At the time of the cession of Louisiana to the United States, the old man was in comfortable circumstances. The best house in the village was his, and he had slaves and several arpens in the common field.1 But he had now fallen on evil days. He scorned to acquire any knowledge of the language, laws, and customs of the new masters of the country, and desired only to live in retirement and obscurity. But he could not help having some dealings with the world, and the management of these he committed to an only son, who had acquired a considerable proficiency both in our language and laws.
1 An arpen is the French acre. In the sense in which the word is here used, it means an allotment of land, in the common field of a village, of an arpen in breadth, and usually forty arpens in length. Three or four of these contiguous to each other, enclosed by the common ring fence, and brought under the plough, were sufficient to supply as much of the necessaries and comforts of life as the simple peasantry of that country had any idea of.
But if Master Louis excelled his father in these things, he was as much his inferior in every honorable and manly virtue. In short, a greater knave never breathed, as soon appeared by his so managing the old man's affairs as to reduce him to want. At the same time his craft, though sufficient to defraud his father, was no defence against the superior art of the adventurers who flocked to the country. He too was reduced to poverty, and spurned by his father, detested by his countrymen, and despised by the Anglo-Americans, his name was a by-word of scorn. But he still bustled about, trafficking in every thing he could lay his hands upon, negotiating bargains between new comers and the old inhabitants, and cheating both as often as he could. But the profits of his villainy were small, for he was too cautious to venture on any bold measure.
At length, however, the fiend he served seemed to have betrayed him into the hands of his enemies. At the opening of one of the terms of St. Charles' Court, I found his name on the criminal docket. I looked for the charge, and found it to be for stealing a slave. This was a capital offence, and I at once concluded that Louis' time was come. He had not a friend on earth. No witness could be expected to soften a word of testimony; no juror would do violence to his conscience for his sake, and he had therefore no hope but in innocence; and nothing could be more improbable than that.
The trial came on. In a corner of the room I observed a cluster of the poor peasantry of the village huddled together with looks of concern and awe, occasionally muttering in low and earnest tones. They are a good-natured people, and I was not surprised to see, as I supposed, some tokens of relenting toward poor Louis. But I was soon led to put a different construction on their manner, when I caught a glimpse of a figure sitting with the head bowed between the knees, which I at once recognized as that of the culprit's father.
As the cause proceeded, the excited interest of the old man came in aid of his pride, and he at length raised himself; made signs to those around him to stand aside, and thus sat full before me. He was pale and ghastly, and his eye was sunken, fixed, and rayless. With a countenance betokening stupor, like that of one just recovering from a stunning blow, he appeared to look on without seeing, and to listen without hearing.
It turned out that Louis' case was not so bad as I had apprehended. The prosecution was conceived in folly or malice, for the slave had been taken on a claim of property, by the advice of a lawyer. Of course I had but to say a few words to the jury, and he was acquitted.
This turn of the case was so sudden, that the poor Frenchmen, who understood only a word here and there, were unprepared for it, and began among themselves an eager jabbering, which at length awakened the faculties of the old man. He caught a few words, and then seemed, for the first time, to listen understandingly to what he heard. But whatever emotion he felt was either repressed by self-command, or buried in the depth of conscious abasement. He soon rose, and left the room, followed by the little party that had surrounded him.
The next morning I happened to be passing through the bar-room of the house I lodged in, and as I entered the door, I heard the bar-keeper say, "Here he is." I looked up. There was only one other person present, and his back was to me. Turning at the moment, I saw that it was old Charlot. I immediately approached him, accosting him with marked courtesy. He seemed not to hear me, but tottered toward me, looking up in my face with a dim lack-lustre eye, as if endeavoring to distinguish who I was. As I accosted him, extending my hand, he laid hold of it and drew himself forward, still gazing on me with the same fixed inquiring look. "C'est Monsieur le Juge?" asked he, in a subdued and tremulous voice. At the moment his eye found the answer to his question, and, before I could speak, he had fallen on his knees, and my hand was pressed to his lips, and bathed in tears which rained from his wintry eyes. I was inexpressibly shocked, and more humbled in his humiliation than at any other moment of my life.
I raised him with difficulty, and in a voice choked by tears, he tried to speak. I knew what he would say, and replied to his meaning. "You have no cause to thank me," said I. "Your son had done nothing for which he could lawfully be punished; his acquittal was inevitable, and he has merely received sheer justice at my hands." While I spoke, he recovered himself enough to speak. "Ah! Monsieur," said he, "that is true. But in the case of a poor wretch, hated and despised by all, who neither has, nor deserves to have a friend on earth, is not mere justice something to be thankful for? Bad as he is, he is my only son, and I must have leave to thank you."