CHAPTER III.
'In wedlock a species of lottery lies,
Where in blanks and in prizes we deal;
But how comes it that you, such a capital prize,
Should so long have remained in the wheel?'
Moore.
Ann Harriet was determined that her wedding should be a romantic one; she said that it was by no means an every-day affair, and therefore it should be carried out in a style proportionate to its rarity. After consulting Mrs. Pendergast, and searching through a pile of 'New York Dashers,' she was much inclined to a midnight wedding, especially as Mrs. Pendergast offered to loan her patent lamp for the occasion; but when they suddenly happened to hear of a marriage celebrated in the wild and picturesque woods of the White Hills, it was immediately decided that there was no better place; so sacred a ceremony should be performed 'under the broad canopy of heaven,' and the birds of the air and the countless leaves of the trees should sing their epithalamium.
After some search, it was decided that the happy spot should be on 'Huckleberry Hill,' a picturesque elevation about a mile from the postoffice in Peonytown, covered with a luxurious growth of pines and hemlocks, interspersed with huckleberry bushes, sweet fern, and mullenstalks. A small, open place was selected, where the long moss made a beautiful carpet, and the tall trees on every side entwined their arms as lovingly together as if they, too, were about to take each other 'for better for worse,' while the ripple of a brook hidden in the woods lent a pleasant melody to the scene.
'This is the place of all others,' remarked Ann Harriet. 'Houses may burn down or decay, churches may be sold and turned into ice-cream saloons and lager-beer depots—as Mr. Dunstable's was; but these lofty pines and rugged hemlocks will stand for centuries, to mark the spot where, in my girlhood, I plighted my troth to that dear Dobbs.'
Preparations for the bridal went gloriously on. The Peonytown dressmaker was busy day and evening in making up the trousseau of the expectant bride. The wedding dress was to be of fine white muslin, and no ornaments to detract from its spotless purity.
The important day at length arrived. The sun rose warm, brilliant, calm, and cloudless—and so did Ann Harriet. Her heart beat quick and tumultuously as the coming event of the day suddenly occurred to her, and she rejoiced to think that she was now to have one to shield her from the chilling blasts of a cold, relentless world—a husband on whose breast her weary head could rest and feel secure.
These thoughts made her footsteps light, and she hastened to array herself for the bridal, which, was appointed at ten o'clock. The barber of Peonytown was sent for, and, although dressing a bride's hair was something as yet unknown to him, yet, after much perseverance and more ox marrow, he succeeded in twisting and braiding her luxuriant black locks into a kind of triumphal-arched basketwork, that resembled a miniature summer-house. The white muslin dress was then put on, and a pair of white kid gloves drawn over her small fingers (plump people have little hands), and Ann Harriet awaited her husband elect.
All Peonytown had been apprized of the hour of the wedding, and, in consequence, the grove was at an early period filled with spectators. Boys climbed into the trees; camp stools were provided; and one enterprising Peonytowner brought a long wooden settee, and let the weary rest on it for the slight consideration of half a dime each. The Rev. Derby Sifter was there too. He was to perform the ceremony, and, as it was the first wedding in Peonytown for six months, he was in unusual humor, rubbing his hands together, and laughing at every remark that was made.
At the appointed time Ann Harriet appeared, hanging lovingly on the arm of the gallant Captain. The bride attracted universal attention. At first, indeed, many were impressed with the idea that a crowd of girls were coming, dressed in unsullied white; but as she approached nearer, they saw that it was the fair Ann Harriet in her white muslin, leaning on the arm of Captain Dobbs, who was dressed in full uniform, and had a carnation pink in his mouth. The Rev. Derby Sifter now stepped forward, and the parties took their places. No bridesmaids were needed, the bride 'answering' for several. After a few preliminary remarks, the reverend gentleman pronounced them—under green leaves—husband and wife! Ann Harriet heaved a sigh of relief: the H had vanished forever from her name, and D now reigned in its stead. A short prayer then followed.
Meanwhile, a boy in a tree directly over their heads spied a caterpillar's nest near him, and, breaking a twig from a branch, he probed the nest, causing a tremendous stampede among the inmates. Down they dropped, silently and softly, upon the elaborate head of the bride, who stood wholly unconscious of the additional ornaments so profusely decorating her hair; the company noticed it, and very soon every one was in a broad grin. Ann Harriet became conscious of some merriment in that portion of the party immediately under her observation, and a succession of blushes suffused her face as she felt that something ridiculous to herself must have caused it. At that instant a caterpillar, that had been swinging to and fro on his attenuated web, landed plump on Ann's nose as she raised her face (he had been waiting for something to turn up), causing her to give utterance to a scream that made the clerical gentleman open his eyes, and a couple of catbirds to fly frightened and squealing from their nests.
At the same time an angry cow, rendered furious by the sting of some insect, plunged frantically into the wedding circle, bellowing, tossing her head, and flourishing her tail in a terrific and antinuptial manner. The Rev. Mr. Sifter was the first one to leave, and, being very spare, he passed swiftly through the trees and bushes, never looking behind him till he had reached the meeting house, where he stopped and in his unconscious delirium caught at the bell rope and rang the bell with a vigor that started every one from his work, so that in a few minutes 'Extinguisher No. 1' was hurried along the roads by an extempore company of about fifty men and boys.
Meanwhile, the witnesses of the rural wedding had all skedaddled—to borrow a Greek word—into the woods, in dire confusion, tearing dresses, pulling down 'back hair,' hitching hoop skirts, and tumbling over blackberry vines—but each intent on increasing the distance from the mad cow. Ann Harriet was not so fortunate; her size prevented her running, and a fiery peony on her bosom attracted the animal's attention, so that, with a loud roar, the beast rushed directly upon her. Had Ann Harriet been—as she was a few weeks before—an unprotected female, the undertaker of Peonytown would have had a 'big job' that day; but luckily, he who had just sworn to love and protect her saw that now was his time and chance to begin; so, drawing his sword, he stepped in front of his trembling bride, and, as the cow approached with head down and eyeballs glaring wildly, he aimed a blow with his weapon, which inflicted a severe cut on her nose.
The cow paused.
'Step backward gradually, my Ann Harriet,' said the valiant Dobbs, 'and I will see that she does not touch you.'
Ann Harriet stepped backward, but not 'gradually,' for she trod on a loose stone, which upset her, and she rolled over and over down a sloping rock, ruining, on the way, any quantity of huckleberry bushes and pennyroyal. This started the cow, who made another furious charge at the soldier, who this time, by a well-directed blow, cut one horn sheer off.
'That's good!' exclaimed he; 'next time I'll take t'other horn, and then commence on her legs.'
The cow made another retreat, but appeared by no means vanquished. The Captain stood his ground manfully. Ann Harriet sat on the moss at the foot of the rock, disentangling from her hair the bruised and mangled caterpillars which still remained there.
Just as the cow was about to make her third charge, shouts were heard in the path which led to the village, and in a moment 'Extinguisher No. 1,' with its brave volunteers, was on the ground. They had followed the directions of the parson and arrived at an opportune moment.
The boys at once decided that, as there was no fire to put out, they would 'put out' the cow; so, unreeling the hose, they drew the water from the brook, and in a very little while a stream of water from a two-inch pipe struck the astonished cow full in the face, when she turned and scampered off into the forest, jumping over Ann Harriet at a single bound, and was seen no more.
Captain Dobbs wiped his gory weapon on the greensward, and returned it to the sheath. He then sprang to the side of his wife, and, with the help of the foreman and two brakemen, raised her. She said her nerves were all unstrung, and she 'never could walk home in the world;' so she was placed on the box of the hose carriage and carried to the village.
The Peonytowners turned out en masse to meet them, and were anxious that the heroic Captain should make a speech from the town pump; but he declined.
In a short time the happy couple were comfortably seated on the sofa in the parlor of the old homestead, and his arm was as far round her waist as it would go. Here we will bid them adieu. Ann Harriet being married, she will have no more miss-haps—albeit at some future time something may be heard of Captain and Mrs. Dobbs—and all the little Dobbses.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] Broken-up apple pie.
THE UNION.
IV.
The census tables of the North and the South, and especially of Massachusetts, Maryland, and South Carolina, heretofore presented, have proved that slavery greatly retarded the progress of population, wealth, science, education, and religion. The comparison now instituted between New York and Virginia demonstrates the same law.
By the census, the population of Virginia in 1790 was 748,308, and in 1860, 1,596,318, making the ratio of increase 113.32 percent. In 1790, New York numbered 340,120, and in 1860, 3,880,735, the ratio of increase being 1,040.99. (Table 1, Prelim. Census Rep., p. 132.) Thus, the rate of increase in New York exceeded that of Virginia more than nine to one.
In 1790, the population of Virginia was largely more than double that of New York. In 1860, the population of New York was very largely more than double that of Virginia. In 1790, Virginia, in population, ranked first of all the States, and New York the fifth. In 1860, they had reversed their positions, and New York was the first, and Virginia the fifth. (Rep., p. 120.) At the same rate of progress, from 1860 to 1900, as from 1790 to 1860, Virginia, retaining slavery, would have sunk from the first to the twenty-first State, and would still continue, at each succeeding decade, descending the inclined plane toward the lowest position of all the States. Such has been, and still continues to be, the effect of slavery, in dragging down that once great State from the first toward the last in rank in the Union. But if, as in the absence of slavery must have been the case, Virginia had increased from 1790 to 1860 in the same ratio as New York, her population in 1860 would have been 7,789,141, and she must always have remained the first in rank of all the States.
Area.—The natural advantages of Virginia far exceed those of New York. The area of Virginia is 61,352 square miles, and that of New York, 47,000. The population of Virginia per square mile in 1790 was 12.19, and in 1860, 26.02. That of New York, in 1790, was 7.83, and in 1860, 84.36. Now, if New York, with her present numbers per square mile, had the area of Virginia, her population, in 1860, would have been 5,175,654, and that of Virginia, reduced to the area of New York, on the basis of her present numbers per square mile, would have been 1,320,000. This illustrates the immense effect of area, as one of the great elements influencing the progress of population. But, wonderful as are these results, the great fact is omitted in this calculation, that Virginia, in 1790, had largely more than double the population of New York. Thus, if we reverse the numbers of New York and Virginia in 1790, and take the actual ratio of increase of each for the succeeding seventy years, the population of Virginia, in 1860, would have been 728,875, and that of New York, as we have seen, would have been 7,789,141, making the difference exceed seven millions, or very largely more than ten to one. Reverse the areas also, and the difference would exceed eight millions.
Shore Line.—As furnishing cheap and easy access for imports and exports, creating marts for commerce with great cities, and affecting the interior most beneficially, the shore line, with adequate harbors, constitutes a vast element in the progress of states and empires. Now, by the last tables of the United States coast survey, the shore line of Virginia was 1,571 miles, and of New York 725 miles. The five great parallel tide-water rivers of Virginia, the Potomac, the Rappahannock, the York river, James river, and Roanoke (partly in North Carolina), with their tributaries, furnish easy access for hundreds of miles into the interior, with both shores of the noble Chesapeake bay for many miles, as well as its magnificent outlet and the main ocean for a considerable distance, all within the limits of Virginia. We have seen that the coast line of Virginia is largely more than double that of New York, and the harbors of Virginia are more numerous, deeper, and much nearer the great valley of the Ohio and Mississippi. By the coast-survey tables, the mean low water into the harbor of New York by Gedney's channel is 20 feet, and at high-water spring tides is 24.2; north channel, 24, mean low water, and 29.1 spring tides, high water; south channel, 22 and 27.1; main ship channel, after passing S.W. spit buoy, on N.E. course, one mile up the bay, for New York, 22.5-27.06. By the same tables, from capes at entrance of Chesapeake bay to Hampton, at mean low water, 30 feet; spring tides, high water, 32.8. Anchorage in Hampton roads, 59-61.8. From Hampton roads to Sewell's point, 25-27.8. South of Sewell's point (one mile and a half), 21-23.8; up to Norfolk, 23-25.8. From Hampton roads to James river, entering to the northward of Newport News, middle ground, 22-24.8. From Hampton roads to James river, entering to the southward of Newport News, middle ground, 27-29.8. From abreast the tail of York spit, up to Yorktown, 33-35.8. Elizabeth river, between Norfolk and navy yard, 25.5-28.3.
When we leave the tide-water rivers for the interior navigable streams, Virginia has a vast advantage. New York has no such rivers above tide, but Virginia has the Ohio for hundreds of miles, with its tributaries, the Kanawha, Guyandotte, and Big Sandy. It is true, New York has several of the great lakes, and the vast advantage of connection with them through her great canal. But, in the absence of slavery, the canal projected by Washington (preceding that of New York) would have connected, through Virginia, the Chesapeake bay with the Ohio river. The James river, flowing into the Chesapeake, cuts the Blue Mountains, and the Kanawha, a confluent of the Ohio, cuts the Alleghany; thus opening an easy and practicable route for a great canal from the eastern to the western waters. The valley of the lakes, with which New York is connected by her canal, has an area of 335,515 square miles. The valley of the Mississippi, with which the Chesapeake would long since, in the absence of slavery, have been connected by the Virginia canal, has an area of 1,226,600 square miles. The shore line of the Mississippi and its tributaries, above tide water, is 35,644 miles. (Page 35 Compend. Census of 1850.) Our shore line of the lakes is 3,620 miles, including bays, sounds, and islands; and that of the British, 2,629. (Ib. 35.) The connection of the lakes with the Ohio and Mississippi would be the same for both States, the one being from the lakes to these rivers, and the other from the rivers to the lakes. The location of Virginia is more central than that of New York, and Virginia runs farther west by several hundred miles. We are so accustomed to look at the connection of New York with the West by her canal, and Virginia with no such union, that it is difficult to realize the great change if Virginia had been connected by her progressing work with the Ohio and Mississippi, and thence, by the present canals, with the lakes.
It is apparent, then, that, as regards easy access to the West, the natural advantages of Virginia surpass New York, and with greater facilities for artificial works. How many decades would be required, after emancipation, to bring the superior natural advantages of Virginia into practical operation, is not the question; nor do I believe that the city of New York will ever cease to be the centre of our own trade, and ultimately of the commerce of the world. But although Virginia, in adhering to slavery, has lost her supremacy in the Union, it is quite certain that, as a Free State, she would commence a new career of wonderful prosperity, that capital and population from the North and from Europe would flow there with a mighty current, her lands be doubled in value, and her town and city property far more than quadrupled.
Mines.—Virginia has vast mines of coal, the great element of modern progress. New York has none. It is coal that has made Great Britain a mighty empire, giving her power, by land and sea, equal to the manual force of all mankind. It is stated by the Commissioner of the General Land Office, in his report before referred to, of November, 1860, 'that an acre of coal, three feet thick, is equal to the product of 1,940 acres of forest trees; and each acre of a coal seam four feet in thickness, and yielding one yard of pure coal, is equivalent to 5,000 tons, and possesses, therefore, a reserve of mechanical strength in its fuel, equal to the life labor of more than 1,600 men.'
This statement of the Commissioner is made on the highest authority, and proves the vast natural advantages of Virginia over New York. Virginia, also, has far more abundant mines of iron, more widely diffused over the State, reaching from tide water to the Ohio. She has also these iron mines in juxtaposition with coal and all the fluxes. Virginia, also, has valuable mines of gold, lead, and copper. New York has no gold or copper mines, and produced in 1860 but $800 worth of lead. (Table 14.)
Hydraulic Power.—Omitting Niagara, which thus far scorns the control of man, the hydraulic power of Virginia very far exceeds that of New York. It is to be found on the Potomac and its tributaries, and upon nearly every stream that flows into the Chesapeake or Ohio. The superior mildness of the climate of Virginia makes this power available there for a much greater portion of the year. The great falls of the Potomac, where Washington constructed the largest locks of the continent, has a water power unsurpassed, and is but twelve miles from tide water, at Washington. This point is a most healthy and beautiful location, surrounded by lands whose natural fertility was very great, and, in the absence of slavery, must have been a vast manufacturing city. This water power could move more spindles than are now worked on all this continent.
Agriculture and Manufactures.—The natural fertility of the soil of Virginia far exceeded that of New York, with a more genial sun, and much more favorable seasons for agricultural products, as well as for stock. The number of acres of land in Virginia susceptible of profitable culture, is nearly double that of New York, but much of it has been impoverished by slave labor, scratching and exhausting the soil, without manure or rotation of crops. The census shows that Virginia has all the products of New York, and cotton in addition. Virginia produced, in 1860, 12,727 bales of cotton (table 36), worth, at present prices, nearly $3,000,000. She also adjoins the States of North Carolina and Tennessee, producing, in 1860, 372,964 bales, worth, at present prices, nearly $90,000,000. Virginia is also much nearer than New York to all the other cotton States. With these vast advantages, with her larger area, more fertile soil, cheaper subsistence, her coal and iron and great hydraulic power, with so much cotton raised by herself and in adjacent States, Virginia should have manufactured much more cotton than New York. But, by the census (table 22), the value of the cotton manufacture of Virginia in 1850 was $1,446,109, and in 1860, $1,063,611—a decrease of one third. In New York, the value of the cotton manufacture in 1850 was $5,019,323, and in 1860, $7,471,961, an increase of over 48 per cent. So, if we look at the tables of mines, manufactures, and the fisheries, with the vastly superior advantages of Virginia, the whole product in 1860 was of the value of $51,300,000, and of agriculture $68,700,000; whilst in New York these values were respectively $379,623,560 and $226,376,440. (Tables of Census, 33 and 36.)
Climate and Mortality.—By table 6, page 22, of the Census, there were for the year ending June 1st, 1860, 46,881 deaths in New York, being 1 in every 82 of the population, and 1.22 per cent. The number of deaths in Virginia, in the same year, was 22,472, being 1 in every 70 of the population, or 1.43 per cent. There was, then, a slight difference in favor of New York. But Virginia is divided into four geographical sections: the tide-water, the Piedmont (running from the tide-water region to the Blue Mountains), the valley between these mountains and the Alleghanies, and the trans-Alleghany to the Ohio. These three last sections, containing three fourths of the area and white population of the State, surpass New York in salubrity, with the most bracing and delightful climate. The climate of Virginia is far more favorable for stock and agricultural products than New York, with longer and better seasons, and is more salubrious than the climate of Europe. (Comp. 1850.)
Progress of Wealth.—We have seen how great was the advance in population of New York over Virginia, from 1790 to 1860, being in the ratio of more than 9 to 1. Now let us compare the relative progress of wealth. It is contended by the advocates of slavery, that it accumulates wealth more rapidly, and thus enriches the nation, although it may depress its moral and intellectual development, its increase of numbers and of power, and tarnish its reputation throughout the world. As population and its labor create wealth, it must be retarded by a system which, as we have seen in this case, diminishes the relative advance of numbers in the ratio of more than 9 to 1. But the census proves that slavery greatly retards the increase of wealth. By tables 33 and 36 of the census of 1860, it appears, omitting commerce, that the products of industry, as given, viz., of agriculture, manufactures, mines, and fisheries, were that year in New York $604,000,000, or $155 per capita; and in Virginia $120,000,000, or $75 per capita. This shows a total value of product in New York more than five times greater than in Virginia, and per capita, more than 2 to 1. If we include the earnings of commerce, and all business not given in the census, I think it will be shown hereafter, that the value of the products and earnings of New York, in 1860, exceeded those of Virginia at least 7 to 1. As to the rate of increase, the value of the products of agriculture, manufactures, mines, and fisheries of Virginia, in 1850, was $84,480,428 (table 9), and in New York $356,736,603, showing an increase in Virginia from 1850 to 1860 of $35,519,572, being 41 per cent., and in New York $247,263,397, being 69 per cent., exhibiting a difference of 28 per cent. Now the increase of population in Virginia from 1850 to 1860 was 12.29 per cent., and in New York 25.29 per cent., the difference being only 13 per cent. (Table 1, p. 131.) Thus, it appears, the increase of wealth in New York, exclusive of the gains of commerce, as compared with Virginia, was more than double the ratio of the augmentation of population. By the census table of 1860, No. 35, p. 195, 'The true value of the real and personal property, according to the eighth census was, New York, $1,843,338,517, and of Virginia $793,249,681.' Now we have seen the value of the products of New York in 1860 by the census was $604,000,000, and in Virginia $120,000,000. Thus, as a question of the annual yield of capital, that of New York was 32.82 per cent., and Virginia 15.13 per cent.; the annual product of capital being more than double in New York what it was in Virginia. The problem then is solved in Virginia, as it was in Maryland and South Carolina, and all the South compared with all the North, that slavery retards the progress of wealth and accumulation of capital, in the ratio of 2 to 1. Our war taxes may be very great, but the tax of slavery is far greater, and the relief from it, in a few years, will add much more to the national wealth than the whole deduction made by the war debt. Our total wealth, by the census of 1860, being, by table 35, $16,159,616,068, one per cent. taken annually to pay the interest and gradually extinguish the war debt, would be $161,596,160; whereas, judging by Virginia and New York, the diminished increase of the annual product of capital, as the result of slavery, is 2.8 per cent., or $452,469,250 per annum, equal in a decade, without compounding the annual results, to $4,524,692,500.
That our population would have reached in 1860 nearly 40,000,000, and our wealth have been more than doubled, if slavery had been extinguished in 1790, is one of the revelations made by the census; whilst in science, in education, and national power, the advance would have been still more rapid, and the moral force of our example and success would have controlled for the benefit of mankind the institutions of the world.
By table 36, p. 196, of the census of 1860, the cash value of the farms of Virginia was $371,096,211, being $11.91 per acre, and of New York $803,343,593, being $38.26 per acre. Now, by the table, the number of acres embraced in these farms of New York was 20,992,950, and in Virginia 31,014,950, the difference of value per acre being $26.36, or much more than 3 to 1 in favor of New York. Now, if we multiply this number of acres of farm lands of Virginia by the New York value, it would make the total value of the farm lands of New York $1,186,942,136, and the additional value caused by emancipation $815,845,925. Now the whole number of slaves in Virginia in 1860, was 490,865; multiplying which by $300 as their average value, would be $147,259,500, leaving $668,586,425 as the sum by which Virginia would be richer in farms alone, if slavery were abolished. But, stupendous as is this result in regard to lands, it is far below the reality. We have seen that the farm lands of Virginia, improved and unimproved, constituted 31,014,950 acres. By the census and the land-office tables, the area of Virginia is 39,265,280 acres. Deduct the farm lands, and there remain unoccupied 8,250,330 acres. Now, Virginia's population to the square mile being 26.02, and that of New York 84.36, with an equal density in Virginia, more than two thirds of these Virginia lands, as in New York, must have been occupied as farms. This would have been equivalent, at two thirds, to 5,500,000 acres, which, at their present average value of $2 per acre, would be worth $11,000,000; but, at the value per acre of the New York lands, these 5,500,000 acres would be worth $206,430,000. Deduct from this their present value, $11,000,000, and the remainder, $195,430,000, is the sum by which the unoccupied lands of Virginia, converted into farms, would have been increased in value by emancipation. Add this to the enhanced value of their present farms, $815,845,925, and the result would be $1,011,275,925, as the gain of Virginia in the value of lands by emancipation. To these we should add, from the same cause, the enhancement of the town and city property in Virginia to the extent of several hundred millions of dollars. In order to realize the truth, we must behold Virginia as she would have been, with New York railroads and canals, farms, manufactures, commerce, towns, and cities. Then we must consider the superior natural advantages of Virginia, her far greater area, her richer soil, her more genial sun, her greater variety of products, her mines of coal, iron, gold, copper, and lead, her petroleum, her superior hydraulic power, her much larger coast line, with more numerous and deeper harbors—and reflect what Virginia would have been in the absence of slavery. Her early statesmen, Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Mason, Tucker, and Marshall, all realized this great truth, and all desired to promote emancipation in Virginia. But their advice was disregarded by her present leaders—the new, false, and fatal dogmas of Calhoun were substituted; and, as a consequence, Virginia, from the first rank (longo intervallo) of all the States, has fallen to the fifth, and, with slavery continued, will descend still more rapidly in the future than in the past. Let her abolish slavery, and she will commence a new career of progress. Freedom and its associates, education and energy, will occupy her waste lands, restore her exhausted fields, decaying cities, and prostrate industry, employ her vast hydraulic power, develop her mines, unite by her grand canals the waters of the Chesapeake and Ohio, and, placing her feet upon slavery, hear her proclaim, in the proud language of her own State motto, 'Sic semper tyrannis.'
By census table 36, p. 197, the value, in 1860, of the farm lands of all the Slave States, was $2,570,466,935, and the number of acres 245,721,062, worth $10.46 per acre. In the Free States, the value of the farm lands was $4,067,947,286, and the number of acres 161,462,008, worth $25.19 per acre. Now if, as certainly in the absence of slavery would have been the case, the farm lands of the South had been worth as much per acre as those of the North, their total value would have been $6,189,713,551, and, deducting the present price, the additional cash value would have been $3,619,346,616. Now the whole number of slaves in all the States, in 1860, was 3,950,531, multiplying which by $300, as their average value, would make all the slaves in the Union worth $1,185,159,300. Deduct this from the enhanced value of the farm lands of the South as above, and the result would be $2,434,087,316 as the gain in the price of farms by emancipation. This is independent of the increased value of their unoccupied lands, and of their town and city property.
By census tables of 1860, 33 and 36, the total value of the products of agriculture, mines, and fisheries in the Free States was $4,100,000,000, and of the Slave States $1,150,000,000, making the products of the Free States in 1860 nearly 4 to 1 of the Slave States, and $216 per capita for the Free States, and for the Slave States $94 per capita. This is exclusive of commerce, which would greatly increase the ratio in favor of the North, that of New York alone being nearly equal to that of all the Slave States. Now, multiply the population of the Slave States by the value of the products per capita of the Free States, and the result is $2,641,631,032, making, by emancipation, the increased annual product of the Slave States $1,491,631,032, and in ten years, exclusive of the yearly accumulations, $14,916,310,320.
By the table 35, census of 1860, the total value of all the property, real and personal, of the Free States, was $10,852,081,681, and of the Slave States, $5,225,307,034. Now, the product, in 1860, of the Free States, being $4,100,000,000, the annual yield on the capital was 38 per cent.; and, the product of the Slave States being $1,150,000,000, the yield on the capital was 22 per cent. This was the gross product in both cases. I have worked out these amazing results from the census tables, to illustrate the fact, that the same law, by which slavery retarded the progress of wealth in Virginia, as compared with New York, and of Maryland and South Carolina, as compared with Massachusetts, rules the relative advance in wealth of all the Slave States, as compared with that of all the Free States. I have stated that the statistics of commerce, omitted in these tables, would vastly increase the difference in favor of the Free States, as compared with the Slave States, and of New York as contrasted with Virginia. I shall now resume the latter inquiry, so as to complete the comparison between New York and Virginia. By commerce is embraced, in this examination, all earning not included under the heads of agriculture, manufactures, the mines, or fisheries.
Railroads.—The number of miles of railroads in operation in New York, in 1860, including city roads, was 2,842 miles, costing $138,395,055; and in Virginia, 1,771 miles, costing $64,958,807. (Census table of 1860, No. 38, pp. 230 and 233.) Now, by the same census report, p. 105, the value of the freights of the New York roads for 1860 was as follows: Product of the forest—tons carried, 373,424; value per ton, $20; total value, $7,468,480. Of animals—895,519 tons; value per ton, $200; total value, $179,103,800. Vegetable food—1,103,640 tons; value per ton, $50; total value, $55,182,000. Other agricultural products—143,219 tons; value per ton, $15; total value, $2,148,055. Manufactures—511,916 tons; value per ton, $500; total value, $391,905,500. Other articles—930,244 tons; value, $10 per ton; total value, $9,302,440. Grand total, 4,741,773 tons carried; value per ton, $163. Total values, $773,089,275. Deducting one quarter for duplication, makes 3,556,330 tons carried on the New York roads in 1860; and the value, $579,681,790. The values of the freights on the Virginia roads, as estimated, is $60,000,000, giving an excess to those of New York of $519,681,790, on the value of railroad freights in 1860. The passenger account, not given, would largely increase the disparity in favor of New York.
Canals.—The number of miles of canals in New York is 1,038, and their cost $67,567,972. In Virginia, the number of miles is 178, and the cost $7,817,000. (Census table 39, p. 238.) The estimated value of the freight on the New York canals is 19 times that of the freight on the Virginia canals. (Census.)
Tonnage.—The tonnage of vessels built in New York in 1860 was 31,936 tons, and in Virginia 4,372. (Census, p. 107.)
Banks.—The number of banks in New York in 1860 was 303; capital $111,441,320, loans $200,351,332, specie $20,921,545, circulation $29,959,506, deposits $101,070,273; and in Virginia the number was 65; capital $16,005,156, loans $24,975,792, specie $2,943,652, circulation $9,812,197, deposits $7,729,652. (Table 34, p. 193, Census.)
Insurance Companies.—The risks taken in New York were $916,474,956, or nearly one third of those in the whole Union. Virginia, estimated at $100,000,000; difference in favor of New York $816,474,956. (Census, p. 79.)
Exports and Imports, etc.—Our exports abroad from New York for the fiscal year ending 30th June, 1860, were $145,555,449, and the foreign imports $248,489,877; total of both, $394,045,326. The clearances same year from New York were 4,574,285 tons, and the entries 4,836,448 tons; total of both, 9,410,733 tons. In Virginia, the exports the same year were $5,858,024, and the imports $1,326,249; total of both, $7,184,273; clearances, 80,381 tons, entries, 97,762 tons; total of both, 178,143 tons. (Table 14, Register of United States Treasury.) Revenue collected from customs same year in New York, $37,788,969, and in Virginia $189,816, or 200 to 1 in favor of New York. (Tables, U.S. Com. of Customs.) No returns are given for the coastwise and internal trade of either State, but the tables of the railway and canal transportation of both States show nearly the same proportion in favor of New York as in the foreign trade. Thus the domestic exports from New York for the above year abroad were $126,060,967, and from Virginia $5,833,371. (Same table, 14.) And yet Virginia, as we have seen, had much greater natural advantages than New York for commerce, as well as for mines, manufactures, and agriculture. But slavery has almost expelled commerce from Virginia, and nearly paralyzed all other pursuits.
These tables, taken from the census and the Treasury records, prove incontestably, that slavery retards the progress of wealth and population throughout the South, but especially in Virginia. Nor can the Tariff account for the results; for Virginia, as we have seen, possesses far greater advantages than New York for manufactures. Besides, the commerce of New York far surpasses that of Virginia, and this is the branch of industry supposed to be affected most injuriously by high tariffs, and New York has generally voted against them with as much unanimity as Virginia. But there is a still more conclusive proof. The year 1824 was the commencement of the era of high tariffs, and yet, from 1790 to 1820, as proved by the census, the percentage of increase of New York over Virginia was greater than from 1820 to 1860. Thus, by table I of the census, p. 124, the increase of population in Virginia was as follows:
| From | 1790 | to | 1800 | 17.63 | per cent. |
| " | 1800 | " | 1810 | 10.73 | " |
| " | 1810 | " | 1820 | 9.31 | " |
| " | 1820 | " | 1830 | 13.71 | " |
| " | 1830 | " | 1840 | 2.34 | " |
| " | 1840 | " | 1850 | 14.60 | " |
| " | 1850 | " | 1860 | 12.29 | " |
The increase of population in New York was:
| From | 1790 | to | 1800 | 72.51 | per cent. |
| " | 1800 | " | 1810 | 63.45 | " |
| " | 1810 | " | 1820 | 43.14 | " |
| " | 1820 | " | 1830 | 39.76 | " |
| " | 1830 | " | 1840 | 26.60 | " |
| " | 1840 | " | 1850 | 27.52 | " |
| " | 1850 | " | 1860 | 25.29 | " |
In 1790 the population of Virginia was 748,318, in 1820, 1,065,129, and in 1860, 1,596,318. In 1790 the population of New York was 340,120, in 1820, 1,372,111, and in 1860, 3,880,735. Thus, from 1790 to 1820, before the inauguration of the protective policy, the relative increase of the population of New York, as compared with Virginia, was very far greater than from 1820 to 1860. It is quite clear, then, that the Tariff had no influence whatever in depressing the progress of Virginia as compared with New York.
We have heretofore proved by the census the same position as regards the relative progress of Maryland and Massachusetts, and the same principle applies as between all the Free, as compared with all the Slave States. In New York, we have seen that her progress from 1790 to 1820, in the absence of high tariffs, and, even before the completion of her great canal, her advance in population was much more rapid than from 1820 to 1860. Indeed, it is quite clear that, so far as the Tariff had any influence, it was far more unfavorable to New York than to Virginia, New York being a much greater agricultural as well as commercial State.
Having shown how much the material progress of Virginia has been retarded by slavery, let us now consider its effect upon her moral and intellectual development.
Newspapers AND Periodicals.—The number of newspapers and periodicals in New York in 1860 was 542, of which 365 were political, 56 religious, 63 literary, 58 miscellaneous; and the number of copies circulated in 1860 was 320,930,884. (Census tables, Nos. 15, 37.) The number in Virginia was 139; of which 117 were political, 13 religious, 3 literary, 6 miscellaneous; and the number of copies circulated in 1860 was 26,772,568. Thus, the annual circulation of the press in New York was twelve times as great as that of Virginia. As to periodicals: New York had 69 monthlies, of which 2 were political, 25 religious, 24 literary, and 18 miscellaneous; 10 quarterlies, of which 5 were religious, and 5 literary; 6 annuals, of which 2 were political, 2 religious, and 2 miscellaneous. Virginia had 5 monthlies, of which 1 was political, 2 religious, 1 literary, and 1 miscellaneous; and no quarterlies or annuals. The annual circulation of the New York monthlies was 2,045,000; that of Virginia was 43,900; or more than 43 to 1 in favor of New York.
As regards schools, colleges, academies, libraries, and churches, I must take the census of 1850, those tables for 1860 not being yet arranged and printed. The number of public schools in New York in 1850 was 11,580, teachers 13,965, pupils 675,221; colleges, academies, etc., pupils 52,001; attending school during the year, as returned by families, 693,329; native adults of the State who cannot read or write, 23,341. Public libraries, 11,013; volumes, 1,760,820. Value of churches, $21,539,561. (Comp. Census, 1850.)
The number of public schools in Virginia in 1850 was 2,937, teachers 3,005, pupils 67,438; colleges, academies, etc., pupils 10,326; attending school during the year, as returned by families, 109,775; native white adults of the State who cannot read or write, 75,868. Public libraries, 54; volumes, 88,462. Value of churches, $2,902,220. (Compend. of Census of 1850.) By table 155, same compend, the percentage of native free population in Virginia over 20 years of age who cannot read or write is 19.90, and in New York 1.87, in North Carolina 30.34, in Maryland 11.10, in Massachusetts 0.32, or less than one third of one per cent. In New England, the percentage of native whites who cannot read or write is 0.42, or less than one half of one per cent.; and in the Southern States 20.30, or 50 to 1 in favor of New England. (Compend., table 157.) But, if we take the whole adult population of Virginia, including whites, free blacks, and slaves, 42.05 per cent., or nearly one half, cannot read or write; and in North Carolina, more than one half cannot read or write. We have seen, by the above official tables of the census of 1850, that New York, compared with Virginia, had nearly ten times as many pupils at schools, colleges, and academies, twenty times as many books in libraries, and largely more than seven times the value of churches; while the ratio of native white adults who cannot read or write was more than 10 to 1 in Virginia, compared with New York. We have seen, also, that in North Carolina nearly one third of the native white adults, and in Virginia nearly one fifth, cannot read or write, and in New England 1 in every 400, in New York 1 in every 131, in the South and Southwest 1 in every 12 of the native white adults. (Comp. p. 153.)
These official statistics enable me, then, again to say that slavery is hostile to the progress of wealth and education, to science and literature, to schools, colleges, and universities, to books and libraries, to churches and religion, to the press, and therefore to free government; hostile to the poor, keeping them in want and ignorance; hostile to labor, reducing it to servitude, and decreasing two thirds the value of its products; hostile to morals, repudiating among slaves the marital and parental condition, classifying them by law as chattels, darkening the immortal soul, and making it a crime to teach millions of human beings to read or write. Surely such a system is hostile to civilization, which consists in the education of the masses of the people of a country, and not of the few only. A State, one third of whose population are slaves, classified by law as chattels, and forbidden all instruction, and nearly one fifth of whose adult whites cannot read or write, is semi-civilized, however enlightened may be the ruling classes. If a highly educated chief or parliament governed China or Dahomey, they would still be semi-civilized or barbarous countries, however enlightened their rulers might be. The real discord between the North and the South, is not only the difference between freedom and slavery, but between civilization and barbarism caused by slavery. When we speak of a civilized nation, we mean the masses of the people, and not the government or rulers only. The enlightenment of the people is the true criterion of civilization, and any community that falls below this standard, is barbarous or semi-civilized. In countries where kings or oligarchies rule, the government may be maintained, (however unjustly,) without educating the masses; but, in a republic, or popular government, this is impossible; and the deluded masses of the South never could have been driven into this rebellion, but for the ignorance into which they had been plunged by slavery; nor is there any remedy for the evil but emancipation. If, then, we would give stability and wisdom to the government, and perpetuity to the Union, we must abolish slavery, which withholds education and enlightenment from the masses of the people, who, with us, control the policy of the nation.
With our only cause of ignorance and poverty among the people, and only element of discord among the States, extirpated by the gradual removal of slavery and negroism, we would bound forward in a new and wonderful career of power and prosperity. Our noble vessel of state, the great Republic, freighted with the hopes of humanity, and the liberties of our country and of mankind, still bearing aloft the flag of our mighty Union, indissoluble by domestic traitors or conspiring oligarchs, will, under Divine guidance, pass over the troubled waters, reassuring a desponding world, as she glides into the blessed haven of safety and repose. All the miracles of our past career would be eclipsed by the glories of the future. We might then laugh to scorn the impotent malice of foreign foes. Without force or fraud, without sceptre or bayonet, our moral influence and example, for their own good, and by their own free choice, would control the institutions and destiny of nations. The wise men of the East may then journey westward again, to see the rising star of a regenerated humanity, the fall of thrones and dynasties, the lifting up of the downtrodden masses, and the political redemption of our race, not by a new dispensation, but by the fulfilment thus of the glorious prophecies and blessed promises of Holy Writ. And can we not lift ourselves into that serene atmosphere of love of country and of our race, above all selfish schemes or mere party devices, and contemplate the grandeur of these results, if now, now, NOW we will only do our duty? Now, indeed, is the 'accepted time,' now is the day of the 'salvation' of our country. And now, as in former days of trouble, let us remember the mighty dead, as, when living, silencing the voice of treason, and calming the tempest of revolution, he uttered those electric words: 'Union and Liberty, now and forever, one and inseparable!'
If we could rise to the height of prophetic vision, behold the procession of coming events, and, unrolling the scroll of advancing years and centuries, contemplate our Union securing by its example the rights and liberties of man, would we not welcome any sacrifice, even death itself, if we could thus aid in accomplishing results so god-like and sublime? But, whether in gloom or glory, chastened for national sins or rewarded for good deeds, let us realize the great truth, that the Almighty directs nations as well as planets in their course, governs the moral as well as the material world, never abdicating for a moment the control of either; and that persevering opposition to his laws must meet, in the end, retributive justice.
PROMISE.
O watcher for the dawn of day,
As o'er the mountain peaks afar
Hangs in the twilight cold and gray,
Like a bright lamp, the morning star!
Though slow the daybeams creep along
The serried pines which top the hills,
And gloomy shadows brood among
The silent valleys, and the rills
Seem almost hushed—patience awhile!
Though slowly night to day gives birth,
Soon the young babe with radiant smile
Shall gladden all the waiting earth.
By fair gradation changes come,
No harsh transitions mar God's plan,
But slowly works from sun to sun
His perfect rule of love to man.
And patience, too, my countrymen,
In this our nation's fierce ordeal!
Bright burns the searching flame, and then,
The dross consumed, shall shine the real.
Wake, watcher! see the mountain peaks
Already catch a golden ray,
Light on the far horizon speaks
The dawning of a glorious day.
Murky the shadows still that cling
In the deep valleys, but the mist
Is soaring up on silver wing
To where the sun the clouds has kissed.
Hard-fought and long the strife may be,
The powers of wrong be slow to yield,
But Right shall gain the victory,
And Freedom hold the battle field.
AMERICAN DESTINY.
We would study the question of American Destiny in the light of common sense, of history, and of science.
It may be unusual to illustrate from science a principle which is to have a political application; but we shall endeavor to do so, believing it to be unexceptionably legitimate. The different departments of science, science and history, science and politics, have been, heretofore, kept quite distinct as to the provinces of inquiry to which it was presumed they severally belonged. Each has been cultivated as if it had no relation external to itself, and was not one of a family of cognate truths. This, however, is undergoing a gradual but certain change, in which it is becoming constantly more manifest that between the different departments of human inquiry there are mutual dependences and complicated interrelations, which enable us, by the truths of one science, to thread the mazes of another.
There are certain general laws which pertain with equal validity to many departments of activity in the natural world; there are parallel lines of development as the result of the inherent correlation of forces. Thus, if we have found a great general law in physiology, that same law may apply with equal aptness to astronomy, geology, chemistry, and even to social and political evolution.
One of these general laws, and perhaps the most comprehensive in its character and universal in its application of any yet known, we will announce in the language of Guyot, the comparative geographer: 'We have recognized in the life of all that develops itself, three successive states, three grand phases, three evolutions, identically repeated in every order of existence; a chaos, where all is confounded together; a development, where all is separating; a unity, where all is binding itself together and organizing. We have observed that here is the law of phenomenal life, the formula of development, whether in inorganic nature or in organized nature.'
This answers for the department of physics and physiology. We will let Guizot, the historian, speak for the political and social realm: 'All things, at their origin, are nearly confounded in one and the same physiognomy; it is only in their aftergrowth that their variety shows itself. Then begins a new development which urges forward societies toward that free and lofty unity, the glorious object of the efforts and wishes of mankind.'
We find an illustration of this law in the simplest of the sciences, if the nebular hypothesis be true, as most astronomers believe. We have first the chaotic, nebulous matter, then the formation of worlds therefrom, by a continuous process of unfolding. Each world is a unit within itself, but part of a still greater unit composed of a system of worlds revolving around the same sun; and this greater unit, part of one which is still greater—a star cluster, composed of many planetary systems, and subject to the same great cosmical laws. If the theory be correct, we find, in this example, the heterogeneous derived from the simple, and far more completely an organized unit, with all its complexity, than was the chaotic mass from which development originally proceeded.
We find additional illustration in coming to our own world. Its primeval geography was simple and uniform; there was little diversity of coast line, soil, or surface. But the cooling process of the earth went on, the surface contracted and ridged up, the exposed rocks were disintegrated by the action of the atmosphere and the waters; the sediment deposited in the bottom of the seas was thrown to the surface; continents were enlarged, higher mountain ranges upheaved, the coasts worn into greater irregularity of outline; and everywhere the soil became more composite, the surface more uneven, the landscape more variegated.
Corresponding changes have taken place in the climate. At first the temperature of the earth was much warmer than now, and uniform in all parallels of latitude, as is shown by the fossil remains. Now we have a great diversity of climate, whether we contrast the polar with the torrid regions, or the different seasons of the temperate zone with each other.
The same law of increasing diversity obtains in the fauna and flora of the various periods of geological history. The earliest fossil record of animal life is witness to the simplicity of organic structure. Among vertebrated animals, fishes first appear, next reptiles, then birds; still higher, the lower type of animals which suckle their young; and as the strata become more recent, still higher forms of mammalia, till we reach the upper tertiary, in which geologists have discovered the remains of many animals of complex structure nearly allied to those which are now in existence. In the historic period appear many organic forms of still greater complexity, with man at the head of the zoological series.
In this glance of zoological progress, we discover increasing complication of two kinds; for while the individual structure has been constantly becoming more complex, there are now in existence the analogues of the lowest fossil types, which, with the highest, and with all the intermediate, present a maze and vastness of complication, which, in comparison with the homogeneity of the aggregate of early structure, is sufficiently obvious and impressive.
There is in this view, still another outline of increasing complexity. At first the same types prevailed all over the earth's surface; but as the soil, atmosphere, and climate changed, and the animal structure became more complex and varied, the limits of particular species became more and more localized, till the earth's surface presented zoological districts, with the fauna of each peculiar to itself.
But, what of unitization? Here, there appears to be divergence only, and that continually increasing.
Guyot says that 'the unity reappears with the creation of man, who combines in his physical nature all the perfections of the animal, and who is the end of all this long progression of organized beings.' Agassiz recognizes man alone as cosmopolite; and Comte regards him as the supreme head of the economy of nature, and representative of the fundamental unity of the anatomical scale.
But another and more obvious example of unitization in complexity, is derivable from the consideration of the animal organism, and will soon be given.
We will merely mention in passing, that the most complex animals, in the various stages of fetal development through which they pass, correspond to the types of structure which are permanent in the lower forms of animal life. Thus, in the zoological chain, there are beings of all grades, from the most simple in structure to the most complex; and the most complex animal, in its development from the ovum or egg, passes through all these grades of structure, ending in that which is above all, and distinctively its own. 'Without going into tedious details, man presents, as regards the most important of his constituent structures, his nervous system, the successive characteristics of an avertebrated animal, a fish, a turtle, a bird, a quadruped, a quadrumanous animal, before he assumes the special human characteristics.' (Draper.)
Our purpose being to show that while complexity of structure is constantly increasing, unitization, or the organized dependence of one part on another, is, at the same time, becoming more complete, we shall refer briefly to the comparative anatomy and physiology of animals. There is in this connection such wealth of material—a long chain of animal beings with all grades of structure from very simple to very complex; each complex animal, in its development from the ovum, passing through all the lower types of structure in succession; so many new organs and functions arising in the course of this development; each organ so arising, becoming, in its turn, more complex in structure, more specialized in function, and more dependent on the office of other organs;—in the midst, I say, of all this wealth of material, indicated here in a great general and imperfect manner, the difficulty, in so brief an exposition as this, is to know what facts to seize upon as calculated to illustrate most aptly the principle under consideration.
The development of the senses, with reference to their organs, nerves, and functions, presents a striking illustration of increasing complexity.
In the lowest forms of animal life, we find general sensibility only, and it is claimed that this exists in the lowest forms, without even the presence of nerves. But as we rise higher in the scale, the special organs of sense gradually become developed—one new sense after another appears; but this is not the only line of increasing complexity. When an organ of sense first appears, its function is of the simplest character; and it is only when we reach the highest types of animal life that it performs the greatest variety of offices peculiar thereto. That of touch is, at first, but crude and simple, becoming delicate and complicated only in the highest types. The sense of pain is a differentiated function, possessed only in a slight degree by reptiles and fishes, and probably not at all by animals still lower in the scale.
The eye-spots of star fishes and jelly fishes simply distinguish light from darkness, much as we do with our eyes closed. There are many degrees of development from this condition of the inferior organism to that of the human eye, which distinguishes the nicest shades of color, distance, form, and size of objects, and the play of passion on the human countenance.
The same variety of function is acquired by the ear in its development from its simplest to its most complex form. In the higher animals, the organ of hearing is formed of three parts, an external, middle, and internal portion; but in birds the external ear is wanting; in fishes both the external and middle parts are wanting; in mollusks it is reduced to a simple sack of microscopic dimensions, filled with a liquid in which there are otolithes, or pebbly substances. Such an organ can distinguish noises only; it can recognize nothing of the infinite variety of articulations, notes, tones, melodies, harmonies of the human voice and of musical instruments. There is even a great difference between the disciplined, and therefore differentiated ear of a cultured person, and the undisciplined, and therefore less differentiated ear of a boor. Similar specializations of structure and function pertain to the other senses; but we may pass them.
The digestive, circulatory, and respiratory systems, and all the other systems of the animal structure, evince the same law.
The lowest form of the circulating fluid, as in sponges, is simply water containing gases and organic particles; and this can scarcely be spoken of as circulating, for it is merely drawn in and then expelled. A little higher in the scale naturalists find a 'chylaqueous fluid,' which oscillates in the general cavity of the sack-like animal. The true blood is another step in development; and even this organized fluid changes its character as the scale advances. Most animals have no heart; and when the organ does first appear, it is but a simple, rudimentary structure, very unlike the complex machine which plays at the centre of circulation in the higher types.
Though fishes breathe through their gills, receiving all the oxygen they require from the small amount of air in the water, the swimming bladder is in them the rudimentary lung—a very simple structure, indeed, when compared with the more complex arrangement for respiration in the higher animals.
Some animals of gelatinous, and therefore flexible structure, perform digestion by folding their bodies over the food, and pressing the nutritious matter out of it: they extemporize a stomach for the occasion. And even in some of their higher types, in such as have a permanent mouth and stomach, the digestive process is simply a squeezing out of the elements of nutrition. The digestive apparatus, from being a simple sack in the polype and similar organisms, becomes, by a continuous unfolding, the complicated structure which we find in the higher animals, with various organs effecting various parts of the digestive change, and even different parts of the same organ having specialized functions to perform.
The most complex animal proceeds originally from a simple cell; and 'at the two extremes we may contemplate the single germinal membrane of the ovum, which is discharging contemporaneously every function—digesting, absorbing, respiring, etc.; and the complete organic apparatus of man, the stomach, the lungs, the skin, the kidneys, and the liver—mechanisms set apart each for the discharge of a special duty, yet each having arisen, as we know positively from watching the order of their development, from that simple germinal membrane.' (Draper.) This is what one physiologist says of the ovum which is being developed into a complex being. Here is what another says of animals at the lower end of the zoological scale: 'The simplest organisms breathe, exhale, secrete, absorb, and reproduce, by their envelopes alone.' (Lewes.) Here we perceive the resemblance between the ovum of the higher animals and the permanent structure of the lower animals. Indeed, some of the lower forms of animal life are simply cells. How vast the difference between the organism of man, with all its complexity of structure, and that of the Ameba or Actinophrys, which, being merely a homogeneous mass of organic matter, performs all the functions of its simple life without any special organ whatever! Yet, is man any less a unit than the Ameba, or any other simple organism? Does his multiplicity of organs impair the integrity of his anatomical and physiological oneness? Is the circulation independent of respiration? Is digestion independent of the circulation? Can any one organ act independently of the others? Is not the entire series of parts, organs, and functions bound up in complete and inseparable unity? The vicarious action of one organ for another has been a question among physiologists; and if admitted, as in the case of the salivary glands acting for the kidneys in profuse spitting, and the skin for the liver, the vicarious function can only obtain to a slight degree and in a temporary manner. The destruction of any considerable organ involves the destruction of all the rest. I repeat that the integrity of the physiological unity at the top of the scale, is far more complete, with all its complexity, than is the integrity of the physiological unity at the bottom of the scale, with its marked simplicity of structure. By no sort of legerdemain or surgical skill can we make an individual mammal become two. If we divide it, the whole dies. Not so, however, with some of the lower grades of animal existence. Cut a hydra into thirty or forty pieces, and each piece will become a distinct animal—a facsimile of the original one. In quite an analogous way do a large number of animals at the lower end of the scale propagate, by segmentation and division; one individual becoming two, two four, and so on.
Many examples might be adduced to show the absence of organized unity in the lower orders of the animal creation. Thus, in the annelid, which is composed of a great many similar rings, and is regarded as quite a complex creature, there is so little dependence of one part on another, that a number of the rings may be destroyed without any injury to the rest. The Synapta, when in want of food, will amputate its own body to procure the necessary supply; and it has been observed to repeat the operation, until it 'had by degrees eaten away the whole of its body to keep life in the head.' (Quatrefages.) Such a phenomenon as this is very unlike that presented by the higher animals, which, together with their multiplied individuality of part and function, and their infinite variety of physiognomic expression, present, at the same time, a unity of organization so complete, that an injury to one part is instantaneously telegraphed to all parts of the system, and sympathized in by all to a greater or less extent.
As in physiology, the development of the individual corresponds to the development of the entire zoological series; so, when we rise into the psychological realm, do we ascertain that the development of the individual mind corresponds to the development of the mental series from the savage to the civilized. In the physiognomy of the savage there is little variety of expression; he has not differentiated that multiplicity of thought and feeling which moulds the face and plays upon its lineaments in the cultivated Teuton. The same is true of the latter while an infant. But who will say that the cultured man of this age is less a balanced, unitized creature than the child of the cradle, or of the forest? The latter is but a creature of impulse, moved by every appetite, and swayed by every gust of passion. He has no fixed principles for the regulation of his life. There is no presiding power to rule and subordinate the tumultuous and refractory elements of his character, and thus unitize the mental organism and its manifestations. This is what culture gives. Here then we also perceive that with the development of variety and complexity, the element of unity becomes more active and manifest. This view of the progressive unitization of the individual man in a psychological aspect, is very suggestive when taken in connection with the wane of despotism and the growth of liberty, as society and government advance, and it becomes ever less the province of law to govern, and also to regulate.
We have adduced some of the illustrations which physical and physiological science affords of the Law of Universal Development: let us close this part of our subject with the illustrations afforded by the rise and progress of Science as a whole. The first germs of science were very simple, existing in connection with Art, and subserving the purposes of priestcraft. For a long time the range of scientific inquiry was so limited that the same individual was able to grasp it entire. But one branch after another has sprung up, diverging more and more into the realms of the unknown, until no one mind can hope to obtain even a general knowledge of them all.
But this has not been the only tendency of scientific growth. Divergence and differentiation had not proceeded far till the combining and organizing movement began. The more individuality and complexity have threatened to outreach the mental powers and become unmanageable, the more have order and organization shown their ability to subordinate and unitize the seeming diversity of elements. While the sciences continued to increase in number and complexity, they began to overlap and interlace, the principles of one running into the domain of another, and even coördinating and binding together its seemingly incongruous parts.
A simple scientific generalization is based on certain facts which, taken in their collective capacity, mean the truth which is expressed in the formula. A higher generalization embraces those which are simpler, and unites by its expression the truths which they contain into the formula of one great truth. This process goes on, rising constantly higher and higher, the generalizations of the ascending series becoming more comprehensive, and the convergence of all the diversified elements into great general laws more striking and complete. Thus advances the unitizing movement of science; and it is now progressing with a steadiness and certainty unknown in former periods of research. Great minds are at this moment occupied in the discovery and verification of these great unitizing laws. Thus we perceive, that while science has developed a bewildering mass of individual facts and minor principles, it has also developed the germs of a unity which is destined to unfold with a richness and magnificence of result heretofore unknown in the annals of human inquiry.
As the special departments of science have testified, so also does the general view of all science testify to this Law of Universal Development.
But, what has all this to do with American Destiny? Very much, as may yet appear. It is by the Past only that we can read the Future; and if in history and in all development, there is revealed by the inductive process a great general law, that law becomes the Oracle of Destiny.
A fitting transition from science to history would be ethnology, the science of races, connected as it is with physics, chemistry, and physiology, on the one hand, and with history on the other.
There are different theories in vogue to account for the diversity of human races now in existence. Some refer human origin to an original pair, whose descendants have changed through the action of physical causes, as food, soil, climate, and scenery, and also through the operation of moral ones as dependent on the physical, and therefore secondary thereto, such as manners, customs, and government. Others deduce it from different lines of development, coming up through the zoological scale, and thence passing from the lower to the higher races of men. Others still speak of mankind as originating 'in nations,' each race being fixed in its physical and mental characteristics, and having an origin independent and distinct from all others.
It matters little to our purpose which of these theories may be true, the difference as to aptness of illustration being only one of degree. We prefer, however, to deal with facts in regard to which there is little or no difference of opinion among the theorists themselves.
There are simple and complex peoples or races, as there are simple and complex organisms. Take any primitive race, whether described in history or by some contemporaneous traveller: in a physical point of view, the men are all very nearly alike, and the women likewise. Describe one individual, and you have the description for all other individuals of the same sex belonging to the race. And there is not usually as much difference in the physical appearance of the sexes in primitive races as among those who stand higher in the scale. What is true of their physique, is also true of their minds. As one thinks and feels, so all think and feel—and that, too, without concert; it is the simple expression of an undiversified mental organism. Their faculties are rude and uncultivated; they act chiefly on the perceptive plane, reflecting but little. They are predominantly sensual, not having developed the higher mental activities which pertain to an advanced state of society and result in those great diversities of attainment and expression among individuals of the same people. There are reasons for believing that there was a time when this planet had no human inhabitants but races of this simple type. Great changes have taken place since that day; changes which, by the law of their accomplishment, correspond precisely with the changes which have taken place in the zoological scale. Owing to causes which we may not fully understand, races have been developed which present, each within its own limits, great contrarieties of physical appearance and mental characteristics. Among 'Anglo-Saxons' there is often greater diversity in members of the same family, than you would find in a million individuals of a primitive race. The complex appears, somehow or other, to have been developed from the simple.
The simple fact of a population becoming more numerous, necessitates certain changes—from hunting to pasturage, for example, from pastoral life to agricultural and fixed habitation—and these would affect the habits, modes of thought, and, to some extent, personal appearance. The modification of climate by clearing, draining, and cultivation, and the removal of a people from one climate to another, would effect still other changes. But the intermixture of races by war and immigration has, perhaps, done more than any other cause to produce the great physical diversities which we now find in the higher races. Having traced the stream of warlike immigration from Eastern Asia westward, and thence to Central Europe, and still westward and southward to the shores of the Atlantic, and even across the Mediterranean into Africa, overwhelming the Roman Empire of the West in its course,—observe this tide of human movement, as wave followed wave for centuries, rolling peoples against and over one another, confounding them together, and leaving them upon the same soil, or in close proximity to each other; and, even admitting that they were simple and primitive to begin with, we shall not wonder at the diversified aspect of the people of Europe and their descendants in America. But this is only one series of movements from which has resulted the intermixture of races; there are others, and some, no doubt, beyond the farthest reach of history. The process of intermixture is still going on, especially in the Western World, though by methods usually more peaceful than formerly. The result multiplies itself, and the leading races of mankind are becoming constantly more composite.
The contact and intermixture of races have had a moral result, which, in its turn, acts upon the physical. Mental development has been one of the results of war and immigration; one people learning from another, and striking out new modes of thought from the sheer necessity of new circumstances; and this mental development changing the physiognomic expression and general bearing of the man. This result has been increasing in geometrical progression since history, printing, and the facilities of intercommunication have made the culture of one people contagious to other peoples, and the attainments of one generation available to all the generations that follow. Thus does every movement among the nations conspire to change the simple types into those which are more complex.
The ethnological unity may be less apparent; and before we clearly perceive it, we may have to rise into the consideration of social and political relations, not divorcing these from physiology, without which no question relative to man can be rightly judged. And it may be that after greater development in this direction, the unity of races may become more distinctly pronounced and more readily recognized.
We may observe, in passing, that the same causes which have contributed to this ethnological complexity, have, at the same time, aided in the development of the cosmical idea—the idea of the unity of the universe. At first, tribes had little communication with each other, and knew nothing of geography beyond the limits of their own hunting grounds. They knew as little of the vastness of the earth outside of their domain as of that of the universe. This could only be conjectured from the vantage ground of some degree of intellectual culture, and the idea must remain vague and indefinite till after long ages of real experience and intellectual unfolding. It was not till after Alexander's conquests in the East, the extension of the Roman Empire, the invention of the mariner's compass, the discovery of America, and the circumnavigation of the globe, together with the perfection of optical instruments by the use of which the true character of the celestial bodies was demonstrated, that the cosmical idea became truly a scientific one. (Humboldt.) Thus were the partial and fragmentary notions of early peoples at length corrected, enlarged, unitized.
Closely akin to this is the development of the god-idea. Fetich-worship is that of the rudest people. They see a god in every individual object, in every stream, in every tree, in every stone. All they see is, however, shrouded in mystery, and they have a blind veneration for every object. A step farther, and the developing mind generalizes these objects. The individual trees, for example, are taken collectively, and their divine representative worshipped as the god of the groves. There are, at the same time, other unitizing conceptions of the god-idea. There is a god of the hills, a god of the streams, of the seas, and so on. New classes of divinities may be evolved in the mythological system; the strong and salient passions of our nature may come to have their deities—to be unitized, at length, with all other gods. Meantime, mankind are forming into states, with some degree of regular government; and apparently in accordance with this fact, the gods are subjected to the partial control of one who is greater than all the rest, and who is their father and king, but himself subject to the decrees of Fate. Another grand step, and seemingly in correspondence with the more centralized government of a vast and powerful empire, we hear of one God only, who is all-powerful, and master of Fate itself, with a hierarchy of angels, powers, and principalities, reaching from God to man, and subordinate to the Central Will, which rules all things, whether 'in the armies of heaven or among the inhabitants of the earth.' Thus did the idea of one God eventually swallow up all the others; and the god-idea was completely unitized.
We now come to consider the political and social evolution of mankind, as it appears to be revealed by the comparison of various stages of national growth.
The primitive condition of all races, so far as history and travel reveal it, correspond with what is characterized as homogeneous or unorganized. Socially and politically, individuals of the same sex are all alike. There are no classes in society, no rulers, no aristocrats—no society even—nothing but individuals; and it is here that we find individuality in its purest form. There is no law originating with a sovereign, or with the people, for the adjustment of difficulties; every individual avenges his own wrongs in his own way. Coöperation is scarcely known; there is nothing in their habits, nothing in their social and political relations to bind society together; there are no specialized parts or functions—no dependence of one part on another; it is marked by a homogeneity of structure, if structure it can be called, which is unimpeachable. The only coöperation which obtains beyond the limits of the family, is that of hunting and war; and these exercises develop the need of a chief or leader. The strongest and most daring are self-elected by virtue of individual prowess. But still the chief is very like all the rest of the tribe, lives in the same style, provides for his own wants in the same way, has no special privileges—is merely a chief or leader, and nothing more. And afterward, when he may have acquired some degree of authority, that authority is purely of a military character—civil government is not yet born. Usage comes at length to confirm the chief's right, and human selfishness works out its legitimate results: smaller men are dwarfed, as occasion permits, in order that the one who is greatest may be magnified. His office becomes hereditary, and his family is, at length, fabled to have descended from the gods. This is the tendency of primitive ignorance and superstition: there must be a sensual object for the blind veneration of sensual minds; and the imagination readily provides this, by attributing to the progenitors of their chiefs vast corporeal forms, great strength and skill, undaunted courage, and success in amorous intrigue—the perfection of those qualities which they themselves most covet. Their chiefs or petty kings are now such by divine origin; and when civil relations become developed, one man combines within himself all the prerogatives of civil, military, and religious government.
The ambition and turbulence of the chief or petty king and of his people bring them into hostile conflict with other tribes or petty states; and when victorious, they appropriate the conquered territory, and annihilate, enslave, or extend their rule over the vanquished people. This warlike encroachment and increase of power alarm other states, and they form confederacies or leagues more or less intimate and permanent for resistance and mutual protection. Thus does the unitizing element of government gather strength with the progress of political movement.
The ambitious chieftain, having acquired greater power than his neighbors, conceives of further aggrandizement, undertakes new conquests, attacks the weak, and adds other states to his own, till in time he may have made himself a great sovereign and won a great kingdom. These new conquests impose additional cares on the ruler; but he uses the tools of his power to execute his will; he governs his kingdoms with absolute sway, as a general governs his army; it is a military despotism of the simplest structure, and all prerogatives and interests are merged in and subservient to this one. The civil function is not yet developed as distinct from the military. Only one idea pervades the government, and that is the idea of absolute rule by brute force. Society has as yet developed few elements, has but few interests and little functional diversity; there are only two classes, the ruler and the ruled, the masters and the slaves. There being but few political and social interests to play among each other, there cannot be development for want of activity; there can be little progress of any kind. Such are the simple, unprogressive, one-idea governments which prevailed in the earliest times of which we have any tolerably authentic record, and which still prevail among half-civilized peoples.
Government is simply a growth, a development, and it must correspond to the character of the people out of whose mental status it has sprung. If the people are homogeneous in their mental structure, their social and political interests must be correspondingly homogeneous and simple. The more rude and primitive the minds of any people, the fewer are the relations external to the individual which obtain among them. But when a people, or a mixture of peoples, have developed great versatility of mind, a great variety of tastes, propensities, aspirations, and interests, their social and political institutions become correspondingly heterogeneous and complex. Such are the social and political systems of Middle and Western Europe. There was nothing of the kind in the ancient world. Then the people were more simple and less versatile in their mental habitudes; and a simple, though despotic government was the inevitable outgrowth. Rome was but a military despotism, and it conquered and ruled with military stringency. It was not till the reign of Diocletian that the civil functions were divorced from the military, and then only to a partial extent. It remained for Constantine to carry out more fully what Diocletian had begun, and to divide, or, if you please, to differentiate the governmental functions to an extent which had been altogether unknown before.
The people of the provinces subject to Roman dominion had no recognized rights, no voice in their own government, but were dominated by the central power at Rome. The right of representation, so sacred in modern times as an element of confederate policy, they did not desire nor appreciate; for, when seven provinces of the south of Gaul were commanded by the emperor Honorius to send a representation of their chief men to the city of Arles for the supervision of interests which concerned themselves, they disregarded the mandate. A central despotism maintained Roman unity; and, whenever its iron arm should by any means become weakened, the empire must fall into fragments.
The dissolution of the Roman Empire in the West was the end of one cycle; thence began another—that in which we now are, and which should be of absorbing interest to us. A state of affairs quite unlike anything known before was then inaugurated. Hundreds of years have been required to develop results so as to enable the human mind to divine at all definitely the law of its movement; and hundreds more may be required to develop the full fruition of what was then so inauspiciously begun.
As we are all aware, the Roman Empire of the West was overrun by hordes of barbarians from the North, who annihilated a great portion of the old population, and changed the character of society. But Rome did not die without bequeathing a legacy to be enjoyed by the descendants at least of those by whose hands she had fallen. There was still some remembrance of what Rome was. Guizot says that 'the two elements which passed from the Roman civilization into ours were, first, the system of municipal corporations—its habits, its regulations, its principle of liberty, a general civil legislation common to all; secondly, the idea of absolute power—the principle of order and the principle of servitude.' These elements, though almost latent for a time, were destined to make up and play a conspicuous part in the war of diversified interests and the adjustment of political relations, hundreds of years afterward.
Another element of society at the time of the Fall, was the Church. The barbarians conquered the empire, but the Church conquered them; without gaining much, however, to show for her victory; for, while the barbarians embraced Christianity, they reduced it to barbarism, and were much the same rude, cruel people, after their conversion, that they were before. The Church, however, in its origin and growth, illustrates the law under consideration, in the gradual development of the distinct specialities of organization; and we are now regarding it at a time when it was one element among others, and destined with them, by the interaction of their various forces, to evolve a still higher unity.
Another element in society, at this time, was that which was brought by the conquerors from their native wilds in the free North. They were a rude, and even savage people, with no fixed ideas of property, but living by hunting and pasturage, and driving their herds from one region to another as necessity required. The most marked and distinctive feature in their character, and that which played the most conspicuous part in the social and political drama of the following centuries of development, was their personal independence—their almost absolute individuality, as the result, we believe, of their superior native physical constitution.
They had little or no coöperation in their own country; no combination of civil interests; no settled government. They were apt for adventure, and readily formed into bands of roving warriors; and when pressed forward by the tide of warlike immigration from the East, they conquered the Roman Empire, and divided the lands among themselves. German magnates courted followers in their own country by hospitality, by presents of horses and arms; but in the conquered countries, by grants of land for military service. These grants were at first made during pleasure, then for life, and at length they became hereditary. (Robertson.) In this manner it appears that the feudal system originated—a system which grew into such magnificent proportions in Middle and Western Europe. It was, however, a growth which was five centuries in maturing. (Hallam.)
A curious circumstance, connected with its development, deserves to be noticed, as showing that certain rights, however desirable, and even sacred they may seem to be, must succumb to the prevailing order, however undesirable that system or order might, under other circumstances, appear to be. Allodial lands, or those held in the right of the individual, and for which there was no obligation of service, except in the general defence, were at length swallowed up by the feudal system. In those days of universal anarchy, rapine, and oppression, the rule of might and unrestrained selfishness prevailed to such an extent, that small proprietors, having no means of defence against the strong, were compelled to surrender their allodial title for a feudal one, and do homage to the neighboring lord for the sake of protection. And to such an extent did the abasement of allodial privileges prevail, that it came at length to be recognized as a principle that the feudal arrangement was the only legitimate one; whereupon allodial lands were seized with impunity, and appropriated by the feudal barons. Even the Church was subordinated by the prevailing system. Bishops became feudal lords. The incomes of religious service were, in some cases, seized upon by the irresponsible barons, and disposed of according to the feudal policy. This, however, is but one example of the struggle of a system or movement to subordinate what stands in its way, and become universal; it is a law of history.
The feudal system was a very complete embodiment of despotism. It grew out of the political circumstances and mental status of the times, and could only exist by the warrant of these conditions. It had its redeeming qualities, however, and, no doubt, promoted the conditions and the spirit which prepared the way for its own overthrow and the inauguration of a better system. The isolated and pent-up condition of all classes, together with such culture as was afforded by their mode of life to the inmates of the baronial castle, made the occasion for that general restlessness in society from which proceeded such ready response to the fanatical appeals of Peter the Hermit. The Crusades lasted two hundred years, and contributed to the overthrow of feudalism by the increase of general intelligence and the diminution of the baronial estates.
After the fall of the empire, the cities began to decline, and their government fell, in a great measure, into the hands of the clergy; and thence supervened a kind of ecclesiastical municipal system. Commerce, which some centuries later began to develop, gave renewed importance to the cities; and the activities developed within them were antagonistic to the feudal spirit, and destined to contribute their part, and an important one, to the process of ultimate organization and its accompanying phenomena. The cities at length became free, not without a struggle; for it is not to be supposed that the great barons would passively allow the enfranchisement of a rival power within their own domains. In those rude times, the cities had little intercourse with each other; yet they became independent nearly at the same time, showing that this political phenomenon was also a growth arising out of the condition of the times—the result of political and social causes acting in concert over more than half a continent.
The cities accomplished their political mission by doing something toward establishing law and order, and fostering the germs of freedom. Their example could not but tell upon their immediate neighbors. In some cases they even attacked the nearest feudal lords, and afterward those more remote, compelling them to become citizens. Thus was feudalism overthrown in Italy in the thirteenth century. Elsewhere, commerce had as yet done less for the cities, and their progress was less rapid. But, whenever they appeared, they had the great barons to contend with. The free cities or communities gradually extended intercourse with each other; and for objects of commerce and mutual defence against their enemies, they formed into leagues. Coalitions of the feudal barons also sprung up, and wars between the two systems were frequent and bloody. Feudal France made war on municipal France. The Hanseatic league, embracing at one time eighty-five German cities, maintained successful wars against the monarchs themselves. There was a confederacy of cities in Italy of great power and influence. These movements show that the former isolated condition of European society was no longer compatible with the change which was being gradually brought about in the social elements. We perceive a manifest tendency toward more extensive union; larger combinations were becoming a demand of the times.
But, along with the progress of this tendency to unity, we perceive that society was constantly becoming more diversified in character, and its elements more distinctly defined. The institution of chivalry, the troubadours, and minnesingers had played their part. Besides those great political and social powers, the Church, the barons, the kings, and the free cities, new classes were rising in society, giving it greater complexity, and, by their diversified activities and needs, urging it forward to a more comprehensive and centralized organization. At first, in the twelfth century, the inhabitants of the cities or free communities were composed only of 'small traders and small landed or house proprietors.' 'Three centuries afterward there were added to these, lawyers, physicians, men of letters, and local magistrates.' (Guizot.)
In the rude and chaotic society which succeeded the fall of the empire, there was no occupation honorable but that of arms; but in the course of time, the meed of honor assumed new branches, and fell upon various classes.
The discovery of the Pandects of Justinian in the twelfth century, gave the study of the law a new impulse, and, together with accompanying developments, complicated the administration of justice. Rude and ignorant warriors were no longer adequate to this function; civil processes required a distinct organ; the profession of law arose, and commanded its share of public attention and respect. With the rise of commerce, there was developed a commercial class, which acquired wealth, power, distinction, and a demand for rights. With the revival of learning and philosophy, however unpromising at first, there arose a literary class, which attracted notice and acquired influence.
In the view given of the earlier stages of modern civilization, we perceive, first, a social chaos which obtained for some time after the fall of the empire in the West; secondly, the development out of this chaos, in the course of centuries, of various political and social powers, classes, and interests, which were differentiated from the unorganized mass; thirdly, all these diversified elements, classes, and interests, gradually tending to the formation of more comprehensive relations with each other. There was no general organization of these several elements, in the early periods of the modern cycle. There were what were called kings and kingdoms, but it was not till a comparatively recent period that the government became an integer, a complete organism, with a sensorium and will-power, and a mutual interrelation and dependence of parts and functions. During the prevalence of the feudal system and the rise of the independent communities, European society was composed of innumerable fragments, isolated from each other, and each caring for itself only, looking to no centre as the source of political order and vitality, without organization or head. The king did not rule the barons any more than the barons ruled the king—they were rival powers; the barons and the cities were rival powers; the kings and barons played off the cities against each other. The Church, by the peculiarity of its constitution and character, was related to them all. The clergy were the subjects of the king, the vassals of the baron, and yet the spiritual lords of both, as well as of their feudal peers. And when the Church effected the separation of her own from the political power, she sought, in turn, to subordinate the latter; and secular rulers were obliged to resist her encroachments to save themselves. The kings had no fixed revenue adequate to government, and were the sport of the capricious elements within their own realms. But the Crusades brought all these fragments into closer relations, and broke the power of the feudal lords. The king gained what the barons lost; and with these powerful, turbulent, and refractory subjects out of the way, the cities were easily subordinated. The sovereign acquired at length an adequate revenue and a standing army; he was now enabled to command the resources of his kingdom, and play a king's part in the drama of nations. Thus was consummated the movement of national centralization.
Progress advances by action and reaction; extremes develop each other. It was so in governmental affairs. The movement of unitization ended in the absolute power of the sovereign, who became not only the head of the executive function, but the source of legislation as well. In France, Louis XIV. knew no will but his own; the States General and Parliament were little more than empty names; and in England, Parliament stood in awe of Queen Elizabeth, and the courts did her behests. The sovereigns were absolute. But with the culmination of royal prerogative and centralized government, there were also an increase of intelligence, greater facilities for intercommunication, and, as we have seen, a diversity of social and political forces interrelated, and acting and reacting upon each other in a manner quite unprecedented. The inquiry and criticism of plebeian minds were becoming more daring, and there was a stir and a restlessness in society, which made bad subjects for an absolute monarch. The religious Reformation, which began in Germany and spread to the westward, was but the legitimate result of the intellectual agitation which preceded it; and the political absolutism of kings could no more expect exemption from searching criticism and final revolution than the religious absolutism of the Pope. The German Reformation was blind to the magnitude and significance of its own mission; for while its leaders denounced reason, it was in its essential nature a protest against priestly domination over intellect, and a plea for the right of free inquiry. Agitation, of whatever kind, is contagious; and the energetic play of this diversity of plebeian forces must needs result in the recognition of a popular element in the government, more or less formal in its character. The government of an intelligent people must emanate from the popular will, to a very great extent, whatever the form of government may be. If Queen Elizabeth and Louis XIV. were more absolute than the sovereigns of our day, it was because the French and English people had not then developed that versatility of genius, that intelligence and freedom of inquiry, that self-appreciation and dignity of character for which they have since become so conspicuous. With the increase of intelligence and self-respect among the people, there originated a popular branch of government to look after their interests, and it grew with their growth. Through this channel there came a pressure upon the throne, which must needs yield, or be overturned by the surges of revolution. The examples of Charles I. and Louis XVI. were extreme. The popular element has since then usually accomplished its ends with less turbulence and commotion. It has been less violent, but none the less effective. Since the Restoration in England, the popular will has been making itself felt in national affairs more and more. And in France, even a Napoleon, mighty and original as he was, had to consult popular tastes, and, in a great measure, conform thereto. We have heard a great deal about the tyranny and usurpation of Louis Napoleon; but he, too, must conform to the predominance of public feeling in France, or that public feeling—'public opinion'—would burst out in a torrent of revolution which would overwhelm him. This introduction of the popular element into government is a result of the developing process, which has made government an organism of almost infinite complexity.
As we have seen, while primitive peoples remained in an isolated and exclusively individualistic condition, there were few civil interests; and these few the sovereign was not concerned with, so that he could discharge in person all the functions of his simple government. But, when the civil interests had grown into greater magnitude and diversity, and the pressure of their administration was upon the throne, the affairs of government became too burdensome for one man. A division of labor became necessary. The order of priests originated at an early day, and took charge of religion. The king, in time, ceased to march at the head of his army, and sent his generals instead. Not being able to hear and decide all causes, he named judges to administer justice; and thus the process of functional differentiation began, and kept on without abatement as the needs of the government required. There was a time when an Englishman had no conception of a prime minister. (Hume.) In this age we cannot conceive of government without such a functionary, whether administered in the name of king or president. With the development of new interests arose new branches in the administration of government. The constant rise of new industrial elements; the increasing demand for the facilities of intercommunication; the development of trade and commerce; the interrelation of interests within, and the complication of affairs without, have given rise to new departments in the government, with a hierarchy of subordinate bureaus; while the interests of towns, counties, and states have necessitated an analogous scale of functionaries, making, on the whole, an amazing complication of governmental machinery. This increase of complexity is precisely analogous to the order of development in every department of nature; it is perfectly in accordance with the second feature of the law which we have recognized as a Law of Universal Development.
Some of our economists may object on principle to so much complexity, and attempt to simplify government by eliminating certain terms of the series. Let them try it; God is mightier than they! There may be governmental abuse in regard to the complexity of its functions; but the thing itself is simply in the order of destiny. Man develops it, because he must; it is the historical result of the accumulation of all human activities.
There is one kind of simplification, however, which should be closely observed; and that is to accomplish the object of any governmental function in the most direct and economical manner. There is great room for improvement in this respect. Nature, in the midst of all her growing complexities, exemplifies the principle of the greatest possible result with the greatest possible economy of means, considering in all cases the obstacles to be overcome. Let government do the same, and see that every channel of official activity be thoroughly purged of corruption and abuse.
This development of organic complexity is just as necessary and inevitable in the political as in the animal economy; and the performance of any function, in the one case as in the other, depends for the degree of its completeness on the extent to which 'the division of labor' is carried through the complexity of the organic structure. There are no grounds of apprehension from this source whatever. In regard to government, this increase of complexity is most strikingly observable in the executive department; and it is worthy of notice that while this department of government is in general becoming less tyrannical and relatively weaker with reference to the legislative department, it is also becoming more complex: as tyranny recedes, complexity advances. There is no point better sustained in history than the general fact that, as government increases the multiplicity of its machinery, it gradually relaxes its interference with the private rights of individuals.
After man has laid aside his primitive habits of selfish isolation, and, though still rude and untutored, has come, through the mere increase of numbers, into a more compact form of society, the government, however circumscribed as to territorial limits, assumes a despotic and intermeddling character. Such was the government of the feudal lords during the middle ages, and of the kings at a still later day. Laws were made for the regulation of dress, as to quality and cut for particular classes, and the number of garments which any person might have in a year. Citizens were not allowed to keep certain kinds of furniture; and the dishes they might have for dinner and supper respectively were definitely and rigidly prescribed. The wages of the laborer were fixed by law to the great advantage of the lordly employer: this, however, was a very natural sequence to the abolition of villanage or vassal servitude. The law made service at particular trades compulsory; and decided where certain kinds of manufacturing should be carried on; and how an article should be made, and how sold when made. This interference affected every department of the individual's private life. Religious interference need only be mentioned; it is well known. As Buckle declares, in speaking of the interference of governments, 'It may be emphatically said that they have taxed the human mind. They have made the very thoughts of men pay toll.' Queen Elizabeth was a very great sovereign, but she meddled with very small matters. She disliked the smell of woad, a plant used for blue dye, and thereupon prohibited its cultivation. She was displeased with long swords and high ruffs, and commissioned her officers to break the swords and abate the ruffs. None of the nobility dared marry without her consent; no one could travel without her permission. Foreign commerce was subject to her capricious will. The star chamber, the court of high commission, the court martial, the warrants of the secretary of state and privy council, were instruments of terror to the subject, who had no remedy by law. There was no safety but for harmless stupidity or slavish conformity. Individual independence was impossible. Every noble, manly head that appeared above the servile mass, was unceremoniously hid away in a dungeon, or struck off on a scaffold.
Such annoying and insolent meddling on the part of governments no longer exists. There can be no such thing among an enlightened people. As the mass of mankind, or we will say their leaders or representatives, become more cultured, they demand a larger field of individual freedom, and organize a pressure upon government, which in time effects its object, and the oppression is removed, or gradually becomes relaxed and obsolete.
Observing that the differentiation of function obtains chiefly in the administrative department of government, and putting the two general facts of history together,—first, that while the subject is enlarging the domain of individual liberty, and secondly, the government becoming more complex in structure and activity,—we infer that, through the advance of general intelligence and the multiplication of interests, government is changing its character from an instrument of compulsion and force to an instrument of management and direction, wielded by the governed themselves for the benefit of their own diversified and interrelated interests.
In following the course of individuality, we find it simple and almost absolute in savage life; then it is overpowered and disappears under the despotic and one-idea governments of ancient times, and of Asia still; at length it reappears, and gathers strength with every advancing age, with every discovery, with every improvement, with every flash of intelligence, till it has accumulated, in its course, all the diversified means of expression and gratification afforded by art, literature, and all the social appliances of a complex and exalted form of society;—and the end is not yet: there will be more freedom, other methods of expression, new facilities for enjoyment and happiness. Its destiny is a glorious one!
It may be well in this connection to recall to mind the principle that, with the rise of new functions and the increase of complexity, unity obtains its completest form and fullest expression. These two elements are by no means antagonistic; they belong together, and one necessitates the other.
It is a general fact of history that there is a relation between the culture of a people and the geographical extent of their voluntary combinations. Whilst rude and uncultivated, with no facilities for intercommunication, they form no permanent associations of any considerable magnitude; but with the advance of general intelligence, the rise of distinct classes and industrial and commercial interests, together with the improvement of facilities for travel and trade, and for the intercommunication of thought and feeling, there is developed a general bond of sympathy between larger masses of mankind, and the natural result is more extensive combination. The unity becomes more comprehensive. We have observed this in our glance at European development.
Let us trace the course of one of the lines of political movement. In a primitive society, as among the ancient Germans, each individual has the right of avenging himself, of taking justice into his own hands, and determining what the measure of satisfaction shall be. The right of private war, derived from rude society, remained for a long time in Western Europe, and pertained to the clergy as well as to laymen—a custom which was withal not very Christian-like. A step beyond this, and there was recognized a regular method of determining the amount of satisfaction due for an injury: composition for crime became fixed. We observe here a development from absolute individuality in the matter of determining justice to the recognition of a conventionalism—a law which was the product of the sense of many individuals acting, it may have been, in some cases, without conscious concert, yet in a social and coöperative way. As mankind grew out of their original rude conditions, they relinquished the individual prerogative of taking justice into their own hands, and appealed therefore to a tribunal which was recognized as adequate to this end, and the jurisdiction of which seems to have had a constant tendency to enlarge its territorial limits. Thus, for a time, the feudal barons claimed the final adjudication of all difficulties among their own vassals; but, gradually, dissatisfied clients appealed to the king, who encouraged them to do so, and at length the throne became the universally recognized centre and source of all formal justice.
This was a movement occupying centuries for its consummation, a movement which extended the jurisdiction of the tribunal of justice from the territory of a private individual to the territory of an entire kingdom, collecting the isolated jurisdictions of every individual in barbarian society, and uniting them all together in the recognized sovereign of a consolidated nation.
Now, while it is true that 'the history of progress is the history of successful struggles against coercion and authoritative direction, and in favor of human spontaneity and free motion' (Slack); it is also true, as we have seen in tracing the course of the administration of justice, that 'the progress of civilization consists in the substitution of the general for the individual will, of legal for individual resistance.' (Guizot.)
The development of law, or of a general method, is the necessary result of social interchange, through which thoughts and feelings become contagious and mould a general will. In primitive society, individuals are isolated, and it matters little to others what any individual does; hence he is allowed to settle his own difficulties in his own way. He is let alone in a way so terrible, that similar treatment would be social death to a man of culture. We repeat, there is nothing like absolute individuality, except among isolated and unsocial savages. In an advanced state of society, human interests become interrelated—a complete network of complexity; and what any particular individual does becomes a matter of interest to many, since the many are, to a certain extent, affected thereby. The individual of civilization has developed relations external to himself, and his rights can only be secured and his tastes and wants gratified by mutual understanding, coöperation, and combination. His individuality is of a far higher order than that of the uncultivated man; and precisely because it is higher, does it develop law as the embodiment of the general will, and require organization for its expression. 'It is through association that the highest form of individuation becomes possible; and nationality wisely developed will terminate in a cosmopolitan identity of interests, and a general unity founded upon a reciprocity of services among all the divisions of mankind.' (Slack.)
It is owing to this same fact of the interrelation and dependence of interests, that the movement of unitization has not stopped in Europe with the organization of a distinct government for each nation. We have observed that when primitive individuals develop relations with each other, they form into small societies, and that when these develop relations with like societies, they unite and form larger associations; and further, that these states, cities, baronies, come at length to develop relations with each other, and the result is their union into kingdoms. But this tendency of growth does not cease here. One nation cannot long remain isolated and distinct from other nations. The interests of one kingdom become, in many ways, interrelated with the interests of other kingdoms; and there must be new governmental appliances to meet the case. Diplomacy, a new function of government, arose from this necessity. This is a political activity of quite recent development: it originated in the fifteenth century. Like all progressive developments, it was at first immature; 'it was not till the seventeenth century that it became really systematic; before then it had not brought about long alliances, great combinations, and especially combinations of a durable nature, directed by fixed principles, with a steady object, and with that spirit of consistency which forms the true character of established government.' (Guizot.)
Who can say that we have yet seen the end of this process of national development? Centuries have been required for all great changes affecting the destiny of man: the centuries of the great Future may yet develop a unity among the nations themselves—a distinct political organism for the regulation of national interests, which are constantly becoming more interrelated and complex. As cities, states, and baronies were developed from individuals and tribes, and as kingdoms were developed from cities, states, and baronies, so may a mightier political fabric than has yet been known be developed from the family of nations!
The law, we repeat, is, that with the advance of social dependence and complexity, the principle of unitization becomes practically more intimate and comprehensive. It is to this law that nations owe that vitality of which diplomatists and constitutional lawyers take cognizance. By virtue of this law, a nation is a living organism, resisting with all its vital force whatever may threaten it with dissolution. Hence the utter folly of cherishing the idea of a 'peaceable separation' of confederated states. There can be no such thing in the order of nature. The rupture and division of a nation is a reaction against the spirit of social progress, a backward movement against the current of civilization, a terrible outrage to the organizing forces of the political realm, and can only be effected through violence and bloodshed. The more mature civilization becomes, the more difficult to effect disunion, the more terrible the penalty, and the more enduring, discordant, and wretched the consequences.
The law of unitization is a universal one, being an accompaniment of all unfolding, and man worse than wastes his energy in fighting against it. It is a great law of Universal Progress; and in lifting our hands against it, we are presuming to measure arms with a Power which will be sure to overwhelm us with confusion and defeat. We must consent to go with the grand movements of the Universe, and to march to the step of Destiny, or be crushed under the resistless tread of advancing peoples!
The course of industrial, mechanical, and commercial progress from savage to civilized life, goes to illustrate and confirm the view which we have taken of the course of political development.
Among the least cultivated tribes of mankind, the family is wholly adequate to itself, there being no dissimilarity of industrial function, except between the husband and wife. The family builds its own hut, makes its own weapons, kills its own game—in short, provides for all its own needs. What is industrially true of one family is true of all others; there is no division of labor, no exchange of products. They have no accumulated property, no fixed habitation, but wander from place to place, as the attractions of their simple life may lead them. But when population becomes more numerous, and neither hunting nor pasturage is sufficient for their support, the cultivation of the soil is resorted to, and new wants are developed. The division of labor, the differentiation of the industrial function begins. One man cultivates the soil, another works in iron, another in wood, and so on; and these specialities, in their turn, assume new branches. Take agriculture for example: At first every husbandman grows all that he needs for himself and family; after a while he observes that his soil is better adapted to one kind of crop than another, and he devotes himself more exclusively to its cultivation. A similar result with a different crop obtains on a different soil and in a different locality; and thus do the specialities of soil and climate result in the specialization of agriculture. These diversities of occupation with reference to the soil, wood, metals, imply the exchange of products; but this must obtain to a very limited extent while neighbors are remote, and the means of travel and transportation defective. With few roads, and commerce undeveloped, there is little intercommunication, little culture, little civilization. This was the condition of Scotland as late as the middle of the eighteenth century. (Buckle.) England had some external commerce as early as the thirteenth century (Hallam), but did not send a ship of her own into the Mediterranean till the fifteenth. (Robertson.) Think of the difference between then and now!
The making of tools, implements, and fabrics is at first carried on solely by individuals working alone, but at length, machinery comes into use, the elements are used as driving power, and manufacturing establishments arise having a complicated organization. The division of labor has been all the time becoming more complete, till now a single workman manages but a part of the process of making an implement or a fabric, which must pass through many hands in succession before it is completed. All are familiar with this fact. It is exactly analogous to that which we observe in the animal economy. Low in the zoological scale, one membrane performs all the organic functions; higher in the scale, there are different organs to perform the distinct functions. When the stomach and liver first appear, they are very simple in structure, and as simple in function; it is just so with the manufactories in the industrial organism. But the stomach and liver become more complicated as the scale rises; it is just so with the manufactories as civilization advances. Animals lowest in the scale have no heart—no circulation. It is just so with society—if society it may be called—which is lowest in the scale; it has no exchange of products—no commercial circulation. The parallelism is complete.
Further, as already specified, we find in the animal organism, that the dependence of parts and functions upon each other becomes greater with the increase of complexity; that unitization at the top of the scale, in the midst of an almost infinite complication of organic structures and functions, has a completeness and significance which it cannot have in the simple organism at the bottom of the scale. The same precisely is true of the social organism. At the bottom of the scale, there is no dependence of one part on another—no coöperation—no proper unity—nothing but simple individual life. Higher in the scale, there is dependence of one element of society on another; there must be coöperation, combination, organization, a tendency, at least, toward unity.
This is well exemplified by industrial and commercial development. With regard to manufacturing, there is specialization, not only in the handiwork, but also in the locality of production. Thus, in Great Britain, where this development has most fully matured itself, 'the calico manufacture locates itself in this county, the woollen-cloth manufacture in that; silks are produced here, lace there, stockings in one place, shoes in another; pottery, hardware, cutlery, come to have their special towns; and ultimately, every locality becomes more or less distinguished from the rest by the leading occupation carried on in it. Nay, more, this subdivision of functions shows itself, not only among the different parts of the same nation, but among different nations.' (Westminster Review.) Some of our economists object to this process, and would bring all kinds of productive labor into the same district; but a law higher than their theories brings artisans of the same kind into the neighborhood of each other;—it is the coöperative action of the principles of differentiation and unitization.
The effect of this process is to make one locality dependent on another locality. Once, as we have seen, the family was adequate to its own needs; now, we perceive the industrial producers of one district have become dependent on each other, and on the products of other districts and nations, for the supply of their needs. This industrial division and concentration gives increased importance to commerce, without which there could be no industrial development. It is thus that these two activities are separating the elements of society in order to bind them the more firmly together.
The improvement of roads, rivers, harbors, the construction of canals, railroads, and telegraphs, the development of industry, the extension of commerce, the advance of general culture, and the consequent increase of human wants, is making society a very complicated structure;—indeed, it has nerve and tissue, and is becoming very sensitive. The loss of a crop in one country affects all other countries. The burning of a city, or even of a great manufacturing establishment, is really felt to the remotest ends of civilization. A commercial crisis on either shore of the Atlantic shocks the whole civilized world. A rebellion in the United States is affecting the agriculture of the whole country, the production of a staple on three continents, manufacturing in France and New and Old England, commerce everywhere. Every partisan clique, every political court and cabinet, even political destiny itself, throughout the whole world, reels with every surge of a distant revolution! How different from the condition even of Europe in the twelfth century, when a whole city or barony, an entire kingdom, or half the continent even, might have sunk beneath, the ocean, and the rest of the world have known nothing of it by its social results!
Thus, as in the undeveloped organism there is a want of dependence and sensitiveness, so is there the same want in undeveloped society. As in the higher organic structures there is a high degree of unity and sensitiveness, an injury to the remotest part affecting instantaneously the whole organism; so, precisely, is the same true of society in its higher stages of development. The law is universal; it governs the organic as well as the inanimate, the social as well as the organic world. Hence the reason why the rupture of Europe, on the death of Charlemagne, into provinces and kingdoms loosely united, could not prevent the ultimate organization of national government, and the rise of relations external to the individual nation, out of which diplomacy grew, for the consummation of a policy above the nations themselves. Obstructions may be thrown in the way of unitization, but it will express itself in some form or other. If, on account of the viciousness of primitive conditions from which it has been developed, modern Europe cannot yet exist as a union of states under one great and glorious government, it will, nevertheless, approximate that union, as best it can, and consummate vast national leagues, which are becoming constantly more comprehensive and permanent as civilization advances.
WAS HE SUCCESSFUL?
'Do but grasp into the thick of human life! Every one lives it—to not many is it known; and seize it where you will, it is interesting.'—Goethe.
'Successful.—Terminating in accomplishing what is wished or intended.'—Webster's Dictionary.
CHAPTER XV.
Our hero starts once more with a new field before him—the field where all his hopes and aspirations have been centred since he first was capable of comprehending the shrewd advice of Hiram Bennett, of the firm of H. Bennett & Co.
Yes, he starts with a new field in view, unencumbered by any love affair, and free from all entanglements of that nature—indeed, of any nature.
I have endeavored to be so minute in this history as to give the reader a proper idea of young Meeker at the time he was ready to launch upon New-York life. He was now nearly twenty-three years old, and fully competent, by his previous education and experience, to undertake any kind of business.
Mr. Bennett, with whom Hiram had become a great favorite, looked confidently to securing him in his establishment. It is true, he had attempted to make no positive engagement with his namesake in advance, but for the last year he always spoke to him as if, in due time, he was to enter his service as a matter of course. Hiram did not assent nor dissent to such observations; but, really, he had not the slightest idea of taking a situation with his cousin. He did not like 'dry goods' to begin with. He thought the trade offered too little scope for enterprise, unless, indeed, one had good foreign connections, and even then he had his objections to it. The competition was more active, the credits longer, and the risks were greater, than in other commercial or mercantile pursuits. The question, as you may naturally suppose, had occupied his serious attention for years; but he kept his counsel, and never spoke of his designs.
The first that was known of Hiram's whereabouts, he was established as the junior clerk in a first-class ship chandler's store in South street. It was rather difficult to obtain such a situation; but the reader well knows that, once in it, Hiram will not fail to merit the approbation of his employers.
Singular to say, he was indebted for the place to that scapegrace Hill. The head clerk was Hill's cousin, himself utterly unlike his relation, yet a good deal attached to him. Hiram, who made it a rule never to lose sight of anybody, always managed to fall in with Hill (who had quit Joslin) whenever he came to the city, and on one occasion Hill introduced him to this cousin. He managed to make himself very agreeable, and an intimacy commenced, which ended in Hiram's obtaining the place of the junior clerk, who was about leaving. Of course, Hiram came backed with the highest recommendations, so that his friend had really to assume no responsibility on his behalf. Thus he secured the place.
A 'ship chandler!' Reader, have you any idea of his occupation? You have doubtless some business notion of commerce, or at least a romantic idea of ships on the ocean, their sails spread to favorable breezes, or closehauled, braving adverse gales—joyous in fine weather, defiant in the tempest—yes, you know or feel something about this. But to enable the good ship to pursue her way, she must be 'provided.' She must not only have wherewithal to feed crew and passengers, but every special notion which can be conceived of in the ship's 'husbandry.' From out a ship chandler's establishment comes everything, directly or indirectly, which shall furnish the vessel.
Step in, and look through such a store. Taking the interest I hope you do in Hiram, pray devote a few moments to visiting the place where he has resolved to begin his New-York life. You won't find it an agreeable spot. Nothing to compare with the neat, well-arranged office at Burnsville—pleasant Burnsville!—nor even as attractive as the country store of Benjamin Jessup, at Hampton. It is dark and disagreeable. It smells of tar, bacon, cheese, and cordage, blended with a suspicious odor of bilge water. This last does not really belong to the store, but comes from the docks, which are in close proximity. The place is ample. It has a large front, runs back deep, and you will find, if you walk far enough, a respectable counting-room, where the gas is kept all the time burning. This establishment is managed by three partners, careful, economical men, who divide a large sum each year in profits. They have, it is true, the cream of the trade, for they are reliable, straightforward people, and can be trusted to fit out a ship without fear that advantage will be taken if they are not closely watched. No danger that the pork, when opened ninety days out, will prove to be rusty, or the beef a little tainted. Hendly, Layton & Gibb are old-fashioned, respectable people. They have been already twenty years together. Hendly keeps the books, Layton makes all the purchases, Gibb fits out the vessels. Levi Eastman (Hill's cousin, Hiram's friend), now over ten years in the place, is head man under the firm, having a general supervision of whatever is going on. He is forty years old at least, has a wife, and, some say, in addition to a good salary, enjoys a percentage on all profits over a certain amount. Hiram Meeker ranks next to Eastman, though it will take him a few weeks to get familiar with his duties.
I will tell you presently what decided Hiram to become clerk to a ship chandler, I do not intend, after being so communicative, to hide his motives on this occasion. I say I will explain presently: meantime, do not fear that Hiram has any desire to supplant his friend Eastman, or get the control of the business of the firm; not at all. Other views, far more important, engage his mind—views which he thinks, in this ship chandler's store, to study and develop to advantage.
Hiram seemed to have altered his tactics on leaving Burnsville. There his style of living was considered expensive. His salary was very liberal, and although he did not spend it all (it was much increased after the Joslin affair), he appeared far from calculating in his disbursements. Now, this was all changed. Eastman, who had no children, and with two spare rooms in his house, consented, after consulting his wife, to take Hiram as a boarder, on more moderate terms than he could possibly get elsewhere for comfortable accommodations.
In this arrangement, Hiram had unquestionably decided to forego the luxury of pleasant female society. Mrs. Eastman had a sour-looking countenance, which did not in the least belie her disposition. In fact, her husband had a hard time of it, and doubtless thought Hiram's presence might prove a distraction for him—or for his wife. In either case, he would be the gainer, even if Hiram suffered somewhat. The latter did not appear to be apprehensive, but made himself at home in short order.
Then, and not before, he called on Mr. Bennett, and told him, ere the latter had time to inquire, that he had quit Burnsville, and was now clerk for Hendly, Layton & Gibb, ship chandlers.
'Well, that's a move, I declare! Did you suppose I was so full I could not make room for you?'
'Not that; but, you see, I am not going into your line,' said Hiram, blandly.
Till that moment Mr. Bennett had himself no idea how much he was calculating on Hiram's assistance in his largely increasing business. He was greatly disappointed. He was too shrewd, however, to express much regret. He only said, 'I should have been glad to have had you with me, but you know your own business best, I dare say. You will do anywhere, I guess. Now you are here, come and see us often, and let me know when I can be of use to you.'
Keen men sympathize with keen; knaves with knaves; the good with the good.
CHAPTER XVI.
When Sarah Burns, after Hiram's departure, sat down, quietly to think over the events of the past few days—for during the week he remained in the house she had no opportunity for reflection—she was sensible of a species of relief that she was no longer bound to him.
It was not permitted in nature nor in God's providence that this fellow should have lasting power over one so true hearted. With such, his influence was not to become absolute or controlling.
This was Sarah's first love affair, and she had no experience as to her own emotions, and possessed, therefore, no test by which to judge of their intensity. Now she could look back and see that her heart had not been satisfied.
'Not satisfied!' How many a young girl has been forced bitterly to take up this burden—when too late. 'Disappointed!' How many, when it is past help, whisper the terrible word in secret to their souls! How many are now dragging out a despairing existence, chained to some Hiram Meeker, with heart-wants never to be filled; with sympathies never to be responded to; with rich capacities for loving, which find in return neither tenderness nor appreciation; with affections, and no lawful object;—glowing, earnest natures companioned with calculation and selfishness and a remorseless subtlety; full, fresh, joyous vitality, yoked to a living corpse.
Thank God! for Sarah Burns it was not too late.
It is true, she persuaded herself she loved Hiram, and that she enjoyed every delight which flows from affections mutually pledged. But, really, it was entirely on one side. He, as we know, utterly selfish, had no genuine affection to impart; so all was made up by her. Out of her full imagination she brought rich treasures, and bestowed them on her lover, and then, valued him for possessing them.
Still, for Sarah Burns it was not too late.
That afternoon, when she came and threw her arms around her father's neck, and pleaded to come back again to his confidence, she was fully convinced of Hiram's real character. From that moment everything was settled. She permitted no explanations; for Hiram, when he saw how summarily he was to be disposed of, felt not only piqued, but roused, I may say, to a certain degree of appreciation of the object he was to lose so unexpectedly. He believed Sarah was so strongly attached to him that she would become reconciled to his going to New York, and then he could permit the affair to drag along to suit his convenience, to be revived or die out at his pleasure. So all his attempts at a private interview, his injured looks, and woful countenance went for nothing.
Sarah treated him precisely as she would treat an ordinary acquaintance, while Mr. Burns was careful to make no allusion to the subject, or permit the slightest difference in his conduct toward his confidential clerk. Hiram, therefore, was the one to feel uncomfortable; but the week was soon brought to a close, and he departed.
He went first to Hampton to visit his home. When the wagon drove to Mr. Burns's house to receive his luggage, Sarah was entertaining two or three young ladies who were paying her a morning visit. I dare say there was an object in the call not altogether amiable: namely, to see how Sarah would 'appear' in respect to Hiram's departure, and to find out, if possible, by the way she bore it, whether or not there was anything in the rumor of an engagement between them. Hiram had already taken a most affectionate leave of each of these young ladies the day before, and they thought he was to depart early in the morning. Much to their disappointment, Sarah Burns never appeared more natural or more at ease. She spoke of Hiram's going to New York as a settled plan, determined on even before he came to Burnsville; and (the trunks were now all in the carriage) at length exclaimed, 'Come, girls; I think Hiram must be waiting to bid us good-by.'
Thereupon, all went on the piazza, and thus frustrated a design of Hiram of taking a brief but most pathetic and impressive and never-to-be-forgotten farewell of his cruel betrothed. He had prepared a short speech for the occasion, which he believed would plant a dagger in her heart. He intended, just as soon as everything was ready, to find Sarah, deliver his speech, then rush to the carriage, and be almost instantly lost sight of.
As it was, he saw with intense mortification a bevy of girls come running out, each with something to say, and all at once—for, to conceal any little private feeling of her own, each one was as gay as possible. At last Hiram was forced to mount the wagon (the trunks filled all the vacant space, and, besides, were provokingly placed so that his seat was a most awkward one) and to drive away very unromantically, amid the adieus and railleries of the commingled voices.
CHAPTER XVII.
Freed from Hiram's disagreeable presence, Sarah Burns, as soon as her visitors had left, sat down to think; and she experienced, as I have already remarked, a species of relief. By degrees her spirits rose to their old, natural level, and then the fact struck her that they had not of late been so elastic and joyous as formerly. Presently she jumped up, and, snatching her hat, she resolved to run into the office, as she used to do in 'old times,' and surprise her father by a little visit. She tripped cheerfully out, and was soon at the office door. Here she paused. Her heart beat loudly, but it was with pleasure. Then she quietly opened the door and stepped in.
'Good morning, sir,' she exclaimed. 'Here is your old clerk back again.'
She rushed up and gave him a kiss, and received a dozen in return.
Mr. Burns used afterward to say it was the most blissful moment of his life.
After that, how they enjoyed themselves!—like school children let loose. Sarah ran up, and down, and around the office, through the front room and the little room back, then in the closets, her father following, as much of a child as she—his heart also freed of a load, and his soul filled with sunshine—no Hiram Meeker to cast a baleful shadow over it.
There were not any explanations between those two. Explanations were not in the least necessary. Each felt that all was explained, and all was right and happy again. That was enough.
After a while, some one came in to see Mr. Burns on business, and Sarah took her departure. With a light heart she retraced her steps toward home. She had reached the memorable corner where she once encountered Hiram—it was on his first visit to Burnsville—when, quite abruptly, as it seemed, a tall, handsome young man stood directly in her way.
She stopped, of course; she could not do otherwise, unless she chose to run into the arms of the stranger. A pair of bright, dark eyes were turned inquiringly on her.
'I have found you at last,' said the young man, in a pleasant tone. 'I have just left your house. I did not think you would be out so early. And now that we do meet,' he continued, 'I perceive you don't know me: that is too bad!'
Sarah stood like one in a trance. At first she thought the man was deranged; but he looked so handsome and so intelligent, she quickly abandoned that hypothesis. Then she began to think she was a little out of her wits herself. That seemed to her more probable.
Meanwhile, there he stood, directly and squarely in her path. He appeared rather to enjoy Sarah's perplexity.
'Yes, it is unkind in you to forget an old friend—one you promised to remember always.'
Sarah was beginning to recover herself. It was evident, from the whole appearance of the stranger, that he would not adopt this singular mode of addressing her, unless he had some claim to her acquaintance. So she reasoned. Resolving she would no longer play the part of a bashful miss, she said: 'I am very sorry to be obliged to confess it; but, really, I have not the slightest recollection of you.'
'Ah, that is the way with the sex!' continued the other, in the same tone. 'Who would have thought it? After bestowing on me such a precious token (here he presented a locket, in which he exhibited a curl of hair), you now propose to ignore me altogether.'
'I am inclined to think you are the one in error. I am quite sure you mistake me for some other person,' retorted Sarah, quietly.
'Possibly. Therefore, permit me to inquire whether or not I have the honor of addressing Miss Sarah Burns?'
'Yes.'
'Yet you have no recollection of presenting me with this?'
'You must have shown me the wrong locket,' said Sarah, dryly. 'The hair is several shades lighter than mine.'
'True, I did not think of that,' said the mysterious young gentleman.' I ought to have known it would be so; but it never occurred to me. Good-by!'
He bowed courteously and passed on his way, leaving Sarah in complete bewilderment. She walked slowly toward home. She roused her memory. She went through the list of her acquaintances. She endeavored to recall those she had encountered when taking some little trips with her father—but the stranger was not any of these.
A faint outline was, nevertheless, before her. A shadowy image, the same, yet not the same, with the young man who had stood in her path.
'Who? where? when?'
In vain she asked herself the questions.
Over the past hangs a dim uncertainty, like that which veils the future, and, young as Sarah was, she could already realize it. At length she stopped her efforts, and recurred to the more pleasing task of thinking about the young gentleman as he now appeared, without respect to any other circumstance. She recalled his manly form. He was nearly six feet in height. How bright his eyes were, and how mischievously they were turned on her, yet how kindly—she was almost ready to think lovingly—when the locket was produced! What about that locket? She never gave anybody a locket, never—not even Hiram Meeker. Faugh! It sickened her to think of him now, and in this connection. Only imagine it! A lock of her hair. How ridiculous! No living being had a lock of her hair. She knew that well enough. Besides, this was so much lighter—as light as hers was when she was a child. A sudden thought struck her. Strange; how very, very strange! Yet, it was true. Once in her life she had given a single curl! Was this it? Had she promised anything with the curl? And was this young man he? Sarah's heart beat tumultuously as she entered the house. She reflected on the words of the stranger as he turned to leave her. Should she see him again? * * *
A message came from her father. He would bring a gentleman to dine with him—that was all.
Who would it be? the one she had lately parted with? Not a doubt of it. That she felt instinctively.
On a certain occasion, as the reader may remember, Sarah had imperceptibly prepared herself to receive Hiram Meeker. It was the first time he took tea at the house. This day she did the very same thing to receive somebody else. There is no use to deny it, for such is the fact. Yet it was but a short week since she was the betrothed of Hiram, and believed she loved him. That very morning they had separated forever!
It often happens that a young girl is deceived by or disappointed in her admirer. They may prove to be incompatible, or, what is worse, he may prove unworthy; and she discards him, but with reluctance, after a struggle, leaving a pang in her heart, while she mourns over her lost love—not lover. Him she no longer regards with any feeling; but the memory of the old attachment is dear to her, though it be sad, and time is required before the heart will be attracted by new objects, or seek to be engrossed by a fresh passion.
The bond between Hiram and Sarah was of no such nature. He exercised a species of magnetism over her, in consequence of her lively and sympathetic nature; but it was of a kind that, when broken, neither pleasing nor mournful reminiscences remained—no recollection of past joys, no thought of former happiness and bliss. The fountains of the heart had not been reached, and when Hiram Meeker quitted her presence, she was as though she had never known him.
Thus it was, when she received her father's message, her pulses thrilled at the idea of meeting the one he was to bring with him.
Already she guessed who it was.
VATES.
Poets are never in the wrong,
Whate'er the present age may say:
The future only, in their song,
Will see the truth of this our day;
And what a Bryant says and sings
May well outweigh all false-born things.
THE PHYSICAL SURVEY OF NEW YORK HARBOR AND ITS APPROACHES.
No coast offers more admirable opportunities for the study, on a large scale, of the effects of winds, waves, and currents, tidal and others, on the movable matters which line the ocean shores, than that from New York southward. Besides the peculiar local actions, there are general ones, which are changing, slowly or rapidly, the whole of the sandy coast line. While here the pebbles of the ancient drift are being assorted by size and shape, and rolled into ridges and heaps, by the action of the waves, there heaps and ridges of wet sand are formed by the waves and travel under their motion, and the dry sand is forced along by the winds, covering up meadows and woods, and changing the ocean shore line; and in other or the same localities, sub-currents, setting in a nearly constant general direction, roll onward the movable materials of the bottom of the sea, or tidal currents roll them forward and backward, giving the general direction of the resulting motion.
The reports of the Government and State engineers and commissioners, public and private, who have studied the improvements of different localities, have given us glimpses of the local, and even of the general actions; but most commonly there has been a want of means or such preliminary experiments as were necessary fully to develop the actions, and which, like the stitch which saves nine, would often have saved the costly experiment on the full scale of construction. Remarkable instances of complete modes of investigation occur in the examination of the Mississippi River by Captain A.A. Humphreys and Lieutenant Abbot, of the Topographical Engineers, and by the commission of which General Totten, Prof. Bache, and Admiral Davis were members. As most familiar to me, from having taken an official part in the experiments and observations made, I propose to notice the Physical Surveys of New York and Boston, indicating the chief agents which are at work in destroying and building up, so as to produce the present condition of these important ports.
In connection with the surveys made a few years since by direction of the Commissioners on Harbor Encroachments, there was undertaken, as an incidental inquiry, an investigation into the physical conditions under which the shoals and beaches in and about New York harbor had submitted to those changes of position and area which the repeated surveys revealed. It was at the request of these Commissioners that Professor Bache, the Superintendent of the Coast Survey, gave his personal attention to this subject. He drew up a comprehensive scheme for a series of observations upon all the natural agencies at work, and, for the execution of the project, selected one of his assistants, whose experience had already been considerable in similar studies.
The investigation was commenced in the lower harbor early in the spring of 1856. Records were kept of tides, currents, winds, and waves, and the most careful notes were made on the immediate effects of these working agents as observable in the movements of the sands.
A glance at a general coast chart discovers at once a marked contrast between two different sections of our seaboard: to the eastward of us, the principal harbors of New England are rockbound, with elevated back countries; while to the southward, in the region of alluvial drift, which extends all along the coast of the Middle and Southern States, the harbors have flat and sandy shores. The harbor and neighborhood of New York, holding an intermediate position between these diverse sections, exhibit a singular combination of the leading physical features of both, and present to the hydrographer a field for research that is quite without a parallel.
We recognize in the Bar of New York simply a submerged portion of that sandy cordon which skirts the coast from Montauk Point to Florida; and although, in the ordinary sense, the lower entrance to the harbor is not an inlet, it may nevertheless be regarded as belonging to the same class.
This sandy cordon, which may be said to be the principal characteristic of our coast, is an exceedingly interesting feature; it appears to have been formed by the action of the sea, which has disintegrated the borders of shallow flats, bearing away the light vegetable moulds, but suffering the coarse quartz sand to remain rolled up into ridges. In many places the dry winds have caught up these sands, when laid bare at low water, and elevated them into dunes or galls.
The distance of the sand ridge from the mainland is observed to vary with the slope of the adjacent country. It is the motion of translation which a wave acquires on reaching shallow water, that gives it such great capacity for the transportation of material.
This translative action, as it is technically called, commences ordinarily in about three fathoms water, and is most violent in six or eight feet depths, within which the sea breaks. It is just within the breaker that the windrows of sand are observed to form on exposed flats.
This disposition of the sea to cast up well defined boundaries of sand along its margin, is so great and persistent, that the inland waters are dammed up and suffered only to escape into the ocean by narrow avenues, where their rapid currents maintain a supremacy of power—albeit with unceasing contest.
Wherever, along our coast, the waves drive obliquely upon the beach, a movement of the sand takes place, and the inlets are consequently continually shifting.
The Long Island inlets are moving westward, and Sandy Hook advances to the northward, because the sea rolls in along the axis of the great bay between Long Island and New Jersey, and necessarily sweeps along the beaches, instead of taking the direction of a normal to the shore line.
The movement of Sandy Hook to the northward is, however, a problem not so easily disposed of as we might conceive from the above considerations; for although, in the most general sense, its existence must be regarded as the work of the waves, there are other agents influencing materially its form and its rate of progress. The currents control, to a very great extent, the final disposition of the sands worn away or kept in motion by the waves.
Professor Bache's investigations in the neighborhood of Sandy Hook have been published, and we should not especially refer to them here, except that the recent physical changes reported by Colonel Delafield to the Engineer Department, have reawakened an interest in the matter.
The measurements of the Coast Survey, made in 1856 and 1857, showed that the Hook was being washed away on the east and west shores, but was extending slowly to the northwest, where it already encroached on the main ship channel. This order of things has continued up to the present time, and is now in progress.
The able Superintendent of the fortifications at Sandy Hook has evinced considerable alarm lest the new fort shall fall a prey to the encroachments, or be separated from the main body of the beach by slue-ways. The Coast Surrey has been notified of the matter, and the assistant to whom I have already referred has visited the Hook, and made an informal report, which agrees essentially with the statements of Colonel Delafield. A complete and reliable report can only be made upon actual surveys; and we trust these will be executed, and the Government placed in possession of the whole truth.
We understand that Colonel Delafield has already, upon a small scale, made some very successful experiments of curvilineal dikes, constructed with caissons of concrete; and we have no doubt that, with adequate means at his disposal, this ingenious engineer could avert the dangers which threaten, not only the fort, but the noble harbor of New York.
To return to the Physical Survey, and to speak as briefly as we may upon so extended a subject, we hold that it is possible, by a patient collection of facts and figures, to determine the natural scheme of the harbor—we had almost said the formula of its development.
It is ascertained that the group of shoals which form the Bar—composed, as they are, for the most part, of loose and shifting sands—are not accidental accumulations, modified by violent storms and freshets, but that they are orderly arrangements, made by the currents, to whose unceasing activities are due the form and preservation of each bank and channel. The peculiar contours of the shoals given by our most ancient charts are still developed by recent surveys, although alterations in magnitude have taken place. The order of the physical forces is unchanged, but their work is still progressing.
Now, since these currents have determinable laws, regulating their periods, durations, velocities, and directions, it was only necessary to compile observations, in order to reduce this study to a simple consideration of the composition of forces.
'The process by which sand is swept along by currents upon the bottom of the sea, is not unlike the motion of dunes upon the land; a ridge of sand is propagated in the direction of the current by the continual rolling of the particles from the rear to the front. This movement is exceedingly slow when compared with that of the current which induces it, and for this reason a shoal, though traversed by violent tidal currents, may, as a whole, remain stationary when the alternate drifts are equal and opposite; for in this case, though the sand upon the surface is drifted to and fro, it undergoes no more ultimate change of position than it would if the forces which acted upon it were simultaneous and in equilibrium.'[9]
Of course, so simple a case as that in which the ebb and flood forces are equal and opposite, is rarely presented; for at most of the stations on the Bar the direction of the flow varies from hour to hour, going quite round the circle in a half-tidal day: the velocities and directions also vary with the depth. These circumstances complicate the computation a little, but the problem is still simple and direct. Everything depends upon the faithfulness of the observations.
The physical diagrams which have been plotted from the results of these studies may be regarded as decided successes, for they show in most cases that the shoals lie in the foci or in the equilibrium points of the observed forces.
The current stations occupied cover a district embracing not only the immediate vicinity of the shoals, but extending many miles from them in different directions; for it was deemed necessary that each elementary force should be separately studied before it reached its working point. It has been ascertained that among the causes of the different shoal formations there exists a mutual relation and dependence, so that they may be regarded as a single physical system. It will be seen from this consideration, that any artificial disturbance of the conditions, at a single point, may interrupt the operations of nature in other localities more or less remote, or cause general changes in the hydrogaphy of the harbor.
It is not simply the superficial drift of the tidal and other currents that these observations comprehend; but, with the use of apparatus suitably arranged, the movements at all depths have been determined, with the exact amount of power exerted by streams coursing along the bed of the sea. The necessity for this minuteness of examination has been fully shown in some of the curious discoveries that have been made.
In several parts of our harbor, systems of counter-currents have been detected, occupying strata of water at different depths, and these present, in their motions, striking contrasts of directions, velocities, and epochs. The most remarkable exhibition of these sub-currents was observed in the neighborhood of the city, in the channel between Governor's and Bedloe's Islands. In this locality, during the last quarter of the ebb, floating objects drift southward toward the sea, while the heavier material upon the bottom is borne northward toward the city piers. While, upon the surface, the ebb exceeds the flood both in velocity and duration, the motions of the lowest water-stratum are subject to the reverse conditions: it therefore follows that the heavier deposits from the city drainage cannot be swept away through this the main avenue to the sea. This contrast of motion between the upper and lower drifts was observed in greater or less degree throughout the entire distance from the Bar to a point in the Hudson River off Fort Washington. These results appear to us of the highest importance, since they would seem to indicate that the scouring action of the currents will not be sufficient to prevent the accumulation of certain classes of deposits in the upper harbor—as the ashes from the steamers, and the like.
The course of the land waters in their progress seaward was followed nearly sixty miles beyond the Bar, where currents of considerable velocity were still observed. At the station farthest seaward, where the sounding is thirty fathoms, the observations at different depths disclosed some very remarkable peculiarities. It was perceived that the moving stratum was not always of the same depth; the whole body of the sea moving steadily forward at one time, while at another no motion could be detected below a superficial stream.
The land waters, to which allusion has been made, augment the ebb current to such a degree, that a general eastwardly preponderance was observed in the drift along the south shore of Long Island; and this preponderance, increasing steadily from station to station at each remove, was found, at a point twenty-five miles east of Fire Island Light, to outlive the tidal currents and maintain itself as a constant coastwise stream.
One very curious discovery was made with regard to this stream along shore. It was ascertained that during easterly gales a portion of the water, crowded up into the bight of the coast, escapes seaward by a sub-current. Shells, carefully marked, were deposited in the sea during fine weather, and, after an easterly gale, were picked up on the shore of Fire Island, four miles eastward of the place of deposit. There was no evidence that these shells travelled any distance during still weather.
We do not despair of the possibility of artificial improvements at the Long Island inlets.
At present the great inland basins on the southern portion of Long Island communicate with the sea only by narrow passes obstructed by bars and shoals; yet, in spite of the dangers which are always presented, large fleets of market vessels pass out daily through the inlets, laden with farm produce and shell fish. It requires no thought to perceive that if these inlets were made safe and permanent by suitable marine constructions, and were furnished with the proper buoys and beacons, there would spring up in their neighborhood great commercial enterprises.
While, in the case of the lower harbor and its approaches, it was the design of the observations to detect in the movement of the waters the causes of alterations in the physical geography, the same kind of studies, undertaken afterward in Hell Gate, had for their object the reverse inquiry, viz., to ascertain to what degree and in what manner the form of the rocky channel influenced the tides and currents, in order that some prediction might be made of the consequences likely to follow the removal of obstructions from the waterways. The propagations of the tide wave meet at Hell Gate, so that here the observations, when plotted, exhibit compound curves, in which the portion due to the wave from Sandy Hook is easily distinguishable from that due to the wave from Long Island Sound. The Sandy Hook tide wave differs so widely in height and time from that of Long Island Sound, that there is over three feet difference of level between the harbor and the Sound at certain stages of the tides; and at these times the currents rush through the Gate, vainly endeavoring to restore the inequalities.
The problem of referring a current to a tidal head is a very difficult one. The current, for instance, which renders Hell Gate so dangerous, is not at any time so great as a permanent head, equal to the difference of the tides observed, would engender. The currents are so very slow in their movements, compared with the undulations of the tide wave, that it cannot be ascertained as yet, what are the magnitudes of such elements as inertia and friction, and how they are to be corrected for, so as to predict the time and velocity of the current from observations of the vertical rise and fall.
It is due to the officers of the Coast Survey to state that their services to the Harbor Commissioners were rendered gratuitously; the work offered to them only an opportunity for research.
This Physical Survey must, at the outset, have held out small inducements to patient labor—the field was so large and ill defined, and had been so long the region of mere speculation; but the few simple and useful generalizations it has now grasped should, hereafter, prove the stepping stones to larger inductions, valuable alike to physical science and commercial interests.
FOOTNOTES:
[9] Report of the Observations for the Completion of the Physical Survey of New York Bar and Harbor, in pursuance of the Act of the Legislature of New York, April 17, 1857, and of the authority of the Commissioners on Harbor Encroachments. By A. D. Bache, Supt. U.S. Coast Survey.
AN ENGLISHMAN IN SOUTH CAROLINA.
DECEMBER, 1860, AND JULY, 1862.
II.
'Mornin', sa! De Cunnel send dis with his compliments. Merry Christmas, sa!' Such was the salutation arousing me on the anniversary of the birth of Him who came on earth to preach the Gospel of love and fraternity to all men—or the date which pious tradition has arbitrarily assigned to it. And Pomp appeared by the bedside of the ponderous, old-fashioned four-poster, in which I had slept, bearing a tumbler containing that very favorite Southern 'eye-opener,' a mixture of peach brandy and honey. I sipped, rose, and began dressing. The slave regarded me wistfully, and repeated his Christmas salutation.
I knew what the poor fellow meant, well enough, and responded with a gratuity sufficient to make his black face lustrous with pleasure. All through the South the system of backsheesh is as prevalent as in Turkey, and with more justification. At the hotels its adoption is compulsory, if the traveller would shun eyeservice and the most provoking inattention or neglect. His coffee appears unaccompanied by milk or sugar, his steak without bread, condiments are inaccessible, and his sable attendant does the least possible toward deserving that name, until a semi-weekly quarter or half dollar transforms him from a miracle of stupidity and awkwardness into your enthusiastic and ever-zealous retainer. This, however, by the way.
My present had the usual effect; Pompey became approbative and talkative:
'You come from England, sa?' he asked, looking up from the hearth and temporarily desisting in his vigorous puffing at the fire he had already kindled for me to dress by.
'Yes,' I answered.
'Dat a long ways off, sa?'
'Over three thousand miles of salt water, Pompey.'
'Golly! I 'fraid o' dem! didn't tink dere was so much water in de world!' adding a compliment on the supposed courage involved in crossing the Atlantic. Negroes have almost no relative ideas of distance or number beyond a very limited extent; they will say 'a tousan'd,' fifty or a hundred 'tousand,' with equal inexactitude and fluency. Presently Pompey began again:
'Many colored people in England, sa?'
'Very few. You might live there a year without meeting one.'
'I'se hear dey's all free—dem what is dar? dat so?' he asked, curiously.
'Yes; just as they are at the North; only I think they're a little better treated in England. We don't make any difference between men on account of their skin. You might marry a white woman there, Pompey, if you could get her to have you.'
Pompey honored this remark with as much ready negro laughter as he seemed to think it demanded.
'I'se got a wife already, sa,' he answered. 'But 'pears to me England must be good country to lib in.'
'Why so?'
'All free dar, sa!'
'Why you'd have to work harder than you do here, and have nobody to take care of you. The climate wouldn't suit you, either, there's not enough sunshine. You couldn't have a kinder or a better master than Colonel ----, I'm sure.'
'No, sa!' with a good deal of earnestness; 'he fust-rate man, sa, dat a fac; and Mass' Philip and de young ladies, dey berry good to us. But—' and the slave hesitated.
'What is it, Pompey? Speak out!'
'Well, den, some day de Cunnel he die, and den trouble come, suah! De ole plantation be sold, and de hands sold too, or we be divide 'tween Mass' Phil, Miss Jule, and Miss Emmy. Dey get married, ob course. Some go one way, some toder, we wid dem—nebber lib together no more. Dat's what I keep t'inkin ob, sa!'
What answer could be made to this simple statement of one of the dire contingencies inevitable to slave life? perhaps that most dreaded by the limited class of well cared-for house servants, of which Pompey was a good representative. He knew, as well as I, that his poor average of happiness was fortuitous—that it hinged on the life of his master. At his death he might become the chattel of any human brute with a white epidermis and money enough to buy him; might be separated from wife, children, companions and past associations. Suggesting the practical wisdom involved in the biblical axiom that sufficient for the day is the evil thereof, I turned the conversation and presently dismissed him. I experienced some little difficulty in accomplishing the latter, for he was both zealous and familiar in my service: indeed, this is one of the nuisances appertaining to the institution; a pet slave seems hardly to understand the desire for privacy, and is prone to consider himself ill-used if you presume to dispense with his attendance. His ideal of a master is one who needs a great deal of waiting on in trivial, unlaborious ways, who tolerates all shortcomings and slovenliness, and bestows liberal gratuities.
Descending to the breakfast parlor, I received and responded to the appropriate salutations for the day from my host and his family, who had already recognized it, English fashion, by the interchange of mutual presents, those of the Colonel to his daughters being jewelry of a handsome and expensive character. The trinkets were submitted to my inspection and duly admired.
'I must tell you something about these knick-knacks, Mr. ——,' said the evidently gratified father. 'You wouldn't suppose, now, that these mercenary girls actually asked me to give them money instead of trinkets?'
His tone and looks involved some latent compliment to the young ladies, and I said as much.
'They wanted to give it to the State, to help arm and equip some of the military companies. I couldn't let 'em suffer for their patriotism, you know; so I had to advance the money and buy the trinkets, too; though I'll do them the justice to say they didn't expect it. Never mind! the Southern Confederacy and free trade will reimburse me. And now let's have breakfast.'
The Southern Confederacy and Free Trade! During secession time in Charleston, there was displayed in front of the closed theatre, a foolish daub on canvas, depicting crowded wharves, cotton bales, arriving and departing vessels, and other indications of maritime and commercial prosperity, surmounted by seven stars, that being the expected number of seceding States, all presented as a representation of the good time coming. It remained there for over a month, when one of those violent storms of wind and rain variegating the humidity of a South-Carolinian winter tore it to pieces, leaving only the skeleton framework on which it had been supported. May not this picture and its end prove symbolical?
'Did you observe that our Charleston ladies dress very plainly, this season?' continued the Colonel, as we sat at breakfast. 'There are no silks and satins this Christmas, no balls, no concerts, no marriages. We are generally economizing for whatever may happen.'
'Why, I thought you didn't expect war?' I answered.
'No more we do; but it's well to be prepared.'
'There's to be no race ball, I understand,' said the lazy gentleman, who had appeared later than the rest of us, and was having a couple of eggs 'opened' for him into a tumbler, by Pompey. 'The girls will miss that. Can you tell me how the betting stood between Albine and Planet?'
I could not, and observed that the Colonel changed the subject with some marks of irritation. I learned afterward that his indolent relative had an incurable passion for betting, and, when carried away by it, was capable of giving unauthorized notes upon his opulent relative, who paid them in honor of the family name, but objected to the practice. He himself affected to discourage betting, though his State pride actually induced him to risk money on the 'little mare' Albine, a South-Carolina horse, who subsequently and very unexpectedly triumphed over her Virginian opponent. But this by the way.
Breakfast over and cigars lighted (the Colonel imported his own from Havana, each one enwrapped in a separate leaf, and especially excellent in quality), we strolled abroad. The negroes were not at work, of course; and, early as it was, we found their quarters all alive with merriment and expectation. Some of the younger men, dressed in their best clothes—generally suits of plain, substantial homespun, white or check shirts, and felt hats—went from house to house, wishing the inmates the compliments of the season, blended with obstreperous, broad-mouthed laughter; in some instances carrying nosegays, received, in common with the givers, with immense delight and coquetry on the part of the females. These wore neatly-made, clean cotton dresses, with gaily-colored handkerchiefs arranged turban fashion upon their heads. Many of the old men and not a few of the old women were smoking clay or corncob pipes; the children laughed, cried, played with each other, rolled upon the ground, and disported themselves as children, white, black, or particolored, do all the world over; the occasional twang of a banjo and a fiddle was heard, and everything looked like enjoyment and anticipation. Of course, the huts of the future brides constituted the centre of attraction: from the chattering of tongues within we inferred that the wedding dresses were exposed for the admiring inspection of the negro population.
The Colonel had just arrived at the peroration of an eloquent eulogium of the scene, when the overseer appeared at the end of the avenue of orange trees, and presently drew rein beside us, his countenance exhibiting marks of dissatisfaction.
'I've had trouble with them boys over to my place, Colonel,' he said, briefly, and looking loweringly around, as though he would be disposed to resent any listening to his report on the part of the negroes.
'Why, what's the matter with them?' asked his employer, hastily.
'Well, it 'pears they got some rotgut—two gallon of it—from somewheres last night, and of course, all got as drunk as h——, down to the old shanty behind the gin—they went thar so's I shouldn't suspicion nothin'. They played cards, and quarrelled and fit, and Hurry's John he cut Timberlake bad—cut Wilkie, too, 'cross the hand, but ain't hurt him much!'
'Hurry's John! I always knew that nigger had a d——d ugly temper!' I'll sell him, by —— ! I won't have him on the place a week longer. Is Timberlake badly hurt?'
'He's nigh killed, I reckon. Got a bad stick in the ribs, and a cut in the shoulder, and one in the face—bled like a hog, he did! Reckon he may get over it. I've done what I could for him.'
The Colonel's handsome face was inflamed with passion; he strode up and down, venting imprecations of an intensity only to be achieved by an enraged Southerner. Presently he stopped and asked abruptly:
'Where did they get the liquor from?'
'I don't know. Most likely from old Whalley, down to the landing. He's mean enough for anything.'
'If I can prove it on him, I'll run him out of the country! I'll—I'll—d——n it! I'll shoot him!' And the Colonel continued his imprecations, this time directing them toward the supposed vender of the whiskey.
'These men are the curse of the country! the curse of the country!' he repeated, excitedly; 'these d——d mean, low, thieving, sneaking, pilfering, poor whites! They teach our negroes to steal, they sell them liquor, they do everything to corrupt and demoralize them. That's how they live, by ——! The slaves are respectable, compared to them. By ----, they ought to be slaves themselves—only no amount of paddling[10] would get any work out of their d——d lazy hides! I almost wish we might have a war with the Yankees: we should get some of 'em killed off, then!'
How little Colonel —— thought, as he uttered these words, 'so wicked and uncivic' (as Gellius says of a similar wish on the part of a Roman lady, for which she was fined the sum of twenty-five thousand pounds brass), that in the future lay such dire fulfilment of them! Apropos of the subject, what fitting tools for the purposes of rebellion have these hated 'poor whites' proved themselves!—their ignorance, their vices, their brutality rendering them all the more appropriate instruments for the work in hand. It would seem, almost, as if a diabolic providence had prepared them for this very result.
'I must ride over and see about this business at once,' resumed the Colonel. 'Mr. ——, I can very well suppose you'd rather be spared accompanying me, so make yourself at home for an hour or two. I won't be a minute longer than I can help. Perhaps you'd better not mention this unfortunate affair up at the house until I return; it'll shock the girls, and I'm very careful to keep all unpleasant things out of their way. It's the first time such an atrocity has occurred on this plantation, believe me.'
And, ordering his horse, he rode off with the overseer. I should really have preferred visiting the scene of the recent tragedy, but my host's wish to the contrary was evident, and I knew enough of Southern sensitiveness with respect to the ugly side of their 'institution' to comply. (I had been advised by a fellow countryman not to attend a slave sale in Charleston, lest my curiosity might be looked upon as impertinent, and get me into trouble; but I did it, and, I am bound to say, without any evil consequences.) So I retraced my steps toward the house, presently encountering the lazy gentleman, and one in black, who was introduced to me as the Reverend Mr. ——, an Episcopal clergyman of Beaufort, also a resident on an adjacent island.
The lazy gentleman inquired after Colonel ——. Judging that my host's caution, as to secrecy, was only intended to apply to his daughters, I made no scruple of relating what I had heard. My auditors were at once more than interested—anxious. Whenever a negro breaks bounds in the South, everybody is on the alert, a self-constituted detective, judge, inquisitor, and possible executioner. Eternal vigilance is the price of—slavery!
'That boy born on the plantation?' asked the clergyman, when the affair had been discussed at considerable length.
'Yes! He's a valuable hand, too; I've known him pick seven hundred and fifty pounds of cotton in a day—of course, for a wager.'
'The Colonel will have to sell him, I suppose? he can't keep him after this.'
'Reckon so, though he hates to part with any of his hands. This trouble wouldn't have happened, if it hadn't been for the whiskey, I've no doubt. The rascal who sold it ought to be responsible.'
'Are crimes originating in drunkenness common among the negroes?' I asked.
'Well, no!' answered the clergyman, deliberately; 'I can't say that. But most of them will drink, if they get an opportunity—the field hands especially; and then they're apt to be quarrelsome, and if there's a knife handy, they'll use it.'
'That's so,' assented the lazy gentleman, nodding. 'You Englishmen and Yankees—excuse me for coupling you together!—know very little of negro character; and, because the darkies have a habit of indulging in unmeaning laughter on all occasions, you think them the best-tempered people in existence. In reality their tempers are often execrable—infernal!' And he compacently blew a ring of tobacco-smoke into the mild, humid morning. The clergyman looked on assentingly.
'They can never be trusted with any responsibility involving the exercise of authority without abusing it. They ill use animals on all occasions—treat them with positive brutality, and sometimes whip their children so unmercifully that we have to interfere. I don't know what would become of them without us, I'm sure!'
'What do you think of their religious convictions?' I asked of the clergyman, when the speaker had arrived at his comfortable, characteristically Southern conclusion.
'Our best negroes are unquestionably pious,' he answered; 'and some of them have a very earnest sense of their duties as to this life and the next; but I regret to say that a good deal of what passes for religion among them is mere exitement, often of a mischievous and sensual character.'
'Heathenish! quite heathenish!' added the lazy gentleman. 'Did you ever see a shout, Mr. ——?'
I responded in the negative, and inquired what it was.
'Oh, a dance of negro men and women to the accompaniment of their own voices. It's of no particular figure, and they sing to no particular tune, improvising both at pleasure, and keeping it up for an hour together. I'll defy you to look at it without thinking of Ashantee or Dahomey; it's so suggestive of aboriginal Africa.'
I had an opportunity, subsequently, of witnessing the performance in question, and can indorse the lazy gentleman's assertion. Inheriting the saltatory traditions of their barbarous ancestry, the slaves have also a current fund of superstition, of a simple and curious character. But further ethical disquisitions were here cut short by the appearance of the Colonel's daughters, when the conversation was at once changed, as by tacit consent of all three of us. What their father had told me, relative to his solicitude to keep them in ignorance of all 'unpleasant things' accruing from the fundamental institution, was in perfect accordance with Southern instincts. I had observed similar instances of habitual caution before, reminding me of the eulogized tendency toward 'Orientalism' alluded to in the previous chapter. And, of all people, South-Carolinians possess the equally rare and admirable faculty of holding their tongues, when there is occasion for it.
We joined the ladies in a walk. As the elder had much to say to the clergyman about mutual acquaintances, while her fat relative strolled carelessly by her side, her sister naturally fell to my companionship. With a rather handsome and intelligent girl I should have preferred to converse on general topics than the one with which I had been already nauseated at Charleston—secession; but she was full of it, and would not be evaded. Very soon she asked me what I supposed would be the sentiment in England toward the seceding States, in the assumed event of their forming a confederacy.
I told her, as I then believed, that it would be adverse, in consequence of the national hostility to slavery, appealing to her own British experience for confirmation.
'Yes,' she said, 'they were all abolitionists in England, and could hardly credit us when we told them that we owned negroes. They thought all Southerners must be like Legree in Uncle Tom's Cabin! But papa, who went to the club houses, and mixed with the aristocracy, says that they are much better informed about us; that they were opposed to emancipation in the West Indies, and have always regarded it as a great mistake. And England must have cotton, you know.'
'If there's a war between the North and South, won't you find it very difficult to retain your negroes?' I asked, waiving the immediate question.
Miss —— responded by the usual assertion of the fidelity of the slaves to their owners.
'What if the new Government resorts to emancipation as a weapon against you?' I made this inquiry, thinking it possible that this might be done at the outset. Like other foreigners, though familiar with the North, I had not supposed that nearly two years of civil war, with its inevitable expenditure of blood and treasure, would be needed to induce this direct and obvious means of subduing a rebellion. Englishmen, it is known, have ferocious ideas on the subject, as witness India.
'If the slaves rose, we should kill them like so many snakes!' was the answer. And the young lady's voice and flashing eyes showed that she was in earnest.
Our promenade lasted until the return of the Colonel, who presently took a private opportunity of informing me that the wounded slave would probably survive, and that he had sent for a surgeon from an adjoining plantation, expressing some apprehension that delay or indifference on his part might involve fatal consequences.
'It's Christmas time, you see, and perhaps he won't care about coming,' said my host. I may add that his anticipation was in part verified by the result, 'the doctor' not appearing till the following morning. Thanks, however, to a rough knowledge of surgery on the part of the overseer, aided by the excellence of his constitution, 'Timberlake' recovered. I will mention here, in dismissing the subject, that 'Hurry's John' was subsequently sold to a Louisiana sugar-planter, a fate only less terrible to a negro than his exportation to Texas.
Within an hour of our return to the house, we partook of an excellent and luxurious Christmas dinner, to which birds of the air, beasts of the earth, and fish of the sea had afforded tribute, and the best of European wines served as an appropriate accompaniment. The meal was, I think, served earlier than usual, that we might attend the event of the day, the negro weddings.
These were solemnized at a little private church, in the rear of which was absolutely the most enormous live-oak I had ever seen, its branches, fringed with pendent moss, literally covering the small churchyard, where, perhaps, a dozen of the —— family lie buried—a few tombstones, half hidden by the refuse of the luxuriant vegetation, marking their places of sepulture. The plain interior of the building had been decorated with evergreens in honor of the time and the occasion, under the tasteful direction of the young ladies, who had also contrived to furnish white dresses and bouquets for the brides. These, duly escorted by their future husbands, clad in their best, and looking alternate happiness and sheepishness, had preceded us by a few minutes, and were waiting our arrival, while all around beamed black faces full of expectation and interest.
We walked through a lane of sable humanity—for the church was too small to contain a fourth of the assembled negroes—to the little altar, before which the six couples were presently posed by the clergyman, in front of us and himself. That done to everybody's satisfaction, the Colonel stationed to give away the brides—an arrangement that caused a visible flutter of delight among them—and as many lookers-on accommodated within the building as could crowd in, the ceremony was proceeded with, the clergyman using an abbreviated form of the Episcopal service, reading it but once, but demanding separate responses. I noticed that he omitted the words 'until death do ye part,' and I thought that omission suggestive.
The persons directly concerned behaved with as much propriety as if they had possessed the whitest of cuticles, being quiet, serious, and attentive; nor did I detect anything indecorous on the part of the spectators, beyond an occasional smile or whisper by the younger negroes, whose soft-skinned, dusky faces and white eyeballs glanced upward at the six couples with admiring curiosity, and at us, visitors, with that appealing glance peculiar to the negro—always, to my thinking, irresistibly touching, and suggestive of dependence on, humility toward, and entreaty for merciful consideration at the hands of a superior race. Perhaps, however, the old folks enjoyed the occasion most, particularly the negresses: one wrinkled crone, of at least fourscore years, her head bound in, the usual gaudy handkerchief, and her hands resting on a staff or crutch, went off into a downright chuckle of irrepressible exultation after the closing benediction, echoed more openly by the crowd of colored people peeping in at the doors and windows.
The ceremony over, the concourse adjourned to a large frame building, part shed, part cotton-house, ordinarily used for storing the staple plant of South Carolina, before ginning and pressing. The Colonel had sent his year's crop to Charleston, and the vacant space was now occupied by a triple row of tables, set out with plates, knives and forks, and drinking utensils. Here, the newly married couples being inducted into the uppermost seats, as places of honor, and the rest of the company accommodated as well as could be effected, a substantial dinner was served, and partaken of with a gusto and appreciation only conceivable in those to whom such an indulgence is exceptional, coming, like the occasion, but once in a year. Upward of a hundred and fifty persons sat down to it, exclusive of those temporarily detailed as waiters, who presently found leisure to minister to their own appetites. Their owner surveyed the scene with an air of gratification, in which I could not detect a trace of his recent serious discomposure. I am well persuaded, however, that he had not forgotten it, as that the cause of it was known among the negroes; I thought I observed evidences of it in their looks and deportment, even amid the general hilarity.
The ladies had returned to the house, and we were about following them, when the clatter of a horse's hoofs was heard without, and the officious voices of the negroes announced the arrival of a visitor or messenger for the Colonel, who stepped forward to meet him. A young man, clad in a coarse homespun gray uniform, scantily trimmed with red worsted, and a French military cap, alighted, and addressed our friend in a faltering, hesitating manner, as though communicating some disastrous intelligence. I saw the Colonel turn pale, and put his hand to his head as if he had received a stunning blow. Instinctively the three of us rushed toward him.
'My God! what's the matter? what has happened, ——?' inquired the clergyman.
'Philip! Philip! my boy's dead—shot himself by accident!' was the answer.
A very few words explained all, The young volunteer had fallen a victim to one of those common instances of carelessness in playing with loaded firearms. While frolicking with a comrade, at his barracks, he had taken up his revolver, jestingly threatening to shoot. The other, grasping the barrel of the cocked pistol, in turning it round, had caused its discharge, the bullet penetrating the breast of the unfortunate owner of the weapon. Conveyed to the hospital, he had died within an hour after his arrival.
Our holiday-making, of course, came to a sudden termination. Next day I accompanied the Colonel to Charleston, to claim the body of his deceased son, and not long afterward parted with him, on my return to the North.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] The paddle has superseded the cowhide in all jails, workhouses, and places of punishment in South Carolina, as being more effective—that is painful. In some instances it is used on the plantations. It consists of a wooden instrument, shaped like a baker's peel, with a blade from three to five inches wide, and from eight to ten long. There are commonly holes in the blade, which give the application a percussive effect. In Charleston this punishment is generally administered at the guardhouse by the police, who are all Irishmen. Any offended master or mistress sends a slave to the place of chastisement with a note, stating the desired amount, which is duly honored. Like institutions breed like results all over the world: in Sala's 'Journey Due North' we find the same system in operation in Russia.
PEN, PALLET, AND PIANO.
With the roar of cannon and tramp of armed men resounding through the land, and the fair young face of the Republic disfigured to our eyes by the deep furrows of war, it is pleasant to know that in certain nooks and corners, gentler sounds of harmony still linger, and that ateliers exist where men's fancies grow on canvas from day to day into soothing visions of loveliness.
The scarlet-and-gold and general paraphernalia of war are too tempting to pallet and brush, not to be seized on with avidity and reproduced with marvellous truth; but it is more agreeable to pass over accurate representations of the Irish zouave, with Celtic features, not purely classical in outline, glowing defiantly under the red cap of the Arab, and Teutonic cavalrymen, clinging clumsily to their steeds, and turn for solace to the grand, solemn Shores of Niagara, to wander amid the tangled luxuriance of the Heart of the Andes, or to bask in the sweet silence of Twilight in the Wilderness. There are Icebergs too, floating in the Arctic Sea, frozen white and mute with horror at the dread secrets of ages; but, responsive to the versatile talent of the hand that creates them, they glow with prismatic light of many colors. Mr. Church irradiates the frozen regions with the coruscations of his own genius, bringing to these lonely, despairing masses of ice the revivifying hope and promise of warmer climates.
In pondering over the sad mystery of these Icebergs, we float down again to Tropical Seas and Islands; and as we linger under the shade of palm and banana tree, the rude chant of the negro strikes the ear in the grotesque and characteristic framework of the 'Bananier,' the plaintive melody of 'La Savane' sighs past on the evening breeze, Spanish eyes flash out temptingly from the enticing cadence of the 'Ojos Criollos,' and Spanish guitars tinkle in the soft moonlight of the 'Minuit à Seville,' and Tropical life awakes to melody under the touch of the Creole poet of the piano, Mr. Gottschalk.
There are many beings, otherwise estimable, to whom the Tropical sense is wanting; who are ever suspicious of malaria lurking under the rich, glossy leaves of the orange groves; who look with disgust and loathing at the exaggerated proportions and venomous nature of all creeping things; who find the succulence of the fruit unpleasant to the taste, and the flowers, though fair to the eye, deadly as the upas tree to all other sense;—for whom it is no compensation to feel, with the first breath of morning air, the dull, leaden weight of life lifted, or no happiness to watch the sea heaving and palpitating with delight under the rays of the noon-day sun, and to know that the stars at night droop down lovingly and confidingly to the embrace of warm Tropical earth. With an insensibility to these influences, there can be but little sympathy or appreciation of the works of Mr. Gottschalk; for all that is born of the Tropics partakes of its beauties and its defects, its passionate languor, its useless profusion and its poetic tenderness. And where else in the United States, can we look for a spontaneous gush of melody? Plymouth Rock and its surroundings have not hitherto seemed favorable to the growth and manifestation of musical genius; for the old Puritan element, in its savage intent to annihilate the æsthetic part of man's nature, under the deadening dominion of its own Blue Laws, and to crush out whatever of noble inspiration had been vouchsafed to man by his Creator, rarely sought relief in outbursts of song.
Psalmody appears to have been the chief source of musical indulgence, and for many a long, weary year, hymns of praise, nasal in tone and dismal in tendency, have ascended from our prim forefathers to the throne of grace on high.
Such depressing musical antecedents have not prepared New England for greater efforts of melody than are to be found in the simple ballads supposed to originate with the plantation negro, who, in addition to his other burdens, is thus chosen to assume the onerous one of Northern song, as being the only creature frivolous enough to indulge in vain carolling. If we can scarcely affirm that the Americans are yet a musical people, that they would be is an undeniable fact, and one constantly evinced in their lavish support of artists, from the highest to the lowest grade. Among the musical aspirants to popular favor, none has of late enjoyed so large a share of notice and admiration as Mr. Gottschalk; and to return from our recent digression, we will proceed to the consideration of his compositions. Fragmentary and suggestive as are his ideas, there is infinite method and system in their treatment. Avoiding thus far what is termed 'sustained effort,' and which frequently implies the same demands on the patience of the listener as on the creative power of the composer, Mr. Gottschalk's compositions contain just so much of the true poetic vein as can be successfully digested and enjoyed in a piano piece of moderate length. With the power to conceive, and the will and discipline of mind to execute, there is no reason why, with perhaps a diminished tendency to fritter away positive excellence at the shrine of effect, enduring proofs of the genius of our American pianist should not be given to the world.
As a mere player, the popularity of Mr. Gottschalk with the uninitiated masses is due, in a great measure, to his tact in discerning the American craving for novelty and sensation, and to his native originality and brilliancy, which allow him to respond so fully to these exigencies of public taste, as to possess on all occasions the keynote to applause. The faculty of never degenerating into dulness, the rock on which most pianists are wrecked in early youth, is another just cause for insuring to our compatriot the preëminence which he enjoys. Viewed from a critical point, the mechanical endowments and acquirements of Gottschalk are such as to enable him to subject his playing to the test of keenest analysis without detriment to his reputation. For clearness and limpidity of touch and unerring precision, for impetuosity of style, combined with dreamy delicacy, he has few rivals. The evenness and brilliancy of his trill are unequalled, the mechanical process required to produce it being lost to sight in the wonderful birdlike nature of the effect. In the playing of classical music, Mr. Gottschalk has to contend against his own individuality. This individuality, naturally intense and of a kind calculated to meet with public favor, has been cultivated and indulged in to such an extent as to prove an occasional obstacle to the exclusive absorption and utter identification with the ideas of another composer that classical music demands. In the mere matter of execution there is no difficulty which the fingers of this skilful pianist cannot overcome, and his intellectual grasp of a subject enables him to discern and interpret the beauties of all musical themes; but where an earnest, passionate interest in the music of the old masters is not felt by the performer, it is rarely communicated to his hearers.
The world of letters, however, has not seemingly regretted the inability of Byron to trammel his muse with the uncongenial fetters of Pope's metre, and has certainly never quarrelled with Tom Moore for not assuming the manners and diction of the revered Samuel Johnson, LL.D.
With due allowance for difference of latitude, and wide difference of aim and pursuit, the contemplation of the Master of Creole Melody recalls to us a genius which found utterance in song none the less melodious that it was written, not sung. The 'ashen sky' and 'crisped, sere leaves of the lonesome October,' so thrillingly pictured by Edgar Poe in his 'Ulalume,' find echo in the foreboding sadness of the opening bars to Gottschalk's 'Last Hope;' and as both poems grow in vague, dreamy sound, they culminate in a cry of smothered despair at the tomb where all hopes lie buried with the lost Ulalume. The same weird conception and eccentricity of design, with knowledge of rhythmical effect and extreme carefulness of finish, are prominent traits of both artists; and the American disregard of tradition, as evinced in all enterprises, whether literary, artistic, or commercial, and which readily infects the simple sojourner among us as well as the happy being born to republican privileges, marks alike the nationality of poet and pianist.
Edgar Poe's literary reputation undoubtedly gains additional lustre as the lapse of years permits the veil of obscurity to fall over the personal vices and irregularities which so tarnished the living fame of this great artist. Genius draws around itself a magical circle, attracting and keeping by the force of its own magnetism those whom it values, but at the same time exercising an equally repellent effect on the envious and ignorant wandering beyond the pale of its charmed precincts. Hence the difficulty of judging it by contemporaneous standards. The Hyperion head of Poe was lost to the view of many by a too persistent search for the satyr's cloven foot. In considering the poet's eccentricities, in common with other extraordinary and anomalous beings, it must be deeply deplored that one so endowed with wealth of intellect beyond his fellow men, should be still so poor in moral store that the dullest of them could dare look with disdain on this heir to gifts regal and sacred.
He could forget his deep, earnest love of order in things intellectual, in every excess of disorder in things material, and his passionate love of the beautiful could be profaned by frequent grovelling amid the hideous deformities of vice. Poe, in his reverence for Art (his only reverence), seemed generally to set greater store on the elaborate and artistic perfection of his works, than in the spontaneity of genius therein displayed. So it would seem, at least, in his voluntarily exposing the skeleton design of his greatest poem, 'The Raven,' and the various processes by which this grand shadow attained its final harmonious and terrible proportions. This may be a noble sacrifice to the principles of Art, intended as a warning to rash novices against the sin of slovenliness in composition; but the poem must be of solid fibre to resist this disenchanting test. The unveiling of hidden mysteries, the disclosure of trap doors, ropes, and pulleys, may assist in the general dissemination of knowledge; but in behalf of those who prefer to be ignorant that they may be happy, we protest against the innovation. In this dangerous experiment of Poe's, however, we are forced to do what he would have us do—admire the ingenuity of the poet, together with his knowledge of effect, rhythmical and dramatic, his flexibility and strength of versification, and marvellous faculty of word painting. This propensity to make all things subservient to the advancement of Art is not always productive of present good to one's fellow beings, whatever may be the results to posterity, as the luckless women who cross the path of such men cannot unfrequently testify—oftentimes assiduously wooed, won, and lightly discarded, to furnish an artistic study of the female capacity for suffering, as well as to supply renewed inspiration for further poetic bemoanings. In the prose narrations of Edgar Poe, the same skilful handling of mystery, and the turning to account of any incident susceptible of dramatic effect, are always apparent as in his poems. But the want of extended sympathy with mankind, the artist egotism, which looks inwardly for all material, and in truth scorns the approval of the masses, must naturally fail to secure the interest of a large class of readers. His compositions, on the contrary, which give full scope to his keen, subtle powers of analysis, and vigorous handling of the subject in question, are more widely understood and appreciated. Since the days when Poe dealt with contemporaneous literature, and literary men, in not the most temperate mood of criticism, poetic fire in America, with few exceptions, seems to have sunk into a dead, smouldering condition, and to have yielded to its sister art of painting the task of grappling with the New-World monster of utilitarianism and practical reform. The demands for indigenous painters in America being constantly greater, the result is necessarily a vast increase and improvement in this branch of Art.
New England, on whose barren musical soil we have already descanted, and who has not hitherto disputed to the Old World her privilege of pouring out on our untutored continent the accumulated wealth of years of musical study and training, has at last gone far to redeem her reputation of artistic nullity, by producing the greatest landscape painter of which the country can boast. With us, the superiority of atmospheric effects over most countries, and the great variety and originality of American scenery, have united in bringing the landscape painter into existence, and the public have assured this existence by fostering applause and pecuniary compensation. Nature, thus prodigal of gifts to America, has, in a crowning act of munificence, conferred also a painter, capable of interpreting her own most recondite mysteries, and of faithfully transcribing the beauties revealed to all eyes in their simple majesty.
Immensity of theme possesses no terrors for Mr. Church's essentially American genius; his facile brush recoils not before the gigantic natural elements of his own land, but deals as readily and composedly with the unapproachable sublimity of Niagara and the terrible beauty of icebergs as with the peace of simple woodland scenes and the glowing sentiment of the tropics. To tread the beaten path of landscape painting, and offer to the public a tame transcript of the glories he has beheld, is repugnant to the creative power of this true artist; but when form, color, and the legitimate means at his command fail to embody all he would express, his suggestive faculty is generally of force sufficient to reach all beholders, even those of feeblest imagination.
In standing before the Falls of Niagara, one can, in fancy, feel the cool moisture of spray, rising, incense-like, through a rainbow of promise, from the inspired canvas, together with the earth's tremor at the roar of mad waters rushing headlong to a desperate death. This inestimable quality of suggestiveness is preserved in Mr. Church's pictures when deprived of the aid of color and reduced to mere black and white in engraving, a fact bearing equally conclusive testimony to their inherent correctness of lines and elegance of composition.
Mr. Church's prominent characteristics of hardy vigor and adventurous treatment of a subject, seem to have monopolized his artistic nature, to the frequent exclusion of tenderness, either in idea or in the handling of color. The painting, in our eyes, least open to this objection, is Twilight in the Wilderness—a dreamy picture of inexpressible sadness, of a tearful silence that is felt, and of a loneliness too sacred to be profaned by human intrusion. The gorgeous panorama of the Heart of the Andes, its snowy mountain peaks, and plains glowing with tropical verdure, is too bewildering in its complicated grandeur to excite dreams of beauty so tender and sadness so touching.
In contemplating this last-named picture, the demands on the attention are so numerous and weighty,—in the first place, to comprehend the situation, and exchange at a moment's notice the stagnation of the temperate zone for the emotional excitement of the tropics; then to separate and classify the many points of beauty, to rise to the summits of distant mountains, sublime in their snowy crests, and sink again to earth at the foot of the rustic cross, by whose aid we may one day rise to sink no more,—to follow the painter successfully through this maze of thoughts, without the guiding light of his own matchless color, would seem a difficult and displeasing task. But the task has been accomplished with complete success, in an English line engraving of the Heart of the Andes, recently arrived in this country; which indication of popularity abroad conduces materially to the ever-growing fame of the artist. The same test, we believe, is in store for the Icebergs—with what result, time will show. Meanwhile, the picture itself will, on foreign soil, plead the cause of American civilization, and tend to assure those who look with dismay at the tumultuous upheavings of freedom's home, that imperishable Art still maintains her placid sway in this distracted land, and that her votaries falter not in their allegiance.
Volcanoes pour out fiery lava under the red glare of the setting sun, obedient to Church's magic touch—delicate fancies are weaved into poetic life by the fingers of Gottschalk—but the voice of Poe, alas! is mute forever. The 'Lost Lénore,' found too late, may have inspired a song far beyond the dull range of human comprehension, but poor mortals left below, can only echo, with the grim and ghastly raven: Nevermore! Nevermore!
LITERARY NOTICES
The Slave Power; Its Character, Career, and Probable Designs: Being an Attempt to Explain the Real Issues Involved in the American Contest. By J. E. Cairnes, M.A., Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Economy in Queen's College, Galway, and late Whately Professor in the University of Dublin. Second edition. New York: Carleton, 413 Broadway. London: Parker and Son & Co.
It is to be sincerely hoped that the American public, in its detestation of the ungenerous, narrow-minded, and inconsistent conduct of the majority of Englishmen toward the Federal Union since the present war began, will not lose sight of the fact that, here and there in Great Britain, men of superior intelligence and information have labored strenuously to make the truth known, and to vindicate our cause. Amid a mob of ignorant and furious foes of freedom, France has seen a Gasparin rise calm and great in superior knowledge, declaring incontrovertible truths; and in like manner, the English press has given the views of Stewart Mill and Professor Cairnes to their public, at a time when it seemed as if falsehood had completely triumphed. In 'The Slave Power,' the latest work by this last-named writer, we have indeed such a searching analysis of the present American crisis, and find the history of the entire difficulty set forth so fully, yet with such remarkable conciseness, that we cannot suppress a feeling of astonishment that a country which has slandered us so cruelly should, at the same time, have given to the world by far the best vindication of our cause which has as yet appeared. For it is no undue praise to say, that in this book we have the completest defence of the Federal cause and the most effective onslaught on the Slave Power which any writer has thus far placed on record; and we cordially agree with the vigorous reviewer of the Westminster, in believing that a work more needed could scarcely have been produced at the present time, 'since,' as he adds, 'it contains more than enough to give a new turn to English feeling on the subject, if those who guide and sway public opinion were ever likely to reconsider a question on which they have so deeply committed themselves.'
'The Slave Power,' it is true, contains little which has not, at one time or another, been brought before the mind of the well-informed American republican; yet it is precisely in this that its chief merit consists, since it is not by idle oratory and fine writing, but by facts and the plain truth, that we can be best vindicated. Englishmen are grossly ignorant of the true causes of this struggle, or of the principles involved—a matter little to be marvelled at, when we find almost a majority of professed Federal Americans, under the name of Democrats, cheerfully admitting that their confederate foes are quite in the right as far as the main cause of the difficulty is concerned. For all such men, a clear exposition of facts, logically set forth, cannot be other than a real blessing; since their amiability to the South, when not based on traitorous and selfish interests, means simply nothing more nor less than ignorance—and that of a kind which is little less than criminal, let the guilt rest where it may.
Professor Cairnes begins judiciously by showing that in the beginning it was believed, not without very apparent cause, in England, that our war 'sprang from narrow and selfish views of sectional interests,' in which the free-trading South was in the right, and that the abolition of slavery was a mere pretence by which the North sought, without a color of truth, to attract foreign sympathy. And when we remember for how long a time slaves were returned by Federal officers to their owners, and how persistently anything like abolition, or even the most moderate emancipation, was earnestly and practically disowned by the Federal power, it is not wonderful, as Mr. Cairnes declares, that England should have regarded our claim to be fighting for the cause of free labor as a shallow deceit. Even as we write, we have before us a journal containing an allusion to an officer who attempted to return to slavery a contraband who had brought to him information of the greatest importance. Yet, despite the frightful appearances against us, our writer saw, through all, the truth, and declared that, as regarded the popular British abuse of this country, 'never was an explanation of a political catastrophe propounded, in more daring defiance of all the great and cardinal realities of the case with which it professed to deal.'
Slavery is the cause and core of our national difficulty. Secession and Southern Rights have flourished in strength in exact ratio to the number of slaves in the States—nay, in the very counties in which slaves abounded. Slavery early developed a sectional class of politicians devoted to one object, who, by the sheer force of intense, unscrupulous application, from the year 1819 down to 1860, swayed our councils, gave an infamous character to American diplomacy, and stained our national character. They are called the Free Trade Party: why was it, then, that they never employed their power to accomplish that object, 'or how does it happen that, having submitted to the tariffs of 1832, 1842, and 1846, it should have resorted to the extreme measure of secession while under the tariff of 1857—a comparatively Free Trade law'? 'From 1842 down to 1860, the tendency of Federal legislation was distinctly in the direction of Free Trade.' 'If Free Trade was their main object, why did the Southern senators withdraw from their posts precisely at the time when their presence was most required to secure their cherished principle?' Or why did they not apply to their supple and infamous tool, Buchanan, to veto the bill? Because they wished it to pass—to make political capital against the North in England; and they accordingly aided its passage, Mr. Toombs being in the Senate, and actually voting for it! Or if it was a Free Trade question, why was it that the Western States did not take part with them?
The North, however, did not take up arms to destroy slavery, but the Right of Secession, since that was the irritating point d'honneur, and, what was more, the real first cause of injury which at first presented itself. Mr. Lincoln had cause to know that in the beginning, even in the South itself, secession was only the work of a turbulent minority. 'To have yielded would have been to have written himself down before the world as incompetent—nay, as a traitor to the cause which he had just sworn to defend.' In short, we were misunderstood—painfully so—and it is not a matter of indifference to learn that at last there is a reaction of intelligence in our favor, and that light is breaking through the bewildering mists which once veiled the truth.
In discussing 'the economic basis of slavery,' Professor Cairnes deals out truths with a prompt vigor which is truly admirable. From Stirling, Olmsted, Sewell, and others, he disposes of the old falsehood that only the negro can endure the Southern climate—a fact but recently generally made known at the North—that isothermal lines do not follow the parallels of latitude—and that it is a gross error to believe the black incapable of improvement as a freeman. He admits that slave labor has its advantages, in being absolutely controllable, and in returning the whole fruit of its labor to the owner. It may, therefore, be combined on an extensive scale, and its cost is trifling. But, on the other hand, slave labor is given reluctantly, and is consequently a losing means, unless much of it can be concentrated under the eye of one overseer. It is unskillful, because the slave cannot be educated; and, therefore, having once learned one thing, he must be kept at that for life.
The result of this is that, as the slave, unlike the free farm-laborer, cannot (with rare exceptions) be profitably employed at aught save agriculture, and indeed only at one branch of that, he soon exhausts the soil. If all the blacks in the South were capable of laboring at rotation of crops, they would soon be free. Slavery has always of itself died out in the wheat and corn regions—because, in raising cereals, labor is more widely dispersed than in cotton or tobacco planting, and the workers are more difficult to oversee. Hence the constant immigration from the wornout to the new plantation, and the cry for new land; and hence the admission, by the most intelligent men of the South, that to prevent the extension of slavery would be to destroy it. Free labor flourishes even on barren soils—ingenuity is stimulated and science developed. But slave labor requires abundance of fertile soil and a branch of culture demanding combination and organization of large masses of labor and its concentration.
Yet, in spite of these facts, a writer in the London Saturday Review informs the English public that the rapid deterioration of the soil under slave labor is a popular fallacy! Could the gentleman who gives this information so glibly, examine, we do not say Virginia, but simply that lower county of Delaware which has adhered somewhat to the old Southern slave system, in contradistinction to its two sisters, he might have distinctly ascertained if the exhaustion of soil by slave labor be a fallacy. Again, if the profits of slavery be only for the master, it may be true that the same process which enriches him impoverishes the country at large; and this is really the case through all the South. Free labor shuns slave society: a few Northern men may here and there live in the South, but as a rule the negro makes the poor white meaner than himself. It is true that free white labor in new lands is very exhaustive—but in time it takes them up again and restores them: this the negro never does, and never can do.
The tendencies of slavery to render the white man insolent, arrogant, and oligarchical, are well pointed out by Professor Cairnes, and with them the evil tendencies of slave societies. It makes bad white men, and intolerable political neighbors. In the ancient world, slaves were constantly being educated, freed, and made equal to their masters; but in the confederacy, everything is done to crush them lower and lower; and in these facts lie perdu the future further degradation of every poor white in the South, the constant increase of power and capital in the hands of a few, and the diminution in number even of these few.
The fact that Virginians breed slaves expressly for sale is well exposed in this book. Our author is kind enough to believe that they never raise a single negro for the express purpose of selling him or her; but we, who live nearer the 'sacred soil,' know better. It is not many days since a farmer in our present immediate vicinity, on the Southern Pennsylvania line, found himself obliged to dismiss a fine six-foot negro runaway from Virginia, whom he had hired, on account of the entire inability of the contraband to do the simplest farm tasks. 'What is the reason you can't stand work?' inquired the amazed farmer. 'Why, mass', to tell de trufe, I wasn't brought up to wuck (work), but to sell. If I'd been wucked too hard, it ud a spiled my looks fo' de markit.' Professor Cairnes may accept the sorrowful assurances of more than one person, who has been taken frequently enough into the councils of 'the enemy' in bygone times (crede experto Ruperto), that slaves are begotten, born, bred, and raised for the Southern market—as much so as any pigs—and that, too, by eminently aristocratic and highly refined scions of first families. Now that we can and dare speak the truth, it is not amiss to do so. We recall the day when to have taken part in the charge of the Six Hundred would have been a trifle of bravery compared to making the above truthful statement—for any one who valued social standing, or indeed a whole skin—on the border. Whether their own children were sold may be imagined from an anecdote long current in Virginia, relative to ex-Governor Wise, who, in a certain law case where he was opposed by a Northern trader, decided of a certain slave, that the chattel, being a mulatto, was of more value than 'a molangeon.' 'And what, in the name of God, is a molungeon?' inquired the astonished 'Northern man.' 'A mulatto,' replied Wise, is the child of a female house-servant by young master'—a molungeon is the offspring of a field hand by a Yankee peddler.'
Mr. Cairnes has, we doubt not, often heard of mulattoes—they constitute the great majority of Virginia slaves. But did he ever hear of 'molungeons'?
Mr. Cairnes justly denies the common theory that the South has maintained paramount political sway in the Union by a superior capacity for politics. He declares that men whose interests and ideas are concentrated in a very narrow range, on one object, have vast advantage over their intellectual superiors, when the latter pursue no such single course. He might have added that the young Southern gentleman, when not intended for a physician, almost invariably devotes to mere provincial politics and the arts of declamation and debate, all of those intellectual energies which the Northerner applies to business, art, commerce, literature, and other solidly useful occupations. If the Southerner has an inborn superior talent for politics, why is it that, as in the case of British or French statesmen, he never develops the slightest talent for literature? So notoriously is this the case, that even the first writers of the South, especially for the press, are generally broken-down Northern literary hacks, or miserable Irish and English refugees. Mr. Cairnes quotes De Bow's Review. He might be amazed, could he examine a number of that remarkable periodical, at the quality of the English written by some of the most eminent philosophers, patriots, and politicians of the confederacy!
The history of the Slave Power, as set forth in Louisiana, Missouri and its Compromise, the Mexican war, Kansas, the rise of the Republican Party, the Dred Scott decision, the attempt of John Brown, and secession, are given in a masterly manner in this work, and with a miraculous appreciation of truths. Not less vigorous and shrewd is the chapter devoted to the designs of the Slave Power, in which the future capacity of that power to do illimitable mischief is set forth in a manner which will be new even to the great mass of American Republican readers. If we differ with him in his 'Conclusion,' it is that we may be consistent to his earlier position. We do not agree with him when he advocates the giving permission to the South to secede with the Mississippi as their western boundary. Penned up by North and West, and with their ports occupied by us, the South would soon decay. But we rather believe the North, brought to the tremendous trial of a test between aristocracy and republicanism, will yet conquer by destroying slavery and giving the poor whites of the South their rights. But we cannot conclude without expressing the earnest hope that this book will be read, and that thoroughly, by every intelligent American. There is at present a reaction rapidly forming in England in favor of the Federal cause, and we foresee that this extraordinary work—the best summary in existence of our principles, and the most overwhelming stylus-stroke which slavery has ever received—is destined to be of incalculable service to the great cause. Let it circulate by the hundred thousand!—and do you, dear reader, do your part by perusing it, and making its merits known to all. In connection with it, we commend the review in the Westminster already referred to. It is pleasant to realize that we have friends among enemies. Let us hope that when brighter days come, our Government and our people will not be unmindful of those who defended us in the days of darkness and dole. We owe a great debt of gratitude to such men as Professor Cairnes, and must not be slack in paying it.
Les Miserables. No. IV. St. Denis. By Victor Hugo. New York: Carleton.
A great improvement on the preceding miserable trio, yet still far from fulfilling the extravagant assertions as to its merit with which the press has been deluged. We see in this novel, historic pictures, not without accuracy, details of life which are true enough, and, we might add, familiar enough, from a thousand feuilletons, but we find no PURPOSE, corresponding to the expectations excited. We have every variety of miserable wretch imaginable paraded before us, without a hint of any means of curing their social disease. 'There is a hammer for tearing down, but no trowel for building up,' beyond a little empty talk on the benefits to be derived from education. The truth is that Victor Hugo writes, like too many of his nation, simply for sensation and effect. The fault to be found with this series is, that, like Jack Sheppard, it degrades the taste and blunts the feelings—in a word, it vulgarizes, and is as improper reading for the young, so far as effect is concerned, as the most immoral production extant. Vulgarity is the open doorway to vice, and, philosophize as we may, sketches of thieves and vagabonds, gamins, prostitutes and liars are vulgar and unfit reading for youthful minds, if not for any minds whatever.
Abel Drake's Wife. By John Saunders. New York: Harper & Brothers.
The reader is well aware that this work has attained a great popularity—we may add that it has deserved it, being a work of marked originality; one of characters and feelings which will even bear at sundry times reperusal: as good a character as can be given to a novel, and a far better one than we are disposed to award to the majority of those which we meet. It is, we should say, in justice to the progressive powers of the author, far superior to his earlier productions.
EDITOR'S TABLE.
In the noble Message of President Lincoln, there are two paragraphs which should be committed to memory and constantly recalled by every man:
'Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this Administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down into honor or dishonor to the highest generation.
'We say 'we are for the Union!' The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save this Union. The world knows we know how to save it. We—even we here—hold the power and bear the responsibility!'
'We cannot escape history.' And this is true, not only of the Congress and of the Administration, but of all men who at the present day are raised one fraction above the veriest obscurity and completest nothing-ism. You, reader, and series of those whom you daily meet, may fancy that your deeds, speeches, writings, overshadowed as they are by the greater men and events of the day, will be forgotten. It is not so.
The last age was more antiquarian, more given to collecting, searching, and recording, than its predecessor. This present one is, however, a hundredfold more seeking and more chronicling than the last, and this tendency increases every year. As it is, scarce a hero or a traitor, even of the Revolution, is escaping glory or infamy. Will it be less the case with the good and bad men of the Emancipation? There is not one among them who shall escape history.
There is no thieving contractor, no 'helping' official, no shoddy scoundrel, no unrighteously 'commission' gathering leech, who is not quietly noted down here and there, to be duly exposed, some soon—some in after years. We know that extensive researches have been undertaken, to prepare and keep in black and white a record of the rascality of this war, in high places as well as low. They shall not escape history.
There is no cowardly, dishonest, selfish politician—be he who he may—no trimmer and truckler to the times—who will be forgotten. The most important war of all history—the greatest and most clearly outlined struggle between Aristocracy and Republicanism—will not pass away into oblivion. Men will toil away their lives that they may revive some of the salient points of this great fight for freedom. To commemorate the good, they must set forth the opposition of the bad—of those who aided the foe either by approving of endless slavery, by clogging the action of the Administration, or by turning the hardly earned income of Government, wrung from a suffering people, to their own profit. They shall not escape history.
Those who had the ability to aid the great cause of truth in any way, by brain or hand, and yet who did nothing—verily they shall not escape history.
The cautious, shrewd fellows, who hurrah loudly for the truth—after it has become safe and profitable to do so—they who run with the hound and hold with the hare—they may chuckle to themselves in their day, and rejoice at their shrewdness-but Time and GOD sift all things, however small—even such men as these. They shall not escape history.
And let them cry, 'After us the Deluge,' who will. You will live again in your children; the heritage of sin is repaid with compound interest to your name. How do you know but there is a GOD and a future knowledge of all this, that you act so boldly? What evil have your children or your name done you, that you should lay a curse on them? For if you do not put forth your hand to the great cause of truth and in the great battle of the Lord on behalf of Freedom, be certain that you are now shaping a malediction, and awaking the anathema maranatha, which shall go down into the deepest ages, and even in many lands, to cover you and yours with the dark shadow of shame forever. You shall not escape history.
But neither shall they escape who have fought the good fight for truth, for man and liberty. Truly, as the German proverb hath it, Zeit bricht Rosen und Zeit bringt Rosen—'Time breaks roses—but Time brings them also.' There is an age coming which will distinguish between the battles for conquest and idle glory and the honor of kings, and those which were fought for holy freedom. In that age, the great and good and wise, yes! even the smallest and weakest who chose the cause of Truth, will be prized above the men of all battles which ever were beforetime. Stand fast, O soldier! be firm, O friend of the good cause! let us see this thing bravely through to the end, come what may. GOD bless you!—and he will bless you! Die on the battle field, or labor humbly at home—if your heart and your hand have been given to the good work, you shall not escape history.
'Fate for you shall sheathe her shears,
You shall live some thousand years.'
It has been nobly proposed, and we doubt not that the proposition will be as nobly realized, that a shipload of food be sent to the relief of the starving operatives of England. If the wealthy classes of Great Britain were generous in proportion to the same order of men in this country, and in proportion to their own riches, it would be simply absurd for us to offer to relieve their paupers. But they are not so; and it is a matter to be deeply deplored, that the manufacturers who have made fortunes from their operatives, are, in Great Britain, the ones who are least inclined to relieve the sufferings of their poor dependants. And this we state entirely on the authority of the British press, and from the comments made by it on a recent and wretchedly abortive effort to collect from manufacturing capitalists somewhat to feed the poor who had enriched them. To an American, accustomed to hear of deeds of generosity and public spirit, the list of moneys subscribed for such an object, against the names of millionaires, would seem incredibly beggarly and pitiful.
However this may be, some one must feed the poor; and if John Bull cannot afford it, Jonathan must. There is a degree of suffering in which Englishman or confederate rebel becomes simply a suffering brother, and when he who would not act the good Samaritan becomes most truly an outlaw to all humanity. Therefore, let there be, not one, but many shiploads sent to the sufferers—let us cast our bread upon the waters, literally as well as figuratively, and give no heed or thought to its return. The London Times will, we presume, impugn the motives of the charity—call it Pecksniffian and Heep-ish—or possibly try to prove that the Federals had no hand in the good deed. Let it rave—the business in hand is to feed starving men, women, and children, and not to make political capital, or gain glory, or please a party—for that we most assuredly shall not—but to do good and act in the large-hearted manner which gives a good conscience, and which as a national trait is the noblest characteristic of a republican.
The South has been quicker than the North in perceiving that public opinion in England is rapidly changing in certain quarters in favor of the Federal cause, and it is for this reason that the press in Secessia has of late been so unamiable toward Great Britain, while Semmes has shown in his pirating so little kindness to English goods. Possibly Secessia may after all discover that she might do a more unprofitable thing than be in alliance offensive and defensive with us, and that she might go further and fare worse, either alone, or with foreign friends who are, after all, only foes in disguise.
But it is a mad and a foolish thing for England to hope to be benefited by our dissension. Have we grown weaker or less dangerous by the discovery that we are capable of raising the greatest armies and the most invincible fleets in the world? While we flourish in prosperity, we afford her an outlet for all her paupers, thieves, vagabond Bohemians, and refuse of all sorts, to say nothing of the vast mass of the really industrious poor who do well here, but who would have starved to death at home. With one person in eight in Great Britain dying as a pauper and buried at the public expense, it is hardly expedient for its people to wish to see us ruined. Were we to exclude her vagabonds and paupers by an alien act from entering this country, and at the same time close our markets to her goods, of what avail would all the cotton in the world be to her? The American public understand this thing perfectly—so perfectly that the first movement toward intervention would be to effectually shut out the offending party, to bear by itself the worst results of prostrated manufactures and a turbulent starving population.
But we trust that nothing of the kind may happen, and that England will perceive that a great, prosperous, and united America, though it covers the whole Western hemisphere, will be of more advantage to her than a divided, impoverished land, full of fighting factions. It is a bad, an inhuman, and a most un-Christian policy to set wealthy and powerful neighbors at dissensions, to rejoice at their losses, and finally hope to see them from prosperous citizens, turned into starved brigands. Envy is of the devil. And it is the more wicked, because we know, and every one of our readers knows with us, that there never existed in this country, within our recollection, any desire whatever to see England impoverished, injured, or in any way 'set back' as a country. That deep-seated desire, openly avowed by her orators and press, to see our growing greatness checked, was never seriously cherished by any true American—and it could be proved that the insulting expressions of such a desire have in almost every instance originated with British emigrés in this country, who are notoriously the most bitter foes to their fatherland.
It is finally worth noting that the sympathy expressed by Americans for Russia during the Crimean war, has been of late frequently urged in England as a reason for withholding sympathy from the Federals. Now it is most undeniably true that, with certain rare exceptions, the friendship for Russia at that time came in a great measure from the Democratic party, and especially from the South. It was an Irish antipathy to England in the North, and a serf-sympathy in the South which caused it all—naturally enough, in all conscience. If any one doubts this, let him recall Roger Pryor's book, indorsing Russia as the great power destined to swallow up all Europe—written at a time when Pryor was beyond question the first and loudest exponent living of Southern feelings and principles. This is the simplest and plainest of facts, most easily susceptible of proof—and yet how many Englishmen are there who would believe it?
The truth is that the whole criticism of America by England has presented the melancholy spectacle of prejudice and envy, made maudlin by gross ignorance—and the worst of it all has been the making the North responsible for the bygone evil deeds of the South. Repudiation, protection, Russian sympathy, filibustering, and other objections—are all heaped on the Federal head alone to bear? Will the truth ever come to light in England?
May we venture to mention to our readers that 'Among the Pines'—originally published in these pages—is now selling its thirtieth thousand, with constantly increasing orders. And in connection we would add that 'Americans in Rome'—originally published in The Continental under the title of Maccaroni and Canvas has appeared in book form, and may be obtained from George P. Putnam. This work is, we believe, one of the most remarkable collections of sketches and observation ever written on Italy; combining a very great amount of accurate personal observations of the Roman people, both in the city and country, with that of American artists' life there. The observations are throughout racily humorous, and those who have within a few years visited 'the Cradle of Art' cannot fail to recognize, as hit off with no sparing hand, more than one American notoriety. Art quackery as it exists, is well shown up in 'Americans in Rome;' the author having little in common with those amiable romancers who glorify every illiterate picture-maker, though he never fails to do justice to true genius. We believe, in short, that these sketches form a very peculiar, piquant, and earnest work, as truthful as it is amusing, and as such commend it to our readers.
The
Continental Monthly.
EDITORS:
HON. ROBERT J. WALKER,
CHARLES G. LELAND,
HON. FRED. P. STANTON,
EDMUND KIRKE.
The readers of the Continental are aware of the important position it has assumed, of the influence which it exerts, and of the brilliant array of political and literary talent of the highest order which supports it. No publication of the kind has, in this country, so successfully combined the energy and freedom of the daily newspaper with the higher literary tone of the first-class monthly; and it is very certain that no magazine has given wider range to its contributors, or preserved itself so completely from the narrow influences of party or of faction. In times like the present, such a journal is either a power in the land or it is nothing. That the Continental is not the latter is abundantly evidenced by what it has done—by the reflection of its counsels in many important public events, and in the character and power of those who are its staunchest supporters.
By the accession of Hon. Robert J. Walker and Hon. F. P. Stanton to its editorial corps, the Continental acquires a strength and a political significance which, to those who are aware of the ability and experience of these gentlemen, must elevate it to a position far above any previously occupied by any publication of the kind in America. Preserving all "the boldness, vigor, and ability" which a thousand journals have attributed to it, it will at once greatly enlarge its circle of action, and discuss, fearlessly and frankly, every principle involved in the great questions of the day. The first minds of the country, embracing men most familiar with its diplomacy and most distinguished for ability, are to become its contributors; and it is no mere "flattering promise of a prospectus" to say, that this "magazine for the times" will employ the first intellect in America, under auspices which no publication ever enjoyed before in this country.
Charles Godfrey Leland, the accomplished scholar and author, who has till now been the sole Editor of the Magazine, will, beside his editorial labors, continue his brilliant contributions to its pages; and Edmund Kirke, author of "Among the Pines," will contribute to each issue, having already begun a work on Southern Life and Society, which, will be found far more widely descriptive, and, in all respects, superior to the first.
While the Continental will express decided opinions on the great questions of the day, it will not be a mere political journal: much the larger portion of its columns will be enlivened, as heretofore, by tales, poetry, and humor. In a word, the Continental will be found, under its new staff of Editors, occupying a position and presenting attractions never before found in a magazine.