The New Man: Twenty-nine years a slave, twenty-nine years a free man

by Henry Clay Bruce

One of the first lessons a new appointee should learn, and I might say the most important one, is entire and complete subordination, for without this he cannot succeed. He must make up his mind to lay aside what he calls his manly instincts and personal independence, and resolve to submissively obey all orders of his superiors without a murmur, even though they are not stated exactly in accordance with the rules of syntax, laid down by Lindley Murray. He will also find that he must so act as to win the respect and confidence of his superiors in office, and to so live as to hold them, and to do this, he must be a gentleman away from the office as well as in it, for if he keeps bad company, the report of it will eventually reach his superiors, and thereby affect his standing materially. A new clerk will not be here very long before he will find that in addition to these other necessary requirements, that “Influence” counts a good deal, and without it one can make slow headway singlehanded and alone, trusting to his own ability. To obtain social standing and influence, one must associate with the better class of people, and to do that he must be of clean character, if he expects to obtain entre therein. The various Departments of the government here are run by old and experienced clerks, who have spent a large part of their lives in this service, and cannot well be displaced by the new ones, however intelligent they may be. The fitness of these old clerks is proved by long, efficient and faithful service. They also very clearly understand the value of influence, and know just when, where and how to bring it to bear. They are regular diplomats.

But aside from other considerations, these men have devoted their lives to the service, grown old in it, and are content, and I might say, fitted to this kind of work to the exclusion of all other work. They cannot go out into the world and make a decent living on their own wits, and therefore should be let alone, because the government has received the benefit of their best days of service, and should not cast them out on account of old age, at least, to “go over the hill to the poor house.”

ENDORSEMENTS.

Probably the most unique work of its kind will be Mr. H. C. Bruce’s book, “The New Man.” It is ostensibly the author’s autobiography, but he has made more of it than a simple narrative by interweaving with his own experience much of the history of the ante-bellum days and very many vivid descriptions of the habits and customs of the Old South.

One of the most conspicuous features of this book is the entire absence of the passion usually displayed when former slaves refer to their past bondage. Yet without this very dispassionateness no history can be authentic. We may be fascinated by the elegant style of an historian, but the fascination changes to doubt in the presence of his evident bias and his expressed prejudice.

Mr. Bruce felt his bondage—all slaves felt it—but he has been fair enough, and I may add courageous enough, to say that within his experience and observation, savagery and brutality in the treatment of slaves were the exception and not the rule. The great wrong was in the enslavement per se of a fellow-man. Why, he argues, would a man abuse and over-work and starve his slave, a valuable piece of property, any more than he would poorly feed or maltreat his horse or his ox? His own self-interest would require good treatment in order to secure good results from the labor of his slaves. There were harsh, even brutal masters, but Mr. Bruce claims that these were usually found among a class of people who were low bred, and he asserts that the cruelties of slavery could be as easily traced to this class of white men, as we can trace to a similar class to-day the proscriptions, and persecutions and hardships that are suffered by the better element of Colored people.

If left to themselves, Mr. Bruce believes, there would be the best of feeling between the old aristocrat and his former slave, and the world would not be periodically shocked by the intelligence of lynching bees and burnings.

To me, Mr. Bruce’s accounts of the old highway system, with the then prevailing modes of travel and trade, are as instructive as they are interesting. But this is only one of the many valuable contributions to history, with which the book abounds.