Though very unwilling to meet death on the field of battle when a loophole to escape is at hand, yet no one faces it more courageously than the Haytian, both black and coloured, when on the place of execution. He stands dauntless before the trembling soldiers, who, shutting their eyes or turning away their heads, fire at random, and who too often only wound, and have to charge and recharge their muskets before their prisoner dies. The soldiers have a superstitious dread of shooting any particular man in cold blood, and fancy that his spirit will haunt that individual whose bullet has sent him into the other world.
The black in his family relations is in general kindly, though few of the lower orders go through any civil or religious marriage ceremony; in fact, it was at one time the custom of all classes to be “placé,” and only since the priests have regained some of their ancient influence have those who are considered respectable consented to go to church. The first daring innovators were almost stoned by the people, and even such men as Presidents Pétion and Boyer were only “placed,” the latter succeeding to the authority and “placée” of the former. Yet the children of these unions are by Haytian law legitimate, as the agreement to live together, as in our old common law, was considered equivalent to marriage.
In the interior a well-to-do black lives openly with several women as wives, and I have seen the patriarch sitting at the door of the central house, with huts all around in which his younger wives lived, as they could not be made to dwell under the same roof. On Friday evenings he descends to market on a horse or mule, perhaps holding in his arms the latest born, while following in his train are a dozen women and sturdy children either carrying loads or driving beasts of burden. No one is mounted but himself. The French priests attempted to alter this state of things, but they did not succeed, as the wives, surrounding the intruder, asked him what was to be their position if the husband selected one among them and abandoned the rest. The priests have for the most part wisely decided not to meddle with the present, but rather endeavour to act upon the minds of the younger generation. They can hardly expect success as long as the numbers of women greatly exceed those of the men.
The blacks, though in general kind to their children, neglect them, and the mortality is said to be great. They are, however, very passionate, and in their anger they use in correction the first thing that comes to hand. A Spanish friend with a tender heart was riding one day in the country when his attention was drawn by the piercing shrieks of a child. He turned his head, and saw a black woman holding a little boy by the arm and beating him with the handle of a broom. He rode up, and catching the next blow on the handle of his whip, said, “Don’t beat the child in that manner.” The woman looked up surprised at the interference, and coolly replied in their patois, “Consite, li nègue; li pas fait li mal.”—“Consul, it is a negro; it will do him no harm.”
Another day he saw a gigantic black beating with his club an interesting-looking young negress, giving blows that only a black could stand without being maimed. Again he interfered, but both set upon him, first with foul words, and then with such menacing gestures, that he was too glad to put spurs to his horse and gallop away. He found he had been interfering in a domestic quarrel.
The brutal use of the cocomacaque or club is universal, as I shall have to notice when describing the police. Under Toussaint’s regulations the use of the whip, as an unpleasant memento of slavery, was abolished, but the club was introduced. Dessalines, as Inspector-General of Agriculture, brought it into vogue. At Les Cayes he one day ordered a woman to be beaten for neglecting some agricultural work; she was far advanced in pregnancy, and her child was prematurely born whilst the punishment was being inflicted. Whenever Dessalines’ name is mentioned, it is associated with some act of fiendish cruelty.
As might be expected, few marriages take place between the whites and blacks; the only instance of which I heard was a German clerk who married the daughter of a Minister in the hope of making his fortune through the contracts he expected to obtain from his unscrupulous father-in-law; but within a fortnight of the marriage the Minister was expelled from office. Contrary to general expectation, the German boldly faced his altered prospects, and the marriage appeared to have turned out more happily than could have been anticipated from so ill-assorted a union.
Whilst travelling in Hayti one is often surprised at the extraordinary difference in the appearance of the population, many being tall, fine men with open countenances, whilst others are the meanest-looking gorillas imaginable. Then their colour: some have shiny skins, that look as if blacking and the blacking-brush had been conscientiously applied, whilst others have the skin completely without lustre, looking almost as if disease were there. Again, others are of the deepest black, whilst their next neighbours may be of a reddish tinge.
During my residence in Hayti I only saw one handsome negress, and she was a peasant girl of La Coupe near Port-au-Prince: her features were almost perfect, and she might well have said—
“Mislike me not for my complexion,