Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation: 1838-1839 Part 3

How can we keep this man in such a condition? How is such a cruel sin of injustice to be answered? Mr. ----, of course, sees and feels none of this as I do, and I should think must regret that he ever brought me here, to have my abhorrence of the theory of slavery deepened, and strengthened every hour of my life, by what I see of its practice.

This morning I went over to Darien upon the very female errands of returning visits and shopping. In one respect (a.s.suredly in none other) our life here resembles existence in Venice; we can never leave home for any purpose or in any direction but by boat--not, indeed, by gondola, but the sharp cut, well made, light craft in which we take our walks on the water is a very agreeable species of conveyance. One of my visits this morning was to a certain Miss ----, whose rather grandiloquent name and very striking style of beauty exceedingly well became the daughter of an ex-governor of Georgia. As for the residence of this princess, it was like all the planters' residences that I have seen, and such as a well-to-do English farmer would certainly not inhabit. Occasional marks of former elegance or splendour survive sometimes in the size of the rooms, sometimes in a little carved wood-work about the mantelpieces or wainscoatings of these mansions; but all things have a Castle Rackrent air of neglect, and dreary careless untidiness, with which the dirty bare-footed negro servants are in excellent keeping. Occasionally a huge pair of dazzling shirt gills, out of which a black visage grins as out of some vast white paper cornet, adorns the sable footman of the establishment, but unfortunately without at all necessarily indicating any downward prolongation of the garment; and the perfect tulip bed of a head handkerchief with which the female attendants of these 'great families'

love to bedizen themselves, frequently stands them instead of every other most indispensable article of female attire.

As for my shopping, the goods or rather 'bads,' at which I used to grumble, in your village emporium at Lenox, are what may be termed 'first rate,' both in excellence and elegance, compared with the vile products of every sort which we wretched southerners are expected to accept as the conveniences of life in exchange for current coin of the realm. I regret to say, moreover, that all these infamous articles are Yankee made--expressly for this market, where every species of _thing_ (to use the most general term I can think of), from list shoes to pianofortes, is procured from the North--almost always New England, utterly worthless of its kind, and dearer than the most perfect specimens of the same articles would be anywhere else. The incredible variety and ludicrous combinations of goods to be met with in one of these southern shops beats the stock of your village omnium-gatherum hollow to be sure, one cla.s.s of articles, and that probably the most in demand here, is not sold over any counter in Ma.s.sachussetts--cow-hides, and man-traps, of which a large a.s.sortment enters necessarily into the furniture of every southern shop.

In pa.s.sing to-day along the deep sand road, calling itself the street of Darien, my notice was attracted by an extremely handsome and intelligent-looking poodle, standing by a little wizen-looking knife-grinder, whose features were evidently European, though he was nearly as black as a negro who, strange to say, was discoursing with him in very tolerable French. The impulse of curiosity led me to accost the man at the grindstone, when his companion immediately made off. The itinerant artisan was from Aix in Provence; think of wandering thence to Darien in Georgia! I asked him about the negro who was talking to him; he said he knew nothing of him, but that he was a slave belonging to somebody in the town. And upon my expressing surprise at his having left his own beautiful and pleasant country for this dreary distant region, he answered, with a shrug and a smile, 'Oui, madame, c'est vrai; c'est un joli pays, mais dans ce pays-la, quand un homme n'a rien, c'est rien pour toujours.' A property which many no doubt have come hither, like the little French knife-grinder, to increase, without succeeding in the struggle much better than he appeared to have done.

Dear E----, Having made a fresh and, as I thought, more promising purchase of fishing-tackle, Jack and I betook ourselves to the river, and succeeded in securing some immense cat-fish, of which, to tell you the truth, I am most horribly afraid when I have caught them. The dexterity necessary for taking them off the hook so as to avoid the spikes on their backs, and the spikes on each side of their gills, the former having to be pressed down, and the two others pressed up, before you can get any purchase on the slimy beast (for it is smooth skinned and without scales, to add to the difficulty)--these conditions, I say, make the catching of cat-fish questionable sport. Then too, they hiss, and spit, and swear at one, and are altogether devilish in their aspect and demeanour; nor are they good for food, except, as Jack with much humility said this morning, for coloured folks--'Good for coloured folks, missis; me 'spect not good enough for white people.' That 'spect, meaning _ex_pect, has sometimes a possible meaning of _sus_pect, which would give the sentence in which it occurs a very humorous turn, and I always take the benefit of that interpretation. After exhausting the charms of our occupation, finding that cat-fish were likely to be our princ.i.p.al haul, I left the river and went my rounds to the hospitals. On my way I encountered two batches of small black fry, Hannah's children and poor Psyche's children, looking really as neat and tidy as children of the bettermost cla.s.s of artisans among ourselves. These people are so quick and so imitative that it would be the easiest thing in the world to improve their physical condition by appealing to their emulative propensities. Their pa.s.sion for what is _genteel_ might be used most advantageously in the same direction; and indeed, I think it would be difficult to find people who offered such a fair purchase by so many of their characteristics to the hand of the reformer.

Returning from the hospital I was accosted by poor old Teresa, the wretched negress who had complained to me so grievously of her back being broken by hard work and child-bearing. She was in a dreadful state of excitement, which she partly presently communicated to me, because she said Mr. O---- had ordered her to be flogged for having complained to me as she did. It seems to me that I have come down here to be tortured, for this punishing these wretched creatures for crying out to me for help is really converting me into a source of increased misery to them. It is almost more than I can endure to hear these horrid stories of lashings inflicted because I have been invoked; and though I dare say Mr. ----, thanks to my pa.s.sionate appeals to him, gives me little credit for prudence or self-command, I have some, and I exercise it too when I listen to such tales as these with my teeth set fast and my lips closed. Whatever I may do to the master, I hold my tongue to the slaves, and I wonder how I do it.

In the afternoon I rowed with Mr. ---- to another island in the broad waters of the Altamaha, called Tunno's Island, to return the visit of a certain Dr. T----, the proprietor of the island, named after him, as our rice swamp is after Major ----. I here saw growing in the open air the most beautiful gardinias I ever beheld; the branches were as high and as thick as the largest clumps of Kalmia, that grow in your woods, but whereas the tough, stringy, fibrous branches of these gives them a straggling appearance, these magnificent ma.s.ses of dark shiny glossy green leaves were quite compact; and I cannot conceive anything lovelier or more delightful than they would be starred all over with their thick-leaved cream-white odoriferous blossoms.

In the course of our visit a discussion arose as to the credibility of any negro a.s.sertion, though, indeed, that could hardly be called a discussion that was simply a chorus of a.s.senting opinions. No negro was to be believed on any occasion or any subject. No doubt they are habitual liars, for they are slaves, but there are some thrice honourable exceptions who, being slaves, are yet not liars; and certainly the vice results much more from the circ.u.mstances in which they are placed than from any natural tendency to untruth in their case. The truth is that they are always considered as false and deceitful, and it is very seldom that any special investigation of the facts of any particular case is resorted to in their behalf. They are always prejudged on their supposed general characteristics, and never judged after the fact on the merit of any special instance.

A question which was discussed in the real sense of the term, was that of ploughing the land instead of having it turned with the spade or hoe. I listened to this with great interest, for Jack and I had had some talk upon this subject, which began in his ardently expressed wish that ma.s.sa would allow his land to be ploughed, and his despairing conclusion that he never would, ''cause horses more costly to keep than coloured folks,' and ploughing, therefore, dearer than hoeing or digging. I had ventured to suggest to Mr. ----- the possibility of ploughing some of the fields on the island, and his reply was that the whole land was too moist and too much interrupted with the huge ma.s.ses of the Cypress yam roots, which would turn the share of any plough. Yet there is land belonging to our neighbour Mr. G----, on the other side of the river, where the conditions of the soil must be precisely the same, and yet which is being ploughed before our faces. On Mr. ----'s adjacent plantation the plough is also used extensively and successfully.

On my return to our own island I visited another of the hospitals, and the settlements to which it belonged. The condition of these places and of their inhabitants is, of course, the same all over the plantation, and if I were to describe them I should but weary you with a repet.i.tion of identical phenomena: filthy, wretched, almost naked, always bare-legged and bare-footed children; negligent, ignorant, wretched mothers, whose apparent indifference to the plight of their offspring, and utter incapacity to alter it, are the inevitable result of their slavery. It is hopeless to attempt to reform their habits or improve their condition while the women are condemned to field labour; nor is it possible to overestimate the bad moral effect of the system as regards the women entailing this enforced separation from their children and neglect of all the cares and duties of mother, nurse, and even house-wife, which are all merged in the mere physical toil of a human hoeing machine. It seems to me too--but upon this point I cannot, of course, judge as well as the persons accustomed to and acquainted with the physical capacities of their slaves--that the labour is not judiciously distributed in many cases; at least, not as far as the women are concerned. It is true that every able-bodied woman is made the most of in being driven a-field as long as under all and any circ.u.mstances she is able to wield a hoe; but on the other hand, stout, hale, hearty girls and boys, of from eight to twelve and older, are allowed to lounge about filthy and idle, with no pretence of an occupation but what they call 'tend baby,' i.e. see to the life and limbs of the little slave infants, to whose mothers, working in distant fields, they carry them during the day to be suckled, and for the rest of the time leave them to crawl and kick in the filthy cabins or on the broiling sand which surrounds them, in which industry, excellent enough for the poor babies, these big lazy youths and la.s.ses emulate them. Again, I find many women who have borne from five to ten children rated as workers, precisely as young women in the prime of their strength who have had none; this seems a cruel carelessness. To be sure, while the women are pregnant their task is diminished, and this is one of the many indirect inducements held out to reckless propagation, which has a sort of premium offered to it in the consideration of less work and more food, counterbalanced by none of the sacred responsibilities which hallow and enn.o.ble the relation of parent and child; in short, as their lives are for the most part those of mere animals, their increase is literally mere animal breeding, to which every encouragement is given, for it adds to the master's live stock, and the value of his estate.

Dear E----. To-day, I have the pleasure of announcing to you a variety of improvements about to be made in the infirmary of the island. There is to be a third story--a mere loft indeed--added to the buildings, but by affording more room for the least distressing cases of sickness to be drafted off into, it will leave the ground-floor and room above it comparatively free for the most miserable of these unfortunates. To my unspeakable satisfaction these dest.i.tute apartments are to be furnished with bedsteads, mattresses, pillows, and blankets; and I feel a little comforted for the many heart-aches my life here inflicts upon me: at least some of my twinges will have wrought this poor alleviation of their wretchedness for the slaves, when prostrated by disease or pain.

I had hardly time to return from the hospital home this morning before one of the most tremendous storms I ever saw burst over the island. Your northern hills, with their solemn pine woods, and fresh streams and lakes, telling of a cold rather than a warm climate, always seem to me as if undergoing some strange and unnatural visitation, when one of your heavy summer thunder-storms bursts over them. Snow and frost, hail and, above all, wind, trailing rain clouds and brilliant northern lights, are your appropriate sky phenomena; here, thunder and lightning seem as if they might have been invented. Even in winter (remember, we are now in February) they appear neither astonishing nor unseasonable, and I should think in summer (but Heaven defend me from ever making good my supposition) lightning must be as familiar to these sweltering lands and slimy waters as sunlight itself.

The afternoon cleared off most beautifully, and Jack and I went out on the river to catch what might be caught. Jack's joyful excitement was extreme at my announcing to him the fact that Mr. ---- had consented to try ploughing on some of the driest portions of the island instead of the slow and laborious process of hoeing the fields; this is a disinterested exultation on his part, for at any rate as long as I am here, he will certainly be nothing but 'my boy Jack,' and I should think after my departure will never be degraded to the rank of a field-hand or common labourer. Indeed the delicacy of his health, to which his slight slender figure and languid face bear witness, and which was one reason of his appointment to the eminence of being 'my slave,' would, I should think, prevent the poor fellow's ever being a very robust or useful working animal.

On my return from the river I had a long and painful conversation with Mr. ---- upon the subject of the flogging which had been inflicted on the wretched Teresa. These discussions are terrible: they throw me into perfect agonies of distress for the slaves, whose position is utterly hopeless; for myself, whose intervention in their behalf sometimes seems to me worse than useless; for Mr. ----, whose share in this horrible system fills me by turns with indignation and pity. But, after all, what can he do? how can he help it all? Moreover, born and bred in America, how should he care or wish to help it? and of course he does not; and I am in despair that he does not: et voila, it is a happy and hopeful plight for us both. He maintained that there had been neither hardship nor injustice in the case of Teresa's flogging; and that, moreover, she had not been flogged at all for complaining to me, but simply because her allotted task was not done at the appointed time. Of course this was the result of her having come to appeal to me, instead of going to her labour; and as she knew perfectly well the penalty she was incurring, he maintained that there was neither hardship nor injustice in the case; the whole thing was a regularly established law, with which all the slaves were perfectly well acquainted; and this case was no exception whatever.

The circ.u.mstance of my being on the island could not of course be allowed to overthrow the whole system of discipline established to secure the labour and obedience of the slaves; and if they chose to try experiments as to that fact, they and I must take the consequences. At the end of the day, the driver of the gang to which Teresa belongs reported her work not done, and Mr. O---- ordered him to give her the usual number of stripes; which order the driver of course obeyed, without knowing how Teresa had employed her time instead of hoeing. But Mr. O---- knew well enough, for the wretched woman told me that she had herself told him she should appeal to me about her weakness and suffering and inability to do the work exacted from her.

He did not, however, think proper to exceed in her punishment the usual number of stripes allotted to the non-performance of the appointed daily task, and Mr. ---- p.r.o.nounced the whole transaction perfectly satisfactory and _en regle_. The common drivers are limited in their powers of chastis.e.m.e.nt, not being allowed to administer more than a certain number of lashes to their fellow slaves. Head man Frank, as he is called, has alone the privilege of exceeding this limit; and the overseer's lat.i.tude of infliction is only curtailed by the necessity of avoiding injury to life or limb. The master's irresponsible power has no such bound. When I was thus silenced on the particular case under discussion, I resorted in my distress and indignation to the abstract question, as I never can refrain from doing; and to Mr. ----'s a.s.sertion of the justice of poor Teresa's punishment, I retorted the manifest injustice of unpaid and enforced labour; the brutal inhumanity of allowing a man to strip and lash a woman, the mother of ten children; to exact from her toil which was to maintain in luxury two idle young men, the owners of the plantation. I said I thought female labour of the sort exacted from these slaves, and corporal chastis.e.m.e.nt such as they endure, must be abhorrent to any manly or humane man. Mr. ---- said he thought it was _disagreeable_, and left me to my reflections with that concession. My letter has been interrupted for the last three days; by nothing special, however. My occupations and interests here of course know no change; but Mr. ---- has been anxious for a little while past that we should go down to St. Simon's, the cotton plantation.

We shall suffer less from the heat, which I am beginning to find oppressive on this swamp island; and he himself wished to visit that part of his property, whither he had not yet been since our arrival in Georgia.

So the day before yesterday he departed to make the necessary arrangements for our removal thither; and my time in the meanwhile has been taken up in fitting him out for his departure.

In the morning Jack and I took our usual paddle, and having the tackle on board, tried fishing. I was absorbed in many sad and serious considerations, and wonderful to relate (for you know ---- how keen an angler I am), had lost all consciousness of my occupation, until after I know not how long a time elapsing without the shadow of a nibble, I was recalled to a most ludicrous perception of my ill-success by Jack's sudden observation, 'Missis, fishing berry good fun when um fish bite.'

This settled the fishing for that morning, and I let Jack paddle me down the broad turbid stream, endeavouring to answer in the most comprehensible manner to his keen but utterly undeveloped intellects the innumerable questions with which he plied me about Philadelphia, about England, about the Atlantic, &c. He dilated much upon the charms of St. Simon's, to which he appeared very glad that we were going; and among other items of description mentioned, what I was very glad to hear, that it was a beautiful place for riding, and that I should be able to indulge to my heart's content in my favourite exercise, from which I have, of course, been utterly debarred in this small d.y.k.eland of ours. He insinuated more than once his hope and desire that he might be allowed to accompany me, but as I knew nothing at all about his capacity for equestrian exercises, or any of the arrangements that might or might not interfere with such a plan, I was discreetly silent, and took no notice of his most comically turned hints on the subject. In our row we started a quant.i.ty of wild duck, and he told me that there was a great deal of game at St. Simon's, but that the people did not contrive to catch much, though they laid traps constantly for it. Of course their possessing firearms is quite out of the question; but this abundance of what must be to them such especially desirable prey, makes the fact a great hardship. I almost wonder they don't learn to shoot like savages with bows and arrows, but these would be weapons, and equally forbidden them.

In the afternoon I saw Mr. ---- off for St. Simon's; it is fifteen miles lower down the river, and a large island at the very mouth of the Altamaha.

The boat he went in was a large, broad, rather heavy, though well-built craft, by no means as swift or elegant as the narrow eight-oared long boat in which he generally takes his walks on the water, but well adapted for the traffic between the two plantations, where it serves the purpose of a sort of omnibus or stage-coach for the transfer of the people from one to the other, and of a baggage waggon or cart for the conveyance of all sorts of household goods, chattels, and necessaries. Mr. ---- sat in the middle of a perfect chaos of such freight; and as the boat pushed off, and the steersman took her into the stream, the men at the oars set up a chorus, which they continued to chaunt in unison with each other, and in time with their stroke, till the voices and oars were heard no more from the distance. I believe I have mentioned to you before the peculiar characteristics of this veritable negro minstrelsy--how they all sing in unison, having never, it appears, attempted or heard anything like part-singing. Their voices seem oftener tenor than any other quality, and the tune and time they keep something quite wonderful; such truth of intonation and accent would make almost any music agreeable. That which I have heard these people sing is often plaintive and pretty, but almost always has some resemblance to tunes with which they must have become acquainted through the instrumentality of white men; their overseers or masters whistling Scotch or Irish airs, of which they have produced by ear these _rifacciamenti_. The note for note reproduction of 'Ah! vous dirai-je, maman?' in one of the most popular of the so-called Negro melodies with which all America and England are familiar, is an example of this very transparent plagiarism; and the tune with which Mr. ----'s rowers started him down the Altamaha, as I stood at the steps to see him off, was a very distinct descendant of 'Coming through the Rye.' The words, however, were astonishingly primitive, especially the first line, which, when it burst from their eight throats in high unison, sent me into fits of laughter.

Jenny shake her toe at me, Jenny gone away; Jenny shake her toe at me, Jenny gone away.

Hurrah! Miss Susy, oh!

Jenny gone away; Hurrah! Miss Susy, oh!

Jenny gone away.

What the obnoxious Jenny meant by shaking her toe, whether defiance or mere departure, I never could ascertain, but her going away was an unmistakable subject of satisfaction; and the pause made on the last 'oh!'

before the final announcement of her departure, had really a good deal of dramatic and musical effect. Except the extemporaneous chaunts in our honour, of which I have written to you before, I have never heard the negroes on Mr. ----'s plantation sing any words that could be said to have any sense. To one, an extremely pretty, plaintive, and original air, there was but one line, which was repeated with a sort of wailing chorus--

Oh! my ma.s.sa told me, there's no gra.s.s in Georgia.

Upon enquiring the meaning of which, I was told it was supposed to be the lamentation of a slave from one of the more northerly states, Virginia or Carolina, where the labour of hoeing the weeds, or gra.s.s as they call it, is not nearly so severe as here, in the rice and cotton lands of Georgia.

Another very pretty and pathetic tune began with words that seemed to promise something sentimental--

Fare you well, and good-bye, oh, oh!

I'm goin' away to leave you, oh, oh!

but immediately went off into nonsense verses about gentlemen in the parlour drinking wine and cordial, and ladies in the drawing-room drinking tea and coffee, &c. I have heard that many of the masters and overseers on these plantations prohibit melancholy tunes or words, and encourage nothing but cheerful music and senseless words, deprecating the effect of sadder strains upon the slaves, whose peculiar musical sensibility might be expected to make them especially excitable by any songs of a plaintive character, and having any reference to their particular hardships. If it is true, I think it a judicious precaution enough--these poor slaves are just the sort of people over whom a popular musical appeal to their feelings and pa.s.sions would have an immense power.

In the evening, Mr. ----'s departure left me to the pleasures of an uninterrupted _tete-a-tete_ with his crosseyed overseer, and I endeavoured, as I generally do, to atone by my conversibleness and civility for the additional trouble which, no doubt, all my outlandish ways and notions are causing the worthy man. So suggestive (to use the new-fangled jargon about books) a woman as myself is, I suspect, an intolerable nuisance in these parts; and poor Mr. O---- cannot very well desire Mr. ---- to send me away, however much he may wish that he would; so that figuratively, as well as literally, I fear the worthy master _me voit d'un mauvais oeil_, as the French say. I asked him several questions about some of the slaves who had managed to learn to read, and by what means they had been able to do so. As teaching them is strictly prohibited by the laws, they who instructed them, and such of them as acquired the knowledge, must have been not a little determined and persevering. This was my view of the case, of course, and of course it was not the overseer's. I asked him if many of Mr. ----'s slaves could read. He said 'No; very few, he was happy to say, but those few were just so many too many.' 'Why, had he observed any insubordination in those who did?' And I reminded him of Cooper London, the methodist preacher, whose performance of the burial service had struck me so much some time ago--to whose exemplary conduct and character there is but one concurrent testimony all over the plantation. No; he had no special complaint to bring against the lettered members of his subject community, but he spoke by antic.i.p.ation.

Every step they take towards intelligence and enlightenment lessens the probability of their acquiescing in their condition. Their condition is not to be changed--ergo, they had better not learn to read; a very succinct and satisfactory argument as far as it goes, no doubt, and one to which I had not a word to reply, at any rate, to Mr. O----, as I did not feel called upon to discuss the abstract justice or equity of the matter with him; indeed he, to a certain degree, gave up that part of the position, starting with 'I don't say whether it's right or wrong;' and in all conversations that I have had with the southerners upon these subjects, whether out of civility to what may be supposed to be an Englishwoman's prejudices, or a forlorn respect to their own convictions, the question of the fundamental wrong of slavery is generally admitted, or at any rate certainly never denied. That part of the subject is summarily dismissed, and all its other aspects vindicated, excused, and even lauded, with untiring eloquence. Of course, of the abstract question I could judge before I came here, but I confess I had not the remotest idea how absolutely my observation of every detail of the system, as a practical iniquity, would go to confirm my opinion of its abomination. Mr. O---- went on to condemn and utterly denounce all the preaching and teaching and moral instruction upon religious subjects, which people in the south, pressed upon by northern opinion, are endeavouring to give their slaves.

The kinder and the more cowardly masters are anxious to evade the charge of keeping their negroes in brutish ignorance, and so they crumble what they suppose and hope may prove a little harmless, religious enlightenment, which, mixed up with much religious authority on the subject of submission and fidelity to masters, they trust their slaves may swallow without its doing them any harm--i.e., that they may be better Christians and better slaves--and so, indeed, no doubt they are; but it is a very dangerous experiment, and from Mr. O----'s point of view I quite agree with him. The letting out of water, or the letting in of light, in infinitesimal quant.i.ties, is not always easy. The half-wicked of the earth are the leaks through which wickedness is eventually swamped; compromises forerun absolute surrender in most matters, and fools and cowards are, in such cases, the instruments of Providence for their own defeat. Mr. O---- stated unequivocally his opinion that free labour would be more profitable on the plantations than the work of slaves, which, being compulsory, was of the worst possible quality and the smallest possible quant.i.ty; then the charge of them before and after they are able to work is onerous, the cost of feeding and clothing them very considerable, and upon the whole he, a southern overseer, p.r.o.nounced himself decidedly in favour of free labour, upon grounds of expediency. Having at the beginning of our conversation declined discussing the moral aspect of slavery, evidently not thinking that position tenable, I thought I had every right to consider Mr. ----'s slave-driver a decided abolitionist.

I had been anxious to enlist his sympathies on behalf of my extreme desire, to have some sort of garden, but did not succeed in inspiring him with my enthusiasm on the subject; he said there was but one garden that he knew of in the whole neighbourhood of Darien, and that was our neighbour, old Mr. C----'s, a Scotchman on St. Simon's. I remembered the splendid gardinias on Tunno's Island, and referred to them as a proof of the material for ornamental gardening. He laughed, and said rice and cotton crops were the ornamental gardening princ.i.p.ally admired by the planters, and that, to the best of his belief, there was not another decent kitchen or flower garden in the State, but the one he had mentioned.

The next day after this conversation, I walked with my horticultural zeal much damped, and wandered along the d.y.k.e by the broad river, looking at some pretty peach trees in blossom, and thinking what a curse of utter stagnation this slavery produces, and how intolerable to me a life pa.s.sed within its stifling influence would be. Think of peach trees in blossom in the middle of February! It does seem cruel, with such a sun and soil, to be told that a garden is worth n.o.body's while here; however, Mr. O---- said that he believed the wife of the former overseer had made a 'sort of a garden' at St. Simon's. We shall see 'what sort'

it turns out to be. While I was standing on the d.y.k.e, ruminating above the river, I saw a beautiful white bird of the crane species alight not far from me. I do not think a little knowledge of natural history would diminish the surprise and admiration with which I regard the, to me, unwonted specimens of animal existence that I encounter every day, and of which I do not even know the names. Ignorance is an odious thing. The birds here are especially beautiful, I think. I saw one the other day, of what species of course I do not know, of a warm and rich brown, with a scarlet hood and crest--a lovely creature, about the size of your northern robin, but more elegantly shaped.

This morning, instead of my usual visit to the infirmary, I went to look at the work and workers in the threshing mill--all was going on actively and orderly under the superintendence of head-man Frank, with whom, and a very sagacious clever fellow, who manages the steam power of the mill, and is honourably distinguished as Engineer Ned, I had a small chat.

There is one among various drawbacks to the comfort and pleasure of our intercourse with these coloured 'men and brethren,' at least in their slave condition, which certainly exercises my fort.i.tude not a little,--the swarms of fleas that cohabit with these sable dependants of ours are--well--incredible; moreover they are by no means the only or most objectionable companions one borrows from them, and I never go to the infirmary, where I not unfrequently am requested to look at very dirty limbs and bodies in very dirty draperies, without coming away with a strong inclination to throw myself into the water, and my clothes into the fire, which last would be expensive. I do not suppose that these hateful consequences of dirt and disorder are worse here than among the poor and neglected human creatures who swarm in the lower parts of European cities; but my call to visit them has never been such as that which constrains me to go daily among these poor people, and although on one or two occasions I have penetrated into fearfully foul and filthy abodes of misery in London, I have never rendered the same personal services to their inhabitants that I do to Mr. ----'s slaves, and so have not incurred the same amount of entomological inconvenience.

After leaving the mill, I prolonged my walk, and came, for the first time, upon one of the 'gangs,' as they are called, in full field work. Upon my appearance and approach there was a momentary suspension of labour, and the usual chorus of screams and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of welcome, affection, and infinite desires for infinite small indulgences. I was afraid to stop their work, not feeling at all sure that urging a conversation with me would be accepted as any excuse for an uncompleted task, or avert the fatal infliction of the usual award of stripes; so I hurried off and left them to their hoeing.

On my way home I was encountered by London, our Methodist preacher, who accosted me with a request for a prayer-book and Bible, and expressed his regret at hearing that we were so soon going to St. Simon's. I promised him his holy books, and asked him how he had learned to read, but found it impossible to get him to tell me. I wonder if he thought he should be putting his teacher, whoever he was, in danger of the penalty of the law against instructing the slaves, if he told me who he was; it was impossible to make him do so, so that, besides his other good qualities, he appears to have that most unusual one of all in an uneducated person--discretion. He certainly is a most remarkable man.

After parting with him, I was a.s.sailed by a small gang of children, clamouring for the indulgence of some meat, which they besought me to give them. Animal food is only allowed to certain of the harder working men, hedgers and ditchers, and to them only occasionally, and in very moderate rations. My small cannibals clamoured round me for flesh, as if I had had a butcher's cart in my pocket, till I began to laugh and then to run, and away they came, like a pack of little black wolves, at my heels, shrieking, 'Missis, you gib me piece meat, missis, you gib me meat,' till I got home. At the door I found another pet.i.tioner, a young woman named Maria, who brought a fine child in her arms, and demanded a present of a piece of flannel. Upon my asking her who her husband was, she replied, without much hesitation, that she did not possess any such appendage. I gave another look at her bonny baby, and went into the house to get the flannel for her. I afterwards heard from Mr. ---- that she and two other girls of her age, about seventeen, were the only instances on the island of women with illegitimate children.

After I had been in the house a little while, I was summoned out again to receive the pet.i.tion of certain poor women in the family-way to have their work lightened. I was, of course, obliged to tell them that I could not interfere in the matter, that their master was away, and that, when he came back, they must present their request to him: they said they had already begged 'ma.s.sa,' and he had refused, and they thought, perhaps, if 'missis' begged 'ma.s.sa' for them, he would lighten their task. Poor 'missis,' poor 'ma.s.sa,' poor woman, that I am to have such prayers addressed to me! I had to tell them, that if they had already spoken to their master, I was afraid my doing so would be of no use, but that when he came back I would try; so, choking with crying, I turned away from them, and re-entered the house, to the chorus of 'Oh, thank you, missis!

G.o.d bless you, missis!' E----, I think an improvement might be made upon that caricature published a short time ago, called the 'Chivalry of the South.' I think an elegant young Carolinian, or Georgian gentleman, whip in hand, driving a gang of 'l.u.s.ty women,' as they are called here, would be a pretty version of the 'Chivalry of the South'--a little coa.r.s.e, I am afraid you will say. Oh! quite horribly coa.r.s.e, but then so true--a great matter in works of art, which, now-a-days, appear to be thought excellent only in proportion to their lack of ideal elevation. That would be a subject, and a treatment of it, which could not be accused of imaginative exaggeration, at any rate.

In the evening I mentioned the pet.i.tions of these poor women to Mr. O----, thinking that perhaps he had the power to lessen their tasks. He seemed evidently annoyed at their having appealed to me; said that their work was not a bit too much for them, and that constantly they were _shamming_ themselves in the family-way, in order to obtain a diminution of their labour. Poor creatures! I suppose some of them do; but again, it must be a hard matter for those who do not, not to obtain the mitigation of their toil which their condition requires; for their a.s.sertion and their evidence are never received--they can't be believed, even if they were upon oath, say their white taskmasters; why? because they have never been taught the obligations of an oath, to whom made, or wherefore binding; and they are punished both directly and indirectly for their moral ignorance, as if it were a natural and incorrigible element of their character, instead of the inevitable result of their miserable position. The oath of any and every scoundrelly fellow with a white skin is received, but not that of such a man as Frank, Ned, old Jacob, or Cooper London.

Dearest E----. I think it right to begin this letter with an account of a most prosperous fishing expedition Jack and I achieved the other morning.

It is true we still occasionally drew up huge cat-fish, with their detestable beards and spikes, but we also captivated some magnificent perch, and the Altamaha perch are worth one's while both to catch and to eat. On a visit I had to make on the mainland, the same day, I saw a tiny strip of garden ground, rescued from the sandy road, called the street, perfectly filled with hyacinths, double jonquils, and snowdrops, a charming nosegay for February 11. After leaving the boat on my return home, I encountered a curious creature walking all sideways, a small cross between a lobster and a crab. One of the negroes to whom I applied for its denomination informed me that it was a land crab, with which general description of this very peculiar multipede you must be satisfied, for I can tell you no more. I went a little further, as the nursery rhyme says, and met with a snake, and not being able to determine, at ignorant first sight, whether it was a malignant serpent or not, I ingloriously took to my heels, and came home on the full run. It is the first of these exceedingly displeasing animals I have encountered here; but Jack, for my consolation, tells me that they abound on St. Simon's, whither we are going--'rattlesnakes, and all kinds,' says he, with an affluence of promise in his tone that is quite agreeable. Rattlesnakes will be quite enough of a treat, without the vague horrors that may be comprised in the additional 'all kinds.' Jack's account of the game on St. Simon's is really quite tantalising to me, who cannot carry a gun any more than if I were a slave. He says that partridges, woodc.o.c.ks, snipe, and wild duck abound, so that, at any rate, our table ought to be well supplied. His account of the bears that are still to be found in the woods of the mainland, is not so pleasant, though he says they do no harm to the people, if they are not meddled with, but that they steal the corn from the fields when it is ripe, and actually swim the river to commit their depredations on the islands. It seems difficult to believe this, looking at this wide and heavy stream--though, to be sure, I did once see a young horse swim across the St. Lawrence, between Montreal and Quebec; a feat of natation which much enlarged my belief in what quadrupeds may accomplish when they have no choice between swimming and sinking.

You cannot imagine how great a triumph the virtue next to G.o.dliness is making under my auspices and a judicious system of small bribery. I can hardly stir now without being a.s.sailed with cries of 'Missis, missis me mind chile, me bery clean,' or the additional gratifying fact, 'and chile too, him bery clean.' This virtue, however, if painful to the practisers, as no doubt it is, is expensive, too, to me, and I shall have to try some moral influence equivalent in value to a cent current coin of the realm.

What a poor chance, indeed, the poor abstract idea runs! however, it is really a comfort to see the poor little woolly heads, now in most instances stripped of their additional filthy artificial envelopes.

In my afternoon's row to-day I pa.s.sed a huge dead alligator, lying half in and half out of the muddy slime of the river bank--a most hideous object it was, and I was glad to turn my eyes to the beautiful surface of the mid stream, all burnished with sunset glories, and broken with the vivacious gambols of a school of porpoises. It is curious, I think, that these creatures should come fifteen miles from the sea to enliven the waters round our little rice swamp.