Southern Literature From 1579-1895 Part 52

Mabel Lee.

Nina's Atonement.

Carmen's Inheritance.

Hearts and Hands.

Land of the Sky.

Heart of Steel.

Summer Idyl.

Roslyn's Fortune.

Morton House.

Ebb Tide.

Daughter of Bohemia.

A Gentle Belle.

A Question of Honor.

After Many Days.

Bonny Kate.

Armine.

Miss Churchill.

Land of the Sun (1895).

[Ill.u.s.tration: ~Mt. Mitch.e.l.l, N. C. Above the Clouds.~]

ASCENT OF MOUNT MITCh.e.l.l, BLACK MOUNTAIN, NORTH CAROLINA.

(_From The Land of the Sky._[44])

The sun is shining brightly, and his golden lances light up the depths of the forest into which we enter--an enchanted world of far-reaching greenness, the stillness of which is only broken by the voice of the streams which come down the gorges of the mountain in leaping cascades. Few things are more picturesque than the appearance of a cavalcade like ours following in single file the winding path (not road) that leads into the marvelous, mysterious wilderness. When the ascent fairly begins, the path is often like the letter S, and one commands a view of the entire line--of hors.e.m.e.n in slouched hats and gray coats, of ladies in a variety of attire, with water-proof cloaks serving as riding-skirts, and hats garlanded with forest wreaths and gra.s.ses. The guide tramps steadily ahead, leading the pack-horse, and we catch a glimpse of his face now and then as he turns to answer some question addressed to him. . . . . . . .

"We wind up the side of the mountain like this for several miles,"

says Eric, "then we travel along a ridge for some distance, and finally we ascend the peak formerly called the Black Dome, now Mount Mitch.e.l.l. The whole distance is about twelve miles, and the most of it is steady climbing." . . . . . .

"And it was in this wilderness that Professor Mitch.e.l.l lost his life sixteen or seventeen years ago, was it not?" I ask.

"Yes, Burnett [the guide] was one of the men engaged in the search for him. He will tell you all about it. . ."

The forest around us becomes wilder, greener, more luxuriant at every step. . . . Presently, however, the aspect of our surroundings changes. We leave this varied forest behind, and enter the region of the balsam, from the dark color of which the mountain takes its name.

Above a certain line of elevation no trees are found save these beautiful yet sombre firs. They grow to an immense height and stand so thickly together that one marvels how any animal larger than a cat can thread its way among their stems. Overhead the boughs interlock in a canopy, making perpetual shade beneath. No shrubs of any kind are to be found here--only beds of thick elastic moss, richer than the richest velvet, and ferns in plumy profusion. . . . Dan Burnett leads on, and presently we emerge on the largest and most beautiful of the little prairies through which we have pa.s.sed. This stretch of open ground lies at the foot of the highest peak, the abrupt sides of which rise in conical shape before us. It is here, Mr. Burnett tells us, that the mountaineers who were searching for Professor Mitch.e.l.l found the first trace of the way he had taken.

"We had been searchin' from Friday to Tuesday," he says, "and on Tuesday we was pretty nigh disheartened, when Wilson--an old hunter from over in Yancey--said he hadn't no doubt the professor had tried to go down to Caney Valley by a trail they two had followed thirteen years afore, and which leads that way"--he points down into the dark wilds below us. "Well, we looked along the edge of this here prairie till we found a track. Wilson was right--he _had_ tried to go down to Caney Valley. We follered his trail fur about four mile, and I was one of them what found him at last."

"He had lost his way," says Eric. "I have seen the spot--they call it Mitch.e.l.l's Falls now--where he died. A stream of considerable size plunges over a precipice of about forty feet into a basin fourteen feet deep by as many wide. Into this he fell, probably at night."

"But how was it possible to bring a dead body up these steeps?" Sylvia says, addressing Mr. Burnett.

"We brought it in a sheet slung to the top of stout poles," he answers. "Then it were carried down to Asheville, and then brought up again, and buried there"--he nods to the peak above us.

"In the warmth of their great friendship and admiration, people thought that he ought to rest in the midst of the scenes he had explored so fearlessly and loved so well," says Eric. . . . Before long we gain the top, and the first object on which our eyes rest is--the grave. . . . . . . .

Besides the grave, the summit is entirely bare.

The view is so immense that one is forced to regard it in sections.

Far to the north east lies Virginia, from which the long waving line of the Blue Ridge comes, and pa.s.ses directly under the Black, making a point of junction, near which it towers into the steep Pinnacle and stately Graybeard--so called from the white beard which it wears when a frozen cloud has iced its rhododendrons. From our greater eminence we overlook the Blue Ridge entirely, and see the country below spreading into azure distance, with white spots which resolve themselves through the gla.s.ses into villages, and mountains clearly defined. The Linville range--through which the Linville River forces its way in a gorge of wonderful grandeur--is in full view, with a misty cloud lying on the surface of Table Rock, while the peculiar form of the Hawk's Bill stands forth in marked relief. Beyond, blue and limitless as the ocean, the undulating plain of the more level country extends until it melts into the sky.

As the glance leaves this view, and, sweeping back over the Blue Ridge, follows the main ledge of the Black, one begins to appreciate the magnitude of this great mountain. For miles along its dark crest appear a succession of cone-like peaks, and, as it sweeps around westwardly, it divides into two great branches--one of which terminates in the height on which we stand, while numerous spurs lead off from its base; the other stretches southward, forming the splendid chain of Craggy. At our feet lie the elevated counties of Yancey and Mitch.e.l.l, with their surfaces so unevenly mountainous that one wonders how men could have been daring enough to think of making their homes amid such wild scenes. . . . Beyond these counties stretches the chain of the Unaka, running along the line of Tennessee, with the Roan Mountain--famous for its extensive view over seven states--immediately in our front. Through the pa.s.ses and rugged chasms of this range, we look across the entire valley of East Tennessee to where the blue outlines of the c.u.mberland Mountains trend toward Kentucky, and we see distinctly a marked depression which Eric says is c.u.mberland Gap.

Turning our gaze due westward, the view is, if possible, still more grand. There the colossal ma.s.ses of the Great Smoky stand, draped in a mantle of clouds, while through Haywood and Transylvania, to the borders of South Carolina, rise the peaks of the Balsam Mountains, behind which are the Cullowhee and the Nantahala, with the Blue Ridge making a majestic curve toward the point where Georgia touches the Carolinas. . . . .

It is enough to sit and watch the inexpressible beauty of the vast prospect us afternoon slowly wanes into evening. There is a sense of isolation, of solemnity and majesty, in the scene which none of us are likely to forget. So high are we elevated above the world that the pure vault of ether over our heads seems nearer to us than the blue rolling earth, with its wooded hills and smiling valleys below. No sound comes up to us, no voice of water or note of bird breaks the stillness. We are in the region of that eternal silence which wraps the summits of the "everlasting hills." A repose that is full of awe broods over this lofty peak, which still retains the last rays of the sinking sun, while over the lower world twilight has fallen.

FOOTNOTE:

[44] By permission of the author, and publishers, D. Appleton & Co., N. Y.

HENRY WOODFEN GRADY.

~1851=1889.~

HENRY WOODFEN GRADY was born at Athens, Georgia, and educated at the State University. He became an editor, and in 1880 purchased an interest in the Atlanta "Const.i.tution" on whose staff he remained till his death. His articles, addresses, and editorials made his name well known throughout the country, and contributed no little to the development of Southern industries after the war. A monument has been erected to him in Atlanta.

WORKS.

The New South, [a series of articles].

Editorials, addresses, &c.

THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR.

(_From The New South, 1889._[45])

[Ill.u.s.tration: ~Grady Monument, Atlanta, Ga.~]

_Master and Slave._--Perhaps no period of human history has been more misjudged and less understood than the slaveholding era in the South. Slavery as an inst.i.tution cannot be defended; but its administration was so nearly perfect among our forefathers as to challenge and hold our loving respect. It is doubtful if the world has seen a peasantry so happy and so well-to-do as the negro slaves in America. The world was amazed at the fidelity with which these slaves guarded, from 1861 to 1865, the homes and families of the masters who were fighting with the army that barred their way to freedom. If "Uncle Tom's Cabin" had portrayed the rule of slavery rather than the rarest exception, not all the armies that went to the field could have stayed the flood of rapine and arson and pillage that would have started with the first gun of the civil war. Instead of that, witness the miracle of the slave in loyalty to his master, closing the fetters upon his own limbs--maintaining and defending the families of those who fought against his freedom--and at night on the far-off battle-field searching among the carnage for his young master, that he might lift the dying head to his breast and bend to catch the last words to the old folks at home, so wrestling the meantime in agony and love that he would lay down his life in his master's stead.

History has no parallel to the faith kept by the negro in the South during the war. Often five hundred negroes to a single white man, and yet through these dusky throngs the women and children walked in safety, and the unprotected homes rested in peace. Unmarshalled, the black battalions moved patiently to the fields in the morning to feed the armies their idleness would have starved, and at night gathered anxiously at the "big house to hear the news from marster," though conscious that his victory made their chains enduring. Everywhere humble and kindly. The body-guard of the helpless. The rough companion of the little ones. The observant friend. The silent sentry in his lowly cabin. The shrewd counsellor. And when the dead came home, a mourner at the open grave. A thousand torches would have disbanded every Southern army, but not one was lighted. When the master, going to a war in which slavery was involved, said to his slave, "I leave my home and loved ones in your charge," the tenderness between man and master stood disclosed.

The Northern man, dealing with casual servants, querulous, sensitive, and lodged for a day in a sphere they resent, can hardly comprehend the friendliness and sympathy that existed between the master and the slave. He cannot understand how the negro stood in slavery days, open-hearted and sympathetic, full of gossip and comradeship, the companion of the hunt, frolic, furrow, and home, contented in the kindly dependence that had been a habit of his blood, and never lifting his eyes beyond the narrow horizon that shut him in with his neighbors and friends. But this relation did exist in the days of slavery. It was the rule of that _regime_. It has survived war, and strife, and political campaigns in which the drum-beat inspired and Federal bayonets fortified. It will never die until the last slaveholder and slave has been gathered to rest. It is the glory of our past in the South. It is the answer to abuse and slander. It is the hope of our future.

_Ante-bellum Civilization._--The relations of the races in slavery must be clearly understood to understand what has followed, and to judge of what is yet to come. Not less important is it to have some clear idea of the civilization of that period.

That was a peculiar society. Almost feudal in its splendor, it was almost patriarchal in its simplicity. Leisure and wealth gave it exquisite culture. Its wives and mothers, exempt from drudgery, and almost from care, gave to their sons, through patient and constant training, something of their own grace and gentleness and to their homes beauty and light. Its people, h.o.m.ogeneous by necessity, held straight and simple faith, and were religious to a marked degree along the old lines of Christian belief. This same h.o.m.ogeneity bred a hospitality that was as kinsmen to kinsmen, and that wasted at the threshold of every home what the more frugal people of the North conserved and invested in public charities.

The code duello furnished the highest appeal in dispute. An affront to a lad was answered at the pistol's mouth. The sense of quick responsibility tempered the tongues of even the most violent, and the newspapers of South Carolina for eight years, it is said, did not contain one abusive word. The ownership of slaves, even more than of realty, held families steadfast on their estates, and everywhere prevailed the sociability of established neighborhoods. Money counted least in making the social status, and constantly ambitious and brilliant youngsters from no estate married into the families of the planter princes. Meanwhile the one character utterly condemned and ostracized was the man who was mean to his slaves. Even the coward was pitied and might have been liked. For the cruel master there was no toleration.

The _ante-bellum_ society had immense force. Working under the slavery which brought the suspicion or hostility of the world, and which practically beleaguered it within walls, it yet accomplished good things. For the first sixty-four years of the republic it furnished the president for fifty-two years. Its statesmen demanded the war of 1812, opened it with but five Northern senators supporting it, and its general, Jackson, won the decisive battle of New Orleans. It was a Southern statesman who added the Louisiana territory of more than 1,000,000 square miles to our domain. Under a Southern statesman Florida was acquired from Spain. Against the opposition of the free States, the Southern influence forced the war with Mexico, and annexed the superb empire of Texas, brought in New Mexico, and opened the gates of the republic to the Pacific. Scott and Taylor, the heroes of the Mexican war, were Southern men. In material, as in political affairs, the old South was masterful. The first important railroad operated in America traversed Carolina. The first steamer that crossed the ocean cleared from Savannah.