FOOTNOTES:
[25] See Numbers LVI., LVIII., LIX., and LXV. of this magazine.
[26] La Cause des Esclaves Nègres et des Habitans de la Guinée, portée au Tribunal de la Justice, de la Religion, de la Politique: I. 335; II. 66.
[27] Gros peau, thick skin, was the French equivalent to Bozal: peau fin was the Creole negro.
[28] Clarkson's History of the Abolition of the Slave-Trade, Vol. II. p. 134.
[29] Anthropologie der Naturvölker, von Dr. Theodor Waitz. Zweiter Theil: die Negervölker und ihre Verwandten. Leipzig, 1860. Very full, minute, and humane in tone, though telling all the facts about the manners and habits of native Africans.
Mémoires pour servir à l'Histoire de la Révolution de Saint Dominique. Par le Lieutenant-Général Baron Pamphile de La Croix. 2 Tom. Generally very fair to the negro soldier: himself a distinguished soldier.
Le Système Colonial dévoilé. Par le Baron de Vastey, mulatto. Terrible account of the plantation cruelties.
Mémoires pour servir a l'Histoire d'Hayti. Par l'Adjutant-Général Boisrond-Tonnerre. Written to explain the defection of Dessalines from Toussaint, and the military movements of the former. The author was a mulatto.
Des Colonies, et particulièrement de celle de Saint-Domingue; Mémoire Historique et Politique. Par le Colonel Malenfant, Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur, etc. A pretty impartial book, by a pro-slavery man.
L. F. Sonthonax à Bourdon de l'Oise. Pamphlet. The vindication of Sonthonax for declaring emancipation.
Colonies Étrangères et Haïti. Par Victor Schoelcher. 2 Tom. Valuable, but leaning too much towards the negro against the mulatto.
Histoire des Désastres de Saint-Domingue. Paris, 1795. Journalistic, with the coloring of the day.
Campagnes des Français à Saint-Domingue, et Réfutation des Reproches faits au Capitaine-Général Rochambeau. Par Ph. Albert de Lattre, Propriétaire, etc., 1805. Shows that Rochambeau could not help himself.
Voyages d'un Naturaliste. 3 Tom. Par Descourtilz. Pro-slavery, but filled with curious information.
Expédition à St. Domingue. Par A. Metral. Useful.
The Empire of Hayti. By Marcus Rainsford, Captain in West-Indian Regiment. Occasionally valuable.
[30] The independent Congos in the interior are more active and courageous, expert and quarrelsome than those upon the coast, who have been subjected by the Portuguese.
[31] When the insurgents evacuated a fort near Port-au-Prince, upon the advance of the English, a negro was left in the powder-magazine with a lighted match, to wait till the place was occupied. Here he remained all night; but when the English came later than was expected, his match had burned out. Was that insensibility to all ideas, or devotion to one?
[32] Praloto was a distinguished Italian in the French artillery service. His battery of twenty field-pieces at Port-au-Prince held the whole neighborhood in check, till at length a young negro named Hyacinthe roused the slaves to attack it. In the next fight, they rushed upon this battery, insensible to its fire, embraced the guns and were bayoneted, still returned to them, stuffed the arms of their dead comrades into the muzzles, swarmed over them, and extinguished the fire. This was done against a supporting fire of French infantry. The blacks lost a thousand men, but captured the cannon, and drove the whole force into the city.
[33] Think twice before you try me: the name of a morne of extraordinary difficulty, which had to be surmounted by one of the French columns.
[34] Negro authorities say 750.
REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.
Sunshine in Thought. By Charles Godfrey Leland, Author of "Meister Karl's Sketch-Book," and Translator of "Heine's Pictures of Travel." New York: Charles T. Evans. 16mo.
We do not exactly know how to characterize this jubilant volume. The author, not content to denounce generally the poets of sentimentality and the prophets of despair, has evidently a science of Joy latent in his mind, of which his rich, discursive, and somewhat rollicking sentences give but an imperfect exposition. He is in search of an ideal law of Cheerfulness, which neither history nor literature fully illustrates, but which he still seeks with an undoubting faith. Every transient glimpse of his law he eagerly seizes, whether indicated in events or in persons. And it must be admitted that he is not ignorant either of the great annalists or the great writers of the world. He knows Herodotus as well as he knows Hume, Thucydides as intimately as Gibbon. Xenophon and Plutarch are as familiar to him as Michelet, Thiers, and Guizot. He has studied Aristænetus and Lucian as closely as Horace Walpole and Thackeray,—is as ready to quote from Plato as from Rabelais,—and throws the results of his wide study, with an occasional riotous disregard of prim literary proprieties, into a fierce defiance of everything which makes against his favorite theory, that there is nothing in pure theology, sound ethics, and healthy literature, nothing in the historic records of human life, which can justify the discontent of the sentimentalist or the scorn of the misanthrope.
Engaged thus in an almost Quixotic assault on the palpable miseries of human existence,—miseries which are as much acknowledged by Homer as by Euripides, by Ariosto as by Dante, by Shakspeare as by Milton, by Goethe as by Lamartine,—he has a difficult work to perform. Still he does not bate a jot of heart and hope. He discriminates, with the art of a true critic, between objective representations of human life and subjective protests against human limitations, errors, miseries, and sins. As far as either representation embodies the human principle of Joy,—whether Greek or Roman, ancient or modern, Christian or Pagan,—he is content with the evidence. The moment a writer of either school insinuates a principle or sentiment of Despair, whether he be a dramatist or a sentimentalist, the author enters his earnest protest. Classical and Romantic poets, romancers and historians, when they slip into misery-mongers, are equally the objects of his denunciations. Keats and Tennyson fare nearly as ill as Byron and Heine. Mr. Leland feels assured that the human race is entitled to joy, and there is something almost comical in his passionate assault on the morbid genius of the world. He seems to say, "Why do you not accept the conditions of happiness? The conditions are simple, and nothing but your pestilent wilfulness prevents your compliance with them."
This "pestilent wilfulness" is really the key to the whole position. All objective as well as subjective writers have been impotent to provide the way by which the seeker after perfect and permanent content can attain and embody it. It has been sought through wit, humor, fancy, imagination, reason; but it has been sought in vain. Our author, who, after nearly exhausting all the concrete representatives of the philosophy of Joy, admits that nobody embodies his ideal of happiness, surrenders his ideal, as far as it has been practically expressed in life or thought. Rabelais dissatisfies him; Scarron dissatisfies him; Molière, Swift, Sterne, not to mention others, dissatisfy him. Every ally he brings forward to sustain his position is reduced by analysis into a partial enemy of his creed. But while we cannot concur in Mr. Leland's theory in his exclusive statement of it, and confess to a strong liking for many writers whom he considers effeminate, we cordially agree with him in his plea for "Sunshine in Thought," and sympathize in his vigorous and valorous assault on the morbid elements of our modern literature. We think that poets should be as cheerful as possible; whereas some of them seem to think it is their duty to be as fretful as possible, and to make misery an invariable accompaniment of genius. The primary object of all good literature is to invigorate and to cheer, not to weaken and depress; it should communicate mental and moral life, as well as convey sentiments and ideas,—should brace and strengthen the mind, as well as fill it; and when it whimpers and wails, when it teaches despair as philosophy, especially when it uses the enchantments of imagination to weaken the active powers, its effect is mischievous. Woe, considered as a luxury, is the most expensive of all luxuries; and there is danger to the mental and moral health even in the pensive sadness which, to some readers, sheds such a charm over the meditations of that kind of genius which is rather thoughtful than full of thought. For the melodious miseries which mediocrity mimics, for the wretchedness which some fifth-rate rhymers assume in order to make themselves interesting, there can, of course, be no toleration. Mr. Leland pounds them as with the hammer of Thor, and would certainly beat out their brains, had not Nature fortunately neglected to put such perilous matter into craniums exposed to such ponderous blows.
Apart from the general theory and purpose of the book, there is a great deal of talent and learning exhibited in the illustrations of the subject. The remarks on Aristophanes, Rabelais, Swift, Sterne, and Heine,—half analysis, half picture,—are very striking; and there are, throughout the volume, continual flashes of suggestive thought and vivid portraiture, which both delight and detain the reader. The style is that of animated conversation,—the conversation of a man whose veins are as full of blood as his mind is of ideas, who is hilarious from abounding health, and whose occasional boisterousness of manner proceeds from the robustness of his make and the cheer of his soul. The whole volume tends to create in thought that "sunshine" which it so joyously recommends and celebrates. The reader is warmed by the ardor and earnestness with which propositions he may distrust are urged upon his attention, and closes the volume with that feeling of pleased excitement which always comes from contact with a fresh and original mind.
The Gentleman. By George H. Calvert. Boston: Ticknor & Fields.
Paradoxical as it may appear, we believe there never was a time when the true and pure standard of gentlemanhood could be more impressively raised and upheld in this republic than now. The vast and keen civil conflict which so deeply agitates our political life has laid bare the groundwork and brought to the surface the latent elements of our social life, so that a new, an obvious, and a searching test is instinctively applied to character; as in all times of profound moral excitement, shams grow fantastic and contemptible, and principles of action and being rise to superlative worth. The question, What constitutes the Gentleman? suggested at first by the preposterous and exclusive claims thereto arrogantly put forth by a little community, in justification of profane and destructive violence to a nation's welfare, has come to be regarded as embracing all the obligations, responsibilities, and humanities that make up and certify Christian manhood and genuine patriotism; the wide and deep significance of a word too often confounded with mere manners is thus practically found to indicate the most vital elements of personal worth and social well-being. Accordingly, a comprehensive, philosophical definition and illustration of the Gentleman, in the ideal grace and greatness and in the real authority and use of that so much misunderstood and seldom achieved character, is doubly welcome at this hour, the strife and discussion whereof bring out in such strong relief the true animus and equipment of statesmen, soldiers, citizens, men and women, and force us to realize the poverty of soul, the inherent baseness, or the magnanimity and rectitude of our fellow-creatures, with a vividness never before experienced. How indispensable to the welfare of the State is a society based on higher motives than those of material ambition, and how impossible is the existence of such a society, except through individual probity and disinterestedness, is a lesson written in blood and tears before our eyes to-day; and thrice welcome, we repeat, is the clear and emphatic exposition of the Gentleman, as an incarnation of the justice, love, and honor, whereon, in the last analysis, rest the hopes and welfare of the nation. No ethical or æsthetical treatise could be more seasonable than this of Mr. Calvert's. We regard it as the best lay-sermon thus far evoked by the moral exigencies of the hour; however appropriate it may also be and is to any and all times and readers of taste and thought, a superficial, merely dilettante essay on such a subject and at such a time would repel instead of alluring.
The charming little volume before us, while made genially attractive by occasional playfulness and anecdote, is yet pervaded by an earnestness born of strong conviction and deep sympathies. It analyzes the springs of character, traces conduct to its elemental source, and follows it to its ultimate influence. To a concise style it unites an expansive spirit; with a tone of rich and high culture it blends the vivacity and grace of the most genial colloquy. From the etymology of the word to the humanity of the character, a full, forcible, frank, and fervent discussion of the Gentleman is given, as he figures in history, in society, in domestic life, and in literature,—and as he lives, a grand and gracious ideal, in the consciousness of the author. Beginning with the meaning, origin, and use of the word Gentleman, Mr. Calvert gives a critical analysis of its historical personation. As a chevalier type, in such men as Sidney and Bayard. Its ethical and æsthetical meaning is finely exemplified in the contrast between Charles Lamb and George IV., Leicester and Hampden, Washington and Napoleon. The Gentleman in St. Paul is well illustrated. The relation of this character to antiquity is defined with a scholar's zest: whatever of its force and flavor is discernible in Socrates and Brutus is gracefully indicated; the deficiency of Homer's heroes, excepting Hector, therein, is ably demonstrated. These and like illustrations of so prolific a theme inevitably suggest episodes of argument, incidental, yet essential to the main question; and the just and benign remarks on the Duel, the Position of Women in Ancient and Modern Society, and the Influence of Christianity upon Manners, are striking in their scope and style, and breathe the lofty and tender spirit of that Faith which inculcates disinterestedness as the latent and lasting inspiration of the Gentleman. Perhaps the most delectable illustrations, which give both form and beauty to this essay, are those drawn from modern literature: they are choice specimens of criticism, and full of subtile discrimination in tracing the relation of literature to life. We would instance especially the chapters on Shakspeare's Gentleman; the recognition of the Gentleman in Sir Roger de Coverley, Uncle Toby, and Don Quixote; and the admirable distinction pointed out between the characters of Scott, Byron, Shelley, and Keats. There is no part of the volume more worthy attention than the remarks of a "high-bred tone in writing." The hollowness of Chesterfield's code is keenly exposed; Honor and Vulgarity are freshly and ably defined; Fashion, Pride, and Vanity, the conventional elements of the Gentleman, are treated with philosophical justice; the favorite characters of fiction, and the most renowned poets and heroes, beaux and braves, pass before us, and are subjected to the test of that Christian ideal of the Gentleman so clearly defined and firmly applied by the intrepid author; and many a disguised coxcomb is stripped of his borrowed plumes, imperial parvenus exposed as charlatans in manners as well as morals, and heroic, but modest souls, of whom the world's court-calendar gives no hint, stand forth exemplars of the highest, because the most soulful breeding.