"O Eva, tell us what you see! What is it?" said her father.
'A bright, a glorious smile passed over her face, and she said, brokenly: "O love—joy—peace!" gave one sigh, and passed from death unto life!'
Previous to the death of the dear Eva, she had induced her father to promise to emancipate Tom, and he was taking steps to give this faithful servant his liberty, when a terrible catastrophe occurred. St Clare was suddenly killed in attempting to appease a quarrel in one of the coffee-rooms of New Orleans. His family were plunged into grief and consternation; and by his trustees the whole of the servants in the establishment, Uncle Tom included, were brought to sale in the open market.
'Beneath a splendid dome were men of all nations, moving to and fro over the marble pavé. On every side of the circular area were little tribunes, or stations, for the use of speakers and auctioneers. Two of these, on opposite sides of the area, were now occupied by brilliant and talented gentlemen, enthusiastically forcing up, in English and French commingled, the bids of connoisseurs in their various wares. A third one, on the other side, still unoccupied, was surrounded by a group waiting the moment of sale to begin. And here we may recognise the St Clare servants, awaiting their turn with anxious and dejected faces.
'Tom had been standing wistfully examining the multitude of faces thronging around him for one whom he would wish to call master; and, if you should ever be under the necessity, sir, of selecting out of two hundred men one who was to become your absolute owner and disposer, you would perhaps realise, just as Tom did, how few there were that you would feel at all comfortable in being made over to. Tom saw abundance of men, great, burly, gruff men; little, chirping, dried men; long-favoured, lank, hard men; and every variety of stubbed-looking, common-place men, who pick up their fellow-men as one picks up chips, putting them into the fire or a basket with equal unconcern, according to their convenience; but he saw no St Clare.
'A little before the sale commenced, a short, broad, muscular man, in a checked shirt, considerably open at the bosom, and pantaloons much the worse for dirt and wear, elbowed his way through the crowd, like one who is going actively into a business; and, coming up to the group, began to examine them systematically. From the moment that Tom saw him approaching, he felt an immediate and revolting horror at him, that increased as he came near. He was evidently, though short, of gigantic strength. His round, bullet head, large, light-gray eyes, with their shaggy, sandy eyebrows, and stiff, wiry, sun-burned hair, were rather unprepossessing items, it is to be confessed; his large, coarse mouth was distended with tobacco, the juice of which, from time to time, he ejected from him with great decision and explosive force; his hands were immensely large, hairy, sun-burned, freckled, and very dirty, and garnished with long nails, in a very foul condition. This man proceeded to a very free personal examination of the lot. He seized Tom by the jaw, and pulled open his mouth to inspect his teeth; made him strip up his sleeve to shew his muscle; turned him round, made him jump and spring, to shew his paces.' Almost immediately, Tom was ordered to mount the block. 'Tom stepped upon the block, gave a few anxious looks round; all seemed mingled in a common, indistinct noise—the clatter of the salesman crying off his qualifications in French and English, the quick fire of French and English bids; and almost in a moment came the final thump of the hammer, and the clear ring on the last syllable of the word "dollars," as the auctioneer announced his price, and Tom was made over.—He had a master!
'He was pushed from the block; the short, bullet-headed man, seizing him roughly by the shoulder, pushed him to one side, saying, in a harsh voice: "Stand there, you!"'
By his new and rude master, Tom was forthwith marched off; put on board a vessel for a distant cotton-plantation on Red River; stripped of his decent apparel by his savage owner, and dressed in the meanest habiliments. The treatment of the poor negro was now most revolting. He was wrought hard under a burning sun; half-starved; scourged; loaded with the grossest abuse. All this ends in a rapid decline of health; and his story terminates with an account of his death, his last moments being dignified by a strong sentiment of piety, and of forgiveness towards his inhuman taskmaster.
We have now presented a sufficiently ample abstract of Uncle Tom's Cabin, a work which will undoubtedly be perused at length by all who feel deeply on the subject of negro slavery. Of the authoress, Mrs H. B. Stowe, it may be said, that her chief merit consists in close observation of character, with a forcible and truth-like power of delineation. In plot, supposing her to aim at such a thing, she decidedly fails, and the winding-up of her dramatis personæ is hurried and imperfect. Notwithstanding these defects, however, she has succeeded in rivetting universal attention, while her aims are in the highest degree praiseworthy.