This brings us to the consideration of the all-important subject called in America the “negro question,” but which is, nevertheless, the immortal question of the rights of man.
The inhabitants of Hayti consisted of 540,000 souls, and were divided into three distinct classes—the whites, the slaves, and the mulattoes and free blacks. The term mulatto comprehended all shades between whites and negroes. The whites conducted themselves as if born to command, and the blacks, awed into submission, yielded obedience to their imperious mandates, while the mulattoes were despised by both parties.
The freedom they enjoyed was rather nominal than real. On reaching a state of manhood each became liable to serve in a military establishment, the office of which was to arrest runaway slaves, protect travellers on the public roads, and, in short, to “mount a three years’ guard on the public tranquillity.” To complete their degradation, they were utterly disqualified from holding any office or place of public trust. No mulatto durst assume the surname of his father; and to prevent the revenge which such flagrant and contemptible injustice could hardly fail to excite, the law had enacted that if a free man of color presumed to strike a white man, his right arm should be cut off. In fact, they were not much above the condition of the free blacks in the United States. “On comparing the situation of these two classes of men”—the slaves and the nominally free—says Coke, “it is difficult to say which was the most degraded. The social difference was, without doubt, very great, but in the aggregate must have been about the same.”
Such was the state of affairs previous to 1790. What they have been subsequently remains to be seen. The whip of terror never yet made a friend. It may prevent men from being avowed enemies for a while, but it usually makes a deeper impression upon the heart than upon the skin. The heart is nearest the seat of recollection, and will stimulate to revenge for a long time after the wound has been inflicted, as the reader of the following pages will abundantly attest.
“Time the Avenger! unto thee I lift
My hands and eyes and heart, and crave of thee a gift.”
LETTER X.
Republic of Hayti.
AFFAIRS IN FRANCE—THE CASE OF THE MULATTOES—TERRIBLE FATE OF OGÉ AND CHAVINE.
T was towards the close of the year 1788 that the revolutionary spirit which had been fermenting among the French people from the conclusion of the American war first manifested itself in the mother country; and although that extraordinary event convulsed the empire in every part, in no place was the shock so great as in Hayti.