the mare
+the reins, and told her to go. And she _did_ go. She flew against the
+wind with a motion so rapid that my face, as it clove the air, felt as
+if cutting its way through a solid body, and the trees, as we passed,
+seemed struck with panic, and running for dear life in the opposite
+direction.
+
+For a few moments I thought the mare was gaining, and I turned to the
+Colonel with an exultant look.
+
+"Don't shout till you win, my boy," he called out from the distance
+where I was fast leaving him and Sandy.
+
+I _did not shout_, for spite of all my efforts the space between me and
+the pig seemed to widen. Yet I kept on, determined to win, till, at the
+end of a short half-mile, we reached the Waccamaw--the swine still a
+hundred yards ahead! There his pigship halted, turned coolly around,
+eyed me for a moment, then with a quiet, deliberate trot, turned off
+into the woods.
+
+A bend in the road kept my companions out of sight for a few moments,
+and when they came up I had somewhat recovered my breath, though the
+mare was blowing hard, and reeking with foam.
+
+"Well," said the Colonel, "what do you think of our bacon 'as it runs?'"
+
+"I think the Southern article can't be beat, whether raw or cooked,
+standing or running."
+
+At this moment the hound, who had been leisurely jogging along in the
+rear, disdaining to join in the race in which his dog of a master and I
+had engaged, came up, and dashing quickly on to the river's edge, set up
+a most dismal howling. The Colonel dismounted, and clambering down the
+bank, which was there twenty feet high, and very steep, shouted:
+
+"The d----d Yankee has swum the stream!"
+
+"Why so?" I asked.
+
+"To cover his tracks and delay pursuit; but he has overshot the mark.
+There is no other road within ten miles, and he must have taken to this
+one again beyond here. He's lost twenty minutes by this manoeuvre.
+Come, Sandy, call in the dog, we'll push on a little faster."
+
+"But he tuk to t'other bank, Cunnel. Shan't we trail him thar?" asked
+Sandy.
+
+"And suppose he found a boat here," I suggested, "and made the shore
+some ways down?"
+
+"He couldn't get Firefly into a flat--we should only waste time in
+scouring the other bank. The swamp this side the next run has forced him
+into the road within five miles. The trick is transparent. He took me
+for a fool," replied the Colonel, answering both questions at once.
+
+I had reined my horse out of the road, and when my companions turned to
+go, was standing at the edge of the bank, overlooking the river.
+Suddenly I saw, on one of the abutments of the bridge, what seemed a
+long, black log--strange to say, _in motion_!
+
+"Colonel," I shouted, "see there! a live log as I'm a white man!"
+
+"Lord bless you," cried the planter, taking an observation, "it's an
+alligator!"
+
+I said no more, but pressing on after the hound, soon left my companions
+out of sight. For long afterward, the Colonel, in a doleful way, would
+allude to my lamentable deficiency in natural history--particularly in
+such branches as bacon and "live logs."
+
+I had ridden about five miles, keeping well up with the hound, and had
+reached the edge of the swamp, when suddenly the dog darted to the side
+of the road, and began to yelp in the most frantic manner. Dismounting,
+and leading my horse to the spot, I made out plainly the print of
+Firefly's feet in the sand. There was no mistaking it--that round shoe
+on the off forefoot. (The horse had, when a colt, a cracked hoof, and
+though the wound was outgrown, the foot was still tender.) These prints
+were dry, while the tracks we had seen at the river were filled with
+water, thus proving that the rain had ceased while the overseer was
+passing between the two places. He was therefore not far off.
+
+The Colonel and Sandy soon rode up.
+
+"Caught a live log! eh, my good fellow?" asked my host, with a laugh.
+
+"No; but here's the overseer as plain as daylight; and his tracks not
+wet!"
+
+Quickly dismounting, he examined the ground, and then exclaimed:
+
+"The d--l----it's a fact--here not four hours ago! He has doubled on
+his tracks since, I'll wager, and not made twenty miles--we'll have him
+before night, sure! Come, mount--quick."
+
+We sprang into our saddles, and again pressed rapidly on after the dog,
+who followed the scent at the top of his speed.
+
+Some three miles more of wet, miry road took us to the run of which the
+Colonel had spoken. Arrived there, we found the hound standing on the
+bank, wet to the skin, and looking decidedly chop-fallen.
+
+"Death and d----n!" shouted the Colonel; "the dog has swum the run, and
+lost the trail on the other side! The d--d scoundrel has taken to the
+water, and balked us after all! Take up the dog, Sandy, and try him
+again over there."
+
+The native spoke to Caesar, who bounded on to the horse's back in front
+of his master. They then crossed the stream, which there was about
+fifty yards wide, and so shallow that in the deepest part the water
+merely touched the horse's breast; but it was so roiled by the recent
+rain that we could not distinguish the foot-prints of the horse beneath
+the surface.
+
+The dog ranged up and down the opposite bank, but all to no purpose: the
+overseer had not been there. He had gone either up or down the
+stream--in which direction, was now the question. Calling Sandy back to
+our side of the run, the Colonel proceeded to hold a 'council of war.'
+Each one gave his opinion, which was canvassed by the others, with as
+much solemnity as if the fate of the Union hung on the decision.
+
+The native proposed we should separate--one go up, another down the
+stream, and the third, with the dog, follow the road; to which he
+thought Moye had finally returned. Those who should explore the run
+would easily detect the horse's tracks where he had left it, and then
+taking a straight course to the road, all might meet some five miles
+further on, at a place indicated.
+
+I gave my adhesion to Sandy's plan, but the Colonel overruled it on the
+ground of the waste of time that would be incurred in thus recovering
+the overseer's trail.
+
+"Why not," he said, "strike at once for the end of his route? Why follow
+the slow steps he took in order to throw us off the track? He has not
+come back to this road. Ten miles below there is another one leading
+also to the railway. He has taken that. We might as well send Sandy and
+the dog back and go on by ourselves."
+
+"But if bound for the Station, why should he wade through the creek
+here, ten miles out of his way? Why not go straight on by the road?" I
+asked.
+
+"Because he knew the dog would track him, and he hoped by taking to the
+run to make me think he had crossed the country instead of striking for
+the railroad."
+
+I felt sure the Colonel was wrong, but knowing him to be tenacious of
+his own opinions, I made no further objection.
+
+Directing Sandy to call on Madam P---- and acquaint her with our
+progress, he then dismissed the negro-hunter, and once more led the way
+up the road.
+
+The next twenty miles, like our previous route, lay through an unbroken
+forest. As we left the watercourses, we saw only the gloomy pines, which
+there--the region being remote from the means of transportation--were
+seldom tapped, and presented few of the openings that invite the weary
+traveller to the dwelling of the hospitable planter.
+
+After a time the sky, which had been bright and cloudless all the
+morning, grew overcast, and gave out tokens of a coming storm. A black
+cloud gathered in the west, and random flashes darted from it far off in
+the distance; then gradually it neared us; low mutterings sounded in the
+air, and the tops of the tall pines a few miles away, were lit up now
+and then with a fitful blaze, all the brighter for the deeper gloom that
+succeeded. Then a terrific flash and peal broke directly over us, and a
+great tree, struck by a red-hot bolt, fell with a deafening crash, half
+way across our path. Peal after peal followed, and then the rain--not
+filtered into drops as it falls from our colder sky, but in broad,
+blinding sheets--poured full and heavy on our shelterless heads.
+
+"Ah! there it comes!" shouted the Colonel. "God have mercy upon us!"
+
+As he spoke, a crashing, crackling, thundering roar rose above the
+storm, filling the air, and shaking the solid earth till it trembled
+beneath our horses' feet, as if upheaved by a volcano. Nearer and nearer
+the sound came, till it seemed that all the legions of darkness were
+unloosed in the forest, and were mowing down the great pines as the
+mower mows the grass with his scythe. Then an awful, sweeping crash
+thundered directly at our backs, and turning round, as if to face a foe,
+my horse, who had borne the roar and the blinding flash till then
+unmoved, paralyzed with dread, and panting for breath, sunk to the
+ground; while close at my side the Colonel, standing erect in his
+stirrups, his head uncovered to the pouring sky, cried out:
+
+"THANK GOD, WE ARE SAVED!"
+
+There--not three hundred yards in our rear, had passed the
+TORNADO--uprooting trees, prostrating dwellings, and sending many a soul
+to its last account, but sparing _us_ for another day! For thirty miles
+through the forest it had mowed a swath of two hundred feet, and then
+moved on to stir the ocean to its briny depths.
+
+With a full heart, I remounted, and turning my horse, pressed on in the
+rain. We said not a word till a friendly opening pointed the way to a
+planter's dwelling. Then calling to me to follow, the Colonel dashed up
+the by-path which led to the mansion, and in five minutes we were
+warming our chilled limbs before the cheerful fire that roared and
+crackled on its broad hearth-stone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE YANKEE-SCHOOL-MISTRESS.
+
+
+The house was a large, old-fashioned frame building, square as a
+packing-box, and surrounded, as all country dwellings at the South are,
+by a broad, open piazza. Our summons was answered by its owner, a
+well-to-do, substantial, middle-aged planter, wearing the ordinary
+homespun of the district, but evidently of a station in life much above
+the common "corn-crackers" I had seen at the country meeting-house. The
+Colonel was an acquaintance, and greeting us with great cordiality, our
+host led the way directly to the sitting-room. There we found a bright,
+blazing fire, and a pair of bright sparkling eyes, the latter belonging
+to a blithesome young woman of about twenty, with a cheery face, and a
+half-rustic, half-cultivated air, whom our new friend introduced to us
+as his wife.
+
+"I regret not having had the pleasure of meeting Mrs. S---- before, but
+am very happy to meet her now," said the Colonel, with all the
+well-bred, gentlemanly ease that distinguished him.
+
+"The pleasure is mutual, Colonel J----," replied the lady, "but thirty
+miles in this wild country, should not have made a neighbor so distant
+as you have been."
+
+"Business, madam, is at fault, as your husband knows. I have much to do;
+and besides, all my connections are in the other direction--with
+Charleston."
+
+"It's a fact, Sally, the Colonel is the d---- busy man in these parts.
+Not content with a big plantation and three hundred niggers, he looks
+after all South Carolina, and the rest of creation to boot," said our
+host.
+
+"Tom will have his joke, Madam, but he's not far from the truth."
+
+Seeing we were dripping wet, the lady offered us a change of clothing,
+and retiring to a chamber, we each appropriated a suit belonging to our
+host, giving our own to a servant, to be dried.
+
+Arrayed in our fresh apparel, we soon rejoined our friends in the
+sitting-room. The new garments fitted the Colonel tolerably well, but,
+though none too long, they were a world too wide for me, and as my wet
+hair hung in smooth flat folds down my cheeks, and my limp shirt-collar
+fell over my linsey coat, I looked for all the world like a cross
+between a theatrical Aminodab Sleek and Sir John Falstaff, with the
+stuffing omitted. When our hostess caught sight of me in this new garb,
+she rubbed her hands together in great glee, and, springing to her feet,
+gave vent to a perfect storm of laughter--jerking out between the
+explosions:
+
+"Why--you--you--look jest like--a scare-crow."
+
+There was no mistaking that hearty, hoydenish manner; and seizing both
+of her hands in mine, I shouted: "I've found you out--you're a
+"country-woman" of mine--a clear-blooded Yankee!"
+
+"What! _you_ a Yankee!" she exclaimed, still laughing, "and here with
+this horrid 'secesherner,' as they call him."
+
+"True as preachin', Ma'am," I replied, adopting the drawl--"all the way
+from Down East, and Union, tu, stiff as buckram."
+
+"Du tell!" she exclaimed, swinging my hands together as she held them in
+hers. "If I warn't hitched to this 'ere feller, I'd give ye a smack
+right on the spot. I'm _so_ glad to see ye."
+
+"Do it, Sally--never mind _me_," cried her husband, joining heartily in
+the merriment.
+
+Seizing the collar of my coat with both hands, she drew my face down
+till my lips almost touched hers (I was preparing to blush, and the
+Colonel shouted, "Come, come, I shall tell his wife"): but then turning
+quickly on her heel, she threw herself into a chair, exclaiming, "_I_
+wouldn't mind, but the _old man would be jealous_." Addressing the
+Colonel, she added, "_You_ needn't be troubled, sir, no Yankee girl will
+kiss _you_ till you change your politics."
+
+"Give me that inducement, and I'll change them on the spot," said the
+Colonel.
+
+"No, no, Dave, 'twouldn't do," replied the planter; "the conversion
+wouldn't be genuwine--besides such things arn't proper, except 'mong
+blood-relations--and all the Yankees, you know are first-cousins."
+
+The conversation then subsided into a more placid mood, but lost none of
+its genial, good humor. Refreshments were soon set before us, and while
+partaking of them I gathered from our hostess that she was a Vermont
+country-girl, who, some three years before, had been induced by liberal
+pay to come South as a teacher. A sister accompanied her, and about a
+year after their arrival, she married a neighboring planter. Wishing to
+be near her sister, our hostess had also married and settled down for
+life in that wild region. "I like the country very well," she added;
+"it's a great sight easier living here than in Vermont; but I do hate
+these lazy, shiftless, good-for-nothing niggers; they are _so_ slow, and
+_so_ careless, and _so_ dirty, that I sometimes think they will worry
+the very life out of me. I do believe I'm the hardest mistress in all
+the district."
+
+I learned from her that a majority of the teachers at the South are from
+the North, and principally, too, from New England. Teaching is a very
+laborious employment there, far more so than with us, for the
+Southerners have no methods like ours, and the same teacher usually has
+to hear lessons in branches all the way from Greek and Latin to the
+simple A B C. The South has no system of public instruction; no common
+schools; no means of placing within the reach of the sons and daughters
+of the poor even the elements of knowledge. While the children of the
+wealthy are most carefully educated, it is the policy of the ruling
+class to keep the great mass of the people in ignorance; and so long as
+this policy continues, so long will that section be as far behind the
+North as it now is, in all that constitutes true prosperity and
+greatness.
+
+The afternoon wore rapidly and pleasantly away in the genial society of
+our wayside-friends. Politics were discussed (our host was a Union man),
+the prospects of the turpentine crop talked over, the recent news
+canvassed, the usual neighborly topics touched upon, and--I hesitate to
+confess it--a considerable quantity of corn whiskey disposed of, before
+the Colonel discovered, all at once, that it was six o'clock, and we
+were still seventeen miles from the railway station. Arraying ourselves
+again in our dried garments, we bade a hasty but regretful "good-bye" to
+our hospitable entertainers, and once more took to the road.
+
+The storm had cleared away, but the ground was heavy with the recent
+rain, and our horses were sadly jaded with the ride of the morning. We
+gave them the reins, and, jogging on at their leisure, it was ten
+o'clock at night before they landed us at the little hamlet of W----
+Station, in the state of North Carolina.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+THE RAILWAY STATION.
+
+
+A large hotel, or station-house, and about a dozen log shanties made up
+the village. Two of these structures were negro-cabins; two were small
+groceries, in which the vilest alcoholic compounds were sold at a bit
+(ten cents) a glass; one was a lawyer's office, in which was the
+post-office, and a justice's court, where, once a month, the small
+offenders of the vicinity "settled up their accounts;" one was a
+tailoring and clothing establishment, where breeches were patched at a
+dime a stitch, and payment taken in tar and turpentine; and the rest
+were private dwellings of one apartment, occupied by the grocers, the
+tailor, the switch-tenders, the postmaster, and the negro _attaches_ of
+the railroad. The church and the school-house--the first buildings to go
+up in a Northern village--I have omitted to enumerate, because--they
+were not there.
+
+One of the natives told me that the lawyer was a "stuck-up critter;" "he
+don't live; he don't--he puts-up at th' hotel." And the hotel! Would
+Shakspeare, had he have known it, have written of taking one's _ease_ at
+his inn? It was a long, framed building, two stories high, with a
+piazza extending across the side and a front door crowded as closely
+into one corner as the width of the joist would permit. Under the
+piazza, ranged along the wall, was a low bench, occupied by about forty
+tin wash-basins and water-pails, and with coarse, dirty crash towels
+suspended on rollers above it. By the side of each of these towels hung
+a comb and a brush, to which a lock of everybody's hair was clinging,
+forming in the total a stock sufficient to establish any barber in the
+wig business.
+
+It was, as I have said, ten o'clock when we reached the Station.
+Throwing the bridles of our horses over the hitching-posts at the door,
+we at once made our way to the bar-room. That apartment, which was in
+the rear of the building, and communicated with by a long, narrow
+passage, was filled almost to suffocation, when we entered, by a cloud
+of tobacco smoke, the fumes of bad whiskey, and a crowd of drunken
+chivalry, through whom the Colonel with great difficulty elbowed his way
+to the counter, where "mine host" and two assistants were dispensing
+"liquid death," at the rate of ten cents a glass, and of ten glasses a
+minute.
+
+"Hello, Cunnel, how ar' ye," cried the red-faced liquor-vender, as he
+caught sight of my companion, and, relinquishing his lucrative
+employment for a moment, took the Colonel's hand, "how ar' ye?"
+
+"Quite well, thank you, Miles," said the Colonel, with a certain
+patronizing air, "have you seen my man, Moye?"
+
+"Moye, no! What's up with him?"
+
+"He's run away with my horse, Firefly--I thought he would have made for
+this station. At what time does the next train go up?"
+
+"Wal, it's due half arter 'leven, but 'taint gin'rally 'long till nigh
+one."
+
+The Colonel was turning to join me at the door, when a well-dressed
+young man of very unsteady movements, who was filling a glass at the
+counter, and staring at him with a sort of dreamy amazement, stammered
+out, "Moye--run--run a--way, zir! that--k--kant be--by G--. I know--him,
+zir--he's a--a friend of mine, and--I'm--I'm d----d if he ain't
+hon--honest."
+
+"About as honest as the Yankees run," replied the Colonel, "he's a
+d----d thief, sir!"
+
+"Look here--here, zir--don't--don't you--you zay any--thing 'gainst--the
+Yankees. D----d if--if I aint--one of 'em mezelf--zir," said the fellow
+staggering toward the Colonel.
+
+"_I_ don't care _what_ you are; you're drunk."
+
+"You lie--you--you d----d 'ris--'ristocrat," was the reply, as the
+inebriated gentleman aimed a blow, with all his unsteady might, at the
+Colonel's face.
+
+The South Carolinian stepped quickly aside, and dexterously threw his
+foot before the other, who--his blow not meeting the expected
+resistance--was unable to recover himself, and fell headlong to the
+floor. The planter turned on his heel, and was walking quietly away,
+when the sharp report of a pistol sounded through the apartment, and a
+ball tore through the top of his boot, and lodged in the wall within two
+feet of where I was standing. With a spring, quick and sure as the
+tiger's, the Colonel was on the drunken man. Wrenching away the weapon,
+he seized the fellow by the neck-tie, and drawing him up to nearly his
+full height, dashed him at one throw to the other end of the room. Then
+raising the revolver he coolly levelled it to fire!
+
+But a dozen strong men were on him. The pistol was out of his hand, and
+his arms were pinioned in an instant; while cries of "Fair play, sir!"
+"He's drunk!" "Don't hit a man when he's down," and other like
+exclamations, came from all sides.
+
+"Give _me_ fair play, you d----d North Carolina hounds," cried the
+Colonel, struggling violently to get away, "and I'll fight the whole
+posse of you."
+
+"One's 'nuff for _you_, ye d----d fire-eatin' 'ristocrat;" said a long,
+lean, bushy-haired, be-whiskered individual, who was standing near the
+counter: "ef ye want to fight, _I'll_ 'tend to yer case to onst. Let him
+go, boys," he continued as he stepped toward the Colonel, and parted the
+crowd that had gathered around him: "give him the shootin'-iron, and
+let's see ef he'll take a man thet's sober."
+
+I saw serious trouble was impending, and stepping forward, I said to the
+last speaker, "My friend, you have no quarrel with this gentleman. He
+has treated that man only as you would have done."
+
+"P'raps thet's so; but he's a d----d hound of a Secesherner thet's
+draggin' us all to h--ll; it'll du the country good to git quit of one
+on 'em."
+
+"Whatever his politics are, he's a gentleman, sir, and has done you no
+harm--let me beg of you to let him alone."
+
+"Don't beg any thing for me, Mr. K----," growled the Colonel through his
+barred teeth, "I'll fight the d----d corn-cracker, and his whole race,
+at once."
+
+"No you won't, my friend. For the sake of those at home you won't;" I
+said, taking him by the arm, and partly leading, partly forcing him,
+toward the door.
+
+"And who in h--ll ar you?" asked the corn-cracker, planting himself
+squarely in my way.
+
+"I'm on the same side of politics with you, Union to the core!" I
+replied.
+
+"Ye ar! Union! Then give us yer fist," said he, grasping me by the hand;
+"by ---- it does a feller good to see a man dressed in yer cloes thet
+haint 'fraid to say he's Union, so close to South Car'lina, tu, as this
+ar! Come, hev a drink: come boys--all round--let's liquor!"
+
+"Excuse me now, my dear fellow--some other time I'll be glad to join
+you."
+
+"Jest as ye say, but thar's my fist, enyhow."
+
+He gave me another hearty shake of the hand, and the crowd parting, I
+made my way with the Colonel out of the room. We were followed by Miles,
+the landlord, who, when we had reached the front of the entrance-way,
+said, "I'm right sorry for this row, gentlemen; the boys will hev a time
+when they gets together."
+
+"Oh, never mind;" said the Colonel, who had recovered his coolness; "but
+why are all these people here?"
+
+"Thar's a barbacue cumin' off to-morrer on the camp-ground, and the
+house is cram full."
+
+"Is that so?" said the Colonel, then turning to me he added, "Moye has
+taken the railroad somewhere else; I must get to a telegraph office at
+once, to head him off. The nearest one is Wilmington. With all these
+rowdies here, it will not do to leave the horses alone--will you stay
+and keep an eye on them over to-morrow?"
+
+"Yes, I will, cheerfully."
+
+"Thar's a mighty hard set, round har now, Cunnel," said the landlord;
+"and the most peaceable get enter scrapes ef they hain't no friends.
+Hadn't ye better show the gentleman some of your'n, 'fore you go?"
+
+"Yes, yes, I didn't think of that. Who is here?"
+
+"Wal, thar's Cunnel Taylor, Bill Barnes, Sam Heddleson, Jo Shackelford,
+Andy Jones, Rob Brown, and lots of others."
+
+"Where's Andy Jones?"
+
+"Reckon he's turned in; I'll see."
+
+As the landlord opened a door which led from the hall, the Colonel said
+to me, "Andy is a Union man; but he'd fight to the death for me."
+
+"Sal!" called out the hotel keeper.
+
+"Yas, massa, I'se har," was the answer from a slatternly woman, awfully
+black in the face, who soon thrust her head from the door-way.
+
+"Is Andy Jones har?" asked Miles.
+
+"Yas, massa, he'm turned in up thar on de table."
+
+We followed the landlord into the apartment. It was the dining-room of
+the hotel, and by the dim light which came from a smoky fire on the
+hearth, I saw it contained about a hundred people, who, wrapped in
+blankets, bed-quilts and travelling-shawls, were disposed in all
+conceivable attitudes, and scattered about on the hard floor and tables,
+sleeping soundly. The room was a long, low apartment--extending across
+the entire front of the house--and had a wretched, squalid look. The
+fire, which was tended by the negro-woman--(she had spread a blanket on
+the floor, and was keeping a drowsy watch over it for the night)--had
+been recently replenished with green wood, and was throwing out thick
+volumes of black smoke, which, mixing with the effluvia from the lungs
+of a hundred sleepers, made up an atmosphere next to impossible to
+breathe. Not a window was open, and not an aperture for ventilation
+could be seen!
+
+Carefully avoiding the arms and legs of the recumbent chivalry, we
+picked our way, guided by the negro-girl, to the corner of the room
+where the Unionist was sleeping. Shaking him briskly by the shoulder,
+the Colonel called out: "Andy! Andy! wake up!"
+
+"What--what the d----l is the matter?" stammered the sleeper, gradually
+opening his eyes, and raising himself on one elbow, "Lord bless you,
+Cunnel, is that you? what in ---- brought _you_ har?"
+
+"Business, Andy. Come, get up, I want to see you, and I can't talk
+here."
+
+The North Carolinian slowly rose, and throwing his blanket over his
+shoulders, followed us from the room. When we had reached the open air
+the Colonel introduced me to his friend, who expressed surprise, and a
+great deal of pleasure, at meeting a Northern Union man in the Colonel's
+company.
+
+"Look after our horses, now, Miles; Andy and I want to talk," said the
+planter to the landlord, with about as little ceremony as he would have
+shown to a negro.
+
+I thought the white man did not exactly relish the Colonel's manner, but
+saying, "All right, all right, sir," he took himself away.
+
+The night was raw and cold, but as all the rooms of the hotel were
+occupied, either by sleepers or carousers, we had no other alternative
+than to hold our conference in the open air. Near the railway-track a
+light-wood fire was blazing, and, obeying the promptings of the frosty
+atmosphere, we made our way to it. Lying on the ground around it,
+divested of all clothing except a pair of linsey trousers and a flannel
+shirt, and with their naked feet close to its blaze--roasting at one
+extremity, and freezing at the other--were several blacks, the
+switch-tenders and woodmen of the Station--fast asleep. How human beings
+could sleep in such circumstances seemed a marvel, but further
+observation convinced me that the Southern negro has a natural aptitude
+for that exercise, and will, indeed, bear more exposure than any other
+living thing. Nature in giving him such powers of endurance, appears to
+have specially fitted him for the life of hardship and privation to
+which he is born.
+
+The fire-light enabled me to scan the appearance of my new acquaintance.
+He was rather above the medium height, squarely and somewhat stoutly
+built, and had an easy and self-possessed, though rough and unpolished
+manner. His face, or so much of it as was visible from underneath a
+thick mass of reddish gray hair, denoted a firm, decided character; but
+there was a manly, open, honest expression about it that gained one's
+confidence in a moment. He wore a slouched hat and a suit of the
+ordinary "sheep's-grey," cut in the "sack" fashion, and hanging loosely
+about him. He seemed a man who had made his own way in the world, and I
+subsequently learned that appearances did not belie him. The son of a
+"poor white" man, with scarcely the first rudiments of book-education,
+he had, by sterling worth, natural ability, and great force of
+character, accumulated a handsome property, and acquired a leading
+position in his district. Though on "the wrong side of politics," his
+personal popularity was so great that for several successive years he
+had been elected to represent the county in the state legislature. The
+Colonel, though opposed to him in politics--and party feeling at the
+South runs so high that political opponents are seldom personal
+friends--had, in the early part of his career, aided him by his
+endorsements; and Andy had not forgotten the service. It was easy to see
+that while two men could not be more unlike in character and appearance
+than my host and the North Carolinian, they were warm and intimate
+friends.
+
+"So, Moye has been raising h--ll gin'rally, Colonel," said my new
+acquaintance after a time. "I'm not surprised. I never did b'lieve in
+Yankee nigger-drivers--sumhow it's agin natur' for a Northern man to go
+Southern principles quite so strong as Moye did."
+
+"Which route do you think he has taken?" asked the Colonel.
+
+"Wal, I reckon arter he tuk to the run, he made fur the mountings. He
+know'd you'd head him on the travelled routes; so he's put, I think, fur
+the Missussippe, where he'll sell the horse and make North."
+
+"I'll follow him," said the Colonel, "to the ends of the earth. If it
+costs me five thousand dollars, I'll see him hung."
+
+"Wal," replied Andy, laughing, "if he's gone North you'll need a
+extradition treaty to kotch him. South Car'lina, I b'lieve, has set up
+fur a furrin country."
+
+"That's true," said the Colonel, also laughing, "she's "furrin" to the
+Yankees, but not to the old North State."
+
+"D----d if she haint," replied the North Carolinian, "and now she's got
+out on our company, I swear she must keep out. We'd as soon think of
+goin' to h----ll in summer time, as of jining partnership with her.
+Cunnel, you'r the only decent man in the State--d----d if you
+haint--and _your_ politics are a'most bad 'nuff to spile a township. It
+allers seemed sort o'queer to me, that a man with such a mighty good
+heart as your'n, could be so short in the way of brains."
+
+"Well, you're complimentary," replied the Colonel, with the utmost
+good-nature, "but let's drop politics; we never could agree, you know.
+What shall I do about Moye?"
+
+"Go to Wilmington and telegraph all creation: wait a day to har, then if
+you don't har, go home, hire a native overseer, and let Moye go to the
+d----l. Ef it'll do you any good I'll go to Wilmington with you, though
+I did mean to give you Secesherners a little h--har to-morrer."
+
+"No, Andy, I'll go alone. 'Twouldn't be patriotic to take you away from
+the barbacue. You'd 'spile' if you couldn't let off some gas soon."
+
+"I do b'lieve I shud. Howsumdever, thar's nary a thing I wouldn't do for
+you--you knows that."
+
+"Yes, I do, and I wish you'd keep an eye on my Yankee friend here, and
+see he don't get into trouble with any of the boys--there'll be a hard
+set 'round, I reckon."
+
+"Wal, I will," said Andy, "but all he's to do is to keep his mouth
+shet."
+
+"That seems easy enough," I replied, laughing.
+
+A desultory conversation followed for about an hour, when the
+steam-whistle sounded, and the up-train arrived. The Colonel got on
+board and bidding us "good-night," went on to Wilmington. Andy then
+proposed we should look up sleeping accommodations. It was useless to
+seek quarters at the hotel, but an empty car was on the turn-out, and
+bribing one of the negroes we got access to it, and were soon stretched
+at full length on two of its hard-bottomed seats.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+THE BARBACUE.
+
+
+The camp-ground was about a mile from the station, and pleasantly
+situated in a grove, near a stream of water. It was in frequent use by
+the camp-meetings of the Methodist denomination--which sect at the South
+is partial to these rural religious gatherings. Scattered over it, with
+an effort at regularity, were about forty small but neat log cottages,
+thatched with the long leaves of the turpentine pine, and chinked with
+branches of the same tree. Each of these houses was floored with leaves
+or straw, and large enough to afford sleeping accommodations for about
+ten persons, provided they spread their bedding on the ground, and lay
+tolerably close together. Interspersed among the cabins were about a
+dozen canvas tents which had been erected for this especial occasion.
+
+Nearly in the centre of the group of huts a rude sort of scaffold, four
+or five feet high, and surrounded by a rustic railing, served for the
+speaker's stand. It would seat about a dozen persons, and was protected
+by a roof of pine-boughs, interlaced together so as to keep off the sun,
+without affording protection from the rain. In the rear of this stand
+were two long tables, made of rough boards, and supported on stout
+joists, crossed on each other in the form of the letter X. A canopy of
+green leaves shaded the grounds, and the whole grove, which was
+perfectly free from underbrush, was carpeted with the soft, brown
+tassels of the pine.
+
+Being fatigued with the ride of the previous day, I did not awake till
+the morning was far advanced, and it was nearly ten o'clock when Andy
+and I took our way to the camp-ground. Avoiding the usual route, we
+walked on through the forest. It was mid-winter, and vegetation lay dead
+all around us, awaiting the time when spring should breathe into it the
+breath of life, and make it a living thing. There was silence and rest
+in the deep woods. The birds were away on their winter wanderings; the
+leaves hung motionless on the tall trees, and nature seemed resting from
+her ceaseless labors, and listening to the soft music of the little
+stream which sung a cheerful song as it rambled on over the roots and
+fallen branches that blocked its way. Soon a distant murmur arose, and
+we had not proceeded far before as many sounds as were heard at Babel
+made a strange concert about our ears. The lowing of the ox, the
+neighing of the horse, and the deep braying of another animal, mingled
+with a thousand human voices, came through the woods. But above and over
+all rose the stentorian tones of the stump speaker,
+
+        "As he trod the shaky platform,
+         With the sweat upon his brow."
+
+About a thousand persons were already assembled on the ground, and a
+more motley gathering I never witnessed. All sorts of costumes and all
+classes of people were there; but the genuine back-woods corn-crackers
+composed the majority of the assemblage. As might be expected much the
+larger portion of the audience were men, still I saw some women and not
+a few children; many of the country people having taken advantage of the
+occasion to give their families a holiday. Some occupied benches in
+front of the stand, though a larger number were seated around in groups,
+within hearing of the speaker, but paying very little attention to what
+he was saying. A few were whittling--a few pitching quoits, or playing
+leap-frog, and quite a number were having a quiet game of whist, euchre
+or "seven-up."
+
+The speaker was a well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking man and a tolerably
+good orator. He seemed accustomed to addressing a jury, for he displayed
+all the adroitness in handling his subject, and in appealing to the
+prejudices of his hearers, that we see in successful special pleaders.
+But he overshot his mark. To nine out of ten of his audience, his words
+and similes, though correct, and sometimes beautiful, were as
+unintelligible as the dead languages. He advocated immediate,
+unconditional secession; and I thought from the applause which met his
+remarks, whenever he seemed to make himself understood, that the large
+majority of those present were of the same way of thinking.
+
+He was succeeded by a heavy-browed, middle-aged man, slightly bent, and
+with hair a little turned to gray, but still hale, athletic, and in the
+prime and vigor of manhood. His pantaloons and waistcoat were of the
+common homespun, and he used, now and then, a word of the country
+dialect, but as a stump-speaker he was infinitely superior to the more
+polished orator who had preceded him.
+
+He, too, advocated secession, as a right and a duty--separation, now and
+forever, from the dirt-eating, money-loving Yankees, who, he was ashamed
+to say, had the same ancestry, and worshipped the same God, as himself.
+He took the bold ground that slavery is a curse to both the black and
+the white, but that it was forced upon this generation before its birth,
+by these same greedy, grasping Yankees, who would sell not only the
+bones and sinews of their fellow men, but--worse than that--their own
+souls, for gold. It was forced upon them without their consent, and now
+that it had become interwoven with all their social life, and was a
+necessity of their very existence, the hypocritical Yankees would take
+it from them, because, forsooth, it is a sin and a wrong--as if _they_
+had to bear its responsibility, or the South could not settle its own
+affairs with its MAKER!
+
+"Slavery is now," he continued, "indispensable to us. Without it,
+cotton, rice, and sugar will cease to grow, and the South will starve.
+What if it works abuses? What if the black, at times, is overburdened,
+and his wife and daughters debauched? Man is not perfect anywhere--there
+are wrongs in every society. It is for each one to give his account, in
+such matters, to his God. But in this are we worse than they? Are there
+not abuses in society at the North? Are not their laborers overworked?
+While sin here hides itself under cover of the night, does it not there
+stalk abroad at noon-day? If the wives and daughters of blacks are
+debauched here, are not the wives and daughters of whites debauched
+there? and will not a Yankee barter away the chastity of his own mother
+for a dirty dollar? Who fill our brothels? Yankee women! Who load our
+penitentiaries, crowd our whipping-posts, debauch our slaves, and cheat
+and defraud us all? Yankee men! And I say unto you, fellow-citizens,"
+and here the speaker's form seemed to dilate with the wild enthusiasm
+which possessed him, "'come out from among them; be ye separate, and
+touch not the unclean thing,' and thus saith the Lord God of Hosts, who
+will guide you, and lead you, if need be, to battle and to victory!"
+
+A perfect storm of applause followed. The assemblage rose, and one long,
+wild shout rent the old woods, and made the tall trees tremble. It was
+some minutes before the uproar subsided; when it did, a voice near the
+speaker's stand called out, "Andy Jones!" The call was at once echoed by
+another voice, and soon a general shout for "Andy!" "Union Andy!" "Bully
+Andy!" went up from the same crowd which a moment before had so wildly
+applauded the secession speaker.
+
+Andy rose from where he was seated beside me, and quietly ascended the
+steps of the platform. Removing his hat, and passing to his mouth a huge
+quid of tobacco from a tin box in his pantaloons-pocket, he made
+several rapid strides up and down the speaker's stand, and then turned
+squarely to the audience.
+
+The reader has noticed a tiger pacing up and down in his cage, with his
+eyes riveted on the human faces before him. He has observed how he will
+single out some individual, and finally stopping short in his rounds,
+turn on him with a look of such intense ferocity as makes a man's blood
+stand still, and his very breath come thick and hard, as he momentarily
+expects the beast will tear away the bars of the cage and leap forth on
+the obnoxious person. Now, Andy's fine, open, manly face had nothing of
+the tiger in it, but, for a moment, I could not divest myself of the
+impression, as he halted in his walk up and down the stage, and turned
+full and square on the previous speaker--who had taken a seat among the
+audience near me--that he was about to spring upon him. Riveting his eye
+on the man's face, he at last slowly said:
+
+"A man stands har and quotes Scriptur agin his feller man, and forgets
+that 'God made of one blood all nations that dwell on the face of the
+'arth.' A man stands har and calls his brother a thief, and his mother a
+harlot, and axes us to go his doctrin's! I don't mean his brother in the
+Scriptur sense, nor his mother in a fig'rative sense, but I mean the
+brother of his own blood, and the mother that bore him; for HE,
+gentlemen (and he pointed his finger directly at the recent speaker,
+while his words came slow and heavy with intense scorn), HE is a Yankee!
+And now, I say, gentlemen, d--n sech doctrin's; d----n sech
+principles, and d----n the man that's got a soul so black as to utter
+'em!"
+
+A breathless silence fell on the assemblage, while the person alluded to
+sprang to his feet, his face on fire, and his voice thick and broken
+with intense rage, as he yelled out: "Andy Jones, by----, you shall
+answer for this!"
+
+"Sartin," said Andy, coolly inserting his thumbs in the armholes of his
+waistcoat; "enywhar you likes--har--now--ef 'greeable to you."
+
+"I've no weapon here, sir, but I'll give you a chance mighty sudden,"
+was the fierce reply.
+
+"Suit yourself," said Andy, with perfect imperturbability; "but as you
+haint jest ready, s'pose you set down, and har me tell 'bout your
+relations: they're a right decent set--them as I knows--and I'll swar
+they're 'shamed of you."
+
+A buzz went through the crowd, and a dozen voices called out: "Be civil,
+Andy"--"Let him blow"--"Shut up"--"Go in, Jones"--with other like
+elegant exclamations.
+
+A few of his friends took the aggrieved gentleman aside, and, soon
+quieting him, restored order.
+
+"Wal, gentlemen," resumed Andy, "all on you know whar I was raised--over
+thar in South Car'lina. I'm sorry to say it, but it's true. And you all
+know my father was a pore man, who couldn't give his boys no chance--and
+ef he could, thar warn't no schules in the district--so we couldn't hev
+got no book-larning ef we'd been a minded to. Wal, the next plantation
+to whar we lived was old Cunnel J----'s, the father of this cunnel. He
+was a d----d old nullifier, jest like his son--but not half so decent a
+man. Wal, on his plantation was an old nigger called Uncle Pomp, who'd
+sumhow larned to read. He was a mighty good nigger, and he'd hev been in
+heaven long afore now ef the Lord hadn't a had sum good use for him down
+har--but he'll be thar yet a d----d sight sooner than sum on us white
+folks--that's sartin. Wal, as I was saying, Pomp could read, and when I
+was 'bout sixteen, and had never seen the inside of a book, the old
+darky said to me one day--he was old then, and that was thirty years
+ago--wal, he said to me, 'Andy, chile, ye orter larn to read, 'twill be
+ob use to ye when you'se grow'd up, and it moight make you a good and
+'spected man--now, come to ole Pomp's cabin, and he'll larn you, Andy,
+chile.' Wal, I reckon I went. He'd nothin' but a Bible and Watts' Hymns;
+but we used to stay thar all the long winter evenin's, and by the light
+o' the fire--we war both so darned pore we couldn't raise a candle
+atween us--wal, by the light o' the fire he larned me, and fore long I
+could spell right smart.
+
+"Now, jest think on that, gentlemen. I, a white boy, and, 'cordin' to
+the Declaration of Independence, with jest as good blood in me as the
+old Cunnel had in him, bein' larned to read by an old slave, and that
+old slave a'most worked to death, and takin' his nights, when he orter
+hev been a restin' his old bones, to larn me! I'm d----d if he don't
+get to heaven for that one thing, if for nothin' else.
+
+"Wal, you all know the rest--how, when I'd grow'd up, I settled har, in
+the old North State, and how the young Cunnel backed my paper, and set
+me a runnin' at turpentining. P'raps you don't think this has much to do
+with the Yankees, but it has a durned sight, as ye'll see rather sudden.
+Wal, arter a while, when I'd got a little forehanded, I begun shipping
+my truck to York and Bostin'; and at last my Yankee factor, he come out
+har, inter the back woods, to see me, and says he, 'Jones, come North
+and take a look at us.' I'd sort o' took to him. I'd lots o' dealin's
+with him afore ever I seed him, and I allers found him straight as a
+shingle. Wal, I went North, and he took me round, and showed me how the
+Yankees does things. Afore I know'd him, I allers thought--as p'raps
+most on you do--that the Yankees war a sort o' cross atween the devil
+and a Jew; but how do you s'pose I found 'em? I found that they _sent
+the pore man's children to schule_, FREE--and that the schule-houses war
+a d----d sight thicker than the bugs in Miles Privett's beds! and
+that's sayin' a heap, for ef eny on you kin sleep in his house, excep'
+he takes to the soft side of the floor, I'm d----d. Yas, the pore man's
+children are larned thar, FREE!--all on 'em--and they've jest so good a
+chance as the sons of the rich man! Now, arter that, do you think that
+I--as got all my schulein, from an old slave, by the light of a borrored
+pine-knot--der you think that _I_ kin say any thing agin the Yankees?
+P'r'aps they _do_ steal--though I doant know it--p'r'aps they _do_
+debauch thar wives and darters, and sell thar mothers' vartue for
+dollars--but, ef they do, I'm d----d if they doant send pore children
+to schule--and that's more'n we do--and let me tell you, until we do
+thet, we must expec' they'll be cuter and smarter nor we are.
+
+"This gentleman, too, my friends, who's been a givin' sech a hard
+settin' down ter his own relation, arter they've broughten him up, and
+given him sech a schulein for nuthin', he says the Yankees want to
+interfere with our niggers. Now, thet haint so, and they couldn't ef
+they would, 'case it's agin the Constertution. And they stand on the
+Constertution a durned sight solider nor we do. Didn't thar big
+gun--Daniel Webster--didn't he make mince-meat of South Car'lina Hayne
+on thet ar' subjec'? But I tell you they haint a mind ter meddle with
+the niggers; they're a goin' to let us go ter h--l our own way, and
+we're goin' thar mighty fast, or I haint read the last census."
+
+"P'r'aps you haint heerd on the ab'lsh'ners, Andy?" cried a voice from
+among the audience.
+
+"Wal, I reckon I hev," responded the orator, "I've heerd on 'em, and
+seed 'em, too. When I was North I went to one on thar conventions, and
+I'll tell you how they look. They've all long, wimmin's har, and thin,
+shet lips, with big, bawlin' mouths, and long, lean, tommerhawk faces,
+as white as vargin dip--and they all talk through the nose (giving a
+specimen), and they all look for all the world jest like the South
+Car'lina fire-eaters--and they _are_ as near like 'em as two peas,
+excep' they don't swar quite so bad, but they make up for thet in
+prayin'--and prayin' too much, I reckon, when a man's a d----d
+hippercrit, is 'bout as bad as swearin'. But, I tell you, the decent
+folks up North haint ablisheners. They look on _'em_ jest as we do on
+mad dogs, the itch, or the nigger traders.
+
+"Now, 'bout this secession bis'ness--though 'taint no use to talk on
+that subjec', 'case this state never'll secede--South Car'lina has done
+it, and I'm raather glad she has, for though I was born thar--and say it
+as hadn't orter say it--she orter hev gone to h--l long ago, and now
+she's got thar, why--_let her stay_! But, 'bout thet bis'ness, I'll tell
+you a story.
+
+"I know'd an old gentleman once by the name of Uncle Sam, and he'd a
+heap of sons. They war all likely boys--but strange ter tell, though
+they'd all the same mother, and she was a white woman, 'bout half on 'em
+war colored--not black, but sorter half-and-half. Now, the white sons
+war well-behaved, industrious, hard-workin' boys, who got 'long well,
+edicated thar children, and allers treated the old man decently; but the
+mulatter fellers war a pesky set--though some on 'em war better nor
+others. They wouldn't work, but set up for airystocracy--rode in
+kerriges, kept fast horses, bet high, and chawed tobaccer like the
+devil. Wal, the result was, _they_ got out at the elbows, and 'case they
+warn't gettin' 'long quite so fast as the white 'uns--though that war
+all thar own fault--they got jealous, and one on 'em who was blacker nor
+all the rest--a little feller, but terrible big on braggin'--he packed
+up his truck one night, and left the old man's house, and swore he'd
+never come back. He tried to make the other mulatters go with him, but
+they put thar fingers to thar nose, and says they, 'No you doant.' I was
+in favor of lettin' on him stay out in the cold, but the old man was a
+bernevolent old critter, and so _he_ says: 'Now, sonny, you jest come
+back and behave yourself, and I'll forgive you all your old pranks, and
+treat you jest as I allers used ter; but, ef you wont, why--I'll make
+you, thet's all!'
+
+"Now, gentlemen, thet quarrelsome, oneasy, ongrateful, tobaccer-chawin',
+hoss-racin', high-bettin', big-braggin', nigger-stealin',
+wimmin-whippin', yaller son of the devil, is South Car'lina, and ef she
+doant come back and behave herself in futur', I'm d----d ef she wont be
+ploughed with fire, and sowed with salt, and Andy Jones will help ter do
+it."
+
+The speaker was frequently interrupted in the course of his remarks by
+uproarious applause--but as he closed and descended from the platform,
+the crowd sent up cheer after cheer, and a dozen strong men, making a
+seat of their arms, lifted him from the ground and bore him off to the
+head of the table, where dinner was in waiting.
+
+The whole of the large assemblage then fell to eating. The dinner was
+made up of the barbacued beef and the usual mixture of viands found on a
+planter's table, with water from the little brook hard by, and a
+plentiful supply of corn-whiskey. (The latter beverage had, I thought,
+been subjected to the rite of immersion, for it tasted wonderfully of
+water.)
+
+Songs and speeches were intermingled with the masticating exercises, and
+the whole company was soon in the best of humor.
+
+During the meal I was introduced by Andy to a large number of the
+"natives," he taking special pains to tell each one that I was a Yankee,
+and a Union man, but always adding, as if to conciliate all parties,
+that I also was a guest and a friend of _his_ very particular friend,
+"thet d----d seceshener, Cunnel J----."
+
+Before we left the table, the secession orator happening near where we
+were seated, Andy rose from his seat, and, extending his hand to him,
+said: "Tom, you think I 'sulted you; p'r'aps I did, but you 'sulted my
+Yankee friend har, and your own relation, and I hed to take it up, jest
+for the looks o' the thing. Come, there's my hand; I'll fight you ef you
+want ter, or we'll say no more 'bout it--jest as you like."
+
+"Say no more about it, Andy," said the gentleman, very cordially; "let's
+drink and be friends."
+
+They drank a glass of whiskey together, and then leaving the table,
+proceeded to where the ox had been barbacued, to show me how cooking on
+a large scale is done at the South.
+
+In a pit about eight feet deep, twenty feet long, and ten feet wide,
+laid up on the sides with stones, a fire of hickory had been made, over
+which, after the wood had burned down to coals, a whole ox, divested of
+its hide and entrails, had been suspended on an enormous spit. Being
+turned often in the process of cooking, the beef had finally been "done
+brown." It was then cut up and served on the table, and I must say, for
+the credit of Southern cookery, that it made as delicious eating as any
+meat I ever tasted.
+
+I had then been away from my charge--the Colonel's horses--as long as
+seemed to be prudent. I said as much to Andy, when he proposed to return
+with me, and, turning good-humoredly to his reconciled friend, he said:
+"Now, Tom, no secession talk while I'm off."
+
+"Nary a word," said "Tom," and we left.
+
+The horses had been well fed by the negro whom I had left in charge of
+them, but had not been groomed. Seeing that, Andy stripped off his coat,
+and setting the black at work on one, with a handful of straw and pine
+leaves, commenced operations on the other, whose hair was soon as smooth
+and glossy as if it had been rubbed by an English groom.
+
+The remainder of the day passed without incident till eleven at night,
+when the Colonel returned from Wilmington.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE RETURN.
+
+
+Moye had not been seen or heard of, and the Colonel's trip was
+fruitless. While at Wilmington he sent telegrams, directing the
+overseer's arrest, to the various large cities of the South, and then
+decided to return home, make arrangements preliminary to a protracted
+absence from the plantation, and proceed at once to Charleston, where he
+would await replies to his dispatches. Andy agreed with him in the
+opinion that Moye, in his weak state of health, would not take an
+overland route to the free states, but would endeavor to reach some town
+on the Mississippi, where he might dispose of the horse, and secure a
+passage up the river.
+
+As no time was to be lost, we decided to return to the plantation on the
+following morning. Accordingly, with the first streak of day we bade
+"good-bye" to our Union friend, and started homeward.
+
+No incident worthy of mention occurred on the way, till about ten
+o'clock, when we arrived at the house of the Yankee schoolmistress,
+where we had been so hospitably entertained two days before. The lady
+received us with great cordiality, forced upon us a lunch to serve our
+hunger on the road, and when we parted, enjoined on me to leave the
+South at the earliest possible moment. She was satisfied it would not
+for a much longer time be safe quarters for a man professing Union
+sentiments. Notwithstanding the strong manifestations of loyalty I had
+observed among the people, I was convinced the advice of my pretty
+"countrywoman" was judicious, and I determined to be governed by it.
+
+Our horses, unaccustomed to lengthy journeys, had not entirely recovered
+from the fatigues of their previous travel, and we did not reach our
+destination till an hour after dark. We were most cordially welcomed by
+Madam P----, who soon set before us a hot supper, which, as we were
+jaded by the long ride, and had fasted for twelve hours, on
+bacon-sandwiches and cold hoe-cake, was the one thing needful to us.
+
+While seated at the table the Colonel asked:
+
+"Has every thing gone right, Alice, since we left home?"
+
+"Every thing," replied the lady, "except"--and she hesitated, as if she
+dreaded the effect of the news; "except that Jule and her child have
+gone."
+
+"Gone!" exclaimed my host; "gone where?"
+
+"I don't know. We have searched everywhere, but have found no clue to
+them. The morning you left Sam set Jule at work among the pines; she
+tried hard, but could not do a full task, and at night was taken to the
+cabin to be whipped. I heard of it, and forbade it. It did not seem to
+me that she ought to be punished for not doing what she had not strength
+to do. When released from the cabin, she came and thanked me for having
+interfered for her, and talked with me awhile. She cried and took on
+fearfully about Sam, and was afraid you would punish her when you
+returned. I promised you would not, and she left me seeming more
+cheerful. I supposed she would go directly home after getting her child
+from the nurse's quarters; but it appears she went to Pompey's, where
+she staid till after ten o'clock. Neither she nor the child have been
+seen since."
+
+"Did you get no trace of her in the morning?"
+
+"Yes, but soon lost it. When she did not appear at work, Sam went to her
+cabin to learn the cause, and found the door open, and her bed
+undisturbed. She had not slept there. Knowing that Sandy had returned, I
+sent for him, and, with Jim and his dog, he commenced a search. The dog
+tracked her directly from Pompey's cabin to the bank of the run near the
+lower still. There all trace of her disappeared. We dragged the stream,
+but discovered nothing. Jim and Sandy then scoured the woods for miles
+in all directions, but the hound could not recover the trail. I hope
+otherwise, but I fear some evil has befallen her."
+
+"Oh, no! there's no fear of that," said the Colonel: "she is smart: she
+waded up the run far enough to baffle the dog, and then made for the
+swamp. That is why you lost her tracks at the stream. Rely upon it, I am
+right: but she shall not escape me."
+
+We shortly afterward adjourned to the library. After being seated there
+a while the Colonel, rising quickly, as if a sudden thought had struck
+him, sent for the old preacher.
+
+The old negro soon appeared, hat in hand, and taking a stand near the
+door, made a respectful bow to each one of us.
+
+"Take a chair, Pompey," said Madam P----, kindly.
+
+The black meekly seated himself, when the Colonel asked: "Well, Pomp,
+what do you know about Jule's going off?"
+
+"Nuffin', massa--I shures you, nuffin'. De pore chile say nuffin to ole
+Pomp 'bout dat."
+
+"What did she say?"
+
+"Wal, you see, massa, de night arter you gwo 'way, and arter she'd
+worked hard in de brush all de day, and been a strung up in de ole cabin
+fur to be whipped, she come ter me wid har baby in har arms, all a-faint
+and a-tired, and har pore heart clean broke, and she say dat she'm jess
+ready ter drop down and die. Den I tries ter comfut har, massa; I takes
+har up from de floor, and I say ter har dat de good Lord He pity
+har--dat He woant bruise de broken reed, and woant put no more on her
+dan she kin b'ar--dat He'd touch you' heart, and I toled har you'se a
+good, kine heart at de bottom, massa--and I knows it, 'case I toted you
+'fore you could gwo, and when you's a bery little chile, not no great
+sight bigger'n har'n, you'd put your little arms round ole Pomp's neck,
+and say dat when you war grow'd up you'd be bery kine ter de pore brack
+folks, and not leff 'em be 'bused like dey war in dem days."
+
+"Never mind what _you_ said," interrupted the Colonel, a little
+impatiently, but showing no displeasure; "what did _she_ say?"
+
+"Wal, massa, she tuk on bery hard 'bout Sam, and axed me ef I raaily
+reckoned de Lord had forgib'n him, and took'n him ter Heself, and gibin'
+him one o' dem hous'n up dar, in de sky. I toled her dat I _know'd_ it;
+but she say it didn't 'pear so ter har, 'case Sam had a been wid har out
+dar in de woods, all fru de day; dat she'd a _seed_ him, massa, and
+dough he handn't a said nuffin', he'd lukd at har wid sech a sorry,
+grebed luk, dat it gwo clean fru har heart, till she'd no strength leff,
+and fall down on de ground a'most dead. Den she say big Sam come 'long
+and fine har dar, and struck har great, heaby blows wid de big whip!"
+
+"The brute!" exclaimed the Colonel, rising from his chair, and pacing
+rapidly up and down the room.
+
+"But p'r'aps he warn't so much ter blame, massa," continued the old
+negro, in a deprecatory tone; "maybe he 'spose she war shirkin' de work.
+Wal, den she say she know'd nuffin' more, till byme-by, when she come
+to, and fine big Sam dar, and he struck har agin, and make har gwo ter
+de work; and she did gwo, but she feel like as ef she'd die. I toled har
+de good ma'am wudn't leff big Sam 'buse har no more 'fore you cum hum,
+and dat you'd hab 'passion on har, and not leff har gwo out in de woods,
+but put har 'mong de nusses, like as afore.
+
+"Den she say it 'twarn't de work dat trubble har--dat she orter work,
+and orter be 'bused, 'case she'd been bad, bery bad. All she axed war
+dat Sam would forgib har, and cum to har in de oder worle, and tell har
+so. Den she cried, and tuk on awful; but de good Lord, massa, dat am so
+bery kine ter de bery wuss sinners, He put de words inter my mouf, and I
+tink dey gib har comfut, fur she say dat it sort o' 'peared to har den
+dat Sam _would_ forgib har, and take har inter his house up dar, and she
+warn't afeard ter die no more.
+
+"Den she takes up de chile and gwo 'way, 'pearin' sort o' happy, and
+more cheerful like dan I'd a seed har eber sense pore Sam war shot."
+
+My host was sensibly affected by the old man's simple tale, but
+continued pacing up and down the room, and said nothing.
+
+"It's plain to me, Colonel," I remarked, as Pompey concluded, "she has
+drowned herself and the child--the dog lost the scent at the creek."
+
+"Oh, no!" he replied; "I think not. I never heard of a negro committing
+suicide--they've not the courage to do it."
+
+"I fear she _has_, David," said the lady. "The thought of going to Sam
+has led her to it; yet, we dragged the run, and found nothing. What do
+you think about it, Pompey?"
+
+"I dunno, ma'am, but I'se afeard of dat; and now dat I tinks ob it, I'se
+afeard dat what I tole har put har up ter it," replied the old preacher,
+bursting into tears. "She 'peared so happy like, when I say she'd be
+'long wid Sam in de oder worle, dat I'se afeard she's a gone and done
+it wid har own hands. I tole har, too, dat de Lord would oberlook good
+many tings dat pore sinners do when dey can't help 'emselfs--and it make
+har do it! Oh! it make har do it!" and the old black buried his face in
+his hands, and wept bitterly.
+
+"Don't feel so, Pomp," said his master, _very_ kindly. "You did the best
+you could; no one blames you."
+
+"I knows _you_ doant, massa--I knows you doant, and you'se bery good
+nottur--but oh! massa, de Lord!" and his body swayed to and fro with the
+great grief; "I fears de Lord do, massa, for I'se sent har ter Him wid
+har own blood, and de blood of dat pore innercent chile, on har hands.
+Oh, I fears de Lord neber'll forgib me--neber'll forgib me for _dat_."
+
+"He will, my good Pomp--He will!" said the Colonel, laying his hand
+tenderly on the old man's shoulder. "The Lord will forgive you, for the
+sake of the Christian example you've set your master, if for nothing
+else;" and here the proud, strong man's feelings overpowering him, his
+tears fell in great drops on the breast of the old slave, as they had
+fallen there in his childhood.
+
+Such scenes are not for the eye of a stranger, and turning away, I left
+the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+"ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE."
+
+
+The family met at the breakfast-table at the usual hour on the following
+morning; but I noticed that Jim was not in his accustomed place behind
+the Colonel's chair. That gentleman exhibited his usual good spirits,
+but Madam P---- looked sad and anxious, and _I_ had not forgotten the
+scene of the previous evening.
+
+While we were seated at the meal, the negro Junius hastily entered the
+room, and in an excited manner exclaimed:
+
+"Oh, massa, massa, you muss cum ter de cabin--Jim hab draw'd his knife,
+and he swar he'll kill de fuss 'un dat touch him!"
+
+"He does, does he!" said his master, springing from his seat, and
+abruptly leaving the apartment.
+
+Remembering the fierce burst of passion I had seen in the negro, and
+fearing there was danger a-foot, I rose to follow, saying, as I did so:
+
+"Madam, cannot you prevent this?"
+
+"I cannot, sir; I have already done all I can. Go and try to pacify the
+Colonel--Jim will die before he'll be whipped." Jim was standing at the
+farther end of the old cabin, with his back to the wall, and the large
+spring knife in his hand. Some half-dozen negroes were in the centre of
+the room, apparently cowed by his fierce and desperate looks, and his
+master was within a few feet of him.
+
+"I tell you, Cunnel," cried the negro, as I entered, "you touch me at
+your peril!"
+
+"You d----d nigger, do you dare to speak so to me?" said his master,
+taking a step toward him.
+
+The knife rose in the air, and the black, in a cool, sneering tone,
+replied: "Say your prayers 'fore you come nigher, for, so help me God,
+you'm a dead man!"
+
+I laid my hand on the Colonel's arm, to draw him back, saying, as I did
+so: "There's danger in him! I _know_ it. Let him go, and he shall ask
+your pardon."
+
+"I shan't ax his pardon," cried the black; "leff him an' me be, sir;
+we'll fix dis ourselfs."
+
+"Don't interfere, Mr. K----," said my host, with perfect coolness, but
+with a face pallid with rage. "Let me govern my own plantation."
+
+"As you say, sir," I replied, stepping back a few paces; "but I warn
+you--there is danger in him!"
+
+Taking no notice of my remark, the Colonel turning to the trembling
+negroes, said: "One of you go to the house and bring my pistols."
+
+"You kin shoot me, ef you likes," said Jim, with a fierce, grim smile;
+"but I'll take you ter h--l wid me, _shore_. You knows WE wont stand a
+blow!"
+
+The Colonel, at the allusion to their relationship, started as if shot,
+and turning furiously on the negro, yelled out: "I'll shoot you for
+that, you d----d nigger, by ----."
+
+"It 'pears ter me, Cunnel, ye've hed 'bout nuff shootin' round har,
+lately; better stop thet sort o' bis'ness; it moight give ye a sore
+throat," said the long, lean, loose-jointed stump-speaker of the
+previous Sunday, as he entered the cabin and strode directly up to my
+host.
+
+"What brought you here, you d----d insolent hound?" cried the Colonel,
+turning fiercely on the new-comer.
+
+"Wal, I cum ter du ye a naaboorly turn--I've kotched two on yer niggers
+down ter my still, and I want ye ter take 'em 'way," returned the
+corn-cracker, with the utmost coolness.
+
+"Two of my niggers!" exclaimed the Colonel, perceptibly moderating his
+tone--"which ones?"
+
+"A yaller gal, and a chile."
+
+"I thank you, Barnes; excuse my hard words--I was excited."
+
+"All right, Cunnel; say no more 'bout thet. Will ye send fur 'em? I'd
+hev fotched 'em 'long, but my waggin's off jest now."
+
+"Yes, I'll send at once. Have you got them safe?"
+
+"Safe? I reckon so! Kotched 'em last night, arter dark, and they've kept
+right still ever sense, I 'sure ye--but th' gal holds on ter th' young
+'un ter kill--we cudn't get it 'way no how."
+
+"How did you catch them?"
+
+"They got 'gainst my turpentime raft--the curren' driv 'em down, I
+s'pose."
+
+"What! are they dead?"
+
+"Dead? deader'n drownded rats!" replied the native,
+
+"My God! drowned herself and her child!" exclaimed the Colonel, with
+deep emotion.
+
+"It is terrible, my friend. Come, let us go to them, at once," I said,
+laying my hand on his arm, and drawing him unresistingly away.
+
+A pair of mules was speedily harnessed to a large turpentine wagon, and
+the horses we had ridden the day before were soon at the door. When the
+Colonel, who had been closeted for a few minutes with Madam P----, came
+out of the house, we mounted, and rode off with the "corn-cracker."
+
+The native's farm was located on the stream which watered my friend's
+plantation, and was about ten miles distant. Taking a by-road which led
+to it through the woods, we rode rapidly on in advance of the wagon.
+
+"Sort o' likely gal, thet, warn't she?" remarked the turpentine-maker,
+after a while.
+
+"Yes, she was," replied the Colonel, in a half-abstracted manner;
+"_very_ likely."
+
+"Kill harself 'case har man war shot by thet han'som overseer uv
+your'n?"
+
+"Not altogether for that, I reckon," replied my host; "I fear the main
+reason was her being put at field-work, and abused by the driver."
+
+"Thet comes uv not lookin' arter things yerself, Cunnel. I tend ter my
+niggers parsonally, and they keer a durned sight more fur this world
+then fur kingdom-cum. Ye cudn't hire 'em ter kill 'emselves fur no
+price."
+
+"Well," replied the Colonel, in a low tone, "I _did_ look after her. I
+put her at full field-work, myself!"
+
+"By----!" cried the native, reining his horse to a dead stop, and
+speaking in an excited manner: "I doant b'lieve it--'taint 't all like
+ye--yer a d----d seceshener; thet comes uv yer bringin'-up--but ye've a
+soul bigger'n a meetin'-house, and ye cudn't hev put thet slim, weakly
+gal inter th' woods, no how!"
+
+The Colonel and I instinctively halted our horses, as the "corn-cracker"
+stopped his, and were then standing abreast of him in the road.
+
+"It's true, Barnes," said my host, in a voice that showed deep
+dejection; "I _did_ do it!"
+
+"May God Almighty furgive ye, Cunnel," said the native, starting his
+horse forward; "_I_ wudn't hev dun it fur all yer niggers, by ----."
+
+The Colonel made no reply, and we rode on the rest of the way in
+silence.
+
+The road was a mere wagon-track through the trees, and it being but
+little travelled, and encumbered with the roots and stumps of the pine,
+our progress was slow, and we were nearly two hours in reaching the
+plantation of the native.
+
+The corn-cracker's house--a low, unpainted wooden building--stood near
+the little stream, and in the centre of a cleared plot of some ten
+acres. This plot was surrounded by a post-and-rail fence, and in its
+front portion was a garden, which grew a sufficient supply of vegetables
+to serve a family of twenty persons. In the rear, and at the sides of
+the dwelling, were about seven acres, devoted mainly to corn and
+potatoes. In one corner of the lot were three tidy-looking negro-houses,
+and close beside them I noticed a low shed, near which a large quantity
+of the stalks of the tall, white corn, common to that section, was
+stacked in the New England fashion. Browsing on the corn-stalks were
+three sleek, well-kept milch cows, and a goat.
+
+About four hundred yards from the farmer's house, and on the bank of the
+little run, which there was quite wide and deep, stood a turpentine
+distillery; and around it were scattered a large number of rosin and
+turpentine barrels, some filled and some empty. A short distance higher
+up, and far enough from the "still" to be safe in the event of a fire,
+was a long, low, wooden shed, covered with rough, unjointed boards,
+placed upright, and unbattened. This was the "spirit-house," used for
+the storage of the spirits of turpentine when barrelled for market, and
+awaiting shipment. In the creek, and filling nearly one-half of the
+channel in front of the spirit-shed, was a raft of pine timber, on which
+were laden some two hundred barrels of rosin. On such rude conveyances
+the turpentine-maker sent his produce to Conwayboro'. There the
+timber-raft was sold to my way-side friend, Captain B----, and its
+freight shipped on board vessel for New York. Two "prime" negro men,
+dressed in the usual costume, were "tending the still;" and a negro
+woman, as stout and strong as the men, and clad in a short, loose,
+linsey gown, from beneath which peeped out a pair of coarse leggins, was
+adjusting a long wooden trough, which conveyed the liquid rosin from the
+"still" to a deep excavation in the earth, at a short distance. In the
+pit was a quantity of rosin sufficient to fill a thousand barrels.
+
+"Here, Bill," said Barnes to one of the negro men, as we pulled up at
+the distillery, "put these critters up, and give 'em sum oats, and when
+they've cooled off a bit, water 'em."
+
+"Yas, yas, massa," replied the negro, springing nimbly forward, and
+taking the horses by the bridles, "an' rub 'em down, massa?"
+
+"Yas, rub 'em down right smart," replied the corn-cracker; then turning
+to me, as we dismounted, he said: "Stranger, thet's th' sort o' niggers
+fur ye; all uv mine ar' jess like him--smart and lively as kittens."
+
+"He does seem to go about his work cheerfully," I replied.
+
+"Cheerfully! d----d ef he doant--all on 'em du! They like me better'n
+thar own young 'uns, an' it's 'cause I use 'em like human bein's;" and
+he looked slyly toward the Colonel, who just then was walking silently
+away, in the direction of the run, as if in search of the browned
+"chattels."
+
+"Not thar, Cunnel," cried the native; "they're inter th' shed;" and he
+started to lead the way to the "spirit-house."
+
+"Not now, Barnes," I said, putting my hand on his arm: "leave him alone
+for a little while. He is feeling badly, and we'd better not disturb him
+just yet."
+
+The native motioned me to a seat on a rosin-barrel, as he replied:
+
+"Wal, he 'pears ter--thet's a fact, and he orter. D----d ef it arn't
+wicked to use niggers like cattle, as he do."
+
+"I don't think he means to ill-treat them--he's a kind-hearted man."
+
+"Wal, he ar sort o' so; but he's left ev'ry thing ter thet d----d
+overseer uv his'n. I wudn't ha' trusted him to feed my hogs."
+
+"Hogs!" I exclaimed, laughing; "I supposed you didn't _feed_ hogs in
+these diggins. I supposed you 'let 'em run.'"
+
+"_I_ doant; an' I've got th' tallest porkys round har."
+
+"I've been told that they get a good living in the woods."
+
+"Wal, p'r'aps the' du jest make eout ter live thar; but my ole 'oman
+likes 'em ter hum--they clean up a place like--eat up all th' leavin's,
+an' give th' young nigs suthin' ter du."
+
+"It seems to me," I said, resuming the previous thread of the
+conversation; "that overseers are a necessity on a large plantation."
+"Wal, the' ar', an' thet's why thar ortent ter be no big plantations;
+God Almighty didn't make human bein's ter be herded togethar in th'
+woods like hogs. No man orter ter hev more'n twenty on 'em--he can't
+look arter no more himself, an' its agin natur ter set a feller over 'em
+what hain't no int'rest in 'em, an' no feelin' fur 'em, an' who'll drive
+'em round like brutes. I never struck one on 'em in my life, an' my ten
+du more'n ony fifteen th' Cunnel's got."
+
+"I thought they needed occasional correction. How do you manage them
+without whipping?"
+
+"Manage them! why 'cordin' ter scriptur--do ter 'em as I'd like ter be
+dun ter, ef I war a nigger. Every one on 'em knows I'd part with my last
+shirt, an' live on taters an' cow-fodder, fore I'd sell em; an' then I
+give 'em Saturdays for 'emselfs--but thet's cute dealin' in me (tho' th'
+pore, simple souls doant see it), fur ye knows the' work thet day for
+'emselfs, an' raise nigh all thar own feed, 'cept th' beef and
+whiskey--an' it sort o' makes 'em feel like folks, too, more like as ef
+the' war _free_--the' work th' better fur it all th' week."
+
+"Then you think the blacks would work better if free?"
+
+"In _course_ I does--its agin man's natur to be a slave. Thet lousy
+parson ye herd ter meetin, a Sunday, makes slavery eout a divine
+institooshun, but my wife's a Bible 'oman, and she says 'taint so; an'
+I'm d----d ef she arn't right."
+
+"Is your wife a South Carolina women?"
+
+"No, she an' me's from th' old North--old Car'tret, nigh on ter Newbern;
+an' we doant take nat'rally to these fire-eaters."
+
+"Have you been here long?"
+
+"Wal, nigh on ter six yar. I cum har with nuthin' but a thousan' ter my
+back--slapped thet inter fifteen hun'red acres--paid it down--and then
+hired ten likely, North Car'lina niggers--hired 'em with th' chance uv
+buyin' ef the' liked eout har. Wal, th' nigs all know'd me, and the'
+sprung ter it like blazes; so every yar I've managed ter buy two on 'em,
+and now I've ten grow'd up, and thar young'uns; th' still and all th'
+traps paid fur, an' ef this d----d secesh bis'ness hadn't a come 'long,
+I'd hev hed a right smart chance o' doin' well."
+
+"I'm satisfied secession will ruin the turpentine business; you'll be
+shut up here, unable to sell your produce, and it will go to waste."
+
+"Thet's my 'pinion; but I reckon I kin' manage now witheout turpentime.
+I've talked it over 'long with my nigs, and we kalkerlate, ef these ar
+doin's go eny furder, ter tap no more trees, but clar land an' go ter
+raisin' craps."
+
+"What! do you talk politics with your negroes?"
+
+"Nary a politic--but I'm d----d ef th' critters doan't larn 'em sumhow;
+the' knows 'bout as much uv what's goin' on as I du--but plantin arn't
+politics; its bisness, an' they've more int'rest in it nor I hev, 'cause
+they've sixteen mouths ter feed agin my four."
+
+"I'm glad, my friend, that you treat them like men: but I have supposed
+they were not well enough informed to have intelligent opinions on such
+subjects."
+
+"Informed! wal, I reckon the' is; all uv mine kin read, an' sum on 'em
+kin write, too. D'ye see thet little nig thar?" pointing to a juvenile
+coal-black darky of about six years, who was standing before the "still"
+fire; "thet ar little devil kin read an' speak like a parson. He's got
+hold, sumhow, uv my little gal's book o' pieces, an' larned a dozen on
+'em. I make him cum inter th' house, once in a while uv an evenin', an'
+speechify, an' 'twould do yer soul good ter har him, in his shirt tail,
+with a old sheet wound round him fur a toger (I've told him th'
+play-acters du it so down ter Charles'on), an' spoutin' out: 'My name am
+Norval; on de Gruntin' hills my fader feed him hogs!' The little coon
+never seed a sheep, an' my wife's told him a flock's a herd, an' he
+thinks 'hog' _sounds_ better'n 'flock,' so, contra'y ter th' book, he
+puts in 'hogs,' and hogs, you knows, hev ter grunt, so he gits 'em on
+th' 'Gruntin hills;" and here the kind-hearted native burst into a fit
+of uproarious laughter, in which, in spite of myself, I had to join.
+
+When the merriment had somewhat subsided, the turpentine-maker called
+out to the little darky:
+
+"Come here, Jim."
+
+The young chattel ran to him with alacrity, and wedging in between his
+legs, placed his little black hands, in a free-and-easy way, on his
+master's knees, and, looking up trustfully in his face, said:
+
+"Wal, massa?"
+
+"What's yer name?"
+
+"Dandy Jim, massa."
+
+"Thet arn't all--what's th' rest?"
+
+"Dandy Jim of ole Car'lina."
+
+"Who made ye?"
+
+"De good God, massa."
+
+"No, He didn't: God doant make little nigs. He makes none but white
+folks;" said the master, laughing.
+
+"Yas He'm do; Missus say He'm do; dat He make dis nig jess like He done
+little Totty."
+
+"Wal, He did, Jim. I'm d----d ef _He_ didn't, fur nobody else cud make
+_ye_!" replied the man, patting the little woolly head with undisguised
+affection.
+
+"Now, Jim, say th' creed fur 'de gemman.'"
+
+The young darky then repeated the Apostle's Creed and the Ten
+Commandments.
+
+"Is thet all ye knows?"
+
+"No, massa, I knows a heap 'sides dat."
+
+"Wal, say suthin' more--sum on 'em pieces thet jingle."
+
+The little fellow then repeated with entire correctness, and with
+appropriate gestures, and emphasis, though in the genuine darky
+dialect--which seems to be inborn with the pure-Southern black--Mrs.
+Hemans' poem:
+
+"The boy stood on the burning deck."
+
+"Mrs. Hemans draped in black!" I exclaimed, laughing heartily: "How
+would the good lady feel, could she look down from where she is, and
+hear a little darky doing up her poetry in that style?"
+
+"D----d ef I doant b'lieve 'twud make her love th' little nig like I
+do;" replied the corn-cracker, taking him up on his knee as tenderly as
+he would have taken up his own child.
+
+"Tell me, my little man," I said: "who taught you all these things?"
+
+"I larned 'em, myseff, sar," was the prompt reply.
+
+"You learned them, yourself! but who taught you to read?"
+
+"I larned 'em myseff, sar!"
+
+"You couldn't have learned _that_ yourself; didn't your 'massa' teach
+you?"
+
+"No, sar."
+
+"Oh! your 'missus' did."
+
+"No, sar."
+
+"No, sar!" I repeated; then suspecting the real state of the case, I
+looked him sternly in the eye, and said: "My little man, it's wrong to
+tell lies--you must _always_ speak the truth; now, tell me truly, did
+not your 'missus' teach you these things?"
+
+"No, sar, I larned 'em myseff."
+
+"Ye can't cum it, Stranger; ye moight roast him over a slow fire, an'
+not git nary a thing eout on him but thet," said the corn-cracker,
+leaning forward, and breaking into a boisterous fit of laughter. "It's
+agin th' law, an' I'm d----d ef I teached him. Reckon he _did_ larn
+himself!"
+
+"I must know your wife, my friend. She's a good woman."
+
+"Good! ye kin bet high on thet; she's uv th' stuff th' Lord makes angels
+eout on."
+
+I had no doubt of it, and was about to say so, when the Colonel's
+turpentine wagon drove up, and I remembered I had left him too long
+alone.
+
+The coachman was driving, and Jim sat on the wagon beside him.
+
+"Massa K----," said the latter, getting down and coming to me: "Whar am
+dey?"
+
+"In the spirit-shed."
+
+He was turning to go there, when I called him back, saying: "Jim, you
+must not see your master now; you'd better keep out of sight for the
+present."
+
+"No, massa; de ma'am say de Cunnel take dis bery hard, and dat I orter
+tell him I'se sorry for what I'se done."
+
+"Well, wait a while. Let me go in first."
+
+Accompanied by the corn-cracker, I entered the turpentine-shed. A row of
+spirit-barrels were ranged along each of its sides, and two tiers
+occupied the centre of the building. On these a number of loose planks
+were placed, and on the planks lay the bodies of the metif woman and her
+child. The Colonel was seated on a barrel near them, with his head
+resting on his hands, and his eyes fixed on the ground. He did not seem
+to notice our entrance, and, passing him without speaking, I stepped to
+the side of the dead.
+
+The woman's dress, the common linsey gown worn by her class, was still
+wet, and her short, kinky, brown hair fell in matted folds around her
+face. One arm hung loosely by her side; the other was clasped tightly
+around her child, which lay as if asleep on her bosom. One of its small
+hands clung to its mother's breast, and around its little lips played a
+smile. But how shall I describe the pale, sweet beauty of the face of
+the drowned girl, as she lay there, her eyes closed, and her lips
+parted, as in prayer? Never but once have I seen on human features the
+strange radiance that shone upon it, or the mingled expression of hope,
+and peace, and resignation that rested there--and that was in the
+long-gone time, when, standing by her bedside, I watched the passing
+away of one who is now an angel in heaven!
+
+"Come, my dear friend, let us go," I said, turning and gently taking the
+Colonel by the arm, "the negroes are here, and will take charge of the
+dead."
+
+"No, no!" he replied, rising, and looking around, as if aroused from a
+troubled dream; "that is for _me_ to do!" Then he added, after a
+moment's pause, "Will you help me to get them into the wagon?"
+
+"Yes, I will, certainly."
+
+He made one step toward the body of the dead girl, then sinking down
+again on the barrel, covered his face with his hands, and cried out: "My
+God! this is terrible! Did you ever see such a look as that? It will
+haunt me forever!"
+
+"Come, my friend, rouse yourself--this is weakness; you are tired with
+the long ride and excitement of the past few days. Come, go home--I will
+look after them."
+
+"No, no! I must do it. I will be a man again;" and he rose and walked
+steadily to the dead bodies. "Is there any one here to help?" he asked.
+
+Jim was standing in the door-way, and I motioned to him to come forward.
+The great tears were streaming down his face as he stepped timidly
+towards his master, and said: "I'll do dis, massa, don't you trubble
+yerself no more."
+
+"It's good of you, Jim. You'll forgive me for being so cruel to you,
+wont you?" said the Colonel, taking the black by the hand.
+
+"Forgib ye, massa! _I_ war all ter blame--but ye'll forgib me,
+massa--ye'll forgib me!" cried the black, with strong emotion.
+
+"Yes, yes; but say no more about it. Come, let us get Julie home."
+
+But the poor girl was already _home_--home where her sufferings and her
+sorrows were over, and all her tears were wiped away forever!
+
+We four bore away the mother and the child. A number of blankets were in
+the bottom of the wagon, and we laid the bodies carefully upon them.
+When all seemed ready, the Colonel, who was still standing by the side
+of the dead, turned to my new friend, and said: "Barnes, will you loan
+me a pillow? I will send it back to-night."
+
+"Sartin, Cunnel;" and the farmer soon brought one from the house.
+Lifting tenderly the head of the drowned girl, the Colonel placed it
+beneath her, and smoothing back her tangled hair, he gently covered her
+face with his handkerchief, as if she could still feel his kindness, or
+longer cared for the pity or the love of mortal. Yet, who knows but that
+her parted soul, from the high realm to which it had soared, may not
+then have looked down, have seen that act, and have forgiven him!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE SMALL PLANTER.
+
+
+In the first moments of grief the sympathy of friends, and the words of
+consolation bring no relief. How much more harshly do such words grate
+on the ear when the soul is bowed down by remorse and unavailing regret!
+Then the wounded spirit finds peace nowhere but with God.
+
+I saw that the Colonel would be alone, and turning to him, as he
+prepared to follow the strange vehicle, which, with its load of death,
+was already jolting its way over the rough forest road, I said,
+
+"Will you pardon me, if I remain with your friend here for awhile? I
+will be at the mansion before dark."
+
+"Oh, certainly, my friend, come when you feel disposed," he replied, and
+mounting his horse he was soon out of sight among the trees.
+
+"Now, Barnes," I said, shaking off the gloomy feelings that had
+oppressed me: "come, I must see that wife of yours, and get a glimpse of
+how you live?"
+
+"Sartin, stranger; come in; I'll give ye th' tallest dinner my 'oman can
+scare up, an' she's sum pumkins in th' cookin' line;" and he led the way
+to the farm-house.
+
+As I turned to follow, I slipped a half-dollar into the hand of the
+darky who was holding my horse, and asked him to put her again into the
+stable.
+
+"I'll do dat, sar, but I karn't take dis; masaa doant 'low it nohow;" he
+replied, tendering me back the money.
+
+"Barnes, your negroes have strange ways; I never met one before who'd
+refuse money."
+
+"Wal, stranger, 'taint hosspetality to take money on yer friends, and
+Bill gets all he wants from me."
+
+I took the silver and gave it to the first darky I met, who happened to
+be an old centenarian belonging to the Colonel. As I tossed it to him,
+he grinned out: "Ah, massa, I'll git sum 'backer wid dis; 'pears like I
+hadn't nary a chaw in forty yar." With more than one leg in the grave
+the old negro had not lost his appetite for the weed--in fact, that and
+whiskey are the only "luxuries" ever known to the plantation black.
+
+As we went nearer, I took a closer survey of the farm-house. It was, as
+I have said, a low, unpainted wooden building, located in the middle of
+a ten acre lot. It was approached by a straight walk, paved with a
+mixture of sand and tar, similar to that which the reader may have seen
+in the Champs Elysees. I do not know whether my back-woods friend, or
+the Parisian pavior, was the first inventor of this composition, but I
+am satisfied the corn-cracker had not stolen it from the stone-cracker.
+The walk was lined with fruit-bearing shrubs, and directly in front of
+the house, were two small flower-beds.
+
+The dwelling itself, though of a dingy brown wood-color, was neat and
+inviting. It may have been forty feet square on the ground, and was only
+a story and a half high, but a projecting roof, and a front
+dormer-window, relieved it from the appearance of disproportion. Its
+gable ends were surmounted by two enormous brick chimneys, carried up on
+the outside, in the fashion of the South, and its high, broad windows
+were ornamented with Venetian blinds. Its front door opened directly
+into the "living-room," and at the threshold we met its mistress.
+
+As the image of that lady has still a warm place in a pleasant corner of
+my memory, I will describe her. She was about thirty years of age, and
+had a fresh, cheerful face. To say that she was handsome, would not be
+strictly true; though she had that pleasant, gentle, kindly expression
+that sometimes makes even a homely person seem beautiful. But she was
+not homely. Her features were regular, her hair, glossy and brown, and
+her eyes, black and brilliant, and, for their color, the mildest and
+softest I had ever seen. Her figure was tall, and in its outline
+somewhat sharp and angular, but she had an ease and grace about her that
+made one forget she was not moulded as softly and roundly as others. She
+seemed just the woman on whose bosom a tired, worn, over-burdened man
+might lay his weary head, and find rest and forgetfulness.
+
+She wore a neat calico dress, fitting closely to the neck, and an apron
+of spotless white muslin. A little lace cap perched cosily on the back
+of her head, hiding a portion of her wavy, dark hair, and on her feet--a
+miracle, reader, in one of her class--were stockings and shoes! Giving
+me her hand--which, at the risk of making her husband jealous, I held
+for a moment--she said, making a gentle courtesy:
+
+"Ye ar welcome, stranger."
+
+"I sincerely thank you, madam; I _am_ a stranger in these parts."
+
+She tendered me a chair, while her husband opened a sideboard, and
+brought forth a box of Havanas, and a decanter of Scuppernong. As I took
+the proffered seat, he offered me the refreshments. I drank the lady's
+health in the wine, but declined the cigars. Seeing this, she remarked:
+
+"Yer from th' North, sir; arn't ye?"
+
+"Yes, madam, I live in New York, but I was born in New-England."
+
+"I reckoned so; I knew ye didn't belong in Car'lina."
+
+"How did you know that, madam?" I asked, laughing.
+
+"I seed ye doan't smoke 'fore wimmin. But ye musn't mind me; I sort o'
+likes it; its a great comfut to John, and may be it ar to ye."
+
+"Well, I do relish a good cigar, but I never smoke before any lady
+except my wife, and though she's only 'a little lower than the angels,'
+she _does_, once in awhile, say it's a shame to make the _house_ smell
+like a tobacco factory."
+
+Barnes handed me the box again, and I took one. As I was lighting it, he
+said:
+
+"Ye've got a good 'oman, hev ye?"
+
+"There's none better; at least, I think so."
+
+"Wal, I'm 'zactly uv thet 'pinion 'bout mine: I wouldn't trade her fur
+all this worle, an' th' best half uv 'tother."
+
+"Don't ye talk so, John," said the lady; then addressing me, she added:
+"It's a good husband thet makes a good wife, sir."
+
+"Sometimes, madam, but not always. I've known some of the best of wives
+who had miserable husbands."
+
+"An' I'm d----d ef I made my wife th' 'oman she ar'," said the
+corn-cracker.
+
+"Hush, John; ye musn't sw'ar so; ye knows how often ye've said ye
+wouldn't."
+
+"Wal, I du, an' I wont agin, by ----. But Sukey, whar's th' young 'uns?"
+
+"Out in the lot, I reckon; but ye musn't holler'm in--they'r all dirt."
+
+"No matter for that, madam," I said; "dirt is healthy for little ones;
+rolling in the mud makes them grow."
+
+"Then our'n orter grow right smart, fur they'r in it allers."
+
+"How many have you, madam?"
+
+"Two; a little boy, four, and a little gal, six."
+
+"They're of interesting ages."
+
+"Yas, the' is int'restin'; ev'ry 'uns own chil'ren is smart; but the'
+does know a heap. John was off ter Charl'ston no great while back, an'
+the little boy used ter pray ev'ry mornin' an' ev'nin' fur his fader ter
+cum hum. I larned 'em thet jest so soon as the' talked, 'cause thar's no
+tellin' how quick the' moight be tooken 'way. Wal, the little feller
+prayed ev'ry mornin' an' ev'nin' fur his fader ter cum back; an' John
+didn't cum; so finarly he got sort o' provoked with th' Lord; an' he
+said God war aither deaf, an' couldn't har, or he war naughty, an'
+wouldn't tell fader thet little Johnny wanted to seed 'im 'werry
+mooch'"--and here the good lady laughed pleasantly, and I joined in most
+heartily.
+
+Blessed are the children that have such a mother.
+
+Soon the husband returned with the little girl and boy, and four young
+ebonies, all bare-headed, and dressed alike, in thick trousers, and a
+loose linsey shirt. Among them was my new acquaintance, "Dandy Jim, of
+ole Car'lina."
+
+The little girl came to me, and soon I had two white children on one
+knee, and two black on the other, and Dandy Jim between my legs, playing
+with my watch-chain. The family made no distinction between the colors,
+and as the children were all equally clean I did not see why _I_ should
+do so.
+
+The lady renewed the conversation by remarking; "P'raps ye reckon it's
+quar, sir, that we 'low our'n to 'sociate 'long with th' black chil'ren;
+but we karn't help it. On big plantations it works sorry bad, fur th'
+white young 'ons larn all manner of evil from the black 'uns; but I've
+laboored ter teach our'n so one wont do no harm ter 'tother."
+
+"I suppose, madam, that is one of the greatest evils of slavery. The low
+black poisons the mind of the white child, and the bad influence lasts
+through life."
+
+"Yas, it's so, stranger; an' it's the biggest keer I hev. It often
+'pears strange ter me thet our grow'd up men arn't no wuss then the'
+is."
+
+In those few words that unlettered woman had said, what would--if men
+were but wise enough to hear and heed the great truth which she
+spoke--banish slavery from this continent forever!
+
+After awhile the farmer told the juvenile delineator of Mrs. Hemans, and
+the other poets, to give us a song; and planting himself in the middle
+of the floor, the little darky sang "Dixie," and several other negro
+songs, which his master had taught him, but into which he had introduced
+some amusing variations of his own. The other children joined in the
+choruses; and then Jim danced breakdowns, "walk-along-Joes," and other
+darky dances, his master accompanying him on a cracked fiddle, till my
+sides were sore with laughter, and the hostess begged them to stop.
+Finally the clock struck twelve, and the farmer, going to the door, gave
+a long, loud blast on a cow's horn. In about five minutes one after
+another of the field hands came in, till the whole ten had seated
+themselves on the verandah. Each carried a bowl, a tin-cup, or a gourd,
+into which my host--who soon emerged from a back room[J] with a pail of
+whiskey in his hand--poured a gill of the beverage. This was the day's
+allowance, and the farmer, in answer to a question of mine, told me he
+thought negroes were healthier, and worked better for a small quantity
+of alcohol daily. "The' work hard, and salt feed doant set 'em up
+'nough," was his remark.
+
+Meanwhile the hostess busied herself with preparations for dinner, and
+it was soon spread on a bright cherry table, covered by a spotless white
+cloth. The little darkies had scattered to the several cabins, and we
+soon sat down to as good a meal as I ever ate at the South.
+
+We were waited on by a tidy negro woman, neatly clad in a calico gown,
+with shoes on her feet, and a flaming red and yellow 'kerchief on her
+head. This last was worn in the form of a turban, and one end escaping
+from behind, and hanging down her back, it looked for all the world like
+a flag hung out from a top turret. Observing it, my host said:
+
+"Aggy--showin' yer colors? Ye'r Union gal--hey?"
+
+"Yas, I is dat, massa; Union ter de back bone;" responded the negress,
+grinning widely.
+
+"All th' Union _ye_ knows on," replied the master, winking slyly at me,
+"is th' union yer goin' ter hitch up 'long with black Cale over ter
+Squire Taylor's."
+
+"No, 'taint, massa; takes more'n tu ter make de Union."
+
+"Yas, I knows--it gin'rally takes ten or a dozen: reckon it'll take a
+dozen with ye."
+
+"John, ye musn't talk so ter th' sarvents; it spiles 'em," said his
+wife.
+
+"No it doant--do it, Aggy?"
+
+"Lor', missus, I doant keer what massa say; but I doant leff no oder man
+run on so ter me!"
+
+"No more'n ye doant, gal! only Cale."
+
+"Nor him, massa; I makes him stan' roun' _I_ reckon."
+
+"I reckon ye du; ye wudn't be yer massa's gal ef ye didn't."
+
+When the meal was over, I visited, with my host, the negro houses. The
+hour allowed for dinner[K] was about expiring, and the darkies were
+preparing to return to the field. Entering one of the cabins, where were
+two stout negro men and a woman, my host said to them, with a perfectly
+serious face:
+
+"Har, boys, I've fotched ye a live Yankee ab'lishener; now, luk at 'im
+all roun'. Did ye ever see sech a critter?"
+
+"Doant see nuffin' quar in dat gemman, massa," replied one of the
+blacks. "Him 'pears like bery nice gemman; doant 'pear like
+ab'lishener;" and he laughed, and scraped his head in the manner
+peculiar to the negro, as he added: "kinder reckon he wudn't be har ef
+he war one of _dem_."
+
+"What der _ye_ knows 'bout th' ab'lisheners? Ye never seed one--what
+d'ye 'spose the' luk like?"
+
+"Dey say dey luk likes de bery ole debil, massa, but reckon taint so."
+
+"Wal, the' doant; the' luk wusa then thet: they'm bottled up thunder an'
+lightnin', an' ef the' cum down har, they'll chaw ye all ter hash."
+
+"I reckon!" replied the darky, manipulating his wool, and distending his
+face into a decidedly incredulous grin.
+
+"What do you tell them such things for?" I asked, good-humoredly.
+
+"Lor, bless ye, stranger, the' knows th' ab'lisheners ar thar friends,
+jest so well as ye du; and so fur as thet goes, d----d ef the' doan't
+know I'm one on 'em myseff, fur I tells 'em, ef the' want to put, the'
+kin put, an' I'll throw thar trav'lin 'spences inter th' bargin. Doan't
+I tell ye thet, Lazarus."
+
+"Yas, massa, but none ob massa's nigs am gwine ter put--lesswise, not so
+long as you an' de good missus, am 'bove groun'."
+
+The darky's name struck me as peculiar, and I asked him where he got it.
+
+"_'Tain't_ my name, sar; but you see, sar, w'en massa fuss hire me ob
+ole Capt'in ----, up dar ter Newbern-way, I war sort o' sorry
+like--hadn't no bery good cloes--an' massa, he den call me Lazarus,
+'case he say I war all ober rags and holes, an' it hab sort o' stuck ter
+me eber sense. I war a'mighty bad off 'fore dat, but w'en I cum down har
+I gets inter Abr'am's buzzum, I does;" and here the darky actually
+reeled on his seat with laughter.
+
+"Is this woman your wife?" I asked.
+
+"No, sar; my wife 'longs to Cunnel J----; dat am my new wife--my ole
+wife am up dar whar I cum from!"
+
+"What! have you two wives?"
+
+"Yas, massa, I'se two."
+
+"But that's contrary to Scripture."
+
+"No, sar; de Cunnel say 'tain't. He say in Scriptur' dey hab a heap ob'
+'em, and dat niggers kin hab jess so many as dey likes--a hun'red ef dey
+want ter."
+
+"Does the Colonel teach that to his negroes?" I asked, turning to the
+native.
+
+"Yas, I reckon he do--an' sits 'em th' 'zample, too," he replied,
+laughing; "but th' old sinner knows better'n thet; he kin read."
+
+"Do you find that in the Bible, Lazarus?"
+
+"Yas, massa; whar I reads it. Dat's whar it tell 'bout David and Sol'mon
+and all dem--dey hab a heap ob wives. A pore ole darky karn't hab
+'nuffin 'sides dem, an' he _orter_ be 'low'd jess so many as he likes."
+
+Laughing at the reasoning of the negro, I asked:
+
+"How would _you_ like it, if your wife over at Colonel J----'s, had as
+many husbands as _she_ liked?"
+
+"Wal, I couldn't fine no fault, massa: an' I s'pose she do; dough I
+doan't knows it, 'case I'se dar only Sundays."
+
+"Have you any children?"
+
+"Yas, sar; I'se free 'longin' ter de Cunnel, an' four or five--I doant
+'zactly know--up ter hum; but _dey'se_ grow'd up."
+
+"Is your wife, up there, married again?"
+
+"Yas, massa, she got anoder man jess w'en I cum 'way; har ole massa make
+har do it."
+
+We then left the cabin, and when out of hearing of the blacks, I said to
+the corn-cracker: "That _may be_ Scripture doctrine, but _I_ have not
+been taught so!"
+
+"Scriptur or no Scriptur, stranger, it's d----d heathenism," replied
+the farmer, who, take him all in all, is a superior specimen of the
+class of small-planters at the South; and yet, seeing polygamy practised
+by his own slaves, he made no effort to prevent it. He told me that if
+he should object to his darky cohabiting with the Colonel's negress, it
+would be regarded as unneighborly, and secure him the enmity of the
+whole district! And still we are told that slavery is a _Divine_
+institution!
+
+After this, we strolled off into the woods, where the hands were at
+work. They were all stout, healthy and happy-looking, and in answer to
+my comments on their appearance, the native said that the negroes on the
+turpentine farms are always stronger and longer-lived, than those on the
+rice and cotton-fields. Unless carried off by the fevers incident to the
+climate, they generally reach a good old age, while the rice-negro
+seldom lives to be over forty, and the cotton-slave very rarely attains
+sixty. Cotton-growing, however, my host thought, is not, in itself, much
+more unhealthy than turpentine-gathering, though cotton-hands work in
+the sun, while the turpentine slaves labor altogether in the shade.
+"But," he said, "the' work 'em harder nor we does, an' doan't feed 'em
+so well. We give our'n meat and whiskey ev'ry day, but them articles is
+skarse 'mong th' cotton blacks, an' th' rice niggers never get 'em
+excep' ter Chris'mas time, an' thet cums but onst a yar."
+
+"Do you think the white could labor as well as the black, on the rice
+and cotton-fields?" I asked.
+
+"Yas, an' better--better onywhar; but, in coorse, 'tain't natur' fur
+black nor white ter stand long a workin' in th' mud and water up ter
+thar knees; sech work wud kill off th' very devil arter a while. But th'
+white kin stand it longer nor the black, and its' 'cordin' ter reason
+that he shud; fur, I reckon, stranger, that the sperit and pluck uv a
+man hev a durned sight ter du with work. They'll hole a man up when he's
+clean down, an' how kin we expec' thet the pore nig', who's nary a thing
+ter work fur, an' who's been kept under an' 'bused ever sense Adam was a
+young un'--how kin we expec' he'll work like men thet own 'emselfs, an'
+whose faders hev been free ever sense creation? I reckon that the
+parient has a heap ter du with makin' th' chile. He puts the sperit
+inter 'im: doan't we see it in hosses an' critters an' sech like? It
+mayn't crap eout ter onst, but it's shore ter in th' long run, and
+thet's th' why th' black hain't no smarter nor he is. He's been a-ground
+down an' kept under fur so long thet it'll take more'n 'un gin'ration
+ter bring him up. 'Tain't his fault thet he's no more sperit, an'
+p'raps 'tain't ourn--thet is, them on us as uses 'em right--but it war
+the fault uv yer fader an' mine--yer fader stole 'em, and mine bought
+'em, an' the' both made cattle uv 'em."
+
+"But I had supposed the black was better fitted by nature for hard
+labor, in a hot climate, than the white?"
+
+"Wal, he arn't, an' I knows it. Th' d----d parsons an' pol'tishuns say
+thet, but 'tain't so. I kin do half agin more work in a day then th'
+best nig' I've got, an' I've dun it, tu, time an' agin, an' it didn't
+hurt me nuther. Ye knows ef a man hev a wife and young 'uns 'pendin' on
+him, an' arn't much 'forehanded, he'll work like th' devil. I've dun it,
+and ye hev ef ye war ever put ter it; but th' nig's, why the' hain't got
+no wives and young 'uns ter work fur--the law doan't 'low 'em ter hev
+any--the' hain't nary a thing but thar carcasses, an' them's thar
+masters'."
+
+"You say a man works better for being free; then you must think 'twould
+be well to free the negroes?"
+
+"In coorse, I does. Jest luk at them nig's o' mine; they're ter all
+'tents an' purposes free, 'case I use 'em like men, an' the' knows the'
+kin go whenever the' d----d please. See how the' work--why, one on 'em
+does half as much agin as ony hard-driv' nigger in creation."
+
+"What would you do with them, if they were _really_ free?"
+
+"Du with 'em? why, hire 'em, an' make twice as much eout on 'em as I
+does now."
+
+"But I don't think the two races were meant to live together."
+
+"No more'n the' warn't. But 'tain't thar fault thet they's har. We
+hain't no right ter send 'em off. We orter stand by our'n an' our
+faders' doin's. The nig' keers more fur his hum, so durned pore as it
+ar', then ye or I does fur our'n. I'd pack sech off ter Libraria or th'
+devil, as wanted ter go, but I'd hev no 'pulsion 'bout it."
+
+"Why, my good friend, you're half-brother to Garrison. You don't talk to
+your neighbors in this way?"
+
+"Wal; I doan't;" he replied, laughing. "Ef I dun it, they'd treat me to
+a coat uv tar, and ride me out uv th' deestrict raather sudden, I
+reckon; but yer a Nuthener, an' the' all take nat'rally ter freedum,
+excep' th' d----d dough-faces, an' ye aren't one on 'em, I'll swar."
+
+"Well, I'm not. Do many of your neighbors think as you do?"
+
+"Reckon not many round har; but op in Cart'ret, whar I cum from, heaps
+on 'em do, though the' darn't say so."
+
+By this time we had reached the still, and, directing his attention to
+the enormous quantity of rosin that had been run into the pit which I
+have spoken of, I asked him why he threw so much valuable material away.
+
+"Wal, 'tain't wuth nothin' har. Thet's th' common, an' it won't bring in
+York, now, more'n a dollar forty-five. It costs a dollar an' two bits
+ter get it thar, and pay fur sellin' on it, an' th' barr'l's wuth th'
+diff'rence. I doan't ship nuthin wuss nor No. 2."
+
+"What is No. 2?"
+
+He took the head from one of the barrels, and with an adze cut out a
+small piece, then handing me the specimen, replied:
+
+"Now hole thet up ter th' sun. Ye'll see though its yaller, it's clean
+and clar. Thet's good No. 2, what brings now two dollars and two bits,
+in York, an' pays me 'bout a dollar a barr'l, its got eout o' second yar
+dip, an' as it comes eout uv th' still, is run through thet ar
+strainer," pointing to a coarse wire seive that lay near. "Th' common
+rosum, thet th' still's runnin' on now, is made eout on th' yaller
+dip--thet's th' kine o' turpentine thet runs from th' tree arter two
+yars' tappin'--we call it yallar dip ca'se it's allers dark. We doant
+strain common 't all, an' it's full uv chips and dirt. It's low now, but
+ef it shud ever git up, I'd tap thet ar' heap, barr'l it up, run a
+little fresh stilled inter it, an' 'twould be a'most so good as new."
+
+"Then it is injured by being in the ground."
+
+"Not much; it's jest as good fur ev'rything but makin' ile, puttin it in
+the 'arth sort o' takes th' sap eout on it, an' th' sap's th' ile.
+Natur' sucks thet eout, I s'pose, ter make th' trees grow--I expec' my
+bones 'ill fodder 'em one on these days."
+
+"Rosin is put to very many uses?"
+
+"Yes, but common's used mainly for ile and soap, th' Yankees put it
+inter hard yaller soap, 'case it makes it weigh, an' yer folks is up
+ter them doin's," and he looked at me and gave a sly laugh. I could not
+deny the "hard" impeachment, and said nothing. Taking a specimen of very
+clear light-colored rosin from a shelf in the still-house, I asked him
+what that quality was worth.
+
+"Thet ar brought seven dollars, for two hundred an' eighty pounds, in
+York, airly this yar. It's th' very best No. 1; an' its hard ter make,
+'case ef th' still gets overhet it turns it a tinge. Thet sort is run
+through two sieves, the coarse 'un, an' thet ar," pointing to another
+wire strainer, the meshes of which were as fine as those of the flour
+sieve used by housewives.
+
+"Do your seven field hands produce enough 'dip' to keep your still a
+running?"
+
+"No, I buys th' rest uv my naboors who haint no stills; an' th' Cunnel's
+down on me 'case I pay 'em more'n he will; but I go on Franklin's
+princerpel: 'a nimble sixpence's better'n a slow shillin.' A great ole
+feller thet, warn't he? I've got his life."
+
+"And you practice on his precepts; that's the reason you've got on so
+well."
+
+"Yas, thet, an' hard knocks. The best o' doctrin's am't wuth a d----n
+ef ye doan't work on 'em."
+
+"That is true."
+
+We shortly afterward went to the house, and there I passed several hours
+in conversation with my new friend and his excellent wife. The lady,
+after a while, showed me over the building. It was well-built,
+well-arranged, and had many conveniences I did not expect to find in a
+back-woods dwelling. She told me its timbers and covering were of
+well-seasoned yellow pine--which will last for centuries--and that it
+was built by a Yankee carpenter, whom they had "'ported" from
+Charleston, paying his fare, and giving him his living, and two dollars
+and a half a day. It had cost as near as she "cud reckon, 'bout two
+thousan' dollars."
+
+It was five o'clock, when, shaking them warmly by the hand, I bade my
+pleasant friends "good-bye," and mounting my horse rode off to the
+Colonel's.
+
+[Footnote J: The whiskey was kept in a back room, above ground, because the
+dwelling had no cellar. The fluid was kept safely, under lock and key,
+and the farmer accounted for that, by saying that his negroes would
+steal nothing but whiskey. Few country houses at the South have a
+cellar--that apartment deemed so essential by Northern housekeepers. The
+intervening space between the ground and the floor is there left open,
+to allow of a free circulation of air.]
+
+[Footnote K: No regular dinner-hour is allowed the blacks on most
+turpentine plantations. Their food is usually either taken with them to
+the woods, or carried there by house servants, at stated times.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE BURIAL OF "JULE."
+
+
+The family were at supper when I returned to the mansion, and, entering
+the room, I took my accustomed place at the table. None present seemed
+disposed to conversation. The little that was said was spoken in a low,
+subdued tone, and no allusion was made to the startling event of the
+day. At last the octoroon woman asked me if I had met Mrs. Barnes at the
+farmer's.
+
+"Yes," I replied, "and I was greatly pleased with her. She seems one of
+those rare women who would lend grace to even the lowest station."
+
+"She _is_ a rare woman; a true, sincere Christian. Every one loves her;
+but few know all her worth; only those do who have gone to her in sorrow
+and trial, as--" and her voice trembled, and her eyes moistened--"as I
+have."
+
+And so that poor, outcast, despised, dishonored woman, scorned and
+cast-off by all the world, had found one sympathizing, pitying friend.
+Truly, "He tempers the wind to the shorn lamb."
+
+When the meal was over, all but Madam P---- retired to the library.
+Tommy and I fell to reading, but the Colonel shortly rose and continued
+pacing up and down the apartment till the clock sounded eight. The lady
+then entered, and said to him.
+
+"The negroes are ready, David; will _you_ go, Mr. K----?"
+
+"I think not, madam," I replied; "at least not now."
+
+I continued reading, for a time, when, tiring of the book, I laid it
+down, and followed them to the little burial-ground.
+
+The grave of Sam was open, and the plantation blacks were gathered
+around it. In the centre of the group, and at the head of the rude
+coffin, the Colonel was seated, and near him the octoroon woman and her
+son. The old preacher was speaking.
+
+"My chil'ren," he said: "she hab gone ter Him, wid har chile: gone up
+dar, whar dey doan't sorrer no more, whar dey doan't weep no more, whar
+all tears am wiped from dar eyes foreber. I knows she lay han's on
+harseff, and dat, my chil'ren, am whot none ob us shud do, 'case we'm de
+Lord's; He put us har, an' he'll take us 'way when we's fru wid our
+work, not afore. We hab no right ter gwo afore. Pore Juley did--but
+p'raps she cudn't help it. P'raps de great sorrer war so big in har
+heart, dat she cudn't fine rest nowhar but in de cole, dark riber.
+P'raps she warn't ter blame--p'raps," and here his eyes filled: "p'raps
+ole Pomp war all ter blame, for I tole har, my chil'ren"--he could say
+no more, and sinking down on a rude seat, he covered his face, and
+sobbed audibly. Even the Colonel's strong frame heaved with emotion, and
+not a dry eye was near. After a time the old man rose again, and with
+streaming eyes, and upturned face, continued:
+
+"Dars One up dar, my chil'ren, dat say: 'Come unter Me, all ye dat am a
+weary an' a heaby laden, an' I will gib you ress.' He, de good Lord, He
+say dat; and p'raps Juley hard Him say it, an' dat make har gwo." Again
+his voice failed, and he sank down, weeping and moaning as if his heart
+would break.
+
+A pause followed, when the Colonel rose, and aided by Jim and two other
+blacks, with his own hands nailed down the lid, and lowered the rude
+coffin into the ground. Then the earth was thrown upon it, and then the
+long, low chant which the negroes raise over the dead, mingling now with
+sobs and moans, and breaking into a strange wild wail, went up among the
+pines, and floating off on the still night air, echoed through the dark
+woods, till it sounded like music from the grave. I have been in the
+chamber of the dying; I have seen the young and the beautiful laid away
+in the earth; but I never felt the solemn awfulness of death, as I did,
+when, in the stillness and darkness of night, I listened to the wild
+grief of that negro group, and saw the bodies of that slave mother and
+her child, lowered to their everlasting rest by the side of Sam.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+HOMEWARD.
+
+
+The morning broke bright and mellow with the rays of the winter sun,
+which in Carolina lends the warmth of October to the chills of January,
+when, with my portmanteau strapped, and my thin overcoat on my arm, I
+gave my last "God bless you" to the octoroon woman, and turned my face
+toward home.
+
+Jim shouted "all ready," the driver cracked his whip, and we were on our
+way to Georgetown.
+
+The recent rains had hardened the roads, the bridges were repaired, and
+we were whirled rapidly forward, and, at one o'clock, reached
+Bucksville. There we met a cordial welcome, and remained to dinner. Our
+host pressed us to pass the night at his house, but the Colonel had
+business with one of his secession friends residing down the road--my
+wayside acquaintance, Colonel A----, and desired to stay overnight with
+him. At three o'clock, bidding a kindly farewell to Captain B---- and his
+excellent family, we were again on our way.
+
+The sun was just sinking among the western pines, when we turned into a
+broad avenue, lined with stately old trees, and rode up to the door-way
+of the rice-planter. It was a large, square, dingy old house, seated on
+a gentle knoll, a short half-mile from the river, along whose banks
+stretched the rice-fields. We entered, and were soon welcomed by its
+proprietor.
+
+He received my friend warmly, and gave me a courteous greeting,
+remarking, when I mentioned that I was homeward bound, that it was wise
+to go. "Things are very unsettled; there's no telling what a day may
+bring forth; feeling is running very high, and a Northern man, whatever
+his principles, is not safe here. By-the-way," he added, "did you not
+meet with some little obstruction at Conwayboro', on your way up?"
+
+"Yes, I did; a person there ordered me back, but when things began to
+look serious, Scipio, the negro whom you saw with me, got me out of the
+hobble."
+
+"Didn't he tell the gentleman that you were a particular friend of mine,
+and had met me by appointment at Captain B----'s?" he asked, smiling.
+
+"I believe he did, sir; but I assure you, _I_ said nothing of the kind,
+and I think the black should not be blamed, under the circumstances."
+
+"Oh, no; I don't blame him. I think he did a smart thing. He might have
+said you were my grandmother, if it would have served you, for that low
+fellow is as fractious as the devil, and dead sure on the trigger."
+
+"You are very good, sir," I replied: "how did you hear of it?"
+
+"A day or two afterward, B---- passed here on his way to Georgetown. I
+had been riding out, and happened to be at the head of my avenue when
+he was going by. He stopped, and asked if I knew you. Not knowing, then,
+the circumstances, I said that I had met you casually at Bucksville, but
+had no particular acquaintance with you. He rode on, saying nothing
+further. The next morning, I had occasion to go to Georgetown, and at
+Mr. Fraser's office, accidentally heard that Scip--who is well-known and
+universally liked there--was to have a public whipping that evening.
+Something prompted me to inquire into it, and I was told that he had
+been charged by B---- with shielding a well-known abolitionist at
+Conwayboro'--a man who was going through the up-country, distributing
+such damnable publications as the New York _Independent_ and _Tribune_.
+I knew, of course, it referred to you, and that it wasn't true. I went
+to Scip and got the facts, and by stretching the truth a little, finally
+got him off. There was a slight discrepancy between my two accounts of
+you" (and here he laughed heartily), "and B----, when we were before the
+Justice, remarked on it, and came d----d near calling me a liar. It was
+lucky he didn't, for if he had, he'd have gone to h--l before the place
+was hot enough for him."
+
+"I cannot tell you, my dear sir, how grateful I am to you for this. It
+would have pained me more than I can express, if Scip had suffered for
+doing a disinterested kindness to me."
+
+Early in the morning we were again on our way, and twelve o'clock found
+us seated at a dinner of bacon, corn-bread, and waffles, in the "first
+hotel" of Georgetown. The Charleston boat was to leave at three o'clock;
+and, as soon as dinner was over, I sallied out to find Scip. After a
+half-hour's search I found him on "Shackelford's wharf," engaged in
+loading a schooner bound for New York with a cargo of cotton and
+turpentine.
+
+He was delighted to see me, and when I had told him I was going home,
+and might never see him again, I took his hand warmly in mine, and said:
+
+"Scip, I have heard of the disgrace that was near being put upon you on
+my account, and I feel deeply the disinterested service you did to me;
+now, I _can not_ go away without doing _something_ for you--showing you
+in _some_ way that I appreciate and _like_ you."
+
+"I like's _you_, massa," he replied, the tears coming to his eyes: "I
+tuk ter you de bery fuss day I seed you, 'case, I s'pose," and he wrung
+my hand till it ached: "you pitied de pore brack man. But you karnt do
+nuffin fur _me_, massa; I doant want nuffin; I doant want ter leab har,
+'case de Lord dat put me har, arn't willin' I shud gwo. But you kin do
+suffin, massa, fur de pore brack man,--an' dat'll be doin' it fur _me_,
+'case my heart am all in dat. You kin tell dem folks up dar, whar you
+lib, massa, dat we'm not like de brutes, as dey tink we is. Dat we's got
+souls, an' telligence, an' feelin's, an' am men like demselfs. You kin
+tell 'em, too, massa,--'case you's edication, and kin talk--how de pore
+wite man 'am kep' down har; how he'm ragged, an' starvin', an' ob no
+account, 'case de brack man am a slave. How der chil'ren can't get no
+schulein', how eben de grow'd up ones doan't know nuffin--not eben so
+much as de pore brack slave, 'case de 'stockracy wan't dar votes, an
+cudn't get 'em ef dey 'low'd 'em larning. Ef your folks know'd all de
+trufh--ef dey know'd how both de brack an' de pore w'ite man, am on de
+groun', and can't git up, ob demselfs--dey'd do _suffin'_--dey'd break
+de Constertution--dey'd do suffin' ter help us. I doant want no one
+hurted, I doant want no one wronged; but jess tink ob it, massa, four
+million ob bracks, and nigh so many pore wites, wid de bressed gospil
+shinin' down on 'em, an' dey not knowin' on it. All dem--ebry one of
+'em--made in de image ob de great God, an' dey driven roun', an' 'bused
+wuss dan de brutes. You's seed dis, massa, wid your own eyes, an' you
+kin tell 'em on it; an' you _will_ tell 'em on it, massa;" and again he
+took my hand while the tears rolled down his cheeks; "an' Scip will
+bress you fur it, massa; wid his bery lass breaf he'll bress you; an' de
+good Lord will bress you, too, massa; He will foreber bress you, for
+He'm on de side ob de pore, an' de 'flicted: His own book say dat, an'
+it am true, I knows it, fur I feels it _har_;" and he laid his hand on
+his heart, and was silent.
+
+I could not speak for a moment. When I mastered my feelings, I said, "I
+_will_ do it Scip; as God gives me strength, I _will_."
+
+Reader, I am keeping my word.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+
+This is not a work of fiction. It is a record of facts, and therefore
+the reader will not expect me to dispose of its various characters on
+artistic principles--that is, lay them away in one of those final
+receptacles for the creations of the romancer--the grave and matrimony.
+Death has been among them, but nearly all are yet doing their work in
+this breathing, busy world.
+
+The characters I have introduced are real. They are not drawn with the
+pencil of fancy, nor, I trust, colored with the tints of prejudice. The
+scenes I have described are true. I have taken some liberties with the
+names of persons and places, and, in a few instances, altered dates; but
+the events themselves occurred under my own observation. No one
+acquainted with the section of country I have described, or familiar
+with the characters I have delineated, will question this statement.
+Lest some one who has not seen the slave and the poor white man of the
+South, as he actually is, should deem my picture overdrawn, I will say
+that "the half has not been told!" If the whole were related--if the
+Southern system, in all its naked ugliness, were fully exposed--the
+truth would read like fiction, and the baldest relation of fact like
+the wildest dream, of romance.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The overseer was never taken. A letter which I received from Colonel
+J----, shortly prior to the stoppage of the mails, informed me that Moye
+had succeeded in crossing the mountains into Tennessee, where, in an
+interior town, he disposed of the horse, and then made his way by an
+inland route to the free states. The horse the Colonel had recovered,
+but the overseer he never expected to see. Moye is now, no doubt,
+somewhere in the North, and is probably at this present writing a
+zealous Union man, of somewhat the same "stripe" as the conductors of
+the New York _Herald_ and the Boston _Courier_.
+
+I have not heard directly from Scipio, but one day last July, after a
+long search, I found on one of the wharves of South Street, a coasting
+captain, who knew him well, and who had seen him the month previous at
+Georgetown. He was at that time pursuing his usual avocations, and was
+as much respected and trusted, as when I met him.
+
+A few days after the tidings of the fall of Sumter were received in New
+York, and when I had witnessed the spontaneous and universal uprising of
+the North, which followed that event, I dispatched letters to several of
+my Southern friends, giving them as near as I could an account of the
+true state of feeling here, and representing the utter madness of the
+course the South was pursuing. One of these letters went to my Union
+acquaintance whom I have called, in the preceding pages, "Andy Jones."
+
+He promptly replied, and a pretty regular correspondence ensued between
+us, which has continued, at intervals, even since the suspension of
+intercourse between the North and the South.
+
+Andy has stood firmly and nobly by the old flag. At the risk of every
+thing, he has boldly expressed his sentiments everywhere. With his life
+in his hand, and--a revolver in each of his breeches-pockets, he walked
+the streets of Wilmington when the secession fever was at its height,
+openly proclaiming his undying loyalty to the Union, and "no man dared
+gainsay him."
+
+But with all his patriotism, Andy keeps a bright eye on the "main
+chance." Like his brother, the Northern Yankee, whom he somewhat
+resembles and greatly admires, he never omits an opportunity of "turning
+an honest penny." In defiance of custom-house regulations, and of our
+strict blockade, he has carried on a more or less regular traffic with
+New York and Boston (_via_ Halifax and other neutral ports), ever since
+North Carolina seceded. His turpentine--while it was still his
+property--has been sold in the New York market, under the very eyes of
+the government officials--and, honest reader, _I_ have known of it.
+
+By various roundabout means, I have recently received letters from him.
+His last, dated in April, and brought to a neutral port by a shipmaster
+whom he implicitly trusts, has reached me since the previous chapters
+were written. It covers six pages of foolscap, and is written in
+defiance of all grammatical and orthographical principles; but as it
+conveys important intelligence, in regard to some of the persons
+mentioned in this narrative, I will transcribe a portion of it.
+
+It gave me the melancholy tidings of the death of Colonel J----. He had
+joined the Confederate army, and fell, bravely meeting a charge of the
+Massachusetts troops, at Roanoke.
+
+On receiving the news of his friend's death, Andy rode over to the
+plantation, and found Madam P---- plunged in the deepest grief. While he
+was there a letter arrived from Charleston, with intelligence of the
+dangerous illness of her son. This second blow crushed her. For several
+days she was delirious, and her life despaired of; but throughout the
+whole the noble corn-cracker, neglecting every thing, remained beside
+her.
+
+When she returned to herself, and had in a measure recovered her
+strength, she learned that the Colonel had left no will; that she was
+still a slave; and soon to be sold, with the rest of the Colonel's
+_personal property_, according to law.
+
+This is what Andy writes about the affair. I give the letter as he wrote
+it, merely correcting the punctuation, and enough of the spelling, to
+make it intelligible.
+
+"W'en I hard thet th' Cunel hadent leff no wil, I was hard put what ter
+dew; but arter thinkin' on it over a spell, I knowed shede har on it
+sumhow; so I 'cluded to tel har miseff. She tuk on d----d hard at
+fust, but arter a bit, grew more calm like, and then she sed it war
+God's wil, an' she wudent komplane. Ye nows I've got a wife, but wen the
+ma'am sed thet, she luk'd so like an angel, thet d----d eff I cud help
+puttin' my arms round har, an' hugin' on har, till she a'moste
+screeched. Wal, I toled har, Id stan' by har eff evrithing went ter
+h--l--an I wil, by ----.
+
+"I made up mi minde to onst, what ter dew. It war darned harde work tur
+bee'way from hum jess then, but I war in fur it; soe I put ter
+Charleston, ter see th' Cunel's 'oman. Wal, I seed har, an' I toled har
+how th' ma'am felte, an' how mutch shede dun at makein' th' Cunel's
+money--(she made nigh th' hul on it, 'case he war alers keerles, an' tuk
+no 'count uv things; eff tadent ben fur thet, hede made a wil,) an' I
+axed har ter see thet the ma'am had free papers ter onst. An' whot der
+ye 'spoze she sed? Nuthin, by ---- 'cept she dident no nuthin' 'bout
+bisniss, an' leff all uv sech things ter har loryer. Wal, then I went
+ter him--he ar one on them slick, ily, seceshun houn's, who'd sell thar
+soles fur a kountterfit dollar--an' he toled me, th' 'ministratur hadent
+sot yit, an' he cudent dew nuthin til he hed. Ses I: 'ye mean th'
+'ooman's got ter gwo ter th' hi'est bider?' 'Yas,' he sed, 'the Cunel's
+got dets, an' the've got ter bee pade, an' th' persoonel prop'ty muste
+bee sold ter dew it.' Then I sed, 'twud bee sum time fore thet war dun,
+an' the 'ooman's 'most ded an' uv no use now; 'what'll ye _hire_ har tur
+me fur.' He sed a hun'red for sicks months. I planked down the money
+ter onst, an' put off.
+
+"I war bilin' over, but it sumhow cum inter my hed thet the Cunnel's
+'ooman cudn't bee _all_ stun; so I gose thar agin; an' I toled har what
+the loryer sed, an' made a reg'lar stump-'peal tew har bettar natur. I
+axed har eff she'd leff the 'ooman who'd made har husban's fortun, who
+war the muther ov his chil'ren, who fur twenty yar, hed nussed him in
+sickness, an' cheered him in healtf; ef shede let _thet 'ooman_, bee
+auckyund off ter th' hi'est bider. I axed al thet, an' what der ye think
+she sed, Why jest this. '_I_ doant no nuthin' bout it, Mister Jones. Ye
+raily must talke ter mi loryer; them maters I leaves 'tirely ter him.'
+Then, I sed, I 'spozed the niggers war ter bee advertist. 'O, yas!' she
+sed, (an' ye see, she know'd a d----d site 'bout _thet_), 'all on 'em
+muss be solde, 'case, ye knows, I never did luv the kuntry,--'sides _I_
+cud'ent karry on the plantashun, no how.' Then, sed I: 'the Orlean's
+traders 'ill be thar--an' she wunt sell fur but one use, fur she's
+hansum yit; an' ma'am, ye wunt leff a 'ooman as white as you is, who fur
+twenty yar, hes ben a tru an' fatheful _wife_ tar yer own ded husban,'
+(I shudn't hev put thet in, but d----d ef I cud help it,) ye wunt put
+_har_ up on the block, an' hev har struck down ter the hi'est bider, ter
+bee made a d---- d---- on?'
+
+"Wal, I s'pose she hadent forgot thet, fur more'n twelve yar, the Cunnel
+hed _luv'd_ t'other 'ooman, an' onely _liked_ har; fur w'en I sed thet,
+har ize snapped like h--l, an' she screetched eout thet she dident 'low
+no sech wurds in har hous', an' ordurd me ter leave. Mi'tey sqeemish
+thet, warn't it? bein' as shede ben fur so mony yar the Cunnel's ----,
+an' th' tuther one his raal wife.
+
+"Wal, I _did_ leav'; but I left a piece of mi mind a-hind. I toled har
+I'de buy that ar 'ooman ef she cost all I war wuth and I had ter pawne
+my sole ter git the money; an' I added, jess by way ov sweet'nin' the
+pill, thet I ow'd all I hed ter har husband, an' dident furget _my_
+debts ef she did _her'n_, an' ef his own wife disgraced him, I'd be
+d----d ef _I_ wud.
+
+"Wal, I've got th' ma'am an' har boy ter hum, an' my 'ooman hes tuk ter
+har a heep. I doant no w'en the sale's ter cum off, but ye may bet hi'
+on my beein' thar; an' I'll buy har ef I hev ter go my hull pile on har,
+an' borrer th' money fur ole Pomp. But _he'll_ go cheap, 'case the
+Cunnel's deth nigh dun him up. It clean killed Ante Lucey. She never
+held her hed up arter she heerd 'Masser Davy' war dead, fur she sot har
+vary life on him. Don't ye fele consarned 'bout the ma'am--I knows ye
+sot hi' on har--_I'll buy har_, shore. Thet an' deth ar th' onely things
+thet I knows on, in this wurld, jess now, that ar SARTIN."
+
+Such is Andy's letter. Mis-spelled and profane though it be, I would not
+alter a word or a syllable of it. It deserves to be written in
+characters of gold, and hung up in the sky, where it might be read by
+all the world. And it _is_ written in the sky--in the great
+record-book--and it will be read when you and I, reader, meet the
+assembled universe, to give account of what _we_ have done and written.
+God grant that our record may show some such deed as that!
+
+
+
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