North America — Volume 2

by Anthony Trollope

Cincinnati has long been known as a great town,—conspicuous among all towns for the number of hogs which are there killed, salted, and packed. It is the great hog metropolis of the western States; but Cincinnati has not grown with the rapidity of other towns. It has now 170,000 inhabitants, but then it got an early start. St. Louis, which is west of it again, near the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi, has gone ahead of it. Cincinnati stands on the Ohio river, separated by a ferry from Kentucky, which is a slave State. Ohio itself is a free-soil State. When the time comes for arranging the line of division, if such time shall ever come, it will be very hard to say where northern feeling ends and where southern wishes commence. Newport and Covington, which are in Kentucky, are suburbs of Cincinnati; and yet in these places slavery is rife. The domestic servants are mostly slaves, though it is essential that those so kept should be known as slaves who will not run away. It is understood that a slave who escapes into Ohio will not be caught and given up by the intervention of the Ohio police; and from Covington or Newport any slave can escape into Ohio with ease. But when that division takes place, no river like the Ohio can form the boundary between the divided nations. Such rivers are the highways, round which in this country people have clustered themselves. A river here is not a natural barrier, but a connecting street. It would be as well to make a railway a division, or the centre line of a city a national boundary. Kentucky and Ohio States are joined together by the Ohio river, with Cincinnati on one side and Louisville on the other; and I do not think that man's act can upset these ties of nature. But between Kentucky and Tennessee there is no such bond of union. There a mathematical line has been simply drawn, a continuation of that line which divides Virginia from North Carolina, to which two latter States Kentucky and Tennessee belonged when the thirteen original States first formed themselves into a union. But that mathematical line has offered no peculiar advantages to population. No great towns cluster there, and no strong social interests would be dissevered should Kentucky throw in her lot with the North, and Tennessee with the South; but Kentucky owns a quarter of a million of slaves, and those slaves must either be emancipated or removed before such a junction can be firmly settled.

The great business of Cincinnati is hog-killing now, as it used to be in the old days of which I have so often heard. It seems to be an established fact, that in this portion of the world the porcine genus are all hogs. One never hears of a pig. With us a trade in hogs and pigs is subject to some little contumely. There is a feeling, which has perhaps never been expressed in words, but which certainly exists, that these animals are not so honourable in their bearings as sheep and oxen. It is a prejudice which by no means exists in Cincinnati. There hog killing and salting and packing are very honourable, and the great men in the trade are the merchant princes of the city. I went to see the performance, feeling it to be a duty to inspect everywhere that which I found to be of most importance; but I will not describe it. There were a crowd of men operating, and I was told that the point of honour was to "put through" a hog a minute. It must be understood that the animal enters upon the ceremony alive, and comes out in that cleanly, disembowelled guise in which it may sometimes be seen hanging up previous to the operation of the pork-butcher's knife. To one special man was appointed a performance which seemed to be specially disagreeable, so that he appeared despicable in my eyes; but when on inquiry I learned that he earned five dollars, or a pound sterling, a day, my judgment as to his position was reversed. And after all what matters the ugly nature of such an occupation when a man is used to it?

Cincinnati is like all other American towns, with second, third, and fourth streets, seventh, eighth, and ninth streets, and so on. Then the cross-streets are named chiefly from trees. Chesnut, walnut, locust, &c. I do not know whence has come this fancy for naming streets after trees in the States, but it is very general. The town is well built, with good fronts to many of the houses, with large shops and larger stores;—of course also with an enormous hotel, which has never paid anything like a proper dividend to the speculator who built it. It is always the same story. But these towns shame our provincial towns by their breadth and grandeur. I am afraid that speculators with us are trammelled by an "ignorant impatience of ruin." I should not myself like to live in Cincinnati or in any of these towns. They are slow, dingy, and uninteresting; but they all possess an air of substantial, civic dignity. It must however be remembered that the Americans live much more in towns than we do. All with us that are rich and aristocratic and luxurious live in the country, frequenting the metropolis for only a portion of the year. But all that are rich and aristocratic and luxurious in the States live in the towns. Our provincial towns are not generally chosen as the residences of our higher classes.

Cincinnati has 170,000 inhabitants, and there are 14,000 children at the free schools,—which is about one in twelve of the whole population. This number gives the average of scholars throughout the year ended 30th June, 1861. But there are other schools in Cincinnati,—parish schools and private schools, and it is stated to me that there were in all 32,000 children attending school in the city throughout the year. The education at the State schools is very good. Thirty-four teachers are employed, at an average salary of £92 each, ranging from £260 to £60 per annum. It is in this matter of education that the cities of the free States of America have done so much for the civilization and welfare of their population. This fact cannot be repeated in their praise too often. Those who have the management of affairs, who are at the top of the tree, are desirous of giving to all an opportunity of raising themselves in the scale of human beings. I dislike universal suffrage; I dislike vote by ballot; I dislike above all things the tyranny of democracy. But I do like the political feeling—for it is a political feeling—which induces every educated American to lend a hand to the education of his fellow-citizens. It shows, if nothing else does so, a germ of truth in that doctrine of equality. It is a doctrine to be forgiven when he who preaches it is in truth striving to raise others to his own level;—though utterly unpardonable when the preacher would pull down others to his level.

Leaving Cincinnati I again entered a slave State, namely, Kentucky. When the war broke out Kentucky took upon itself to say that it would be neutral, as if neutrality in such a position could by any means have been possible! Neutrality on the borders of secession, on the battle-field of the coming contest, was of course impossible. Tennessee, to the south, had joined the South by a regular secession ordinance. Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana to the north were of course true to the Union. Under these circumstances it became necessary that Kentucky should choose her side. With the exception of the little State of Delaware, in which from her position secesssion would have been impossible, Kentucky was, I think, less inclined to rebellion, more desirous of standing by the North, than any other of the slave States. She did all she could, however, to put off the evil day of so evil a choice. Abolition within her borders was held to be abominable as strongly as it was so held in Georgia. She had no sympathy and could have none with the teachings and preachings of Massachusetts. But she did not wish to belong to a Confederacy of which the northern States were to be the declared enemy, and be the border State of the South under such circumstances. She did all she could for personal neutrality. She made that effort for general reconciliation of which I have spoken as the Crittenden compromise. But compromises and reconciliation were not as yet possible, and therefore it was necessary that she should choose her part. Her Governor declared for secession; and at first also her legislature was inclined to follow the Governor. But no overt act of secession by the State was committed, and at last it was decided that Kentucky should be declared to be loyal. It was in fact divided. Those on the southern border joined the secessionists, whereas the greater portion of the State, containing Frankfort the capital and the would-be secessionist Governor who lived there, joined the North. Men in fact became unionists or secessionists, not by their own conviction, but through the necessity of their positions; and Kentucky, through the necessity of her position, became one of the scenes of civil war.

I must confess that the difficulty of the position of the whole country seems to me to have been under-estimated in England. In common life it is not easy to arrange the circumstances of a divorce between man and wife, all whose belongings and associations have for many years been in common. Their children, their money, their house, their friends, their secrets, have been joint property and have formed bonds of union. But yet such quarrels may arise, such mutual antipathy, such acerbity and even ill-usage, that all who know them admit that a separation is needed. So it is here in the States. Free-soil and slave-soil could, while both were young and unused to power, go on together,—not without many jars and unhappy bickerings; but they did go on together. But now they must part; and how shall the parting be made? With which side shall go this child, and who shall remain in possession of that pleasant homestead? Putting secession aside, there were in the United States two distinct political doctrines, of which the extremes were opposed to each other as pole is opposed to pole. We have no such variance of creed, no such radical difference as to the essential rules of life between parties in our country. We have no such cause for personal rancour in our Parliament as has existed for some years past in both Houses of Congress. These two extreme parties were the slave-owners of the South and the abolitionists of the North and West. Fifty years ago the former regarded the institution of slavery as a necessity of their position,—generally as an evil necessity,—and generally also as a custom to be removed in the course of years. Gradually they have learned to look upon slavery as good in itself, and to believe that it has been the source of their wealth and the strength of their position. They have declared it to be a blessing inalienable,—that should remain among them for ever,—as an inheritance not to be touched, and not to be spoken of with hard words. Fifty years ago the abolitionists of the North differed only in opinion from the slave-owners of the South in hoping for a speedier end to this stain upon the nation; and in thinking that some action should be taken towards the final emancipation of the bondsmen. But they also have progressed; and as the southern masters have called the institution blessed, they have called it accursed. Their numbers have increased, and with their numbers their power and their violence. In this way two parties have been formed who could not look on each other without hatred. An intermediate doctrine has been held by men who were nearer in their sympathies to the slave-owners than to the abolitionists; but who were not disposed to justify slavery as a thing apart. These men have been aware that slavery has existed in accordance with the constitution of their country, and have been willing to attach the stain which accompanies the institution to the individual State which entertains it, and not to the national Government, by which the question has been constitutionally ignored. The men who have participated in the Government have naturally been inclined towards the middle doctrine; but as the two extremes have retreated further from each other, the power of this middle-class of politicians has decreased. Mr. Lincoln, though he does not now declare himself an abolitionist, was elected by the abolitionists; and when, as a consequence of that election, secession was threatened, no step which he could have taken would have satisfied the South which had opposed him, and been at the same time true to the North which had chosen him. But it was possible that his Government might save Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri. As Radicals in England become simple Whigs when they are admitted into public offices, so did Mr. Lincoln with his government become anti-abolitionist when he entered on his functions. Had he combated secession with emancipation of the slaves, no slave State would or could have held by the Union. Abolition for a lecturer may be a telling subject. It is easy to bring down rounds of applause by tales of the wrongs of bondage. But to men in office, abolition was too stern a reality. It signified servile insurrection, absolute ruin to all southern slave-owners, and the absolute enmity of every slave State.

But that task of steering between the two has been very difficult. I fear that the task of so steering with success is almost impossible. In England it is thought that Mr. Lincoln might have maintained the Union by compromising matters with the South,—or if not so, that he might have maintained peace by yielding to the South. But no such power was in his hands. While we were blaming him for opposition to all southern terms, his own friends in the North were saying that all principle and truth was abandoned for the sake of such States as Kentucky and Missouri. "Virginia is gone; Maryland cannot go. And slavery is endured and the new virtue of Washington is made to tamper with the evil one, in order that a show of loyalty may be preserved in one or two States which after all are not truly loyal!" That is the accusation made against the government by the abolitionists; and that made by us on the other side is the reverse. I believe that Mr. Lincoln had no alternative but to fight, and that he was right also not to fight with abolition as his battle-cry. That he may be forced by his own friends into that cry, is, I fear, still possible. Kentucky at any rate did not secede in bulk. She still sent her senators to Congress, and allowed herself to be reckoned among the stars in the American firmament. But she could not escape the presence of the war. Did she remain loyal or did she secede, that was equally her fate.

The day before I entered Kentucky a battle was fought in that State, which gave to the northern arms their first actual victory. It was at a place called Mill Spring, near Somerset, towards the south of the State. General Zollicoffer, with a Confederate army, numbering, it was supposed, some eight thousand men, had advanced upon a smaller Federal force, commanded by General Thomas, and had been himself killed, while his army was cut to pieces and dispersed; the cannon of the Confederates were taken, and their camp seized and destroyed. Their rout was complete; but in this instance again the advancing party had been beaten, as had, I believe, been the case in all the actions hitherto fought throughout the war. Here, however, had been an actual victory, and it was not surprising that in Kentucky loyal men should rejoice greatly, and begin to hope that the Confederates would be beaten out of the State. Unfortunately, however, General Zollicoffer's army had only been an offshoot from the main rebel army in Kentucky. Buell, commanding the Federal troops at Louisville, and Sydney Johnston, the Confederate General, at Bowling Green, as yet remained opposite to each other, and the work was still to be done.

I visited the little towns of Lexington and Frankfort, in Kentucky. At the former I found in the hotel to which I went seventy-five teamsters belonging to the army. They were hanging about the great hall when I entered, and clustering round the stove in the middle of the chamber;—a dirty, rough, quaint set of men, clothed in a wonderful variety of garbs, but not disorderly or loud. The landlord apologized for their presence, alleging that other accommodation could not be found for them in the town. He received, he said, a dollar a day for feeding them, and for supplying them with a place in which they could lie down. It did not pay him,—but what could he do? Such an apology from an American landlord was in itself a surprising fact. Such high functionaries are, as a rule, men inclined to tell a traveller that if he does not like the guests among whom he finds himself, he may go elsewhere. But this landlord had as yet filled the place for not more than two or three weeks, and was unused to the dignity of his position. While I was at supper, the seventy-five teamsters were summoned into the common eating-room by a loud gong, and sat down to their meal at the public table. They were very dirty; I doubt whether I ever saw dirtier men; but they were orderly and well-behaved, and but for their extreme dirt might have passed as the ordinary occupants of a well-filled hotel in the West. Such men, in the States, are less clumsy with their knives and forks, less astray in an unused position, more intelligent in adapting themselves to a new life than are Englishmen of the same rank. It is always the same story. With us there is no level of society. Men stand on a long staircase, but the crowd congregates near the bottom, and the lower steps are very broad. In America men stand upon a common platform, but the platform is raised above the ground, though it does not approach in height the top of our staircase. If we take the average altitude in the two countries, we shall find that the American heads are the more elevated of the two. I conceived rather an affection for those dirty teamsters; they answered me civilly when I spoke to them, and sat in quietness, smoking their pipes, with a dull and dirty, but orderly demeanour.

The country about Lexington is called the Blue Grass Region, and boasts itself as of peculiar fecundity in the matter of pasturage. Why the grass is called blue, and or in what way or at what period it becomes blue, I did not learn; but the country is very lovely and very fertile. Between Lexington and Frankfort a large stock farm, extending over three thousand acres, is kept by a gentleman, who is very well known as a breeder of horses, cattle, and sheep. He has spent much money on it, and is making for himself a Kentucky elysium. He was kind enough to entertain me for a while, and showed me something of country life in Kentucky. A farm in that part of the State depends, and must depend, chiefly on slave-labour. The slaves are a material part of the estate, and as they are regarded by the law as real property—being actually adstricti glebæ—an inheritor of land has no alternative but to keep them. A gentleman in Kentucky does not sell his slaves. To do so is considered to be low and mean, and is opposed to the aristocratic traditions of the country. A man who does so willingly, puts himself beyond the pale of good-fellowship with his neighbours. A sale of slaves is regarded as a sign almost of bankruptcy. If a man cannot pay his debts, his creditors can step in and sell his slaves; but he does not himself make the sale. When a man owns more slaves than he needs, he hires them out by the year; and when he requires more than he owns, he takes them on hire by the year. Care is taken in such hirings not to remove a married man away from his home. The price paid for a negro's labour at the time of my visit was about a hundred dollars, or twenty pounds, for the year; but this price was then extremely low in consequence of the war disturbances. The usual price had been about fifty or sixty per cent. above this. The man who takes the negro on hire feeds him, clothes him, provides him with a bed, and supplies him with medical attendance. I went into some of their cottages on the estate which I visited, and was not in the least surprised to find them preferable in size, furniture, and all material comforts to the dwellings of most of our own agricultural labourers. Any comparison between the material comfort of a Kentucky slave and an English ditcher and delver would be preposterous. The Kentucky slave never wants for clothing fitted to the weather. He eats meat twice a day, and has three good meals; he knows no limit but his own appetite; his work is light; he has many varieties of amusement; he has instant medical assistance at all periods of necessity for himself, his wife, and his children. Of course he pays no rent, fears no baker, and knows no hunger. I would not have it supposed that I conceive slavery with all these comforts to be equal to freedom without them; nor do I conceive that the negro can be made equal to the white man. But in discussing the condition of the negro, it is necessary that we should understand what are the advantages of which abolition would deprive him, and in what condition he has been placed by the daily receipt of such advantages. If a negro slave wants new shoes, he asks for them, and receives them, with the undoubting simplicity of a child. Such a state of things has its picturesquely patriarchal side; but what would be the state of such a man if he were emancipated to-morrow?