Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp

by Harriet Beecher Stowe

The last two words Tiff always added to his prayers, from a sort of sense of propriety, feeling as if they rounded off the prayer, and made it, as he would have phrased it, more like a white prayer. We have only to say, to those who question concerning this manner of prayer, that, if they will examine the supplications of patriarchs of ancient times, they will find that, with the exception of the broken English and bad grammar, they were in substance very much like this of Tiff.

The Bible divides men into two classes: those who trust in themselves, and those who trust in God. The one class walk by their own light, trust in their own strength, fight their own battles, and have no confidence otherwise. The other, not neglecting to use the wisdom and strength which God has given them, still trust in his wisdom and his strength to carry out the weakness of theirs. The one class go through life as orphans; the other have a Father.

Tiff's prayer had at least this recommendation, that he felt perfectly sure that something was to come of it. Had he not told the Lord all about it? Certainly he had; and of course he would be helped. And this confidence Tiff took, as Jacob did a stone, for his pillow, as he lay down between his children and slept soundly.

How innocent, soft, and kind, are all God's works! From the silent shadows of the forest the tender and loving presence which our sin exiled from the haunts of men hath not yet departed. Sweet fall the moonbeams through the dewy leaves; peaceful is the breeze that waves the branches of the pines; merciful and tender the little wind that shakes the small flowers and tremulous wood-grasses fluttering over the heads of the motherless children. Oh thou who bearest in thee a heart hot and weary, sick and faint with the vain tumults and confusions of the haunts of men, go to the wilderness, and thou shalt find Him there who saith, "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you. I will be as the dew to Israel. He shall grow as a lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon."

Well, they slept there quietly, all night long. Between three and four o'clock, an oriole, who had his habitation in the vine above their heads, began a gentle twittering conversation with some of his neighbors; not a loud song, I would give you to understand, but a little, low inquiry as to what o'clock it was. And then, if you had been in a still room at that time, you might have heard, through all the trees of pine, beech, holly, sweet-gum, and larch, a little, tremulous stir and flutter of birds awaking and stretching their wings. Little eyes were opening in a thousand climbing vines, where soft, feathery habitants had hung, swinging breezily, all night. Low twitterings and chirpings were heard; then a loud, clear, echoing chorus of harmony answering from tree to tree, jubilant and joyous as if there never had been a morning before. The morning star had not yet gone down, nor were the purple curtains of the east undrawn; and the moon, which had been shining full all night, still stood like a patient, late-burning light in a quiet chamber. It is not everybody that wakes to hear this first chorus of the birds. They who sleep till sunrise have lost it, and with it a thousand mysterious pleasures—strange, sweet communings,—which, like morning dew, begin to evaporate when the sun rises.

But, though Tiff and the children slept all night we are under no obligations to keep our eyes shut to the fact that between three and four o'clock there came crackling through the swamps the dark figure of one whose journeyings were more often by night than by day. Dred had been out on one of his nightly excursions, carrying game, which he disposed of for powder and shot at one of the low stores we have alluded to. He came unexpectedly on the sleepers, while making his way back. His first movement, on seeing them, was that of surprise; then, stooping and examining the group more closely, he appeared to recognize them. Dred had known Old Tiff before; and had occasion to go to him more than once to beg supplies for fugitives in the swamps, or to get some errand performed which he could not himself venture abroad to attend to. Like others of his race, Tiff, on all such subjects, was so habitually and unfathomably secret, that the children, who knew him most intimately, had never received even a suggestion from him of the existence of any such person.

Dred, whose eyes, sharpened by habitual caution, never lost sight of any change in his vicinity, had been observant of that which had taken place in Old Tiff's affairs. When, therefore, he saw him sleeping as we have described, he understood the whole matter at once. He looked at the children, as they lay nestled at the roots of the tree, with something of a softened expression, muttering to himself, "They embrace the Rock for shelter."

He opened a pouch which he wore on his side, and took from thence one or two corn-dodgers and half a broiled rabbit, which his wife had put up for hunting provision, the day before; and, laying them down on the leaves, hastened on to a place where he had intended to surprise some game in the morning.

The chorus of birds we have before described awakened Old Tiff, accustomed to habits of early rising. He sat up, and began rubbing his eyes and stretching himself. He had slept well, for his habits of life had not been such as to make him at all fastidious with regard to his couch.