Octavia, the Octoroon

by J. F. Lee

Horror of horrors! This was "the unkindest cut of all." Simon was crushed, humiliated, and felt that he was disgraced by the conduct of his sister; and to think of her duplicity for all those months was enough to cause an angel to swear. He and his sister were the most intelligent and refined negroes in all that country. They were the élite, the bon ton, the upper crust, and were looked on as such by the other slaves. If there were aristocrats among slaves, Simon and sister filled the bill. Simon had held his sister up to the negro girls on the place as an example, and for her to bring disgrace on them in that way was too much!

Aunt Lucy, Elsie's nurse, said that Elsie had no ordinary baby; that "it was white as the whitest, eyes as blue as ole mars'er, an' hair as strate as ole missis, an' not a white man in de kentry. Dis weren't no nigger baby; Elsie she got wid chile by de Holy Spirit." Simon knew that the days of miracles had passed, and that none other than a white man was its father. Elsie admitted after a long time that her owner was the child's father. Whether he was satisfied, Simon said no more about it, but refused for a long while to even see the baby. Time heals all things, and finally Simon consented to see it and was struck with her beauty. Elsie named her child Octavia, and as it grew in years Simon began to love the child as his own. She became a favorite on the whole plantation, nothing being too good that any of the slaves had for little Octavia. She was a heroine from the first, as she proved to be in after life.

To all appearances she was as pure as the purest Caucasian, and if an expert had been put on the stand to swear as to her race he would have said Caucasian. Such are the circumstances under which this afterwards wonderful being was brought into existence.

With a white father and quadroon mother, this made her seven-eighths Caucasian.

CHAPTER IV.

ALMOST A WATERY GRAVE.

Before proceeding further I would say that the standard of virtue among the negroes is very low, and that if any of their girls wander from the paths of virtue they are not cast off as is the case with the whites. It must be admitted, however, that there is an improvement among them along this line. When Octavia was a year old she came very near being drowned in the river. Elsie was fond of fishing, and carried Octavia and a little negro nurse to watch the child. The nurse got careless and let the child fall into the river, and would have drowned had not Simon happened to be near and heard his sister's screams, and getting there, jumped in just in time to rescue both mother and child, the former having leaped in to save the child. Simon gave his sister a good lecture and the nurse a switching for their carelessness. It seemed that Simon's nearness was providential.

Simon always said, after the child was a few months old, that she had a bright future before her; that, though a slave, the Lord would open up a way for her.

In Colonel R.'s absence Simon was required to make frequent visits to his mistress's home to report to her the progress he was making on the farm. The war had been over half fought, and while the Confederacy had gained many battles it suffered serious losses, and was daily getting weaker, and it was only a question of time when it would collapse. During his visits to his mistress Simon gained this intelligence in regard to the progress of the war, and while he was sure of his freedom, regardless of the way the war terminated, he could not but wish for the success of the Union armies on account of his sister and her child, who would thereby gain their freedom. He also had a broad, sympathetic feeling for his race and wanted them liberated.