“Be it so!” was, as usual, his conclusion—“Be it so! for as long as Heaven pleases—though that cannot be long. The one consolation of being buried alive, soul or body—or both, as in this case—is, that release is sure and near. This poor fellow’s spirit will die within him, and his body will then be let out—the consummation most necessary for him. And my body, already failing, will soon die, and my work be done. To die, and to die thus, is part of my work; and I will do it as willingly as in the field. Hundreds, thousands of my race have died for slavery, cooped up, pining, suffocated in slave-ships, in the wastes of the sea. Hundreds and thousands have thus died, without knowing the end for which they perished. What is it, then, for one to die of cold in the wastes of the mountains, for freedom, and knowing that freedom is the end of his life and his death? What is it? If I groan, if I shrink, may my race curse me, and my God cast me out!”
A warmer glow than the dying embers could give passed through his frame; and he presently slept, basking till morning in dreams of his sunny home.
Chapter Forty One.
Half Free.
Autumn faded, and the long winter of the Jura came on, without bringing changes of any importance to the prisoners—unless it were that, in addition to the wood-fire, which scarcely kept up the warmth of life in their bodies, they were allowed a stove. This indulgence was not in answer to any request of theirs. Toussaint early discovered that Rubaut would grant nothing that was asked for, but liked to bestow a favour spontaneously, now and then. This was a clear piece of instruction; by which, however, Mars Plaisir was slow to profit. Notwithstanding his master’s explanations and commands, and his own promises, fervently given when they were alone, he could never see the Commandant without pouting out all his complaints, and asking for everything relating to external comfort that his master had been accustomed to at Pongaudin. A stove, not being among the articles of furniture there, was not asked for; and thus this one comfort was not intercepted by being named. Books were another. Mars Plaisir had been taught to read and write in one of the public schools in the island; but his tastes did not lie in the direction of literature; and he rarely remembered that he possessed the accomplishment of being able to read, except when circumstances called upon him to boast of his country and his race. Books were therefore brought, two at a time, with the Commandant’s compliments; two at a time, for the rule of treating the prisoners as equals was exactly observed. This civility brought great comfort to Toussaint—the greatest except solitude. He always chose to suppose that Mars Plaisir was reading when he held a book: and he put a book into his hands daily when he opened his own. Many an hour did he thus obtain for the indulgence of his meditations; and while his servant was wondering how he could see to read by the dim light which came in at the window—more dim each day, as the snow-heap there rose higher—or by the fitful flame of the fire, his thoughts were far away, beating about amidst the struggle then probably going on in Saint Domingo; or exploring, with wonder and sorrow, the narrow and darkened passages of that mind which he had long taken to be the companion of his own; or springing forward into the future, and reposing in serene faith on the condition of his people when, at length, they should possess their own souls, and have learned to use their human privileges. Many a time did Mars Plaisir, looking off from a volume of the Philosophical Dictionary, which yielded no amusement to him, watch the bright smile on his master’s face, and suppose it owing to the jokes in the Racine he held, when that smile arose from pictures formed within of the future senates, schools, courts, and virtuous homes, in which his dusky brethren would hereafter be exercising and securing their lights. Not ungratefully did he use his books the while. He read and enjoyed; but his greatest obligations to them were for the suggestions they afforded, the guidance they offered to his thoughts to regions amidst which his prison and his sufferings were forgotten.
At times, the servant so far broke through his habitual deference for his master as to fling down his book upon the table, and then beg pardon, saying that they should both go mad if they did not make some noise. When he saw the snow falling perpetually, noiseless as the dew, he longed for the sheeted rains of his own winter, splashing as if to drown the land. Here, there was only the eternal drip, drip, which his ear was weary of months ago.
“Cannot you fancy it rain-drops falling from a palm-leaf? Shut your eyes and try,” said his master.
It would not do. Mars Plaisir complained that the Commandant had promised that this drip should cease when the frosts of winter came.