Autographs for Freedom Part 19

The girgir, or the _geshe el aube_, a species of flowering gra.s.s.

Piercing, fragrant, and grateful in its odor, it operates not unlike a mild stimulant, when respired for any length of time, and is found chiefly near the borders of small streams and in the vicinage of the Ta.s.sada.--_Lyn. Gui. and Soud._

[11] "Where browse the _fecho_ and the dun-gazelle."

Among the wild animals are prodigious numbers of the vari-colored species of the gazelle, the bohur sa.s.sa, fecho, and madoqua. They are extremely numerous in the provinces depopulated _by war and slavery_, enjoying the wild oats of the deserted hamlets without fear of molestation from a returning population.--_Notes on Central Africa._

[12] "And wiser than Athenas' wisest schools, Nor led by zealots, nor scholastic rules, Gazed at the stars which stud yon tender blue, And hoped and deemed the cheat of death untrue."

Though Socrates and Plato, particularly the former, are generally admitted by writers of authority, among whom, indeed, are Polycarpe, Chrysotom, and Eusebius, to have in a manner _suspected_ rather than believed, the immortality of the soul; yet we have no evidence of their ever having, by the finest process of ratiocination, so thoroughly convinced themselves as to introduce it generally as a tenable thesis on the portico. A beautiful thread of implicit belief and fervent hope, of after life, a.s.similating to the hunting-ground of our own American Indians, and though sensuous still, a step far in advance of the black void of ancient philosophy, has always run through the higher mythologies of the Negro. So notorious, indeed, was the fact among early Christians, that that ubiquitous riddle, "Prestor John," was, by believers, regarded as having a _locale_ in Central Africa; while Henry of Portugal actually despatched two amba.s.sadors, Corvilla and Payvan, to a rumored Christian court, south of the Sahara.--_Edin. Encyc. Early Chris. His. Port._

[13] "Yet supple sophist to a plastic mind, Sees G.o.ds in woods, and spirits in the wind."

The imagination of the African, like his musical genius, which extracts surprising harmony from the rudest of sources, the clapping of hands, the clanking of chains, the resonance of la.s.so wood, and perforated sh.e.l.ls, seems to invest everything with a resident spirit of peculiar power. Accordingly, his mythologies are most numerous and poetical--his entire catalogue of superior G.o.ds alone, embracing a more extended length than the a.s.syro-Babylon Alphabet, with its three hundred letters.

[14] "The vengeful causes and the deed forgot."

All travellers agree in the facile ductility and inertia-like amiability of the native African character.--BREWSTER _on Africa._

[15] "The merry numbers of his crisp-haired crew."

The negro race is, perhaps, the most prolific of all the human species. Their infancy and youth are singularly happy. The parents are pa.s.sionately fond of their children.--GOLDBURY'S _Travels._

"Strike me," said my attendant, "but do not curse my mother." The same sentiment I found universally to prevail.

Some of the first lessons in which the Mandings women instruct their children is the _practice of truth_. It was the only consolation for a negro mother, whose son had been murdered by the Moors, that "_the boy had never told a lie_."--PARK'S _Travels._

[16] "With all the father sees each form retire, A ruthless heathen, but a loving sire."

"Or led the combat, bold without a plan, An artless savage, but a fearless man."

CAMPBELL.

[17] "Till lured by wealth the hardy Portuguese, Sought the green waters of his Eastern seas, And venturous nations more excursive grown, Pierced his glad coast from radiant zone to zone."

Vasquez de Gama, a Portuguese n.o.bleman, was the first to discover a maritime pa.s.sage to the Indies; unless, perhaps, we credit the improbable achievement of the Phoenicians, related by Herodotus as occurring, 604 B.C.

De Gama doubled the cape in 1498, explored the eastern sh.o.r.es as far as Melinda, in Zanguebar, and sailing thence arrived at Calcutta in May. This expedition, second to none in its results, save that of Columbus six years before, drew the attention of all Europe. Whole nations became actuated by the same enthusiasm, and private companies of merchants sent out whole fleets on voyages of discovery, scouring the entire coast from Cape Verd to Gaudfui, and discovering the Mascharenhas and most of the islands of the Ethiopean Archipelago.

[18] "Cheats his own nature and now generous grown, Dispenses realms and empires not his own."

Charles V. granted a patent _to one of his Flemish favorites_, containing an exclusive right to import four thousand negroes!--_Hist.

Slavery_.

The crime of having _first_ recommended the importation of African slaves into America, _is due to the Flemish n.o.bility_, who obtained a monopoly of four thousand negroes, which they sold to some Genoese merchants for 25,000 ducats.--_Life of Cardinal Ximenes_.

They (the Genoese) were the first to bring into a regular form, that commerce for slaves, between Africa and America, which has since grown to such an amazing extent.--_Robertson._

[19] "Too warmly generous and dearly true, The simple black," &c.

It will remain an indelible reproach on the name of Europeans, that for more than three centuries their intercourse with the Africans has only tended to destroy their happiness and debase their character.--_Edin. Ency._

[20] "Now laughs the stranger at their anguished throes."

The arts of the slave-merchant have inflamed the hostility of their various tribes, and heightened their ferocity by sedulously increasing their wars.--_Ibid._

[21] "By specious creeds and sophists darkly taught."

Hamlet's advice to his offending mother;--

"a.s.sume a virtue, tho' you have it not."

Adding hypocrisy to avowed unworthiness, was the acknowledged injunction of the church, wherever and whenever she partic.i.p.ated in secular affairs, with a view of emolument. For a peculiar ill.u.s.tration of this favorite doctrine, see Clement VI.'s edict, when, in virtue of the right arrogated by the holy see _to dispose of all countries belonging to the heathen_, he erected (1344) the Canaries into a kingdom, and disposed of them to Lewis de la Corda, a prince of Castile.

[22] "Or bolder still on fancy's fiery wing."

That I do not exaggerate the _belle lettres_ and cla.s.sical accomplishments of at least two of the "chattels" of the "peculiar inst.i.tution," in the lines following the above, see "Poems written by Rosa and Maria," _property_ of South Carolina, and published in 1834.

[23] "Hear _Loxian_ murmurs in Rhodolphe's caves."

Loxian is a name frequently given to Apollo by Greek writers and is met with, more than once, in the "Choephorae of Eschylus."--_Campbell._

Euripides mentions it three times, and Sophocles twice, its euphony recommends it more than any other name of the fair-haired G.o.d.

[24] "And in the march of nations led the _van_."

_Campbell_

[Ill.u.s.tration: Henry Ward Beecher. (Engraved by J. C. b.u.t.tre)]

Letter

BROOKLYN, December 6th, 1853.

Dear Sir,--

Your note of November 29th, requesting a line from me for the Autographs for Freedom, is received.

I wish that I had something that would add to the literary value of your laudable enterprise. In so great a cause as that of human liberty, every great interest in society ought to have a voice and a decisive testimony. Art should be in sympathy with freedom and literature, and all human learning should speak with _unmistakable_ accents for the elevation, evangelization, and liberation of the oppressed. In a future day, the historian cannot purge our political history from the shame of wanton and mercenary oppression. But there is not, I believe, a book in the literature of our country that will be alive and known a hundred years hence, in which can be found the taint of despotism. The literature of the world is on the side of liberty.

I am very truly yours,

[Ill.u.s.tration: (signature) Henry Ward Beecher]

[Ill.u.s.tration: H. B. Stowe (Engraved by J. C. b.u.t.tre)]