In the evening, there was another immense meeting of negroes in the outskirts of Beaufort. It was again found that no church would hold them, and so God’s first temples—it must have been live-oak groves Bryant thought of, when he wrote the well-known lines—were again sought. Crowding through the throng that obstructed all the approaches, and ascending the platform, one was struck with the impressiveness of a scene as peculiar as that in the morning on St. Helena, and yet widely differing from it. Great live-oaks again reared their stately pillars of gray, and spread their glorious canopy of green, beside and above the platform; negroes, old and young, again spread out in a sea of black humanity before us; but for the rows of carts, and the old meeting-house, and the moss-grown gravestones that shut in the view on St. Helena, we had here the serried ranks of two full regiments of negroes. Black urchins clambered up into the live-oak boughs, above our heads; black girls adjusted their scarfs, and fidgeted about the front of the platform; white-wooled, but black-faced, old men leaned against the railing; the mass of the congregation in front were women, and, as for the young men, they were clad in blue, and they stood in ranks outside the rest.
The faces seemed somewhat more intelligent than those on St. Helena. There were more house-servants, and all had been brightened by the contact with business in the town. A keen-eyed lady on the platform called my attention to the owner of a particularly showy turban, and lo! beneath its dazzling colors looked forth, in befitting black, the very face of Mrs. Gummidge, the “lone, lorn creetur’” of David Copperfield’s early acquaintance. To the very whimper of the mouth, and watery expression of the eyes, and last particular of desolate and disconsolate appearance, it was Mrs. Gummidge’s self, as Dickens has made her immortal. But this was not a common expression. Chubby-faced, glittering-eyed youngsters, of the Topsy type, and comfortable, good-natured Aunties, at peace with themselves and the world, were the prevailing characters. Beaufort was more stylish than St. Helena, and many a ludicrous effort was made in willow crinoline, tawdry calico and cotton gloves, to ape the high-born mulattoes whom the traveled ones had seen in Charleston, and occasionally at Hilton Head.
The sermonizing, singing and speech-making, need hardly be described. Given the occasion and the circumstances, and what weary reader of the papers can not tell, to the very turn of the climax and the polish of the peroration, the nature of the speeches? But it was worthy of note that the orators found the audience to their liking; and, on the point of intelligence, your popular orator is exacting. “I have been in the habit of addressing all sorts of people,” said Doctor Fuller, “but never felt so intensely the inspiration of a deeply-sympathizing audience.” Two or three humorous little sallies were caught with a quickness and zest that showed how understandingly they were following the speaker; and, at times, the great audience—greater than Cooper Institute could hold—was swaying to and fro, now weeping, then laughing, in the agitation of a common passion the orator had evoked. They seemed to know all about the Chief Justice, and clamored for him, till, as he stood up for a moment, the thunder of the cheers swayed the Spanish moss that hung in pendent streamers above our heads, and made the leaves of the live-oaks quiver as if a gale were blowing through the branches. “If I had only known you were coming,” whispered a superintendent, “we might have had two or three marriages here, under the live-oaks, to conclude the exercises of the day!”
But it was when the “exercises” were over, that the real interest of the occasion was brought out. Not less than a hundred of Doctor Fuller’s former slaves were in the audience. The moment the benediction was pronounced, they made a rush for the platform, and the good Doctor found his path blocked up at the steps. “Lod bress ye, Massa Rich’d; was afeard ’ud never see ye agin.” “Don’t you know me, Massa Rich’d? I’m Aunt Chloe.” “’Pears like ye wa’n’t never comin’, no more!” And all the while a vigorous hand-shaking and hand-kissing went on, the former master standing on the steps, and looking benevolently down into upturned faces that fairly shone with joy and excitement.
Presently one of the Aunties, whose happiness was altogether too exuberant for words, struck up a wild chant, and in a moment half a hundred voices had joined her. She stood with clasped hands and beaming face, balancing from one foot to the other in a sort of measured dance, sometimes stopping a moment to shout “glory,” and then resuming with yet more enthusiasm; while the former slaves still kept crowding up, feeling the Doctor’s hair, passing their hands over his shoulders, clustering lingeringly about him, and joining with deep-throated emphasis in the chant. Soon other women had approached the swaying leader, two or three clasped hands, there was the same animal, half-hysteric excitement, the same intoxication of the affections, which we had witnessed in the morning on St. Helena; while, meantime, a few middle-aged negroes, who gave no other marks of excitement than a perfectly gratified expression of countenance, quietly engaged the Doctor in conversation, told him something of their life since they had become freemen, their hardships and their final prosperity. The women kept up the singing; more and more negroes were joining the circle about the former planter, as we pushed through and left them to themselves. Long lines of soldiers were marching away, their glistening bayonets setting the red rays of the sinking sun to flickering in grotesque lights and shades over the shouting and dancing slaves. Under the trees on the outskirts stood a group of interested spectators, officers, traders, agents of different departments of the Government; a few ladies wonderingly looked on; the breeze was fluttering the flags over the platform; and the late slaves were still singing and kissing their former master’s hand. It was our last sight of Beaufort.
A lead-colored little steamer lay at the wharf to take us down to Hilton Head; a short, heavy-set, modest-speaking, substantial negro, a little past middle-age, came to say that the vessel was ready, and awaited our orders. It was the “Planter,” and the negro was her Captain, Robert Small—lionized over much, but not spoilt yet. The breeze over the island was delicious; not a film of mist flecked the sky; and down to the very meeting of sky and water, we caught the sparkle of the stars, brilliant with all the effulgence of tropic night.
[18]. I subsequently, however, saw several badly-neglected cotton fields. The very intelligent correspondent of the Boston Advertiser (Mr. Sidney Andrews,) writing from Beaufort, in July, likewise found ill-tilled plantations. He says: