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Showing results for 'frank james' in content posted by richardmurray.
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@Stefan Can you provide a link of when i ever said crypto was a viable investment for black people ? I will help you. The following is a link to all post from me with the word crypto in it, in aalbc. https://aalbc.com/tc/search/?&q=crypto&quick=1&author=richardmurray&search_and_or=or&sortby=newest The only truly credible proof is a private financial investment ledger which I am not privy too. Cause I repeat , I have never personally supported investing in crypto. And if I was privy to such information I doubt i would display it without the permission of the people it relates to. Now, I have never suggested I can provide irrefutable proof on anything. And regardless of my offline information, which I wouldn't convey online anyway, that isn't proof. I wanted you to help me write something. I don't recall I ever wrote anything like that. Here is one half of my proof , these are all the posts with frank james concerning me. Never once did I ask or desire you to help me write anything. You like proof, check yourself. https://aalbc.com/tc/search/?&q=frank james&quick=1&author=richardmurray&search_and_or=and&sortby=newest The following is the other half. I don't usually submit a private multilog, but your lies force this. If you notice, you started this private message, not me. I never asked you for... anything. I never wanted anything from you. And I refuted your view toward me. You kept suggesting your assisting me by communicating to me. Now, for your next positions Again, I never said ideal. I have never said offline or online that at any moment in the history of the usa or the european colonies that proceeded it that anything was ideal concerning black people, no plans no situation no ideas have ever been ideal for black people in the usa. What I said, and here is your proof https://aalbc.com/tc/search/?&q=black political party&quick=1&author=richardmurray&search_and_or=and&sortby=newest is the following I want you to quote when I said anything was ideal some of my earliest quotes, say nothing about ideal situations. And you can use the link above if you want more proof. I messaged in a public post that it is a Black party of Governance. And I never said one existed , I said one was needed, and hasn't been tried. And for the historical record, so many black men were lynched , black women raped, black towns burned completely, I don't comprehend why a Black party of governance would had made more of a negative difference, when even whites will admit that violence against black people after slavery in those early years was worse than during slavery. https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/5/?tab=comments#comment-495 https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/5/?tab=comments#comment-496 https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/5/?tab=comments#comment-498 https://aalbc.com/tc/topic/5787-black-party-to-governance-after-listening-share-your-thoughts/ https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/8/?tab=comments#comment-898 https://aalbc.com/tc/topic/9211-the-black-community-in-the-usa-need-an-alternative-to-black-officials-from-the-party-of-andrew-jackson-or-abraham-lincoln/ And lastly, your position of black ignorance of the past. The articles are all cited. And clearly show the idea that black people were ignorant to their condition in the past is a lie, or that they were disengaged. I repeat, black leadership made a choice and that choice led to the changes black leadership wanted in the black community but they had other options that I think were better and still today, the black community in the usa has elements it lacks which its leadership isn't supporting. https://aalbc.com/tc/profile/6477-richardmurray/?status=2346&type=status My only problem was I went against what I said and I replied to you. That was my mistake. I will not make it again. -
An illustration of the Union prisoners’ cemetery in Charleston, published in Harper’s Weekly two years after the May 1865 celebration.
© Alfred R. Waud/New York Public LibraryBlack people may have started Memorial Day. Whites erased it from history.
Story by Donald Beaulieu • Yesterday 6:00 AMOn May 1, 1865, thousands of newly freed Black people gathered in Charleston, S.C., for what may have been the nation’s first Memorial Day celebration. Attendees held a parade and put flowers on the graves of Union soldiers who had helped liberate them from slavery.
The event took place three weeks after the Civil War surrender of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee and two weeks after the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. It was a remarkable moment in U.S. history — at the nexus of war and peace, destruction and reconstruction, servitude and emancipation.
But the day would not be remembered as the first Memorial Day. In fact, White Southerners made sure that for more than a century, the day wasn’t remembered at all.
It was “a kind of erasure from public memory,” said David Blight, a history professor at Yale University.
The contested Confederate roots of Memorial Day
In February 1865, Confederate soldiers withdrew from Charleston after the Union had bombarded it with offshore cannon fire for more than a year and began to cut off supply lines. The city surrendered to the Union army, leaving a massive population of freed formerly enslaved people.Also left in the wake of the Confederate evacuation were the graves of more than 250 Union soldiers, buried without coffins behind the judge’s stand of the Washington Race Course, a Charleston horse track that had been converted into an outdoor prison for captured Northerners. The conditions were brutal, and most of those who had died succumbed to exposure or disease.
In April, about two dozen of Charleston’s freed men volunteered to disinter the bodies and rebury them in rows of marked graves, surrounded by a wooden, freshly whitewashed fence, according to newspaper accounts from the time.
Then, on May 1, about 10,000 people — mostly formerly enslaved people — turned out for a memorial service that the freed people had organized, along with abolitionist and journalist James Redpath and some White missionaries and teachers from the North. Redpath described the day in the New-York Tribune as “such a procession of friends and mourners as South Carolina or the United States never saw before.”
The day’s events began around 9 a.m. with a parade led by about 2,800 Black schoolchildren, who had just been enrolled in new schools, bearing armfuls of flowers. They marched around the horse track and entered the cemetery gate under an arch with black-painted letters that read “Martyrs of the Race Course.” The schoolchildren proceeded through the cemetery and distributed the flowers on the gravesites.
Other attendees entered the cemetery with even more flowers, as the schoolchildren sang songs including “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “John Brown’s Body.”
“When all had left,” Redpath wrote, “the holy mounds — the tops, the sides, and the spaces between them — were one mass of flowers, not a speck of earth could be seen; and as the breeze wafted the sweet perfume from them, outside and beyond, to the sympathetic multitude, there were few eyes among those who knew the meaning of the ceremony that were not dim with tears of joy.”
In 1865, thousands of Black South Carolinians signed a 54-foot-long freedom petition < look after the first image below >
The dedication ended with prayers and Bible verses from local Black ministers, followed by speeches from Union officers and Northern missionaries, a picnic on the racecourse and drills by Union infantrymen, including some African American regiments. The observance didn’t end until sundown.
And then, Blight said, the event was forgotten. Not right away — but within a few decades, any recollection persisted merely as rumor, in verbal anecdotes.
The reason, he said, is that “by the middle and end of Reconstruction, the Black folks of Charleston were not creating the public memory of that city.”
The Southern generals who stuck with the Union in the Civil War
The portrayal of the Civil War and its aftermath was controlled in the South by groups such as the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Ladies’ Memorial Association, as well as Confederate veterans, Blight said.“The Daughters of the Confederacy were the guardians of that narrative,” said Damon Fordham, an adjunct professor of history at The Citadel, a military college in Charleston. “And much of that was skewed toward the Confederate point of view.”
Blight chronicled the 1865 Charleston ritual in his 2001 book “Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory,” based on evidence that Fordham helped him uncover. Blight had been researching the book in 1999, in an archive of the Houghton Library at Harvard University, when he found a collection of papers written by Union veterans that contained a description of the May 1, 1865, events in Charleston.
If the description was accurate, Blight said, he knew that “that event in Charleston deserves its own full commemoration, just because of the poignancy of it, the sheer scale of it.”
But first he had to corroborate it. One of the first places he contacted was the Avery Research Center for African American History and Culture at the College of Charleston. “I called up the curator there,” Blight recalled, “and I said, ‘I just found this in a collection of veterans materials. Have you ever heard of this story?’ And the guy said, ‘No. That never happened.’”
The “guy” was Fordham, who at the time was a graduate student at the college and a research assistant at Avery. Despite his doubts, Fordham knew the center had microfilm of the Charleston Courier, a daily newspaper from that time, so he checked it.
“About two hours later, he called me back, and he said, ‘Oh my God, here it is,’” Blight said. It was a Courier article from May 2, 1865, “describing this extraordinary parade on the old planters’ racecourse.”
Blight went on to find more proof, including an illustration of the fenced cemetery that was published in Harper’s Weekly in 1867. “Pretty soon I had all these sources that no one had ever bumped into, so one thing kept leading to another,” he said. “But even people in Charleston said, ‘No, never heard of it.’ That shows the power of the erasure of public memory over time.”
In the book, Blight describes a 1916 letter written by the president of the Ladies’ Memorial Association in Charleston, replying to an inquiry about the May 1, 1865, parade. “A United Daughters of the Confederacy official wanted to know if it was true that blacks and their white abolitionist friends had engaged in such a burial rite,” he wrote. “Mrs. S.C. Beckwith responded tersely: ‘I regret that I was unable to gather any official information in answer to this.’”
In the 1880s, the bodies of the Union soldiers, the “Martyrs of the Race Course,” were exhumed and moved to Beaufort National Cemetery. The horse track closed shortly after that, and the 60 acres of land became Hampton Park, named for Wade Hampton III, a Confederate general and Charleston native who became governor of South Carolina in 1876. Hampton enslaved nearly 1,000 people before the war, and his governorship was supported by the Red Shirts, a White paramilitary group that violently suppressed the Black vote.
After slavery, Black people desperately searched for family through newspaper ads <look after second image below>
By the end of the century, no vestige of the racecourse, the cemetery or the 1865 parade remained.More spring graveside memorials followed the one in Charleston. Several occurred in towns across the country in the spring of 1866, and many of these places — such as Columbus, Miss., whose commemoration became annual — claim to have held the original Memorial Day observance. Officially, the nation recognizes Memorial Day as having started in Waterloo, N.Y.
In Charleston, the freed people didn’t have the power to develop an annual tradition after 1865. But the city now recognizes itself, regardless, as the holiday’s birthplace.
“On May 1, 1865, a parade to honor the Union war dead took place here,” reads a state historical marker erected in Hampton Park in 2017. “The event marked the earliest celebration of what became known as ‘Memorial Day.’”
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This 54-foot-long petition bears the signatures of hundreds of men who participated in the State Convention of Colored People of South Carolina in 1865. (Gwenanne Edwards/Library of Congress, Conservation Division)
In 1865, thousands of Black South Carolinians signed a 54-foot-long freedom petition
It goes on display Friday for the first time at the African American history museum in Washington.By Michael E. Ruane
September 23, 2021 at 7:43 p.m. EDTIn November 1865, eight months after the end of the Civil War, a group of African Americans formed a convention in Charleston, S.C., drew up a petition demanding their civil rights and sent it to Congress in Washington.
“We the undersigned colored citizens of South Carolina, do respectfully ask … in consideration of our unquestioned loyalty [that in the] re-establishment of civil government in South Carolina, our equal rights before the law may be respected,” the handwritten document begins.
What followed were 3,740 signatures, then-Sen. Jacob M. Howard (R-Mich.) told his Senate colleagues after receiving the petition — on a document that was 54 feet long.
It was a striking appeal from the newly freed, and previously free, African Americans, asking that they not be forgotten in the country’s postwar reconstruction. Never displayed publicly before, it goes on exhibit Friday at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.
“The petition is a real touchstone for the expectations and the will of … African Americans …[who saw] this moment in the county’s history as a new beginning,” said Katy Kendrick, exhibitions curator at the museum. It’s a “very powerful and very direct claiming of full rights of citizenship.”
The petition is part of a new exhibit of 175 objects at the museum entitled “Make Good the Promises: Reconstruction and Its Legacies.”
The exhibit covers the turbulent postwar era of Reconstruction as the vanquished Southern states sought to recreate prewar racial oppression, and African Americans fought, ultimately in vain, to prevent it.
And it examines the legacy of that struggle today.
It includes a frightening Ku Klux Klan head mask with horns, made of cloth and animal fur, owned by a Confederate army officer in North Carolina and used to terrorize Black residents.
It includes a document from the Freedmen’s Bureau, the federal agency set up to help the 4 million people newly freed, that tells of a mother’s attempt get her two children back from their former enslaver.
Caroline Atkinson went to the bureau’s office in Vicksburg, Miss., in September 1867, two years after slavery had been abolished in 1865.
But her daughters Elizabeth, 10, and Mary Jane, 11, were still in the hands of one William Atkinson, who had refused to return them unless he was paid $100 — roughly $1,600 today.
She signed the document with an X. The bureau investigated and ordered the children returned to their mother, according to the museum.
There’s an old pew from a former Black church, as well as the stained glass windows picturing Confederate generals that was removed from Washington National Cathedral in 2017.
The Cathedral announced Thursday that the windows would be replaced with racial justice-themed windows created by Black artist Kerry James Marshall.
The exhibit also includes a Bible and nine-page Bible study guide loaned by a survivor of the massacre at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, where nine African Americans were murdered on June 17, 2015.
That church is across the street from the site of the old Zion Presbyterian Church, where the freedom petition was drawn up 150 years before. (Zion Presbyterian was demolished in 1960, according to a study by the College of Charleston.)
“Reconstruction was a pivotal moment … when the nation had an opportunity to make amends for the injustices of slavery and rebuild itself on a new foundation of racial equality,” Kevin Young, the museum director, said in a statement.
“While some gains were made, this was also a period of voter suppression … violence and unlawful incarceration,” he said. “Because of the work left unfinished … and the decades of discrimination that followed, the struggle … continues in society today.”
The signers of the petition to Congress met at the “State Convention of the Colored People of South Carolina” over six days in late November 1865 at Zion Presbyterian, according to an account of the proceedings printed by a local newspaper. At the time, Zion Presbyterian was the biggest church in Charleston and a center for the Black community.
In addition to the petition, the convention issued a number of resolutions, including:
“That in the death of the late President of the United States, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, this nation has sustained an irreparable loss and we, as a race, deprived of a noble friend. We sympathize with his afflicted family and will ever hold his name in grateful remembrance.”
Lincoln had been assassinated the previous April.
The convention resolved: “That we hereby object to a ‘negro code’ [of law]. … In our humble opinion a code of laws for the government of all, regardless of color, is all that is necessary for the advancement of the interests and prosperity of the state.”
Oppressive state laws restricting the lives of African Americans, called “Black Codes,” soon became a grim hallmark of Reconstruction.
The convention issued an address to the people of South Carolina:
“Heretofore we have had no avenues opened to us or our children — We have had no firesides that we could call our own. … The laws that have made white men great have degraded us because we are colored. …
“But now that we are free, now that we have been lifted up by the providence of God … we have resolved to come forward, and … speak and act for ourselves.”
And it resolved:
“As the old institution of slavery has passed away … we cherish in our hearts no hatred or malice toward those who have held our brethren as slaves, but we extend the right hand of fellowship to all and make it our special aim to establish unity, peace and love amongst all men.”
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Mary Bailey searches for her children. Her ad ran Nov. 24, 1866, in the Daily Dispatch newspaper in Richmond.
‘My mother was sold from me’: After slavery, the desperate search for loved ones in ‘last seen ads’
By DeNeen L. Brown
September 7, 2017 at 7:30 a.m. EDTTen months after the Civil War ended, an enslaved woman who had been ripped away from her children started looking for them.
Elizabeth Williams, who had been sold twice since she last saw her children, placed a heart-wrenching ad in a newspaper:
“INFORMATION WANTED by a mother concerning her children,” Williams wrote March 17, 1866, in the Christian Recorder newspaper in Philadelphia. Her ad was one of thousands taken out by formerly enslaved people looking for lost relatives after the Civil War.
Those ads are now being digitized in a project called “Last Seen: Finding Family After Slavery,” < https://informationwanted.org/ >which is run by Villanova University’s graduate history program in collaboration with Philadelphia’s Mother Bethel AME Church.
In four column inches, the mother summed up her life, hoping the rich details would help her find the children. She listed their names — Lydia, William, Allen, and Parker — and explained in a few words that she last saw them when they were “formerly owned together” by a man named John Petty who lived about six miles from Woodbury, Tenn.
She explained how her family was split apart when she was sold again and taken farther south into captivity.
“She has never seen the above-named children since,” the ad said. “Any information given concerning them, however, will be gratefully received by one whose love for her children survives the bitterness and hardships of many long years spent in slavery.”
The “Last Seen” ads started appearing around 1863. By 1865, when the Civil War ended, they were coming out in streams. Black people torn away from family members by slavery placed thousands of “Information Wanted” notices in black-owned newspapers across the country, seeking any help to find loved ones.
In the ads, mothers looked for their children; children looked for their mothers; fathers placed ads for lost sons; sisters looked for sisters; husbands sought their wives; wives tried to find their husbands. The ads showed in real time the destruction slavery wrought on black families, tearing people apart and scattering generations like leaves in the wind.
The ads often gave detailed physical descriptions of the missing, names of former slave owners, locations subscribers “last saw” family members and sometimes maps, tracing how many times they were sold from one owner to the next until they so far from family members all they had to cling to was sketchy memories.
Many of the Last Seen ads, dating from 1863 to 1902, were placed in the Christian Recorder, the official newspaper of the African Methodist Church. Others ads were placed in the Black Republican in New Orleans, the South Carolina Leader in Charleston, the Colored Citizen in Cincinnati, the Free Men’s Press in Galveston, Texas, and the Colored Tennessean in Nashville.
Judy Giesberg, the graduate program director at Villanova’s History Department, began noticing the newspaper ads while researching the story of Emilie Davis, a free black woman who lived in Philadelphia during the Civil War and kept a diary while there.
“Emilie Davis would write about a lecture she would see or some event in Philadelphia,” Giesberg said. “If she said she went to see Frederick Douglass, we would look in the newspaper to see where he was. It was hard to overlook these ads.”
Sometimes the ads took up columns and columns that would make up whole pages, which captured the weight of the missing and the desperation of subscribers to find them.
Giesberg started collecting the ads with the intention of one day making them available to people online. “I started with the AME Church newspaper,” Giesberg said. “It was the first place I noticed the ads. When I started looking in other black newspapers, I found this was a common phenomenon to include ads taken by people who were one step out of slavery.”
Last August, Giesberg created the “LAST SEEN: FINDING FAMILY AFTER SLAVERY” website, where genealogists and other researchers can search for specific names and locations. Two graduate students — Margaret Strolle and James Byrd — read microfilm to find the material. The site uses volunteers to help transcribe the ads. There are now more than 2,000 ads on the site, of which 1,500 have been transcribed. Since January, the site has been visited by more than 1 million unique visitors.
“There are comparable projects that have collected runaway slave ads,” Giesberg said. What is unique about Last Seen ads, she added, “is they were taken out from the other perspective. They were taken out by the enslaved people.”
The Last Seen ads break down what genealogists and researchers call the “1870 Census Wall.” Before the 1870 Census, there were very few official records of black people. Enslaved black people were often listed as property, by a check mark, a number or by a gender. They were often listed on bills of sale, like chattel. When researchers try to get information on enslaved black people, they often hit a brick wall when searching for information before 1870.
“What the ads do is reach from the other side of the 1870 Census Wall,” Giesberg said. “The ads place people together in a time before 1870.”
The ads tell real stories of real people with real names, humanizing enslaved people, something slave owners often tried to prevent.
“Slave owners often painted a portrait of enslaved people as part of a happy family in which white men were patriarchs,” Giesberg said. The ads go “beyond that myth, the myth of the benign slaveholder who believes he was a good slaveholder and all the slaves belonged to him. These ads are where real truth lies.”
Enslaved people lived with the constant fear that they or a family member would be sold.
“Slave owners’ wealth lay largely in the people they owned, therefore, they frequently sold and or purchased people as finances warranted,” according to a report by the National Humanities Center, a nonprofit that collects primary historical resources. “An enslaved person could be sold as part of an estate when his owner died, or because the owner needed to liquidate assets to pay off debts or because the owner thought the enslaved person was a troublemaker.”
An exhibit entitled “The Weeping Time” at the Smithsonian’s African American Museum of History and Culture explains the circumstances that often split families apart.
“Night and day, you could hear men and women screaming … ma, pa, sister or brother … taken without any warning,” according to a witness account in the exhibit. “People was always dying from a broken heart.”
Another witness described an emotional scene at a slave auction. A mother clings to her baby while being whipped with a lash because she refused to put her baby down and climb an auction block.
The woman pleaded for God’s mercy, Henry Bibb recounted.
“But the child was torn from the arms of its mother amid the most heart rending-shrieks from the mother and child on the one hand, and the bitter oaths and cruel lashes from the tyrants on the other,” Bibb recalled. “Finally, the poor child was torn from the mother while she sacrificed to the highest bidder.”
In a “Last Seen” ad placed on April 17, 1902, in the Christian Recorder newspaper in Philadelphia, a woman seeks information about “my people.”
“My mother was sold from me when I could but crawl,” the woman writes.Since the sale, “I never saw any of my people. I was about 39 years old last March and am married and living at Panama, Vernon Co., Mo. My name is Mary Delaney; it used to be Mary Long. Address me at Post office: Panama, Vernon county, Mo.”
In a “Last Seen” ad placed on April 17, 1902, in the Christian Recorder newspaper in Philadelphia, a woman seeks information about “my people.”
“My mother was sold from me when I could but crawl,” the woman writes.Since the sale, “I never saw any of my people. I was about 39 years old last March and am married and living at Panama, Vernon Co., Mo. My name is Mary Delaney; it used to be Mary Long. Address me at Post office: Panama, Vernon county, Mo.”
Some of the ads were intentionally vague, masking details, and mysteriously leaving out specific names and locations. These ads showed mental calculations of a people one step out of slavery. Even after Lincoln declared enslaved people in Confederate states to be freed, they were suspicious about the terms of that Emancipation, fearing that at any time they could be pulled back into slavery.
In a June 7, 1883, ad placed in the Southwestern Christian Advocate in New Orleans, an unnamed man searched for his son. The ad is brief: “Mr. EDITOR,” the man wrote, “I desire to hear from my son. His name was Tony Jones. I have not seen him since the war. He lived with Thomas Jones. His mother was Julia Jones.”
If anyone should know Tony Jones — the enslaved man with the same name as his “master”— he asks them to write to him care of P.P. Brooks in Shelbyville, Tex.
The ad is unsigned.Other ads gave insight into how people lived, their aspirations and successes.
In an ad placed June 28, 1883, in the Southwestern Christian Advocate newspaper in New Orleans, Betty Davis inquires “for my people.” Davis explained that she was separated from her mother when she was three years old.
“I am now 55 years of age,” she wrote. “I learned how to read when I was 50. I take and read the SOUTHWESTERN, it is food for my soul. I am anxious and would be glad to hear something of my mother or my brother Henry. Someone help me.”
Sometimes, the ads led to happy endings.
In an Aug. 26, 1886, ad that ran in the Southwestern Christian Advocate newspaper, which did not charge for publishing letters from subscribers, Alcy Boone wrote a letter to the editor saying she found who she was looking for:
“I have found my mother through the dear SOUTHWESTERN. God bless you and your paper; it resurrects the forgotten, the lost can be found.”
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Someday The World Will Be Black
richardmurray replied to anonymous50's topic in Culture, Race & Economy
JAmes baldwin once said, the world isn't white, the world isn't black either. -
@Mel Hopkins When the war between the states ended and ever since, most black churches are composed of black women even though at said early time, the black men heading churches opposed black women from leadership positions. My point, I don't concur to lincoln's assertion that democracy is an absence of slavery but crispis attics in that minority in the minority in the black community when the usa was founded/frederick douglass + the black elected officials he inspired, which left a heritage Obama+Adams+dinkins embraced/many, I daresay most, black women in the black dos branch of the black community in the usa /mlk jr./barrack obama whose wife is a black DOSer/you yourself Mel side millions of other black people today did or do. Slavery can occur in any form : group to group <black to white> individual to individual <wife to husband> individual to group <Malcolm to the Natin of Islam> group to individual <the black community in the usa to Barrack Obama>. Black women wanted the freedom to lead their own lives, not just from the white communities machinations or stratagems but from the passions of black men. I will never forget a black woman saying the black women who ran her household sent black men away when they wanted to commit acts of violence towards whites who were harming their clan. <That scene in daughters of the dust when the raped black woman will not tell her husband, a black man, which whites did it, cause she didn't want him killed, and the other black women agree to her choice> The black women in this clan wanted to fight in the courts. Said black men in the same clan didn't. They sent them away so that the black women can be free to do as they please and the black men , distantly in the north, can be free to do as they please. <I think of James Baldwin, I paraphrase, black women try not to emasculate black men while they support them to their dreams >And while said clan has been split ever since, for the record, said black family still own their house:) in texas. I think the black community in the USA has been harmed by such folk or their actions, BUT from crispus attics to you I comprehend the determination to see this through even knowing the condition of most black people. I comprehend. It isn't my way or path, and I don't concur but I do comprehend and I think one of the problems in the black community in the usa is the challenge in comprehending other black people. I never forget when the DC Snipers were active, a black woman said they were crazy and I told her she is wrong for saying that. They didn't ask you to join them, why call them crazy. You know why they are doing it, it is the same reason why you harass every black person to vote every year, regardless of elected official quality or policy outcomes. You have your way, let them have theirs. ... She didn't reply.
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2:30 it's funny how being a single parent like any adult comes in all forms. Zenobia, the question is do you think using an uncommon form of single parenting is unwarranted or just not your artistic cup of tea? 4:34 Claudine is old enough to be before women had the 2023 levels of freedom from male domination , yes I am a man. But Nike, women globally are still commonly in Claudine's situation. It's funny how in the usa, the rules in the usa are nonchalantly applied to the global humanity, when you said something similar too, this was when women couldn't have a bank account. 7:20 The question is, did the kids too easily or quickly accept James Earl Jones new parental figure? Nike or Zenobia. 10:30 haha! Too many Black women have heard a black man or black men say publicly, or in the black man cave, women are too much:) in the usa. 13:52 did the story before the movie, when Claudine met the new interest, did she trick him or not tell him about the kids? 23:22 great scenes, with the young daughter and James Earl Jones shock at what he is getting into. 30:35 Good question Zenobia, did the characterizations in Claudine give examples to how certain negative behaviors develop from child to adult. 32:14 yes, Pauline wasn't in the category of "Whitey Bad" films. The funny thing about Shaft and Foxy Brown is how they were written by whites. Foxy Brown was written by Jack Hill. Shaft was written by Ernest Tidyman. As a writer my biggest issue with many films in the 1970s that had nearly all black cast or definitely all black major cast, are the writers of the stories are white , sequentially, the viewpoints or narratives are from whites interpreting black people, or referring to their black connections. 36:02 Great point, Sweetback plus other films in the 1970s involving black musicians or actors, is why in the late 1970s <star wars> + 80s <back to the future , die hard, et cetera> films with mostly white thespians put such a huge emphasis on soundtracks, that is one of the elements that the 1970s films in the USA with majority black thespians brought into the complete USA film industry. Closing thoughts: what are my thoughts to welfare or single parenting relevancy. To relevancy, you have to break issues up. First welfare itself + single parenting. Where do I begin. Claudine is in Harlem, a city that is legally a district of a borough in a city. Remember, each district in New York City has more people in it that the average city in the USA. Think on that, cities in the USA with a third the populace of harlem have full representation or powers over their geography while harlem has none. Why does this matter? Welfare is a leg up system, like the projects also a NYC concept spread throughout the USA, that can be easily insufficient but on existence always acceptable or rejectable. To rephrase, people can always say a person shouldn't be on welfare, using the taxpayers money, or they can say it is a public good to aid a person who needs financial assistance, but the quality of assistance the person gets tends to be insufficient, regardless of people's opinion of it. The best example is another film, also based in NYC. The film is Sabrina. Sabrina's father and Roop are similar men. The maids of the lauraughby household are no different than Claudine. But, Roop + Claudine are not getting a wage anywhere near what the workers in the Laraughby household are getting. So Claudine + Roop need welfare, they need assistance to equal what the servants in Sabrina are getting doing the same work. But the government of Harlem , wait it doesn't exist. NYC's government which doesn't cater to the whole city doesn't provide a welfare system or a labor law adequate. As for single parenting, the reality is Black people have been single parents or being raised absent parents in far harder circumstances. I argue that black people in the usa today complain more about other black people in difficult scenarios than warranted. It was worse in the past in the USA. But that leads to the next point. The next point is perception, cause perception in the Black community in the usa is rarely functional. Welfare or single parenting is a prime example. Black individuals who will make speeches, give rants on Black people using welfare or being a single parent, will be silent amidst the presence of a non black person on welfare or being a single parent. Which means what? the problem most black people have isn't welfare or single parenting cause they would rant at non black instances the way they rant at black instances. The problem is , they want zero percent black people on welfare or zero percent black people as a single parent. Many a non black is a single parent in NYC today, many. But you never hear in the news from white asians, white latinos, white muslims avbout their own people still on welfare being lazy, or their own women need to close their legs. And not because it isn't happening, it is because they give their own the freedom to be that way without condemnation. Even though more white people are on welfare in the usa than black people, some black people want black people to have no one on welfare, while white people say that is the governments role to help their own. Even though more single mothers are non black in the usa than black single mothers, some black people want no black woman to be a single parent, while non blacks go on begging sprees for their own single mothers who are doing the same job like Claudine. I will end this part with a little truth that sometimes black people don't include in comprehending how we got here. In the late 1900s a number of movements, like the club women in the usa, supported the idea of black improvement regardless, meaning even though the scenario is unfair or unjust or negative to black people or a black person they are obliged to overcome all of that, regardless. And that culture back then has become today a heritage many black people adhere to. A false one. A government is meant to govern. But a government should not be treated as something to be proud of or a member of absent an ability to be in your favor, and sadly, that concept is what many black leaders accepted in the past. The idea isn't born from stupidity, it is born from a question black people were forced to ask themselves when the war between the states ended. If I am supposed to love this place, the USA, instead of leave it, and how can I love it, when my people or community or self is mistreated yearly, monthly, daily. The answer is simple. You have to love and not leave it, regardless. That is the source of the absolutism in the black community in the usa. Now a heritage that many black people adhere to in the usa, in my view, a dysfunctional heritage but nothing is completely bad. I will speak of its merits another time:) I want to end with one of the most important points in the film. Fiscally poor people don't have easy relationships because they are fiscally poor. And yes, Claudine has six kids, begs for welfare even though she works for a living, Roop is a garbage man who has to pay for kids not Claudine's he isn't as socially connected to and barely has any money to help Claudine with her kids. Yes, and you know what, they do love each other and they can smile and walk down that street in northern Harlem:) with all those kids, still broke but loving. As a note, Claudine was a rare film in the 1970s organized by a black production company. Third world cinema of Ozzie Davis. And that is the point.
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Has any reporter spoken to any of these whites?
richardmurray replied to richardmurray's topic in Culture, Race & Economy
@Troy yeah yeah, I got another internet oddity hmm, many people are all talk well, the people in the usa never were atoned, nor are atone now. Moreover, the legal system of the usa or time from english colonies to 2023 or the multiracial community of nonviolent integrationists in the USA are atonements, things that atone , make one. Being one people requires the one thing the USA never had and doesn't have now, a purpose that unifies a people. Germany used to be federated states. Italy was principalities. But it was a unified purpose<to make a country that could stand with pride against their neighbors> that made modern germany, not the law, not a group of people in the country forcing all others<and yes, the German jew wanted a united germany too, and had it, before world war II>, not an individual liberty mantra. Oneness is always possible no matter the inner multiraciality of any group, but it requires something to be one around. IT can not be oneness for oneness sake. if by atonement the hebrew israelites mean repairer, well, the usa has nothing to repair. All the past conditions in the USA or the english colonies preceding it were negative. And, the elements that need repair in the past of the usa are beyond money or technology. Can someone bring back and make as if lived the native american peoples that were slaughtered by whites of europe? can someone bring back and make as if lived the majority of enslaved blacks, as 80% of black enslaved people never made it cross the water, most enslaved black people are in the ocean. Atone, to make one. Repair , to fix. @Pioneer1 well, I have never heard a black person say publicly that they want a white person to kiss their feet either BUT I did hear a black person, james baldwin admit that his father hated whites, while his father never, ever, spit/hurled threats/or acted violently towards whites. what is my point? Black people in the usa have a heritage of not speaking , or moreover not acting, how we feel amongst whites or other blacks. I bet many black people wouldn't mind seeing their feet kissed by whites. I am not suggesting me. No I don't want white people kissing my feet. But I am also certain a whole lot more black people , especially descended of enslaved, who wouldn't mind that, but will never say it. Many Black christian chruch people in the 1960s scoffed at Black panthers for self defense members simply demanding all black people arm themselves against white aggression. Said black church people never trusted white people and lived in fear of whites but publicly scoffed at the notion of black people defending themselves. No, the black community in the usa's public voice is untrustworthy to its true desires. -
The problem with the film industry in the USA and Kemet
OPENING THOUGHTS
Historical fact versus Film industry goals.
A film, with chadwick boseman before the black panther called, Gods of egypt , had only one Black god of egypt. Thoth. But, all the gods of Kemet, which the hellens< the romans called the hellens greeks, the greeks called kemet egypt> took over through the macedonian rule of hellens, are Black, all of them. So all the gods of egypt should had been Black.
In parallel, Cleopatra is white. I didn't say she wasn't Egyptian. She spoke the native tongue. In the same way the Mamluks , who are from eastern europe, are not native to Kemet but lived most of their lives in Kemet, they called egypt, while being muslim. So, the problem is the film industry in the USA has a goal with many projects. The goal is simple. Unbind all characters from racial definition, a key to araciality. The problem is, history isn't a false thing, history is fact. Cleopatra was not black, just like the Mamluks. But this doesn't mean most people in Kemet or Egypt are white.
But i wanted to do research and find out, who is the lawyer that filed the complaint because as always, the internet story linked to me has no citation.
I found the following and I will end with lcosing thoughts
ARTICLES
TITLE
Egyptians complain over Netflix depiction of Cleopatra as blackCONTENT
by David Gritten
BBC News
A Netflix docudrama series that depicts Queen Cleopatra VII as a black African has sparked controversy in Egypt.A lawyer has filed a complaint that accuses African Queens: Queen Cleopatra of violating media laws and aiming to "erase the Egyptian identity".
A top archaeologist insisted Cleopatra was "light-skinned, not black".
But the producer said "her heritage is highly debated" and the actress playing her told critics: "If you don't like the casting, don't watch the show."
Adele James made the comment in a Twitter post featuring screengrabs of abusive comments that included racist slurs.
Cleopatra was born in the Egyptian city of Alexandria in 69 BC and became the last queen of a Greek-speaking dynasty founded by Alexander the Great's Macedonian general Ptolemy.
She succeeded her father Ptolemy XII in 51 BC and ruled until her death in 30 BC. Afterwards, Egypt fell under Roman domination.
The identity of Cleopatra's mother is not known, and historians say it is possible that she, or any other female ancestor, was an indigenous Egyptian or from elsewhere in Africa.
Netflix's companion website Tudum reported in February that the choice to cast Adele James, a British actress who is of mixed race, as Cleopatra in its new documentary series was "a nod to the centuries-long conversation about the ruler's race".
Jada Pinkett Smith, the American actress who was executive producer and narrator, was meanwhile quoted as saying: "We don't often get to see or hear stories about black queens, and that was really important for me, as well as for my daughter, and just for my community to be able to know those stories because there are tons of them!"
But when the trailer was released last week many Egyptians condemned the depiction of Cleopatra.
Zahi Hawass, a prominent Egyptologist and former antiquities minister, told the al-Masry al-Youm newspaper: "This is completely fake. Cleopatra was Greek, meaning that she was light-skinned, not black."
Mr Hawass said the only rulers of Egypt known to have been black were the Kushite kings of the 25th Dynasty (747-656 BC).
"Netflix is trying to provoke confusion by spreading false and deceptive facts that the origin of the Egyptian civilisation is black," he added and called on Egyptians to take a stand against the streaming giant.
On Sunday, lawyer Mahmoud al-Semary filed a complaint with the public prosecutor demanding that he take "the necessary legal measures" and block access to Netflix's services in Egypt.
He alleged that the series included visual material and content that violated Egypt's media laws and accused Netflix of trying to "promote the Afrocentric thinking... which includes slogans and writings aimed at distorting and erasing the Egyptian identity".
Three years ago, plans for a movie about Cleopatra starring the Israeli actress Gal Gadot triggered a heated debate on social media, with some people insisting that the role should instead go to an Arab or African actress.
Gadot subsequently defended the casting decision, saying: "We were looking for a Macedonian actress that could fit Cleopatra. She wasn't there, and I was very passionate about Cleopatra."
URL
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-65322821
<Rough translation of the arabic to english from google translate>
TITLE
"Falsification of facts and Cleopatra was not black." Zahi Hawass comments on Netflix's latest movieCONTENT
Zahi Hawass, former Minister of Antiquities and archaeologist, commented on the film "Cleopatra", which was revealed by Netflix yesterday, and drew criticism from public opinion in Egypt for portraying the "black" Ptolemaic queen, considering it a falsification of history.
Hawass commented in an exclusive statement to «Al-Masry Al-Youm» on the film, saying: «That is a falsification completely, Cleopatra was Greek, in the sense that she was blonde and not black», and considered that the film «falsification of facts and an attempt to attract illustrious historical names such as Queen Cleopatra, with the aim of promoting that the Egyptian civilization is black».
Hawass pointed out that there is a trend in the world in recent years led by American blacks and blacks in South America, to claim that the Egyptian civilization is originally black, stressing that «this talk has no basis at all».The archaeologist pointed out that the black civilization has no connection with the Egyptian civilization, pointing out that the black civilization did not rule Egypt except in the twenty-fifth dynasty during the era of the Kingdom of Kush, that is, at the end of civilization. (The number of families of the Egyptian civilization is 30 families).
Hawass proved that the Egyptian civilization is different from other African civilizations, pointing out that the Egyptian temples have drawings of Egyptian kings, and the Egyptian king is depicted beating his enemies, explaining that the temples depict his enemies either «African, Nubian, Libyan or Asian, and all of them have a different shape».
Hawass continued that «Netflix is trying to create confusion to spread false and false information that the origin of the Egyptian civilization is black», and called on Hawass to take a stand against the Netflix platform.
Netflix launched a promotional advertisement for a documentary about Queen Cleopatra, directed by Jada Ninket Smith, wife of the famous American star Will Smith, and will be shown on the platform on May 10, and actress Adele James was chosen to play the role of the Ptolemaic queen.
Queen Cleopatra, the last ruler of the Ptolemaic dynasty, was born in 69 BC and died in 30 BC in Alexandria.
URL
https://www.almasryalyoum.com/news/details/2864818
<Rough translation of the arabic to english from google translate>
TITLE
After the crisis of the movie Cleopater the brunette. Public prosecutor's complaint against Netflix demanding that the platform be bannedCONTENT
Lawyer Mahmoud Al-Samri submitted a report to the Public Prosecutor to close the Netflix platform, after the announcement of the documentary film Cleopater Al-Samra, and to take all legal measures against those in charge of this work, and against the management of the platform for its participation in this crime, and to investigate them and block its broadcast in Egypt and address all concerned authorities, especially the National Media Authority, to achieve this.
The complaint filed against Netflix stated: It was recently noted that the Netflix platform broadcasts some visual materials and content that violate the controls of media content, which we are accustomed to in Arab and Eastern societies in all countries of the Arab and Islamic region, as most of what is presented by this platform contradicts Islamic and societal values and principles, especially Egyptian.
As stated in the communication after the crisis of Cleopater's black film: The platform's management reached them to display advertising and attractive ads seen by millions in the world, and spread on their official pages documented via Facebook, recently, an invitation to watch a documentary film about Queen Cleopatra, who was of Greek origin that she is black and all the pharaohs at the time have black skin, unlike Egyptian history and civilization, to promote the thought of Afrocentric spread widely on social media, which have slogans and writings aimed at distorting and obliterating the Egyptian identity In a crude and worrying way for us as Egyptians we have a historical civilization that nations talk about over time and the issue of these owners of this thought is largely supported by large external parties to falsify the facts of the Egyptians.The communication against Netflix continued on the Black Cleopatra Declaration: From the standpoint of preserving the Egyptian national and cultural identity among Egyptians all over the world and taking pride in it, and consolidating the spirit of belonging to the homeland, and accordingly, we ask and request you to take the necessary legal measures against this platform, and to stop displaying every work whose purpose is to obliterate and distort the Egyptian identity, by playing in the minds with attractive advertisements and films aimed at falsifying and distorting history in Egypt, and also accusing those in charge of forgery of this work jointly And assistance from the management of the platform.
At the end of his communication, Al-Samri called for taking all legal measures against those responsible for this work and against the platform's management for its participation in this crime.
URL
https://www.cairo24.com/1783644
CLOSING THOUGHTS
My first thought in closing is a question. Did Zahi Hawass or Mohamed-El-Sayed-El-Semary file a lawsuit against gods of Egypt. Because don't tell me that the gods of Egypt were nordic ? How is that not a falsification?
And even though, and I quote
... the world of Gods of Egypt never really existed. It is inspired by Egyptian mythology, but it makes no attempt at historical accuracy because that would be pointless — none of the events in the movie ever really happened. It is about as reality-based as Star Wars — which is not real at all ... Maybe one day if I get to make further chapters I will reveal the context of the when and where of the story. But one thing is for sure — it is not set in Ancient Egypt at all.
—Director Alex Proyas, December 2015
if Gods of Egypt can be forgiven for that then the African Queens series by Jada Pinkett Smith can be forgiven. These films are meant to make Black women of African descent feel good about themselves. These films are not meant to be documentaries.
Now Adele James who portrays Cleopatra said, if you don't like the casting don't watch the show. And to be fair, the lawsuit, though gaining global attention isn't for a global ban, it is for a ban in Kemet itself. Which is not unusual in film. Many governments ban films involving the history. China banned Seven Years In Tibet. This is not uncommon.
But Hawass and James and Jada Pinkett for me, offer an interesting question about the series and casting and identity.
The first thing I thought was, why didn't they chose Nefertiti ?
They could had chosen Hatshepsut but she is to dominant. Hatshepsut goes into other arguments about women's role in general and Jada Pinkett probably wanted to step away from that. But Nefertiti is legendary and she has a bust that is preserved. I want you to take a look at the show poster and then Nefertiti bust.
Adele James as Cleopatra
The bust of Neferitti
Doesn't ADele James look like Nefertiti?
Why not Nefertiti? Why did Jada Pinkett SMith have to use Cleopatra, whom I have said countless times in AALBC is a white woman. I didn't say she wasn't egyptian and I didn't say she didn't have black blood.
Take a look at the following image of an actor named Ty Burrell. A white man.
Said actor, Ty Burrell has an ancestor, as Black as the night. And, in his own words <you search the "finding your roots" episode, he admitted that people in his community growing up stated that in whispers about his clan>
So Cleopatra being white doesn't mean she doesn't have Black ancestors. It doesn't mean she can't claim Kemet. Charlize Theron says she is south african. She isn't XHosa or Zulu.
The point is Cleopatra is a white woman. But being in the phenotypical ranges commonly labeled white or black doesn't define one's background or how one defines themselves. Look at the following of Fredi Washington, who played the first Peola in the first film version of Imitation of Life
She look more like Betty Davis than Lena Horne and Lena Horne is extremely Yella. And Fredi Washington never called herself anything but Black. Hawass would call Fredi Washington light skinned.
So I see three points, in any order.
Phenotype in modern USA based media, film in particular but even outside ala Hamilton the play with all the white or blanco historical figures being played by negros/mullatoes/mestizoes, likes to suggest an araciality to historical figures. Anyone can play anybody is the message, in my mind at least. So, The Dagda of the Tuatha de danaan can be played by a male or female person, kid or elder, with blue black skin and a large black afro. While... Ogun of the Yoruba Orishas can be played by a male or female person, kid or elder, with long blonde hair and snow white skin. Now the question is why? well, the USA has a problem. It's population is the most multiracial or multicultural or multiheritaged in modern humanity and is only growing more multi every day. But, alot of negativity or hatred or dislike is between the parts of the people. The USA populace doesn't have enough love in its populace to become a family, a set of loving ones. But maybe it can be engineered to be a clan <ala the country of immigrants claim which is false to the native american or partial to enslaved black people as they were unwilling>, perhaps even better a creed<ala the shared belief in individual rights, government of elected officilals through voting, a set of laws that need to be abided and respected absent the use of arms>. Various individuals or groups of people in the USA across all racial spectrums are trying to make the USA into a clan or creed and in the arts, this has led to hamilton or this film of Cleopatra. I see two goals, the first is to deracialize historical figures to support the idea that one can be a racial stranger in a community, the usa, and be part of it instantaneously if they abide by the rules of the clan or creed. The second is to support the idea that one can idolize, be proud of, adopt someone who isn't of their race as part of their essence. Do I artistically like this? no. I prefer historical truth. But that is only a matter of taste, it doesn't warrant a large multilog for me. Any artist knows, no work makes everybody happy, and it shouldn't.
Phenotype outside the USA, race, is simpler but when applied to the USA media's portrayals of race, become very complicated. I have been to africa. I can tell you, many women <not most> of North Africa, today, are white women. Now, they are african. They are muslim. And they are not nordic in appearance. Many Northern African women do share the mediterranean look with Southern European women, ala why in Europe, many northern europeans would call southern europeans dark. But they are white women. But they don't see themselves as Europeans. and this is the problem with race outside the usa in comparison to in the USA. In the USA race in general is usually reduced, made simpler, rightly or wrongly. But in BRasil you have Pardo, you have the brown skinned. In African there is no one drop rule, being black doesn't equate to african in africa. In India, people who look like my mother's father, will argue they are not black because in asia, black equates to african. In asia, the word dark is used for people who in the usa will be deemed black. So outside the USA phenotype, appearance, has other rules and when you apply the goals , the phenotypical goals, in USA media to places outside the USA it is dysfunctional. But, part of the dysfunction doesn't merely stem from the combination of two unequals or the attempting to find a multiracial center in the USA end, but also the old rigidities of race in many places outside the USA. I live in New York City and anyone who knows latin americans knows that in their homes, the dark or black or negra members of the familia are not treated like in the disney film encanto. Rosie Perez said it best herself, that in the latin community a colorism exist deeply. So when latin americans talk about latin unity, I scoff at that because I know fully well that in their homes, in their community that unity dissolves into a rulership by whites or light skins or alveno's or blancos over everybody else, negra, zambo, indios, et cetera. And it is the same in an India or in Egypt or other North African governments. The communities under said governments have rigid inequal racial categories that are accepted as part of their essential identity. Thus El Semary talks about national Identity even though most people in Egypt if they were in Mississippi in the 1960s would be called nigger on a daily basis. while most of the wealthy in Egypt if in the same Mississippi would be deemed the White elite. Which in Egypt is how the whites treat the blacks, as an elite.
The importance of media. Hawass is correct. Video media in modernity are the books of yore. The video is how many or most learn, rightly or wrongly. Sequentially, any historical lies in video will be treated as truth or history by many. The question is, it is dangerous. I argue it isn't. But I will explain why. Growing up as a kid my parents provided me with nonfiction or fiction by black people that allowed my perceptions of black people to exist without need of white people. I didn't need public school. I didn't need colleges or universities. I didn't need the television or some video media. Sadly , many people in modernity need an external because their parents are ignorant, they don't know. In the black community in the USA, many black people like to say that the black community doesn't know enough about itself, but the truth is, that is all communities in humanity. The reason why is simple, most communities in humanity are recovering from being completely dominated by another community in humanity and that recovery tends to be a crude or complicated thing. Rarely as smooth as in the fiction books, Sequentially, media serves a huge role, like the images on the early european christian church walls to the illiterate in europe. It doesn't convey the truth, but it conveys a message easier.
Preproduction in the arts, is an underrated thing. What I know on the outer rim boundaries of the entertainment industry in the usa is how often arts are produced absent a lot of quality preproduction. I am not suggesting a system exist to evade negative criticism. But, I wonder about Jada Pinkett's series. Why go from Nzinga to Cleopatra. In my mind, Jada Pinkett wanted to show being African is not equal to being african. While that is the truth I would had advised her to use another. I can see why Nefertiti was not used based on the phenotypical range. Nefertiti is black, looks black, regardless to people like Hawass saying otherwise. But, I think the one of the Kandake's, like Shanakdakhete or Amanirenas<one of my personal favorites>, or other queens of Nubia or Kush and its descendants to Sudan or Aksum, like Gudit<who I learned of doing research for this post>, and its descendants to modern ethiopia. Hawass is correct. Cleopatra is not black. But he is incorrect in one key way. The problem with Kemet and Egypt is that the Upper Nile, the south of the land because in the nilotic world the north is where the Nile flows from which is south if you base north on the pole nearest Europe which is what most in modern humanity do, has always been in a cohabitation with the peoples south of it, whether Nubia or Kush or Aksum. In the same token, the Lower Nile, which is the one that border the modern day mediterranean, has always been in connection to Hellens/the larger Europe or Asia. So, when Hawass talks about the non Blackness of Egypt I argue the Kandake's are to the upper nile what cleopatra is to the lower nile. Female rulers representing the external communities to either half of kemet. And that kind of interpretation is needed in preproduction. It doesn't mean it will happen. But in preproduction it is rarer than people think.
The power of negative media. The first season involved Nzinga of congo and the second involved Cleopatra. Now considering the slap from her husband to chris rock happened nearly a month after the first season with Nzinga started, it proves the power of negative media. The show from Jada Pinkett wasn't mentioned alongside the slap. The slap was mentioned as the central issue of Jada Pinkett, Will Smith, plus Chris Rock. Her series was barely mentioned if at all. The movie, Emancipation, starring Will SMith was prejudged through people's view to the actor, and Chris Rock's standup was expected and eventually did rotate around this issue, one negative moment dominated all three of their recent time.
I conclude with a simple point. All EL Semary wants is the show banned in egypt itself. Not an issue. And neither is the depiction of Cleopatra. I already spoke of Hamilton. None of the key points advertised in the media are important.
The location of Mohamed El Sayed El Semary
https://yellowpages.com.eg/en/profile/Mohamed-El-Sayed-El-Semary/315467
IN AMENDMENT
I finally found evidence to answer my question about gods of egypt in the post above, I didn't find a page and quit on it as I have other things to do but after @Troy asked the same question. I tried again, and read the following
https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl3847128833/weekend/
Mar 2-6 - $39,360 - 1 - $39,360 $39,360 1
Mar 9-13 - $14,958 -62% 1 - $14,958 $60,950 2
Mar 16-20 - $13,675 -8.6% 1 - $13,675 $77,216 3So, Gods of Egypt wasn't banned, wasn't called to be banned in Egypt. People saw it in egypt. So, this invalidates the desire of the few in Egypt to pan the cleopatra film by Jada Pinkett Smith. And what does it prove. It proves that, the issue here isn't that the Cleopatra film in question isn't phenotypically or other racially correct, it is that, it is produced by Jada Pinkett SMith, a Black woman of the USA in the NEtflix zone, which is going to be mostly seen online in streaming. This is the true issue. Black produced and mostly on streaming not in theaters. Hawass and EL Semary realize that most of the young in egypt, like most poor people in the usa , get film through streaming, not theaters, they are afraid of said Cleopatra's visions being displayed amongst the youth, which will get some youth to question the Europhilic-whitephilic aspects of egyptian culture that have been peddled or enforced by those in power in egypt.
REFERRING COMMENT
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forum post
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I want it known. It was a white connection, not a black one that placed this on my wall. Now I admit, I am up late doing some emanagement and so at this hour means my usual feed's soccer based content can be quiet. So a lesson for me on many levels. But, the best comment I read was from a guy who said, no one mentioned the rick james boots, which I think is funny. But, beyond that. I tried to find out if someone had talked to any of these whites who have done this. I saw a few white couples, or white males or females individually. But, if any of you know some media outlet that actually talked with one of these whites who did that, please share to me. Staging these events isn't new or odd but I will like to know.
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@Pioneer1 you got me, well , I will never forget james baldwin saying that because so few black people viewed heavily ever admit blacks don't like whites as a community with a nonviolent posture. In the UA non violence equals civilization, equals integration, equals acceptance, but James Baldwin used his personal connections to display the falsehood in that narrative. And I think many Black people in the USA are in denial about said truth. I will never forget a black man i used to see on a daily route who looked so miserable , clearly working a well paying job but clearly miserable. Being peacefully hateful isn't positive even if it is nonviolent. When you said : this is not elijah muhammed but an actor:) classic. Fair enough, the black community in NEw York State's goal <defined as what most black people are engaged in functionally>, since the USA was founded was peaceful integration side whites. And I argue the black community in new york state, led by new york city has reached closer to that. Every single organization in the government of NEw York has black people who have potent roles or positions. The financial sector of NY has black people in it throughout. The goal is near. At this point the question for the black community in New York State is not about integration but potency. The fact that in New York State the marijuana licenses are actually going out to some blacks who were incarcerated while white pharmaceutical firms brought lawsuit against the state of new york for that action shows you where the black community in new york state is in relations to new york state, notice I have not said the usa. Now New York has some unique characteristics. One more black people live in new york than any other state. two the internal multiraciality of the black community in new york state is higher than anywhere else which has brought challenges but also has some advantages when it comes to outreach and the identity of being black in new york is less specific. yes, white power is still the rule in new york state, but the black community in new york isn't trying to topple whites but integrate side whites. That is an important point. The goal isn't for the black community in New York to be dominant over all others. In comparison, the black community in louisiana can't have the same goal as the black community in new york. the white community in louisiana is more pure. Meaning the white community in new york state also is highly multiracial internally. As well as the latino or asian, so that explains why the racial walls are looser. So, I think in some states the black community does have a goal. But the black community in each place can't have the same goal. In some places, like south africa, integration isn't working and black people need more power. In other places, like a germany, black people need a minority goal, they are too small in quantity to go for integration. Each place has it's own answer. so functionally you want black people to return to the geographic distribution we had before jim crow in the usa? Internally many black people still don't like the southern/midwestern states. Do you live in the south or midwest? You know what they are doing, they are reaching their goals. And this goes back to my simple point. But I will use an example. When Obama was president he said he wasn't the president of black people and many have talked about that line but most have miscomprehended its true value. All those mayors or police commissioners you showed are no different than the black mayors or police commissioners in NYC or Newark in the north. Their goals are not to help the black community get stronger over all others, their goal is to prove blacks and whites can exist integrated in these systems whites started. And they are achieving that. The problem is in NY that is satisfactory as the goal of being an aracial people is in the potential future. but in louisiana that isn't the case. Blacks don't like whites and whites don't like blacks in majority, so while black or white people in Louisiana , like the former mayor of new orleans landrieu, may see themselves as serving all of louisiana that isn't a good goal for the situation. It is clear that Louisiana's populace on the ground is a different creature and that isn't a problem. The USA is a federation for a reason. The white slavers that started this government knew that no people under any government in human history are every truly one, always a minority or another exist and they need space to be. The problem is those people don't have a goal that involves the betterment of the black community. tHeir goal is already succeeded, they are black continuing the status quo of whites. That is how a person in one community shows they can lead many in another by not empowering their own:) And while that goal seems to be good enough for the black community in New York, I don't think it is good enough for the black community in louisiana?
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@Pioneer1 I know you know the history of the Black community in the english colonies or new france or the USA or the Louisiana Purchase. I know you know the majority of Black people in said places have never been in happy in those time periods I mentioned. Not all, but the overwhelming majority of Black people in the english colonies, new france, the usa or the louisiana purchase. And, you know most Black ancestors in the history of said places cursed white people every day of their lives without taking up arms. They lived hating whites. I quote james baldwin: his father hated whites. and I amend what baldwin didn't say, his father acted nonviolently his entire life. his father never made any violent moves towards whites while hating them every day. Pioneer you know everything I just said, you know. So, the following question is not insult but is mandatory. Can you name one reason for the Black community in Louisiana, not black people anywhere else in the USA, have for digging in? And, what is the goal for the Black community in Louisiana by digging in, cause I don't see a goal for them, not for black people across the usa or new york, just louisiana? Fair point. But you didn't say where. You would advise the black people in california to leave but you didn't say where ... where ? Are you suggesting the black people in california need to go to lousiiana? You are speaking about the black community in the USA as one. I live in New York city in New York state. New York city has black billionaires. No disrespect to Black people who live in NYC which includes myself, but our scenario has no value in my view for black people in louisiana. The law talk, non violence talk, justice talk, all that is cute in New York but Lousiana... I wish you could provide a reason that emphasizes black people in louisiana. I may be wrong but it seems your suggesting the black people in louisiana need to dig in for black people who live in other states. That is a great idea , but the black community in Louisiana doesn't have the means to make that happen. it is that simple. Whites have too much power and it is that simple. Power matters. It's beyond the law. Are black people the fiscal wealthiest in louisiana? no, so we don't have members in our community who can just pay elected officials to do what they want, which is how most laws are made in the usa historically. Are black people the overwhelming majority populace in louisiana ? no so block voting isn't enough. What your saying can work in south africa. No black people are not the fiscal richest but they have the numbers to dictate law with a movement. No state in the usa has a black populace that can win 80% of the elected positions in the state based on the black vote alone. No state in the usa fiscal wealthiest are black.
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Director and actor Robert Townsend shares his affinity for “Blaxploitation” films and how it was the first time he saw Black characters in films as superheroes. [VID: Interview with actor Robert Townsend. Transcript: For one, I hate the term black exploitation because that was the very first time I got to see black folks in lead roles kicking butt and being like all the other heroes that I had grew up on from Bogart to Cagney to John Wayne. You name it. So it was a period where Fred Williamson was my hero. Pam Greer was my hero. Rudy Ray Moore, it wasn't, I hate that they always say it was exploitation. No, Hollywood made a lot of money. Hollywood made a lot of money on those films and they supplied a need. If you've only seen people in that kind of "yes sir, boss," mode and all of a sudden you see 'em, "I'm the cool guy, I get the girl." I mean the only time the brothers would get the girls in the movies before was when they were dead. You know? "I'm gonna miss you." And she was shot. They never saved the day, they were always the best friend. And so here we had a period where you got Shaft, you got African Americans in lead roles and they fought the bad guys and they won. And I don't know why that was bad because as a kid growing up in Chicago, I'd go down to the McVickers and the Woods Theater downtown in Chicago and see three movies for $2. And you'd see a "Shaft," you'd see a "Super Fly," you'd see "The Mack." And all it was was great entertainment. But only this time, the leads were African Americans.] WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS? REFERENCE https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/archive/interview/robert-townsend/ Robert Townsend Found in: Sidney Poitier: One Bright Light Interview Date: 1998-10-14 Runtime: 0:33:35 Keywords: American Archive of Public Broadcasting GUID: cpb-aacip-504-4f1mg7g994, cpb-aacip-504-b853f4m850 MLA CITATIONS: "Robert Townsend , Sidney Poitier: One Bright Light" American Masters Digital Archive (WNET). October 14, 1998 , https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/archive/interview/robert-townsend/ APA CITATIONS: (1 , 1). Robert Townsend , Sidney Poitier: One Bright Light [Video]. American Masters Digital Archive (WNET). https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/archive/interview/robert-townsend/ CHICAGO CITATIONS: "Robert Townsend , Sidney Poitier: One Bright Light" American Masters Digital Archive (WNET). October 14, 1998 . Accessed April 11, 2023 https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/archive/interview/robert-townsend/ FULL TRANSCRIPT Speaker Sydney wrote in his book, Viewed from where I stood on the margins of the American social reality, the Hollywood of my youth was not a courageous place, nor was in a hospital, a place for one perceived as different as a trespasser prowling too close to some private domain. Sydney came to Hollywood in the 50s when you were born and you follow. Speaker 30 years later, did you find this a hospitable place when you arrived? Speaker Oh, you know, when I. Speaker You know, it’s funny because my earliest memories of Hollywood were before I even got here as a kid watching movies and being a big fan of Humphrey Bogart and just the images that I saw. But I knew something was wrong because I would watch and want to be Humphrey Bogart. And he was looking at you, sweetheart, all of that. And I noticed that the black people talk differently. Speaker They were you all meeting in the movie? Is there anything? Speaker And as a kid, I knew something was wrong, but I couldn’t. I was like going, well, I want to be Humphrey Bogart. And I couldn’t quite figure out why they were talking that way, because everybody else is talking English, you know, like regular, you know. Speaker And they were and, you know, I mean, you know. Speaker And so when I finally got into show business and I discovered that there were writers that would write certain things and there were directors that would direct you in a certain way to play these roles, then I discovered another side of Hollywood and I had that much more respect for Mr. Porter when I would look back at the films that he was a part of. It really made me realize there was something going on different. And so when I got here, I was kind of aware, but I didn’t quite know, you know, when I was a kid, my nickname was TV Guide because all I did was watch television and I could do impressions of everything. And I thought I was going to be Ronald Coleman when I got in fights with the queen of England. Speaker I shall do whatever, you know. I mean, that’s what I was thinking. Speaker And I found myself auditioning for a lot of slaves and pimps and junkies and illiterate basketball players. So those were the only roles. And so when I got to Hollywood, I discovered something different as well. Speaker What kind of difference do you think Sydney having first made for you? Speaker Oh, what I would say is that I can’t remember the first time I saw him on screen. I just remember that that was the very first time I saw someone that looked like me have dignity and stand up for themselves because I had seen all those other images of, you know, there a line in here and eyeballs really big. Speaker And there was this man who was articulate and strong. Speaker And, you know, right away I could understand. I saw something. I can understand the magic. And he had a charisma and he was I don’t know, it was like royalty. It’s like photographing royalty. And there it was. And I said, wow, that’s what it’s really about. You know, that’s who because I never watched television and movies with a prejudice. I but I just knew that something was lopsided. And then when I saw, you know, Mr 48 for the very first time, it really affected me on a deeper level. I just knew that that was the right. He was doing what I really wanted to do. And and back then, I didn’t know what his struggles were, you know. You know, it’s funny because I had I had lunch with him a long time ago and I you know you know me. Speaker I’m like a kid, you know, I’m like, well, how did you get to have dignity? Speaker Know, I mean, I’m an artist. I’m like, what? Anybody else didn’t get dignity. You got dignity. And he said, you know. Speaker You know, he’s so, you know, you know, articulate and, you know, eloquent in his words. And he said that would mean, Robert, that, you know, that understood that understood what was going on was wrong. And these men had a lot of courage. These directors, these writers that, you know, said, hey, here’s the defiant ones, a year, I guess, who’s coming to dinner. And they had vision and they, you know, took whatever heat they had to take, you know, in the heat of the night, you know. But he said he only did so many movies because of that, because he said no, because he didn’t want to do, you know, the stereotypical roles. And so I had to. And he just I you know, he says I haven’t done, you know, hundreds and hundreds of films. But the ones I did they did matter to me. Speaker And that always stayed with me because I to this day, I remember the comedy. How do you get to have dignity? Because you’re talking about the 50s. Speaker And when you look at if you said there was a scale of, you know, all the films that were coming out of Hollywood, for the most part, everyone followed the same pattern. And so there was this man that didn’t have to shuffle and do you know, can’t look at you. Speaker I can’t look at it. Speaker You know, he was you know, I will look at you and I. I can be a psychiatrist. I could be anything. And you go like, whoa, you know, it was unheard of to see that on screen. It was happening. And, you know, in segregation, you had black doctors, black psychiatrists and all of that, but you never saw them on screen. Speaker And so, you know, I mean, his impact was was was was deeper on a lot of levels because visually, you could see him as a doctor, you know, where that was such a powerful imagery for me as a kid, because I grew up on the west side of Chicago, rough neighborhood. All I saw was like hustlers and pimps and that kind of stuff. And started to see something like that on television was kind of, you know, really groundbreaking, you know, for me, because I know what’s wrong with this picture. But nothing was wrong with the picture. It was just that my eyes had never adjusted to understanding all the possibilities. Speaker So I just think because that kid thing stays with you your whole life in a funny way, that clean slate and it doesn’t have a political thing to do. Just as I see this and now I see this and. Speaker Oh, yeah, well, you know, it’s kind of like. Speaker It’s like some kids took in the images and made them say, I can’t do because of the color of my skin, I can’t play a king, I can’t play whatever character with with Mr. portrayed. There were no limits. And for some reason, I evolved into that, that there was something going on that made me stronger, you know what I mean? But I like I said, I was a kid. I was you know, I guess my nickname was TV Guide, but I would do impressions of everything I saw on television. But when he came on, there was something. Speaker And to this day, he still has it. Speaker And it still affects me the same way on. Speaker What was the first do you remember your first? What do you feel? Do you remember what it was? Speaker Oh, what comes to mind are two different films. Speaker One is The Defiant Ones, because that that imagery was so powerful, you don’t know what to think you can remember. Speaker Well, that made a difference. Well, you know what, I was so. Speaker There’s another. I think it’s up to you. I’m not sure. Speaker I saw a golden rule of. Rudy. Speaker For the very first time I saw Mr. Portrayed in the movie, a couple of movies come to mind on. The Defiant Ones with Tony Curtis, because I remember, you know, the chains and then being linked together, but then this friendship, this bond, you know, and and again, that. He was outspoken and he had something to say, so that’s one that comes to mind what the three come to mind as a kid. Then there was a movie with Richard Widmark and he was on. It was a long, long ships. I can’t think of the name of the movie now, but it’s I see him and he’s got like a he’s a swashbuckler kind of character and I don’t even know the film now. I’m just thinking as a kid, I remember that had an impact, you know, because the way, you know, the way he was dressed in the whole period. Speaker And but the other film that I would say no way out. Yeah. That one because of again. Speaker His manner, because it was like nothing I’d ever seen before, and it’s funny how imagery stays in your head even as a kid and I haven’t seen a lot of these films of late, but the imagery I’m going back to when I was a kid now, and I just remember going, wow, I don’t even know how to describe it. I it’s like I just remember seeing it on television and even though it was black and white and how powerful it was. And I mean, I haven’t seen it since then, but those were the earliest those were the earliest things I remember. Speaker It’s interesting on the way up. Speaker I’ll tell you that later. Speaker Had you ever seen or heard of Paul Robeson Academy or one? Speaker I just. No, no, I of you know, I mean, much later I had what? Because with with Paul Robeson, it was, you know, Old Man River, you know, and again, I couldn’t identify because there were a lot of those dialects that I so and not hated. But it was just like I had seen so much of that. So I couldn’t identify. And it wasn’t later on until later on that I understood, you know, in terms of who he really was. But, you know, again, it fell into that thing of understanding that certain performers had to do that, like watching Amos and Andy. Speaker And when you hear him talk, you know, and I just remember as a kid, you know, like caught up Dallas Sapphire, I know that you really did want to die. Speaker This president and I and I just remember that Dilek as a kid because I could do any voice. And then I was like, well, you know, but again. With with Paul Robeson, it wasn’t until later on that I that I saw tapes of his his his his speaking and what he was really about, but old Man River becomes the first imagery that comes to mind. Speaker Absolutely. Speaker What what role? Can somebody just just run, check it out like like to check it out, because it is the. Speaker Now we’re rolling. What role did you play in relation to the black community? Speaker Its aspirations, its frustrations. Speaker For me, I know. He represented hope, he represented hope, because if this one man could. Speaker Have dignity on that screen. Others can have dignity, and I think when I think about. You know, being a kid in the 60s, you know, and that’s when I started to really watch these movies, he was one of very few that had dignity. And so to me, it’s the power of example, you know, to say, hey, no one knew what his struggle was in Hollywood, but the work that was coming out was different than anything else. So that’s the impact that registers for me and people that I grew up with. We all said, hey, you know, if you’re going to be an actor, like my friends, when I left for Hollywood, if you’re going to be an actor, you know, go for that to Sidney Poitier, roll, you know, go for that kind of quality because it was like he said, he said he raised the bar very high. And it’s one thing to look and say, well, when I go to Hollywood, I want to be like Stepin Fetchit. I want to be like Mantan Moreland. Nothing’s wrong with them. But then it’s like, well, I don’t know if I want to do that, you know? And then there was Sidney Poitier and everybody says. And so I think he definitely had a huge impact on. Speaker But again, I didn’t know politically what what strings were being pulled at him. I just knew from my eyes it was hard enough to be a great actor and have dignity and have class in a place that was producing images that were totally, totally counter. Speaker Of. Speaker Well, I don’t think you would know this, it said that there was only one black star that. Speaker Why do you think it was made and what kind of pressure do you think was involved in being the one? Speaker I mean, if you want to put it like this on. Speaker You tell me one time. Speaker What did they call the light? What did they call the light? Oh, I can’t remember now. Speaker I can’t remember, but they one of the lights is is kind of a racist term, and he told me once, he said, you know, going into the studio, it would be him and only the shoeshine guy and how sometimes he encountered racism, but he knew he had to rise above it. Speaker It was like he was like the like Jackie Robinson was to baseball. Sidney was to acting. So you’re going to have a lot of people resenting you. I can imagine. And. I don’t know what it was like, but the only thing I can equate it to is the stories I’ve heard about, you know, Jackie Robinson, you know, and his own teammates didn’t want to play with him at times. And, you know, the things that people would heckle. And so, you know, here you have this leading man who happens to be black. And I’m sure that, you know, there were crew cars that probably, you know, didn’t want to deal with him or didn’t like him. I mean, so I know that. I mean, but he’s such a classy man that, you know, it’s like it just came with the territory. Speaker But I know that it’s I mean, you know, it it’s like racism exists now. And I can’t I can’t imagine what it was like in the 50s with all the segregation and everything, colored water fountains, you know, white water fountains. Speaker And then to be this actor that was doing work that wasn’t. In that box, so I don’t know, I mean, but I know it it had to be an incredible amount of pressure. I mean, he had to have the weight of the world on his shoulders because he anybody to talk to to say, hey, man, how’s it going at your studio? How are you dealing with it? You know, and then it’s like there wasn’t a body. Speaker So it’s not like you could call so-and-so over at someone so and say, how’s it for you? You know, I’m doing this part and I’ve got to play the psychiatrist. And everybody else is like, what are you complaining about? Because we wish we could. Speaker So he didn’t have anybody to to really call and compare notes because he was by himself. He was in a league by himself. So I don’t I don’t know how he made it through, I mean, in terms of family and friends. But to really know, you know, to make the decisions, to say no to a PA that back then if he was being paid two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, you know a lot. And to say, no, I can’t do that because I don’t feel comfortable. And so my girls. Who are you not you know that you know and you know and so his career, he only did the films that he really believed in, which is a luxury that a lot of people, you know, don’t have. And he didn’t have either. But he chose to he chose to take the high road instead of the low road and compromise. And he never compromise. And so all of his when you look at all of his films, they all have this incredible life energy. Speaker Do you see a very different person? Huh? Speaker No. OK. Speaker There came a point when Sydney was very strongly criticized. Speaker He and his rule were not seen as representing the realities of the black community. His elegance and the balance he created backfired. He was called a black actor for white audiences. The title of the piece was called Why Whites Love Sidney Poitier So Much. Speaker Why do you think that was? Why do you think that was? Speaker And what do you think about that now with some distance and perspective? Speaker Oh, you know, the sad thing about. Speaker The sad thing about African-American people sometimes is that they want their celebrities to be everything to everybody and no one is going to satisfy everybody. He’s one man and. Speaker Within his own way, he was creating a system, a revolution of sorts. Speaker Oh, sorry, is that no, that’s that’s fine. I was borderline, but yeah. Speaker No, you know, it’s a sad thing when you. Speaker I mean, when you say there was an article and people say, you know, black people say, hey, you know, you know, why do white people like him? And then when you say, well, what? When you really break it down? There are people that are going to be jealous. There are people that are going to be pulling him from nine million ways. And when it was all said and done, if there was one person that represented on a whole new image of African-Americans, it was simply, so how dare someone say, you know, I mean, why do they like him? I mean, this man brought such integrity and. Well, aside from the talent, he put a human face on on on on black people, he put a human face. We laugh, we cry, we get angry. Before that, it was just what we call the happy darky period where it’s like we just all happy, you know, we can’t we can’t do nothing. And here was this man. So I don’t understand when the critics came at him like that, but I think that people wanted maybe him to be more involved in, you know, I don’t know what causes, but I think his work said everything, you know. Speaker I mean, he was the only one. It wasn’t like I was like, this is why do white people like him? The roles he played were different roles. He wasn’t playing. You know, I’m Hollywoods boy, rub my head. He wasn’t playing that. He was like, you know, I’m powerful, I’m strong. And the directors that supported him and the writers that wrote the material wrote these powerful characters that weren’t stereotypes by any stretch of the imagination. Speaker So I really you know, it hurts me to even hear that because this man had a lot of dignity and he had a lot of class and he had a lot of he had a lot of character. And I think that, you know, it’s like there were those who didn’t like Jackie Robinson because they said, why does he have to be in in the big leagues? Why can’t he stay in the Negro Leagues? And maybe that was part of it. Why does Sidney need to be in this? Why isn’t he working in these in the separate cinema? You know, I mean, like Oscar Micheaux. Why doesn’t he I mean, it’s like anytime somebody rises to the top, there’s going to be those that want to yank you back down. It’s the crab crab in the barrel syndrome. And I think Sidney rose so high that there’s going to be people that says he could do. He could do. But, you know, again, the whole world is watching. And what was at the core to me was just this talented artist just wanted to do his work. But along the way, he raised the bar. And I just think that it’s not every day that people come along to raise the bar that make you proud to be who you are or make you, you know, raise your head a little bit higher to say I could do that. And I think that it’s unfair. But I think part of it is crabs in a barrel. I really do. Speaker Well, uh, next came the so-called black exploitation films produced by White Men specifically to attract black audiences and their dollars. Speaker Was this any more real? What was that stuff? Speaker You know what, I hate the term black exploitation, because that was a very first time I got to see, you know, black folks in lead roles kicking butt and being, you know, like all the other heroes that I grew up on from Bogarde to Cagney to John Wayne, you name it, you know. So it was a period where, you know, Fred Williamson was my hero. You know, Pam Grier was my hero. Rudy Ray Moore. It wasn’t. I hate that they always say it was exploitation. No, Hollywood made a lot of money. Speaker Hollywood made a lot of money on those films. And they supply the need. You know, we if you’ve seen it, we’ve only seen, you know, people in that that kind of. Yes. A boss mold. And all of a sudden you see them, you know, I’m the cool guy. I get the girl, you know. I mean, the only time the brothers would get the girls in the movies before was when they were dead. Speaker You know, she was shot. You know, they never save the day. They were always the best friend. Speaker And so here we had a period where you got you got Shaf. You got, you know, you know, African-Americans in lead roles and they fought the bad guys and they won. And I don’t know why that was bad, because as a kid growing up in Chicago, I’d go down to the McVicar and watch theater downtown in Chicago and see three movies for two dollars and you’d see a share. If you see a super fly, you see the mack. And all it was was great entertainment. But only this time the leads were African-Americans, you know what I mean? But I think that it was a good period. I hate the word exploitation because who was being exploited, you know? I mean, it was just that take away that period. The only person that was in a powerful position was Sidney Poitier. So other than that, there were no movies aside from Oscar Micheaux’s films, which were more in the the the 40s and the 30s, you know, I mean, that period. But other than that, there were no other. James Earl Jones is just coming along with the Great White Hope and and the films that he was doing. But that period was a really, I think, one of one of the best periods in African-American cinema, to tell you the truth. I mean, you had films ranging from Claudine to Cooley High to, you know, the legend of [Unrecognized] Charlie. I mean, they were all really well made movies. Speaker Let’s talk about the director, his three comedies with Bill Cosby in the 1970s. Right. So every night piece of the action. Let’s do it again. How did you react to these films? And what were they? Speaker Uptown Saturday night, let’s do it again, a piece of the action. Very funny films, piece of the action was really touching because it had some great performances by the kids. Sheryl Lee Ralph is in that film. And, you know, he and Bill Cosby created a comedy team on par with Martin and Lewis. Any of those? I mean, they had like it was great to see Mr. A Stretch. Speaker I mean, he’s just shown his range that he could you know, I mean, I remember that scene where it’s like he’s in a bar, Cosby. And then as I talk about his mom, talk about his mom a little Seymour, your mama. Speaker I know your mama. Speaker And then Harold Nicholas is playing Little Seymour. Speaker This is classic, you know, I mean, that whole thing. And he showed his rage. He showed that he could do comedy in a way that people always thought that, you know, he’s a serious, serious guy. So the thing that I think it was refreshing. You had a who’s who in the cast, Richard Pryor, playing a detective in one, James Earl Jones and just seeing all of them together was like because here were all these legendary stars and they were just having fun. And then they they showed me as a comedian that you could be really funny, still be classy. And it wasn’t cheap humor. It was just classic comedy and just some really funny I mean, like I said, that whole thing with, you know, because to hear Sidney do your mama jokes, this is funny. Speaker You know, just feel, you know, like your mama is. Speaker So I heard the other day, you know, he just got his rhythm. Speaker So very funny. Just very funny and. All my heroes on screen together, just jamming, you know, is like is like a great jazz session. Speaker All the players write and tune and so interesting for him to go in that direction after all the. Speaker Yeah, well, you know, it’s you know, it shows the mark of a true artist, you know? I mean, he’s a true, you know, and a fine, fine actor. I mean, he could go from, you know, something, you know, so serious, as you know, no way out to. Speaker Let’s do it again. You know, I mean, uptown Saturday night, you know. I mean. I mean. I mean. And then as a director, stir crazy. Speaker I mean, one of the funniest pitches. I mean, oh, man. You talk about pulling the magic out of Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor and Richard Pryor had never been better. And that whole you know, it’s classic now. I mean, you see it on sitcoms and other people. We’ve had we’ve had, you know, that whole thing, Richard. And I mean, you know, it just you know, it just shows just how I mean, that he understands, you know, it in front and behind the camera. Speaker You. Yeah, funny moment. Very funny movie criticism. Speaker It’s I mean I mean, George Sanford Brown. I mean, it was just really well done and and it just made you laugh. And I said he knew how to pull the magic out of Richard and Gene Wilder. And I mean, I think that really started their whole relationship that continued on and on. I mean, with silver, no silver streak as far as I believe. Speaker Yeah, but the magic was there, so I’m finished. Speaker Oh, you would like to say anything else? Speaker I’d like to say you have said it all. Speaker But if there’s no you know, I mean, I just love him. So I mean. I mean, I’m glad you guys are doing this. I mean. Speaker You know, I think. Speaker Hopefully, by taking people on a journey through, you know, Mr. Porter’s life, it’ll encourage and inspire a whole new generation, you know? Speaker And so, you know, I’m just glad to be I mean, like I said, he continues to be an inspiration for me, you know? I mean I mean, his work is he just keeps pushing it. And I don’t even know how old he is, but he just continues to push it. I mean, and he still has it. And so it’s inspiring for me. Speaker I mean, I’m I’m still a baby, so I’m having fun. Thank you. Thank you.
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Webinar with south side home movie project
7:30 pm eastern standard
forum post
https://aalbc.com/tc/topic/10199-a-webinar-with-the-south-side-home-movie-project/
status post
https://aalbc.com/tc/profile/6477-richardmurray/?status=2294&type=statusTIME INDEX THOUGHTS
sabrina craig
7:32
justin williamsfounded by jacqueline stewart in 2005
the people who are behind the organization
7:35
35 mm is theatrical super 8 or 8 mm is for home movies
7:37
home movies are documentaries of the black past, archivist thought to preserve them to7:39
very little record of south side chicago from black people
neither image was from a black migrant in the usa.
the photographer's context is absent the angle from black people how we saw ourselves
Justin williams will narrate some home movies
7:41Presents home movies, I will take stills from them.
womens's history moments
althea gibson
naacp
medgar evers wife
party from 1941
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/collections/nicholas-osborn-collection7:55
williams explains the process into digital
they do family watch parties/ oral histories/ participatory programs. all is archived and stored in double places.
During the pandemic they made streaming spinning home movies
to see spinning home movies
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/creative-reuse/spinning-home-movies8:04
the archivists interacting making this possible
community tagging, to describe what goes on in film, who is from chicago
8:11 jeanette foreman family collection
justin williams shares the movies and jeanette shares the stories
love the gold pants
the url
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/collections/jean-patton-collection
uncle ironing
jeanette younger
jeanette early 30s
kids playing - the complete film is a nice magic trick
8:24 adding tags to the videos
an example8:31
what jeanette says
lake meadows had the first high rise in the black community of chicago
imminent domain was used by the government, but overcrowding was rampant
they had kitchenette apartmentsI think this can be a place for memory dates, someone younger type in and someone older remember
modern nyc is revitalizing kitchenette apartments for the highest rent in NYCQuestions and answers
Did any home movies from pullman porters?
james e taylor, but it isn't fully digitizedwhat did she cook in the gold pants?
She made apple pie in the gold pants, any time apple pie or peach pie. the family canned the fruit all year.I wonder how many other black communities , that didn't have as many home movies, that have a lost existence?
any plan of extending beyond south side chicago, i comprehend the task isn't quick or the ability to find content easy
you can use this to connect stories to items
https://storycorps.org/participate/great-questions/their main website
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/
how it works
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/community-cataloging-guidehave you found home movies where no one was able to speak on them?
the oldest, no one knows who can speak on them
dr helen hash
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/collections/dr-helen-nash-collection
a pediatrician and practiced in st louis missouri
she was the first african american physician on staff at washington universityjeanette says, women in her memory didn't smoke in front of their father's or in public
but gold pants said, that is my kitchen and I will smoke in it.have you guys asked people from countries where the doctor traveled outside the usa to look at her movies to get an idea of where these places are?
thank you all, the legend Jeanette, Justin and Sabrina for making this happen, Jacqueline for starting this organization and all for making this fun
THE NEXT EVENT
https://sshmp.uchicago.edu/events/spinning-home-movies-live-special-guest-artist-tbd -
My Thoughts Before The Articles
The first article is correct but incorrect. Biden like his predecessor Obama is poor on policy making. this is a simple truth. but, Saudi arabia nor Iran love the usa. Both of these countries are well aware that the usa rather them both be satraps. To be blunt, OPEC led by saudi arabia was not something the usa wanted and fought hard against, and the usa is why the shah was murdered. The usa has more to do with the most important recent events in either of these countries lives , as a negative agent.
To the arab -israeli concept, again, it is a miscomprehension. The other people commonly called arab from morocco to Pakistan may be willing to turn their back on the palestinean effort, but they clearly comprehend with Da'ish, known in the anglophone as the islamic state, that the common people desire a unification last seen a the times of the caliphates. The caliphates didn't have an israel, the caliphates had a palestine.
The article author misses a simple point, Biden has a domestic voting base that is self righteous. A domestic voting base that believes all firms/individuals/groups have to act according to a nonviolent/nonsectarian/individualistic/anti-strong communal mantra. But most governments in humanity are sectarian/willing to use violence beyond a legal code/proudly racial/anti minority. Pakistan/India/Saudi Arabia each have abused minorities/each are culturally inflexible to immigrants/have governments led by particular groups. So, Biden wants to do two things at the same time. He wants to do business with these countries but he also wants to chagrin them. And that is dysfunctional.
At the end of the day, the USA has banned or blockaded or stymied most if not all the countries from saudi arabia to china in a major way. The USA sent troops to mexico and put a gun to the mexican presidents head to gain the north of mexico and make it the western states. Iran/Saudi Arabia/Pakistan/India/China are all rivals, who have blood between them, but nothing that extreme. I argue they finally see the USA as their collective true opposer.To the second article,
the problem is the difference between Western Europe plus the USA at the end of the second phase of the World War and the rest of humanity at the same point. It is as i say to Black people whose forebears were enslaved completely in the USA. From a white communal situation, USA history is: Native american/European colonies/USA<original/louisiana/war between states/world war/usa world order or norms>, but from a black communal situation, USA history is: Native American/Slavery complete/Slavery through jails/Civil rights act 1965/Early integration of the 1980s/Integration or the Obama Presidency and after>
When human beings talk about history, we tend to say, the victor's write the books. But your essay isn't the book. The history book is designed as a guide for general use. But your words are yours. When history books speak of the internet, you can expect a generalization, that will be favorable to the USA. But when I speak of the internet, I speak of mismanagement/misguidance at the beginning. Dysfunctional systems designed to emphasize media over purpose. In my opinion the internet needs to be chutted. Not because a system of communication between humans is bad. No, the structure of the internet is dysfunctional. Too much energy/time/resources are spent on repeated prose/advertising/dysfunctional websites. In parallel, the writer of the second article, speaks of the norms or world order, but that is from a western European standpoint. The problem is, when the NAzi party fell in germany, western europe, which includes the U.S.A.+ Japan set up this idea of humanity, where they lead and the rest of humanity follows. But, the rest of humanity outside western europe had a different view. Russia wanted to be the leader but overreached itself, miscalculating how impotent it will be in the rest of humanity outside eastern europe. Western europe had centuries of connections in africa/asia/latin america/caribbean that made the victory over russia simple to see. But, the rest of humanity , outside russia, was trying to figure out what they will be after generations, 20 year multiples, of white european rule. China was once cut up into parts by western europe. The article says wolf warrior, should china trust the countries who less than one hundred years ago had cut it up into fealties for their financial empowerment while telling chinese they can't walk in certain parts of the cities in china. Shouldn't china be offensive/militaristic. This is the problem with the former colonies of the western european powers, commonly called the developing countries. These countries historically went from European Imperialism to European satrap. These countries don't have a sense of self rule. The last time the lands that were once part of european empires straightly had self rule was before european impires took them over. In that environment do you expect people in those countries to cherish the rule of law or the rule of power. The USA whose military is throughout the entire humanity, talks of the rule of law, while its power influences beyond the law everyday. but then people in the usa want countries absent power but influence by power to cherish some legal code that serves them nothing but pain.
China realizes the former colonies of white european empires<white european empires includes the U.S.A.> in the caribbean/south america/africa/asia want to be wolf warriors too. They want want China alone as a former european imperial colony achieved. Self rule. And china achieved self rule through a combination of violence to its own as well to others/determination even when the self was harmed/a line of my way or the highway with no compromise or deals/enough population or natural resources to exist free from external manipulation <sorry haiti or cuba>. Eastern Europe or Australia want to join western europe < which includes the u.s.a. > that is fine. They are like the U.S.A. , not naturally western european but through the years have become connected to western europe deeply. But, the rest of humanity, which is a much larger population wants to be wolf warriors. Yeah, maybe kill some citizens to close to betrayal. Yeah, maybe hurt a minority group viciously. Yeah, maybe public while proud of negative actions for its betterment. But, that is the way. The goal is to be free, not liked. China isn't asking the rest of its peers to like it, to be it, they are asking them to be free to become what they want to be while giving china financial favor over the usa. The USA can't offer a better future than the chinese, cause the chinese are offering countries the chance to be what they want to be. The USA can only offer to be a cheap dysfunctional clone of western europe and as Tunisia proves, people in the former western european satraps are becoming more and more tired of that.IN AMENDMENT
China's problem is how to separate the immigrant groups in the usa from the countries they come from. The USA's great advantage in influence is the minority of people who live in the usa but influence affairs in their country of origin or descendency. People who haven't been in Jamaica for ten years influence jamaica more than people who never left jamaica. People who haven't been in the Phillipines for years influence the phillipines more than filipinos who never left the phillipines. The USA has agents, like the cuban community in the usa who have no positive connection to the country of their ancestry, like cuba, but work tirelessly against it while living in the usa. The issue isn't immigration but how immigrants influence or are used to influence the countries they came from.
If you come from Iran and you are living in NYC, why can't you shut up about Iran. You don't live in IRan, you don't act in the government in Iran. Why can't you just wish iran well and shut up and focus more on the usa, the place you actually live.
THE ARTICLES
A man in Tehran, Iran holds a local newspaper reporting on its front page the China-brokered deal between Iran and Saudi Arabia to restore ties on March, 11 2023.
ATTA KENARE / AFP / Getty ImagesSaudi-Iran Deal: China Fills a Middle East Vacuum Left by the Biden AdministrationMar 24, 2023 4 min read
James Phillips
Visiting Fellow, Allison Center for Foreign Policy StudiesJames Phillips is a Visiting Fellow for Middle Eastern affairs at The Heritage Foundation.
China scored an unexpected diplomatic coup with the March 10 announcement that it had brokered an agreement between archrivals Iran and Saudi Arabia to restore diplomatic relations, which had been ruptured for seven years.
How did it happen? Beijing exploited a vacuum of power created by multiple miscues by the Biden administration. Biden’s bumbling, disastrous 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan considerably lowered America’s stock in the region. The Administration made a bad situation worse by making vain efforts to appease Iran with another illusory nuclear agreement and a misguided push to castigate Saudi Arabia as a pariah, despite its importance as a longtime partner for the U.S. on regional security issues.
The Chinese-brokered agreement pushed Washington even further into the diplomatic sidelines of Middle East influence. It set back U.S. national interests by undermining American efforts to isolate Iran’s rogue regime, build an Arab-Israeli framework for containing Iranian threats, and expand the Abraham peace accords between Israel and Arab states by including Saudi Arabia.
Prior to the March 10 agreement, China had not played a significant role in Middle East diplomacy. At a time when the United States is perceived by many regional allies to be withdrawing from the Middle East, the accord confirmed China’s role as a new power player in the region and a rising global force.
Iran’s threats to Saudi Security
Iran and Saudi Arabia have endured a hostile relationship since the 1979 Iranian revolution, which added deep ideological tensions between Iran’s revolutionary regime and the Saudi kingdom to pre-existing tensions over nationalist and sectarian religious disputes. Iran’s Shia revolutionaries have sought to displace the Sunni fundamentalist Saudis as the most influential leaders of the Muslim world.
Diplomatic ties between the two Islamic powers were broken in 2016, after Iranians attacked and ransacked the Saudi embassy in Tehran following Saudi Arabia’s execution of a Saudi Shia cleric perceived to be pro-Iranian. In addition to the fierce sectarian rivalry, the two countries have fought bloody proxy battles, supporting clashing militias and terrorist groups in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen.
Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Yemen have attacked Saudi oil facilities and civilian infrastructure with Iranian-made drones and ballistic missiles. Iran also launched a drone and cruise missile attack on Saudi oil facilities in 2019 that temporarily shut down roughly 5 percent of global oil production.
Saudi Arabia’s tentative détente with Iran, brokered by China, exposes a dangerous shift in perceptions about the Middle East balance of power. It is not surprising that Iran would look to China for diplomatic mediation, given their increasingly close alignment following their 2021 Comprehensive Strategic Partnership agreement. But it is disturbing that Saudi Arabia, with its long-term ties to the U.S., sought Chinese diplomatic backing.
Saudi-American tensions
A critical factor in the deterioration of Saudi-American relations has been the ham-handed policies of the Biden administration, which has neglected important security issues and focused on virtue signaling about Saudi human rights abuses.
President Biden came into office pledging to turn Saudi Arabia into a “pariah” for the 2018 assassination of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident journalist. The Biden administration went out of its way to publicly chastise Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto leader of the kingdom, for that killing, while turning a blind eye to Iran’s far worse human rights record.
The Saudis chafed at the criticism. Moreover, they were alarmed that the Administration failed to adequately respond to mounting threats to their security posed by Iran and its proxies. The Biden administration froze arms sales to Saudi Arabia, cut off support for the Saudi-backed war against the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen, withdrew some of the U.S. missile defense systems deployed to Saudi Arabia, and prioritized the revival of the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal, which the Trump administration withdrew from in 2018.
The Saudis regarded Biden’s drive to resurrect the flawed Iran nuclear deal as a major threat to their own security, fearing that another weak nuclear deal would allow Tehran to pocket billions of dollars of sanctions relief that would be used to finance Iran’s escalating military and terrorist threats against its neighbors.
The Saudi government values many aspects of its ties to the United States, particularly in the economic and technological spheres, as demonstrated by its purchase earlier this month of 78 Boeing 787 Dreamliner commercial aircraft, in a deal worth almost $37 billion.
But the Biden administration’s cold shoulder and its complacent down-sizing of the U.S. military presence in the region prompted the Saudis to seek additional security insurance against aggression by Iran, which enjoyed steady support from China and Russia. Saudi Arabia has now hedged its security bets by bolstering relations with Russia, China, and even Iran.
The Bottom Line
The Biden administration, which claims to be “pivoting” to the Indo-Pacific, left a diplomatic and security vacuum in the Middle East. China is now working to fill that void, pivoting to the Middle East at America’s expense.
President Biden’s threat to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” not only pushed Riyadh into China’s arms, but weakened regional efforts to contain Iran, and set back hopes of expanding the Abraham peace accords between Israel and Arab states to include Saudi Arabia.
The Administration’s misguided aggravation of Saudi-American tensions created an opportunity that Beijing was happy to exploit. It now enjoys better relations with Riyadh than Washington does.
In addition to China, Iran is a major beneficiary of the agreement, which helps it escape diplomatic isolation and buy more time for advancing its nuclear program. Moreover, Saudi Arabia is now less likely to join Arab-Israeli efforts to contain Iran.
The Biden administration needs to recalibrate its Middle East policy to give a higher priority to security issues and the need to deter and defend against multiple Iranian threats to regional security.
Perhaps then long-term partners in the Middle East, who now harbor increasing doubts about U.S. security guarantees, would stop looking to China to augment their security.
President Xi Jinping of China enters the APEC Economic Leaders Sustainable Trade and Investment meeting on November 19, 2022 in Bangkok, Thailand.
Lauren DeCicca / Getty ImagesThe U.S. Is Losing the Developing World to ChinaDec 8, 2022 3 min read
COMMENTARY BY
Michael Cunningham
Research Fellow, China, Asian Studies CenterMichael is a Research Fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Asian Studies Center.
China has an image problem, and Xi Jinping’s "wolf warrior" diplomacy is largely to blame. At least that’s how most in the United States and Europe see it. But this narrative fails to recognize the headway Beijing is making in other parts of the world. What many fail to realize is that Beijing is conducting an effective diplomatic offensive in the developing world, and it poses a real challenge to U.S. global leadership.
To be sure, the abrasive tone China has presented to the international community has caused serious problems in Beijing’s relations with much of the developed world. Even many of China’s most important trading partners are increasingly aligning with the U.S., undoing decades of painstaking efforts by a smoother generation of diplomats. This is a weakness in Xi’s diplomacy, and Washington should capitalize on it.
But on a global scale, Xi’s diplomatic style isn’t failing so much as it’s playing a different game with rules unfamiliar to many Western powers. So-called wolf warrior diplomacy isn’t a flaw of Xi’s "New Era" program—it’s a feature of it. Since Xi came to power, China has recalibrated its diplomatic strategy to focus on the developing world, which it hopes to use to change the world order gradually.
This was a radical shift. Since the 1980s, the primary aim of Chinese diplomats was to placate the U.S. and its allies, easing their concerns about the Chinese Communist Party’s global intentions and convincing them that China’s rise actually benefits the existing international system. This policy was successful—the U.S. not only didn’t oppose China’s rise, but it actively enabled it, truly believing the disinformation narrative that engagement would result in democratic and free market reforms.
But the effectiveness of this U.S.-centric approach to diplomacy started to wane during the Trump administration. By 2017, Xi already pivoted from Deng Xiaoping’s injunction to "hide your strength and bide your time" in favor of assuming China’s place as a major world power in its own right. "Xi Jinping Thought on Diplomacy" aims to "reform" the international system and create a China-led world order, which is ominously referred to in Chinese as a "community of common destiny for mankind."
This is where the developing world comes in. Beijing knows it cannot currently challenge U.S. hegemony through military means. Rather, in a strategy likely informed in part by the CCP's own experience using workers and peasants to overthrow Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government in China, Beijing hopes to entice as many members of the international community as possible to back its rise as a global leader. In a United Nations system characterized by "one country, one vote," the country with the most supporters often wins, and there are considerably more developing and nondemocratic countries than there are developed Western democracies.
China has worked to entice countries that are less invested in the U.S.-led international order to take its side and help fight its battles in the international community. This includes nations that openly resent the U.S. and oppose its leadership, such as Iran and Russia. China’s harsh anti-American rhetoric and aggressive treatment of Western countries appeal to these countries, giving Beijing credibility in their eyes.
It also includes underdeveloped countries in Africa, Latin America, and the South Pacific, which are not necessarily opposed to U.S. leadership but whose favor Beijing can buy through economic statecraft. China’s tone in dealing with these countries differs vastly from the harshness with which it approaches the West. In the case of many of these countries, state-owned Chinese firms are among the only developers willing to invest in much-needed infrastructure projects. While many developing countries don’t fully trust China and worry about becoming overly reliant on Beijing, cooperation is usually the least expensive and often the only way for political leaders in these countries to fill urgent needs for their struggling populations.
The U.S. can’t expect to win over rogue states intent on its decline, but it can and must compete with Beijing in the developing world. Already, China is having considerable success securing the votes it needs to block U.N. actions inconsistent with its interests. The greatest casualty has arguably been global human rights norms. China punches well above its weight in the U.N. Human Rights Council despite not even ranking among the top funders of that body. The fact that the world’s preeminent human rights authority is unable to pass a resolution to even discuss the genocide in China’s Xinjiang region shows how effective Beijing’s assault on democratic norms has become.
This is just one of many examples of how Beijing is using its influence over developing countries to overturn global norms and promote its interests in opposition to the U.S.-led global order. It is past time for the U.S. policy community to take China’s influence in the developing world seriously. Many developing countries desire alternatives to Beijing’s enticements, and the U.S. and its allies should develop strategies to compete with China for their loyalty.
U.R.L.
https://www.heritage.org/asia/commentary/the-us-losing-the-developing-world-china
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https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/age-of-easy-money/ TRANSCRIPT MALE NEWSREADER: Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell speaking at an annual economic summit in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. MALE VOICE: Yep, we’re on with him. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Powell and his colleagues at the Fed are under pressure to curb inflation. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Powell could take a harder line, or he could simply play his cards close to the vest. MALE VOICE: Here we go. He’s on the move. MALE NEWSREADER: It’s going to be a tough crowd at Jackson Hole because of the fact that he made a call simply last year that didn’t age well. Now— CHRISTOPHER LEONARD, Author, The Lords of Easy Money: Every year the Federal Reserve holds an economic symposium at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, in August. It's sort of like the Oscars of the Fed world. And media comes from all around the world and the Fed chairman gives a keynote speech that gets all the attention. MALE NEWSREADER: All eyes on Jackson Hole this morning. MALE NEWSREADER: He’s giving a speech as central banker to the world. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN, Chief economic advisor, Allianz: So Jackson Hole plays a very important role in the central bank community, because you're basically bringing the central bankers of the world and economists to a place to discuss critical issues. So people looked to Jackson Hole to see, is there a reset in monetary policy? FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: The economy has slowed. We’re likely in recession and perhaps going deeper into it. Are they going to keep taking us down this road? Are they going to keep slamming the brakes on rates? Raising 75 basis points until we've got job cuts across the corporate sector? RAGHURAM RAJAN, Fmr. head, Indian Central Bank: Central bankers were saviors post-global financial crisis. This time it was different. The mood was more "for the first time, we're failing." FEMALE REPORTER: Is Powell ready to risk recession? This is the question. MALE SPEAKER: Chair Powell, the floor is yours. Please come to the podium. NOURIEL ROUBINI, Economist: Jackson Hole in 2022 was quite important. JEROME POWELL: Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone. NOURIEL ROUBINI: The market were feeling in the summer that maybe the Fed would have a pivot, would stop raising rates and maybe start cutting them. MALE INVESTMENT ADVISER: The market started talking about a Fed pivot. FEMALE REPORTER: —market, so maybe they’ll just ease up a bit. MALE INVESTMENT STRATEGIST: The market is, I think, anticipating that they’re going to blink. JEROME POWELL: Reducing inflation is likely to require a sustained period of below-trend growth. NOURIEL ROUBINI: And what Powell told them in Jackson Hole, he said, "Listen, inflation is still way too high, it's not peaking, it's not going to fall fast enough. And if you guys think that we're going to stop raising rates, or even cutting them, you are a bit delusional." JEROME POWELL: The U.S. economy is clearly slowing from the historically high growth rates of 2021. NEEL KASHKARI, Pres. & CEO, Fed. Reserve Bank of Minneapolis: I think the chair’s objective at Jackson Hole was to deliver a very concise message that, "We know what our job is: Our job is to get inflation back down to 2%, and we're going to do what we need to do to get it back down to 2%." JEROME POWELL: While higher interest rates, slower growth and softer labor market conditions will bring down inflation, they will also bring some pain to households and businesses. These are the unfortunate costs of reducing inflation. But a failure to restore price stability would mean far greater pain. NEEL KASHKARI: His remarks were remarkably brief for a Jackson Hole speech, and that was by design to deliver a very direct message. And I think his message was very effective. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Pain. LARRY SUMMERS: Pain. MALE NEWSREADER: Pain. MALE NEWSREADER: Some big— MALE NEWSREADER: —pain ahead. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Pain for American families. SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN, (D) MA: What he calls “some pain” means putting people out of work. DION RABOUIN, The Wall Street Journal: Jay Powell is not messing around. And that is when the markets reacts and says, “Oh, my God. Things are going to change.” JEROME POWELL: Restoring price stability will likely require maintaining a restrictive policy stance for some time. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: If the Fed puts us into a higher interest rate world, it will change everything. The financial system globally has been built around extremely low, ultralow interest rates for 10 years. All of these of things that got built up over the last decade are going to have to be dismantled or changed. JEROME POWELL: We will keep at it until we're confident the job is done. Thank you. NOURIEL ROUBINI: We lived in a bubble, in a dream, and this dream in a bubble is bursting. FEMALE NEWSREADER: —as rising interest rates in the U.S. and many other countries are intensifying fears of a recession. JAMES JACOBY: Ever since that Fed meeting at Jackson Hole, we’ve been getting mixed signals about the economy. Is it bound for recession, or is it in a booming recovery? MALE NEWSREADER: An economy with such a strong labor market is not in a recession. JAMES JACOBY: At the center of the debate are the actions of the Federal Reserve, which seems to have our economic fate in its hands. MALE NEWSREADER: The Fed is trying to stop inflation. But is the medicine worse than the disease? JAMES JACOBY: Lately, it’s been raising interest rates at the fastest pace in decades, trying to tamp down on inflation. But for most of the past decade, the Fed was keeping interest rates incredibly low, trying to stimulate the economy, creating what has been called an age of easy money. MALE NEWSREADER: Tonight, the economic alarms are blaring. JAMES JACOBY: For the past two years, I’ve been investigating the Fed and the far-reaching consequences of its easy money policies. THOMAS HOENIG, Pres., Fed. Reserve Bank of Kansas City, 1991-2011: I'm game if you are. JAMES JACOBY: I’m definitely game. I’ve been speaking to current and former Fed officials. Is that really the first time you’re in a suit since COVID? RICHARD W. FISHER, Pres., Fed. Reserve Bank of Dallas, 2005-15: From the waist down. SHEILA BAIR, Chair, FDIC, 2006-11: Can I take my mask off? JAMES JACOBY: Titans of finance. You were thinking what? JIM CHANOS, Founder, Kynikos Associates: I was thinking this is the craziest market I've seen in 40 years. JAMES JACOBY: Those who follow the decision making— CHARLES DUHIGG, The New York Times: None of us think about this because it’s boring, but it’s everything. It touches everything. JAMES JACOBY: —and those who have been hit the hardest by it. FEMALE SPEAKER: It’s like choosing between your rent and your food. JOHN ADEL, Client, Money Management Intl.: They do not understand what everybody's going through. CHAPTER ONE An Emergency Measure JAMES JACOBY: The Fed's easy money experiment traces back to pivotal decisions made over a decade ago in 2008— FEMALE REPORTER: Right now, breaking news here: Stocks all around the world are tanking because— JAMES JACOBY: —when investors, speculators and Wall Street bankers nearly brought down the global economy. MALE FLOOR TRADER: Right? Get on the train, otherwise it's going to leave the station without you. FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: —with Wall Street shaken to its very foundation today. PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: We are in the midst of a serious financial crisis, and the federal government is responding with decisive action. FEMALE REPORTER: The Bush administration— JAMES JACOBY: The president and Congress spent hundreds of billions of dollars to restart the economy, but at the center of the rescue effort was the Federal Reserve. Richard Fisher was the head of the Fed’s bank in Dallas at the time. RICHARD W. FISHER, Pres., Fed. Reserve Bank of Dallas, 2005-15: What the Federal Reserve does is provide the blood supply for the body of our capitalist economy. And what happened in 2008 is all the veins and the capillaries and the arteries collapsed. So every financial function had failed. It had collapsed, and we had to restore them. MALE NEWSREADER: We’re at the precipice of the apocalypse. MALE NEWSREADER: We’re on the edge of the abyss. SEN. BARACK OBAMA, (D) IL: We are in the most serious financial crisis in generations. MALE NEWSREADER: There was nothing but panic yesterday. There's been panic all week. MALE NEWSREADER: The bottom to America’s financial woes appear nowhere in sight. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The banks are still not lending to one another, and as long as that’s not happening, the system remains stuck and imperiled. JAMES JACOBY: In normal times the Fed’s job is to promote employment and keep inflation in check, primarily by raising and lowering short-term interest rates, making borrowing cheaper or more expensive. But amid the crisis, Fed officials decided to do something they hadn’t done in half a century: They began dropping rates, eventually to almost zero. FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Those massive rate cuts have not been stimulating the economy, so it's the other things— JAMES JACOBY: With Americans still suffering and the banking system on the verge of collapse, Fed officials there at the time told me they felt compelled to go even further. RICHARD W. FISHER: And then the question was, "What else can we do?" And the committee came up with the idea of quantitative easing. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Quantitative easing. What in the world is it that? FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Quantitative easing. That’s just a Greek term to a lot of people. FEMALE NEWSREADER: A lot of people want to know what they’re going to say about what we call quantitative easing. JAMES JACOBY: Quantitative easing, or QE, was championed by Ben Bernanke, then the Fed chairman. BEN BERNANKE: The Federal Reserve is committed to using all available tools to stimulate economic activity and to improve financial market functioning. JAMES JACOBY: QE was an experimental way for the Fed to inject money into the financial system and lower long-term interest rates. RICHARD W. FISHER: It's almost like alchemy. You can create money out of thin air if you're at the central bank. So creating more money puts more money in the banking system, put more money out there for the economy to take it and put it to work and to grow and to restore itself. BEN BERNANKE: The Federal Reserve has been putting the pedal to the metal. So we're doing everything we can to support the economy, and we hope that that's going to get us going next year sometime. JAMES JACOBY: Their hope was that the new money would help shore up the failing banks and get them lending again. It would become the heart of their easy money policies. THOMAS HOENIG: It was an emergency measure. I mean, the economy was imploding. No one would lend to anyone. There was no ability to borrow. The economy was going to be a stop dead. JAMES JACOBY: Thomas Hoenig was the president of the Kansas City Fed and initially supported the quantitative easing plan. THOMAS HOENIG: These are trying times, and as you just heard, there is much to be done as we try and work through this financial crisis. When you have a crisis, that's when you want your central bank to be willing to put cash in, and so to avoid a major depression, where everything just stops, you provide the cash. So I agreed with, yes, we need to provide this money on the expectation that once we got through the crisis, we would go back to a more normal policy. ANDREW HUSZAR, Fed. Reserve Bank of NY, 2001-11: Again, you can tell me if I’m giving too long answers or what have you. JAMES JACOBY: The task of managing most of the program went to Andrew Huszar, a former Fed official who was then working on Wall Street. ANDREW HUSZAR: I realized very quickly what I was being asked. I was being asked if I would manage the largest financial markets intervention by a government in world history. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed began creating hundreds of billions of dollars to buy things like mortgage-backed securities and government bonds from banks and financial institutions. ANDREW HUSZAR: This was a $5 trillion market. This was the largest private bond market in the world, and the Fed had never once before bought a mortgage bond in its history. And basically in the fall of 2008, it announced that it would buy basically 25% of the entire market within 15 months. JAMES JACOBY: And that was your job to do that purchasing? ANDREW HUSZAR: That was my job, to think about how to get the program done. SARAH BLOOM RASKIN, Fed. Reserve Board of Governors, 2010-14: Many of these tools had not been tried before. They were definitely like "break the glass" kind of tools. Like, what are we going to do in order to restart the economy here? JAMES JACOBY: Sarah Bloom Raskin joined the board of governors while QE was already underway. SARAH BLOOM RASKIN: As QE began, it showed great promise. We started to see that people's sense of economic well-being was ticking up somewhat. People were finding jobs. People were finding homes. The foreclosure rate had slowed. So there was a sense that something was working. Now how it was working was a different question altogether. MALE NYSE FLOOR TRADER: Things are not as bad. We’re getting better. And things will get better. There’s no question about it. SARAH BLOOM RASKIN: So view it as an experimental drug that actually is doing some good things, but nobody quite knows how or why at the moment. JAMES JACOBY: The financial sector had begun to stabilize, but there were early signs that not everything would go according to plan. MALE NEWSREADER: The banking industry fat cats still aren't lending money. MALE NEWSREADER: Well, the big banks aren’t lending. JAMES JACOBY: Despite the money the Fed was pouring into the banks, they still weren’t back to lending. MALE SPEAKER: The government's not doing anything to help small business, and the banks are sitting on their butts and they’re still not lending money. JAMES JACOBY: Instead, they were taking a lot of the money and investing it themselves. MALE ECONOMIST: The banking sector is broken. It is not lending to small business. Somebody’s got to get the money there. The government is the actor in this case. JAMES JACOBY: You were injecting money into the banks, more than a trillion dollars worth at that point, and what were the banks doing with that money? ANDREW HUSZAR: The Fed's idea was the banks would be taking that money and lending it, effectively, at lower interest rates. What the banks were doing instead was that they were just investing in the same bonds that the Fed was buying. They were taking that money and they were turning around and buying the same mortgage-backed securities and other bonds. Why? Because the Fed had made very clear that its goal was to drive up the price of financial assets. And so Wall Street turned around and thought, "Why would I go through the effort of making a mortgage when I can just press a button and buy millions, if not billions, dollars of bonds and ride that trade, as the price of those assets are very consciously being inflated by the Fed?" JAMES JACOBY: Huszar grew increasingly disappointed by the program and would eventually leave in 2011. ANDREW HUSZAR: I hadn't seen the benefits accrue to the average American, and I wasn't seeing larger structural reform in favor of the average American. I began to question whether it was my role any more to be at the Fed. JAMES JACOBY: Were you seeing that the banks were gaming the Fed? That they were in some ways taking advantage of this program that was intended to help the real economy? ANDREW HUSZAR: I think you could say they were gaming the Fed, or I think you could just say that they have a different mind, and they're not part of the Fed, and they have their own interests. You know, it's sort of like the Aesop's fable of the scorpion and the frog. On some level, it's in their nature to do what's in their nature, and their nature is to make the most money possible in the quickest way possible. And just because the Fed wanted to do something, and wanted to help the average American, it doesn't necessarily mean that Wall Street has the same interests. CHAPTER TWO Volatility and Anger PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Twenty billion dollars worth of bonuses. It is shameful. MALE NEWSREADER: Are these executives greedy or stupid? Personally, I am stumped for an alternative word. BARACK OBAMA: There will be time for them to make profits, and there will be time for them to get bonuses. Now is not that time. MALE VOICE: It’s socialism for the rich. JAMES JACOBY: By the end of 2009 the banks were back to making money, and paying themselves record bonuses, while the real economy lagged. MALE ECONOMIST: Washington loaned them money at cut rates, so our thanks is they’re going to stuff it in their pockets even as many Americans are suffering from unemployment and reduced wages. MALE VOICE: People absolutely ought to be outraged. I mean, these guys just don’t get it. JAMES JACOBY: The inflation rate was well below the Fed’s target of 2%, signaling weak demand. Unemployment had shot up, and foreclosures were continuing across the country. MALE PROTESTER: Banks got bailed out, we got sold out! SARAH BLOOM RASKIN: People had lost homes. Household net worth had plummeted. It really wasn't an inclusive recovery. It was a recovery that benefited only portions of the economy. FEMALE PROTESTER: I’m here to support all of the people who want their taxpayer dollars back, me included. SARAH BLOOM RASKIN: There was a sense that the banking sector, the financial sector benefited primarily, and not so much everybody else. And that had a political taste to it which became the basis, I think, for a lot of anger, and really set the stage for the next chapter in our country's political history. MALE PROTESTER: We have you surrounded. Come out with the Constitution intact, you usurpers! FEMALE REPORTER: Demonstrators opposed to what they call out-of-control government spending begin a series of rallies this afternoon. JAMES JACOBY: That resentment helped give rise to the Tea Party— PROTESTERS [singing]: We ain’t going away! JAMES JACOBY: —fueled by the belief that government spending and bailouts had been out of control and ordinary people weren’t seeing any benefits. MALE PROTESTER: Hedge fund bankers, Bear Stearns—they didn’t build this country. Workers like us did. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: The only political constant in 2010 was volatility and anger. FEMALE PROTESTER: Hell no, we won’t go! FEMALE PROTESTER: Nobama, Nobama! CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: And there was a real loss of faith in the political and economic system. And that manifests as the Tea Party. SARAH PALIN: Tea Party Americans, you’re winning! You’re winning! JAMES JACOBY: They were especially outraged by the $800 billion stimulus package that President Obama and Congress had passed in 2009 to get the economy going again. PROTESTERS [chanting]: Can you hear us now? Can you hear us now? CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: The entire principle of the Tea Party, the entire platform was to stop Washington, D.C., from intervening. MALE PROTESTER: This is just the beginning. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: It was an agenda of "no." SEN. RAND PAUL, (R) KY: We’ve come to take our government back. JAMES JACOBY: As Republicans swept the 2010 midterm elections, aided by the Tea Party’s growing influence— SEN. RON JOHNSON, (R) WI: We need to restore fiscal sanity to this nation. JAMES JACOBY: —the prospects for Congress and the White House working together to pass another stimulus bill were growing dim. REP. CHIP CRAVAACK, (R) MN: Let this serve as a warning to Congress: We don’t work for you, you work for us. JAMES JACOBY: Into the political vacuum stepped the Federal Reserve. Was it palpable that the Fed was sort of the only game in town here? RICHARD W. FISHER: Yes. The fact was we were carrying the load all by ourselves. CHAPTER THREE Unintended Consequences FEMALE NEWSREADER: Resurgent Republicans racked up huge gains Tuesday. MALE REPORTER: A devastating night for the Democrats that fundamentally changes American politics. BARACK OBAMA: People are frustrated, they're deeply frustrated, with the pace of our economic recovery. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed wasted no time. The day after the midterm elections, they took a dramatic step: another round of QE, not just to stabilize the economy, but to boost it. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: What happened on Nov. 3, 2010, represents a step change in the Fed’s role in our economy, when the Fed changes from a central bank that manages the currency to the primary engine of economic growth in America. Whatever your philosophy is—small government, limited government, big government that hires people to go out and build roads to stimulate growth—whatever it is, it's supposed to be our democratic institutions that do that, not the central bank. JAMES JACOBY: You're basically saying that because our democratic institutions are so paralyzed and there's so much political dysfunction, that we as a society, we as a country have become overly reliant on the Fed to run things? CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: Totally. Economic affairs. I think one of the most important things to think about is that our democratic institutions in America are becoming less and less capable and less and less effective. I think that point is almost undeniable. So what we're doing in this country is we're relying on our nondemocratic institutions to take up the burden, like the central bank in economic affairs. Which leads you to the surreal place where we are today, where this committee of 12 people is making these decisions that could very well plunge our economy into a deep, deep, deep recession and cause financial crisis. JAMES JACOBY: In the early days of the easy money experiment, Fed Chair Bernanke promoted his plan saying it would create a wealth effect—that boosting the stock market would make people feel wealthier and start spending again. MALE REPORTER: There’s no doubt that there is quite a bit of opposition. JAMES JACOBY: But he was met with some skepticism and concern that the decision risked causing runaway inflation. He went on television to push back on the critics. BEN BERNANKE: What they're doing is they’re looking at some of the risks and uncertainties associated with doing this policy action. What I think they’re not doing is looking at the risk of not acting. FEMALE NEWSREADER: QE2 has become a punching bag for everyone from top-tier economists to Sarah Palin. JAMES JACOBY: Inside the Fed itself, Thomas Hoenig was sounding alarms about the long-term consequences. FEMALE REPORTER: You are the one member of the Fed that has been critical of 0% interest rates. Why? JAMES JACOBY: Over the course of 2010 he argued against Bernanke’s plan at every meeting and cast the lone dissenting vote eight times in a row. THOMAS HOENIG: It was difficult, but this was fundamental. And so I really did think that it was a wrong policy, and I didn't want to be associated with it, so I voted no. JAMES JACOBY: Did you think it was a radical policy? THOMAS HOENIG: I most certainly did think it was a radical policy, and I think most people did. It was meant to be radical. And so my concern was we had come through a crisis and we provided the liquidity necessary to come through it and we were on the other side of that crisis. The economy was recovering. And yet we were engaging in a deliberate effort to have easy money. JAMES JACOBY: What were you most concerned about, if easy money continued? THOMAS HOENIG: I thought that it was unnecessary to do. I thought it brought new dangers. When you keep interest rates at zero and keep pumping money into the economy, you favor the debtor and you penalize the saver. You are saving for nothing. I mean, you get nothing for that. And if you are a borrower, well, life is good. You borrow for nearly nothing. And so you actually encourage speculation. You encourage additional risk-taking. In fact, that's one of the reasons they did quantitative easing, was to encourage greater risk-taking. CHAPTER FOUR Dangerously Addicted FEMALE NEWSREADER: The stock market rally on Wall Street today pushes the Dow to its highest level in nearly nine months— MALE NEWSREADER: That figure includes activity fueled by recent government stimulus programs. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed’s quantitative easing set off what would become the longest bull run in the stock market’s history. MALE NEWSREADER: Investors took the good news and, well, they basically ran with it. JAMES JACOBY: By design, QE effectively lowered long-term interest rates, making safer investments like bonds less attractive and riskier investments like stocks more attractive. RANA FOROOHAR, Associate editor, Financial Times: The Fed goes out and buys certain kinds of assets, and it kind of puts a floor under the market, and it artificially pushes up prices. And when I say artificial, what I really mean is nothing changed at Apple or IBM or GE. It wasn't like somebody invented the new new thing, post-2008, but a lot more investors got bullish in the stock market, so the stock prices of those companies go up. But what's really happening? Nothing's changed. Nothing new has been invented. It’s a sugar high. It’s like drinking a Coke instead of having a meat-and-potatoes meal. FEMALE NEWSREADER: You’ve got oil up. You’ve got gold up. You’ve got copper up. You’ve got stocks up. Stock futures are up. All because of central banks and the stimulus they’ve been putting into the economy. JAMES JACOBY: On Wall Street, no one seemed to mind. The stock market rally continued. FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: The old saying is "don’t fight the Fed." FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Don’t fight the Fed. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Don't fight the Fed. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Rule number one as a young trader you’re taught is "don’t fight the Fed." FEMALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: I don’t know what the hangover’s going to look like down the road from all this extraordinary stimulus, but for now the markets love it. Don’t fight the Fed. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Don’t fight the Fed. The one institution that has a printing press in the basement, and there's no limits to how much it can use it. That is what makes the Fed such an influential player in the marketplace. JAMES JACOBY: Mohamed El-Erian remembers it well. He was running the largest bond fund in the world at the time and helped advise the Fed on its QE experiment. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Keep an eye on the Treasury market— JAMES JACOBY: He shared with them his concerns that the markets were becoming dangerously addicted to the Fed’s easy money. MALE NEWSREADER: To taper or not to taper. JAMES JACOBY: His prediction played out in 2013 when after multiple rounds of quantitative easing totaling more than $2 trillion, Bernanke signaled the Fed might start to taper off. BEN BERNANKE: If we see continued improvement and we have confidence that that is going to be sustained, then we could, in the next few meetings, we could take a step down in our pace of purchases. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: I was on the trade floor. I remember Chairman Bernanke saying that he would taper. First we had to figure out "what does taper mean?" And the minute people realized what "taper" meant, which is that the Fed would step back from buying all these securities, and even though the Fed said it's going to be gradual, it's going to be measured, the markets had a massive tantrum. FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: The market selling off after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said that the central bank could start tapering its economic stimulus measures— RICHARD W. FISHER: It shows you how addicted the markets are. The markets went into a fit, became dysfunctional. It was known as the "taper tantrum." FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Well, we all know it: When Ben Bernanke talks, and the Federal Reserve speaks, the markets listen. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Markets are like little kids. They want candy, and the minute you try to take the candy away, they have a tantrum. SARAH BLOOM RASKIN: You had big Wall Street reaction, right? You have extreme volatility where Wall Street says, "Whoa, whoa! No, no, no! Unacceptable!" and values plunge. And of course the Fed doesn't like that. Nobody likes that. That's a precursor to instability, right? But it put the Fed in a real bind. MALE ANNOUNCER: Chairman Bernanke. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: And Chairman Bernanke had to go in a conference in Boston and say, "No, no, no, we're not tapering." BEN BERNANKE: You can only conclude that highly accommodative monetary policy for the foreseeable future is what's needed in the U.S. economy. RANA FOROOHAR: Every single time the Fed would start talking about, "OK, we're going to maybe taper back faster, or we're going to think about raising rates." Boom! Stocks would correct, because stocks wanted that easy money dopamine hit. JAMES JACOBY: Bernanke’s successor, Janet Yellen, had better luck the following year. She was able to pause the quantitative easing part of the easy money policy without a tantrum, in part by suggesting she’d maintain the Fed’s massive balance sheet of assets it had bought and to keep short-term interest rates low. JANET YELLEN: The FOMC reaffirmed its view that the current zero to one-quarter percent target range for the federal funds rate remains appropriate. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed justified its actions in part because the fears about runaway inflation hadn’t materialized, and in fact it was running below its target of 2% because economic growth was still low. But Yellen’s partial easy money pullback didn’t dampen concerns and criticisms about the ill effects of the Fed’s policies. CHAPTER FIVE Who Owns the Stocks JOSEPH STIGLITZ, Chief economist, The Roosevelt Institute: So you're doing a documentary on the Fed and monetary policy? JAMES JACOBY: We are trying to. JOSEPH STIGLITZ: OK [laughs]. JAMES JACOBY: Are we insane? JOSEPH STIGLITZ: No, no, no. I think it's a great idea. JAMES JACOBY: OK. Joseph Stiglitz is one of the most well-known economists in America and a winner of the Nobel Prize. JOSEPH STIGLITZ: The intention of the Fed was to stimulate aggregate demand. JAMES JACOBY: He told me that while the Fed had done some good, he worried at the time that by stoking the stock market so aggressively, it was exacerbating economic inequality. JOSEPH STIGLITZ: The main thing I was concerned about was that the way they were trying to revive the economy was a kind of trickle-down economics. The way quantitative easing works is that it's a lowering of the interest rates. That leads stocks to go up. And so who owns the stocks? It's the people in the top. Not just the top 10%, 1%, one-tenth of 1%. And so it increases enormously wealth inequality. We had had increasing inequality really since the late '70s, and this was putting that on steroids. JAMES JACOBY: What sort of response did you get from folks at the Fed to what you were saying at the time? JOSEPH STIGLITZ: "Our mandate is to do what we can to increase employment, to use the tools that we have, and that's what we're doing." JAMES JACOBY: I heard a similar response when I raised these issues with the president of the Minneapolis Fed, Neel Kashkari, in March of 2021. He was the only current Fed official who agreed to speak to us. NEEL KASHKARI: The Fed has been on a mission—I've been on a mission—to put Americans back to work and to help them get their wages up, especially for those lowest-income Americans. And if it has had some effect on Wall Street, to me, the trade-off is well worth it if we can put Americans back to work so that they can put food on the table, they can take care of themselves. That is profoundly beneficial to society. JAMES JACOBY: One of the things that we have seen in this country is a widening wealth gap. The question is what role, if any, the Fed has played in widening that wealth gap? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, this is a great point, and I'm glad you raised it. Most people who make this argument ignore the fact that for many Americans, they don't own a house. They don't own stocks. They don't have a 401(k). The most valuable asset they have is their job. So by putting people back to work and helping to boost their wages, we are actually making their most valuable asset more valuable. BARACK OBAMA: Middle-class economics works. FEMALE NEWSREADER: President Obama today in Wisconsin fired up over jobs. Another 223,000 added in June. Unemployment at its lowest— JAMES JACOBY: In fact, by 2015, the employment was heading toward record lows. But critics I spoke to said the Fed’s focus on jobs was missing the full picture. I mean, Neel Kashkari told me that a job is a great asset. That when I— KAREN PETROU, Author, Engine of Inequality: [Laughs] His may be. I'm not so sure that that's true for the folks working three jobs behind the counter at the supermarket. Sorry, Neel, I think that is an elitist assumption of what labor income is good for. JAMES JACOBY: Karen Petrou is an unlikely critic of the central bank. We’ve got Pete here— KAREN PETROU: Go lie down. Down. There we go. JAMES JACOBY: She spent her career inside the financial system, advising banks and big investors. MALE CAMERA OPERATOR: Interview [inaudible], take five marker. JAMES JACOBY: 2015 to 2020 was actually considered a time of recovery. Unemployment was getting to record lows and there was a kind of conventional wisdom that the economy was in a good place at that point in time. So, you disagreed with that? KAREN PETROU: I did, because most Americans disagreed with that. The majority of Americans said they were economically anxious. Significant percentages of people who were in the statistical middle class were skipping medical treatments because they didn't think they could afford them. Forty percent of the United States didn't have $400 in a rainy day fund and they were at risk of imminent financial peril if a tire blew. That's not a good place. JAMES JACOBY: What about this idea that there was record unemployment? KAREN PETROU: Record unemployment was judged the way conventionally the Fed chooses to judge it, not by taking into account the people sitting out working because they couldn't get enough wages with their jobs to make going to work pay. Employment was fine, by at least some numbers. Wages weren't, and people work to eat. They don't work because of some noble ideal. JAMES JACOBY: So just to understand, what was wrong with the models that the Fed was using in order to judge the success of their programs? KAREN PETROU: Paul Krugman, a well-known economist, has a great example. You've got four guys in a bar, each one of whom is making $60,000 a year. Jeff Bezos walks into the bar, and he's making two gazillion dollars. Does that mean that the four guys in the bar are doing any better? No, it doesn't. It's distorting statistics. You have to look at how much each person has, not at what the averages are, to understand what's going on in the economy. And when four out of five guys in the bar are not doing well, the country isn't doing well. CHAPTER SIX A Missed Opportunity JAMES JACOBY: The growing sense that the system was not working for the poor and middle class became a central theme of Donald Trump’s populist campaign. DONALD TRUMP: Sadly, the American dream is dead. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: When you have a society with the middle struggling and the rich realizing almost unimaginable gains, it starts to corrode the civic foundation. DONALD TRUMP: We have to clean up the country. Our country is a mess. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: People start to feel like this cliche you hear all the time: that the system is rigged. MALE TRUMP SUPPORTER: Like he says, I think the system is rigged. MALE TRUMP SUPPORTER: You know what? He’s just speaking what we’re all thinking. But he’s saying it in the public domain. He’s saying it in the political domain. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: You know, the fact that a huge portion of Americans were willing to vote for a president like Donald Trump, whose entire campaign seemed to be burning down the system— DONALD TRUMP: We are going to drain the swamp. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: —that doesn’t just happen in a vacuum. CROWD [chanting]: Drain the swamp! Drain the swamp! DONALD TRUMP: We are going to fix our inner cities, and rebuild our highways, bridges, tunnels, airports, schools, hospitals. JAMES JACOBY: It was a moment of potential for the Fed’s easy money policies. Trump promised to take advantage of the low interest rates and create jobs by investing in new infrastructure. DONALD TRUMP: We will create millions of new jobs and make millions of American dreams come true. JAMES JACOBY: But once in office, the political paralysis in Washington only intensified— FEMALE VOICE: Congress simply hasn’t been willing to find the amount of money necessary to do it. JAMES JACOBY: —making big economic investments all but impossible. RANA FOROOHAR: There just wasn't the political cohesion to push through these major programs. And you saw a lot of op-eds, by a lot of economists, and even Fed bankers themselves, after the first or second, or certainly third and fourth round, of quantitative easing. They were saying, "Please, give us some fiscal policy," meaning "Give us some government action to direct this money to the right places. We can't do all this alone. We can keep rates low, we trying to keep rates low here, trying to keep confidence high. But we can't make you spend on a bridge or revamp a school." JAMES JACOBY: Are you saying that there was sort of a squandered opportunity here? RANA FOROOHAR: A hundred percent it was a missed opportunity. We didn't use the cheapest money in memory—I don't want to say in history, but certainly in the last several decades. We didn't use that opportunity to spend on the things that would have been almost free, in terms of debt. We really missed something that now will be more costly, because now that interests rates are going up—I still think, for example, we should do more infrastructure spending. That we should revamp education. But it's going to be more costly to do it now. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It’s the largest—I always say the most massive, but it's the largest tax cut in the history of our country. And reform, but tax cut. JAMES JACOBY: The marquee legislative achievement of the Trump administration would instead be a tax cut that further boosted the markets and deepened economic inequality. DONALD TRUMP: That’s your bill. JAMES JACOBY: The jury is still out on whether it contributed to the economic growth that had started to tick up during the Trump presidency. But to some inside the Fed, it seemed like an ideal time to pull back on the easy money experiment. One of them was Jerome Powell. CHAPTER SEVEN The Fed Blinked DONALD TRUMP: It is my pleasure and my honor to announce my nomination of Jerome Powell to be the next chairman of the Federal Reserve. Congratulations. JAMES JACOBY: Trump appointed Powell in late 2017. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: Jay Powell is a profoundly competent, smart guy who has spent his entire career at the nexus of big money and big government. JEROME POWELL: In the years since the global financial crisis ended, our economy has made substantial progress toward full recovery. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: A self-acknowledged Republican. He's a conservative. He tends to embrace the deregulatory view of the economy. And he's also a Wall Street guy, who came up through the business of corporate debt and deal-making. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: The Fed is seen continuing to raise interest rates going forward. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed had already begun raising rates and reversing QE. They’d call it quantitative tightening, or QT. Powell took office eager to accelerate the effort. JEROME POWELL: The really extraordinarily accommodative low interest rates that we needed when the economy was quite weak, we don’t need those anymore. They’re not appropriate anymore. JAMES JACOBY: Once again the market threw a tantrum. MALE NEWSREADER: The Dow closing down more than 500 points today. FEMALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: A brutal week in the market. The Dow and the S&P now on track for their worst December since the Great Depression. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: The global financial system short circuits. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: The decline will accelerate if Jay Powell doesn’t walk things back. JAMES JACOBY: The president threw a tantrum, too. DONALD TRUMP: I think the Fed has gone crazy. It’s a correction that I think is caused by the Federal Reserve. If the Fed knew what it was doing, they would lower rates and they would stop quantitative tightening. MALE NEWSREADER: The president has been attacking the Fed chair on Twitter very often for raising interest rates. FEMALE NEWSREADER: —with the Fed's decision to raise interest rates. He suggested it would hurt the economy. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: In a tweet, he said that quantitative tightening is a killer, should have done the exact opposite. JAMES JACOBY: Powell would change course. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The Federal Reserve cut a key short-term interest rate today after raising it as recently as December. DION RABOUIN: You see this complete reversal and what a lot of investors and economists saw as a capitulation to financial markets. Financial markets don't like this, so the Fed's going to reverse course. And that has defined Chair Powell ever since then. MALE NEWSREADER: A tricky balancing act for Chairman Powell. He’ll now face criticism that the Fed has bowed to pressure from the White House or Wall Street or both, sacrificing the central bank's precious independence. JIM CHANOS, Founder, Kynikos Associates: The Fed blinked, and the Fed reversed course when the market was down 20% and went from tightening policy to easing policy. And it became very clear to the market that saving the stock market was now one of the Fed mandates, and I think that had really ominous ramifications for the future. CHAPTER EIGHT A Giant Bloodsucker JAMES JACOBY: By 2019, the Fed’s easy money experiment had been going on for a decade. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: The Fed’s job isn't to help the president of the United States. JAMES JACOBY: What had started out as an emergency measure to save the economy had become the status quo. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Yes, quantitative easing is there, but it’s a tool you don’t want to overdo. JAMES JACOBY: And it was deepening the concerns about how the Fed was fueling troubling trends. Taking advantage of the Fed’s low rates, private equity firms had been buying up huge swaths of the economy with borrowed money— MALE AUCTIONEER: A hundred and ten thousand, 128,000. MALE REPORTER: For multimillion-dollar private equity firms, this is a bargain hunt. JAMES JACOBY: —concentrating wealth and ownership of everything from houses to hospitals. BLACKSTONE SPOKESMAN: Across Blackstone, we own a range of things. So SeaWorld, Busch Gardens, Birds Eye Foods, Michaels Stores, Hilton and Waldorf. What we like to do is come in, buy either real estate or companies. We see an opportunity to grow something faster, to invest capital, fix whatever that is that's broken, and then sell it. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed’s policies had also been fueling a frenzy in Silicon Valley— MALE REPORTER: WeWork has announced it’s received a massive $4.4 billion investment from SoftBank Group. JAMES JACOBY: —leading to all sorts of excesses— MALE NEWSREADER: Venture capitalists pumped nearly half a billion dollars into the food delivery start-up industry. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Airbnb is now valued at $10 billion, more than big hotels chains, including Hyatt and Wyndham. JAMES JACOBY: —and enabling certain tech companies to disrupt and dominate entire industries without ever turning a profit. FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: WeWork is saying its total opportunity is $3 trillion dollars. I mean, that’s 3.5% of the entire world’s GDP. JAMES JACOBY: But perhaps the most destabilizing consequence to the economy was how the Fed’s low interest rates had been incentivizing public companies to take on more and more debt. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Valuations are generally elevated, especially corporate debt. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: We have flagged the rise in corporate debt. FEMALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: We have entirely too much corporate debt out there. JAMES JACOBY: I saw numerous studies and reports detailing the extent of the debt and how even marquee companies were becoming so leveraged their credit ratings plummeted. The Fed had hoped that companies would put all that borrowed money to good use and invest in their workforce and their infrastructure. But in reality, it played out differently. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Buybacks. MALE NEWSREADER: Buying back stock. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Stock buybacks. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Stock buybacks robbing the American worker. JAMES JACOBY: Companies were often borrowing money to buy back their own stock, making the remaining shares more valuable and the prices higher. DION RABOUIN: As a corporation you realize all that matters is the stock price. So what do we have to do to increase the stock price? And more often that is buying back the stock. So it used to be the Fed would lower interest rates. Businesses would then take on more debt. They would use that debt to hire more workers, build more machines and more factories. Now what happens is the Federal Reserve lowers interest rates, businesses use that to go out and borrow more money, but they use that money to buy back stock and invest in technology that will eliminate workers and reduce employee headcounts. They use that money to give the CEO and other corporate officers big bonuses and then eventually issue more debt and buy back more stock. So it's this endless cycle of things that are designed to increase the stock price rather than improve the actual company. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: GE just authorized a $50 billion stock buyback. JAMES JACOBY: The numbers were astounding: More than $6 trillion in corporate buybacks during this easy money decade after the financial crisis. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: Fifty billion dollar stock buyback. That makes a big deal, big difference to the stock price. SHEILA BAIR, Chair, FDIC, 2006-11: Buybacks were an embarrassment, and so it’s just another example of things that used to be viewed as kind of "ew" just going mainstream. JAMES JACOBY: Sheila Bair, a former top banking regulator, was issuing public warnings at the time that the Fed was incentivizing bad behavior on Wall Street despite its best intentions. SHEILA BAIR: I can't fault the companies so much, because this interest rate environment creates very strong economic incentives to do exactly what they're doing. It's hard to create a new product. It's hard to come up with a new idea for a service. It's hard to build a plant and hire people and run the organization. It's real easy to issue some debt and pay it out to your shareholders to goose your share price. That's real easy to do, but it doesn't create real wealth. It doesn't create real opportunity. It doesn't create jobs. It doesn't improve the labor market. But it's just another example of how these very low interest rates have really distorted economic activity and frankly been a drag on our economic growth, not a benefit. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Warren Buffett likes Apple’s buybacks. MALE NEWSREADER: Well, why wouldn’t he? He’s a shareholder, and they’re buying back $100 billion in stock. RANA FOROOHAR: When you get an age of easy money like what we've seen, you get a financialized economy that's really more in service to itself. So, most of what it's doing is buying and selling existing assets rather than helping real businesses and real people make real investments. But one of the things that's so diabolical, I would say, about easy money and our financialized economy in general, is that we're all in it. We're all part of this Faustian bargain of pretending that there's something wonderful happening in the real economy, when really it's just Wall Street going up. But we all kind of want the market to go up, because we're in it, with our pension funds, and with our 401(k)s. So everybody's money is kind of helping to push this whole cycle along. JAMES JACOBY: Even some of the largest beneficiaries of this trend told me it made them uncomfortable, like legendary investor Jeremy Grantham. JEREMY GRANTHAM, Co-founder, GMO LLC: In my career in America, the percentage of GDP that goes to finance has gone from 3 1/2 to 8 1/2 [laughs]. We're—In a way, we're like a giant bloodsucker, and we have more than doubled in size and sucking more than twice the blood out of the rest of the economy. And we do not generate any widgets. We do not generate any real increase in income. We are just a cost. JAMES JACOBY: When you say "we," you mean you and other members of the financial community have been this kind of bloodsucker on the economy? Is that what you're saying? JEREMY GRANTHAM: Yes. Collectively we fulfill a completely necessary service, but what we have done is created layers upon layers of more and more convoluted, expensive financial instruments. And that's what makes all the profits for the financial industry. It's taken a lot of ingenuity and salesmanship to make this happen, and a lot of lobbying in Congress, etc., etc., and we have imposed on the rest of the economy the idea that banking and finance are utterly important at all times. If you do anything wrong to us, the entire economy will collapse in ragged disarray. JAMES JACOBY: Corporate buybacks. The elevation of corporate debt. How was that viewed by you and others at the Fed? NEEL KASHKARI: Something we pay a lot of attention to. But when companies are buying back their stock, one of the things they're telling us is, "We don't have profitable places to invest, and it's easier for us just to buy back our stock." That's concerning in terms of the future of our economy, but that's not because of the Fed. So we pay attention to it, it really matters, but in my view, we don't—It's not something we control. JAMES JACOBY: Kashkari and others have pointed out that it’s the job of Congress and regulators to address some of these concerning trends. And when we sat down in 2021, he was quick to dispute the criticism that the Fed’s policies had really just been boosting financial markets and helping Wall Street. We hear it all the time from Wall Street people, that basically that prices are completely untethered from some fundamental reality. There is this idea on Wall Street that the Fed has our back, and that because you may have well-intentioned policies that are trying to get everybody to work, there is this side effect, this unintended side effect, of just kind of really helping the rich. NEEL KASHKARI: That argument ignores the benefit to the poor. And for sure, if you're going to ignore the benefit to the poor, then we're only helping the rich. But of course, that's an incomplete analysis. When you actually sit down and say, "Well, let's go through the trade-offs of the choices that the Fed has," whether it's interest rates or it's quantitative easing, it's not just about Wall Street. It's not just about asset prices. It's also about thinking about the men and women in America who are trying to find work and who want to have higher earnings and who deserve higher earnings. If we are benefiting them by helping them find work and helping them have higher wages, I will take that trade-off. CHAPTER NINE A Source of Instability JAMES JACOBY: Beyond the debate over the effects on Main Street, there were increasing concerns about the risks on Wall Street. What would happen to all those companies that had gone deep into debt—and their investors—if there was a downturn? But some of the most dire warnings were about a largely unregulated sector of the financial world that had become a key player in all the borrowing going on. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Finance was getting bigger and bigger and riskier and riskier. And then there was something else going on that was only noticed later on. The risk had migrated to what we call the non-banks, to the financial system that are not banks, and it had morphed, it had changed. And in doing so, the ability to understand what was going on came down, because the non-banks are not supervised and regulated as well as the banks. The phrase that was used at the time was "shadow banking." That there were banking activities happening, but they were happening in the shadows, in the shadows of the banks themselves. These are the asset management companies, these are the hedge funds. These are not well-regulated, but suddenly become systemically important. JAMES JACOBY: When it comes to shadow banks, what was your big concern? LEV MENAND, Economist, Fed. Reserve Bank of NY, 2016-17: The core of the problem of the shadow banking system is that it's extremely fragile. JAMES JACOBY: Lev Menand, who’d been an economic adviser to the Fed and Treasury Department, was warning that even though Congress had imposed regulations on big banks after the financial crisis, shadow banks were largely untouched—and they were endangering the whole system. LEV MENAND: Anybody who is an investor in a shadow bank, who has their money in a shadow bank instead of a real bank, is going to have an incentive to withdraw in the face of any uncertainty. So little economic shocks that cause asset prices to fall have the potential to trigger runs and panics. And so what we've done is, by allowing this shadow banking system to develop, is we've inserted a source of instability in our entire economic system that doesn't need to be there and that has the potential of throwing us all off course. JEROME POWELL: Let me start by saying that my colleagues and I strongly— JAMES JACOBY: That potential instability posed by the shadow banking system was on the Fed’s radar. REP. JIM HIMES, (D) CT: How are you thinking about potential risk bubbling up in the broader shadow banking system? JEROME POWELL: This is a project that the Financial Stability Oversight Council is working on now. And also, the Financial Stability Board globally is looking carefully at leveraged lending. And we think it's something that requires serious monitoring. JAMES JACOBY: But by the end of 2019, little action had been taken by the Fed, financial regulators or Congress to rein in the shadow banks and other growing risks. The system remained vulnerable to a shock. It would arrive in early 2020. CHAPTER 10 Whatever It Takes MALE NEWSREADER: A preliminary investigation into a mysterious pneumonia outbreak in Wuhan, China, has identified a previously unknown coronavirus— NEEL KASHKARI: When the pandemic hit, it was so unlike anything any of us have experienced in our lifetimes. MALE NEWSREADER: Already, 45 cases have been reported in China, including two deaths. The victims are thought to have contracted the virus in a meat and seafood market. NEEL KASHKARI: We'd been paying attention to what was happening in China for a few months. MALE NEWSREADER: There are new images out of Wuhan that purport to show the dire conditions in hospital. NEEL KASHKARI: I was calling my contacts, global businesses that had big operations in China, to understand what their employees and staffs were seeing. And we were all trying to learn as much as we can about pandemics and what it's likely going to mean. FEMALE REPORTER: Major selloff across Europe this morning. NEEL KASHKARI: I think we all figured out very quickly the pandemic and the virus would drive the economy. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Investors are spooked by the growing number of infections outside China. NEEL KASHKARI: But how fast would it hit us? How widespread? What would the health care response be? It was maximum uncertainty. And you were seeing that uncertainty manifest in financial markets. MALE NEWSREADER: What you have here are concerns, fears, worries and deep uncertainties about what’s likely to happen next. NEEL KASHKARI: People were scared. Investors were scared. Individuals were scared. And they said, "You know what? I just want cash." FEMALE NEWSREADER: Markets giving us the worst two-day point drop ever in history. NEEL KASHKARI: "I don't even want Treasury bonds. I don't even want corporate bonds. I don't want stocks. I just want cash." And when everybody in the economy says "I want cash" at the same time, that leads to potentially a collapse of financial markets. MALE FINANCIAL TRADER 1: On the bell, on the bell! MALE NEWSREADER 1: Means the first circuit breaker— MALE NEWSREADER 2: For whom the bell tolls. MALE NEWSREADER 1: —has been triggered. MALE FINANCIAL TRADER 2: I knew we were going to [unintelligible]. JAMES JACOBY: All the weaknesses of the system that had built up over the years of easy money were being exposed. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Market functioning was starting to cascade into failure. MALE NEWSREADER: The Dow plunging again today. The 11-year bull market has ended. DION RABOUIN: Stocks were just on a downward free fall. You had credit markets seizing up. People were selling anything that wasn't nailed down. MALE FLOOR TRADER: I can’t do anything, I'm frozen. JAMES JACOBY: Attention was focused on the highly leveraged shadow banks. LEV MENAND: What we saw was a full-blown panic in the shadow banking system. It wasn't something that you have when you have a pandemic, you have a bank panic. It was you have a bank panic because you had some exogenous shock in the economy and you have these underlying vulnerabilities in your monetary system that you haven't resolved. JAMES JACOBY: The Fed responded to this new crisis with an old tool—once again, quantitative easing. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The Fed will try to steady the ship after a week that echoed the financial crisis of 12 years ago. JAMES JACOBY: It bought up hundreds of billions in debt from financial institutions. MALE REPORTER: We have seen the Fed inject money into the economy in the last couple of days. JAMES JACOBY: By mid-March they had made more than a trillion dollars available to the shadow banks and they cut interest rates back down to near zero. FEMALE NEWSREADER: What that tells all of us is that the economic impact of the coronavirus is going to be crippling. LEV MENAND: The Federal Reserve lent half a trillion dollars to securities dealers, half a trillion dollars to foreign central banks, bought $2 trillion of Treasury securities, another trillion dollars of mortgage-backed securities. It flooded the zone with new government cash to stabilize this system. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Incredible effort from the Federal Reserve, taking major action to— CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: Everything that Ben Bernanke's Fed had done over the course of the financial crisis of 2008, Jay Powell did that in a weekend. The scary part is it wasn't enough. The crisis continued, and they had to intervene even further. MALE NEWSREADER: Good morning. We are here for you on this morning when the stock market has taken a dramatic plunge. At least— FEMALE NEWSREADER: —as the emergency rate cut failed to calm investors. In fact, it did the opposite. Futures immediately dropped— JAMES JACOBY: Despite the Fed’s actions, the corporate debt market froze up and companies were unable to pay their bills, putting the wider financial system at risk. RANA FOROOHAR: There's just this corporate debt picture out there, and we're just beginning to see how those dominoes are going to fall. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Then comes the realization that we have to lock down. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The list of closings and activities being suspended is growing from coast to coast. JAMES JACOBY: In the White House, Eric Ueland was the Trump administration’s point person dealing with Congress on the response. ERIC UELAND, Dir., Trump Office of Legislative Affairs: Every day and into the evening as we're going through and hearing more information and trying to explore the health side of this exploding virus crisis, there's also an economic impact that is just getting larger and larger and more significant. And so what's the impact on a community when suddenly you're telling it a significant amount of economic activity needs to slow or actually cease? That's pretty dramatic. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Three point four million people filed for unemployment last week. FEMALE NEWSREADER: You can't really compare this to the financial crisis, or even 9/11. There's never been a time in history where the U.S. government told the economy to shut down. ERIC UELAND: Then we're talking about impacts on businesses—from small businessmen, who are the real heartbeat of our economy, communities, and how to keep people employed. What's the impact on industries and significant economic sectors of the American economy? But the policy response that we need to design and hopefully execute here inside this crisis is a lot broader than anybody conceived up to that point. REP. ANTHONY BROWN, (D) MD: The motion is adopted. JAMES JACOBY: In a rare moment of bipartisanship, the Trump administration and Congress would end up passing the largest economic stimulus ever. DONALD TRUMP: All right, thank you, all. JAMES JACOBY: The $2.2 trillion CARES Act, which unlike after the crisis in 2008, was aimed not just at Wall Street but directly at individuals and small businesses as well. ERIC UELAND: You encouraged your team to be bold, be brave and go big, and we certainly delivered today: $6.2 trillion. MALE NEWSREADER: You ain't seen nothing yet, from what the Fed is about to do. JAMES JACOBY: Part of the money would go to the Fed, which announced a new range of loan programs worth trillions. And for the first time, it began buying up corporate debt. The easy money experiment went into overdrive. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: A guy inside the Fed was telling me that what they were doing was not that sophisticated. They were just looking at any part of the market that looked like it was on fire and dumping money on it. FEMALE NEWSREADER: We often talk about the Federal Reserve using a bazooka to tackle markets and the economy. This is bazooka, cannons and tanks all at once. DION RABOUIN, Axios, 2018-21: So this was huge. This was the Fed stepping in on an unprecedented scale and saying to the market, "We will do whatever it takes." JEROME POWELL: Many of the programs that we’re undertaking rely on emergency lending powers that are available only in very unusual circumstances such as those we find ourselves in today. We will continue to use these powers forcefully, proactively and aggressively until we're confident that we are solidly on the road to recovery. JAMES JACOBY: I don't think most people are aware that we came this close to a bona fide financial crisis. LEV MENAND: Yeah. I think a lot of it is missed for two reasons. One, there was a lot of other stuff going on in the news at the time. The other is the Federal Reserve did an amazingly good job at putting out the flames of this panic. And even though the panic in March 2020 was more severe along many metrics than anything we saw in 2008, the government's response was more powerful in certain respects. And we're lucky that the government was successful or we could be living through a true depression. CHAPTER ELEVEN Moral Hazard MALE NEWSREADER: Everything has been thrown at this market to try to keep it floating. MALE NEWSREADER: The Federal Reserve now getting into junk bonds. MALE NEWSREADER: It's a joke. The market is manipulated. They're printing trillions of dollars to pump up the value of publicly traded stocks. JAMES JACOBY: In trying to keep workers employed and companies afloat, the Fed had also used its power to rescue some of the riskiest parts of the financial system, like the junk bond market. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR 1: Is this just like a high-yield junk bond bailout? I mean, I don’t get— MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR 2: Yeah, we've got to live with it now, Tom. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR 1: —why this is an emergency. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR 2: We've got to live with it. JAMES JACOBY: To the critics, the Fed was rewarding the same players and practices that had helped make the system so fragile in the first place. JEREMY GRANTHAM, Co-founder, GMO LLC: Over the years, we've been trained to believe that the Fed is on our side. What the Fed has trained us to believe is that if we make a bet in the market and we win, we're on our own. We get to keep the profits. If we lose, they will bend every effort and every dollar they can get their hands on, one way or another, to bail us out. This is asymmetry of the most splendid kind. MALE CAMERA OPERATOR: A speeds. Go ahead and clap it off, please. JAMES JACOBY: Billionaire bond investor Howard Marks called the Fed out at the time, saying it was undercutting the way the free market is supposed to work. HOWARD MARKS, Co-founder & co-chair, Oaktree Capital Management: There are negative ramifications to this. One called moral hazard, which means conditioning people to believe that if there's a problem the government will bail you out. And if people really believe that, then there's no downside to risky behavior, because if there's a problem, it won't fall on you. You'll get bailed out. If you play it aggressively and succeed, you make money. If you play it aggressively and fail, you'll get bailed out. MALE NEWSREADER: We are truly getting to a point of moral hazard. MALE NEWSREADER: Do we want to live in a world—Do central banks themselves want to live in a world where their interventions are so central to the market outlook and of market performance? JAMES JACOBY: So has moral hazard gotten worse as a result of this bailout? HOWARD MARKS: There’s no barometer of moral hazard, so I can’t give you a reading. All I can say is that for the last year or so, risk-taking has been rewarded, and that tends to bring on more risk-taking. FEMALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: I don't think it's anything that investors should be applauding, necessarily, because it's a nail in the coffin of capitalism. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: This is going to be a test of whether or not capitalism is just a call sign when CEOs are looking for bailouts. JAMES JACOBY: Do you see moral hazard in what has just happened? SHEILA BAIR, Chair, FDIC, 2006-11: Oh, absolutely. I think now the entire business community has had a taste of bailouts [laughs]. And boy, doesn't it work really, really nicely. Yeah, so I fear that now, the Fed stepping in, not just to bail out Wall Street, but the entire corporate America, is starting to be embedded into people's thinking. People talk about the survival of capitalism, but this is the biggest threat to capitalism. In good times, when anybody can make money, you reap those profits. In bad times, the Fed just keeps stepping in. You have this never-ending ratchet up. The markets never correct. JAMES JACOBY: It's like a no-lose casino. SHEILA BAIR: It is. It is a no-lose casino. That's exactly right. JAMES JACOBY: This is the second time in 12 years that you and your institution have had to funnel into the financial system trillions of dollars, and there is this sense that the financial markets have an iron-clad backstop from the Fed. NEEL KASHKARI, Pres. & CEO, Fed. Reserve Bank of Minneapolis: Well, I completely agree that it is unacceptable that 12 years after 2008, we had to do this again. I am proud that we did what we did. It was the right thing to do. It was necessary. But it is unacceptable as an American citizen that we have a financial system that is this risky and this vulnerable. JAMES JACOBY: But what, if any, responsibility or accountability does the Fed have for the financial system having been so risky and so vulnerable to a shock? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, I think all financial regulators that have a seat at the table have responsibility for what was left incomplete after 2008 and where we go from here. We need to use this crisis to finish the work that we did not finish after '08. JAMES JACOBY: With all due respect, I wonder if you could be a little bit more explicit with me. What will the Fed own when it comes to the vulnerability of the system? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, I reject the thesis. I actually don't think it's been the Fed's monetary policy that has led to these vulnerabilities. I think it's been incomplete regulatory policy that has led to these vulnerabilities. CHAPTER TWELVE Orgy of Speculation FEMALE NEWSREADER: The coronavirus pandemic has left millions of Americans out of work. MALE FOOD BANK VOLUNTEER: The people have gone now without four or five or six or seven paychecks, and it's starting to catch up. They need food. It's the most basic thing. JAMES JACOBY: In the months following the Fed’s rescue, we saw a troubling disparity. MALE BBC REPORTER: Have you got any income at the moment? FEMALE SPEAKER: No. No. And we have kids, too, so— JAMES JACOBY: As businesses were shuttered and millions of Americans were living on the edge, the markets did indeed look like a no-lose casino, thanks to the Fed's safety net. MALE NEWSREADER: The economy may be facing major hardships, but the stock market is thriving. MALE NEWSREADER: The best quarter for the Dow in 33 years, it surged 17%. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN, Chief economic advisor, Allianz: We ended up in a world where bad news was good news. MALE NEWSREADER: The unemployment rate is now a staggering 14.7% MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Bad news for the economy was good news for markets. Why? FEMALE NEWSREADER: In the midst of all the economic turmoil, Wall Street actually closed out its best week in 45 years. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: Because when people saw bad news, they said, "The Fed will have to do more." MALE NEWSREADER: Anna, today the markets say, “Bring on the next quarter!” MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: And then over the next few months we saw one record after another in stock markets. MALE NEWSREADER: Stocks surging even as America enters its darkest chapter yet of this pandemic. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD, Author, The Lords of Easy Money: Even after the initial emergency passed the Fed was pumping $120 billion a month into the economy through quantitative easing on an indefinite basis. The fire hose was simply turned on and left on the curb. The extraordinary measures of 2010 literally become the daily operating procedure of 2020. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The S&P 500 hitting another record high today after surging 55%. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: The stock market didn't just regain all of its losses in a matter of months but started breaking new records. MALE NEWSREADER: I see quite a bit of green on the markets this morning. Dow, S&P, NASDAQ—all of them higher. JAMES JACOBY: Over the next two years, tech stocks would soar. MALE NEWSREADER: Apple is now the first publicly listed U.S. company to be valued at $2 trillion. MALE NEWSREADER: Tesla shares are soaring. MALE NEWSREADER: This company has just gone through the roof this year. The stock price has more than quadrupled. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Right now it's a seller's market, and homes are selling fast. JAMES JACOBY: The price of real estate would shoot up across the country. MALE NEWSREADER: The housing market has never been hotter. JAMES JACOBY: And corporate America would take on even more debt, which investors gobbled up. MALE NEWSREADER: Massive issuance of corporate debt. FEMALE NEWSREADER: More than $10.5 trillion. JAMES JACOBY: For the richest Americans, it was an extraordinary time. SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, (I) VT: Mark Zuckerberg has increased his wealth during the pandemic by more than $37 billion. MALE NEWSREADER: Elon Musk has added over $10 billion to his wealth just this week. MALE NEWSREADER: Jeff Bezos reportedly earning over $50 billion this year. MALE FINANCIAL REPORTER: Billionaires now hold two-thirds more in wealth than the bottom half of the U.S. population. Let that sink in for a moment. And as I mentioned— DION RABOUIN: Just the billionaires in the United States, from March 2020 to February 2021, have grown their wealth by $1.3 trillion. One point three trillion dollars. JEREMY GRANTHAM: It's the burst of euphoria that typically brings these things to an end. JAMES JACOBY: But even some of those billionaires were worried the Fed was fueling a dangerous bubble. JEREMY GRANTHAM: The housing market, the stock market and the bond market, all overpriced at the same time. If the Fed knew what it was doing it would not allow bubbles of this magnitude to take place. MALE SOCIAL MEDIA PERSONALITY: Smash the "like" button. Invest consistently. JAMES JACOBY: But the epic rise in the markets proved irresistible to millions of new small investors, too. FEMALE SOCIAL MEDIA PERSONALITY: So when a stock does well because of internal or external factors, you secure the bag, honey. ROBINHOOD COMMERCIAL: An app that's changing the way we do money. DION RABOUIN: All these brokerage platforms saw the largest growth of new users they'd ever seen because people said, "Now is my opportunity. I'm going to invest my money in the stock market. I may not understand what the Fed's doing or how it works or what exactly is going on—" FEMALE NEWSREADER: —the S&P 500 now on track for the best week going back since 2008. DION RABOUIN: "—but I understand the Fed takes action, stock prices go up, these people get rich." And it became a very clear mandate for people: "If I want to get in on this economic recovery we're having, I've got to buy stocks." FEMALE SOCIAL MEDIA PERSONALITY: I’m going to take my stimulus check and I’m going to put it in the stock market. DION RABOUIN: So they're online, they're trading stocks, they're buying and selling and putting money into these stock accounts. They started creating their own community. ROARING KITTY, Social media personality: Welcome, Declan, Michael Lee—ah, so many people. Bob Smith— MALE SOCIAL MEDIA PERSONALITY: We've got the get the Dow Jones up! JAMES JACOBY: Fed Chair Powell became a kind of cult figure, master of the money printer. REDDIT MEME VIDEO: Money printer go BRRR. MALE SOCIAL MEDIA PERSONALITY: Invest in these four tickers. I’ll put them right above. JAMES JACOBY: And billions poured into so-called “meme stocks.” ROARING KITTY: This GameStop situation, we will never encounter a setup like this again. JAMES JACOBY: And new, risky asset classes like cryptocurrency took on a life of their own. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Bitcoin. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Bitcoin. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Bitcoin has been on a wild ride. MALE NEWSREADER: It really is the new currency. DION RABOUIN: There's just too much money. [Laughs] People just have so much money and there's not really places to put it. So what folks have started doing is investing in these very speculative assets, things like bitcoin, because they're just seeing ridiculous rates of return. It doesn't really matter what the underlying value of the thing is, just like it doesn't matter what the underlying value of a company is, right? As long as the stock price goes up, you want to buy because the stock is going to keep going up and then you'll sell. It's the greater fool theory of investing. STEPHEN COLBERT: Cryptocurrency. BILL MAHER: Cryptocurrency. "SILICON VALLEY" VIDEO CLIP: Cryptocurrency. "THE SIMPSONS" VIDEO CLIP: Cryptocurrency. ELON MUSK ON SNL: Blockchain technology. BEN McKENZIE, Actor: It's actually—This is actually a very comfortable chair. JAMES JACOBY: Crypto was all the rage in Hollywood, where actor Ben McKenzie saw it being pushed on an unsuspecting public. With reporter Jacob Silverman, he began raising alarms. BEN McKENZIE: Crypto exchanges primarily were driving the advertising dollars here, so it's not unreasonable to think that these folks got paid not just multiple millions of dollars, but potentially tens of millions of dollars to sell this stuff. MEGAN THEE STALLION: Bitcoin is a new kind of money. NEIL PATRICK HARRIS: Cash into crypto. MALE SPEAKER: What's up? TOM BRADY: I'm getting into crypto with FTX. You in? MATT DAMON: History is filled with "almosts." BEN McKENZIE: When you're talking about an ad like the Matt Damon ad that went viral, and not in a good way. What does he work, one day? He walks around a studio and points at stuff that isn't there and talks about how brave you need to be to buy crypto? It's a pretty easy paycheck. MATT DAMON: Fortune favors the brave. BEN McKENZIE: I certainly understand how easy it is to get lured in to cryptocurrency, especially when you see, at least for one brief, shining moment, all of your friends and neighbors or people you follow on social media getting rich. Of course you're going to try it. JAMES JACOBY: How does the Fed figure into this? Was there just so much money sloshing around that it just needed to go somewhere, and crypto was one of those places where it just was like, "All right, we'll throw it in there." BEN McKENZIE: Yeah. When money is cheap, people gamble. It's just undeniable. And fraud runs rampant. JACOB SILVERMAN, Freelance reporter: You would hear, even within crypto circles, people started talking about Ponzi schemes in a non-derisive way, saying, "Well, maybe we're doing new types of economics." There are all forms of irrational thinking, and rationalization also, that come together to help sort of conjure this illusion that there's value here until something pops it. MALE CAMERA OPERATOR: Sound speed. JAMES JACOBY: A number of serious investors, like Jim Chanos, began speaking out. JIM CHANOS, Founder, Kynikos Associates: It just became this orgy of speculation by the first half of 2021. Anyone who wanted to raise money for anything could do so. The amount of fraud we saw being floated on top of legitimate companies was really concerning, particularly in places like the crypto space, which was sort of not being regulated. People were creating new coins or NFTs and selling them on to the public, who was eager to get in on the latest fad. And that bothered me. JAMES JACOBY: And you would draw a direct link between what the Fed was doing and the crypto craze? JIM CHANOS: Well I just—It was all part of speculation that led to people doing really silly things with their money. At the end of bull markets, at the end of speculative markets, all kinds of crazy schemes get floated to separate people from their money. NEEL KASHKARI: At least these are different questions and not the same question over and over again. JAMES JACOBY: Was last time the same question over and over again? NEEL KASHKARI: It was the same question for 90 minutes. JAMES JACOBY: I don't know about that. NEEL KASHKARI: Yes, trust me. I have a tape of it. JAMES JACOBY: Oh, yeah? When I sat down with Neel Kashkari again recently, I asked him how the madness in the markets looked to the Fed. It kind of was mania at the time, but the Fed was continuing to flood the markets with liquidity, with money. Did you not see all of that mania as a sign of overheating? That an indicator in the markets was telling you something about what was happening in the economy? NEEL KASHKARI: Yeah, I mean, we see froth in financial markets not infrequently. There have been other times when we've seen booms in financial markets. If we are going to try to raise interest rates to control excitement in the stock market, the cost—Who's going to bear the cost of that? The people who are out of work today. If we had said, "Let’s go raise interest rates to try to keep crypto down, keep bitcoin from going too high, and we're going to keep millions of Americans out of work as the way to do that," that strikes me as a bad trade. CHAPTER THIRTEEN Economics 101 MALE VOICE: I think interest rates and inflation are going to rise well above what the Fed has projected. JAMES JACOBY: As the markets were heating up, so were concerns that the Fed's policies would fuel inflation. MALE NEWSREADER: Prices are rising at the fastest pace in more than a decade. JAMES JACOBY: But it wasn’t just what the Fed was doing. PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: I'm going to help the American people who are hurting now. JAMES JACOBY: The new Biden administration was sending $1,400 checks to many Americans— FEMALE NEWSREADER: —stimulus money from the latest COVID relief bill is arriving in bank accounts all over the country. JAMES JACOBY: —extending unemployment benefits, tax credits and other relief programs. LARRY SUMMERS: I think there is a real possibility that within the year we're going to be dealing with the most serious incipient inflation problem that we have faced in the last 40 years. JAMES JACOBY: Critics like former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers were publicly expressing concern that all the stimulus money from the Fed and the government would boost economic demand at a time when supply problems from the pandemic were still an issue. NOURIEL ROUBINI, Economist: People like myself, like Larry Summers and other, saw that that massive stimulus—it was unprecedented, an order of magnitude greater than the one we had after the global financial crisis—would lead to excessive demand, overheating and inflation. So we had an unprecedented fiscal stimulus. An unprecedented monetary stimulus. We had bail-out checks sent to everybody—every household, every firm, every financial institution. It was too much and should have been more selective. DION RABOUIN: There really just was all this money being pushed out in the economy. At the same time you've got the Federal Reserve, they're pushing out another $4 or $5 trillion into the economy, and so prices rose. MALE NEWSREADER: Core CPI inflation is set to rise sharply over the next three months. DION RABOUIN: This goes back to your Economics 101 textbook, right? When there's too much money chasing too few goods, prices go up, and that drives inflation higher. JAMES JACOBY: It only took a few months for the warnings to come true. FEMALE NEWSREADER: It seems like everything across the board is becoming more expensive. MALE ON-STREET INTERVIEW: Gas prices going up, food prices going up. JAMES JACOBY: But the Fed didn’t flinch. MALE NEWSREADER: A surge in energy, housing and food costs. JAMES JACOBY: It didn’t raise interest rates or pull back on quantitative easing. MALE REPORTER: The question now haunting economists is whether these price hikes are a pandemic blip or a sign of a long-term threat to the economy. JAMES JACOBY: And they had a word for the highest inflation in more than a decade. MALE NEWSREADER: Transitory. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Transitory. MALE NEWSREADER: Transitory. MALE NEWSREADER: Transitory. REP. PAT TOOMEY, (R) PA: Now, I know you believe this is transitory, but everything's transitory. Life is transitory. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: This inflation round is not transitory. This is a very hot inflation environment, and the longer the central banks wait, the greater the risk. I reacted quite strongly to the assertion that inflation was going to be transitory. I remember warning at that time that we simply don't have enough evidence that it's going to be transitory. Transitory is a very reassuring term, because I tell you, "Don't worry about it, it is temporary. It is reversible. Therefore you don't need to change behavior. So yes, we have inflation, but don't worry." JAMES JACOBY: What kind of evidence were you seeing that this may be stickier inflation than it is transitory? MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: One, what companies were telling us. And companies were saying, "I am not sure it's transitory. This is beyond the pandemic." I was talking to CEOs, and they were giving me a very clear message, the same message that was in one earning call after another earning call: They did not view the disruptions as being transitory. JAMES JACOBY: Why transitory? Why that word? What did you think at the time? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, saw a number of factors that we thought were conspiring to lead to high prices and that many of those factors would fade away over time. So for example, supply chains we saw were getting gummed up. But we also know that businesses were working very hard to un-gum those up, to untangle those supply chains. So we thought that they'd probably make more progress there than we expected. JAMES JACOBY: The Business Roundtable, for instance, was coming out and saying—polling their CEOs and saying, "Look, we're seeing inflation everywhere in what we're doing, OK?" How does something like that land for you at that time? NEEL KASHKARI: I mean, I take it seriously. I don't dismiss it. But then I map it against the data that we're seeing. But I'll just say if we did not have an outlier view on inflation or the economy overall, if you look at the consensus of forecasts of my experts in America, on Wall Street, around the world, they all basically had the same forecast, which is inflation's going to be transitory. It's going to come back down. Yes, there were outliers, but if you look at the consensus, we were well within the consensus of the experts who study this. JAMES JACOBY: Any regret about not taking the foot off the pedal, seeing what, for instance, the federal government was doing at that point in time? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, I think, again, knowing what I know now, absolutely. JAMES JACOBY: I put the same questions to Brian Deese, one of the chief architects of the Biden administration’s $1.9 trillion Rescue Plan. Were the inflation concerns at the time part of your internal deliberation about doing the Rescue Act? BRIAN DEESE, Dir., National Economic Council, 2021-23: It was an issue that we were always aware of and focused on and weighing in the weighing and balancing that you have to make when you do policymaking in the face of uncertainty. JAMES JACOBY: You’re saying that you knew that that could be a potential tradeoff. BRIAN DEESE: It is always a tradeoff. It was always a tradeoff, and the logic behind our actions was to get ahead of the pandemic, help bridge for families and businesses and also ensure against the downside risks to our economy. And I think if we look back now and recognize that the inflation challenge that the U.S. economy faces is not unique, it is a global challenge. Inflation is higher in Europe and the U.K. today than it is in the United States. JAMES JACOBY: Was there a concern at the White House that the Fed was running the economy too hot for too long? BRIAN DEESE: That is a question that I will institutionally not answer. JAMES JACOBY: Why? BRIAN DEESE: Because one of the hallmarks of our system is the independence of monetary policymaking. This has been something that you can't take for granted in our system, that prior presidents have not necessarily honored. But this president, this administration is quite committed to the proposition that the strength of our system, one of the strengths of the U.S. economy, is the trust that people have in the independence of our monetary authority. And therefore we make deliberate choices to not make comments on questions like that. FEMALE NEWSREADER: We're going to begin tonight with the rough road to recovery for America's economy. JAMES JACOBY: Through late 2021 and into 2022, stimulus from the Fed and the government would contribute to a rapid economic recovery. JOE BIDEN: As our economy has come roaring back, we've seen some price increases. JAMES JACOBY: But inflation continued climbing at the fastest pace in decades, hitting the poor and middle class the hardest— MALE REPORTER: You know, these price increases will be a real impact on families, and they're not going away any time soon. JAMES JACOBY: —the people the Fed had hoped its easy money policies would help the most. CHAPTER FOURTEEN A Different World MALE NEWSREADER: This is the epicenter of this rise in inflation. FEMALE NEWSREADER: —the highest inflation rate of any major city in the country. Housing prices— JAMES JACOBY: No city had it worse than Phoenix, which had the highest inflation rate in the nation. When I visited St. Mary’s Food Bank, the cars were lined up first thing in the morning. TOM KERTIS, Pres. and CEO, St. Mary’s Food Bank: Every day, my key team, we get an email with the number of people that come through. Yesterday was a 1,007 households. And it's not people, it's households coming through. They're feeding four or five people. And it's like, wow. And that's five days a week. They just don't have any other choice. We're hearing that their budget is being eaten up by all the impacts of inflation, and it's either that or they don't have food for their children. FEMALE SPEAKER 1: I'm a single mom, so sometimes at the end of the month I need the assistance. Because life has gotten a lot more expensive, and being a single parent, I can feel it. It's like choosing between your rent and your food. FEMALE SPEAKER 2: It's like, yesterday I spent a hundred bucks just to get cereal, milk and bread. And eggs. And that was basically it. And some lunch meat. And that was a hundred bucks, and that was our week's worth of food. And that's not going to feed six kids. JAMES JACOBY: When you did start seeing an increase in people coming? TOM KERTIS: It was the end of February this year, 2022. We saw a slight uptick, didn't know if it was real, but it kept climbing. And it's climbed all through summer. We thought that was a plateau, and then at the end of summer, it's continued to climb. And here we are today with 1,000 households coming through. We've seen a 26% increase year over year in the number of people coming to us for help. JAMES JACOBY: From 2021 to 2022? TOM KERTIS: Yes. And of that, 18% of the people are first-time people coming to the food bank. JAMES JACOBY: Is what you're seeing now actually worse than what you saw during the height of the pandemic? TOM KERTIS: It is worse now. And it's worse because the food was more available during the pandemic. We're seeing food availability going down. What was once predictable doesn't appear to be predictable anymore. It's probably going to get worse before it's going to get better, unfortunately. JAMES JACOBY: What brings you here? MALE SPEAKER: I'm just trying to get a little extra food. Can't really—you know, trying to stretch the dollar. JAMES JACOBY: Yeah. MALE SPEAKER: It's not hard to spend $200 at a grocery store and only have one week's worth of food for two people. JAMES JACOBY: Have you been coming here for a long time, or this is more recent? MALE SPEAKER: It's more recent, since probably the last six months I've been coming here. JAMES JACOBY: Are you working? Are you— MALE SPEAKER: Yeah, I'm working, but it's just not enough. JAMES JACOBY: We heard similar stories from credit counselors and their clients at a money management counseling center. KATE BULGER, Dir. of research, Money Management Intl.: You know, we're getting all these folks who are telling us for the first time they can't pay their bills, they can't make ends meet. And often when when they say that, they say, "I'm a good person. I've always paid my bills before." CRAIG BLECK, Counselor, Money Management Intl.: With the inflation, they have just eaten away their savings. People have told me, "I did the three to six months of savings for an emergency fund. That’s gone." JAMES JACOBY: So you're saying that it's not just folks that you're seeing that have had chronic problems with credit or—these are, there's a lot of new people that are coming to you now. OK. WANDA JENKINS, Counselor, Money Management Intl.: Yeah, a lot of new people. KATE BULGER: These are folks who had been making it before and were solidly middle class now, and today are struggling to make ends meet, struggling to keep their utilities on, struggling to stay in their apartment or their home, and are really in danger of falling out of the middle class. It's a shrinking middle class problem. JAMES JACOBY: How real are rent increases right now? DOMINIQUE PAYTON, Client: At a local shelter here in Phoenix, we've seen an uptick of new families and individuals coming in that just could no longer afford where they were living. Because even where they were living, their rents increase $500 to $1,000 in one month. WANDA JENKINS: Sometimes clients have called me—now, and they're angry when they call. They need our help, but they're angry, and I understand it. They're ashamed and they're crying and all of that, but I was there. I was one of them. JAMES JACOBY: Are your numbers up in terms of people that are seeking out help at the moment? KATE BULGER: So it's not just that we're getting more calls, it's that the folks who are calling us are in greater distress. Because now instead of calling us because they're just behind on their credit cards, they're calling us because they're behind on their credit cards and they're behind on their utilities and they're struggling with their housing payment. They are facing greater economic challenges I think and more diverse economic challenges than what they faced just a few years ago. JOHN ADEL, Client: It's a different world, but I have to tell you, I go to the store and I am just shocked. I'm keeping my nose above the waves right now, but I feel like that wave is a lot bigger than I thought and it's behind me and it's coming. CHAPTER FIFTEEN Things are Gonna Get Harder JAMES JACOBY: In the fall of 2021, with inflation at 6.8%—well above the Fed’s 2% target—Chairman Powell acknowledged it might not be transitory after all. JEROME POWELL: So I think the word "transitory" has different meanings to different people. To many it carries a sense of short-lived. We tended to use it to mean that it won’t leave a permanent mark in the form of higher inflation. I think it’s probably a good time to retire that word and try to explain more clearly what we mean. JAMES JACOBY: It would be the start of a new phase in the easy money experiment. JEROME POWELL: The committee is determined to take the measures necessary to restore price stability. Thank you. I look forward to your questions. JAMES JACOBY: Over several months, they’d raise interest rates. May 2022 JEROME POWELL: Good afternoon. It's nice to see everyone in person for the first time in a couple of years. JAMES JACOBY: In response to the rising inflation, the Fed would also pause quantitative easing and begin tightening. JEROME POWELL: At today's meeting, the committee raised the target range for the federal funds rate. We also decided to begin the process of reducing the size of our balance sheet. MALE FINANCIAL COMMENTATOR: But neither Powell nor any other Fed official has explained with any precision just how far the Fed will go. MALE NEWSREADER: The Federal Reserve raising a key interest rate three-quarters of a percent. MALE NEWSREADER: —its biggest hike in nearly three decades. MALE NEWSREADER: The Federal Reserve has raised its key interest rates again. MALE NEWSREADER: —and a move that seemed unfathomable to many just months ago has now happened twice in a row. JAMES JACOBY: Other events, like the war in Ukraine— MALE NEWSREADER: Russia is picking off Ukraine's military facilities one after another. JAMES JACOBY: —lockdowns in China— MALE NEWSREADER: China has decided to put its southern tech hub Shenzhen under a citywide lockdown. JAMES JACOBY: —and companies raising prices— RODNEY McMULLEN, CEO, Kroger: A little bit of inflation is always good in our business. JAMES JACOBY: —would all send inflation even higher and accelerate the Fed’s moves. MALE NEWSREADER: Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell speaking at an annual economic summit in Jackson Hole, Wyoming— JAMES JACOBY: Which brings us back to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, in August 2022—that annual meeting of central bankers where Jerome Powell signaled that he’d keep the Fed on course— MALE NEWSREADER: He made a call simply last year that didn't age well. JAMES JACOBY: —raising rates to try to combat inflation. JEROME POWELL: While higher interest rates, slower growth and softer labor market conditions will bring down inflation, they will also bring some pain to households and businesses. JAMES JACOBY: How do you explain, for instance, to someone who is seeing their gas bills go up, their food bills go up, and groceries, their rents go up, how is it that higher interest rates and what you're doing with this very blunt instrument, how do you say that that's going to help them with those issues in particular? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, one of the reasons prices are high is because there's too much demand in the economy. And by raising interest rates—For example, we are going to slow down demand for housing, people going out and buying up homes, which eventually should prevent home prices and rents from continuing to climb. That should benefit workers. But things like gas prices, that's not being driven by us. I mean, that's being driven by the war, Russia invading Ukraine, Saudi Arabia cutting back production, big geopolitical forces. So there's some pieces of this that we can directly affect. Some pieces of this are out of our control. JAMES JACOBY: I mean, some people have said you're kind of—interest rates are almost like a hammer, a sledgehammer. It's not like a scalpel. Can these problems be solved with a scalpel, or you really do believe that you need to bring the hammer down to some extent? NEEL KASHKARI: Well, here's the thing. I would love to be able to bring it with a scalpel, and a year ago I argued that I thought many of these factors were transitory, meaning you've got these one-time events, they're going to pass and then inflation will come down, so let’s not bring out the hammer. That was my view. That didn't happen. So now we have to bring the hammer, because if we don't bring the hammer, this thing can get out of control. JAMES JACOBY: So to those who point to the Fed and say you ran it too hot for too long and that was an epic mistake, you say what? NEEL KASHKARI: I say look around the world. Other central banks adjusted more quickly than we did, to their credit, and unfortunately their economies are facing very similar inflation. And so yes, with the benefit of hindsight, I wish we had tightened sooner, but I'm not kidding myself to think it would have made a big difference in where we are in inflation today. MALE NEWSREADER: Stick around for just a second as we watch the clock here, counting down to 2:30. JAMES JACOBY: A month after Jackson Hole, I caught up with business reporter Chris Leonard as the Fed was announcing another rate hike, moving at the fastest pace in 40 years. JEROME POWELL: Good afternoon. Today, the FOMC raised its policy interest rate by three-quarters of a percentage point. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: It can be a little bit hard to understand, because you hear, OK, the Fed hiked rates today to 3 1/2%. Well, what does that mean? That my credit card rate is going to be a little bit higher, or I'll have to borrow more money for a house? He is talking about a fundamental restructuring of the financial system. The financial system globally has been built around extremely low, ultra-low interest rates for 10 years. JEROME POWELL: My colleagues and I are strongly committed to bringing inflation back down to our 2% goal. CHRISTOPHER LEONARD: I think people don't appreciate the magnitude of what the Fed did over the last decade, and so this is going to be like a long-term thing playing out over time, probably over a year or two, of shifting to a higher rate environment and then the correction that that's going to cause. So he's talking about a huge adjustment that's not going to be an adjustment upward. Things aren't going to get easier. Things are going to get harder. MALE NEWSREADER: Tonight, the economic alarms are blaring. JAMES JACOBY: The specter of this kind of economic upheaval has heightened concerns about a recession— FEMALE NEWSREADER: The Fed has made it clear its number one priority is fighting inflation, even if it means the jobless rate, unemployment, goes up. MALE UNION ORGANIZER: Good evening! Are we going to let this corporation stop workers from joining a union? CROWD: No! JAMES JACOBY: It's also raised fears of layoffs, which has aggravated the organized labor movement. LIZ SHULER, President, AFL-CIO: I'm here with 12 1/2 million union members— JAMES JACOBY: Liz Shuler leads the largest union in the country. She's been urging the Fed to slow down. LIZ SHULER: Listen to your workers! We met with Chairman Powell and six board of governors because I think the Fed doesn't often get to hear from actual working people and how they're seeing things in the economy. JAMES JACOBY: What was your message for the Fed when they started to raise rates? LIZ SHULER: That raising the interest rates is bad for working people. That we think it puts the trajectory that we're on at risk, in terms of coming out of this pandemic. We know that we're in a consumer-driven economy, right? And if working people are not able to make ends meet, they're not going to be buying goods, and it's going to grind the economy to a halt. We can't take aggressive moves that are going to throw people out of work and basically balance the economy on the backs of working people. JAMES JACOBY: But I mean, the Fed is tasked with controlling inflation, and inflation is definitely bad for working people. So why advocate for the Fed to take its foot off the pedal? LIZ SHULER: Well, because the interest rate hikes they were implementing were happening quickly, and we thought it was happening too fast. And also, though, their tools aren't necessarily going to impact the things like gas prices and food prices, which is what most working people are worried about. DION RABOUIN: The Fed doesn't ever want to say this out loud, but their goal is, quite literally, to make businesses not want to hire people or to get businesses actually to lay people off. The Fed has estimated that the unemployment rate, under their very rosy projections, by the end of this year would rise to 4 1/2%. There is no real way for unemployment to get from 3 1/2% to 4 1/2% without millions of people losing their jobs. JAMES JACOBY: I understand the best-case scenario being that you bring down inflation without unemployment going up, and that somehow we avoid a recession. But if employment does stay strong and inflation stays high, then don't you have to basically hurt the jobs market? Isn't that the bottom line here? NEEL KASHKARI: We do have to. We are going to have to keep raising rates until we get inflation back down, that is absolutely true. And one of the sources of optimism, and it's mild optimism, is when there have been recessions that have been caused by the central bank raising interest rates, the good news is, once inflation is in check and they reverse the policies, the bounce back can be very quick. So we're not trying to engineer a recession, but if one were to happen, I feel pretty confident that we could have a very fast recovery. JAMES JACOBY: So how remote is the possibility that there could be much higher unemployment in the next couple of years? NEEL KASHKARI: I mean, I wouldn't say it's remote. It's hard to put the odds on it. CHAPTER SIXTEEN The Tide Goes Out JAMES JACOBY: Throughout 2022, the economy remained strong. Unemployment hovered near historic lows. FEMALE NEWSREADER: —showing unemployment at a half-century low. JAMES JACOBY: Wages were on the rise. MALE NEWSREADER: We also saw some wage growth, about 5% annually. JAMES JACOBY: —causing the Fed to continue pumping the brakes to try to cool down inflation. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The Fed has been raising rates in hopes of slowing the economy, and with so many businesses still hiring, that means the economy isn't really slowing that quickly. JAMES JACOBY: That riled Wall Street. MALE NEWSREADER: Facing the growing possibility of a recession, Wall Street spent another day in turmoil. FEMALE NEWSREADER: And you're probably feeling it in those 401(k)s. Stocks are headed— JAMES JACOBY: For the stock market and bond market, it was the worst year since the great financial crisis in 2008. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The NASDAQ down for four straight quarters for the first time since the dot-com bust. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: In 2022, we've had this very unusual situation whereby you've made double-digit losses on both risky assets, stocks, and risk-free assets, U.S. Treasuries. That's not supposed to happen. But there's been absolutely nowhere to hide. That is a big issue for retirement plans, pension systems, because no matter how well you diversified your portfolio, there was no risk mitigation in it at all. JAMES JACOBY: It was all losses? MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: It was all losses. FEMALE NEWSREADER: U.S. existing home sales plunged to a 12-year low in December. DION RABOUIN, The Wall Street Journal: You've seen a huge impact on the housing market. FEMALE NEWSREADER: The Federal Reserve's interest rate hiking cycle has pushed housing into a recession. DION RABOUIN: Housing prices have started actually coming down for the first time in a very long time. Mortgage applications have decreased. The crypto market, you've seen a number of companies wiped out. MALE NEWSREADER: Crypto winter is here. DION RABOUIN: That is not unrelated to what's happened with the Fed. MALE SPEAKER: Hold on to me, Sam. Let's go. FEMALE NEWSREADER: Sam Bankman-Fried faces investigations from U.S. regulators and potentially the Department of Justice. MALE SOCIAL MEDIA PERSONALITY: He invested $3 million into Luna, and now it's worth $1,000. STEVEN PEARLSTEIN, Contributing columnist, The Washington Post: You create these asset bubbles—that is, bubbles in stock markets and bond markets and real-estate markets and art markets, whatever people invest their money in with borrowed money. And then those bubbles burst, and then that causes a downturn. So rather than having— JAMES JACOBY: Steven Pearlstein has been reporting on the financial markets and the economy for almost 40 years. STEVEN PEARLSTEIN: Bubbles tend to be everything bubbles these days because if the source of it is cheap money, then you can be pretty much sure that it's not just real estate, or it's not just stocks, or it's not just tech and telecom. It's not just bitcoin. These things are connected by rubber bands with each other in a sort of way, and what propels one propels all of them. JAMES JACOBY: There's a famous line by investor Warren Buffet. WARREN BUFFET: You don't find out who's been swimming naked until the tide goes out. [Laughter] JAMES JACOBY: Almost everyone I spoke to repeated that line to describe what's been happening. RANA FOROOHAR, Associate editor, Financial Times: When interest rates start to rise and the tide pulls out, as Warren Buffet would say— CHARLES DUHIGG, The New York Times: You don't know who's swimming naked— DENNIS KELLEHER, Pres. & CEO, Better Markets: —until the tide goes out. AARON BENDIKSON, Partner, Onsight Capital Management: You see who's swimming without a bathing suit— NOURIEL ROUBINI: —when the tide is receding. SCOTT MINERD, Chief investment officer, Guggenheim Partners: We'll find out who's wearing their swimsuits when the tide goes out. RANA FOROOHAR: What's amazing is that a lot of people, and I would say I'm included in this, think that there probably will be a bigger correction at some point. JAMES JACOBY: Look, when you say you expect there to be a bigger correction, what does that actually mean? I mean, a lot of people are going to see this and get concerned about that, obviously. RANA FOROOHAR: Yeah. Yeah, let me try and be honest but not scare people [laughs], if that's possible. So the markets were down 20% last year. That seems like a lot, and if we were in a normal market cycle, I'd say, "OK, we're done. We're probably at the bottom." I don't know if I can safely say that we're at the bottom because of what we're looking back at, this age of easy money. Not just even since the financial crisis, but before that, for the decades that rates have been going down and down and down and debt has been going up and up and up. That's a long period of time where assets have arguably been artificially inflated, and so is it possible that you could see a continued correction at some point? It is possible. Now, I'm personally not going out and selling my entire stock portfolio; I don't want to scare people. But I do want to say that I think we are in a once-in-a-lifetime financial transition, and I think that everybody needs to sort of strap in for that, and if you need your money in the next couple of years, I would be more cautious than not. JAMES JACOBY: In these early months of 2023, on Wall Street, some have been betting that the Fed will relent and stop raising interest rates. Maybe even tolerate higher inflation. Because the higher it pushes rates, and the longer it does, the greater the risks. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: So the marketplace is saying the Fed is going to go too far and is going to be forced to reverse course. That is really unusual. And we've got to a situation now where the markets dismiss what the Fed is telling us. It's a moment where there are many more potential outcomes. Some are fine—a "soft landing." Some are not—a hard landing. And the truth is, you cannot distinguish enough between them. JAMES JACOBY: One of the most pessimistic voices is economist Nouriel Roubini, who became famous for his accurate prediction of the financial crisis in 2008. NOURIEL ROUBINI: We have had literally a few decades of ever-increasing bubbles that have been fed and supported by central banks. And not only have we had bubbles, but we've had bubbles that have been fed by excessive leverage, excessive private and public borrowing and excessive risk-taking. The party is over. Inflation is high and rising. Central banks have to increase interest rates. That is bursting the asset bubble. It's increasing the amount of the debt servicing of everybody who over-borrowed like crazy. So we lived in a bubble, in a dream, and this dream in a bubble is bursting and is turning into an economic and a financial nightmare. JAMES JACOBY: If Roubini's prediction of a debt crisis is correct, then Jim Millstein would be on the front lines of it. He’s known on Wall Street as the guy who countries and companies turn to when they run into trouble and need their debts to be restructured. Wouldn't a debt crisis actually be good for your business? JIM MILLSTEIN, Co-chairman, Guggenheim Securities: [Laughs] You know, I'm getting a little too old for this. [Laughs] JAMES JACOBY: [Laughs] Meaning what? Too old for what? JIM MILLSTEIN: This business! No, I—Yeah, no, it'll be a boom for the restructuring business. But I just don't think it's avoidable at this point. I think we're just—The bill has come due and it's going to have to be paid. JAMES JACOBY: How worried are you about what's happening right now? JIM MILLSTEIN: I've never been more worried in the 42 years that I've been a professional, either as a lawyer, banker or government servant. The American corporate sector has never been more levered in American history, never had more debt, and American households are just about as levered as they were heading into the 2008 financial crisis, whether it's student loans or mortgage loans or car loans or personal loans or credit card loans. We've borrowed a lot of money as a people. And so the Fed is absolutely right to try and get it under control by raising interest rates and slowing economic activity. But the most highly levered players in our economy are going to come under real stress, whether that's households or businesses or governments, as interest costs rise. JAMES JACOBY: Are you basically saying that we should be preparing right now? That there would be a bursting of this massive credit bubble? JIM MILLSTEIN: It's happening right in front of us. It may—It's happening right now. JAMES JACOBY: Are you usually this gloomy, or am I just getting you on a bad day? JIM MILLSTEIN: You got me on a bad day. [Laughs] JAMES JACOBY: One of the concerns is that there's a kind of debt bomb out there, both in the American economy as well as the global economy. How concerned are you about a credit bubble popping? NEEL KASHKARI: We're looking at the data. We're not seeing evidence of such a popping. We're not seeing evidence of delinquencies taking off. Might it happen in the future? It might, but I'm not seeing evidence of it. Households on average have very strong balance sheets. The big banks, which can be very risky for the economy, are well-capitalized relative to where they were before 2008. So we're not seeing evidence of it yet. Can't rule it out. JAMES JACOBY: So I guess the question though is how much disruption in the financial markets are you willing to tolerate now that they're adjusting to this new interest rate environment, after more than a decade of zero rates? NEEL KASHKARI: We live in a market economy, and market participants need to find a way to adjust to a changing economic landscape. It's not the Fed's job to bail out Wall Street investors if their stock portfolios go down. Obviously, we need to keep systemic risk from spilling across the whole economy, and when those events happen, we are prepared to act. But from—in my view, the bar of us acting, the bar from us acting should be quite high. JAMES JACOBY: I mean, the Fed has come to the rescue several times, and we've talked about this in the past, of the financial markets that had grown vulnerable and brittle. So, are you saying—I'm just, again I'm asking, what degree of disruption would you have to see in order for the Fed to intervene? NEEL KASHKARI: We're a long, long way away from that. I guess I would say it that way. We're a long, long way for any kind of disruption that would warrant us stepping in in that way. JAMES JACOBY: Less than five months after that interview, the Fed would indeed have to step in. FEMALE NEWSREADER: In breaking news, a U.S. Federal Reserve has bailed out the Silicon Valley Bank, which had collapsed over the weekend. JAMES JACOBY: It enacted emergency measures to shore up the banking system after two banks collapsed. MALE NEWSREADER: This is the biggest bank collapse since the 2008 financial crisis. JOE BIDEN: There are important questions of how these banks got into the circumstance in the first place. SHEILA BAIR: We're seeing a potential fragility in the system related to monetary policy. If we hadn't been driving our economy for 14 years with easy money and then trying to really quickly undo that, no, we wouldn't be having these problems now. Absolutely not. JAMES JACOBY: What should the Fed do? SHEILA BAIR: So, for a long time, I've advocated that the Fed should be raising rates. But even I believe now they need to hit pause. They've gone too far, too fast. They need to hit pause and assess the impact on the financial system and the economy. JAMES JACOBY: It's unclear what the Fed will do next. But just days before the bank failures, Jerome Powell appeared before Congress to answer tough questions about the economy. JEROME POWELL: We actually don’t think that we need to see a sharp or enormous increase in unemployment to get inflation under control. SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN, (D) MA: I’m looking at your projections. Do you call laying off 2 million people this year not a sharp increase? JAMES JACOBY: The hearing was a showcase of partisan politics and government gridlock. SEN. KEVIN CRAMER, (R) ND: Raising interest rates won’t stop Senate Democrats and President Biden from overtaxing, overspending, overborrowing, overregulating. JAMES JACOBY: And it was yet another reminder of how, in an era of political dysfunction, we’ve become so dependent on the Fed, and on easy money, to drive the American economy. STEVEN PEARLSTEIN: The economy needs to get back into balance, and that will be painful. And if we keep putting off the day of reckoning, we’ll just make the day of reckoning a bigger day of reckoning. JAMES JACOBY: How do you think we’ll look back at this era of easy money? STEVEN PEARLSTEIN: Unfortunately, I think we may look back on it as something of a golden era, because cheap and free money, without consequences, is great. But in other ways, we will think about it as a lesson for the future, which is that it was a mistake. MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN: I think that we're going to look back on this era as being totally exceptional historically, and one where we didn't fulfill its potential. We lost sight of something critical: We lost sight of how we grow our economy in a sustainable and inclusive fashion. The world of easy money went way too far. Way, way too far. Let's do the other stuff that's needed. The stuff that really promotes genuine, durable, inclusive growth and not this stuff that creates artificial growth. We are capable of producing that. None of that is in the hands of the Fed. They don't invest in infrastructure. They can't reform the tax system. They can't help labor retraining. This is a political problem.
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in facebook < https://www.facebook.com/groups/162792258578547/permalink/595312771993158/ >
In the literature , carmen is not the villainous, as later in the play or movie. In the play and definitely movie versions carmen is the seductress who tempts a good man away. but in the literature carmen didn't have a part in his original sin so to speak, she simply proves he hasn't changed but is angry when she moves on from him, which all versions have oddly enough. The woman moving on from a fallen guy is the end hook in each:) ... to the white produced film, written by a white man with an all black cast:) I have huge issues with Kleiner's interpretation, like Heyward's porgy and bess. Both stories do not have a proper comprehension of the financial levels or internal social strata's of the black community in the USA. What do I mean? Kleiner suggest that a black woman who has "hoodoo voodoo" is equivalent to a romani woman. the romani are considered another race in spain. A black woman who does "hoodoo voodoo" is not deemed another race in the black community in the usa. From a storytelling perspective, the correct thing for carmen jones is similar to OScar Micheaux's symbol of the unconquered. No disrespect to harry belafonte's joe but in the black community in the usa since world war II is a small, usually high yellow, usually passing, financial black aristocracy who embraced the usa faster than other black people. Joe should be that, like in said michaeux film. So, the vision of the black community is totally false. The reason the movie made money was the same reason cameron's avatar movies make money, the spectacle. A film of black people, with the sexy pearl bailey/dorothy dandrige the handsom well known white female sex symbol [I just quoted or paraphrased james baldwin] is the selling point. For all audiences the image of an all black cast and no mamies, forgive me hattie mcdaniel , during the time of premminger's carmen was the same as the totally digital blue people of cameron's avatar.
in youtube LINK < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBISrX84MpU >
Before 10:15 One key you didn't mention is the role of women inability to own things based on male power.
After 10:15 great point, one of the biggest problems with many later carmen's that the original literature doesn't miss is the other racial category of carmen. Carmen is the tragedy. Dorothy dandrige was clearly very pretty but Carmen isn't the beautiful woman every man needs to fornicate with who when withers if they fornicate with her. Carmen is an outsider , deemed another of the dominant race, who meets a dishonorable/criminal man who still lives a very good life because of his racial status, and when her admiration to him makes him feel better all is good, but when she desires a change and a better man, at least in terms of criminal record, the disgraced man of "a better race" terminates her. That is the lesson of carmen. A person of a potent race can commit crimes and still live affluent or oppulent compared to one of an impotent race, and when the one of an impotent race decides to leave the one of an opulent race the true racial relationship is revealed in the murder.
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Post Bob Marley birthday talk
richardmurray replied to richardmurray's topic in Culture, Race & Economy
@ProfD Well the question is progress to what? Again, the goal matters. One of the problems with many human movements throughout all humanity is people all to often don't see the goal they are reaching for over the journey. Look at Russia. I was a child, but I remember hoopla over the end of the USSR. Later as a teen I read things. As an adult I have seen Russia go through its changes from a distance as an unconcerned observer. But it is a lesson. The russian people who fled russia during the evil soviet years, still haven't returned but supported russians who wanted to make a version of the monarchic days in russia and that is what happened. Yeah, the oppression of the soviets is gone and russia is in a version of the czarist days with an american stylistic visage. But that is what the goal was. What is the progress toward in the black community in the usa? yes, because the goal hasn't changed. the goal is the same that frederick championed over 150 years ago, peaceful coexistence sides whites in the usa. Yeah, a marcus garvey/fannie lou hamer/malcolm x/shirley chisholm happen but they are all outcast in that something about them leads to a goal different than what frederick douglass and most black leaders: booker t washington/w.e.b. dubois the younger/ the black club women of church/the mlk jr/the nation of islam/ fred hampton/the southern black christian leadership conference/jesse jackson/maxine waters/al sharpton/robert johnson/oprah winfrey/ michael jordan/barrack obama side michelle obama/hakeem jeffries/lebron james/ or similar all lead to peaceful coexistence side whites in the usa. Yes,the agenda is as it was set at the end of the war between the states, peaceful coexistence between blacks side all in the usa. That demands a code of nonviolence to whites regardless of white activity/participation in white organizations even styming black ones/forgiveness to whites even it isn't warranted/allegiance to the usa. And black people in the usa in majority have done that. To finalize, they are interested in ending the system of white supremacy through reaching the goal of peaceful multiracial coexistence in the usa. Which as the center of the current global empire has global implications. In conclusion I said in this forum before and I repeat with no hesitancy, I think Frederick Douglass was wrong and his agenda implemented by latter leaders has cost black people in the usa their lives or led to their suffering at the hands of whites with no escape, and influenced the black communities outside the usa negatively. But, the point is the black community in the usa has an agenda, has organizations that follow it with its code. It is a challenge cause it is in spite of what black people in the usa in majority wanted, but that is the situation. And it has its levels or forms of success. -
The One Actor Between The Last Of Us video game and show
richardmurray posted a blog entry in BlackGamesElite's BGE Journal
How Merle Dandridge became the only The Last of Us game actor to reprise role in the series Creators Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin say the new scenes with Marlene and Ellie in the premiere will bring "a greater payoff" by the end of the show. Nick Romano By Nick Romano January 16, 2023 at 02:20 PM EST Warning: Mild spoilers from HBO's The Last of Us premiere are discussed in this article. Merle Dandridge holds a unique position within the cast of HBO's The Last of Us. The BAFTA Award winner is the only legacy actor from the original video games to play the same role in the live-action series adaptation, that of Marlene, the leader of the rebel group known as the Fireflies. Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson, who originated the roles of Joel and Ellie, will appear as different characters, with Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey taking over as the sci-fi drama's two leads. Jeffrey Pierce, who voiced Joel's brother Tommy in the games, will see Gabriel Luna take over the role he helped originate, but he'll be on hand playing a character newly created for the series. Most of this, obviously, had to do with practicality. "I think Merle Dandridge was probably a bit younger than Marlene was in 2013," series writer and executive producer Craig Mazin tells EW, noting the year the first game released. "Or at least Marlene had gone through the apocalypse. She was a little more weathered and [had] a little more grey in her hair." Dandridge, at 47, is neither weathered nor grey. "Don't ever stand next to her in a picture," warns Neil Druckmann, who created the games and now heads the show with Mazin. "It won't do you anything." "You look like dog s--- next to her, I guarantee you," Mazin agrees. "She's also eternally youthful. It's 10 years later [after the first game's debut] and she does have this wonderful gravitas. So it was really a question of, 'Hey, if we just wig her, I think we're there.' That was an easy one. It's obviously not anything we could contemplate with, say, Troy Baker." Baker, Mazin notes, is "so physically different from Joel," a character described as a hardened survivor who's marked by the traumatic death of his daughter, Sarah (Nico Parker). Twenty years after a fungal brain infection has spread across the globe, transforming victims into zombie-like monsters, Joel is living in a quarantine zone in Boston, where he's tasked with smuggling out a 14-year-old girl, Ellie, who's somehow immune to the virus. "Ashley Johnson is in her 30s and clearly not gonna play a 14-year-old girl, but it was important for us to find space for them [in the show] because they matter," Mazin says. "It's not just about fan service. It's a dramatic genetic connection between the game and the show. They needed to be there." Baker will appear later in The Last of Us as James, a minor character from the games that has been expanded on for the show. He's described as a senior member of a group of settlers who must fight to keep their community alive in the face of increasingly brutal odds. Johnson will play Anna, a pregnant woman, alone and on the run, who must give birth under the most terrifying of circumstances. Pierce will then appear as Perry, described only as a rebel in a quarantine zone. Dandridge is also getting an expanded role, as viewers have already seen in the premiere episode, which dropped on HBO and HBO Max Sunday. Scenes between her character and Ramsey's Ellie confirm that Marlene is somehow linked to the girl's origin story. Druckmann points to an artifact players can find towards the end of The Last of Us game: an audio recording that sheds more light on Marlene's relationship with Ellie. "It doesn't get into the same kind of details as we do in the show, but there is a recording that you could find at the end of the game all the way in the hospital that she spells out some of her relationship with Ellie's origin," he says. "I don't wanna say more to spoil it, but because we don't have to adhere to one perspective — in this part of the game, you're playing as Joel in the quarantine zone, so everything you're seeing is through his eyes — we said, how can we introduce Ellie earlier? That was an opportunity to start showing more of that relationship with Marlene, which then has a greater payoff later because we've established the relationship more explicitly here." PHOTO CREDIT: Merle Dandridge appears as Marleen, her character from 'The Last of Us' video games, in the HBO series. | CREDIT: HBO ARTICLE URL : https://ew.com/tv/the-last-of-us-merle-dandridge-marlene-ellie-origins/ -
For decades, the Mapleson Cylinders — recordings from Lionel Mapleson, an English-born librarian for the Metropolitan Opera — have been a valuable but fragile resource.Credit...Tony Cenicola/The New York Times
Wax Cylinders Hold Audio From a Century Ago. The Library Is Listening.
The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts acquired a machine that transfers recordings from the fragile format. Then a batch of cylinders from a Met Opera librarian arrived.By Jeremy Gordon
Published Jan. 2, 2023
Updated Jan. 3, 2023
The first recording, swathed in sheets of distortion, was nonetheless recognizable as a child’s voice — small, nervous, encouraged by his father — wishing a very Merry Christmas to whoever was listening.The second recording, though still noisy, adequately captured the finale of the second act of “Aida,” performed by the German singer Johanna Gadski at the Metropolitan Opera House in the spring of 1903.
And the third recording was the clearest yet: the waltz from “Romeo and Juliet,” also from the Met, sung by the Australian soprano Nellie Melba.
Accessed by laptop in a conference room at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the recordings had been excavated and digitized from a much older source: wax cylinders, an audio format popularized in the late 19th century as the first commercial means of recording sound. These particular documentations originated with Lionel Mapleson, an English-born librarian for the Metropolitan Opera, who made hundreds of wax cylinder recordings, capturing both the turn-of-the-century opera performances he saw as part of his job and the minutiae of family life.
For decades, the Mapleson Cylinders, as they’re called by archivists and audiologists, have been a valuable but fragile resource. Wax cylinders were not made for long-term use — the earliest models wore out after a few dozen plays — and are especially vulnerable to poor storage conditions. But with the innovation of the Endpoint Cylinder and Dictabelt Machine, a custom-built piece of equipment made specifically for safely transferring audio from the cylinders, the library is embarking on an ambitious preservation project: to digitize not just the Mapleson Cylinders, but roughly 2,500 others in the library’s possession.
The machine will also allow the library to play a handful of broken Mapleson cylinders that nobody alive has ever heard. “I have no idea what they’re going to sound like, but the fact that they were shattered a long time ago saved them from being played too often,” said Jessica Wood, the library’s assistant curator for music and recorded sound. “It’s possible that the sound quality of those will let us hear something totally new from the earliest moments in recording history.”
Some of the Mapleson Cylinders had already been in the library’s collection, but another batch was recently provided by Alfred Mapleson, the Met librarian’s great-grandson. This donation was accompanied by another valuable resource: a collection of diaries, written by Lionel Mapleson, that studiously chronicled both his daily life and the Metropolitan Opera’s calendar. The diaries provide extra context to both Mapleson’s audio recordings and the broader world of New York opera. One entry from New Year’s Day in 1908 noted the “tremendous reception” for a performance by Gustav Mahler. Another described the time that the Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini, “in rage,” dismissed his orchestra because of noise on the roof.
“The consistent keeping of this diary is much more important than just for music,” said Bob Kosovsky, a librarian in the New York Public Library’s music division. “It’s such an amazing insight into life in New York and England, since he went back every summer to the family.”
The library acquired the Endpoint machine from its creator, Nicholas Bergh, last spring, as NPR reported then. “The Western music at that time was being recorded in the studios, so it’s very unique to have someone that was documenting what was actually going on there at the theater,” said Bergh, who developed the machine as part of his work in audio preservation.
Alfred Mapleson soon reached out to the library about the diaries, and the collection of his great-grandfather’s cylinders that had, for years, awaited rediscovery in his mother’s Long Island basement. In November, they were packed into coolers and transported by climate-controlled truck to the library, where they’re now stored in acid-free cardboard boxes meant to mitigate the risk of future degradation. (On Long Island, they’d been kept in Tuborg Gold beer caddies.)
These particular cylinders were previously available to the library in the 1980s, when they were transferred to magnetic tape and released as part of a six-volume LP set compiling the Mapleson recordings. After that, they were returned to the Mapleson family, while the greater collection stayed with the library. But, Wood said, “there’s people all over the world that are convinced that a new transfer of those cylinders would reveal more audio details than the previous ones.”
Wax cylinders were traditionally played on a phonograph, where, similar to a modern record player, a stylus followed grooves in the wax and translated the information into sound. The Endpoint machine uses a laser that places less stress on the cylinders, allowing it to take a detailed imprint without sacrificing physical integrity, and to adjust for how some cylinders have warped over time. The machine can retrieve information from broken cylinder shards that are incapable of being traditionally played, which can then be digitally reconstituted into a complete recording.
Within the next few years, the library hopes to digitize both the cylinders and the diaries, and make them available to the public. The non-Mapleson cylinders in the library’s collection are also eligible to be digitized, though Wood said that process will be determined based on requests for certain cylinders. The library’s engineers are shared across departments, and with a backlog of thousands, she said, “We have to wait our turn.”
The wax cylinders comprise just one aspect of the library’s ongoing audiovisual archival projects. Its archives of magnetic tape were recently digitized thanks to a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. And curators are in talks with Bergh about a new machine he’s developing that can play back wire recording, a midcentury format that captured audio on a thin steel wire. Wood estimated that about 32,000 lacquer discs — a predecessor to the vinyl record — at “very high risk of deterioration” are also in the digitization queue. These discs contain all types of audio, including radio excerpts, early jazz music and recordings made at amusement parks.
“Libraries, in general, are very focused on books and paper formats,” Wood said. “We’re getting to a point where we’ve had to argue less hard for the importance of sound recordings, and that’s allowing us to get some more traction to invest resources in digitizing these.”
Alfred Mapleson said he was simply happy to put his family inheritance to good use. The cylinders were previously part of the Mapleson Music Library, a family-owned business that rented sheet music, among other things, to performers. But the business liquidated in the mid-1990s, and the cylinders had sat untouched in his mother’s basement ever since.
“There’s an important obligation to history that needs to be maintained,” he said. “We don’t want them sitting in our possession, where they could get lost or damaged.” He waved off the possibility of selling them to a private collector, where they might find no public utility: “That’s not something that would sit well with my family.”
His great-grandfather’s archives had offered him plenty to reflect on. His wife had gone through the diaries, he said, and pointed out the behavioral similarities between living family members and their ancestors. He noted, with some awe, how his grandfather’s voice — the one wishing a Merry Christmas — resembled his own children’s voices. But it was time to pass everything on, and he said he had no interest in repossessing the materials once the library had finished digitizing everything.
“It’s in better hands at the New York Public Library,” he said. The recordings had originated at the Metropolitan Opera; now, they would reside nearby forever. “Let’s keep it in New York, because this is where it all happened. I like that idea.”
A correction was made on Jan. 3, 2023: An earlier version of this article misstated Bob Kosovsky’s role at the New York Public Library. He is a librarian, not a curator.
A version of this article appears in print on Jan. 4, 2023, Section C, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: Reviving Long-Gone Operatic Voices. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | SubscribeMY THOUGHTS
I am thinking it will be cool to try and make some wax recordings, see what happens.
Now hear are some digital recordings of phonograph cylinders
1888 recording of Arthur Sullivan's "The Lost Chord", recorded by George Gouraud, and played at the August 14, 1888, press conference that introduced the phonograph to London.Song of the "Ujangong" mask dance
Phonograph cylinder recorded in German New Guinea on August 23, 1904, by German anthropologist Rudolf Pöch1910 Indestructible Record
"Auld Lang Syne", sung by Frank C. Stanley in 1910Article URL
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/02/arts/music/new-york-public-library-wax-cylinders.htmlAudio referral URL
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonograph_cylinder
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Larry Buchanan/The New York Times
Did a Fourth Grader Write This? Or the New Chatbot?
Don’t be surprised if you can’t always tell. Neither could a fourth-grade teacher — or Judy Blume.
By Claire Cain Miller, Adam Playford, Larry Buchanan and Aaron Krolik Dec. 26, 2022
It’s hard to fully grasp the enormous potential of ChatGPT, a new artificial intelligence chatbot released last month. The bot doesn’t just search and summarize information that already exists. It creates new content, tailored to your request, often with a startling degree of nuance, humor and creativity. Most of us have never seen anything like it outside of science fiction.
To better understand what ChatGPT can do, we decided to see if people could tell the difference between the bot’s writing and a child’s.
We used real essay prompts from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (the standardized test from the Department of Education, known as the nation’s report card). We asked the bot to produce essays based on those prompts — sometimes with a little coaching, and always telling it to write like a student of the appropriate age. We put what it wrote side by side with sample answers written by real children.
We asked some experts on children’s writing to take our variation on the Turing test, live on a call with us. They were a fourth-grade teacher; a professional writing tutor; a Stanford education professor; and Judy Blume, the beloved children’s author. None of them could tell every time whether a child or a bot wrote the essay. See how you do.
BELOW ARE PROMPTS , can you tell if they are from human children or chatbot, if you want to test yourself, go to the article url after my thoughts and test yourself
Prompt 1: School Lunch
The following prompt was given to fourth graders.
Describe what lunchtime is like for you on a school day. Be sure to tell about your lunchtime so that someone who has never had lunch with you on a school day can understand where you have lunch and what lunchtime is like.
Here are three answers. They were written either by a real fourth grader or ChatGPT. (You can read all three before deciding. But once you pick, your choices lock in. Then keep scrolling to see how our experts did.)
1 of 10
Essay 1: A fun and exciting timeLunchtime on a school day is a fun and exciting time for me and my friends. We usually go to the cafeteria, which is a big and noisy room filled with tables and chairs. After getting our lunch from the lunch ladies, we find a spot to sit and enjoy our meal. I like to bring a yummy sandwich and a cold juice box for lunch, and sometimes I'll even pack a tasty piece of fruit or a bag of crunchy chips. As we eat, we chat and laugh and catch up on each other’s day.
Overall, lunchtime is a great opportunity to take a break from classes and spend time with my friends. I always look forward to it, and I always have a good time. The cafeteria can be a little crowded and noisy, but it's a fun and lively place to be. I’m grateful that I get to enjoy a delicious lunch with my friends every day.
Human child
ChatGPT2 of 10
Essay 2: I usually eat cold lunchAt lunchtime I usually eat cold lunch. My mother packs me a sandwich, a drink, fruit, and a treat. When I get in the lunchroom I find an empty table and sit there, and eat my lunch. My friends come and sit down with me. I open my lunch and start to eat. First I eat my sandwich then I open my drink, then eat my fruit and last but not least my treat. After that I sit quietly until I am dismissed. When I am I go into to the bathroom and clean my teeth because I have braces.
When I am done with that I go outside and put my lunchbox away and go find my friends. We usually play four square or play on the play ground. If we are not on the playground or on the four square ground we are on the field playing tag, kickball, or soccer. I really like to play soccer and my friends do too.
Human child
ChatGPT3 of 10
Essay 3: Everybody talksLunch time in my school is very noisy, because everybody talks. The 4th, 5th, and 6th graders at my school have to eat lunch at the same time. We all sit at tables that are set up in the gym, across half of the basketball court. We eat lunch every day from 11:45 am through 12:00 pm. At lunch everyone eats and talks to their friends until the lunch-moms dismiss them so they can go to recess. When everybody has cleared out of the lunch room, the janitors and lunch moms whipe off the tables, just on time for the 7th and 8th graders to come into the room for lunch. After lunch and recess I go back to my 4th grade classroom, which is in the basement. I like lunch time a lot — it’s my favorite time of the day!
Human child
ChatGPTPrompt 2: Becoming President
The following prompt was given to eighth graders.
Imagine that you wake up one morning to discover that you have become the President of the United States. Write a story about your first day as President.
Here are three answers:
4 of 10
Essay 1: Royal blue silk sheetsIt was my first official day being the president. I woke up early that day because I was extremely eager to begin my work.
I woke up in the most enormous bed I’ve ever laid eyes on. There were layes of royal blue silk sheets under a soft white down comforter. The deep red pillows supported my head and had helped me to enjoy a good nights’ rest.
I hesitated before climbing out of bed, not wanting to leave my sense of eutopia. I eventually found myself making my way to the walk-in closet across the room. In it were countless pants, shirts, shoes, and ties that were all unique, so it wasn't a difficult decision.
I heard a knock on the door and call for them to come in. It was my maid. Yes, I had a maid! I couldn’t believe it.
I sprang downstairs to the breakfast table as numerous people were awaiting to serve me. It was delicious.
After brushing my teeth and doing all of the other essentials, it was time for me to take charge.
My office was humungus and was covered, floor to ceiling with rows and rows of books. In front of gigantic windows, was my desk, where I sat for many hours of the day stressing out over papers I needed to sign and decisions I had to make. It wasn’t as simple as I thought.
That night I had a dinner party to attend with some important businessmen. Everything ran smoothly.
I returned home that night to my cozy bed, just in time for yet another good nights’ sleep. Only to wake up and repeat it all tomorrow. What a life I live.
Human child
ChatGPT5 of 10
Essay 2: Shocked and amazedOne morning, I woke up to discover that I had become the President of the United States. I was shocked and amazed, but I quickly realized that I had a huge responsibility on my shoulders.
I got dressed and headed to the White House, where I was greeted by the Secret Service and my staff. They told me that I had a busy day ahead of me, with meetings with foreign leaders and important decisions to make.
I met with the Vice President and the rest of the Cabinet, and we discussed the major issues facing the country. I listened carefully to their advice, and made some tough decisions.
I also met with the leaders of other countries, and we discussed ways to improve relations and solve global problems. I was nervous at first, but I soon realized that I was up to the task.
At the end of the day, I was exhausted but proud of what I had accomplished. I knew that being President was a huge challenge, but I was ready to face it head on. I went to bed that night, ready for the challenges that the next day would bring.
Human child
ChatGPT6 of 10
Essay 3: Madam PresidentIt was a typical Tuesday morning. I woke up, got dresesed, and went downstairs to eat breakfast. But as I was pouring myself a bowl of cereal, I heard a knock on the door. I opened it to find a man in a suit standing on my porch.
“Good morning, Madam President,” he said. “I’m here to take you to the White House.”
I was stunned. I had no idea what he was talking about. I had never even run for presidnet.
“I’m sorry, but there must be some mistake,” I said. “I’m just an eighth gradeer.”
The man chuckled. “I understand your confusion, Madam President, but the fact remains that you are now the President of the United States. You were chosen by the previous president to be his successor in the event that something were to happen to him.”
I was speechless. I had never even thought about being president before. And now, all of a sudden, I was the leader of the free world.
The man ushered me into a black car and we drove to the White House. When we arrived, I was greeted by a crowd of people and a flurry of flashing cameras. I was whisked inside and taken to the Oval Office, where I was given a briefing on the state of the nation.
It was a crisis-filled day. The economy was in shambles, the nation was divided, and there were threats of war on the horizon. I had to make tough decisions and work with other world leaders to try and solve these problems.
But despite the challenges, I felt a sense of pride and responsibility. I was the President of the United States, and I was determined to do my best for my country and its people.
Human child
ChatGPT
Prompt 3: A Castle AppearsThe following prompt was given to fourth graders.
One morning a child looks out the window and discovers that a huge castle has appeared overnight. The child rushes outside to the castle and hears strange sounds coming from it. Someone is living in the castle!
The castle door creaks open. The child goes in.
Write a story about who the child meets and what happens inside the castle.
And here are four answers (don’t worry, they’re shorter):
7 of 10
Essay 1: John the knight“Wow a castle!” said John. He had know clue of how it got here or where it came from? He walked inside and found that it was rather damp. He wandered around until finally he saw someone. This person didn’t look normal. He was dressed in royalty with a purple cape and a crown of jewels. Then the person spoke out. “There you are you’re supposed to be training right now.” John had know clue what he was talking about. Suddenly he thought of something, was this the King of the castle? He finally got the nerve to ask a question. He asked “Who are you”. He answered “I’m the King.” John was shocked. Then the King told him to get on his armor. John thought and thought. Then he knew what he was talking about. He thought he was a knight. John thought again. If he was to be a knight then he would never see his family again. Then he thought of his older sister, Jennifer. He decided to be a knight. After about 2 months he finally was knighted. He fought many dragons and man. He finally died but is still a legend today. The end.
Human child
ChatGPT8 of 10
Essay 2: A dragon named SparkyOne morning a child looks out the window and discovers that a huge castle has appeared over knight. The child rushes outside to the castle and hears strange sounds coming from it. Someone is living in the castle! The castle door creaks open and the child goes in. The child walks into the castle and is amazed by what they see. The walls are made of shiny stones, and there are torches burning along the walls, casting a warm glow on the room. The child hears a voice calling out from deep inside the castle. “Is anyone there?” the child calls out. “Yes, I’m here!” the voice says. The child follows the voice until they come to a room with a big fireplace. Inside the fireplace, the child sees a small, friendly-looking dragon. “Hello!” the dragon says. “I'm Sparky, I’m the only one who lives here in the castle, I've been all alone for a very long time.” The child is amazed. They have never seen a real dragon before. “Do you want to be friends?” the dragon asks. The child nods and smiles, “Yes, I would love to be friends with you, Sparky.” Sparky is so happy to have a new friend, he shows the child all around the castle. They play games and explore the castle together. The child has the best day of their lie, and they can't wait to come back and visit Sparky again!
Human child
ChatGPT9 of 10
Essay 3: Tsharra exploresOnce there was a little girl who had looked out of her bedroom window. Her name, was Tsharra. She was only 5 yrs. old. Tsharra spotted a castle right in front of her house. So she decided to explore. She went to the front of the castle and a chain wood door opened. It sounded like it needed oil on the hinges. Tsharra stepped her tiny foot in. She looked straight ahead and saw a velvit red thrown on the ground. It has 3 steps that leaded to a marble deck. There were 2 tall chairs and in them were a king and queen. The king and queen wore golden sparkly crows with lots of diamonds and jewls. They both wore purple velvet caps that went all the way around them. Tsharra was amazed she was starring straight in the eyes of a real king and queen. The king and queen had not a son or daughter. The king and queen were whispering back and forth. Should we keep her said one. Sure said the other. We should adapt her by tomorrow. Tsharra heard them. She’s ours. She stayed in the castle over night. In the morning she was adapted and the little family lived happily ever after.
Human child
ChatGPT10 of 10
Essay 4: Sir James and AliceThe child’s name is Alice and she is very curious. She walks into the castle and sees a knight in shining armor. The knight is holding a sword and is practicing his sword skills.
Alice watches the knight for a moment and then walks up to him. The knight is surprised to see her and asks her what she is doing in the castle. Alice tells him that she woke up to find the castle in her backyard and wanted to explore it.
The knight introduces himself as Sir James and tells Alice that he has been living in the castle for many years. He tells her that the castle is magical and that it can take her to different worlds.
Alice is amazed and asks Sir James if he can take her to one of these worlds. Sir James says that he can, but only if she is brave enough. Alice says she is brave and Sir James takes her to a world full of dragons.
Alice is scared at first, but she quickly learns that the dragons are friendly and she even gets to ride one. She has the best adventure of her life and can’t wait to see what other worlds the castle has to offer.
Human child
ChatGPTMY THOUGHTS
As I said to computer programs, sculpting images from a prompt, computer programs sculpting essays isn't a problem to me.
The two issues with computer created art are simple: 1) the truth 2) acceptance of human effort absent competitionsTo the truth, as a writer , if another writer wants to use a computer program to write a book and that book provides millions, I don't have a problem as long as the author admit it. The odd thing about those who use computer programs is how ashamed they are to admit it. Just say you do. why can't you?
The same applies to drawing or anything resulting from a program. Just admit a computer program is used.To artistic competition, one of the problems in art since the domination of those of white european descent to all other humans is the role of critique or judgement in ranking art which relates to financial evaluation. Jean Michel Basquiat when alive had art that he gave away to people who treated it worthlessly, but in the last few years since this writing, his art has sold for multiples of millions.
The point, artistic quality can not be used to rank art. And once artistic ranking ends, then the threat of what computers generate to artists or the greater art community is nonexistent. The reason why artists/art assessors or judgers feel threatened is cause the ranking of art creates an artificial ranking that allows some artist to profit.And for children don't worry, if you want to test any one of any age , just take the time in school to test them, eradicate homework and lesson lecture time and have more testing time, and students will exhibit what they know... the question is, is the goal of education a jounrey to grow or is the goal of education a competitive race to win. If it is a journey to grow, a student can be left back a trillion times and all is well. If education is a competition then cheating has to be allowed.
Article URL
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/12/26/upshot/chatgpt-child-essays.html
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@Troy
I like the fact that the bill realizes that the problem the descendent of enslaved have transcends the usa. One of the problems with reparations as an issue is many can't accept that reparations is beyond the usa, it is truly about the relationship between blacks and whites in the american continent. A relationship that is historically far worse than negative.My only issue with the bill is , it sadly isn't needed. I have thought about reparations for a while and it occurs to me that if you look at the DOS community from a what happened and what needs to be undone perspective, no study is needed.
What happened?
DOSers ancestors were ripped from their homes and forced to be part of another community and said ancestors descendents from the 13 colonies to today live absent a choice for the most part in the community, the usa or the 13 colonies that preceded it, that their forebears were forced to be a part of. That is the simple truth of DOS history. So, that is what happened.
How do you undo that?
Simple, DOSers need a new land all to themselves to replace the lands they were ripped from, and they need resources to build up that land reciprocating all the resources their forebears of themselves provided to make the 13 colonies and the usa what they were.
The problem is, no where on earth is uninhabited . so at least 15,000,000 people will cause chaos by default wherever they go. Exhibit a is israel. at the end of the day, the idea was tried out there and look at palestine, it is a never ending negative situation. Yes, israel has alliances but the palestineans have not forgotten and the situation is simply a blood feud, that will only end when the palestinean or the israeli are gone. DOSers will simply be another israeli group.
The only internal black problem with reparations is something the prior commentors allude to, correctly, but they don't say straightly. White European power forced Black African people to be part of the 13 colonies or the usa. But said power occurred for so long, many, not most , but many black people have accepted the usa side the whites in it. Sequentially, those blacks don't need reparations. Do you comprehend Troy?
It is historical fact that most free blacks and 99% of the enslaved blacks when the usa was founded didn't want the usa founded or wanted out of the usa. It is historical fact that it was true during the war of 1812 and up to the war between the states. It was during the war between the states that a significant percentage of black DOSers started claiming the usa as their home, and from said war between the states to 2023, the percentage of pro usa+ pro white blacks has grown.
The problem is, reparations at its heart has to be a big middle finger to the usa or the whites in it. But it offers a strong cultural question.
DOSers who have accepted the usa, the black immigrants in modernity who come from all over the world to be part of the usa. the non black immigrants who like the black immigrants come from all over the world to be part of the usa, the WASP enslavers descedants who made the usa,killed the native american and enslaved the black dosers for their usa all have a belief in the usa. A love for it. Reparations at its heart is a dislike/hatred of the usa being provided by the usa itself. And that is why the reparations issue has no traction. As an issue it spits in the face of so many in the usa who love the usa, feel its better, feel it warrants a chance, and again, reparations at its heart is DOSers saying, the usa isn't enough, it isn't wanted.
And again, I want it comprehended or said in this forum, the Black DOS communities modern relationship to the usa is modern. It really isn't historical in the 13 colonies or the usa itself. When black people talk about forebears fighting to vote, they seem to forget more of their forebears fought to simply kill whites or leave the usa and many of them dreamed more than anything. I paraphrase james baldwin: his father in the black church of his youth hated whites. Many black DOSers have similar stories but we rarely say it in white owned media as we are ashamed or we just don't want the hassle of talking about it.
So I conclude with a simple restatement.
Reparations involves Black people's relationship with whites from the 13 colonies to modern usa. But it doesn't need a study. It is an issue that needed to happen in the past, but modern usa wealth doesn't happen if reparations happened in the past. Sequentially, most in modern usa, can't accept the fundamental point of reparations, which garvey best comprehended, that many and I daresay most Black DOSers don't like the usa or the whites <wasp/white asians/white latinos/white arabs/white muslims white women or similar> in it. So, reparations is warranted or needed but is contrapose to various communities relationship to the usa, including a large percentage of Black DOSers themselves.
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@Troy I like the fact that the bill realizes that the problem the descendent of enslaved have transcends the usa. One of the problems with reparations as an issue is many can't accept that reparations is beyond the usa, it is truly about the relationship between blacks and whites in the american continent. A relationship that is historically far worse than negative. My only issue with the bill is , it sadly isn't needed. I have thought about reparations for a while and it occurs to me that if you look at the DOS community from a what happened and what needs to be undone perspective, no study is needed. What happened? DOSers ancestors were ripped from their homes and forced to be part of another community and said ancestors descendents from the 13 colonies to today live absent a choice for the most part in the community, the usa or the 13 colonies that preceded it, that their forebears were forced to be a part of. That is the simple truth of DOS history. So, that is what happened. How do you undo that? Simple, DOSers need a new land all to themselves to replace the lands they were ripped from, and they need resources to build up that land reciprocating all the resources their forebears of themselves provided to make the 13 colonies and the usa what they were. The problem is, no where on earth is uninhabited . so at least 15,000,000 people will cause chaos by default wherever they go. Exhibit a is israel. at the end of the day, the idea was tried out there and look at palestine, it is a never ending negative situation. Yes, israel has alliances but the palestineans have not forgotten and the situation is simply a blood feud, that will only end when the palestinean or the israeli are gone. DOSers will simply be another israeli group. The only internal black problem with reparations is something the prior commentors allude to, correctly, but they don't say straightly. White European power forced Black African people to be part of the 13 colonies or the usa. But said power occurred for so long, many, not most , but many black people have accepted the usa side the whites in it. Sequentially, those blacks don't need reparations. Do you comprehend Troy? It is historical fact that most free blacks and 99% of the enslaved blacks when the usa was founded didn't want the usa founded or wanted out of the usa. It is historical fact that it was true during the war of 1812 and up to the war between the states. It was during the war between the states that a significant percentage of black DOSers started claiming the usa as their home, and from said war between the states to 2023, the percentage of pro usa+ pro white blacks has grown. The problem is, reparations at its heart has to be a big middle finger to the usa or the whites in it. But it offers a strong cultural question. DOSers who have accepted the usa, the black immigrants in modernity who come from all over the world to be part of the usa. the non black immigrants who like the black immigrants come from all over the world to be part of the usa, the WASP enslavers descedants who made the usa,killed the native american and enslaved the black dosers for their usa all have a belief in the usa. A love for it. Reparations at its heart is a dislike/hatred of the usa being provided by the usa itself. And that is why the reparations issue has no traction. As an issue it spits in the face of so many in the usa who love the usa, feel its better, feel it warrants a chance, and again, reparations at its heart is DOSers saying, the usa isn't enough, it isn't wanted. And again, I want it comprehended or said in this forum, the Black DOS communities modern relationship to the usa is modern. It really isn't historical in the 13 colonies or the usa itself. When black people talk about forebears fighting to vote, they seem to forget more of their forebears fought to simply kill whites or leave the usa and many of them dreamed more than anything. I paraphrase james baldwin: his father in the black church of his youth hated whites. Many black DOSers have similar stories but we rarely say it in white owned media as we are ashamed or we just don't want the hassle of talking about it. So I conclude with a simple restatement. Reparations involves Black people's relationship with whites from the 13 colonies to modern usa. But it doesn't need a study. It is an issue that needed to happen in the past, but modern usa wealth doesn't happen if reparations happened in the past. Sequentially, most in modern usa, can't accept the fundamental point of reparations, which garvey best comprehended, that many and I daresay most Black DOSers don't like the usa or the whites <wasp/white asians/white latinos/white arabs/white muslims white women or similar> in it. So, reparations is warranted or needed but is contrapose to various communities relationship to the usa, including a large percentage of Black DOSers themselves.
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The director Ryan Coogler on the set of “Wakanda Forever.” Does he want to direct more “Black Panther” movies? “I’ll do it as long as folks will have me.”Credit...Annette Brown/Marvel
The ‘Black Panther’ Sequel That Never Was
Writer-director Ryan Coogler and co-screenwriter Joe Robert Cole reveal the original plot for “Wakanda Forever” and discuss working in the Marvel universe.
By Reggie Ugwu
The “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” screenwriters Ryan Coogler and Joe Robert Cole are just coming up for air. A month after release, the much anticipated follow-up to the original “Black Panther” (2018) is well situated, still screening at more than 3,000 theaters heading into the holiday weekend. The film has received mostly positive reviews from critics and holds the year’s second-highest performance at the box office, after “Top Gun: Maverick.” To date, it has grossed more than $420 million domestically and nearly $800 million overall.
Things could have gone much differently.
“This film was difficult in ways that only the people who made it would know,” Coogler said in a recent interview. “There are things we put in there that felt revolutionary, that challenged the definition of having ‘a good time’ in a movie like this.”
The death of Chadwick Boseman, who played the title role in the original film — a noble but untested leader of the fictional African promised land Wakanda — forced a radical reimagining of the franchise. Coogler and Cole had recently sent Boseman a completed first draft of the script when the actor succumbed to a secret bout with colon cancer.
Their eventual rewrite opened with the death of Boseman’s character, T’Challa, turning the $250 million superhero film that followed into what can be fairly described as an extended meditation on grief and recovery.
In a recent joint conversation over video, the screenwriters discussed their original vision for a “Black Panther” sequel, how they addressed the loss of Boseman, and balancing the demands of their story with those of the broader Marvel Cinematic Universe.
These are edited — and spoiler-filled — excerpts from the conversation.
What was it like collaborating this time?
RYAN COOGLER Last time we went back and forth. Joe had already started when I came on. I think I tried to go for a draft, but I was taking too long and so he jumped in. Then we would get notes from the studio, and we would just kind of divide and conquer. On the second one, we were doing it over the pandemic, so we couldn’t meet up. But Final Draft [the screenwriting software] came out with this update where we could both work in the script at the same time. It was an amazing feature. Very productive, very fun.
JOE ROBERT COLE It allowed us to bridge that feeling of being in a room and just spitballing ideas.
COOGLER Then we took that hit, bro, when Chad passed. I couldn’t believe what was happening. I didn’t know how we were going to pull ourselves up and figure it out. Thank God for Joe and the collaborative process, man. It would’ve been impossible for me to write this thing on my own.
In the initial draft of the script, before Chadwick’s death, how were you looking at the story? What were the challenges?
COOGLER It was, “What are we going to do about the Blip?” [In Marvel’s “Avengers: Infinity War,” T’Challa is one of billions of people who suddenly vanish, only to be brought back by the Avengers five years later.] That was the challenge. It was absolutely nothing like what we made. It was going to be a father-son story from the perspective of a father, because the first movie had been a father-son story from the perspective of the sons.
In the script, T’Challa was a dad who’d had this forced five-year absence from his son’s life. The first scene was an animated sequence. You hear Nakia [T’Challa’s love interest, played by Lupita Nyong’o] talking to Toussaint [the couple’s child, introduced in “Wakanda Forever” in a post-credits sequence]. She says, “Tell me what you know about your father.” You realize that he doesn’t know his dad was the Black Panther. He’s never met him, and Nakia is remarried to a Haitian dude. Then, we cut to reality and it’s the night that everybody comes back from the Blip. You see T’Challa meet the kid for the first time.
Then it cuts ahead three years and he’s essentially co-parenting. We had some crazy scenes in there for Chad, man. Our code name for the movie was “Summer Break,” and the movie was about a summer that the kid spends with his dad. For his eighth birthday, they do a ritual where they go out into the bush and have to live off the land. But something happens and T’Challa has to go save the world with his son on his hip. That was the movie.
Was Namor, the leader of the undersea nation Talokan in “Wakanda Forever,” still the villain?
COOGLER Yeah. But it was a combination. Val [the C.I.A. director, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus] was much more active. It was basically a three-way conflict between Wakanda, the U.S. and Talokan. But it was all mostly from the child’s perspective.
In the new version, the opening scene is T’Challa’s death. Why did you decide to start there?
COLE Just practically, everyone was going to be waiting to see how we dealt with it, so doing it right up front made sense. In terms of the characters, we needed to introduce a different version of Shuri [T’Challa’s sister, played by Letitia Wright]. We’re showing the moment that she becomes a different person than the person we met. She’s the smartest person in the world, but she can’t save her brother. What does that do to you?
COOGLER We wanted to have an emotionally intelligent conversation. It’s about the transformative quality of grief and trauma. There’s this expectation with emotional trauma that you just need time. “Oh, give them a couple weeks off; they’ll come back to work and get back to it.” But that person is completely different in some ways. You just don’t see it because the change isn’t visible.
T’Challa’s death is attributed to an illness, but it seems sudden and inexplicable, which profoundly unsettles Shuri. Why did you make that choice?
COOGLER We wanted to keep it simple. At the end of the day, what mattered is that she had a self-expectation of being able to be solve it and she failed. And we didn’t want her to have anywhere to displace her anger. If somebody else would’ve taken T’Challa out, Shuri would’ve looked for that person. We wanted it to be a situation where the only place to go was internal.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s character has appeared in other Marvel properties and is being set up as a major antagonist in the studio’s future projects, including the “Thunderbolts” movie due in 2024. Is it challenging to incorporate characters or story lines from the broader Marvel Cinematic Universe?
COLE Ryan will have a different perspective as the director, but I’ve never had a conversation where I was asked to incorporate something that didn’t feel organic. The dynamic of the U.S. being an instigator and Western powers being an instigator, that always existed. It wasn’t, “Oh, we need to find a reason to make this character exist.” It was, “Oh, this is already in here and there’s this wonderful actress available.” It always starts from the story and the ideas.
COOGLER Yeah, nobody was shoehorned in or asked to be put into the movie or anything like that. Actually, in this version, [Louis-Dreyfus’s role] was pared back in order to make space for dealing with T’Challa’s death. And we had Val in there before she even appeared in any of the other movies, before “Black Widow” and [the series] “Falcon and the Winter Soldier.” People assume that we were told to put her in, but she was there from the beginning.
Ryan, what’s your appetite to tell more stories in the world of Wakanda?
COOGLER I feel blessed that I have the opportunity to work on these movies, bro. When I got asked to do the first one, it was like a moving train. I thank God every day that I was able to jump on it and meet these people, these actors, and to meet Chadwick during some of the last years of his life. I’ll do it as long as folks will have me. But I think it’s bigger than just me or Joe. Between the first and second movie, we made $2 billion at the box office, which is what matters the most to corporations. So I hope that it continues, man. I hope people are still making movies about Wakanda long after we’re gone.
Reggie Ugwu is a pop culture reporter covering a range of subjects, including film, television, music and internet culture. Before joining The Times in 2017, he was a reporter for BuzzFeed News and Billboard magazine. @uugwuu
URL : https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/23/arts/ryan-coogler-black-panther-wakanda-forever.html
Jacobs-Jenkins, far left, on the “Kindred” set during filming. “In honoring Octavia’s book, I’m trying to find new things to talk about,” he said.Credit...Tina Rowden/FX
‘Kindred’ Creator Wants Viewers to ‘Question Their Assumptions’
In his TV adaptation of the Octavia Butler novel, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins changed parts of the story but kept the author’s focus on “making the familial political.”
By Salamishah Tillet
Dec. 26, 2022
“If a ‘Kindred’ movie is ever made, I wouldn’t be involved,” Octavia Butler wrote in a letter in 2000. “It won’t be my movie, and I suspect it won’t look much like my book.”
It was yet another Butler prediction that was mostly on target, though she was wrong about the format. Adapted by the playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins for FX on Hulu, “Kindred” is neither a film nor a completely faithful interpretation of the novel. But it comes at a time when there is more interest in Butler’s body of work than ever before, and in how her prolific writing, mainly science fiction novels, continues to resonate with our world more than 15 years after her death.
“Kindred” is Butler’s most well-known and often-taught novel. Published in 1979, it tells the story of Dana Franklin, a 26-year-old African American writer who repeatedly and unexpectedly travels from 1976 to a mid-19th-century plantation in Maryland. Each time Dana arrives in the past, she finds herself saving the life of Rufus Weylin, her white slaveholding ancestor; she returns to the present only when her own life is at risk.
In a 1988 interview with the literary critic Larry McCaffery, Butler said that “Kindred,” with its blend of genres, periods and antebellum histories, was informed by ideological debates she had during college in the 1960s, about the extent to which slaves should have rebelled against their masters.
Knowing this, Jacobs-Jenkins sought to capture those tensions while updating the story to convey the complexity of our post-Obama racial reality. A lifelong Butler fan, he wanted to turn “Kindred” into a television series as far back as 2010, when he debuted his first full-length play, “Neighbors,” at the Public Theater.
The drama was well regarded, but it was Jacobs-Jenkins’s 2014 Obie-award-winning play, “An Octoroon,” that established him as one of America’s most exciting young playwrights. A satirical adaptation of Dion Boucicault’s “The Octoroon,” a 19th-century melodrama about the tragic love story between a European-educated white plantation owner and the play’s titular character, an enslaved woman, the play inspired critical raves and hot ticket sales. In his review for The New York Times, Ben Brantley wrote that its success “seemed to confirm the reputation of its author as one of this country’s most original and illuminating writers about race.”
Even then, Jacobs-Jenkins remained committed to “Kindred.” In 2015, he persuaded Courtney Lee-Mitchell, the rights holder of the novel, that it should be a television series and not a movie as previously imagined by other potential producers and even by Butler herself. The decision to stretch the story over multiple seasons has drawn some criticism. (All eight episodes of Season 1 are available on Hulu, but the series has not yet been renewed.)
Nevertheless, Jacobs-Jenkins hopes that his expansion of the novel’s universe encourages more people to discover Butler’s writing for themselves.
“After watching this, I want people to question their assumptions about what they think they know about history, about themselves,” he said. “I want them to read Octavia’s work.”
In a video interview earlier this month, Jacobs-Jenkins talked about his introduction to Butler’s writing, the motivations behind some of his changes to her story and why he thinks television and theaters need even more stories about slavery. These are edited excerpts from that conversation.
When did you first come in contact with “Kindred”?
My relationship with Butler preceded my engagement with “Kindred.” I was one of those kids reading Stephen King on the playground for no good reason, and Ray Bradbury’s novels were important transitional objects for me too. I was like 12 or 13 when I had a babysitter who went to Howard, who was a Black nerd, too. She told me, “You should read Octavia Butler.” So I started with her Patternist series. And when I got to college, I read her on an African American studies syllabus and remember thinking, Oh, this person I read for fun is important academically. That is also when I learned of “Kindred,” which was oddly one of my later introductions to her work.
Before, when I was reading her, it felt very much still like a secret; it felt good to be a part of that weird underground. And now, she’s been mainstreamed in this gigantic way.
How did this adaptation come about?
Slavery is the material of my creative life. I remember becoming obsessed with the visual work of Kara Walker, Glenn Ligon and Kerry James Marshall and wondered why they were so ahead of theater. So back then, I said, I’m going to deep-dive these people, and I’m going to write a play based on my deep dive. I just inhaled whatever their discourse was and tried to translate it into a theater space. And the truth is, my creative life is also ultimately guided by fandom on some level, and I remember rereading “Kindred” in 2010 and thinking, This is a TV show. It was a eureka moment.
I immediately started figuring out how to get the rights. It had been under option since 1979 because people kept trying to make a movie out of it. And I was like, It’s not a movie. Because the whole book is about the experience of time’s passage and watching people transform, witnessing their development, growth, decay and shift of their allegiances. It took six years for me to get the rights, and then my task became trying to translate it and ultimately peel back the layers for people.
Speaking of time passages, her novel was set in 1976 to coincide with the bicentennial year of the Declaration of Independence. Why did you set the series in 2016?
Along the way, I became very friendly with Merrilee Heifetz, Butler’s literary executor and her lifelong agent. One of the things she said to me was, “Octavia would’ve wanted you to make this for now.” So I took that to heart. I think 2016 was that last gasp of naïveté about how we had processed the legacies of this racial regime that the country’s founded on. Do you remember the day after Obama was elected, suddenly, there was a discussion of a phrase called post-race? I remember asking, “What is that?” I also think because people did not see the results of the 2016 [presidential] election coming, we suddenly felt like we were backsliding as a country. “Kindred” was the ultimate metaphor for that, too.
Another surprising change was your inclusion of her mother as a major character. What inspired that story line?
Merrilee also told me that Octavia referred to this book as one she never quite cracked. That interested me because this is her most widely read and known book, and that also sent me to her archives, which had just been cataloged at the Huntington Library.
I read every draft of “Kindred,” and there are ones in which she experimented with this mother figure. In her canon, she’s obsessed with mothers. I don’t want to be psychoanalyzing another artist, but her relationship with her mother was very complicated. Merrilee told me once that she would say, “Octavia, I want you to write a memoir.” And she would say, “I’ve already written a memoir; it’s called ‘Kindred.’”
Unlike many other contemporary representations of enslaved people in television and film, Dana is not by herself. She has a community in each of her periods to help her. Why was this important to portray?
I think Octavia was obsessed with family. I mean, it’s called “Kindred,” and it is about making the familial political. My approach was to always think of what she was doing and try to echo or expand on that universe — I took all my cues from her, except for setting it in 2016. At the same time, she was always trying to understand why tribalism exists, why genes are so varied as a concept, how they’re weaponized to oppress people and what oppression ultimately is rooted in.
Dana has to make some hard choices for herself and often risks the lives of other enslaved African Americans to ensure that she continues to exist in the present. How did you approach bringing her moral ambiguity to the screen?
That’s an essential part of the book, and I think that’s what makes Dana interesting. Most folks are not participating in active insurrection but are fighting in small ways to maintain their agency. This is driven home in Dana, who says to herself: “Wait a minute, to ensure my existence, I have become someone who might destroy or erase the existences of countless people. I want to be perceived as good, and I want to think that my goodness will rub off on Rufus too.” But playing both sides isn’t how justice happens. You wind up being morally compromised in all your actions if you are still thinking about yourself. That’s the interesting challenge she has to negotiate.
Why did you think a multi-season arc was best for this story versus adapting it as a single-season limited series?
I just didn’t think you could do this book in eight hours. It’s about being with people over time and really feeling these tectonic shifts in their personhood. I thought the idea of squeezing in six different actors for Rufus would have felt like a party trick. I’m sure that someone out there could have made that thing, but I just really wanted to give us the fullest canvas I could to tell the story.
Do you ever worry that audiences will grow weary of stories on slavery?
There is this interesting quota that we all want to put on stories about slavery, and I think that question is often asked only of Black creatives. There are a thousand shows on the air about rich white families doing evil sympathetically, and no one puts a quota on that. I think it’s interesting that there’s this desire to police any storytelling about a creative’s history. I mean, this is my history and my family history.
I also think people are worried, afraid of, or sick of the tropes and stereotypes that come with this work and are waiting for the familiar scene in which some female enslaved person is raped or someone is tied to a pole or a tree and whipped. But in honoring Octavia’s book, I’m trying to find new things to talk about. We should never stop telling these stories, especially when people try to erase them from history books.
Salamishah Tillet is a contributing critic at large for The Times and a professor at Rutgers University. She won the Pulitzer Prize for criticism in 2022, for columns examining race and Black perspectives as the arts and entertainment world responded to the Black Lives Matter moment with new works. @salamishah
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Thanks for sharing Kindred should have just been a movie. It feels dragged it. Learning that it is supposed to go more than 1 season. It just does not make sense to me.
I’ve watched the first 5 episodes and I’m not feeling it at all…
The Black Panther details were interesting. I wonder why no one even considered just getting another actor to play Black Panther If multiple actors can play Superman and James Bond someone new could have played T’Challa — maybe even better.
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@Troy my pleasure , but from my own fringe experience , the reason kindred is a series not a film is the money. Netflix didn't feel kindred better served netflix as a film over a multi season show. I think the answer to the last question is the reality for all slavery dramas. they are hit or miss, many black people, some in this sites forums have a no want policy to anything involving slavery in a plot. These shows will always be hit or miss.
You make another valid point, all I want to say is, I would had not recast tchalla, but my reasons are from my views towards media. I am tired of the recast I am tired of the immortal character. The comic book industry in the usa and the film industry in the usa despise letting characters die, letting stories move on and I like the fact that they let a character die. The actor died and they let the character die, lets move on. I admit , I was very saddened when milestone comics rebooted all their characters. I despise reboots or recasts, move on. Having said that, if they would had recast tchalla, I would not had been sad. It would had been the normal in media. And that is fine, not my liking, but fine. and someone else may have played tchalla better. In defense James Bond has been killed and the next 007 film will not have bond. And I think the reality is, superman since the end of christopher reeves has been knocked recast after knocked recast.
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All of these people who are making comic books into movies are functionally retarded, liars, bad people, and have wicked intent, they are using these traits to manifest their political based desires as a profit. While actively disrespecting the source material, and continuously disrespecting the readers of that source material, in multiple ways.
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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Religious and Moral Poems, by Phillis Wheatley This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: Religious and Moral Poems Author: Phillis Wheatley Release Date: January, 1996 [EBook #409] Last Updated: February 24, 2019 Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELIGIOUS AND MORAL POEMS *** Etext produced by Judith Boss HTML file produced by David Widger POEMS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS, RELIGIOUS AND MORAL. By Phillis Wheatley (Negro Servant To Mr. John Wheatley, Of Boston, In New-England) 1771 CONTENTS PREFACE. TO THE PUBLIC. P O E M S TO M AE C E N A S. O N V I R T U E. TO THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, IN NEW-ENGLAND. TO THE KING’S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. 1768. ON BEING BROUGHT FROM AFRICA TO AMERICA. ON THE DEATH OF THE REV. DR. SEWELL, 1769. ON THE DEATH OF THE REV. MR. GEORGE WHITEFIELD. 1770. ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY OF FIVE YEARS OF AGE. ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG GENTLEMAN. TO A LADY ON THE DEATH OF HER HUSBAND. G O L I A T H O F G A T H. THOUGHTS ON THE WORKS OF PROVIDENCE. TO A LADY ON THE DEATH OF THREE RELATIONS. TO A CLERGYMAN ON THE DEATH OF HIS LADY. AN HYMN TO THE MORNING AN HYMN TO THE EVENING. ISAIAH lxiii. 1-8. ON RECOLLECTION. ON IMAGINATION. A FUNERAL POEM ON THE DEATH OF C. E. AN INFANT OF TWELVE MONTHS. TO CAPTAIN H———D, OF THE 65TH REGIMENT. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE WILLIAM, EARL OF DARTMOUTH O D E T O N E P T U N E. TO A LADY ON HER COMING TO NORTH-AMERICA WITH HER SON, FOR THE RECOVERY OF HER HEALTH. TO A LADY ON HER REMARKABLE PRESERVATION IN AN HURRICANE IN NORTH-CAROLINA. TO A LADY AND HER CHILDREN, ON THE DEATH OF HER SON AND THEIR BROTHER. TO A GENTLEMAN AND LADY ON THE DEATH OF THE LADY’S BROTHER AND SISTER, AND A CHILD OF THE NAME OF AVIS, AGED ONE YEAR. ON THE DEATH OF DR. SAMUEL MARSHALL. 1771. TO A GENTLEMAN ON HIS VOYAGE TO GREAT-BRITAIN FOR THE RECOVERY OF HIS HEALTH. TO THE REV. DR. THOMAS AMORY, ON READING HIS SERMONS ON DAILY DEVOTION, IN WHICH THAT DUTY IS RECOMMENDED AND ASSISTED. ON THE DEATH OF J. C. AN INFANT. AN H Y M N TO H U M A N I T Y. TO S. P. G. ESQ; TO THE HONOURABLE T. H. ESQ; ON THE DEATH OF HIS DAUGHTER. NIOBE IN DISTRESS FOR HER CHILDREN SLAIN BY APOLLO, FROM OVID’S METAMORPHOSES, BOOK VI. AND FROM A VIEW OF THE PAINTING OF MR. RICHARD WILSON. TO S. M. A YOUNG AFRICAN PAINTER, ON SEEING HIS WORKS. TO HIS HONOUR THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, ON THE DEATH OF HIS LADY. MARCH 24, 1773. A FAREWEL TO AMERICA. TO MRS. S. W. A REBUS, BY I. B. AN ANSWER TO THE REBUS, BY THE AUTHOR OF THESE POEMS. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE COUNTESS OF HUNTINGDON, THE FOLLOWING P O E M S ARE MOST RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED. BY HER MUCH OBLIGED, VERY HUMBLE AND DEVOTED SERVANT. PHILLIS WHEATLEY. Boston, June 12, 1771. PREFACE. THE following POEMS were written originally for the Amusement of the Author, as they were the Products of her leisure Moments. She had no Intention ever to have published them; nor would they now have made their Appearance, but at the Importunity of many of her best, and most generous Friends; to whom she considers herself, as under the greatest Obligations. As her Attempts in Poetry are now sent into the World, it is hoped the Critic will not severely censure their Defects; and we presume they have too much Merit to be cast aside with Contempt, as worthless and trifling Effusions. As to the Disadvantages she has laboured under, with Regard to Learning, nothing needs to be offered, as her Master’s Letter in the following Page will sufficiently show the Difficulties in this Respect she had to encounter. With all their Imperfections, the Poems are now humbly submitted to the Perusal of the Public. The following is a Copy of a LETTER sent by the Author’s Master to the Publisher. PHILLIS was brought from Africa to America, in the Year 1761, between seven and eight Years of Age. Without any Assistance from School Education, and by only what she was taught in the Family, she, in sixteen Months Time from her Arrival, attained the English language, to which she was an utter Stranger before, to such a degree, as to read any, the most difficult Parts of the Sacred Writings, to the great Astonishment of all who heard her. As to her WRITING, her own Curiosity led her to it; and this she learnt in so short a Time, that in the Year 1765, she wrote a Letter to the Rev. Mr. OCCOM, the Indian Minister, while in England. She has a great Inclination to learn the Latin Tongue, and has made some Progress in it. This Relation is given by her Master who bought her, and with whom she now lives. JOHN WHEATLEY. Boston, Nov. 14, 1772. TO THE PUBLIC. AS it has been repeatedly suggested to the Publisher, by Persons, who have seen the Manuscript, that Numbers would be ready to suspect they were not really the Writings of PHILLIS, he has procured the following Attestation, from the most respectable Characters in Boston, that none might have the least Ground for disputing their Original. WE whose Names are under-written, do assure the World, that the POEMS specified in the following Page,* were (as we verily believe) written by Phillis, a young Negro Girl, who was but a few Years since, brought an uncultivated Barbarian from Africa, and has ever since been, and now is, under the Disadvantage of serving as a Slave in a Family in this Town. She has been examined by some of the best Judges, and is thought qualified to write them. His Excellency THOMAS HUTCHINSON, Governor. The Hon. ANDREW OLIVER, Lieutenant-Governor. The Hon. Thomas Hubbard, | The Rev. Charles Chauncey, D. D. The Hon. John Erving, | The Rev. Mather Byles, D. D. The Hon. James Pitts, | The Rev. Ed. Pemberton, D. D. The Hon. Harrison Gray, | The Rev. Andrew Elliot, D. D. The Hon. James Bowdoin, | The Rev. Samuel Cooper, D. D. John Hancock, Esq; | The Rev. Mr. Saumel Mather, Joseph Green, Esq; | The Rev. Mr. John Moorhead, Richard Carey, Esq; | Mr. John Wheat ey, her Master. N. B. The original Attestation, signed by the above Gentlemen, may be seen by applying to Archibald Bell, Bookseller, No. 8, Aldgate-Street. _________________________________________________________ *The Words “following Page,” allude to the Contents of the Manuscript Copy, which are wrote at the Back of the above Attestation. P O E M S O N V A R I O U S S U B J E C T S. TO M AE C E N A S. MAECENAS, you, beneath the myrtle shade, Read o’er what poets sung, and shepherds play’d. What felt those poets but you feel the same? Does not your soul possess the sacred flame? Their noble strains your equal genius shares In softer language, and diviner airs. While Homer paints, lo! circumfus’d in air, Celestial Gods in mortal forms appear; Swift as they move hear each recess rebound, Heav’n quakes, earth trembles, and the shores resound. Great Sire of verse, before my mortal eyes, The lightnings blaze across the vaulted skies, And, as the thunder shakes the heav’nly plains, A deep felt horror thrills through all my veins. When gentler strains demand thy graceful song, The length’ning line moves languishing along. When great Patroclus courts Achilles’ aid, The grateful tribute of my tears is paid; Prone on the shore he feels the pangs of love, And stern Pelides tend’rest passions move. Great Maro’s strain in heav’nly numbers flows, The Nine inspire, and all the bosom glows. O could I rival thine and Virgil’s page, Or claim the Muses with the Mantuan Sage; Soon the same beauties should my mind adorn, And the same ardors in my soul should burn: Then should my song in bolder notes arise, And all my numbers pleasingly surprise; But here I sit, and mourn a grov’ling mind, That fain would mount, and ride upon the wind. Not you, my friend, these plaintive strains become, Not you, whose bosom is the Muses home; When they from tow’ring Helicon retire, They fan in you the bright immortal fire, But I less happy, cannot raise the song, The fault’ring music dies upon my tongue. The happier Terence* all the choir inspir’d, His soul replenish’d, and his bosom fir’d; But say, ye Muses, why this partial grace, To one alone of Afric’s sable race; From age to age transmitting thus his name With the finest glory in the rolls of fame? Thy virtues, great Maecenas! shall be sung In praise of him, from whom those virtues sprung: While blooming wreaths around thy temples spread, I’ll snatch a laurel from thine honour’d head, While you indulgent smile upon the deed. *He was an African by birth. As long as Thames in streams majestic flows, Or Naiads in their oozy beds repose While Phoebus reigns above the starry train While bright Aurora purples o’er the main, So long, great Sir, the muse thy praise shall sing, So long thy praise shal’ make Parnassus ring: Then grant, Maecenas, thy paternal rays, Hear me propitious, and defend my lays. O N V I R T U E. O Thou bright jewel in my aim I strive To comprehend thee. Thine own words declare Wisdom is higher than a fool can reach. I cease to wonder, and no more attempt Thine height t’ explore, or fathom thy profound. But, O my soul, sink not into despair, Virtue is near thee, and with gentle hand Would now embrace thee, hovers o’er thine head. Fain would the heav’n-born soul with her converse, Then seek, then court her for her promis’d bliss. Auspicious queen, thine heav’nly pinions spread, And lead celestial Chastity along; Lo! now her sacred retinue descends, Array’d in glory from the orbs above. Attend me, Virtue, thro’ my youthful years! O leave me not to the false joys of time! But guide my steps to endless life and bliss. Greatness, or Goodness, say what I shall call thee, To give me an higher appellation still, Teach me a better strain, a nobler lay, O thou, enthron’d with Cherubs in the realms of day. TO THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, IN NEW-ENGLAND. WHILE an intrinsic ardor prompts to write, The muses promise to assist my pen; ’Twas not long since I left my native shore The land of errors, and Egyptian gloom: Father of mercy, ’twas thy gracious hand Brought me in safety from those dark abodes. Students, to you ’tis giv’n to scan the heights Above, to traverse the ethereal space, And mark the systems of revolving worlds. Still more, ye sons of science ye receive The blissful news by messengers from heav’n, How Jesus’ blood for your redemption flows. See him with hands out-stretcht upon the cross; Immense compassion in his bosom glows; He hears revilers, nor resents their scorn: What matchless mercy in the Son of God! When the whole human race by sin had fall’n, He deign’d to die that they might rise again, And share with him in the sublimest skies, Life without death, and glory without end. Improve your privileges while they stay, Ye pupils, and each hour redeem, that bears Or good or bad report of you to heav’n. Let sin, that baneful evil to the soul, By you be shun’d, nor once remit your guard; Suppress the deadly serpent in its egg. Ye blooming plants of human race divine, An Ethiop tells you ’tis your greatest foe; Its transient sweetness turns to endless pain, And in immense perdition sinks the soul. TO THE KING’S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. 1768. YOUR subjects hope, dread Sire— The crown upon your brows may flourish long, And that your arm may in your God be strong! O may your sceptre num’rous nations sway, And all with love and readiness obey! But how shall we the British king reward! Rule thou in peace, our father, and our lord! Midst the remembrance of thy favours past, The meanest peasants most admire the last* May George, beloved by all the nations round, Live with heav’ns choicest constant blessings crown’d! Great God, direct, and guard him from on high, And from his head let ev’ry evil fly! And may each clime with equal gladness see A monarch’s smile can set his subjects free! * The Repeal of the Stamp Act. ON BEING BROUGHT FROM AFRICA TO AMERICA. ’Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land, Taught my benighted soul to understand That there’s a God, that there’s a Saviour too: Once I redemption neither sought nor knew, Some view our sable race with scornful eye, “Their colour is a diabolic die.” Remember, Christians, Negroes, black as Cain, May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train. ON THE DEATH OF THE REV. DR. SEWELL, 1769. ERE yet the morn its lovely blushes spread, See Sewell number’d with the happy dead. Hail, holy man, arriv’d th’ immortal shore, Though we shall hear thy warning voice no more. Come, let us all behold with wishful eyes The saint ascending to his native skies; From hence the prophet wing’d his rapt’rous way To the blest mansions in eternal day. Then begging for the Spirit of our God, And panting eager for the same abode, Come, let us all with the same vigour rise, And take a prospect of the blissful skies; While on our minds Christ’s image is imprest, And the dear Saviour glows in ev’ry breast. Thrice happy saint! to find thy heav’n at last, What compensation for the evils past! Great God, incomprehensible, unknown By sense, we bow at thine exalted throne. O, while we beg thine excellence to feel, Thy sacred Spirit to our hearts reveal, And give us of that mercy to partake, Which thou hast promis’d for the Saviour’s sake! “Sewell is dead.” Swift-pinion’d Fame thus cry’d. “Is Sewell dead,” my trembling tongue reply’d, O what a blessing in his flight deny’d! How oft for us the holy prophet pray’d! How oft to us the Word of Life convey’d! By duty urg’d my mournful verse to close, I for his tomb this epitaph compose. “Lo, here a man, redeem’d by Jesus’s blood, “A sinner once, but now a saint with God; “Behold ye rich, ye poor, ye fools, ye wise, “Not let his monument your heart surprise; “Twill tell you what this holy man has done, “Which gives him brighter lustre than the sun. “Listen, ye happy, from your seats above. “I speak sincerely, while I speak and love, “He sought the paths of piety and truth, “By these made happy from his early youth; “In blooming years that grace divine he felt, “Which rescues sinners from the chains of guilt. “Mourn him, ye indigent, whom he has fed, “And henceforth seek, like him, for living bread; “Ev’n Christ, the bread descending from above, “And ask an int’rest in his saving love. “Mourn him, ye youth, to whom he oft has told “God’s gracious wonders from the times of old. “I too have cause this mighty loss to mourn, “For he my monitor will not return. “O when shall we to his blest state arrive? “When the same graces in our bosoms thrive.” ON THE DEATH OF THE REV. MR. GEORGE WHITEFIELD. 1770. HAIL, happy saint, on thine immortal throne, Possest of glory, life, and bliss unknown; We hear no more the music of thy tongue, Thy wonted auditories cease to throng. Thy sermons in unequall’d accents flow’d, And ev’ry bosom with devotion glow’d; Thou didst in strains of eloquence refin’d Inflame the heart, and captivate the mind. Unhappy we the setting sun deplore, So glorious once, but ah! it shines no more. Behold the prophet in his tow’ring flight! He leaves the earth for heav’n’s unmeasur’d height, And worlds unknown receive him from our sight. There Whitefield wings with rapid course his way, And sails to Zion through vast seas of day. Thy pray’rs, great saint, and thine incessant cries Have pierc’d the bosom of thy native skies. Thou moon hast seen, and all the stars of light, How he has wrestled with his God by night. He pray’d that grace in ev’ry heart might dwell, He long’d to see America excell; He charg’d its youth that ev’ry grace divine Should with full lustre in their conduct shine; That Saviour, which his soul did first receive, The greatest gift that ev’n a God can give, He freely offer’d to the num’rous throng, That on his lips with list’ning pleasure hung. “Take him, ye wretched, for your only good, “Take him ye starving sinners, for your food; “Ye thirsty, come to this life-giving stream, “Ye preachers, take him for your joyful theme; “Take him my dear Americans, he said, “Be your complaints on his kind bosom laid: “Take him, ye Africans, he longs for you, “Impartial Saviour is his title due: “Wash’d in the fountain of redeeming blood, “You shall be sons, and kings, and priests to God.” Great Countess,* we Americans revere Thy name, and mingle in thy grief sincere; New England deeply feels, the Orphans mourn, Their more than father will no more return. But, though arrested by the hand of death, Whitefield no more exerts his lab’ring breath, Yet let us view him in th’ eternal skies, Let ev’ry heart to this bright vision rise; While the tomb safe retains its sacred trust, Till life divine re-animates his dust. *The Countess of Huntingdon, to whom Mr. Whitefield was Chaplain. ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY OF FIVE YEARS OF AGE. FROM dark abodes to fair etherial light Th’ enraptur’d innocent has wing’d her flight; On the kind bosom of eternal love She finds unknown beatitude above. This known, ye parents, nor her loss deplore, She feels the iron hand of pain no more; The dispensations of unerring grace, Should turn your sorrows into grateful praise; Let then no tears for her henceforward flow, No more distress’d in our dark vale below, Her morning sun, which rose divinely bright, Was quickly mantled with the gloom of night; But hear in heav’n’s blest bow’rs your Nancy fair, And learn to imitate her language there. “Thou, Lord, whom I behold with glory crown’d, “By what sweet name, and in what tuneful sound “Wilt thou be prais’d? Seraphic pow’rs are faint “Infinite love and majesty to paint. “To thee let all their graceful voices raise, “And saints and angels join their songs of praise.” Perfect in bliss she from her heav’nly home Looks down, and smiling beckons you to come; Why then, fond parents, why these fruitless groans? Restrain your tears, and cease your plaintive moans. Freed from a world of sin, and snares, and pain, Why would you wish your daughter back again? No—bow resign’d. Let hope your grief control, And check the rising tumult of the soul. Calm in the prosperous, and adverse day, Adore the God who gives and takes away; Eye him in all, his holy name revere, Upright your actions, and your hearts sincere, Till having sail’d through life’s tempestuous sea, And from its rocks, and boist’rous billows free, Yourselves, safe landed on the blissful shore, Shall join your happy babe to part no more. ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG GENTLEMAN. WHO taught thee conflict with the pow’rs of night, To vanquish satan in the fields of light? Who strung thy feeble arms with might unknown, How great thy conquest, and how bright thy crown! War with each princedom, throne, and pow’r is o’er, The scene is ended to return no more. O could my muse thy seat on high behold, How deckt with laurel, how enrich’d with gold! O could she hear what praise thine harp employs, How sweet thine anthems, how divine thy joys! What heav’nly grandeur should exalt her strain! What holy raptures in her numbers reign! To sooth the troubles of the mind to peace, To still the tumult of life’s tossing seas, To ease the anguish of the parents heart, What shall my sympathizing verse impart? Where is the balm to heal so deep a wound? Where shall a sov’reign remedy be found? Look, gracious Spirit, from thine heav’nly bow’r, And thy full joys into their bosoms pour; The raging tempest of their grief control, And spread the dawn of glory through the soul, To eye the path the saint departed trod, And trace him to the bosom of his God. TO A LADY ON THE DEATH OF HER HUSBAND. GRIM monarch! see, depriv’d of vital breath, A young physician in the dust of death: Dost thou go on incessant to destroy, Our griefs to double, and lay waste our joy? Enough thou never yet wast known to say, Though millions die, the vassals of thy sway: Nor youth, nor science, not the ties of love, Nor ought on earth thy flinty heart can move. The friend, the spouse from his dire dart to save, In vain we ask the sovereign of the grave. Fair mourner, there see thy lov’d Leonard laid, And o’er him spread the deep impervious shade. Clos’d are his eyes, and heavy fetters keep His senses bound in never-waking sleep, Till time shall cease, till many a starry world Shall fall from heav’n, in dire confusion hurl’d Till nature in her final wreck shall lie, And her last groan shall rend the azure sky: Not, not till then his active soul shall claim His body, a divine immortal frame. But see the softly-stealing tears apace Pursue each other down the mourner’s face; But cease thy tears, bid ev’ry sigh depart, And cast the load of anguish from thine heart: From the cold shell of his great soul arise, And look beyond, thou native of the skies; There fix thy view, where fleeter than the wind Thy Leonard mounts, and leaves the earth behind. Thyself prepare to pass the vale of night To join for ever on the hills of light: To thine embrace this joyful spirit moves To thee, the partner of his earthly loves; He welcomes thee to pleasures more refin’d, And better suited to th’ immortal mind. G O L I A T H O F G A T H. 1 SAMUEL, Chap. xvii. YE martial pow’rs, and all ye tuneful nine, Inspire my song, and aid my high design. The dreadful scenes and toils of war I write, The ardent warriors, and the fields of fight: You best remember, and you best can sing The acts of heroes to the vocal string: Resume the lays with which your sacred lyre, Did then the poet and the sage inspire. Now front to front the armies were display’d, Here Israel rang’d, and there the foes array’d; The hosts on two opposing mountains stood, Thick as the foliage of the waving wood; Between them an extensive valley lay, O’er which the gleaming armour pour’d the day, When from the camp of the Philistine foes, Dreadful to view, a mighty warrior rose; In the dire deeds of bleeding battle skill’d, The monster stalks the terror of the field. From Gath he sprung, Goliath was his name, Of fierce deportment, and gigantic frame: A brazen helmet on his head was plac’d, A coat of mail his form terrific grac’d, The greaves his legs, the targe his shoulders prest: Dreadful in arms high-tow’ring o’er the rest A spear he proudly wav’d, whose iron head, Strange to relate, six hundred shekels weigh’d; He strode along, and shook the ample field, While Phoebus blaz’d refulgent on his shield: Through Jacob’s race a chilling horror ran, When thus the huge, enormous chief began: “Say, what the cause that in this proud array “You set your battle in the face of day? “One hero find in all your vaunting train, “Then see who loses, and who wins the plain; “For he who wins, in triumph may demand “Perpetual service from the vanquish’d land: “Your armies I defy, your force despise, “By far inferior in Philistia’s eyes: “Produce a man, and let us try the fight, “Decide the contest, and the victor’s right.” Thus challeng’d he: all Israel stood amaz’d, And ev’ry chief in consternation gaz’d; But Jesse’s son in youthful bloom appears, And warlike courage far beyond his years: He left the folds, he left the flow’ry meads, And soft recesses of the sylvan shades. Now Israel’s monarch, and his troops arise, With peals of shouts ascending to the skies; In Elah’s vale the scene of combat lies. When the fair morning blush’d with orient red, What David’s fire enjoin’d the son obey’d, And swift of foot towards the trench he came, Where glow’d each bosom with the martial flame. He leaves his carriage to another’s care, And runs to greet his brethren of the war. While yet they spake the giant-chief arose, Repeats the challenge, and insults his foes: Struck with the sound, and trembling at the view, Affrighted Israel from its post withdrew. “Observe ye this tremendous foe, they cry’d, “Who in proud vaunts our armies hath defy’d: “Whoever lays him prostrate on the plain, “Freedom in Israel for his house shall gain; “And on him wealth unknown the king will pour, “And give his royal daughter for his dow’r.” Then Jesse’s youngest hope: “My brethren say, “What shall be done for him who takes away “Reproach from Jacob, who destroys the chief. “And puts a period to his country’s grief. “He vaunts the honours of his arms abroad, “And scorns the armies of the living God.” Thus spoke the youth, th’ attentive people ey’d The wond’rous hero, and again reply’d: “Such the rewards our monarch will bestow, “On him who conquers, and destroys his foe.” Eliab heard, and kindled into ire To hear his shepherd brother thus inquire, And thus begun: “What errand brought thee? say “Who keeps thy flock? or does it go astray? “I know the base ambition of thine heart, “But back in safety from the field depart.” Eliab thus to Jesse’s youngest heir, Express’d his wrath in accents most severe. When to his brother mildly he reply’d. “What have I done? or what the cause to chide? The words were told before the king, who sent For the young hero to his royal tent: Before the monarch dauntless he began, “For this Philistine fail no heart of man: “I’ll take the vale, and with the giant fight: “I dread not all his boasts, nor all his might.” When thus the king: “Dar’st thou a stripling go, “And venture combat with so great a foe? “Who all his days has been inur’d to fight, “And made its deeds his study and delight: “Battles and bloodshed brought the monster forth, “And clouds and whirlwinds usher’d in his birth.” When David thus: “I kept the fleecy care, “And out there rush’d a lion and a bear; “A tender lamb the hungry lion took, “And with no other weapon than my crook “Bold I pursu’d, and chas d him o’er the field, “The prey deliver’d, and the felon kill’d: “As thus the lion and the bear I slew, “So shall Goliath fall, and all his crew: “The God, who sav’d me from these beasts of prey, “By me this monster in the dust shall lay.” So David spoke. The wond’ring king reply’d; “Go thou with heav’n and victory on thy side: “This coat of mail, this sword gird on,” he said, And plac’d a mighty helmet on his head: The coat, the sword, the helm he laid aside, Nor chose to venture with those arms untry’d, Then took his staff, and to the neighb’ring brook Instant he ran, and thence five pebbles took. Mean time descended to Philistia’s son A radiant cherub, and he thus begun: “Goliath, well thou know’st thou hast defy’d “Yon Hebrew armies, and their God deny’d: “Rebellious wretch! audacious worm! forbear, “Nor tempt the vengeance of their God too far: “Them, who with his Omnipotence contend, “No eye shall pity, and no arm defend: “Proud as thou art, in short liv’d glory great, “I come to tell thee thine approaching fate. “Regard my words. The Judge of all the gods, “Beneath whose steps the tow’ring mountain nods, “Will give thine armies to the savage brood, “That cut the liquid air, or range the wood. “Thee too a well-aim’d pebble shall destroy, “And thou shalt perish by a beardless boy: “Such is the mandate from the realms above, “And should I try the vengeance to remove, “Myself a rebel to my king would prove. “Goliath say, shall grace to him be shown, “Who dares heav’ns Monarch, and insults his throne?” “Your words are lost on me,” the giant cries, While fear and wrath contended in his eyes, When thus the messenger from heav’n replies: “Provoke no more Jehovah’s awful hand “To hurl its vengeance on thy guilty land: “He grasps the thunder, and, he wings the storm, “Servants their sov’reign’s orders to perform.” The angel spoke, and turn’d his eyes away, Adding new radiance to the rising day. Now David comes: the fatal stones demand His left, the staff engag’d his better hand: The giant mov’d, and from his tow’ring height Survey’d the stripling, and disdain’d the fight, And thus began: “Am I a dog with thee? “Bring’st thou no armour, but a staff to me? “The gods on thee their vollied curses pour, “And beasts and birds of prey thy flesh devour.” David undaunted thus, “Thy spear and shield “Shall no protection to thy body yield: “Jehovah’s name———no other arms I bear, “I ask no other in this glorious war. “To-day the Lord of Hosts to me will give “Vict’ry, to-day thy doom thou shalt receive; “The fate you threaten shall your own become, “And beasts shall be your animated tomb, “That all the earth’s inhabitants may know “That there’s a God, who governs all below: “This great assembly too shall witness stand, “That needs nor sword, nor spear, th’ Almighty’s hand: “The battle his, the conquest he bestows, “And to our pow’r consigns our hated foes.” Thus David spoke; Goliath heard and came To meet the hero in the field of fame. Ah! fatal meeting to thy troops and thee, But thou wast deaf to the divine decree; Young David meets thee, meets thee not in vain; ’Tis thine to perish on th’ ensanguin’d plain. And now the youth the forceful pebble slung Philistia trembled as it whizz’d along: In his dread forehead, where the helmet ends, Just o’er the brows the well-aim’d stone descends, It pierc’d the skull, and shatter’d all the brain, Prone on his face he tumbled to the plain: Goliath’s fall no smaller terror yields Than riving thunders in aerial fields: The soul still ling’red in its lov’d abode, Till conq’ring David o’er the giant strode: Goliath’s sword then laid its master dead, And from the body hew’d the ghastly head; The blood in gushing torrents drench’d the plains, The soul found passage through the spouting veins. And now aloud th’ illustrious victor said, “Where are your boastings now your champion’s “dead?” Scarce had he spoke, when the Philistines fled: But fled in vain; the conqu’ror swift pursu’d: What scenes of slaughter! and what seas of blood! There Saul thy thousands grasp’d th’ impurpled sand In pangs of death the conquest of thine hand; And David there were thy ten thousands laid: Thus Israel’s damsels musically play’d. Near Gath and Edron many an hero lay, Breath’d out their souls, and curs’d the light of day: Their fury, quench’d by death, no longer burns, And David with Goliath’s head returns, To Salem brought, but in his tent he plac’d The load of armour which the giant grac’d. His monarch saw him coming from the war, And thus demanded of the son of Ner. “Say, who is this amazing youth?” he cry’d, When thus the leader of the host reply’d; “As lives thy soul I know not whence he sprung, “So great in prowess though in years so young:” “Inquire whose son is he,” the sov’reign said, “Before whose conq’ring arm Philistia fled.” Before the king behold the stripling stand, Goliath’s head depending from his hand: To him the king: “Say of what martial line “Art thou, young hero, and what sire was thine?” He humbly thus; “The son of Jesse I: “I came the glories of the field to try. “Small is my tribe, but valiant in the fight; “Small is my city, but thy royal right.” “Then take the promis’d gifts,” the monarch cry’d, Conferring riches and the royal bride: “Knit to my soul for ever thou remain “With me, nor quit my regal roof again.” THOUGHTS ON THE WORKS OF PROVIDENCE. A R I S E, my soul, on wings enraptur’d, rise To praise the monarch of the earth and skies, Whose goodness and benificence appear As round its centre moves the rolling year, Or when the morning glows with rosy charms, Or the sun slumbers in the ocean’s arms: Of light divine be a rich portion lent To guide my soul, and favour my intend. Celestial muse, my arduous flight sustain And raise my mind to a seraphic strain! Ador’d for ever be the God unseen, Which round the sun revolves this vast machine, Though to his eye its mass a point appears: Ador’d the God that whirls surrounding spheres, Which first ordain’d that mighty Sol should reign The peerless monarch of th’ ethereal train: Of miles twice forty millions is his height, And yet his radiance dazzles mortal sight So far beneath—from him th’ extended earth Vigour derives, and ev’ry flow’ry birth: Vast through her orb she moves with easy grace Around her Phoebus in unbounded space; True to her course th’ impetuous storm derides, Triumphant o’er the winds, and surging tides. Almighty, in these wond’rous works of thine, What Pow’r, what Wisdom, and what Goodness shine! And are thy wonders, Lord, by men explor’d, And yet creating glory unador’d! Creation smiles in various beauty gay, While day to night, and night succeeds to day: That Wisdom, which attends Jehovah’s ways, Shines most conspicuous in the solar rays: Without them, destitute of heat and light, This world would be the reign of endless night: In their excess how would our race complain, Abhorring life! how hate its length’ned chain! From air adust what num’rous ills would rise? What dire contagion taint the burning skies? What pestilential vapours, fraught with death, Would rise, and overspread the lands beneath? Hail, smiling morn, that from the orient main Ascending dost adorn the heav’nly plain! So rich, so various are thy beauteous dies, That spread through all the circuit of the skies, That, full of thee, my soul in rapture soars, And thy great God, the cause of all adores. O’er beings infinite his love extends, His Wisdom rules them, and his Pow’r defends. When tasks diurnal tire the human frame, The spirits faint, and dim the vital flame, Then too that ever active bounty shines, Which not infinity of space confines. The sable veil, that Night in silence draws, Conceals effects, but shows th’ Almighty Cause, Night seals in sleep the wide creation fair, And all is peaceful but the brow of care. Again, gay Phoebus, as the day before, Wakes ev’ry eye, but what shall wake no more; Again the face of nature is renew’d, Which still appears harmonious, fair, and good. May grateful strains salute the smiling morn, Before its beams the eastern hills adorn! Shall day to day, and night to night conspire To show the goodness of the Almighty Sire? This mental voice shall man regardless hear, And never, never raise the filial pray’r? To-day, O hearken, nor your folly mourn For time mispent, that never will return. But see the sons of vegetation rise, And spread their leafy banners to the skies. All-wise Almighty Providence we trace In trees, and plants, and all the flow’ry race; As clear as in the nobler frame of man, All lovely copies of the Maker’s plan. The pow’r the same that forms a ray of light, That call d creation from eternal night. “Let there be light,” he said: from his profound Old Chaos heard, and trembled at the sound: Swift as the word, inspir’d by pow’r divine, Behold the light around its Maker shine, The first fair product of th’ omnific God, And now through all his works diffus’d abroad. As reason’s pow’rs by day our God disclose, So we may trace him in the night’s repose: Say what is sleep? and dreams how passing strange! When action ceases, and ideas range Licentious and unbounded o’er the plains, Where Fancy’s queen in giddy triumph reigns. Hear in soft strains the dreaming lover sigh To a kind fair, or rave in jealousy; On pleasure now, and now on vengeance bent, The lab’ring passions struggle for a vent. What pow’r, O man! thy reason then restores, So long suspended in nocturnal hours? What secret hand returns the mental train, And gives improv’d thine active pow’rs again? From thee, O man, what gratitude should rise! And, when from balmy sleep thou op’st thine eyes, Let thy first thoughts be praises to the skies. How merciful our God who thus imparts O’erflowing tides of joy to human hearts, When wants and woes might be our righteous lot, Our God forgetting, by our God forgot! Among the mental pow’rs a question rose, “What most the image of th’ Eternal shows?” When thus to Reason (so let Fancy rove) Her great companion spoke immortal Love. “Say, mighty pow’r, how long shall strife prevail, “And with its murmurs load the whisp’ring gale? “Refer the cause to Recollection’s shrine, “Who loud proclaims my origin divine, “The cause whence heav’n and earth began to be, “And is not man immortaliz’d by me? “Reason let this most causeless strife subside.” Thus Love pronounc’d, and Reason thus reply’d. “Thy birth, coelestial queen! ’tis mine to own, “In thee resplendent is the Godhead shown; “Thy words persuade, my soul enraptur’d feels “Resistless beauty which thy smile reveals.” Ardent she spoke, and, kindling at her charms, She clasp’d the blooming goddess in her arms. Infinite Love where’er we turn our eyes Appears: this ev’ry creature’s wants supplies; This most is heard in Nature’s constant voice, This makes the morn, and this the eve rejoice; This bids the fost’ring rains and dews descend To nourish all, to serve one gen’ral end, The good of man: yet man ungrateful pays But little homage, and but little praise. To him, whose works arry’d with mercy shine, What songs should rise, how constant, how divine! TO A LADY ON THE DEATH OF THREE RELATIONS. WE trace the pow’r of Death from tomb to tomb, And his are all the ages yet to come. ’Tis his to call the planets from on high, To blacken Phoebus, and dissolve the sky; His too, when all in his dark realms are hurl’d, From its firm base to shake the solid world; His fatal sceptre rules the spacious whole, And trembling nature rocks from pole to pole. Awful he moves, and wide his wings are spread: Behold thy brother number’d with the dead! From bondage freed, the exulting spirit flies Beyond Olympus, and these starry skies. Lost in our woe for thee, blest shade, we mourn In vain; to earth thou never must return. Thy sisters too, fair mourner, feel the dart Of Death, and with fresh torture rend thine heart. Weep not for them, and leave the world behind. As a young plant by hurricanes up torn, So near its parent lies the newly born— But ‘midst the bright ehtereal train behold It shines superior on a throne of gold: Then, mourner, cease; let hope thy tears restrain, Smile on the tomb, and sooth the raging pain. On yon blest regions fix thy longing view, Mindless of sublunary scenes below; Ascend the sacred mount, in thought arise, And seek substantial and immortal joys; Where hope receives, where faith to vision springs, And raptur’d seraphs tune th’ immortal strings To strains extatic. Thou the chorus join, And to thy father tune the praise divine. TO A CLERGYMAN ON THE DEATH OF HIS LADY. WHERE contemplation finds her sacred spring, Where heav’nly music makes the arches ring, Where virtue reigns unsully’d and divine, Where wisdom thron’d, and all the graces shine, There sits thy spouse amidst the radiant throng, While praise eternal warbles from her tongue; There choirs angelic shout her welcome round, With perfect bliss, and peerless glory crown’d. While thy dear mate, to flesh no more confin’d, Exults a blest, an heav’n-ascended mind, Say in thy breast shall floods of sorrow rise? Say shall its torrents overwhelm thine eyes? Amid the seats of heav’n a place is free, And angels open their bright ranks for thee; For thee they wait, and with expectant eye Thy spouse leans downward from th’ empyreal sky: “O come away,” her longing spirit cries, “And share with me the raptures of the skies. “Our bliss divine to mortals is unknown; “Immortal life and glory are our own. “There too may the dear pledges of our love “Arrive, and taste with us the joys above; “Attune the harp to more than mortal lays, “And join with us the tribute of their praise “To him, who dy’d stern justice to stone, “And make eternal glory all our own. “He in his death slew ours, and, as he rose, “He crush’d the dire dominion of our foes; “Vain were their hopes to put the God to flight, “Chain us to hell, and bar the gates of light.” She spoke, and turn’d from mortal scenes her eyes, Which beam’d celestial radiance o’er the skies. Then thou dear man, no more with grief retire, Let grief no longer damp devotion’s fire, But rise sublime, to equal bliss aspire, Thy sighs no more be wafted by the wind, No more complain, but be to heav’n resign’d ’Twas thine t’ unfold the oracles divine, To sooth our woes the task was also thine; Now sorrow is incumbent on thy heart, Permit the muse a cordial to impart; Who can to thee their tend’rest aid refuse? To dry thy tears how longs the heav’nly muse! AN HYMN TO THE MORNING ATTEND my lays, ye ever honour’d nine, Assist my labours, and my strains refine; In smoothest numbers pour the notes along, For bright Aurora now demands my song. Aurora hail, and all the thousand dies, Which deck thy progress through the vaulted skies: The morn awakes, and wide extends her rays, On ev’ry leaf the gentle zephyr plays; Harmonious lays the feather’d race resume, Dart the bright eye, and shake the painted plume. Ye shady groves, your verdant gloom display To shield your poet from the burning day: Calliope awake the sacred lyre, While thy fair sisters fan the pleasing fire: The bow’rs, the gales, the variegated skies In all their pleasures in my bosom rise. See in the east th’ illustrious king of day! His rising radiance drives the shades away— But Oh! I feel his fervid beams too strong, And scarce begun, concludes th’ abortive song. AN HYMN TO THE EVENING. SOON as the sun forsook the eastern main The pealing thunder shook the heav’nly plain; Majestic grandeur! From the zephyr’s wing, Exhales the incense of the blooming spring. Soft purl the streams, the birds renew their notes, And through the air their mingled music floats. Through all the heav’ns what beauteous dies are spread! But the west glories in the deepest red: So may our breasts with ev’ry virtue glow, The living temples of our God below! Fill’d with the praise of him who gives the light, And draws the sable curtains of the night, Let placid slumbers sooth each weary mind, At morn to wake more heav’nly, more refin’d; So shall the labours of the day begin More pure, more guarded from the snares of sin. Night’s leaden sceptre seals my drowsy eyes, Then cease, my song, till fair Aurora rise. ISAIAH lxiii. 1-8. SAY, heav’nly muse, what king or mighty God, That moves sublime from Idumea’s road? In Bosrah’s dies, with martial glories join’d, His purple vesture waves upon the wind. Why thus enrob’d delights he to appear In the dread image of the Pow’r of war? Compres’d in wrath the swelling wine-press groan’d, It bled, and pour’d the gushing purple round. “Mine was the act,” th’ Almighty Saviour said, And shook the dazzling glories of his head, “When all forsook I trod the press alone, “And conquer’d by omnipotence my own; “For man’s release sustain’d the pond’rous load, “For man the wrath of an immortal God: “To execute th’ Eternal’s dread command “My soul I sacrific’d with willing hand; “Sinless I stood before the avenging frown, “Atoning thus for vices not my own.” His eye the ample field of battle round Survey’d, but no created succours found; His own omnipotence sustain’d the right, His vengeance sunk the haughty foes in night; Beneath his feet the prostrate troops were spread, And round him lay the dying, and the dead. Great God, what light’ning flashes from thine eyes? What pow’r withstands if thou indignant rise? Against thy Zion though her foes may rage, And all their cunning, all their strength engage, Yet she serenely on thy bosom lies, Smiles at their arts, and all their force defies. ON RECOLLECTION. MNEME begin. Inspire, ye sacred nine, Your vent’rous Afric in her great design. Mneme, immortal pow’r, I trace thy spring: Assist my strains, while I thy glories sing: The acts of long departed years, by thee Recover’d, in due order rang’d we see: Thy pow’r the long-forgotten calls from night, That sweetly plays before the fancy’s sight. Mneme in our nocturnal visions pours The ample treasure of her secret stores; Swift from above the wings her silent flight Through Phoebe’s realms, fair regent of the night; And, in her pomp of images display’d, To the high-raptur’d poet gives her aid, Through the unbounded regions of the mind, Diffusing light celestial and refin’d. The heav’nly phantom paints the actions done By ev’ry tribe beneath the rolling sun. Mneme, enthron’d within the human breast, Has vice condemn’d, and ev’ry virtue blest. How sweet the sound when we her plaudit hear? Sweeter than music to the ravish’d ear, Sweeter than Maro’s entertaining strains Resounding through the groves, and hills, and plains. But how is Mneme dreaded by the race, Who scorn her warnings and despise her grace? By her unveil’d each horrid crime appears, Her awful hand a cup of wormwood bears. Days, years mispent, O what a hell of woe! Hers the worst tortures that our souls can know. Now eighteen years their destin’d course have run, In fast succession round the central sun. How did the follies of that period pass Unnotic’d, but behold them writ in brass! In Recollection see them fresh return, And sure ’tis mine to be asham’d, and mourn. O Virtue, smiling in immortal green, Do thou exert thy pow’r, and change the scene; Be thine employ to guide my future days, And mine to pay the tribute of my praise. Of Recollection such the pow’r enthron’d In ev’ry breast, and thus her pow’r is own’d. The wretch, who dar’d the vengeance of the skies, At last awakes in horror and surprise, By her alarm’d, he sees impending fate, He howls in anguish, and repents too late. But O! what peace, what joys are hers t’ impart To ev’ry holy, ev’ry upright heart! Thrice blest the man, who, in her sacred shrine, Feels himself shelter’d from the wrath divine! ON IMAGINATION. THY various works, imperial queen, we see, How bright their forms! how deck’d with pomp by thee! Thy wond’rous acts in beauteous order stand, And all attest how potent is thine hand. From Helicon’s refulgent heights attend, Ye sacred choir, and my attempts befriend: To tell her glories with a faithful tongue, Ye blooming graces, triumph in my song. Now here, now there, the roving Fancy flies, Till some lov’d object strikes her wand’ring eyes, Whose silken fetters all the senses bind, And soft captivity involves the mind. Imagination! who can sing thy force? Or who describe the swiftness of thy course? Soaring through air to find the bright abode, Th’ empyreal palace of the thund’ring God, We on thy pinions can surpass the wind, And leave the rolling universe behind: From star to star the mental optics rove, Measure the skies, and range the realms above. There in one view we grasp the mighty whole, Or with new worlds amaze th’ unbounded soul. Though Winter frowns to Fancy’s raptur’d eyes The fields may flourish, and gay scenes arise; The frozen deeps may break their iron bands, And bid their waters murmur o’er the sands. Fair Flora may resume her fragrant reign, And with her flow’ry riches deck the plain; Sylvanus may diffuse his honours round, And all the forest may with leaves be crown’d: Show’rs may descend, and dews their gems disclose, And nectar sparkle on the blooming rose. Such is thy pow’r, nor are thine orders vain, O thou the leader of the mental train: In full perfection all thy works are wrought, And thine the sceptre o’er the realms of thought. Before thy throne the subject-passions bow, Of subject-passions sov’reign ruler thou; At thy command joy rushes on the heart, And through the glowing veins the spirits dart. Fancy might now her silken pinions try To rise from earth, and sweep th’ expanse on high: From Tithon’s bed now might Aurora rise, Her cheeks all glowing with celestial dies, While a pure stream of light o’erflows the skies. The monarch of the day I might behold, And all the mountains tipt with radiant gold, But I reluctant leave the pleasing views, Which Fancy dresses to delight the Muse; Winter austere forbids me to aspire, And northern tempests damp the rising fire; They chill the tides of Fancy’s flowing sea, Cease then, my song, cease the unequal lay. A FUNERAL POEM ON THE DEATH OF C. E. AN INFANT OF TWELVE MONTHS. THROUGH airy roads he wings his instant flight To purer regions of celestial light; Enlarg’d he sees unnumber’d systems roll, Beneath him sees the universal whole, Planets on planets run their destin’d round, And circling wonders fill the vast profound. Th’ ethereal now, and now th’ empyreal skies With growing splendors strike his wond’ring eyes: The angels view him with delight unknown, Press his soft hand, and seat him on his throne; Then smilling thus: “To this divine abode, “The seat of saints, of seraphs, and of God, “Thrice welcome thou.” The raptur’d babe replies, “Thanks to my God, who snatch’d me to the skies, “E’er vice triumphant had possess’d my heart, “E’er yet the tempter had beguil d my heart, “E’er yet on sin’s base actions I was bent, “E’er yet I knew temptation’s dire intent; “E’er yet the lash for horrid crimes I felt, “E’er vanity had led my way to guilt, “But, soon arriv’d at my celestial goal, “Full glories rush on my expanding soul.” Joyful he spoke: exulting cherubs round Clapt their glad wings, the heav’nly vaults resound. Say, parents, why this unavailing moan? Why heave your pensive bosoms with the groan? To Charles, the happy subject of my song, A brighter world, and nobler strains belong. Say would you tear him from the realms above By thoughtless wishes, and prepost’rous love? Doth his felicity increase your pain? Or could you welcome to this world again The heir of bliss? with a superior air Methinks he answers with a smile severe, “Thrones and dominions cannot tempt me there.” But still you cry, “Can we the sigh forbear, “And still and still must we not pour the tear? “Our only hope, more dear than vital breath, “Twelve moons revolv’d, becomes the prey of death; “Delightful infant, nightly visions give “Thee to our arms, and we with joy receive, “We fain would clasp the Phantom to our breast, “The Phantom flies, and leaves the soul unblest.” To yon bright regions let your faith ascend, Prepare to join your dearest infant friend In pleasures without measure, without end. TO CAPTAIN H———D, OF THE 65TH REGIMENT. SAY, muse divine, can hostile scenes delight The warrior’s bosom in the fields of fight? Lo! here the christian and the hero join With mutual grace to form the man divine. In H——-D see with pleasure and surprise, Where valour kindles, and where virtue lies: Go, hero brave, still grace the post of fame, And add new glories to thine honour’d name, Still to the field, and still to virtue true: Britannia glories in no son like you. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE WILLIAM, EARL OF DARTMOUTH His Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for North-America, &c. HAIL, happy day, when, smiling like the morn, Fair Freedom rose New-England to adorn: The northern clime beneath her genial ray, Dartmouth, congratulates thy blissful sway: Elate with hope her race no longer mourns, Each soul expands, each grateful bosom burns, While in thine hand with pleasure we behold The silken reins, and Freedom’s charms unfold. Long lost to realms beneath the northern skies She shines supreme, while hated faction dies: Soon as appear’d the Goddess long desir’d, Sick at the view, she languish’d and expir’d; Thus from the splendors of the morning light The owl in sadness seeks the caves of night. No more, America, in mournful strain Of wrongs, and grievance unredress’d complain, No longer shalt thou dread the iron chain, Which wanton Tyranny with lawless hand Had made, and with it meant t’ enslave the land. Should you, my lord, while you peruse my song, Wonder from whence my love of Freedom sprung, Whence flow these wishes for the common good, By feeling hearts alone best understood, I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate Was snatch’d from Afric’s fancy’d happy seat: What pangs excruciating must molest, What sorrows labour in my parent’s breast? Steel’d was that soul and by no misery mov’d That from a father seiz’d his babe belov’d: Such, such my case. And can I then but pray Others may never feel tyrannic sway? For favours past, great Sir, our thanks are due, And thee we ask thy favours to renew, Since in thy pow’r, as in thy will before, To sooth the griefs, which thou did’st once deplore. May heav’nly grace the sacred sanction give To all thy works, and thou for ever live Not only on the wings of fleeting Fame, Though praise immortal crowns the patriot’s name, But to conduct to heav’ns refulgent fane, May fiery coursers sweep th’ ethereal plain, And bear thee upwards to that blest abode, Where, like the prophet, thou shalt find thy God. O D E T O N E P T U N E. On Mrs. W———‘s Voyage to England. I. WHILE raging tempests shake the shore, While AElus’ thunders round us roar, And sweep impetuous o’er the plain Be still, O tyrant of the main; Nor let thy brow contracted frowns betray, While my Susanna skims the wat’ry way. II. The Pow’r propitious hears the lay, The blue-ey’d daughters of the sea With sweeter cadence glide along, And Thames responsive joins the song. Pleas’d with their notes Sol sheds benign his ray, And double radiance decks the face of day. III. To court thee to Britannia’s arms Serene the climes and mild the sky, Her region boasts unnumber’d charms, Thy welcome smiles in ev’ry eye. Thy promise, Neptune keep, record my pray’r, Not give my wishes to the empty air. Boston, October 12, 1772. TO A LADY ON HER COMING TO NORTH-AMERICA WITH HER SON, FOR THE RECOVERY OF HER HEALTH. INDULGENT muse! my grov’ling mind inspire, And fill my bosom with celestial fire. See from Jamaica’s fervid shore she moves, Like the fair mother of the blooming loves, When from above the Goddess with her hand Fans the soft breeze, and lights upon the land; Thus she on Neptune’s wat’ry realm reclin’d Appear’d, and thus invites the ling’ring wind. “Arise, ye winds, America explore, “Waft me, ye gales, from this malignant shore; “The Northern milder climes I long to greet, “There hope that health will my arrival meet.” Soon as she spoke in my ideal view The winds assented, and the vessel flew. Madam, your spouse bereft of wife and son, In the grove’s dark recesses pours his moan; Each branch, wide-spreading to the ambient sky, Forgets its verdure, and submits to die. From thence I turn, and leave the sultry plain, And swift pursue thy passage o’er the main: The ship arrives before the fav’ring wind, And makes the Philadelphian port assign’d, Thence I attend you to Bostonia’s arms, Where gen’rous friendship ev’ry bosom warms: Thrice welcome here! may health revive again, Bloom on thy cheek, and bound in ev’ry vein! Then back return to gladden ev’ry heart, And give your spouse his soul’s far dearer part, Receiv’d again with what a sweet surprise, The tear in transport starting from his eyes! While his attendant son with blooming grace Springs to his father’s ever dear embrace. With shouts of joy Jamaica’s rocks resound, With shouts of joy the country rings around. TO A LADY ON HER REMARKABLE PRESERVATION IN AN HURRICANE IN NORTH-CAROLINA. THOUGH thou did’st hear the tempest from afar, And felt’st the horrors of the wat’ry war, To me unknown, yet on this peaceful shore Methinks I hear the storm tumultuous roar, And how stern Boreas with impetuous hand Compell’d the Nereids to usurp the land. Reluctant rose the daughters of the main, And slow ascending glided o’er the plain, Till AEolus in his rapid chariot drove In gloomy grandeur from the vault above: Furious he comes. His winged sons obey Their frantic sire, and madden all the sea. The billows rave, the wind’s fierce tyrant roars, And with his thund’ring terrors shakes the shores: Broken by waves the vessel’s frame is rent, And strows with planks the wat’ry element. But thee, Maria, a kind Nereid’s shield Preserv’d from sinking, and thy form upheld: And sure some heav’nly oracle design’d At that dread crisis to instruct thy mind Things of eternal consequence to weigh, And to thine heart just feelings to convey Of things above, and of the future doom, And what the births of the dread world to come. From tossing seas I welcome thee to land. “Resign her, Nereid,” ’twas thy God’s command. Thy spouse late buried, as thy fears conceiv’d, Again returns, thy fears are all reliev’d: Thy daughter blooming with superior grace Again thou see’st, again thine arms embrace; O come, and joyful show thy spouse his heir, And what the blessings of maternal care! TO A LADY AND HER CHILDREN, ON THE DEATH OF HER SON AND THEIR BROTHER. O’ERWHELMING sorrow now demands my song: From death the overwhelming sorrow sprung. What flowing tears? What hearts with grief opprest? What sighs on sighs heave the fond parent’s breast? The brother weeps, the hapless sisters join Th’ increasing woe, and swell the crystal brine; The poor, who once his gen’rous bounty fed, Droop, and bewail their benefactor dead. In death the friend, the kind companion lies, And in one death what various comfort dies! Th’ unhappy mother sees the sanguine rill Forget to flow, and nature’s wheels stand still, But see from earth his spirit far remov’d, And know no grief recals your best-belov’d: He, upon pinions swifter than the wind, Has left mortality’s sad scenes behind For joys to this terrestial state unknown, And glories richer than the monarch’s crown. Of virtue’s steady course the prize behold! What blissful wonders to his mind unfold! But of celestial joys I sing in vain: Attempt not, muse, the too advent’rous strain. No more in briny show’rs, ye friends around, Or bathe his clay, or waste them on the ground: Still do you weep, still wish for his return? How cruel thus to wish, and thus to mourn? No more for him the streams of sorrow pour, But haste to join him on the heav’nly shore, On harps of gold to tune immortal lays, And to your God immortal anthems raise. TO A GENTLEMAN AND LADY ON THE DEATH OF THE LADY’S BROTHER AND SISTER, AND A CHILD OF THE NAME OF AVIS, AGED ONE YEAR. ON Death’s domain intent I fix my eyes, Where human nature in vast ruin lies: With pensive mind I search the drear abode, Where the great conqu’ror has his spoils bestow’d; There where the offspring of six thousand years In endless numbers to my view appears: Whole kingdoms in his gloomy den are thrust, And nations mix with their primeval dust: Insatiate still he gluts the ample tomb; His is the present, his the age to come. See here a brother, here a sister spread, And a sweet daughter mingled with the dead. But, Madam, let your grief be laid aside, And let the fountain of your tears be dry’d, In vain they flow to wet the dusty plain, Your sighs are wafted to the skies in vain, Your pains they witness, but they can no more, While Death reigns tyrant o’er this mortal shore. The glowing stars and silver queen of light At last must perish in the gloom of night: Resign thy friends to that Almighty hand, Which gave them life, and bow to his command; Thine Avis give without a murm’ring heart, Though half thy soul be fated to depart. To shining guards consign thine infant care To waft triumphant through the seas of air: Her soul enlarg’d to heav’nly pleasure springs, She feeds on truth and uncreated things. Methinks I hear her in the realms above, And leaning forward with a filial love, Invite you there to share immortal bliss Unknown, untasted in a state like this. With tow’ring hopes, and growing grace arise, And seek beatitude beyond the skies. ON THE DEATH OF DR. SAMUEL MARSHALL. 1771. THROUGH thickest glooms look back, immortal shade, On that confusion which thy death has made: Or from Olympus’ height look down, and see A Town involv’d in grief bereft of thee. Thy Lucy sees thee mingle with the dead, And rends the graceful tresses from her head, Wild in her woe, with grief unknown opprest Sigh follows sigh deep heaving from her breast. Too quickly fled, ah! whither art thou gone? Ah! lost for ever to thy wife and son! The hapless child, thine only hope and heir, Clings round his mother’s neck, and weeps his sorrows there. The loss of thee on Tyler’s soul returns, And Boston for her dear physician mourns. When sickness call’d for Marshall’s healing hand, With what compassion did his soul expand? In him we found the father and the friend: In life how lov’d! how honour’d in his end! And must not then our AEsculapius stay To bring his ling’ring infant into day? The babe unborn in the dark womb is tost, And seems in anguish for its father lost. Gone is Apollo from his house of earth, But leaves the sweet memorials of his worth: The common parent, whom we all deplore, From yonder world unseen must come no more, Yet ‘midst our woes immortal hopes attend The spouse, the sire, the universal friend. TO A GENTLEMAN ON HIS VOYAGE TO GREAT-BRITAIN FOR THE RECOVERY OF HIS HEALTH. WHILE others chant of gay Elysian scenes, Of balmy zephyrs, and of flow’ry plains, My song more happy speaks a greater name, Feels higher motives and a nobler flame. For thee, O R——-, the muse attunes her strings, And mounts sublime above inferior things. I sing not now of green embow’ring woods, I sing not now the daughters of the floods, I sing not of the storms o’er ocean driv’n, And how they howl’d along the waste of heav’n. But I to R——- would paint the British shore, And vast Atlantic, not untry’d before: Thy life impair’d commands thee to arise, Leave these bleak regions and inclement skies, Where chilling winds return the winter past, And nature shudders at the furious blast. O thou stupendous, earth-enclosing main Exert thy wonders to the world again! If ere thy pow’r prolong’d the fleeting breath, Turn’d back the shafts, and mock’d the gates of death, If ere thine air dispens’d an healing pow’r, Or snatch’d the victim from the fatal hour, This equal case demands thine equal care, And equal wonders may this patient share. But unavailing, frantic is the dream To hope thine aid without the aid of him Who gave thee birth and taught thee where to flow, And in thy waves his various blessings show. May R——- return to view his native shore Replete with vigour not his own before, Then shall we see with pleasure and surprise, And own thy work, great Ruler of the skies! TO THE REV. DR. THOMAS AMORY, ON READING HIS SERMONS ON DAILY DEVOTION, IN WHICH THAT DUTY IS RECOMMENDED AND ASSISTED. TO cultivate in ev’ry noble mind Habitual grace, and sentiments refin’d, Thus while you strive to mend the human heart, Thus while the heav’nly precepts you impart, O may each bosom catch the sacred fire, And youthful minds to Virtue’s throne aspire! When God’s eternal ways you set in sight, And Virtue shines in all her native light, In vain would Vice her works in night conceal, For Wisdom’s eye pervades the sable veil. Artists may paint the sun’s effulgent rays, But Amory’s pen the brighter God displays: While his great works in Amory’s pages shine, And while he proves his essence all divine, The Atheist sure no more can boast aloud Of chance, or nature, and exclude the God; As if the clay without the potter’s aid Should rise in various forms, and shapes self-made, Or worlds above with orb o’er orb profound Self-mov’d could run the everlasting round. It cannot be—unerring Wisdom guides With eye propitious, and o’er all presides. Still prosper, Amory! still may’st thou receive The warmest blessings which a muse can give, And when this transitory state is o’er, When kingdoms fall, and fleeting Fame’s no more, May Amory triumph in immortal fame, A nobler title, and superior name! ON THE DEATH OF J. C. AN INFANT. NO more the flow’ry scenes of pleasure rife, Nor charming prospects greet the mental eyes, No more with joy we view that lovely face Smiling, disportive, flush’d with ev’ry grace. The tear of sorrow flows from ev’ry eye, Groans answer groans, and sighs to sighs reply; What sudden pangs shot thro’ each aching heart, When, Death, thy messenger dispatch’d his dart? Thy dread attendants, all-destroying Pow’r, Hurried the infant to his mortal hour. Could’st thou unpitying close those radiant eyes? Or fail’d his artless beauties to surprise? Could not his innocence thy stroke controul, Thy purpose shake, and soften all thy soul? The blooming babe, with shades of Death o’er-spread, No more shall smile, no more shall raise its head, But, like a branch that from the tree is torn, Falls prostrate, wither’d, languid, and forlorn. “Where flies my James?” ’tis thus I seem to hear The parent ask, “Some angel tell me where “He wings his passage thro’ the yielding air?” Methinks a cherub bending from the skies Observes the question, and serene replies, “In heav’ns high palaces your babe appears: “Prepare to meet him, and dismiss your tears.” Shall not th’ intelligence your grief restrain, And turn the mournful to the cheerful strain? Cease your complaints, suspend each rising sigh, Cease to accuse the Ruler of the sky. Parents, no more indulge the falling tear: Let Faith to heav’n’s refulgent domes repair, There see your infant, like a seraph glow: What charms celestial in his numbers flow Melodious, while the foul-enchanting strain Dwells on his tongue, and fills th’ ethereal plain? Enough—for ever cease your murm’ring breath; Not as a foe, but friend converse with Death, Since to the port of happiness unknown He brought that treasure which you call your own. The gift of heav’n intrusted to your hand Cheerful resign at the divine command: Not at your bar must sov’reign Wisdom stand. AN H Y M N TO H U M A N I T Y. TO S. P. G. ESQ; I. LO! for this dark terrestrial ball Forsakes his azure-paved hall A prince of heav’nly birth! Divine Humanity behold, What wonders rise, what charms unfold At his descent to earth! II. The bosoms of the great and good With wonder and delight he view’d, And fix’d his empire there: Him, close compressing to his breast, The sire of gods and men address’d, “My son, my heav’nly fair! III. “Descend to earth, there place thy throne; “To succour man’s afflicted son “Each human heart inspire: “To act in bounties unconfin’d “Enlarge the close contracted mind, “And fill it with thy fire.” IV. Quick as the word, with swift career He wings his course from star to star, And leaves the bright abode. The Virtue did his charms impart; Their G——-! then thy raptur’d heart Perceiv’d the rushing God: V. For when thy pitying eye did see The languid muse in low degree, Then, then at thy desire Descended the celestial nine; O’er me methought they deign’d to shine, And deign’d to string my lyre. VI. Can Afric’s muse forgetful prove? Or can such friendship fail to move A tender human heart? Immortal Friendship laurel-crown’d The smiling Graces all surround With ev’ry heav’nly Art. TO THE HONOURABLE T. H. ESQ; ON THE DEATH OF HIS DAUGHTER. WHILE deep you mourn beneath the cypress-shade The hand of Death, and your dear daughter laid In dust, whose absence gives your tears to flow, And racks your bosom with incessant woe, Let Recollection take a tender part, Assuage the raging tortures of your heart, Still the wild tempest of tumultuous grief, And pour the heav’nly nectar of relief: Suspend the sigh, dear Sir, and check the groan, Divinely bright your daughter’s Virtues shone: How free from scornful pride her gentle mind, Which ne’er its aid to indigence declin’d! Expanding free, it sought the means to prove Unfailing charity, unbounded love! She unreluctant flies to see no more Her dear-lov’d parents on earth’s dusky shore: Impatient heav’n’s resplendent goal to gain, She with swift progress cuts the azure plain, Where grief subsides, where changes are no more, And life’s tumultuous billows cease to roar; She leaves her earthly mansion for the skies, Where new creations feast her wond’ring eyes. To heav’n’s high mandate cheerfully resign’d She mounts, and leaves the rolling globe behind; She, who late wish’d that Leonard might return, Has ceas’d to languish, and forgot to mourn; To the same high empyreal mansions come, She joins her spouse, and smiles upon the tomb: And thus I hear her from the realms above: “Lo! this the kingdom of celestial love! “Could ye, fond parents, see our present bliss, “How soon would you each sigh, each fear dismiss? “Amidst unutter’d pleasures whilst I play “In the fair sunshine of celestial day, “As far as grief affects an happy soul “So far doth grief my better mind controul, “To see on earth my aged parents mourn, “And secret wish for T——-! to return: “Let brighter scenes your ev’ning-hours employ: “Converse with heav’n, and taste the promis’d joy” NIOBE IN DISTRESS FOR HER CHILDREN SLAIN BY APOLLO, FROM OVID’S METAMORPHOSES, BOOK VI. AND FROM A VIEW OF THE PAINTING OF MR. RICHARD WILSON. APOLLO’s wrath to man the dreadful spring Of ills innum’rous, tuneful goddess, sing! Thou who did’st first th’ ideal pencil give, And taught’st the painter in his works to live, Inspire with glowing energy of thought, What Wilson painted, and what Ovid wrote. Muse! lend thy aid, nor let me sue in vain, Tho’ last and meanest of the rhyming train! O guide my pen in lofty strains to show The Phrygian queen, all beautiful in woe. ’Twas where Maeonia spreads her wide domain Niobe dwelt, and held her potent reign: See in her hand the regal sceptre shine, The wealthy heir of Tantalus divine, He most distinguish’d by Dodonean Jove, To approach the tables of the gods above: Her grandsire Atlas, who with mighty pains Th’ ethereal axis on his neck sustains: Her other grandsire on the throne on high Rolls the loud-pealing thunder thro’ the sky. Her spouse, Amphion, who from Jove too springs, Divinely taught to sweep the sounding strings. Seven sprightly sons the royal bed adorn, Seven daughters beauteous as the op’ning morn, As when Aurora fills the ravish’d sight, And decks the orient realms with rosy light From their bright eyes the living splendors play, Nor can beholders bear the flashing ray. Wherever, Niobe, thou turn’st thine eyes, New beauties kindle, and new joys arise! But thou had’st far the happier mother prov’d, If this fair offspring had been less belov’d: What if their charms exceed Aurora’s teint. No words could tell them, and no pencil paint, Thy love too vehement hastens to destroy Each blooming maid, and each celestial boy. Now Manto comes, endu’d with mighty skill, The past to explore, the future to reveal. Thro’ Thebes’ wide streets Tiresia’s daughter came, Divine Latona’s mandate to proclaim: The Theban maids to hear the orders ran, When thus Maeonia’s prophetess began: “Go, Thebans! great Latona’s will obey, “And pious tribute at her altars pay: “With rights divine, the goddess be implor’d, “Nor be her sacred offspring unador’d.” Thus Manto spoke. The Theban maids obey, And pious tribute to the goddess pay. The rich perfumes ascend in waving spires, And altars blaze with consecrated fires; The fair assembly moves with graceful air, And leaves of laurel bind the flowing hair. Niobe comes with all her royal race, With charms unnumber’d, and superior grace: Her Phrygian garments of delightful hue, Inwove with gold, refulgent to the view, Beyond description beautiful she moves Like heav’nly Venus, ‘midst her smiles and loves: She views around the supplicating train, And shakes her graceful head with stern disdain, Proudly she turns around her lofty eyes, And thus reviles celestial deities: “What madness drives the Theban ladies fair “To give their incense to surrounding air? “Say why this new sprung deity preferr’d? “Why vainly fancy your petitions heard? “Or say why Caeus offspring is obey’d, “While to my goddesship no tribute’s paid? “For me no altars blaze with living fires, “No bullock bleeds, no frankincense transpires, “Tho’ Cadmus’ palace, not unknown to fame, “And Phrygian nations all revere my name. “Where’er I turn my eyes vast wealth I find, “Lo! here an empress with a goddess join’d. “What, shall a Titaness be deify’d, “To whom the spacious earth a couch deny’d! “Nor heav’n, nor earth, nor sea receiv’d your queen, “Till pitying Delos took the wand’rer in. “Round me what a large progeny is spread! “No frowns of fortune has my soul to dread. “What if indignant she decrease my train “More than Latona’s number will remain; “Then hence, ye Theban dames, hence haste away, “Nor longer off’rings to Latona pay; “Regard the orders of Amphion’s spouse, “And take the leaves of laurel from your brows.” Niobe spoke. The Theban maids obey’d, Their brows unbound, and left the rights unpaid. The angry goddess heard, then silence broke On Cynthus’ summit, and indignant spoke; “Phoebus! behold, thy mother in disgrace, “Who to no goddess yields the prior place “Except to Juno’s self, who reigns above, “The spouse and sister of the thund’ring Jove. “Niobe, sprung from Tantalus, inspires “Each Theban bosom with rebellious fires; “No reason her imperious temper quells, “But all her father in her tongue rebels; “Wrap her own sons for her blaspheming breath, “Apollo! wrap them in the shades of death.” Latona ceas’d, and ardent thus replies The God, whose glory decks th’ expanded skies. “Cease thy complaints, mine be the task assign’d “To punish pride, and scourge the rebel mind.” This Phoebe join’d.—They wing their instant flight; Thebes trembled as th’ immortal pow’rs alight. With clouds incompass’d glorious Phoebus stands; The feather’d vengeance quiv’ring in his hands. Near Cadmus’ walls a plain extended lay, Where Thebes’ young princes pass’d in sport the day: There the bold coursers bounded o’er the plains, While their great masters held the golden reins. Ismenus first the racing pastime led, And rul’d the fury of his flying steed. “Ah me,” he sudden cries, with shrieking breath, While in his breast he feels the shaft of death; He drops the bridle on his courser’s mane, Before his eyes in shadows swims the plain, He, the first-born of great Amphion’s bed, Was struck the first, first mingled with the dead. Then didst thou, Sipylus, the language hear Of fate portentous whistling in the air: As when th’ impending storm the sailor sees He spreads his canvas to the fav’ring breeze, So to thine horse thou gav’st the golden reins, Gav’st him to rush impetuous o’er the plains: But ah! a fatal shaft from Phoebus’ hand Smites thro’ thy neck, and sinks thee on the sand. Two other brothers were at wrestling found, And in their pastime claspt each other round: A shaft that instant from Apollo’s hand Transfixt them both, and stretcht them on the sand: Together they their cruel fate bemoan’d, Together languish’d, and together groan’d: Together too th’ unbodied spirits fled, And sought the gloomy mansions of the dead. Alphenor saw, and trembling at the view, Beat his torn breast, that chang’d its snowy hue. He flies to raise them in a kind embrace; A brother’s fondness triumphs in his face: Alphenor fails in this fraternal deed, A dart dispatch’d him (so the fates decreed:) Soon as the arrow left the deadly wound, His issuing entrails smoak’d upon the ground. What woes on blooming Damasichon wait! His sighs portend his near impending fate. Just where the well-made leg begins to be, And the soft sinews form the supple knee, The youth sore wounded by the Delian god Attempts t’ extract the crime-avenging rod, But, whilst he strives the will of fate t’ avert, Divine Apollo sends a second dart; Swift thro’ his throat the feather’d mischief flies, Bereft of sense, he drops his head, and dies. Young Ilioneus, the last, directs his pray’r, And cries, “My life, ye gods celestial! spare.” Apollo heard, and pity touch’d his heart, But ah! too late, for he had sent the dart: Thou too, O Ilioneus, art doom’d to fall, The fates refuse that arrow to recal. On the swift wings of ever flying Fame To Cadmus’ palace soon the tidings came: Niobe heard, and with indignant eyes She thus express’d her anger and surprise: “Why is such privilege to them allow’d? “Why thus insulted by the Delian god? “Dwells there such mischief in the pow’rs above? “Why sleeps the vengeance of immortal Jove?” For now Amphion too, with grief oppress’d, Had plung’d the deadly dagger in his breast. Niobe now, less haughty than before, With lofty head directs her steps no more She, who late told her pedigree divine, And drove the Thebans from Latona’s shrine, How strangely chang’d!—yet beautiful in woe, She weeps, nor weeps unpity’d by the foe. On each pale corse the wretched mother spread Lay overwhelm’d with grief, and kiss’d her dead, Then rais’d her arms, and thus, in accents slow, “Be sated cruel Goddess! with my woe; “If I’ve offended, let these streaming eyes, “And let this sev’nfold funeral suffice: “Ah! take this wretched life you deign’d to save, “With them I too am carried to the grave. “Rejoice triumphant, my victorious foe, “But show the cause from whence your triumphs flow? “Tho’ I unhappy mourn these children slain, “Yet greater numbers to my lot remain.” She ceas’d, the bow string twang’d with awful sound, Which struck with terror all th’ assembly round, Except the queen, who stood unmov’d alone, By her distresses more presumptuous grown. Near the pale corses stood their sisters fair In sable vestures and dishevell’d hair; One, while she draws the fatal shaft away, Faints, falls, and sickens at the light of day. To sooth her mother, lo! another flies, And blames the fury of inclement skies, And, while her words a filial pity show, Struck dumb—indignant seeks the shades below. Now from the fatal place another flies, Falls in her flight, and languishes, and dies. Another on her sister drops in death; A fifth in trembling terrors yields her breath; While the sixth seeks some gloomy cave in vain, Struck with the rest, and mingled with the slain. One only daughter lives, and she the least; The queen close clasp’d the daughter to her breast: “Ye heav’nly pow’rs, ah spare me one,” she cry’d, “Ah! spare me one,” the vocal hills reply’d: In vain she begs, the Fates her suit deny, In her embrace she sees her daughter die. * “The queen of all her family bereft, “Without or husband, son, or daughter left, “Grew stupid at the shock. The passing air “Made no impression on her stiff’ning hair. * This Verse To The End Is The Work Of Another Hand. “The blood forsook her face: amidst the flood “Pour’d from her cheeks, quite fix’d her eye-balls “stood. “Her tongue, her palate both obdurate grew, “Her curdled veins no longer motion knew; “The use of neck, and arms, and feet was gone, “And ev’n her bowels hard’ned into stone: “A marble statue now the queen appears, “But from the marble steal the silent tears.” TO S. M. A YOUNG AFRICAN PAINTER, ON SEEING HIS WORKS. TO show the lab’ring bosom’s deep intent, And thought in living characters to paint, When first thy pencil did those beauties give, And breathing figures learnt from thee to live, How did those prospects give my soul delight, A new creation rushing on my sight? Still, wond’rous youth! each noble path pursue, On deathless glories fix thine ardent view: Still may the painter’s and the poet’s fire To aid thy pencil, and thy verse conspire! And may the charms of each seraphic theme Conduct thy footsteps to immortal fame! High to the blissful wonders of the skies Elate thy soul, and raise thy wishful eyes. Thrice happy, when exalted to survey That splendid city, crown’d with endless day, Whose twice six gates on radiant hinges ring: Celestial Salem blooms in endless spring. Calm and serene thy moments glide along, And may the muse inspire each future song! Still, with the sweets of contemplation bless’d, May peace with balmy wings your soul invest! But when these shades of time are chas’d away, And darkness ends in everlasting day, On what seraphic pinions shall we move, And view the landscapes in the realms above? There shall thy tongue in heav’nly murmurs flow, And there my muse with heav’nly transport glow: No more to tell of Damon’s tender sighs, Or rising radiance of Aurora’s eyes, For nobler themes demand a nobler strain, And purer language on th’ ethereal plain. Cease, gentle muse! the solemn gloom of night Now seals the fair creation from my sight. TO HIS HONOUR THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, ON THE DEATH OF HIS LADY. MARCH 24, 1773. ALL-Conquering Death! by thy resistless pow’r, Hope’s tow’ring plumage falls to rise no more! Of scenes terrestrial how the glories fly, Forget their splendors, and submit to die! Who ere escap’d thee, but the saint * of old Beyond the flood in sacred annals told, And the great sage, + whom fiery coursers drew To heav’n’s bright portals from Elisha’s view; Wond’ring he gaz’d at the refulgent car, Then snatch’d the mantle floating on the air. From Death these only could exemption boast, And without dying gain’d th’ immortal coast. Not falling millions sate the tyrant’s mind, Nor can the victor’s progress be confin’d. But cease thy strife with Death, fond Nature, cease: He leads the virtuous to the realms of peace; * Enoch. + Elijah. His to conduct to the immortal plains, Where heav’n’s Supreme in bliss and glory reigns. There sits, illustrious Sir, thy beauteous spouse; A gem-blaz’d circle beaming on her brows. Hail’d with acclaim among the heav’nly choirs, Her soul new-kindling with seraphic fires, To notes divine she tunes the vocal strings, While heav’n’s high concave with the music rings. Virtue’s rewards can mortal pencil paint? No—all descriptive arts, and eloquence are faint; Nor canst thou, Oliver, assent refuse To heav’nly tidings from the Afric muse. As soon may change thy laws, eternal fate, As the saint miss the glories I relate; Or her Benevolence forgotten lie, Which wip’d the trick’ling tear from Misry’s eye. Whene’er the adverse winds were known to blow, When loss to loss * ensu’d, and woe to woe, Calm and serene beneath her father’s hand She sat resign’d to the divine command. No longer then, great Sir, her death deplore, And let us hear the mournful sigh no more, Restrain the sorrow streaming from thine eye, Be all thy future moments crown’d with joy! Nor let thy wishes be to earth confin’d, But soaring high pursue th’ unbodied mind. Forgive the muse, forgive th’ advent’rous lays, That fain thy soul to heav’nly scenes would raise. A FAREWEL TO AMERICA. TO MRS. S. W. I. ADIEU, New-England’s smiling meads, Adieu, the flow’ry plain: I leave thine op’ning charms, O spring, And tempt the roaring main. II. In vain for me the flow’rets rise, And boast their gaudy pride, While here beneath the northern skies I mourn for health deny’d. III. Celestial maid of rosy hue, O let me feel thy reign! I languish till thy face I view, Thy vanish’d joys regain. IV. Susanna mourns, nor can I bear To see the crystal show’r, Or mark the tender falling tear At sad departure’s hour; V. Not unregarding can I see Her soul with grief opprest: But let no sighs, no groans for me, Steal from her pensive breast. VI. In vain the feather’d warblers sing, In vain the garden blooms, And on the bosom of the spring Breathes out her sweet perfumes. VII. While for Britannia’s distant shore We sweep the liquid plain, And with astonish’d eyes explore The wide-extended main. VIII. Lo! Health appears! celestial dame! Complacent and serene, With Hebe’s mantle o’er her Frame, With soul-delighting mein. IX. To mark the vale where London lies With misty vapours crown’d, Which cloud Aurora’s thousand dyes, And veil her charms around. X. Why, Phoebus, moves thy car so slow? So slow thy rising ray? Give us the famous town to view, Thou glorious king of day! XI. For thee, Britannia, I resign New-England’s smiling fields; To view again her charms divine, What joy the prospect yields! XII. But thou! Temptation hence away, With all thy fatal train, Nor once seduce my soul away, By thine enchanting strain. XIII. Thrice happy they, whose heav’nly shield Secures their souls from harms, And fell Temptation on the field Of all its pow’r disarms! Boston, May 7, 1773. A REBUS, BY I. B. I. A BIRD delicious to the taste, On which an army once did feast, Sent by an hand unseen; A creature of the horned race, Which Britain’s royal standards grace; A gem of vivid green; II. A town of gaiety and sport, Where beaux and beauteous nymphs resort, And gallantry doth reign; A Dardan hero fam’d of old For youth and beauty, as we’re told, And by a monarch slain; III. A peer of popular applause, Who doth our violated laws, And grievances proclaim. Th’ initials show a vanquish’d town, That adds fresh glory and renown To old Britannia’s fame. AN ANSWER TO THE REBUS, BY THE AUTHOR OF THESE POEMS. THE poet asks, and Phillis can’t refuse To show th’ obedience of the Infant muse. She knows the Quail of most inviting taste Fed Israel’s army in the dreary waste; And what’s on Britain’s royal standard borne, But the tall, graceful, rampant Unicorn? The Emerald with a vivid verdure glows Among the gems which regal crowns compose; Boston’s a town, polite and debonair, To which the beaux and beauteous nymphs repair, Each Helen strikes the mind with sweet surprise, While living lightning flashes from her eyes, See young Euphorbus of the Dardan line By Manelaus’ hand to death resign: The well known peer of popular applause Is C——m zealous to support our laws. Quebec now vanquish’d must obey, She too much annual tribute pay To Britain of immortal fame. And add new glory to her name. F I N I S. 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CLOTEL from William Wells Brown
richardmurray posted a blog entry in DOS earliest literature's Work List
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PREFACE MORE than two hundred years have elapsed since the first cargo of slaves was landed on the banks of the James River, in the colony of Virginia, from the West coast of Africa. From the introduction of slaves in 1620, down to the period of the separation of the Colonies from the British Crown, the number had increased to five hundred thousand; now there are nearly four million. In fifteen of the thirty-one States, Slavery is made lawful by the Constitution, which binds the several States into one confederacy. On every foot of soil, over which Stars and Stripes wave, the Negro is considered common property, on which any white man may lay his hand with perfect impunity. The entire white population of the United States, North and South, are bound by their oath to the constitution, and their adhesion to the Fugitive Slaver Law, to hunt down the runaway slave and return him to his claimant, and to suppress any effort that may be made by the slaves to gain their freedom by physical force. Twenty-five millions of whites have banded themselves in solemn conclave to keep four millions of blacks in their chains. In all grades of society are to be found men who either hold, buy, or sell slaves, from the statesmen and doctors of divinity, who can own their hundreds, down to the person who can purchase but one. Were it not for persons in high places owning slaves, and thereby giving the system a reputation, and especially professed Christians, Slavery would long since have been abolished. The influence of the great "honours the corruption, and chastisement doth therefore hide his head." The great aim of the true friends of the slave should be to lay bare the institution, so that the gaze of the world may be upon it, and cause the wise, the prudent, and the pious to withdraw their support from it, and leave it to its own fate. It does the cause of emancipation but little good to cry out in tones of execration against the traders, the kidnappers, the hireling overseers, and brutal drivers, so long as nothing is said to fasten the guilt on those who move in a higher circle. The fact that slavery was introduced into the American colonies, while they were under the control of the British Crown, is a sufficient reason why Englishmen should feel a lively interest in its abolition; and now that the genius of mechanical invention has brought the two countries so near together, and both having one language and one literature, the influence of British public opinion is very great on the people of the New World. If the incidents set forth in the following pages should add anything new to the information already given to the Public through similar publications, and should thereby aid in bringing British influence to bear upon American slavery, the main object for which this work was written will have been accomplished. W. WELLS BROWN 22, Cecil Street, Strand, London. CONTENTS. MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR THE NEGRO SALE GOING TO THE SOUTH THE NEGRO CHASE THE QUADROON'S HOME THE SLAVE MASTER THE RELIGIOUS TEACHER THE POOR WHITES, SOUTH THE SEPARATION THE MAN OP HONOUR THE YOUNG CHRISTIAN THE PARSON POET A NIGHT IN THE PARSON'S KITCHEN A SLAVE HUNT A FREE WOMAN REDUCED TO SLAVERY TO-DAY A MISTRESS, TO-MORROW A SLAVE DEATH OF THE PARSON RETALIATION THE LIBERATOR ESCAPE OF CLOTEL A TRUE DEMOCRAT THE CHRISTIAN'S DEATH A RIDE IN A STAGE COACH TRUTH STRANGER THAN FICTION DEATH IS FREEDOM THE ESCAPE THE MYSTERY THE HAPPY MEETING CONCLUSION CHAPTER I THE NEGRO SALE "Why stands she near the auction stand, That girl so young and fair? What brings her to this dismal place, Why stands she weeping there?" WITH the growing population of slaves in the Southern States of America, there is a fearful increase of half whites, most of whose fathers are slaveowners and their mothers slaves. Society does not frown upon the man who sits with his mulatto child upon his knee, whilst its mother stands a slave behind his chair. The late Henry Clay, some years since, predicted that the abolition of Negro slavery would be brought about by the amalgamation of the races. John Randolph, a distinguished slaveholder of Virginia, and a prominent statesman, said in a speech in the legislature of his native state, that "the blood of the first American statesmen coursed through the veins of the slave of the South." In all the cities and towns of the slave states, the real Negro, or clear black, does not amount to more than one in every four of the slave population. This fact is, of itself, the best evidence of the degraded and immoral condition of the relation of master and slave in the United States of America. In all the slave states, the law says:—"Slaves shall be deemed, sold [held], taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be chattels personal in the hands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators and assigns, to all intents, constructions, and purposes whatsoever. A slave is one who is in the power of a master to whom he belongs. The master may sell him, dispose of his person, his industry, and his labour. He can do nothing, possess nothing, nor acquire anything, but what must belong to his master. The slave is entirely subject to the will of his master, who may correct and chastise him, though not with unusual rigour, or so as to maim and mutilate him, or expose him to the danger of loss of life, or to cause his death. The slave, to remain a slave, must be sensible that there is no appeal from his master." Where the slave is placed by law entirely under the control of the man who claims him, body and soul, as property, what else could be expected than the most depraved social condition? The marriage relation, the oldest and most sacred institution given to man by his Creator, is unknown and unrecognised in the slave laws of the United States. Would that we could say, that the moral and religious teaching in the slave states were better than the laws; but, alas! we cannot. A few years since, some slaveholders became a little uneasy in their minds about the rightfulness of permitting slaves to take to themselves husbands and wives, while they still had others living, and applied to their religious teachers for advice; and the following will show how this grave and important subject was treated:— "Is a servant, whose husband or wife has been sold by his or her master into a distant country, to be permitted to marry again?" The query was referred to a committee, who made the following report; which, after discussion, was adopted:— "That, in view of the circumstances in which servants in this country are placed, the committee are unanimous in the opinion, that it is better to permit servants thus circumstanced to take another husband or wife." Such was the answer from a committee of the "Shiloh Baptist Association;" and instead of receiving light, those who asked the question were plunged into deeper darkness! A similar question was put to the "Savannah River Association," and the answer, as the following will show, did not materially differ from the one we have already given:— "Whether, in a case of involuntary separation, of such a character as to preclude all prospect of future intercourse, the parties ought to be allowed to marry again." Answer:— "That such separation among persons situated as our slaves are, is civilly a separation by death; and they believe that, in the sight of God, it would be so viewed. To forbid second marriages in such cases would be to expose the parties, not only to stronger hardships and strong temptation, but to church-censure for acting in obedience to their masters, who cannot be expected to acquiesce in a regulation at variance with justice to the slaves, and to the spirit of that command which regulates marriage among Christians. The slaves are not free agents; and a dissolution by death is not more entirely without their consent, and beyond their control than by such separation." Although marriage, as the above indicates, is a matter which the slaveholders do not think is of any importance, or of any binding force with their slaves; yet it would be doing that degraded class an injustice, not to acknowledge that many of them do regard it as a sacred obligation, and show a willingness to obey the commands of God on this subject. Marriage is, indeed, the first and most important institution of human existence—the foundation of all civilisation and culture—the root of church and state. It is the most intimate covenant of heart formed among mankind; and for many persons the only relation in which they feel the true sentiments of humanity. It gives scope for every human virtue, since each of these is developed from the love and confidence which here predominate. It unites all which ennobles and beautifies life,—sympathy, kindness of will and deed, gratitude, devotion, and every delicate, intimate feeling. As the only asylum for true education, it is the first and last sanctuary of human culture. As husband and wife, through each other become conscious of complete humanity, and every human feeling, and every human virtue; so children, at their first awakening in the fond covenant of love between parents, both of whom are tenderly concerned for the same object, find an image of complete humanity leagued in free love. The spirit of love which prevails between them acts with creative power upon the young mind, and awakens every germ of goodness within it. This invisible and incalculable influence of parental life acts more upon the child than all the efforts of education, whether by means of instruction, precept, or exhortation. If this be a true picture of the vast influence for good of the institution of marriage, what must be the moral degradation of that people to whom marriage is denied? Not content with depriving them of all the higher and holier enjoyments of this relation, by degrading and darkening their souls, the slaveholder denies to his victim even that slight alleviation of his misery, which would result from the marriage relation being protected by law and public opinion. Such is the influence of slavery in the United States, that the ministers of religion, even in the so-called free states, are the mere echoes, instead of the correctors, of public sentiment. We have thought it advisable to show that the present system of chattel slavery in America undermines the entire social condition of man, so as to prepare the reader for the following narrative of slave life, in that otherwise happy and prosperous country. In all the large towns in the Southern States, there is a class of slaves who are permitted to hire their time of their owners, and for which they pay a high price. These are mulatto women, or quadroons, as they are familiarly known, and are distinguished for their fascinating beauty. The handsomest usually pays the highest price for her time. Many of these women are the favourites of persons who furnish them with the means of paying their owners, and not a few are dressed in the most extravagant manner. Reader, when you take into consideration the fact, that amongst the slave population no safeguard is thrown around virtue, and no inducement held out to slave women to be chaste, you will not be surprised when we tell you that immorality and vice pervade the cities of the Southern States in a manner unknown in the cities and towns of the Northern States. Indeed most of the slave women have no higher aspiration than that of becoming the finely-dressed mistress of some white man. And at Negro balls and parties, this class of women usually cut the greatest figure. At the close of the year, the following advertisement appeared in a newspaper published in Richmond, the capital of the state of Virginia:—"Notice: Thirty-eight Negroes will be offered for sale on Monday, November 10th, at twelve o'clock, being the entire stock of the late John Graves, Esq. The Negroes are in good condition, some of them very prime; among them are several mechanics, able-bodied field hands, ploughboys, and women with children at the breast, and some of them very prolific in their generating qualities, affording a rare opportunity to any one who wishes to raise a strong and healthy lot of servants for their own use. Also several mulatto girls of rare personal qualities: two of them very superior. Any gentleman or lady wishing to purchase, can take any of the above slaves on trial for a week, for which no charge will be made." Amongst the above slaves to be sold were Currer and her two daughters, Clotel and Althesa; the latter were the girls spoken of in the advertisement as "very superior." Currer was a bright mulatto, and of prepossessing appearance, though then nearly forty years of age. She had hired her time for more than twenty years, during which time she had lived in Richmond. In her younger days Currer had been the housekeeper of a young slaveholder; but of later years had been a laundress or washerwoman, and was considered to be a woman of great taste in getting up linen. The gentleman for whom she had kept house was Thomas Jefferson, by whom she had two daughters. Jefferson being called to Washington to fill a government appointment, Currer was left behind, and thus she took herself to the business of washing, by which means she paid her master, Mr. Graves, and supported herself and two children. At the time of the decease of her master, Currer's daughters, Clotel and Althesa, were aged respectively sixteen and fourteen years, and both, like most of their own sex in America, were well grown. Currer early resolved to bring her daughters up as ladies, as she termed it, and therefore imposed little or no work upon them. As her daughters grew older, Currer had to pay a stipulated price for them; yet her notoriety as a laundress of the first class enabled her to put an extra price upon her charges, and thus she and her daughters lived in comparative luxury. To bring up Clotel and Althesa to attract attention, and especially at balls and parties, was the great aim of Currer. Although the term "Negro ball" is applied to most of these gatherings, yet a majority of the attendants are often whites. Nearly all the Negro parties in the cities and towns of the Southern States are made up of quadroon and mulatto girls, and white men. These are democratic gatherings, where gentlemen, shopkeepers, and their clerks, all appear upon terms of perfect equality. And there is a degree of gentility and decorum in these companies that is not surpassed by similar gatherings of white people in the Slave States. It was at one of these parties that Horatio Green, the son of a wealthy gentleman of Richmond, was first introduced to Clotel. The young man had just returned from college, and was in his twenty-second year. Clotel was sixteen, and was admitted by all to be the most beautiful girl, coloured or white, in the city. So attentive was the young man to the quadroon during the evening that it was noticed by all, and became a matter of general conversation; while Currer appeared delighted beyond measure at her daughter's conquest. From that evening, young Green became the favourite visitor at Currer's house. He soon promised to purchase Clotel, as speedily as it could be effected, and make her mistress of her own dwelling; and Currer looked forward with pride to the time when she should see her daughter emancipated and free. It was a beautiful moonlight night in August, when all who reside in tropical climes are eagerly gasping for a breath of fresh air, that Horatio Green was seated in the small garden behind Currer's cottage, with the object of his affections by his side. And it was here that Horatio drew from his pocket the newspaper, wet from the press, and read the advertisement for the sale of the slaves to which we have alluded; Currer and her two daughters being of the number. At the close of the evening's visit, and as the young man was leaving, he said to the girl, "You shall soon be free and your own mistress." As might have been expected, the day of sale brought an unusual large number together to compete for the property to be sold. Farmers who make a business of raising slaves for the market were there; slave-traders and speculators were also numerously represented; and in the midst of this throng was one who felt a deeper interest in the result of the sale than any other of the bystanders; this was young Green. True to his promise, he was there with a blank bank check in his pocket, awaiting with impatience to enter the list as a bidder for the beautiful slave. The less valuable slaves were first placed upon the auction block, one after another, and sold to the highest bidder. Husbands and wives were separated with a degree of indifference that is unknown in any other relation of life, except that of slavery. Brothers and sisters were torn from each other; and mothers saw their children leave them for the last time on this earth. It was late in the day, when the greatest number of persons were thought to be present, that Currer and her daughters were brought forward to the place of sale.—Currer was first ordered to ascend the auction stand, which she did with a trembling step. The slave mother was sold to a trader. Althesa, the youngest, and who was scarcely less beautiful than her sister, was sold to the same trader for one thousand dollars. Clotel was the last, and, as was expected, commanded a higher price than any that had been offered for sale that day. The appearance of Clotel on the auction block created a deep sensation amongst the crowd. There she stood, with a complexion as white as most of those who were waiting with a wish to become her purchasers; her features as finely defined as any of her sex of pure Anglo-Saxon; her long black wavy hair done up in the neatest manner; her form tall and graceful, and her whole appearance indicating one superior to her position. The auctioneer commenced by saying, that "Miss Clotel had been reserved for the last, because she was the most valuable. How much, gentlemen? Real Albino, fit for a fancy girl for any one. She enjoys good health, and has a sweet temper. How much do you say?" "Five hundred dollars." "Only five hundred for such a girl as this? Gentlemen, she is worth a deal more than that sum; you certainly don't know the value of the article you are bidding upon. Here, gentlemen, I hold in my hand a paper certifying that she has a good moral character." "Seven hundred." "Ah; gentlemen, that is something like. This paper also states that she is very intelligent." "Eight hundred." "She is a devoted Christian, and perfectly trustworthy." "Nine hundred." "Nine fifty." "Ten." "Eleven." "Twelve hundred." Here the sale came to a dead stand. The auctioneer stopped, looked around, and began in a rough manner to relate some anecdotes relative to the sale of slaves, which, he said, had come under his own observation. At this juncture the scene was indeed strange. Laughing, joking, swearing, smoking, spitting, and talking kept up a continual hum and noise amongst the crowd; while the slave-girl stood with tears in her eyes, at one time looking towards her mother and sister, and at another towards the young man whom she hoped would become her purchaser. "The chastity of this girl is pure; she has never been from under her mother's care; she is a virtuous creature." "Thirteen." "Fourteen." "Fifteen." "Fifteen hundred dollars," cried the auctioneer, and the maiden was struck for that sum. This was a Southern auction, at which the bones, muscles, sinews, blood, and nerves of a young lady of sixteen were sold for five hundred dollars; her moral character for two hundred; her improved intellect for one hundred; her Christianity for three hundred; and her chastity and virtue for four hundred dollars more. And this, too, in a city thronged with churches, whose tall spires look like so many signals pointing to heaven, and whose ministers preach that slavery is a God-ordained institution! What words can tell the inhumanity, the atrocity, and the immorality of that doctrine which, from exalted office, commends such a crime to the favour of enlightened and Christian people? What indignation from all the world is not due to the government and people who put forth all their strength and power to keep in existence such an institution? Nature abhors it; the age repels it; and Christianity needs all her meekness to forgive it. Clotel was sold for fifteen hundred dollars, but her purchaser was Horatio Green. Thus closed a Negro sale, at which two daughters of Thomas Jefferson, the writer of the Declaration of American Independence, and one of the presidents of the great republic, were disposed of to the highest bidder! "O God! my every heart-string cries, Dost thou these scenes behold In this our boasted Christian land, And must the truth be told? "Blush, Christian, blush! for e'en the dark, Untutored heathen see Thy inconsistency; and, lo! They scorn thy God, and thee!" CHAPTER II GOING TO THE SOUTH "My country, shall thy honoured name, Be as a bye-word through the world? Rouse! for, as if to blast thy fame, This keen reproach is at thee hurled; The banner that above the waves, Is floating o'er three million slaves." DICK WALKER, the slave speculator, who had purchased Currer and Althesa, put them in prison until his gang was made up, and then, with his forty slaves, started for the New Orleans market. As many of the slaves had been brought up in Richmond, and had relations residing there, the slave trader determined to leave the city early in the morning, so as not to witness any of those scenes so common where slaves are separated from their relatives and friends, when about departing for the Southern market. This plan was successful; for not even Clotel, who had been every day at the prison to see her mother and sister, knew of their departure. A march of eight days through the interior of the state, and they arrived on the banks of the Ohio river, where they were all put on board a steamer, and then speedily sailed for the place of their destination. Walker had already advertised in the New Orleans papers, that he would be there at a stated time with "a prime lot of able bodied slaves ready for field service; together with a few extra ones, between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five." But, like most who make a business of buying and selling slaves for gain, he often bought some who were far advanced in years, and would always try to sell them for five or ten years younger than they actually were. Few persons can arrive at anything like the age of a Negro, by mere observation, unless they are well acquainted with the race. Therefore the slave-trader very frequently carried out this deception with perfect impunity. After the steamer had left the wharf, and was fairly on the bosom of the Father of Waters, Walker called his servant Pompey to him, and instructed him as to "getting the Negroes ready for market." Amongst the forty Negroes were several whose appearance indicated that they had seen some years, and had gone through some services. Their grey hair and whiskers at once pronounced them to be above the ages set down in the trader's advertisement. Pompey had long been with the trader, and knew his business; and if he did not take delight in discharging his duty, he did it with a degree of alacrity, so that he might receive the approbation of his master. "Pomp," as Walker usually called him, was of real Negro blood, and would often say, when alluding to himself, "Dis nigger is no countefit; he is de genewine artekil." Pompey was of low stature, round face, and, like most of his race, had a set of teeth, which for whiteness and beauty could not be surpassed; his eyes large, lips thick, and hair short and woolly. Pompey had been with Walker so long, and had seen so much of the buying and selling of slaves, that he appeared perfectly indifferent to the heartrending scenes which daily occurred in his presence. It was on the second day of the steamer's voyage that Pompey selected five of the old slaves, took them in a room by themselves, and commenced preparing them for the market. "Well," said Pompey, addressing himself to the company, "I is de gentman dat is to get you ready, so dat you will bring marser a good price in de Orleans market. How old is you?" addressing himself to a man who, from appearance, was not less than forty. "If I live to see next corn-planting time I will either be forty-five or fifty-five, I don't know which." "Dat may be," replied Pompey; "But now you is only thirty years old; dat is what marser says you is to be." "I know I is more den dat," responded the man. "I knows nothing about dat," said Pompey; "but when you get in de market, an anybody axe you how old you is, an you tell 'em forty-five, marser will tie you up an gib you de whip like smoke. But if you tell 'em dat you is only thirty, den he wont." "Well den, I guess I will only be thirty when dey axe me," replied the chattel. "What your name?" inquired Pompey. "Geemes," answered the man. "Oh, Uncle Jim, is it?" "Yes." "Den you must have off dem dare whiskers of yours, an when you get to Orleans you must grease dat face an make it look shiney." This was all said by Pompey in a manner which clearly showed that he knew what he was about. "How old is you?" asked Pompey of a tall, strong-looking man. "I was twenty-nine last potato-digging time," said the man. "What's your name?" "My name is Tobias, but dey call me 'Toby.'" "Well, Toby, or Mr. Tobias, if dat will suit you better, you is now twenty-three years old, an no more. Dus you hear dat?" "Yes," responded Toby. Pompey gave each to understand how old he was to be when asked by persons who wished to purchase, and then reported to his master that the "old boys" were all right. At eight o'clock on the evening of the third day, the lights of another steamer were seen in the distance, and apparently coming up very fast. This was a signal for a general commotion on the Patriot, and everything indicated that a steamboat race was at hand. Nothing can exceed the excitement attendant upon a steamboat race on the Mississippi river. By the time the boats had reached Memphis, they were side by side, and each exerting itself to keep the ascendancy in point of speed. The night was clear, the moon shining brightly, and the boats so near to each other that the passengers were calling out from one boat to the other. On board the Patriot, the firemen were using oil, lard, butter, and even bacon, with the wood, for the purpose of raising the steam to its highest pitch. The blaze, mingled with the black smoke, showed plainly that the other boat was burning more than wood. The two boats soon locked, so that the hands of the boats were passing from vessel to vessel, and the wildest excitement prevailed throughout amongst both passengers and crew. At this moment the engineer of the Patriot was seen to fasten down the safety-valve, so that no steam should escape. This was, indeed, a dangerous resort. A few of the boat hands who saw what had taken place, left that end of the boat for more secure quarters. The Patriot stopped to take in passengers, and still no steam was permitted to escape. At the starting of the boat cold water was forced into the boilers by the machinery, and, as might have been expected, one of the boilers immediately exploded. One dense fog of steam filled every part of the vessel, while shrieks, groans, and cries were heard on every hand. The saloons and cabins soon had the appearance of a hospital. By this time the boat had landed, and the Columbia, the other boat, had come alongside to render assistance to the disabled steamer. The killed and scalded (nineteen in number) were put on shore, and the Patriot, taken in tow by the Columbia, was soon again on its way. It was now twelve o'clock at night, and instead of the passengers being asleep the majority were ambling in the saloons. Thousands of dollars change hands during a passage from Louisville or St. Louis to New Orleans on a Mississippi steamer, and many men, and even ladies, are completely ruined. "Go call my boy, steward," said Mr. Smith, as he took his cards one by one from the table. In a few moments a fine looking, bright-eyed mulatto boy, apparently about fifteen years of age, was standing by his master's side at the table. "I will see you, and five hundred dollars better," said Smith, as his servant Jerry approached the table. "What price do you set on that boy?" asked Johnson, as he took a roll of bills from his pocket. "He will bring a thousand dollars, any day, in the New Orleans market," replied Smith. "Then you bet the whole of the boy, do you?" "Yes." "I call you, then," said Johnson, at the same time spreading his cards out upon the table. "You have beat me," said Smith, as soon as he saw the cards. Jerry, who was standing on top of the table, with the bank notes and silver dollars round his feet, was now ordered to descend from the table. "You will not forget that you belong to me," said Johnson, as the young slave was stepping from the table to a chair. "No, sir," replied the chattel. "Now go back to your bed, and be up in time to-morrow morning to brush my clothes and clean my boots, do you hear?" "Yes, sir," responded Jerry, as he wiped the tears from his eyes. Smith took from his pocket the bill of sale and handed it to Johnson; at the same time saying, "I claim the right of redeeming that boy, Mr. Johnson. My father gave him to me when I came of age, and I promised not to part with him." "Most certainly, sir, the boy shall be yours, whenever you hand me over a cool thousand," replied Johnson. The next morning, as the passengers were assembling in the breakfast saloons and upon the guards of the vessel, and the servants were seen running about waiting upon or looking for their masters, poor Jerry was entering his new master's stateroom with his boots. "Who do you belong to?" said a gentleman to an old black man, who came along leading a fine dog that he had been feeding. "When I went to sleep last night, I belonged to Governor Lucas; but I understand dat he is bin gambling all night, so I don't know who owns me dis morning." Such is the uncertainty of a slave's position. He goes to bed at night the property of the man with whom he has lived for years, and gets up in the morning the slave of some one whom he has never seen before! To behold five or six tables in a steamboat's cabin, with half-a-dozen men playing at cards, and money, pistols, bowie-knives, all in confusion on the tables, is what may be seen at almost any time on the Mississippi river. On the fourth day, while at Natchez, taking in freight and passengers, Walker, who had been on shore to see some of his old customers, returned, accompanied by a tall, thin-faced man, dressed in black, with a white neckcloth, which immediately proclaimed him to be a clergyman. "I want a good, trusty woman for house service," said the stranger, as they entered the cabin where Walker's slaves were kept. "Here she is, and no mistake," replied the trader. "Stand up, Currer, my gal; here's a gentleman who wishes to see if you will suit him." Althesa clung to her mother's side, as the latter rose from her seat. "She is a rare cook, a good washer, and will suit you to a T, I am sure." "If you buy me, I hope you will buy my daughter too," said the woman, in rather an excited manner. "I only want one for my own use, and would not need another," said the man in black, as he and the trader left the room. Walker and the parson went into the saloon, talked over the matter, the bill of sale was made out, the money paid over, and the clergyman left, with the understanding that the woman should be delivered to him at his house. It seemed as if poor Althesa would have wept herself to death, for the first two days after her mother had been torn from her side by the hand of the ruthless trafficker in human flesh. On the arrival of the boat at Baton Rouge, an additional number of passengers were taken on board; and, amongst them, several persons who had been attending the races. Gambling and drinking were now the order of the day. Just as the ladies and gentlemen were assembling at the supper-table, the report of a pistol was heard in the direction of the Social Hall, which caused great uneasiness to the ladies, and took the gentlemen to that part of the cabin. However, nothing serious had occurred. A man at one of the tables where they were gambling had been seen attempting to conceal a card in his sleeve, and one of the party seized his pistol and fired; but fortunately the barrel of the pistol was knocked up, just as it was about to be discharged, and the ball passed through the upper deck, instead of the man's head, as intended. Order was soon restored; all went on well the remainder of the night, and the next day, at ten o'clock, the boat arrived at New Orleans, and the passengers went to the hotels and the slaves to the market! "Our eyes are yet on Afric's shores, Her thousand wrongs we still deplore; We see the grim slave trader there; We hear his fettered victim's prayer; And hasten to the sufferer's aid, Forgetful of our own 'slave trade.' "The Ocean 'Pirate's' fiend-like form Shall sink beneath the vengeance-storm; His heart of steel shall quake before The battle-din and havoc roar: The knave shall die, the Law hath said, While it protects our own 'slave trade.' "What earthly eye presumes to scan The wily Proteus-heart of man?— What potent hand will e'er unroll The mantled treachery of his soul!— O where is he who hath surveyed The horrors of our own 'slave trade?' "There is an eye that wakes in light, There is a hand of peerless might; Which, soon or late, shall yet assail And rend dissimulation's veil: Which will unfold the masquerade Which justifies our own 'slave trade.'" CHAPTER III THE NEGRO CHASE WE shall now return to Natchez, where we left Currer in the hands of the Methodist parson. For many years, Natchez has enjoyed a notoriety for the inhumanity and barbarity of its inhabitants, and the cruel deeds perpetrated there, which have not been equalled in any other city in the Southern States. The following advertisements, which we take from a newspaper published in the vicinity, will show how they catch their Negroes who believe in the doctrine that "all men are created free." "NEGRO DOGS.—The undersigned, having bought the entire pack of Negro dogs (of the Hay and Allen stock), he now proposes to catch runaway Negroes. His charges will be three dollars a day for hunting, and fifteen dollars for catching a runaway. He resides three and one half miles north of Livingston, near the lower Jones' Bluff Road. "Nov. 6, 1845." "NOTICE.—The subscriber, Lying on Carroway Lake, on Hoe's Bayou, in Carroll parish, sixteen miles on the road leading from Bayou Mason to Lake Providence, is ready with a pack of dogs to hunt runaway Negroes at any time. These dogs are well trained, and are known throughout the parish. Letters addressed to me at Providence will secure immediate attention. My terms are five dollars per day for hunting the trails, whether the Negro is caught or not. Where a twelve hours' trail is shown, and the Negro not taken, no charge is made. For taking a Negro, twenty-five dollars, and no charge made for hunting. "Nov. 26, 1847." These dogs will attack a Negro at their master's bidding and cling to him as the bull-dog will cling to a beast. Many are the speculations, as to whether the Negro will be secured alive or dead, when these dogs once get on his track. A slave hunt took place near Natchez, a few days after Currer's arrival, which was calculated to give her no favourable opinion of the people. Two slaves had run off owing to severe punishment. The dogs were put upon their trail. The slaves went into the swamps, with the hope that the dogs when put on their scent would be unable to follow them through the water. The dogs soon took to the swamp, which lies between the highlands, which was now covered with water, waist deep: here these faithful animals, swimming nearly all the time, followed the zigzag course, the tortuous twistings and windings of these two fugitives, who, it was afterwards discovered, were lost; sometimes scenting the tree wherein they had found a temporary refuge from the mud and water; at other places where the deep mud had pulled off a shoe, and they had not taken time to put it on again. For two hours and a half, for four or five miles, did men and dogs wade through this bushy, dismal swamp, surrounded with grim-visaged alligators, who seemed to look on with jealous eye at this encroachment of their hereditary domain; now losing the trail—then slowly and dubiously taking it off again, until they triumphantly threaded it out, bringing them back to the river, where it was found that the Negroes had crossed their own trail, near the place of starting. In the meantime a heavy shower had taken place, putting out the trail. The Negroes were now at least four miles ahead. It is well known to hunters that it requires the keenest scent and best blood to overcome such obstacles, and yet these persevering and sagacious animals conquered every difficulty. The slaves now made a straight course for the Baton Rouge and Bayou Sara road, about four miles distant. Feeling hungry now, after their morning walk, and perhaps thirsty, too, they went about half a mile off the road, and ate a good, hearty, substantial breakfast. Negroes must eat, as well as other people, but the dogs will tell on them. Here, for a moment, the dogs are at fault, but soon unravel the mystery, and bring them back to the road again; and now what before was wonderful, becomes almost a miracle. Here, in this common highway—the thoroughfare for the whole country around through mud and through mire, meeting waggons and teams, and different solitary wayfarers, and, what above all is most astonishing, actually running through a gang of Negroes, their favourite game, who were working on the road, they pursue the track of the two Negroes; they even ran for eight miles to the very edge of the plain—the slaves near them for the last mile. At first they would fain believe it some hunter chasing deer. Nearer and nearer the whimpering pack presses on; the delusion begins to dispel; all at once the truth flashes upon them like a glare of light; their hair stands on end; 'tis Tabor with his dogs. The scent becomes warmer and warmer. What was an irregular cry, now deepens into one ceaseless roar, as the relentless pack rolls on after its human prey. It puts one in mind of Actaeon and his dogs. They grow desperate and leave the road, in the vain hope of shaking them off. Vain hope, indeed! The momentary cessation only adds new zest to the chase. The cry grows louder and louder; the yelp grows short and quick, sure indication that the game is at hand. It is a perfect rush upon the part of the hunters, while the Negroes call upon their weary and jaded limbs to do their best, but they falter and stagger beneath them. The breath of the hounds is almost upon their very heels, and yet they have a vain hope of escaping these sagacious animals. They can run no longer; the dogs are upon them; they hastily attempt to climb a tree, and as the last one is nearly out of reach, the catch-dog seizes him by the leg, and brings him to the ground; he sings out lustily and the dogs are called off. After this man was secured, the one in the tree was ordered to come down; this, however, he refused to do, but a gun being pointed at him, soon caused him to change his mind. On reaching the ground, the fugitive made one more bound, and the chase again commenced. But it was of no use to run and he soon yielded. While being tied, he committed an unpardonable offence: he resisted, and for that he must be made an example on their arrival home. A mob was collected together, and a Lynch court was held, to determine what was best to be done with the Negro who had had the impudence to raise his hand against a white man. The Lynch court decided that the Negro should be burnt at the stake. A Natchez newspaper, the Free Trader, giving an account of it says, "The body was taken and chained to a tree immediately on the banks of the Mississippi, on what is called Union Point. Faggots were then collected and piled around him, to which he appeared quite indifferent. When the work was completed, he was asked what he had to say. He then warned all to take example by him, and asked the prayers of all around; he then called for a drink of water, which was handed to him; he drank it, and said, 'Now set fire—I am ready to go in peace!' The torches were lighted, and placed in the pile, which soon ignited. He watched unmoved the curling flame that grew, until it began to entwine itself around and feed upon his body; then he sent forth cries of agony painful to the ear, begging some one to blow his brains out; at the same time surging with almost superhuman strength, until the staple with which the chain was fastened to the tree (not being well secured) drew out, and he leaped from the burning pile. At that moment the sharp ringing of several rifles was heard: the body of the Negro fell a corpse on the ground. He was picked up by some two or three, and again thrown into the fire, and consumed, not a vestige remaining to show that such a being ever existed." Nearly 4,000 slaves were collected from the plantations in the neighbourhood to witness this scene. Numerous speeches were made by the magistrates and ministers of religion to the large concourse of slaves, warning them, and telling them that the same fate awaited them, if they should prove rebellious to their owners. There are hundreds of Negroes who run away and live in the woods. Some take refuge in the swamps, because they are less frequented by human beings. A Natchez newspaper gave the following account of the hiding-place of a slave who had been captured:— "A runaway's den was discovered on Sunday, near the Washington Spring, in a little patch of woods, where it had been for several months so artfully concealed under ground, that it was detected only by accident, though in sight of two or three houses, and near the road and fields where there has been constant daily passing. The entrance was concealed by a pile of pine straw, representing a hog-bed, which being removed, discovered a trap-door and steps that led to a room about six feet square, comfortably ceiled with plank, containing a small fire-place, the flue of which was ingeniously conducted above ground and concealed by the straw. The inmates took the alarm, and made their escape; but Mr. Adams and his excellent dogs being put upon the trail, soon run down and secured one of them, which proved to be a Negro-fellow who had been out about a year. He stated that the other occupant was a woman, who had been a runaway a still longer time. In the den was found a quantity of meal, bacon, corn, potatoes, &c. and various cooking utensils and wearing apparel."—Vicksburg Sentinel, Dec. 6th, 1838. Currer was one of those who witnessed the execution of the slave at the stake, and it gave her no very exalted opinion of the people of the cotton growing district. CHAPTER IV THE QUADROON'S HOME "How sweetly on the hill-side sleeps The sunlight with its quickening rays! The verdant trees that crown the steeps, Grow greener in its quivering blaze." ABOUT three miles from Richmond is a pleasant plain, with here and there a beautiful cottage surrounded by trees so as scarcely to be seen. Among them was one far retired from the public roads, and almost hidden among the trees. It was a perfect model of rural beauty. The piazzas that surrounded it were covered with clematis and passion flower. The pride of China mixed its oriental looking foliage with the majestic magnolia, and the air was redolent with the fragrance of flowers, peeping out of every nook and nodding upon you with a most unexpected welcome. The tasteful hand of art had not learned to imitate the lavish beauty and harmonious disorder of nature, but they lived together in loving amity, and spoke in accordant tones. The gateway rose in a gothic arch, with graceful tracery in iron work, surmounted by a cross, round which fluttered and played the mountain fringe, that lightest and most fragile of vines. This cottage was hired by Horatio Green for Clotel, and the quadroon girl soon found herself in her new home. The tenderness of Clotel's conscience, together with the care her mother had with her and the high value she placed upon virtue, required an outward marriage; though she well knew that a union with her proscribed race was unrecognised by law, and therefore the ceremony would give her no legal hold on Horatio's constancy. But her high poetic nature regarded reality rather than the semblance of things; and when he playfully asked how she could keep him if he wished to run away, she replied, "If the mutual love we have for each other, and the dictates of your own conscience do not cause you to remain my husband, and your affections fall from me, I would not, if I could, hold you by a single fetter." It was indeed a marriage sanctioned by heaven, although unrecognised on earth. There the young couple lived secluded from the world, and passed their time as happily as circumstances would permit. It was Clotel's wish that Horatio should purchase her mother and sister, but the young man pleaded that he was unable, owing to the fact that he had not come into possession of his share of property, yet he promised that when he did, he would seek them out and purchase them. Their first-born was named Mary, and her complexion was still lighter than her mother. Indeed she was not darker than other white children. As the child grew older, it more and more resembled its mother. The iris of her large dark eye had the melting mezzotints, which remains the last vestige of African ancestry, and gives that plaintive expression, so often observed, and so appropriate to that docile and injured race. Clotel was still happier after the birth of her dear child; for Horatio, as might have been expected, was often absent day and night with his friends in the city, and the edicts of society had built up a wall of separation between the quadroon and them. Happy as Clotel was in Horatio's love, and surrounded by an outward environment of beauty, so well adapted to her poetic spirit, she felt these incidents with inexpressible pain. For herself she cared but little; for she had found a sheltered home in Horatio's heart, which the world might ridicule, but had no power to profane. But when she looked at her beloved Mary, and reflected upon the unavoidable and dangerous position which the tyranny of society had awarded her, her soul was filled with anguish. The rare loveliness of the child increased daily, and was evidently ripening into most marvellous beauty. The father seemed to rejoice in it with unmingled pride; but in the deep tenderness of the mother's eye, there was an indwelling sadness that spoke of anxious thoughts and fearful foreboding. Clotel now urged Horatio to remove to France or England, where both her [sic] and her child would be free, and where colour was not a crime. This request excited but little opposition, and was so attractive to his imagination, that he might have overcome all intervening obstacles, had not "a change come over the spirit of his dreams." He still loved Clotel; but he was now becoming engaged in political and other affairs which kept him oftener and longer from the young mother; and ambition to become a statesman was slowly gaining the ascendancy over him. Among those on whom Horatio's political success most depended was a very popular and wealthy man, who had an only daughter. His visits to the house were at first purely of a political nature; but the young lady was pleasing, and he fancied he discovered in her a sort of timid preference for himself. This excited his vanity, and awakened thoughts of the great worldly advantages connected with a union. Reminiscences of his first love kept these vague ideas in check for several months; for with it was associated the idea of restraint. Moreover, Gertrude, though inferior in beauty, was yet a pretty contrast to her rival. Her light hair fell in silken ringlets down her shoulders, her blue eyes were gentle though inexpressive, and her healthy cheeks were like opening rosebuds. He had already become accustomed to the dangerous experiment of resisting his own inward convictions; and this new impulse to ambition, combined with the strong temptation of variety in love, met the ardent young man weakened in moral principle, and unfettered by laws of the land. The change wrought upon him was soon noticed by Clotel. CHAPTER V THE SLAVE MARKET "What! mothers from their children riven! What! God's own image bought and sold! Americans to market driven, And barter'd as the brute for gold."—Whittier. NOT far from Canal-street, in the city of New Orleans, stands a large two story flat building surrounded by a stone wall twelve feet high, the top of which is covered with bits of glass, and so constructed as to prevent even the possibility of any one's passing over it without sustaining great injury. Many of the rooms resemble cells in a prison. In a small room near the "office" are to be seen any number of iron collars, hobbles, handcuffs, thumbscrews, cowhides, whips, chains, gags, and yokes. A back yard inclosed by a high wall looks something like the playground attached to one of our large New England schools, and in which are rows of benches and swings. Attached to the back premises is a good-sized kitchen, where two old Negresses are at work, stewing, boiling, and baking, and occasionally wiping the sweat from their furrowed and swarthy brows. The slave-trader Walker, on his arrival in New Orleans, took up his quarters at this slave pen with his gang of human cattle: and the morning after, at ten o'clock, they were exhibited for sale. There, first of all, was the beautiful Althesa, whose pale countenance and dejected look told how many sad hours she had passed since parting with her mother at Natchez. There was a poor woman who had been separated from her husband and five children. Another woman, whose looks and manner were expressive of deep anguish, sat by her side. There, too, was "Uncle Geemes," with his whiskers off, his face shaved clean, and the grey hair plucked out, and ready to be sold for ten years younger than he was. Toby was also there, with his face shaved and greased, ready for inspection. The examination commenced, and was carried on in a manner calculated to shock the feelings of any one not devoid of the milk of human kindness. "What are you wiping your eyes for?" inquired a fat, red-faced man, with a white hat set on one side of his head, and a cigar in his mouth, of a woman who sat on one of the stools. "I s'pose I have been crying." "Why do you cry?" "Because I have left my man behind." "Oh, if I buy you I will furnish you with a better man than you left. I have lots of young bucks on my farm." "I don't want, and will never have, any other man," replied the woman. "What's your name?" asked a man in a straw hat of a tall Negro man, who stood with his arms folded across his breast, and leaning against the wall. "My name is Aaron, sir." "How old are you?" "Twenty-five." "Where were you raised?" "In old Virginny, sir." "How many men have owned you?" "Four." "Do you enjoy good health?" "Yes, sir." "How long did you live with your first owner?" "Twenty years." "Did you ever run away?" "No, sir." "Did you ever strike your master?" "No, sir." "Were you ever whipped much?" "No, sir, I s'pose I did not deserve it." "How long did you live with your second master?" "Ten years, sir." "Have you a good appetite?" "Yes, sir." "Can you eat your allowance?" "Yes, sir, when I can get it." "What were you employed at in Virginia?" "I worked in de terbacar feel." "In the tobacco field?" "Yes, sir." "How old did you say you were?" "I will be twenty-five if I live to see next sweet potater digging time." "I am a cotton planter, and if I buy you, you will have to work in the cotton field. My men pick one hundred and fifty pounds a day, and the women one hundred and forty, and those who fail to pick their task receive five stripes from the cat for each pound that is wanting. Now, do you think you could keep up with the rest of the bands?" "I don't know, sir, I 'spec I'd have to." "How long did you live with your third master?" "Three years, sir." "Why, this makes you thirty-three, I thought you told me you was only twenty five?" Aaron now looked first at the planter, then at the trader, and seemed perfectly bewildered. He had forgotten the lesson given him by Pompey as to his age, and the planter's circuitous talk (doubtless to find out the slave's real age) had the Negro off his guard. "I must see your back, so as to know how much you have been whipped, before I think of buying," said the planter. Pompey, who had been standing by during the examination, thought that his services were now required, and stepping forward with a degree of officiousness, said to Aaron, "Don't you hear de gentman tell you he want to zamon your limbs. Come, unharness yeself, old boy, an don't be standing dar." Aaron was soon examined and pronounced "sound"; yet the conflicting statement about the age was not satisfactory. Fortunate for Althesa she was spared the pain of undergoing such an examination. Mr. Crawford, a teller in one of the banks, had just been married, and wanted a maid-servant for his wife; and passing through the market in the early part of the day, was pleased with the young slave's appearance and purchased her, and in his dwelling the quadroon found a much better home than often falls to the lot of a slave sold in the New Orleans market. The heartrending and cruel traffic in slaves which has been so often described, is not confined to any particular class of persons. No one forfeits his or her character or standing in society, by buying or selling slaves; or even raising slaves for the market. The precise number of slaves carried from the slave-raising to the slave-consuming states, we have no means of knowing. But it must be very great, as more than forty thousand were sold and taken out of the state of Virginia in one year. Known to God only is the amount of human agony and suffering which sends its cry from the slave markets and Negro pens, unheard and unheeded by man, up to his ear; mothers weeping for their children, breaking the night-silence with the shrieks of their breaking hearts. From some you will hear the burst of bitter lamentation, while from others the loud hysteric laugh, denoting still deeper agony. Most of them leave the market for cotton or rice plantations, "Where the slave-whip ceaseless swings, Where the noisome insect stings, Where the fever demon-strews Poison with the falling dews, Where the sickly sunbeams glare Through the hot and misty air." CHAPTER VI THE RELIGIOUS TEACHER "What! preach and enslave men? Give thanks—and rob thy own afflicted poor? Talk of thy glorious liberty, and then Bolt hard the captive's door."—Whittier. THE Rev. John Peck was a native of the state of Connecticut, where he was educated for the ministry, in the Methodist persuasion. His father was a strict follower of John Wesley, and spared no pains in his son's education, with the hope that he would one day be as renowned as the great leader of his sect. John had scarcely finished his education at New Haven, when he was invited by an uncle, then on a visit to his father, to spend a few months at Natchez in the state of Mississippi. Young Peck accepted his uncle's invitation, and accompanied him to the South. Few young men, and especially clergymen, going fresh from a college to the South, but are looked upon as geniuses in a small way, and who are not invited to all the parties in the neighbourhood. Mr. Peck was not an exception to this rule. The society into which he was thrown on his arrival at Natchez was too brilliant for him not to be captivated by it; and, as might have been expected, he succeeded in captivating a plantation with seventy slaves, if not the heart of the lady to whom it belonged. Added to this, he became a popular preacher, had a large congregation with a snug salary. Like other planters, Mr. Peck confided the care of his farm to Ned Huckelby, an overseer of high reputation in his way. The Poplar Farm, as it was called, was situated in a beautiful valley nine miles from Natchez, and near the river Mississippi. The once unshorn face of nature had given way, and now the farm blossomed with a splendid harvest, the neat cottage stood in a grove where Lombardy poplars lift their tufted tops almost to prop the skies; the willow, locust, and horse-chestnut spread their branches, and flowers never cease to blossom. This was the parson's country house, where the family spent only two months during the year. The town residence was a fine villa, seated upon the brow of a hill at the edge of the city. It was in the kitchen of this house that Currer found her new home. Mr. Peck was, every inch of him, a democrat, and early resolved that his "people," as he called his slaves, should be well fed and not overworked, and therefore laid down the law and gospel to the overseer as well as the slaves. "It is my wish," said he to Mr. Carlton, an old school-fellow, who was spending a few days with him, "it is my wish that a new system be adopted on the plantations in this estate. I believe that the sons of Ham should have the gospel, and I intend that my Negroes shall. The gospel is calculated to make mankind better, and none should be without it." "What say you," replied Carlton, "about the right of man to his liberty?" "Now, Carlton, you have begun again to harp about man's rights; I really wish you could see this matter as I do. I have searched in vain for any authority for man's natural rights; if he had any, they existed before the fall. That is, Adam and Eve may have had some rights which God gave them, and which modern philosophy, in its pretended reverence for the name of God, prefers to call natural rights. I can imagine they had the right to eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden; they were restricted even in this by the prohibition of one. As far as I know without positive assertion, their liberty of action was confined to the garden. These were not 'inalienable rights,' however, for they forfeited both them and life with the first act of disobedience. Had they, after this, any rights? We cannot imagine them; they were condemned beings; they could have no rights, but by Christ's gift as king. These are the only rights man can have as an independent isolated being, if we choose to consider him in this impossible position, in which so many theorists have placed him. If he had no rights, he could suffer no wrongs. Rights and wrongs are therefore necessarily the creatures of society, such as man would establish himself in his gregarious state. They are, in this state, both artificial and voluntary. Though man has no rights, as thus considered, undoubtedly he has the power, by such arbitrary rules of right and wrong as his necessity enforces." "I regret I cannot see eye to eye with you," said Carlton. "I am a disciple of Rousseau, and have for years made the rights of man my study; and I must confess to you that I can see no difference between white men and black men as it regards liberty." "Now, my dear Carlton, would you really have the Negroes enjoy the same rights with ourselves?" "I would, most certainly. Look at our great Declaration of Independence; look even at the constitution of our own Connecticut, and see what is said in these about liberty." "I regard all this talk about rights as mere humbug. The Bible is older than the Declaration of Independence, and there I take my stand. The Bible furnishes to us the armour of proof, weapons of heavenly temper and mould, whereby we can maintain our ground against all attacks. But this is true only when we obey its directions, as well as employ its sanctions. Our rights are there established, but it is always in connection with our duties. If we neglect the one we cannot make good the other. Our domestic institutions can be maintained against the world, if we but allow Christianity to throw its broad shield over them. But if we so act as to array the Bible against our social economy, they must fall. Nothing ever yet stood long against Christianity. Those who say that religious instruction is inconsistent with our peculiar civil polity, are the worst enemies of that polity. They would drive religious men from its defence. Sooner or later, if these views prevail, they will separate the religious portion of our community from the rest, and thus divided we shall become an easy prey. Why, is it not better that Christian men should hold slaves than unbelievers? We know how to value the bread of life, and will not keep it from our slaves." "Well, every one to his own way of thinking," said Carlton, as he changed his position. "I confess," added he, "that I am no great admirer of either the Bible or slavery. My heart is my guide: my conscience is my Bible. I wish for nothing further to satisfy me of my duty to man. If I act rightly to mankind, I shall fear nothing." Carlton had drunk too deeply of the bitter waters of infidelity, and had spent too many hours over the writings of Rousseau, Voltaire, and Thomas Paine, to place that appreciation upon the Bible and its teachings that it demands. During this conversation there was another person in the room, seated by the window, who, although at work upon a fine piece of lace, paid every attention to what was said. This was Georgiana, the only daughter of the parson. She had just returned from Connecticut, where she had finished her education. She had had the opportunity of contrasting the spirit of Christianity and liberty in New England with that of slavery in her native state, and had learned to feel deeply for the injured Negro. Georgiana was in her nineteenth year, and had been much benefited by a residence of five years at the North. Her form was tall and graceful; her features regular and well defined; and her complexion was illuminated by the freshness of youth, beauty, and health. The daughter differed from both the father and his visitor upon the subject which they had been discussing, and as soon as an opportunity offered, she gave it as her opinion, that the Bible was both the bulwark of Christianity and of liberty. With a smile she said, "Of course, papa will overlook my differing from him, for although I am a native of the South, I am by education and sympathy, a Northerner." Mr. Peck laughed and appeared pleased, rather than otherwise, at the manner in which his daughter had expressed herself. From this Georgiana took courage and said, "We must try the character of slavery, and our duty in regard to it, as we should try any other question of character and duty. To judge justly of the character of anything, we must know what it does. That which is good does good, and that which is evil does evil. And as to duty, God's designs indicate his claims. That which accomplishes the manifest design of God is right; that which counteracts it, wrong. Whatever, in its proper tendency and general effect, produces, secures, or extends human welfare, is according to the will of God, and is good; and our duty is to favour and promote, according to our power, that which God favours and promotes by the general law of his providence. On the other hand, whatever in its proper tendency and general effect destroys, abridges, or renders insecure, human welfare, is opposed to God's will, and is evil. And as whatever accords with the will of God, in any manifestation of it should be done and persisted in, so whatever opposes that will should not be done, and if done, should be abandoned. Can that then be right, be well doing—can that obey God's behest, which makes a man a slave? which dooms him and all his posterity, in limitless Generations, to bondage, to unrequited toil through life? 'Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' This single passage of Scripture should cause us to have respect to the rights of the slave. True Christian love is of an enlarged, disinterested nature. It loves all who love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity, without regard to colour or condition." "Georgiana, my dear, you are an abolitionist; your talk is fanaticism," said Mr. Peck in rather a sharp tone; but the subdued look of the girl, and the presence of Carlton, caused the father to soften his language. Mr. Peck having lost his wife by consumption, and Georgiana being his only child, he loved her too dearly to say more, even if he felt displeased. A silence followed this exhortation from the young Christian. But her remarks had done a noble work. The father's heart was touched; and the sceptic, for the first time, was viewing Christianity in its true light. "I think I must go out to your farm," said Carlton, as if to break the silence. "I shall be pleased to have you go," returned Mr. Peck. "I am sorry I can't go myself, but Huckelby will show you every attention; and I feel confident that when you return to Connecticut, you will do me the justice to say, that I am one who looks after my people, in a moral, social, and religious point of view." "Well, what do you say to my spending next Sunday there?" "Why, I think that a good move; you will then meet with Snyder, our missionary." "Oh, you have missionaries in these parts, have you?" "Yes," replied Mr. Peck; "Snyder is from New York, and is our missionary to the poor, and preaches to our 'people' on Sunday; you will no doubt like him; he is a capital fellow." "Then I shall go," said Carlton, "but only wish I had company." This last remark was intended for Miss Peck, for whom he had the highest admiration. It was on a warm Sunday morning, in the month of May, that Miles Carlton found himself seated beneath a fine old apple tree, whose thick leaves entirely shaded the ground for some distance round. Under similar trees and near by, were gathered together all the "people" belonging to the plantation. Hontz Snyder was a man of about forty years of age, exceedingly low in stature, but of a large frame. He had been brought up in the Mohawk Valley, in the state of New York, and claimed relationship with the oldest Dutch families in that vicinity. He had once been a sailor, and had all the roughness of character that a sea-faring man might expect to possess; together with the half-Yankee, half-German peculiarities of the people of the Mohawk Valley. It was nearly eleven o'clock when a one-horse waggon drove up in haste, and the low squatty preacher got out and took his place at the foot of one of the trees, where a sort of rough board table was placed, and took his books from his pocket and commenced. "As it is rather late," said he, "we will leave the singing and praying for the last, and take our text, and commence immediately. I shall base my remarks on the following passage of Scripture, and hope to have that attention which is due to the cause of God:—'All things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them'; that is, do by all mankind just as you would desire they should do by you, if you were in their place and they in yours. "Now, to suit this rule to your particular circumstances, suppose you were masters and mistresses, and had servants under you, would you not desire that your servants should do their business faithfully and honestly, as well when your back was turned as while you were looking over them? Would you not expect that they should take notice of what you said to them? that they should behave themselves with respect towards you and yours, and be as careful of everything belonging to you as you would be yourselves? You are servants: do, therefore, as you would wish to be done by, and you will be both good servants to your masters and good servants to God, who requires this of you, and will reward you well for it, if you do it for the sake of conscience, in obedience to his commands. "You are not to be eye-servants. Now, eye-servants are such as will work hard, and seem mighty diligent, while they think anybody is taking notice of them; but, when their masters' and mistresses' backs are turned they are idle, and neglect their business. I am afraid there are a great many such eye-servants among you, and that you do not consider how great a sin it is to be so, and how severely God will punish you for it. You may easily deceive your owners, and make them have an opinion of you that you do not deserve, and get the praise of men by it; but remember that you cannot deceive Almighty God, who sees your wickedness and deceit, and will punish you accordingly. For the rule is, that you must obey your masters in all things, and do the work they set you about with fear and trembling, in singleness of heart as unto Christ; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers, but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart; with good-will doing service as to the Lord, and not as to men. "Take care that you do not fret or murmur, grumble or repine at your condition; for this will not only make your life uneasy, but will greatly offend Almighty God. Consider that it is not yourselves, it is not the people that you belong to, it is not the men who have brought you to it, but it is the will of God who hath by his providence made you servants, because, no doubt, he knew that condition would be best for you in this world, and help you the better towards heaven, if you would but do your duty in it. So that any discontent at your not being free, or rich, or great, as you see some others, is quarrelling with your heavenly Master, and finding fault with God himself, who hath made you what you are, and hath promised you as large a share in the kingdom of heaven as the greatest man alive, if you will but behave yourself aright, and do the business he hath set you about in this world honestly and cheerfully. Riches and power have proved the ruin of many an unhappy soul, by drawing away the heart and affections from God, and fixing them on mean and sinful enjoyments; so that, when God, who knows our hearts better than we know them ourselves, sees that they would be hurtful to us, and therefore keeps them from us, it is the greatest mercy and kindness he could show us. "You may perhaps fancy that, if you had riches and freedom, you could do your duty to God and man with greater pleasure than you can now. But pray consider that, if you can but save your souls through the mercy of God, you will have spent your time to the best of purposes in this world; and he that at last can get to heaven has performed a noble journey, let the road be ever so rugged and difficult. Besides, you really have a great advantage over most white people, who have not only the care of their daily labour upon their hands, but the care of looking forward and providing necessaries for to-morrow and next day, and of clothing and bringing up their children, and of getting food and raiment for as many of you as belong to their families, which often puts them to great difficulties, and distracts their minds so as to break their rest, and take off their thoughts from the affairs of another world. Whereas you are quite eased from all these cares, and have nothing but your daily labour to look after, and, when that is done, take your needful rest. Neither is it necessary for you to think of laying up anything against old age, as white people are obliged to do; for the laws of the country have provided that you shall not be turned off when you are past labour, but shall be maintained, while you live, by those you belong to, whether you are able to work or not. "There is only one circumstance which may appear grievous, that I shall now take notice of, and that is correction. "Now, when correction is given you, you either deserve it, or you do not deserve it. But whether you really deserve it or not, it is your duty, and Almighty God requires that you bear it patiently. You may perhaps think that this is hard doctrine; but, if you consider it right, you must needs think otherwise of it. Suppose, then, that you deserve correction, you cannot but say that it is just and right you should meet with it. Suppose you do not, or at least you do not deserve so much, or so severe a correction, for the fault you have committed, you perhaps have escaped a great many more, and are at last paid for all. Or suppose you are quite innocent of what is laid to your charge, and suffer wrongfully in that particular thing, is it not possible you may have done some other bad thing which was never discovered, and that Almighty God who saw you doing it would not let you escape without punishment one time or another? And ought you not, in such a case, to give glory to him, and be thankful that he would rather punish you in this life for your wickedness than destroy your souls for it in the next life? But suppose even this was not the case (a case hardly to be imagined), and that you have by no means, known or unknown, deserved the correction you suffered, there is this great comfort in it, that, if you bear it patiently, and leave your cause in the hands of God, he will reward you for it in heaven, and the punishment you suffer unjustly here shall turn to your exceeding great glory hereafter. "Lastly, you should serve your masters faithfully, because of their goodness to you. See to what trouble they have been on your account. Your fathers were poor ignorant and barbarous creatures in Africa, and the whites fitted out ships at great trouble and expense and brought you from that benighted land to Christian America, where you can sit under your own vine and fig tree and no one molest or make you afraid. Oh, my dear black brothers and sisters, you are indeed a fortunate and a blessed people. Your masters have many troubles that you know nothing about. If the banks break, your masters are sure to lose something. If the crops turn out poor, they lose by it. If one of you die, your master loses what he paid for you, while you lose nothing. Now let me exhort you once more to be faithful." Often during the delivery of the sermon did Snyder cast an anxious look in the direction where Carlton was seated; no doubt to see if he had found favour with the stranger. Huckelby, the overseer, was also there, seated near Carlton. With all Snyder's gesticulations, sonorous voice, and occasionally bringing his fist down upon the table with the force of a sledge hammer, he could not succeed in keeping the Negroes all interested: four or five were fast asleep, leaning against the trees; as many more were nodding, while not a few were stealthily cracking, and eating hazelnuts. "Uncle Simon, you may strike up a hymn," said the preacher as he closed his Bible. A moment more, and the whole company (Carlton excepted) had joined in the well known hymn, commencing with "When I can read my title clear To mansions in the sky." After the singing, Sandy closed with prayer, and the following questions and answers read, and the meeting was brought to a close. "Q. What command has God given to servants concerning obedience to their masters?—A. 'Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh, not with eye-service as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing God.' "Q. What does God mean by masters according to the flesh?—A. 'Masters in this world.' "Q. What are servants to count their masters worthy of?— A. 'All honour.' "Q. How are they to do the service of their masters?—A. 'With good will, doing service as unto the Lord, and not unto men.' "Q. How are they to try to please their masters?—A. 'Please him well in all things, not answering again.' "Q. Is a servant who is an eye-servant to his earthly master an eye-servant to his heavenly master?—A. 'Yes.' "Q. Is it right in a servant, when commanded to do any thing, to be sullen and slow, and answer his master again?—A. 'No.' "Q. If the servant professes to be a Christian, ought he not to be as a Christian servant, an example to all other servants of love and obedience to his master?—A. 'Yes.' "Q. And, should his master be a Christian also, ought he not on that account specially to love and obey him?—A. 'Yes.' "Q. But suppose the master is hard to please, and threatens and punishes more than he ought, what is the servant to do?—A. 'Do his best to please him.' "Q. When the servant suffers wrongfully at the hands of his master, and, to please God, takes it patiently, will God reward him for it?—A. 'Yes.' "Q. Is it right for the servant to run away, or is it right to harbour a runaway?—A. 'No.' "Q. If a servant runs away, what should be done with him?—A. 'He should be caught and brought back.' "Q. When he is brought back, what should be done with him?— A. 'Whip him well.' "Q. Why may not the whites be slaves as well as the blacks?— A. 'Because the Lord intended the Negroes for slaves.' "Q. Are they better calculated for servants than the whites?— A. 'Yes, their hands are large, the skin thick and tough, and they can stand the sun better than the whites.' "Q. Why should servants not complain when they are whipped?— A. 'Because the Lord has commanded that they should be whipped.' "Q. Where has He commanded it?—A. 'He says, He that knoweth his master's will, and doeth it not, shall be beaten with many stripes.' "Q. Then is the master to blame for whipping his servant?—A. 'Oh, no! he is only doing his duty as a Christian.'" Snyder left the ground in company with Carlton and Huckelby, and the three dined together in the overseer's dwelling. "Well," said Joe, after the three white men were out of hearing, "Marser Snyder bin try hesef to-day." "Yes," replied Ned; "he want to show de strange gentman how good he can preach." "Dat's a new sermon he gib us to-day," said Sandy. "Dees white fokes is de very dibble," said Dick; "and all dey whole study is to try to fool de black people." "Didn't you like de sermon?" asked Uncle Simon. "No," answered four or five voices. "He rared and pitched enough," continued Uncle Simon. Now Uncle Simon was himself a preacher, or at least he thought so, and was rather pleased than otherwise, when he heard others spoken of in a disparaging manner. "Uncle Simon can beat dat sermon all to pieces," said Ned, as he was filling his mouth with hazelnuts. "I got no notion of dees white fokes, no how," returned Aunt Dafney. "Dey all de time tellin' dat de Lord made us for to work for dem, and I don't believe a word of it." "Marser Peck give dat sermon to Snyder, I know," said Uncle Simon. "He jest de one for dat," replied Sandy. "I think de people dat made de Bible was great fools," said Ned. "Why?" Uncle Simon. "'Cause dey made such a great big book and put nuttin' in it, but servants obey yer masters." "Oh," replied Uncle Simon, "thars more in de Bible den dat, only Snyder never reads any other part to us; I use to hear it read in Maryland, and thar was more den what Snyder lets us hear." In the overseer's house there was another scene going on, and far different from what we have here described. CHAPTER VII THE POOR WHITES, SOUTH "No seeming of logic can ever convince the American people, that thousands of our slave-holding brethren are not excellent, humane, and even Christian men, fearing God, and keeping His commandments."—Rev. Dr. Joel Parker. "You like these parts better than New York," said Carlton to Snyder, as they were sitting down to dinner in the overseer's dwelling. "I can't say that I do," was the reply; "I came here ten years ago as missionary, and Mr. Peck wanted me to stay, and I have remained. I travel among the poor whites during the week and preach for the niggers on Sunday." "Are there many poor whites in this district?" "Not here, but about thirty miles from here, in the Sand Hill district; they are as ignorant as horses. Why it was no longer than last week I was up there, and really you would not believe it, that people were so poor off. In New England, and, I may say, in all the free states, they have free schools, and everybody gets educated. Not so here. In Connecticut there is only one out of every five hundred above twenty-one years that can neither read nor write. Here there is one out of every eight that can neither read nor write. There is not a single newspaper taken in five of the counties in this state. Last week I was at Sand Hill for the first time, and I called at a farmhouse. The man was out. It was a low log-hut, and yet it was the best house in that locality. The woman and nine children were there, and the geese, ducks, chickens, pigs, and children were all running about the floor. The woman seemed scared at me when I entered the house. I inquired if I could get a little dinner, and my horse fed. She said, yes, if I would only be good enough to feed him myself, as her 'gal,' as she called her daughter, would be afraid of the horse. When I returned into the house again from the stable, she kept her eyes upon me all the time. At last she said, 'I s'pose you ain't never bin in these parts afore?' 'No,' said I. 'Is you gwine to stay here long?' 'Not very long,' I replied. 'On business, I s'pose.' 'Yes,' said I, 'I am hunting up the lost sheep of the house of Israel.' 'Oh,' exclaimed she, 'hunting for lost sheep is you? Well, you have a hard time to find 'em here. My husband lost an old ram last week, and he ain't found him yet, and he's hunted every day.' 'I am not looking for four-legged sheep,' said I, 'I am hunting for sinners.' 'Ah'; she said, 'then you are a preacher.' 'Yes,' said I. 'You are the first of that sort that's bin in these diggins for many a day.' Turning to her eldest daughter, she said in an excited tone, 'Clar out the pigs and ducks, and sweep up the floor; this is a preacher.' And it was some time before any of the children would come near me; one remained under the bed (which, by the by, was in the same room), all the while I was there. 'Well,' continued the woman, 'I was a tellin' my man only yesterday that I would like once more to go to meetin' before I died, and he said as he should like to do the same. But as you have come, it will save us the trouble of going out of the district.'" "Then you found some of the lost sheep," said Carlton. "Yes," replied Snyder, "I did not find anything else up there. The state makes no provision for educating the poor: they are unable to do it themselves, and they grow up in a state of ignorance and degradation. The men hunt and the women have to go in the fields and labour." "What is the cause of it?" inquired Carlton. "Slavery," answered Snyder, slavery,—and nothing else. Look at the city of Boston; it pays more taxes for the support of the government than this entire state. The people of Boston do more business than the whole population of Mississippi put together. I was told some very amusing things while at Sand Hill. A farmer there told me a story about an old woman, who was very pious herself. She had a husband and three sons, who were sad characters, and she had often prayed for their conversion but to no effect. At last, one day while working in the corn-field, one of her sons was bitten by a rattlesnake. He had scarce reached home before he felt the poison, and in his agony called loudly on his Maker. "The pious old woman, when she heard this, forgetful of her son's misery, and everything else but the glorious hope of his repentance, fell on her knees, and prayed as follows—'Oh! Lord, I thank thee, that thou hast at last opened Jimmy's eyes to the error of his ways; and I pray that, in thy Divine mercy, thou wilt send a rattlesnake to bite the old man, and another to bite Tom, and another to bite Harry, for I am certain that nothing but a rattlesnake, or something of the kind, will ever turn them from their sinful ways, they are so hard-headed.' When returning home, and before I got out of the Sand Hill district, I saw a funeral, and thought I would fasten my horse to a post and attend. The coffin was carried in a common horse cart, and followed by fifteen or twenty persons very shabbily dressed, and attended by a man whom I took to be the religious man of the place. After the coffin had been placed near the grave, he spoke as follows,— "'Friends and neighbours! you have congregated to see this lump of mortality put into a hole in the ground. You all know the deceased—a worthless, drunken, good-for-nothing vagabond. He lived in disgrace and infamy, and died in wretchedness. You all despised him—you all know his brother Joe, who lives on the hill? He's not a bit better though he has scrap'd together a little property by cheating his neighbours. His end will be like that of this loathsome creature, whom you will please put into the hole as soon as possible. I won't ask you to drop a tear, but brother Bohow will please raise a hymn while we fill up the grave.'" "I am rather surprised to hear that any portion of the whites in this state are in so low a condition." "Yet it is true," returned Snyder. "These are very onpleasant facts to be related to ye, Mr. Carlton," said Huckelby; "but I can bear witness to what Mr. Snyder has told ye." Huckelby was from Maryland, where many of the poor whites are in as sad a condition as the Sand Hillers of Mississippi. He was a tall man, of iron constitution, and could neither read nor write, but was considered one of the best overseers in the country. When about to break a slave in, to do a heavy task, he would make him work by his side all day; and if the new hand kept up with him, he was set down as an able bodied man. Huckelby had neither moral, religious, or political principles, and often boasted that conscience was a matter that never "cost" him a thought. "Mr. Snyder ain't told ye half about the folks in these parts," continued he; "we who comes from more enlightened parts don't know how to put up with 'em down here. I find the people here knows mighty little indeed; in fact, I may say they are univarsaly onedicated. I goes out among none on 'em, 'cause they ain't such as I have been used to 'sociate with. When I gits a little richer, so that I can stop work, I tend to go back to Maryland, and spend the rest of my days." "I wonder the Negroes don't attempt to get their freedom by physical force." "It ain't no use for 'em to try that, for if they do, we puts 'em through by daylight," replied Huckelby. "There are some desperate fellows among the slaves," said Snyder. "Indeed," remarked Carlton. "Oh, yes," replied the preacher. "A case has just taken place near here, where a neighbour of ours, Mr. J. Higgerson, attempted to correct a Negro man in his employ, who resisted, drew a knife, and stabbed him (Mr. H.) in several places. Mr. J. C. Hobbs (a Tennessean) ran to his assistance. Mr. Hobbs stooped to pick up a stick to strike the Negro, and, while in that position, the Negro rushed upon him, and caused his immediate death. The Negro then fled to the woods, but was pursued with dogs, and soon overtaken. He had stopped in a swamp to fight the dogs, when the party who were pursuing him came upon him, and commanded him to give up, which he refused to do. He then made several efforts to stab them. Mr. Roberson, one of the party, gave him several blows on the head with a rifle gun; but this, instead of subduing, only increased his desperate revenge. Mr. R. then discharged his gun at the Negro, and missing him, the ball struck Mr. Boon in the face, and felled him to the ground. The Negro, seeing Mr. Boon prostrated, attempted to rush up and stab him, but was prevented by the timely interference of some one of the party. He was then shot three times with a revolving pistol, and once with a rifle, and after having his throat cut, he still kept the knife firmly grasped in his hand, and tried to cut their legs when they approached to put an end to his life. This chastisement was given because the Negro grumbled, and found fault with his master for flogging his wife." "Well, this is a bad state of affairs indeed, and especially the condition of the poor whites," said Carlton. "You see," replied Snyder, "no white man is respectable in these slave states who works for a living. No community can be prosperous, where honest labour is not honoured. No society can be rightly constituted, where the intellect is not fed. Whatever institution reflects discredit on industry, whatever institution forbids the general culture of the understanding, is palpably hostile to individual rights, and to social well-being. Slavery is the incubus that hangs over the Southern States." "Yes," interrupted Huckelby; "them's just my sentiments now, and no mistake. I think that, for the honour of our country, this slavery business should stop. I don't own any, no how, and I would not be an overseer if I wern't paid for it." CHAPTER VIII THE SEPARATION "In many ways does the full heart reveal The presence of the love it would conceal; But in far more the estranged heart lets know The absence of the love, which yet it fain would show." AT length the news of the approaching marriage of Horatio met the ear of Clotel. Her head grew dizzy, and her heart fainted within her; but, with a strong effort at composure, she inquired all the particulars, and her pure mind at once took its resolution. Horatio came that evening, and though she would fain have met him as usual, her heart was too full not to throw a deep sadness over her looks and tones. She had never complained of his decreasing tenderness, or of her own lonely hours; but he felt that the mute appeal of her heart-broken looks was more terrible than words. He kissed the hand she offered, and with a countenance almost as sad as her own, led her to a window in the recess shadowed by a luxuriant passion flower. It was the same seat where they had spent the first evening in this beautiful cottage, consecrated to their first loves. The same calm, clear moonlight looked in through the trellis. The vine then planted had now a luxuriant growth; and many a time had Horatio fondly twined its sacred blossoms with the glossy ringlets of her raven hair. The rush of memory almost overpowered poor Clotel; and Horatio felt too much oppressed and ashamed to break the long deep silence. At length, in words scarcely audible, Clotel said: "Tell me, dear Horatio, are you to be married next week?" He dropped her hand as if a rifle ball had struck him; and it was not until after long hesitation, that he began to make some reply about the necessity of circumstances. Mildly but earnestly the poor girl begged him to spare apologies. It was enough that he no longer loved her, and that they must bid farewell. Trusting to the yielding tenderness of her character, he ventured, in the most soothing accents, to suggest that as he still loved her better than all the world, she would ever be his real wife, and they might see each other frequently. He was not prepared for the storm of indignant emotion his words excited. True, she was his slave; her bones, and sinews had been purchased by his gold, yet she had the heart of a true woman, and hers was a passion too deep and absorbing to admit of partnership, and her spirit was too pure to form a selfish league with crime. At length this painful interview came to an end. They stood together by the Gothic gate, where they had so often met and parted in the moonlight. Old remembrances melted their souls. "Farewell, dearest Horatio," said Clotel. "Give me a parting kiss." Her voice was choked for utterance, and the tears flowed freely, as she bent her lips toward him. He folded her convulsively in his arms, and imprinted a long impassioned kiss on that mouth, which had never spoken to him but in love and blessing. With efforts like a death-pang she at length raised her head from his heaving bosom, and turning from him with bitter sobs, "It is our last. To meet thus is henceforth crime. God bless you. I would not have you so miserable as I am. Farewell. A last farewell." "The last?" exclaimed he, with a wild shriek. "Oh God, Clotel, do not say that"; and covering his face with his hands, he wept like a child. Recovering from his emotion, he found himself alone. The moon looked down upon him mild, but very sorrowfully; as the Madonna seems to gaze upon her worshipping children, bowed down with consciousness of sin. At that moment he would have given worlds to have disengaged himself from Gertrude, but he had gone so far, that blame, disgrace, and duels with angry relatives would now attend any effort to obtain his freedom. Oh, how the moonlight oppressed him with its friendly sadness! It was like the plaintive eye of his forsaken one, like the music of sorrow echoed from an unseen world. Long and earnestly he gazed at that cottage, where he had so long known earth's purest foretaste of heavenly bliss. Slowly he walked away; then turned again to look on that charmed spot, the nestling-place of his early affections. He caught a glimpse of Clotel, weeping beside a magnolia, which commanded a long view of the path leading to the public road. He would have sprung toward her but she darted from him, and entered the cottage. That graceful figure, weeping in the moonlight, haunted him for years. It stood before his closing eyes, and greeted him with the morning dawn. Poor Gertrude, had she known all, what a dreary lot would hers have been; but fortunately she could not miss the impassioned tenderness she never experienced; and Horatio was the more careful in his kindness, because he was deficient in love. After Clotel had been separated from her mother and sister, she turned her attention to the subject of Christianity, and received that consolation from her Bible that is never denied to the children of God. Although it was against the laws of Virginia, for a slave to be taught to read, Currer had employed an old free Negro, who lived near her, to teach her two daughters to read and write. She felt that the step she had taken in resolving never to meet Horatio again would no doubt expose her to his wrath, and probably cause her to be sold, yet her heart was too guileless for her to commit a crime, and therefore she had ten times rather have been sold as a slave than do wrong. Some months after the marriage of Horatio and Gertrude their barouche rolled along a winding road that skirted the forest near Clotel's cottage, when the attention of Gertrude was suddenly attracted by two figures among the trees by the wayside; and touching Horatio's arm, she exclaimed, "Do look at that beautiful child." He turned and saw Clotel and Mary. His lips quivered, and his face became deadly pale. His young wife looked at him intently, but said nothing. In returning home, he took another road; but his wife seeing this, expressed a wish to go back the way they had come. He objected, and suspicion was awakened in her heart, and she soon after learned that the mother of that lovely child bore the name of Clotel, a name which she had often heard Horatio murmur in uneasy slumbers. From gossiping tongues she soon learned more than she wished to know. She wept, but not as poor Clotel had done; for she never had loved, and been beloved like her, and her nature was more proud: henceforth a change came over her feelings and her manners, and Horatio had no further occasion to assume a tenderness in return for hers. Changed as he was by ambition, he felt the wintry chill of her polite propriety, and sometimes, in agony of heart, compared it with the gushing love of her who was indeed his wife. But these and all his emotions were a sealed book to Clotel, of which she could only guess the contents. With remittances for her and her child's support, there sometimes came earnest pleadings that she would consent to see him again; but these she never answered, though her heart yearned to do so. She pitied his young bride, and would not be tempted to bring sorrow into her household by any fault of hers. Her earnest prayer was, that she might not know of her existence. She had not looked on Horatio since she watched him under the shadow of the magnolia, until his barouche passed her in her rambles some months after. She saw the deadly paleness of his countenance, and had he dared to look back, he would have seen her tottering with faintness. Mary brought water from a rivulet, and sprinkled her face. When she revived, she clasped the beloved child to her heart with a vehemence that made her scream. Soothingly she kissed away her fears, and gazed into her beautiful eyes with a deep, deep sadness of expression, which poor Mary never forgot. Wild were the thoughts that passed round her aching heart, and almost maddened her poor brain; thoughts which had almost driven her to suicide the night of that last farewell. For her child's sake she had conquered the fierce temptation then; and for her sake, she struggled with it now. But the gloomy atmosphere of their once happy home overclouded the morning of Mary's life. Clotel perceived this, and it gave her unutterable pain. "Tis ever thus with woman's love, True till life's storms have passed; And, like the vine around the tree, It braves them to the last." CHAPTER IX THE MAN OF HONOUR "My tongue could never learn sweet soothing words, But now thy beauty is propos'd, my fee, My proud heart sues, and prompts my tongue to speak." Shakespeare. JAMES CRAWFORD, the purchaser of Althesa, was from the green mountains of Vermont, and his feelings were opposed to the holding of slaves. But his young wife persuaded him into the idea that it was no worse to own a slave than to hire one and pay the money to another. Hence it was that he had been induced to purchase Althesa. Henry Morton, a young physician from the same state, and who had just commenced the practice of his profession in New Orleans, was boarding with Crawford when Althesa was brought home. The young physician had been in New Orleans but a few weeks, and had seen very little of slavery. In his own mountain home he had been taught that the slaves of the Southern states were Negroes, if not from the coast of Africa, the descendants of those who had been imported. He was unprepared to behold with composure a beautiful young white girl of fifteen in the degraded position of a chattel slave. The blood chilled in his young heart as he heard Crawford tell how, by bartering with the trader, he had bought her for two hundred dollars less than he first asked. His very looks showed that the slave girl had the deepest sympathy of his heart. Althesa had been brought up by her mother to look after the domestic concerns of her cottage in Virginia, and knew well the duties imposed upon her. Mrs. Crawford was much pleased with her new servant, and often made mention of her in the presence of Morton. The young man's sympathy ripened into love, which was reciprocated by the friendless and injured child of sorrow. There was but one course left; that was, to purchase the young girl and make her his wife, which he did six months after her arrival in Crawford's family. The young physician and his wife immediately took lodgings in another part of the city; a private teacher was called in, and the young wife taught some of those accomplishments which are necessary for one's taking a position in society. Dr. Morton soon obtained a large practice in his profession, and with it increased in wealth—but with all his wealth he never would own a slave. Mrs. Morton was now in a position to seek out and redeem her mother, whom she had not heard of since they parted at Natchez. An agent was immediately despatched to hunt out the mother and to see if she could be purchased. The agent had no trouble in finding out Mr. Peck: but all overtures were unavailable; he would not sell Currer. His excuse was, that she was such a good housekeeper that he could not spare her. Poor Althesa felt sad when she found that her mother could not be bought. However, she felt a consciousness of having done her duty in the matter, yet waited with the hope that the day might come when she should have her mother by her side. CHAPTER X THE YOUNG CHRISTIAN "Here we see God dealing in slaves; giving them to his own favourite child [Abraham], a man of superlative worth, and as a reward for his eminent goodness."—Rev. Theodore Clapp, of New Orleans. ON Carlton's return the next day from the farm, he was overwhelmed with questions from Mr. Peck, as to what he thought of the plantation, the condition of the Negroes, Huckelby and Snyder; and especially how he liked the sermon of the latter. Mr. Peck was a kind of a patriarch in his own way. To begin with, he was a man of some talent. He not only had a good education, but was a man of great eloquence, and had a wonderful command of language. He too either had, or thought he had, poetical genius; and was often sending contributions to the Natchez Free Trader, and other periodicals. In the way of raising contributions for foreign missions, he took the lead of all others in his neighbourhood. Everything he did, he did for the "glory of God," as he said: he quoted Scripture for almost everything he did. Being in good circumstances, he was able to give to almost all benevolent causes to which he took a fancy. He was a most loving father, and his daughter exercised considerable influence over him, and owing to her piety and judgment, that influence had a beneficial effect. Carlton, though a schoolfellow of the parson's, was nevertheless nearly ten years his junior; and though not an avowed infidel, was, however, a freethinker, and one who took no note of to-morrow. And for this reason Georgiana took peculiar interest in the young man, for Carlton was but little above thirty and unmarried. The young Christian felt that she would not be living up to that faith that she professed and believed in, if she did not exert herself to the utmost to save the thoughtless man from his downward career; and in this she succeeded to her most sanguine expectations. She not only converted him, but in placing the Scriptures before him in their true light, she redeemed those sacred writings from the charge of supporting the system of slavery, which her father had cast upon them in the discussion some days before. Georgiana's first object, however, was to awaken in Carlton's breast a love for the Lord Jesus Christ. The young man had often sat under the sound of the gospel with perfect indifference. He had heard men talk who had grown grey bending over the Scriptures, and their conversation had passed by him unheeded; but when a young girl, much younger than himself, reasoned with him in that innocent and persuasive manner that woman is wont to use when she has entered with her whole soul upon an object, it was too much for his stout heart, and he yielded. Her next aim was to vindicate the Bible from sustaining the monstrous institution of slavery. She said, "God has created of one blood all the nations of men, to dwell on all the face of the earth. To claim, hold, and treat a human being as property is felony against God and man. The Christian religion is opposed to slaveholding in its spirit and its principles; it classes menstealers among murderers; and it is the duty of all who wish to meet God in peace, to discharge that duty in spreading these principles. Let us not deceive ourselves into the idea that slavery is right, because it is profitable to us. Slaveholding is the highest possible violation of the eighth commandment. To take from a man his earnings, is theft; but to take the earner is a compound, life-long theft; and we who profess to follow in the footsteps of our Redeemer, should do our utmost to extirpate slavery from the land. For my own part, I shall do all I can. When the Redeemer was about to ascend to the bosom of the Father, and resume the glory which he had with him before the world was, he promised his disciples that the power of the Holy Ghost should come upon them, and that they should be witnesses for him to the uttermost parts of the earth. What was the effect upon their minds? 'They all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women.' Stimulated by the confident expectation that Jesus would fulfil his gracious promise, they poured out their hearts in fervent supplications, probably for strength to do the work which he had appointed them unto, for they felt that without him they could do nothing, and they consecrated themselves on the altar of God, to the great and glorious enterprise of preaching the unsearchable riches of Christ to a lost and perishing world. Have we less precious promises in the Scriptures of truth? May we not claim of our God the blessing promised unto those who consider the poor: the Lord will preserve them and keep them alive, and they shall be blessed upon the earth? Does not the language, 'Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye did it unto me,' belong to all who are rightly engaged in endeavouring to unloose the bondman's fetters? Shall we not then do as the apostles did? Shall we not, in view of the two millions of heathen in our very midst, in view of the souls that are going down in an almost unbroken phalanx to utter perdition, continue in prayer and supplication, that God will grant us the supplies of his Spirit to prepare us for that work which he has given us to do? Shall not the wail of the mother as she surrenders her only child to the grasp of the ruthless kidnapper, or the trader in human blood, animate our devotions? Shall not the manifold crimes and horrors of slavery excite more ardent outpourings at the throne of grace to grant repentance to our guilty country, and permit us to aid in preparing the way for the glorious second advent of the Messiah, by preaching deliverance to the captives, and the opening of the prison doors to those who are bound?" Georgiana had succeeded in riveting the attention of Carlton during her conversation, and as she was finishing her last sentence, she observed the silent tear stealing down the cheek of the newly born child of God. At this juncture her father entered, and Carlton left the room. "Dear papa," said Georgiana, "will you grant me one favour; or, rather, make me a promise?" "I can't tell, my dear, till I know what it is," replied Mr. Peck. "If it is a reasonable request, I will comply with your wish," continued he. "I hope, my dear," answered she, "that papa would not think me capable of making an unreasonable request." "Well, well," returned he; "tell me what it is." "I hope," said she, "that in your future conversation with Mr. Carlton, on the subject of slavery, you will not speak of the Bible as sustaining it." "Why, Georgiana, my dear, you are mad, ain't you?" exclaimed he, in an excited tone. The poor girl remained silent; the father saw in a moment that he had spoken too sharply; and taking her hand in his he said, "Now, my child, why do you make that request?" "Because," returned she, "I think he is on the stool of repentance, if he has not already been received among the elect. He, you know, was bordering upon infidelity, and if the Bible sanctions slavery, then he will naturally enough say that it is not from God; for the argument from internal evidence is not only refuted, but actually turned against the Bible. If the Bible sanctions slavery, then it misrepresents the character of God. Nothing would be more dangerous to the soul of a young convert than to satisfy him that the Scriptures favoured such a system of sin." "Don't you suppose that I understand the Scriptures better than you? I have been in the world longer." "Yes," said she, "you have been in the world longer, and amongst slaveholders so long that you do not regard it in the same light that those do who have not become so familiar with its every-day scenes as you. I once heard you say, that you were opposed to the institution, when you first came to the South." "Yes," answered he, "I did not know so much about it then." "With great deference to you, papa," replied Georgiana, "I don't think that the Bible sanctions slavery. The Old Testament contains this explicit condemnation of it, 'He that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his band, he shall surely be put to death'; and 'Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbour's service without wages, and giveth him not for his work'; when also the New Testament exhibits such words of rebuke as these, 'Behold the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth; and the cries of them who have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.' 'The law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons.' A more scathing denunciation of the sin in question is surely to be found on record in no other book. I am afraid," continued the daughter, "that the acts of the professed friends of Christianity in the South do more to spread infidelity than the writings of all the atheists which have ever been published. The infidel watches the religious world. He surveys the church, and, lo! thousands and tens of thousands of her accredited members actually hold slaves. Members 'in good and regular standing,' fellowshipped throughout Christendom except by a few anti-slavery churches generally despised as ultra and radical, reduce their fellow men to the condition of chattels, and by force keep them in that state of degradation. Bishops, ministers, elders, and deacons are engaged in this awful business, and do not consider their conduct as at all inconsistent with the precepts of either the Old or New Testaments. Moreover, those ministers and churches who do not themselves hold slaves, very generally defend the conduct of those who do, and accord to them a fair Christian character, and in the way of business frequently take mortgages and levy executions on the bodies of their fellow men, and in some cases of their fellow Christians. "Now is it a wonder that infidels, beholding the practice and listening to the theory of professing Christians, should conclude that the Bible inculcates a morality not inconsistent with chattelising human beings? And must not this conclusion be strengthened, when they hear ministers of talent and learning declare that the Bible does sanction slaveholding, and that it ought not to be made a disciplinable offence in churches? And must not all doubt be dissipated, when one of the most learned professors in our theological seminaries asserts that the Bible recognises that the relation may still exist, salva fide et salva ecclesia' (without injury to the Christian faith or church) and that only 'the abuse of it is the essential and fundamental wrong?' Are not infidels bound to believe that these professors, ministers, and churches understand their own Bible, and that, consequently, notwithstanding solitary passages which appear to condemn slaveholding, the Bible sanctions it? When nothing can be further from the truth. And as for Christ, his whole life was a living testimony against slavery and all that it inculcates. When he designed to do us good, he took upon himself the form of a servant. He took his station at the bottom of society. He voluntarily identified himself with the poor and the despised. The warning voices of Jeremiah and Ezekiel were raised in olden time, against sin. Let us not forget what followed. 'Therefore, thus saith the Lord—ye have not harkened unto me in proclaiming liberty every one to his brother, and every one to his neighbour—behold I proclaim a liberty for you, saith the Lord, to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine.' Are we not virtually as a nation adopting the same impious language, and are we not exposed to the same tremendous judgments? Shall we not, in view of those things, use every laudable means to awaken our beloved country from the slumbers of death, and baptize all our efforts with tears and with prayers, that God may bless them? Then, should our labour fail to accomplish the end for which we pray, we shall stand acquitted at the bar of Jehovah, and although we may share in the national calamities which await unrepented sins, yet that blessed approval will be ours—'Well done, good and faithful servants, enter ye into the joy of your Lord.'" "My dear Georgiana," said Mr. Peck, "I must be permitted to entertain my own views on this subject, and to exercise my own judgment." "Believe me, dear papa," she replied, "I would not be understood as wishing to teach you, or to dictate to you in the least; but only grant my request, not to allude to the Bible as sanctioning slavery, when speaking with Mr. Carlton." "Well," returned he, "I will comply with your wish." The young Christian had indeed accomplished a noble work; and whether it was admitted by the father, or not, she was his superior and his teacher. Georgiana had viewed the right to enjoy perfect liberty as one of those inherent and inalienable rights which pertain to the whole human race, and of which they can never be divested, except by an act of gross injustice. And no one was more able than herself to impress those views upon the hearts of all with whom she came in contact. Modest and self-possessed, with a voice of great sweetness, and a most winning manner, she could, with the greatest ease to herself, engage their attention. CHAPTER XI THE PARSON POET "Unbind, unbind my galling chain, And set, oh! set me free: No longer say that I'll disdain The gift of liberty." THROUGH the persuasion of Mr. Peck, and fascinated with the charms of Georgiana, Carlton had prolonged his stay two months with his old school-fellow. During the latter part of the time he had been almost as one of the family. If Miss Peck was invited out, Mr. Carlton was, as a matter of course. She seldom rode out, unless with him. If Mr. Peck was absent, he took the head of the table; and, to the delight of the young lady, he had on several occasions taken part in the family worship. "I am glad," said Mr. Peck, one evening while at the tea table, "I am glad, Mr. Carlton, that my neighbour Jones has invited you to visit him at his farm. He is a good neighbour, but a very ungodly man; I want that you should see his people, and then, when you return to the North, you can tell how much better a Christian's slaves are situated than one who does nothing for the cause of Christ." "I hope, Mr. Carlton," said Georgiana, "that you will spend the Sabbath with him, and have a religious interview with the Negroes." "Yes," replied the parson, "that's well thought of, Georgy." "Well, I think I will go up on Thursday next, and stay till Monday," said Carlton; "and I shall act upon your suggestion, Miss Peck," continued he; "and try to get a religious interview with the blacks. By-the-by," remarked Carlton, "I saw an advertisement in the Free Trader to-day that rather puzzled me. Ah, here it is now; and, drawing the paper from his pocket, "I will read it, and then you can tell me what it means: 'To PLANTERS AND OTHERS.—Wanted fifty Negroes. Any person having sick Negroes, considered incurable by their respective physicians, (their owners of course,) and wishing to dispose of them, Dr. Stillman will pay cash for Negroes affected with scrofula or king's evil, confirmed hypochondriacism, apoplexy, or diseases of the brain, kidneys, spleen, stomach and intestines, bladder and its appendages, diarrhoea, dysentery, &c. The highest cash price will be paid as above.' When I read this to-day I thought that the advertiser must be a man of eminent skill as a physician, and that he intended to cure the sick Negroes; but on second thought I find that some of the diseases enumerated are certainly incurable. What can he do with these sick Negroes?" "You see," replied Mr. Peck, laughing, "that he is a doctor, and has use for them in his lectures. The doctor is connected with a small college. Look at his prospectus, where he invites students to attend, and that will explain the matter to you." Carlton turned to another column, and read the following: "Some advantages of a peculiar character are connected with this institution, which it may be proper to point out. No place in the United States offers as great opportunities for the acquisition of anatomical knowledge. Subjects being obtained from among the coloured population in sufficient numbers for every purpose, and proper dissections carried on without offending any individuals in the community!" "These are for dissection, then?" inquired Carlton with a trembling voice. "Yes," answered the parson. "Of course they wait till they die before they can use them." "They keep them on hand, and when they need one they bleed him to death," returned Mr. Peck. "Yes, but that's murder." "Oh, the doctors are licensed to commit murder, you know; and what's the difference, whether one dies owing to the loss of blood, or taking too many pills? For my own part, if I had to choose, I would rather submit to the former." "I have often heard what I considered hard stories in abolition meetings in New York about slavery; but now I shall begin to think that many of them are true." "The longer you remain here the more you will be convinced of the iniquity of the institution," remarked Georgiana. "Now, Georgy, my dear, don't give us another abolition lecture, if you please," said Mr. Peck. "Here, Carlton," continued the parson, "I have written a short poem for your sister's album, as you requested me; it is a domestic piece, as you will see." "She will prize it the more for that," remarked Carlton; and taking the sheet of paper, he laughed as his eyes glanced over it. "Read it out, Mr. Carlton," said Georgiana, "and let me hear what it is; I know papa gets off some very droll things at times." Carlton complied with the young lady's request, and read aloud the following rare specimen of poetical genius: "MY LITTLE NIG. "I have a little nigger, the blackest thing alive, He'll be just four years old if he lives till forty-five; His smooth cheek hath a glossy hue, like a new polished boot, And his hair curls o'er his little head as black as any soot. His lips bulge from his countenance—his little ivories shine— His nose is what we call a little pug, but fashioned very fine: Although not quite a fairy, he is comely to behold, And I wouldn't sell him, 'pon my word, for a hundred all in gold. "He gets up early in the morn, like all the other nigs, And runs off to the hog-lot, where he squabbles with the pigs— And when the sun gets out of bed, and mounts up in the sky, The warmest corner of the yard is where my nig doth lie. And there extended lazily, he contemplates and dreams, (I cannot qualify to this, but plain enough it seems;) Until 'tis time to take in grub, when you can't find him there, For, like a politician, he has gone to hunt his share. "I haven't said a single word concerning my plantation, Though a prettier, I guess, cannot be found within the nation; When he gets a little bigger, I'll take and to him show it, And then I'll say, 'My little nig, now just prepare to go it!' I'll put a hoe into his hand—he'll soon know what it means, And every day for dinner, he shall have bacon and greens." CHAPTER XII A NIGHT IN THE PARSON'S KITCHEN "And see the servants met, Their daily labour's o'er; And with the jest and song they set The kitchen in a roar." MR. PECK kept around him four servants besides Currer, of whom we have made mention: of these, Sam was considered the first. If a dinner-party was in contemplation, or any company to be invited to the parson's, after all the arrangements had been talked over by the minister and his daughter, Sam was sure to be consulted upon the subject by "Miss Georgy," as Miss Peck was called by the servants. If furniture, crockery, or anything else was to be purchased, Sam felt that he had been slighted if his opinion had not been asked. As to the marketing, he did it all. At the servants' table in the kitchen, he sat at the head, and was master of ceremonies. A single look from him was enough to silence any conversation or noise in the kitchen, or any other part of the premises. There is, in the Southern States, a great amount of prejudice against colour amongst the Negroes themselves. The nearer the Negro or mulatto approaches to the white, the more he seems to feel his superiority over those of a darker hue. This is, no doubt, the result of the prejudice that exists on the part of the whites towards both mulattoes and blacks. Sam was originally from Kentucky, and through the instrumentality of one of his young masters whom he had to take to school, he had learned to read so as to be well understood; and, owing to that fact, was considered a prodigy among the slaves, not only of his own master's, but those of the town who knew him. Sam had a great wish to follow in the footsteps of his master, and be a poet; and was, therefore, often heard singing doggerels of his own composition. But there was one great drawback to Sam, and that was his colour. He was one of the blackest of his race. This he evidently regarded as a great misfortune. However, he made up for this in his dress. Mr. Peck kept his house servants well dressed; and as for Sam, he was seldom seen except in a ruffled shirt. Indeed, the washerwoman feared him more than all others about the house. Currer, as we have already stated, was chief of the kitchen department, and had a general supervision of the household affairs. Alfred the coachman, Peter, and Hetty made up the remainder of the house servants. Besides these, Mr. Peck owned eight slaves who were masons. These worked in the city. Being mechanics, they were let out to greater advantage than to keep them on the farm. However, every Sunday night, Peck's servants, including the bricklayers, usually assembled in the kitchen, when the events of the week were freely discussed and commented on. It was on a Sunday evening, in the month of June, that there was a party at Mr. Peck's, and, according to custom in the Southern States, the ladies had their maid-servants with them. Tea had been served in "the house," and the servants, including the strangers, had taken their seats at the tea table in the kitchen. Sam, being a "single gentleman," was usually attentive to the "ladies" on this occasion. He seldom or ever let the day pass without spending at least an hour in combing and brushing up his "hair." Sam had an idea that fresh butter was better for his hair than any other kind of grease; and therefore, on churning days, half a pound of butter had always to be taken out before it was salted. When he wished to appear to great advantage, he would grease his face, to make it "shiny." On the evening of the party therefore, when all the servants were at the table, Sam cut a big figure. There he sat with his wool well combed and buttered, face nicely greased, and his ruffles extending five or six inches from his breast. The parson in his own drawing-room did not make a more imposing appearance than did his servant on this occasion. "I jist bin had my fortune told last Sunday night," said Sam, as he helped one of the girls to some sweet hash. "Indeed," cried half-a-dozen voices. "Yes," continued he; "Aunt Winny teld me I is to hab de prettiest yaller gal in town, and dat I is to be free." All eyes were immediately turned toward Sally Johnson, who was seated near Sarn. "I speck I see somebody blush at dat remark," said Alfred. "Pass dem pancakes and molasses up dis way, Mr. Alf, and none of your insinawaysion here," rejoined Sam. "Dat reminds me," said Currer, "dat Doreas Simpson is gwine to git married." "Who to, I want to know?" inquired Peter. "To one of Mr. Darby's field-hands," answered Currer. "I should tink dat dat gal would not trow hersef away in dat manner," said Sally. "She good enough looking to get a house servant, and not to put up wid a fiel' nigger," continued she. "Yes," said Sam, "dat's a wery insensible remark of yours, Miss Sally. I admire your judgment wery much, I assure you. Dah's plenty of suspectible and well-dressed house servants dat a gal of her looks can get, wid out taken up wid dem common darkies." "Is de man black or a mulatto?" inquired one of the company. "He's nearly white," replied Currer. "Well den, dat's some exchuse for her," remarked Sam; "for I don't like to see dis malgemation of blacks and mulattoes." "No mulatto?" inquired one of the corn-how. Continued Sam, "If I had my rights I would be a mulatto too, for my mother was almost as light-coloured as Miss Sally," said he. Although Sam was one of the blackest men living, he nevertheless contended that his mother was a mulatto, and no one was more prejudiced against the blacks than he. A good deal of work, and the free use of fresh butter, had no doubt done wonders for his "hare" in causing it to grow long, and to this he would always appeal when he wished to convince others that he was part of an Anglo-Saxon. "I always thought you was not clear black, Mr. Sam," said Agnes. "You are right dahr, Miss Agnes. My hare tells what company I belong to," answered Sam. Here the whole company joined in the conversation about colour, which lasted for some time, giving unmistakeable evidence that caste is owing to ignorance. The evening's entertainment concluded by Sam's relating a little of his own experience while with his first master in old Kentucky. Sam's former master was a doctor, and had a large practice among his neighbours, doctoring both masters and slaves. When Sam was about fifteen years of age, his old master set him to grinding up the ointment, then to making pills. As the young student grew older and became more practised in his profession, his services were of more importance to the doctor. The physician having a good business, and a large number of his patients being slaves, the most of whom had to call on the doctor when ill, he put Sam to bleeding, pulling teeth, and administering medicine to the slaves. Sam soon acquired the name amongst the slaves of the "Black Doctor." With this appellation he was delighted, and no regular physician could possibly have put on more airs than did the black doctor when his services were required. In bleeding, he must have more bandages, and rub and smack the arm more than the doctor would have thought of. We once saw Sam taking out a tooth for one of his patients, and nothing appeared more amusing. He got the poor fellow down on his back, and he got astraddle of the man's chest, and getting the turnkeys on the wrong tooth, he shut both eyes and pulled for his life. The poor man screamed as loud as he could, but to no purpose. Sam had him fast. After a great effort, out came the sound grinder, and the young doctor saw his mistake; but consoled himself with the idea that as the wrong tooth was out of the way, there was more room to get at the right one. Bleeding and a dose of calomel was always considered indispensable by the "Old Boss"; and, as a matter of course, Sam followed in his footsteps. On one occasion the old doctor was ill himself, so as to be unable to attend to his patients. A slave, with pass in hand, called to receive medical advice, and the master told Sam to examine him and see what he wanted. This delighted him beyond measure, for although he had been acting his part in the way of giving out medicine as the master ordered it, he had never been called upon by the latter to examine a patient, and this seemed to convince him that, after all, he was no sham doctor. As might have been expected, he cut a rare figure in his first examination, placing himself directly opposite his patient, and folding his arms across his breast, and looking very knowingly, he began, "What's de matter wid you?" "I is sick." "Where is you sick?" "Here," replied the man, putting his hand upon his stomach. "Put out your tongue," continued the doctor. The man ran out his tongue at full length. "Let me feel your pulse," at the same time taking his patient's hand in his, placing his fingers on his pulse, he said, "Ah, your case is a bad one; if I don't do something for you, and dat pretty quick, you'll be a gone coon, and dat's sartin." At this the man appeared frightened, and inquired what was the matter with him: in answer, Sam said, "I done told you dat your case is a bad one, and dat's enough." On Sam's returning to his master's bedside, the latter said, "Well, Sam, what do you think is the matter with him?" "His stomach is out of order, sir," he replied. "What do you think had best be done for him?" "I think I better bleed him and give him a dose of calomel," returned Sam. So to the latter's gratification the master let him have his own way. We need not further say, that the recital of Sam's experience as a physician gave him a high position amongst the servants that evening, and made him a decided favourite with the ladies, one of whom feigned illness, when the black doctor, to the delight of all, and certainly to himself, gave medical advice. Thus ended the evening amongst the servants in the parson's kitchen. CHAPTER XIII A SLAVE HUNTING PARSON "'Tis too much prov'd—that with devotion's visage, And pious action, we do sugar o'er the devil himself." —Shakespeare. "You will, no doubt, be well pleased with neighbour Jones," said Mr. Peck, as Carlton stepped into the chaise to pay his promised visit to the "ungodly man." "Don't forget to have a religious interview with the Negroes, remarked Georgiana, as she gave the last nod to her young convert. "I will do my best," returned Carlton, as the vehicle left the door. As might have been expected, Carlton met with a cordial reception at the hands of the proprietor of the Grove Farm. The servants in the "Great House" were well dressed, and appeared as if they did not want for food. Jones knew that Carlton was from the North, and a non-slaveholder, and therefore did everything in his power to make a favourable impression on his mind. "My Negroes are well clothed, well fed, and not over worked," said the slaveholder to his visitor, after the latter had been with him nearly a week. "As far as I can see your slaves appear to good advantage," replied Carlton. "But," continued he, "if it is a fair question, do you have preaching among your slaves on Sunday, Mr. Jones?" "No, no," returned he, "I think that's all nonsense; my Negroes do their own preaching." "So you do permit them to have meetings." "Yes, when they wish. There's some very intelligent and clever chaps among them." "As to-morrow is the Sabbath," said Carlton, "if you have no objection, I will attend meeting with them." "Most certainly you shall, if you will do the preaching," returned the planter. Here the young man was about to decline, but he remembered the parting words of Georgiana, and he took courage and said, "Oh, I have no objection to give the Negroes a short talk." It was then understood that Carlton was to have a religious interview with the blacks the next day, and the young man waited with a degree of impatience for the time. In no part of the South are slaves in a more ignorant and degraded state than in the cotton, sugar, and rice districts. If they are permitted to cease labour on the Sabbath, the time is spent in hunting, fishing, or lying beneath the shade of a tree, resting for the morrow. Religious instruction is unknown in the far South, except among such men as the Rev. C. C. Jones, John Peck, and some others who regard religious instruction, such as they impart to their slaves, as calculated to make them more trustworthy and valuable as property. Jones, aware that his slaves would make rather a bad show of intelligence if questioned by Carlton, resolved to have them ready for him, and therefore gave his driver orders with regard to their preparation. Consequently, after the day's labour was over, Dogget, the driver, assembled the Negroes together and said, "Now, boys and gals, your master is coming down to the quarters to-morrow with his visitor, who is going to give you a preach, and I want you should understand what he says to you. Now many of you who came of Old Virginia and Kentuck, know what preaching is, and others who have been raised in these parts do not. Preaching is to tell you that you are mighty wicked and bad at heart. This, I suppose, you all know. But if the gentleman should ask you who made you, tell him the Lord; if he ask if you wish to go to heaven, tell him yes. Remember that you are all Christians, all love the Lord, all want to go to heaven, all love your masters, and all love me. Now, boys and gals, I want you to show yourselves smart to-morrow: be on your p's and q's, and, Monday morning, I will give you all a glass of whiskey bright and early." Agreeable to arrangement the slaves were assembled together on Sunday morning under the large trees near the great house, and after going through another drilling from the driver, Jones and Carlton made their appearance. "You see," said Jones to the Negroes, as he approached them, you see here's a gentleman that's come to talk to you about your souls, and I hope you 'ill all pay that attention that you ought." Jones then seated himself in one of the two chairs placed there for him and the stranger. Carlton had already selected a chapter in the Bible to read to them, which he did, after first prefacing it with some remarks of his own. Not being accustomed to speak in public, he determined, after reading the Bible, to make it more of a conversational meeting than otherwise. He therefore began asking them questions. "Do you feel that you are a Christian?" asked he of a full-blooded Negro that sat near him. "Yes, sir," was the response. "You feel, then, that you shall go to heaven." "Yes, sir." "Of course you know who made you?" The man put his hand to his head and began to scratch his wool; and, after a little hesitation, answered, "De overseer told us last night who made us, but indeed I forgot the gentmun's name." This reply was almost too much for Carlton, and his gravity was not a little moved. However, he bit his tongue, and turned to another man, who appeared, from his looks, to be more intelligent. "Do you serve the Lord?" asked he. "No, sir, I don't serve anybody but Mr. Jones. I neber belong to anybody else." To hide his feelings at this juncture, Carlton turned and walked to another part of the grounds, to where the women were seated, and said to a mulatto woman who had rather an anxious countenance, "Did you ever hear of John the Baptist?" "Oh yes, marser, John de Baptist; I know dat nigger bery well indeed; he libs in Old Kentuck, where I come from." Carlton's gravity here gave way, and he looked at the planter and laughed right out. The old woman knew a slave near her old master's farm in Kentucky, and was ignorant enough to suppose that he was the John the Baptist inquired about. Carlton occupied the remainder of the time in reading Scripture and talking to them. "My niggers ain't shown off very well to-day," said Jones, as he and his visitor left the grounds. "No," replied Carlton. "You did not get hold of the bright ones," continued the planter. "So it seems," remarked Carlton. The planter evidently felt that his neighbour, Parson Peck, would have a nut to crack over the account that Carlton would give of the ignorance of the slaves, and said and did all in his power to remove the bad impression already made; but to no purpose. The report made by Carlton, on his return, amused the parson very much. It appeared to him the best reason why professed Christians like himself should be slave-holders. Not so with Georgiana. She did not even smile when Carlton was telling his story, but seemed sore at heart that such ignorance should prevail in their midst. The question turned upon the heathen of other lands, and the parson began to expatiate upon his own efforts in foreign missions, when his daughter, with a child-like simplicity, said, "Send Bibles to the heathen; On every distant shore, From light that's beaming o'er us, Let streams increasing pour But keep it from the millions Down-trodden at our door. "Send Bibles to the heathen, Their famished spirits feed; Oh! haste, and join your efforts, The priceless gift to speed; Then flog the trembling Negro If he should learn to read." "I saw a curiosity while at Mr. Jones's that I shall not forget soon," said Carlton. "What was it?" inquired the parson. "A kennel of bloodhounds; and such dogs I never saw before. They were of a species between the bloodhound and the foxhound, and were ferocious, gaunt, and savage-looking animals. They were part of a stock imported from Cuba, he informed me. They were kept in an iron cage, and fed on Indian corn bread. This kind of food, he said, made them eager for their business. Sometimes they would give the dogs meat, but it was always after they had been chasing a Negro." "Were those the dogs you had, papa, to hunt Harry?" asked Georgiana. "No, my dear," was the short reply: and the parson seemed anxious to change the conversation to something else. When Mr. Peck had left the room, Carlton spoke more freely of what he had seen, and spoke more pointedly against slavery; for he well knew that Miss Peck sympathised with him in all he felt and said. "You mentioned about your father hunting a slave," said Carlton, in an undertone. "Yes," replied she: "papa went with some slave-catchers and a parcel of those nasty Negro-dogs, to hunt poor Harry. He belonged to papa and lived on the farm. His wife lives in town, and Harry had been to see her, and did not return quite as early as he should; and Huckelby was flogging him, and he got away and came here. I wanted papa to keep him in town, so that he could see his wife more frequently; but he said they could not spare him from the farm, and flogged him again, and sent him back. The poor fellow knew that the overseer would punish him over again, and instead of going back he went into the woods." "Did they catch him?" asked Carlton. "Yes," replied she. "In chasing him through the woods, he attempted to escape by swimming across a river, and the dogs were sent in after him, and soon caught him. But Harry had great courage and fought the dogs with a big club; and papa seeing the Negro would escape from the dogs, shot at him, as he says, only to wound him, that he might be caught; but the poor fellow was killed." Overcome by relating this incident, Georgiana burst into tears. Although Mr. Peck fed and clothed his house servants well, and treated them with a degree of kindness, he was, nevertheless, a most cruel master. He encouraged his driver to work the field-hands from early dawn till late at night; and the good appearance of the house-servants, and the preaching of Snyder to the field Negroes, was to cause himself to be regarded as a Christian master. Being on a visit one day at the farm, and having with him several persons from the Free States, and wishing to make them believe that his slaves were happy, satisfied, and contented, the parson got out the whiskey and gave each one a dram, who in return had to drink the master's health, or give a toast of some kind. The company were not a little amused at some of the sentiments given, and Peck was delighted at every indication of contentment on the part of the blacks. At last it came to Jack's turn to drink, and the master expected something good from him, because he was considered the cleverest and most witty slave on the farm. "Now," said the master, as he handed Jack the cup of whiskey; "now, Jack, give us something rich. You know," continued he, "we have raised the finest crop of cotton that's been seen in these parts for many a day. Now give us a toast on cotton; come, Jack, give us something to laugh at." The Negro felt not a little elated at being made the hero of the occasion, and taking the whiskey in his right hand, put his left to his head and began to scratch his wool, and said, "The big bee flies high, The little bee make the honey; The black folks makes the cotton, And the white folks gets the money." CHAPTER XIV A FREE WOMAN REDUCED TO SLAVERY ALTHESA found in Henry Morton a kind and affectionate husband; and his efforts to purchase her mother, although unsuccessful, had doubly endeared him to her. Having from the commencement resolved not to hold slaves, or rather not to own any, they were compelled to hire servants for their own use. Five years had passed away, and their happiness was increased by two lovely daughters. Mrs. Morton was seated, one bright afternoon, busily engaged with her needle, and near her sat Salome, a servant that she had just taken into her employ. The woman was perfectly white; so much so, that Mrs. Morton had expressed her apprehensions to her husband, when the woman first came, that she was not born a slave. The mistress watched the servant, as the latter sat sewing upon some coarse work, and saw the large silent tear in her eye. This caused an uneasiness to the mistress, and she said, "Salome, don't you like your situation here?" "Oh yes, madam," answered the woman in a quick tone, and then tried to force a smile. "Why is it that you often look sad, and with tears in your eyes?" The mistress saw that she had touched a tender chord, and continued, "I am your friend; tell me your sorrow, and, if I can, I will help you." As the last sentence was escaping the lips of the mistress, the slave woman put her check apron to her face and wept. Mrs. Morton saw plainly that there was cause for this expression of grief, and pressed the woman more closely. "Hear me, then," said the woman calming herself: "I will tell you why I sometimes weep. I was born in Germany, on the banks of the Rhine. Ten years ago my father came to this country, bringing with him my mother and myself. He was poor, and I, wishing to assist all I could, obtained a situation as nurse to a lady in this city. My father got employment as a labourer on the wharf, among the steamboats; but he was soon taken ill with the yellow fever, and died. My mother then got a situation for herself, while I remained with my first employer. When the hot season came on, my master, with his wife, left New Orleans until the hot season was over, and took me with them. They stopped at a town on the banks of the Mississippi river, and said they should remain there some weeks. One day they went out for a ride, and they had not been one more than half an hour, when two men came into the room and told me that they had bought me, and that I was their slave. I was bound and taken to prison, and that night put on a steamboat and taken up the Yazoo river, and set to work on a farm. I was forced to take up with a Negro, and by him had three children. A year since my master's daughter was married, and I was given to her. She came with her husband to this city, and I have ever since been hired out." "Unhappy woman," whispered Althesa, "why did you not tell me this before?" "I was afraid," replied Salome, "for I was once severely flogged for telling a stranger that I was not born a slave." On Mr. Morton's return home, his wife communicated to him the story which the slave woman had told her an hour before, and begged that something might be done to rescue her from the situation she was then in. In Louisiana as well as many others of the slave states, great obstacles are thrown in the way of persons who have been wrongfully reduced to slavery regaining their freedom. A person claiming to be free must prove his right to his liberty. This, it will be seen, throws the burden of proof upon the slave, who, in all probability, finds it out of his power to procure such evidence. And if any free person shall attempt to aid a freeman in re-gaining his freedom, he is compelled to enter into security in the sum of one thousand dollars, and if the person claiming to be free shall fail to establish such fact, the thousand dollars are forfeited to the state. This cruel and oppressive law has kept many a freeman from espousing the cause of persons unjustly held as slaves. Mr. Morton inquired and found that the woman's story was true, as regarded the time she had lived with her present owner; but the latter not only denied that she was free, but immediately removed her from Morton's. Three months after Salome had been removed from Morton's and let out to another family, she was one morning cleaning the door steps, when a lady passing by, looked at the slave and thought she recognised some one that she had seen before. The lady stopped and asked the woman if she was a slave. "I am," said she. "Were you born a slave?" "No, I was born in Germany." "What's the name of the ship in which you came to this country?" inquired the lady. "I don't know," was the answer. "Was it the am*zon?" At the sound of this name, the slave woman was silent for a moment, and then the tears began to flow freely down her careworn cheeks. "Would you know Mrs. Marshall, who was a passenger in the am*zon, if you should see her?" inquired the lady. At this the woman gazed at the lady with a degree of intensity that can be imagined better than described, and then fell at the lady's feet. The lady was Mrs. Marshall. She had crossed the Atlantic in the same ship with this poor woman. Salome, like many of her countrymen, was a beautiful singer, and had often entertained Mrs. Marshall and the other lady passengers on board the am*zon. The poor woman was raised from the ground by Mrs. Marshall, and placed upon the door step that she had a moment before been cleaning. "I will do my utmost to rescue you from the horrid life of a slave," exclaimed the lady, as she took from her pocket her pencil, and wrote down the number of the house, and the street in which the German woman was working as a slave. After a long and tedious trial of many days, it was decided that Salome Miller was by birth a free woman, and she was set at liberty. The good and generous Althesa had contributed some of the money toward bringing about the trial, and had done much to cheer on Mrs. Marshall in her benevolent object. Salome Miller is free, but where are her three children? They are still slaves, and in all human probability will die as such. This, reader, is no fiction; if you think so, look over the files of the New Orleans newspapers of the years 1845-6, and you will there see reports of the trial. CHAPTER XV TO-DAY A MISTRESS, TO-MORROW A SLAVE "I promised thee a sister tale Of man's perfidious cruelty; Come, then, and hear what cruel wrong Befell the dark ladie."—Coleridge. LET us return for a moment to the home of Clotel. While she was passing lonely and dreary hours with none but her darling child, Horatio Green was trying to find relief in that insidious enemy of man, the intoxicating cup. Defeated in politics, forsaken in love by his wife, he seemed to have lost all principle of honour, and was ready to nerve himself up to any deed, no matter how unprincipled. Clotel's existence was now well known to Horatio's wife, and both her [sic] and her father demanded that the beautiful quadroon and her child should be sold and sent out of the state. To this proposition he at first turned a deaf ear; but when he saw that his wife was about to return to her father's roof, he consented to leave the matter in the hands of his father-in-law. The result was, that Clotel was immediately sold to the slave-trader, Walker, who, a few years previous, had taken her mother and sister to the far South. But, as if to make her husband drink of the cup of humiliation to its very dregs, Mrs. Green resolved to take his child under her own roof for a servant. Mary was, therefore, put to the meanest work that could be found, and although only ten years of age, she was often compelled to perform labour, which, under ordinary circumstances, would have been thought too hard for one much older. One condition of the sale of Clotel to Walker was, that she should be taken out of the state, which was accordingly done. Most quadroon women who are taken to the lower countries to be sold are either purchased by gentlemen for their own use, or sold for waiting-maids; and Clotel, like her sister, was fortunate enough to be bought for the latter purpose. The town of Vicksburgh stands on the left bank of the Mississippi, and is noted for the severity with which slaves are treated. It was here that Clotel was sold to Mr. James French, a merchant. Mrs. French was severe in the extreme to her servants. Well dressed, but scantily fed, and overworked were all who found a home with her. The quadroon had been in her new home but a short time ere she found that her situation was far different from what it was in Virginia. What social virtues are possible in a society of which injustice is the primary characteristic? in a society which is divided into two classes, masters and slaves? Every married woman in the far South looks upon her husband as unfaithful, and regards every quadroon servant as a rival. Clotel had been with her new mistress but a few days, when she was ordered to cut off her long hair. The Negro, constitutionally, is fond of dress and outward appearance. He that has short, woolly hair, combs it and oils it to death. He that has long hair, would sooner have his teeth drawn than lose it. However painful it was to the quadroon, she was soon seen with her hair cut as short as any of the full-blooded Negroes in the dwelling. Even with her short hair, Clotel was handsome. Her life had been a secluded one, and though now nearly thirty years of age, she was still beautiful. At her short hair, the other servants laughed, "Miss Clo needn't strut round so big, she got short nappy har well as I," said Nell, with a broad grin that showed her teeth. "She tinks she white, when she come here wid dat long har of hers," replied Mill. "Yes," continued Nell; "missus make her take down her wool so she no put it up to-day." The fairness of Clotel's complexion was regarded with envy as well by the other servants as by the mistress herself. This is one of the hard features of slavery. To-day the woman is mistress of her own cottage; to-morrow she is sold to one who aims to make her life as intolerable as possible. And be it remembered, that the house servant has the best situation which a slave can occupy. Some American writers have tried to make the world believe that the condition of the labouring classes of England is as bad as the slaves of the United States. The English labourer may be oppressed, he may be cheated, defrauded, swindled, and even starved; but it is not slavery under which he groans. He cannot be sold; in point of law he is equal to the prime minister. "It is easy to captivate the unthinking and the prejudiced, by eloquent declamation about the oppression of English operatives being worse than that of American slaves, and by exaggerating the wrongs on one side and hiding them on the other. But all informed and reflecting minds, knowing that bad as are the social evils of England, those of Slavery are immeasurably worse." But the degradation and harsh treatment that Clotel experienced in her new home was nothing compared with the grief she underwent at being separated from her dear child. Taken from her without scarcely a moment's warning, she knew not what had become of her. The deep and heartfelt grief of Clotel was soon perceived by her owners, and fearing that her refusal to take food would cause her death, they resolved to sell her. Mr. French found no difficulty in getting a purchaser for the quadroon woman, for such are usually the most marketable kind of property. Clotel was sold at private sale to a young man for a housekeeper; but even he had missed his aim. CHAPTER XVI DEATH OF THE PARSON CARLTON was above thirty years of age, standing on the last legs of a young man, and entering on the first of a bachelor. He had never dabbled in matters of love, and looked upon all women alike. Although he respected woman for her virtues, and often spoke of the goodness of heart of the sex, he had never dreamed of marriage. At first he looked upon Miss Peck as a pretty young woman, but after she became his religious teacher, he regarded her in that light, that every one will those whom they know to be their superiors. It was soon seen, however, that the young man not only respected and reverenced Georgiana for the incalculable service she had done him, in awakening him to a sense of duty to his soul, but he had learned to bow to the shrine of Cupid. He found, weeks after he had been in her company, that when he met her at table, or alone in the drawing room, or on the piazza, he felt a shortness of breath, a palpitating of the heart, a kind of dizziness of the head; but he knew not its cause. This was love in its first stage. Mr. Peck saw, or thought he saw, what would be the result of Carlton's visit, and held out every inducement in his power to prolong his stay. The hot season was just commencing, and the young Northerner was talking of his return home, when the parson was very suddenly taken ill. The disease was the cholera, and the physicians pronounced the case incurable. In less than five hours John Peck was a corpse. His love for Georgiana, and respect for her father, had induced Carlton to remain by the bedside of the dying man, although against the express orders of the physician. This act of kindness caused the young orphan henceforth to regard Carlton as her best friend. He now felt it his duty to remain with the young woman until some of her relations should be summoned from Connecticut. After the funeral, the family physician advised that Miss Peck should go to the farm, and spend the time at the country seat; and also advised Carlton to remain with her, which he did. At the parson's death his Negroes showed little or no signs of grief. This was noticed by both Carlton and Miss Peck, and caused no little pain to the latter. "They are ungrateful," said Carlton, as he and Georgiana were seated on the piazza. "What," asked she, "have they to be grateful for?" "Your father was kind, was he not?" "Yes, as kind as most men who own slaves; but the kindness meted out to blacks would be unkindness if given to whites. We would think so, should we not?" "Yes," replied he. "If we would not consider the best treatment which a slave receives good enough for us, we should not think he ought to be grateful for it. Everybody knows that slavery in its best and mildest form is wrong. Whoever denies this, his lips libel his heart. Try him! Clank the chains in his ears, and tell him they are for him; give him an hour to prepare his wife and children for a life of slavery; bid him make haste, and get ready their necks for the yoke, and their wrists for the coffle chains; then look at his pale lips and trembling knees, and you have nature's testimony against slavery." "Let's take a walk," said Carlton, as if to turn the conversation. The moon was just appearing through the tops of the trees, and the animals and insects in an adjoining wood kept up a continued din of music. The croaking of bull-frogs, buzzing of insects, cooing of turtle-doves, and the sound from a thousand musical instruments, pitched on as many different keys, made the welkin ring. But even all this noise did not drown the singing of a party of the slaves, who were seated near a spring that was sending up its cooling waters. "How prettily the Negroes sing," remarked Carlton, as they were wending their way towards the place from whence the sound of the voices came. "Yes," replied Georgiana; "master Sam is there, I'll warrant you: he's always on hand when there's any singing or dancing. We must not let them see us, or they will stop singing." "Who makes their songs for them?" inquired the young man. "Oh, they make them up as they sing them; they are all impromptu songs." By this time they were near enough to hear distinctly every word; and, true enough, Sam's voice was heard above all others. At the conclusion of each song they all joined in a hearty laugh, with an expression of "Dats de song for me;" "Dems dems." "Stop," said Carlton, as Georgiana was rising from the log upon which she was seated; "stop, and let's hear this one." The piece was sung by Sam, the others joining in the chorus, and was as follows: Sam. "Come, all my brethren, let us take a rest, While the moon shines so brightly and clear; Old master is dead, and left us at last, And has gone at the Bar to appear. Old master has died, and lying in his grave, And our blood will awhile cease to flow; He will no more trample on the neck of the slave; For he's gone where the slaveholders go. Chorus. "Hang up the shovel and the hoe Take down the fiddle and the bow— Old master has gone to the slaveholder's rest; He has gone where they all ought to go. Sam. "I heard the old doctor say the other night, As he passed by the dining-room door 'Perhaps the old man may live through the night, But I think he will die about four.' Young mistress sent me, at the peril of my life, For the parson to come down and pray, For says she, 'Your old master is now about to die,' And says I, 'God speed him on his way.' "Hang up the shovel, &c. "At four o'clock at morn the family was called Around the old man's dying bed; And oh! but I laughed to myself when I heard That the old man's spirit had fled. Mr. Carlton cried, and so did I pretend; Young mistress very nearly went mad; And the old parson's groans did the heavens fairly rend; But I tell you I felt mighty glad. "Hang up the shovel, &c. "We'll no more be roused by the blowing of his horn, Our backs no longer he will score; He no more will feed us on cotton-seeds and corn; For his reign of oppression now is o'er. He no more will hang our children on the tree, To be ate by the carrion crow; He no more will send our wives to Tennessee; For he's gone where the slaveholders go. "Hang up the shovel and the hoe, Take down the fiddle and the bow, We'll dance and sing, And make the forest ring, With the fiddle and the old banjo." The song was not half finished before Carlton regretted that he had caused the young lady to remain and hear what to her must be anything but pleasant reflections upon her deceased parent. "I think we will walk," said he, at the same time extending his arm to Georgiana. "No," said she; "let's hear them out. It is from these unguarded expressions of the feelings of the Negroes, that we should learn a lesson." At its conclusion they walked towards the house in silence: as they were ascending the steps, the young man said, "They are happy, after all. The Negro, situated as yours are, is not aware that he is deprived of any just rights." "Yes, yes," answered Georgiana: "you may place the slave where you please; you may dry up to your utmost the fountains of his feelings, the springs of his thought; you may yoke him to your labour, as an ox which liveth only to work, and worketh only to live; you may put him under any process which, without destroying his value as a slave, will debase and crush him as a rational being; you may do this, and the idea that he was born to be free will survive it all. It is allied to his hope of immortality; it is the ethereal part of his nature, which oppression cannot reach; it is a torch lit up in his soul by the hand of Deity, and never meant to be extinguished by the hand of man." On reaching the drawing-room, they found Sam snuffing the candles, and looking as solemn and as dignified as if he had never sung a song or laughed in his life. "Will Miss Georgy have de supper got up now?" asked the Negro. "Yes," she replied. "Well," remarked Carlton, "that beats anything I ever met with. Do you think that was Sam we heard singing?" "I am sure of it," was the answer. "I could not have believed that that fellow was capable of so much deception," continued he. "Our system of slavery is one of deception; and Sam, you see, has only been a good scholar. However, he is as honest a fellow as you will find among the slave population here. If we would have them more honest, we should give them their liberty, and then the inducement to be dishonest would be gone. I have resolved that these creatures shall all be free." "Indeed!" exclaimed Carlton. "Yes, I shall let them all go free, and set an example to those about me." "I honour your judgment," said he. "But will the state permit them to remain?" "If not, they can go where they can live in freedom. I will not be unjust because the state is." CHAPTER XVII RETALIATION "I had a dream, a happy dream; I thought that I was free: That in my own bright land again A home there was for me." WITH the deepest humiliation Horatio Green saw the daughter of Clotel, his own child, brought into his dwelling as a servant. His wife felt that she had been deceived, and determined to punish her deceiver. At first Mary was put to work in the kitchen, where she met with little or no sympathy from the other slaves, owing to the fairness of her complexion. The child was white, what should be done to make her look like other Negroes, was the question Mrs. Green asked herself. At last she hit upon a plan: there was a garden at the back of the house over which Mrs. Green could look from her parlour window. Here the white slave-girl was put to work, without either bonnet or handkerchief upon her head. A hot sun poured its broiling rays on the naked face and neck of the girl, until she sank down in the corner of the garden, and was actually broiled to sleep. "Dat little nigger ain't working a bit, missus," said Dinah to Mrs. Green, as she entered the kitchen. "She's lying in the sun, seasoning; she will work better by and by," replied the mistress. "Dees white niggers always tink dey sef good as white folks," continued the cook. "Yes, but we will teach them better; won't we, Dinah?" "Yes, missus, I don't like dees mularter niggers, no how: dey always want to set dey sef up for something big." The cook was black, and was not without that prejudice which is to be found among the Negroes, as well as among the whites of the Southern States. The sun had the desired effect, for in less than a fortnight Mary's fair complexion had disappeared, and she was but little whiter than any other mulatto children running about the yard. But the close resemblance between the father and child annoyed the mistress more than the mere whiteness of the child's complexion. Horatio made proposition after proposition to have the girl sent away, for every time he beheld her countenance it reminded him of the happy days he had spent with Clotel. But his wife had commenced, and determined to carry out her unfeeling and fiendish designs. This child was not only white, but she was the granddaughter of Thomas Jefferson, the man who, when speaking against slavery in the legislature of Virginia, said, "The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions; the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submission on the other. With what execration should the statesman be loaded who, permitting one half the citizens thus to trample on the rights of the other, transforms those into despots and these into enemies, destroys the morals of the one part, and the amor patriae of the other! For if the slave can have a country in this world, it must be any other in preference to that in which he is born to live and labour for another; in which he must lock up the faculties of his nature, contribute as far as depends on his individual endeavours to the evanishment of the human race, or entail his own miserable condition on the endless generations proceeding from him. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? that they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep for ever; that, considering numbers, nature, and natural means only, a revolution of the wheel of fortune, an exchange of situation, is among possible events; that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The Almighty has no attribute which can take side with us in such a contest. "What an incomprehensible machine is man! Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprisonment, and death itself, in vindication of his own liberty, and the next moment be deaf to all those motives, whose power supported him through his trial, and inflict on his fellow-men a bondage, one hour of which is fraught with more misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to oppose! But we must wait with patience the workings of an overruling Providence, and hope that that is preparing the deliverance of these our suffering brethren. When the measure of their tears shall be full—when their tears shall have involved heaven itself in darkness—doubtless a God of justice will awaken to their distress, and by diffusing light and liberality among their oppressors, or at length by his exterminating thunder, manifest his attention to things of this world, and that they are not left to the guidance of blind fatality." The same man, speaking of the probability that the slaves might some day attempt to gain their liberties by a revolution, said, "I tremble for my country, when I recollect that God is just, and that His justice cannot sleep for ever. The Almighty has no attribute that can take sides with us in such a struggle." But, sad to say, Jefferson is not the only American statesman who has spoken high-sounding words in favour of freedom, and then left his own children to die slaves. CHAPTER XVIII THE LIBERATOR "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created free and equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."—Declaration of American Independence. THE death of the parson was the commencement of a new era in the history of his slaves. Only a little more than eighteen years of age, Georgiana could not expect to carry out her own wishes in regard to the slaves, although she was sole heir to her father's estate. There were distant relations whose opinions she had at least to respect. And both law and public opinion in the state were against any measure of emancipation that she might think of adopting; unless, perhaps, she might be permitted to send them to Liberia. Her uncle in Connecticut had already been written to, to come down and aid in settling up the estate. He was a Northern man, but she knew him to be a tight-fisted yankee, whose whole counsel would go against liberating the Negroes. Yet there was one way in which the thing could be done. She loved Carlton, and she well knew that he loved her; she read it in his countenance every time they met, yet the young man did not mention his wishes to her. There were many reasons why he should not. In the first place, her father was just deceased, and it seemed only right that he should wait a reasonable time. Again, Carlton was poor, and Georgiana was possessed of a large fortune; and his high spirit would not, for a moment, allow him to place himself in a position to be regarded as a fortune-hunter. The young girl hinted, as best she could, at the probable future; but all to no purpose. He took nothing to himself. True, she had read much of "woman's rights;" and had even attended a meeting, while at the North, which had been called to discuss the wrongs of woman; but she could not nerve herself up to the point of putting the question to Carlton, although she felt sure that she should not be rejected. She waited, but in vain. At last, one evening, she came out of her room rather late, and was walking on the piazza for fresh air. She passed near Carlton's room, and heard the voice of Sam. The negro had just come in to get the young man's boots, and had stopped, as he usually did, to have some talk. "I wish," said Sam, "dat Marser Carlton an Miss Georgy would get married; den, speck, we'd have good times." "I don't think your mistress would have me," replied the young man. "What make tink dat, Marser Carlton?" "Your mistress would marry no one, Sam, unless she loved them." "Den I wish she would lub you, cause I tink we have good times den. All our folks is de same 'pinion like me," returned the Negro, and then left the room with the boots in his hands. During the conversation between the Anglo-Saxon and the African, one word had been dropped by the former that haunted the young lady the remainder of the night—"Your mistress would marry no one unless she loved them." That word awoke her in the morning, and caused her to decide upon this import subject. Love and duty triumphed over the woman's timid nature, and that day Georgiana informed Carlton that she was ready to become his wife. The young man, with grateful tears, accepted and kissed the hand that was offered to him. The marriage of Carlton and Miss Peck was hailed with delight by both the servants in the house and the Negroes on the farm. New rules were immediately announced for the working and general treatment of the slaves on the plantation. With this, Huckelby, the overseer, saw his reign coming to an end; and Snyder, the Dutch preacher, felt that his services would soon be dispensed with, for nothing was more repugnant to the feelings of Mrs. Carlton than the sermons preached by Snyder to the slaves. She regarded them as something intended to make them better satisfied with their condition, and more valuable as pieces of property, without preparing them for the world to come. Mrs. Carlton found in her husband a congenial spirit, who entered into all her wishes and plans for bettering the condition of their slaves. Mrs. Carlton's views and sympathies were all in favour of immediate emancipation; but then she saw, or thought she saw, a difficulty in that. If the slaves were liberated, they must be sent out of the state. This, of course, would incur additional expense; and if they left the state, where had they better go? "Let's send them to Liberia," said Carlton. "Why should they go to Africa, any more than to the Free States or to Canada?" asked the wife. "They would be in their native land," he answered. "Is not this their native land? What right have we, more than the Negro, to the soil here, or to style ourselves native Americans? Indeed it is as much their home as ours, and I have sometimes thought it was more theirs. The Negro has cleared up the lands, built towns, and enriched the soil with his blood and tears; and in return, he is to be sent to a country of which he knows nothing. Who fought more bravely for American independence than the blacks? A negro, by the name of Attucks, was the first that fell in Boston at the commencement of the revolutionary war; and throughout the whole of the struggles for liberty in this country, the Negroes have contributed their share. In the last war with Great Britain, the country was mainly indebted to the blacks in New Orleans for the achievement of the victory at that place; and even General Jackson, the commander in chief, called the Negroes together at the close of the war, and addressed them in the following terms:— 'Soldiers!—When on the banks of the Mobile I called you to take up arms, inviting you to partake the perils and glory of your white fellow citizens, I expected much from you; for I was not ignorant that you possess qualities most formidable to an invading enemy. I knew with what fortitude you could endure hunger and thirst, and all the fatigues of a campaign. I knew well how you loved your native country, and that you, as well as ourselves, had to defend what man holds most dear—his parents, wife, children, and property. You have done more than I expected. In addition to the previous qualities I before knew you to possess, I found among you a noble enthusiasm, which leads to the performance of great things. 'Soldiers! The President of the United States shall hear how praiseworthy was your conduct in the hour of danger, and the representatives of the American people will give you the praise your exploits entitle you to. Your general anticipates them in appauding your noble ardour.' "And what did these noble men receive in return for their courage, their heroism? Chains and slavery. Their good deeds have been consecrated only in their own memories. Who rallied with more alacrity in response to the summons of danger? If in that hazardous hour, when our homes were menaced with the horrors of war, we did not disdain to call upon the Negro to assist in repelling invasion, why should we, now that the danger is past, deny him a home in his native land?" "I see," said Carlton, "you are right, but I fear you will have difficulty in persuading others to adopt your views." "We will set the example," replied she, "and then hope for the best; for I feel that the people of the Southern States will one day see their error. Liberty has always been our watchword, as far as profession is concerned. Nothing has been held so cheap as our common humanity, on a national average. If every man had his aliquot proportion of the injustice done in this land, by law and violence, the present freemen of the northern section would many of them commit suicide in self-defence, and would court the liberties awarded by Ali Pasha of Egypt to his subjects. Long ere this we should have tested, in behalf of our bleeding and crushed American brothers of every hue and complexion, every new constitution, custom, or practice, by which inhumanity was supposed to be upheld, the injustice and cruelty they contained, emblazoned before the great tribunal of mankind for condemnation; and the good and available power they possessed, for the relief, deliverance and elevation of oppressed men, permitted to shine forth from under the cloud, for the refreshment of the human race." Although Mr. and Mrs. Carlton felt that immediate emancipation was the right of the slave and the duty of the master, they resolved on a system of gradual emancipation, so as to give them time to accomplish their wish, and to prepare the Negro for freedom. Huckelby was one morning told that his services would no longer be required. The Negroes, ninety-eight in number, were called together and told that the whip would no longer be used, and that they would be allowed a certain sum for every bale of cotton produced. Sam, whose long experience in the cotton-field before he had been taken into the house, and whose general intelligence justly gave him the first place amongst the Negroes on the Poplar Farm, was placed at their head. They were also given to understand that the money earned by them would be placed to their credit; and when it amounted to a certain sum, they should all be free. The joy with which this news was received by the slaves, showed their grateful appreciation of the boon their benefactors were bestowing upon them. The house servants were called and told that wages would be allowed them, and what they earned set to their credit, and they too should be free. The next were the bricklayers. There were eight of these, who had paid their master two dollars per day, and boarded and clothed themselves. An arrangement was entered into with them, by which the money they earned should be placed to their credit; and they too should be free, when a certain amount should be accumulated; and great was the change amongst all these people. The bricklayers had been to work but a short time, before their increased industry was noticed by many. They were no longer apparently the same people. A sedateness, a care, an economy, an industry, took possession of them, to which there seemed to be no bounds but in their physical strength. They were never tired of labouring, and seemed as though they could never effect enough. They became temperate, moral, religious, setting an example of innocent, unoffending lives to the world around them, which was seen and admired by all. Mr. Parker, a man who worked nearly forty slaves at the same business, was attracted by the manner in which these Negroes laboured. He called on Mr. Carlton, some weeks after they had been acting on the new system, and offered 2,000 dollars for the head workman, Jim. The offer was, of course, refused. A few days after the same gentleman called again, and made an offer of double the sum that he had on the former occasion. Mr. Parker, finding that no money would purchase either of the Negroes, said, "Now, Mr. Carlton, pray tell me what it is that makes your Negroes work so? What kind of people are they?" "I suppose," observed Carlton, "that they are like other people, flesh and blood." "Why, sir," continued Parker, "I have never seen such people; building as they are next door to my residence, I see and have my eye on them from morning till night. You are never there, for I have never met you, or seen you once at the building. Why, sir, I am an early riser, getting up before day; and do you think that I am not awoke every morning in my life by the noise of their trowels at work, and their singing and noise before day; and do you suppose, sir, that they stop or leave off work at sundown? No, sir, but they work as long as they can see to lay a brick, and then they carry tip brick and mortar for an hour or two afterward, to be ahead of their work the next morning. And again, sir, do you think that they walk at their work? No, sir, they run all day. You see, sir, those immensely long, ladders, five stories in height; do you suppose they walk up them? No, sir, they run up and down them like so many monkeys all day long. I never saw such people as these in my life. I don't know what to make of them. Were a white man with them and over them with a whip, then I should see and understand the cause of the running and incessant labour; but I cannot comprehend it; there is something in it, sir. Great man, sir, that Jim; great man; I should like to own him." Carlton here informed Parker that their liberties depended upon their work; when the latter replied, "If niggers can work so for the promise of freedom, they ought to be made to work without it." This last remark was in the true spirit of the slaveholder, and reminds us of the fact that, some years since, the overseer of General Wade Hampton offered the niggers under him a suit of clothes to the one that picked the most cotton in one day; and after that time that day's work was given as a task to the slaves on that plantation; and, after a while, was adopted by other planters. The Negroes on the farm, under "Marser Sam," were also working in a manner that attracted the attention of the planters round about. They no longer feared Huckelby's whip, and no longer slept under the preaching of Snyder. On the Sabbath, Mr. and Mrs. Carlton read and explained the Scriptures to them; and the very great attention paid by the slaves showed plainly that they appreciated the gospel when given to them in its purity. The death of Currer, from yellow fever, was a great trial to Mrs. Carlton; for she had not only become much attached to her, but had heard with painful interest the story of her wrongs, and would, in all probability, have restored her to her daughter in New Orleans. CHAPTER XIX ESCAPE OF CLOTEL "The fetters galled my weary soul— A soul that seemed but thrown away; I spurned the tyrant's base control, Resolved at least the man to play." No country has produced so much heroism in so short a time, connected with escapes from peril and oppression, as has occurred in the United States among fugitive slaves, many of whom show great shrewdness in their endeavours to escape from this land of bondage. A slave was one day seen passing on the high road from a border town in the interior of the state of Virginia to the Ohio river. The man had neither hat upon his head or coat upon his back. He was driving before him a very nice fat pig, and appeared to all who saw him to be a labourer employed on an adjoining farm. "No Negro is permitted to go at large in the Slave States without a written pass from his or her master, except on business in the neighbourhood." "Where do you live, my boy?" asked a white man of the slave, as he passed a white house with green blinds. "Jist up de road, sir," was the answer. "That's a fine pig." "Yes, sir, marser like dis choat berry much." And the Negro drove on as if he was in great haste. In this way he and the pig travelled more than fifty miles before they reached the Ohio river. Once at the river they crossed over; the pig was sold; and nine days after the runaway slave passed over the Niagara river, and, for the first time in his life, breathed the air of freedom. A few weeks later, and, on the same road, two slaves were seen passing; one was on horseback, the other was walking before him with his arms tightly bound, and a long rope leading from the man on foot to the one on horseback. "Oh, ho, that's a runaway rascal, I suppose," said a farmer, who met them on the road. "Yes, sir, he bin runaway, and I got him fast. Marser will tan his jacket for him nicely when he gets him." "You are a trustworthy fellow, I imagine," continued the farmer. "Oh yes, sir; marser puts a heap of confidence in dis nigger." And the slaves travelled on. When the one on foot was fatigued they would change positions, the other being tied and driven on foot. This they called "ride and tie." After a journey of more than two hundred miles they reached the Ohio river, turned the horse loose, told him to go home, and proceeded on their way to Canada. However they were not to have it all their own way. There are men in the Free States, and especially in the states adjacent to the Slave States, who make their living by catching the runaway slave, and returning him for the reward that may be offered. As the two slaves above mentioned were travelling on towards the land of freedom, led by the North Star, they were set upon by four of these slave-catchers, and one of them unfortunately captured. The other escaped. The captured fugitive was put under the torture, and compelled to reveal the name of his owner and his place of residence. Filled with delight, the kidnappers started back with their victim. Overjoyed with the prospect of receiving a large reward, they gave themselves up on the third night to pleasure. They put up at an inn. The Negro was chained to the bed-post, in the same room with his captors. At dead of night, when all was still, the slave arose from the floor upon which he had been lying, looked around, and saw that the white men were fast asleep. The brandy punch had done its work. With palpitating heart and trembling limbs he viewed his position. The door was fast, but the warm weather had compelled them to leave the window open. If he could but get his chains off, he might escape through the window to the piazza, and reach the ground by one of the posts that supported the piazza. The sleeper's clothes hung upon chairs by the bedside; the slave thought of the padlock key, examined the pockets and found it. The chains were soon off, and the Negro stealthily making his way to the window: he stopped and said to himself, "These men are villains, they are enemies to all who like me are trying to be free. Then why not I teach them a lesson?" He then undressed himself, took the clothes of one of the men, dressed himself in them, and escaped through the window, and, a moment more, he was on the high road to Canada. Fifteen days later, and the writer of this gave him a passage across Lake Erie, and saw him safe in her Britannic Majesty's dominions. We have seen Clotel sold to Mr. French in Vicksburgh, her hair cut short, and everything done to make her realise her position as a servant. Then we have seen her re-sold, because her owners feared she would die through grief. As yet her new purchaser treated her with respectful gentleness, and sought to win her favour by flattery and presents, knowing that whatever he gave her he could take back again. But she dreaded every moment lest the scene should change, and trembled at the sound of every footfall. At every interview with her new master Clotel stoutly maintained that she had left a husband in Virginia, and would never think of taking another. The gold watch and chain, and other glittering presents which he purchased for her, were all laid aside by the quadroon, as if they were of no value to her. In the same house with her was another servant, a man, who had from time to time hired himself from his master. William was his name. He could feel for Clotel, for he, like her, had been separated from near and dear relatives, and often tried to console the poor woman. One day the quadroon observed to him that her hair was growing out again. "Yes," replied William, "you look a good deal like a man with your short hair." "Oh," rejoined she, "I have often been told that I would make a better looking man than a woman. If I had the money," continued she, "I would bid farewell to this place." In a moment more she feared that she had said too much, and smilingly remarked, "I am always talking nonsense." William was a tall, full-bodied Negro, whose very countenance beamed with intelligence. Being a mechanic, he had, by his own industry, made more than what he paid his owner; this he laid aside, with the hope that some day he might get enough to purchase his freedom. He had in his chest one hundred and fifty dollars. His was a heart that felt for others, and he had again and again wiped the tears from his eyes as he heard the story of Clotel as related by herself. "If she can get free with a little money, why not give her what I have?" thought he, and then he resolved to do it. An hour after, he came into the quadroon's room, and laid the money in her lap, and said, "There, Miss Clotel, you said if you had the means you would leave this place; there is money enough to take you to England, where you will be free. You are much fairer than many of the white women of the South, and can easily pass for a free white lady." At first Clotel feared that it was a plan by which the Negro wished to try her fidelity to her owner; but she was soon convinced by his earnest manner, and the deep feeling with which he spoke, that he was honest. "I will take the money only on one condition," said she; "and that is, that I effect your escape as well as my own." "How can that be done?" he inquired. "I will assume the disguise of a gentleman and you that of a servant, and we will take passage on a steamboat and go to Cincinnati, and thence to Canada." Here William put in several objections to the plan. He feared detection, and he well knew that, when a slave is once caught when attempting to escape, if returned is sure to be worse treated than before. However, Clotel satisfied him that the plan could be carried out if he would only play his part. The resolution was taken, the clothes for her disguise procured, and before night everything was in readiness for their departure. That night Mr. Cooper, their master, was to attend a party, and this was their opportunity. William went to the wharf to look out for a boat, and had scarcely reached the landing ere he heard the puffing of a steamer. He returned and reported the fact. Clotel had already packed her trunk, and had only to dress and all was ready. In less than an hour they were on board the boat. Under the assumed name of "Mr. Johnson," Clotel went to the clerk's office and took a private state room for herself, and paid her own and servant's fare. Besides being attired in a neat suit of black, she had a white silk handkerchief tied round her chin, as if she was an invalid. A pair of green glasses covered her eyes; and fearing that she would be talked to too much and thus render her liable to be detected, she assumed to be very ill. On the other hand, William was playing his part well in the servants' hall; he was talking loudly of his master's wealth. Nothing appeared as good on the boat as in his master's fine mansion. "I don't like dees steam-boats no how," said William; "I hope when marser goes on a journey agin he will take de carriage and de hosses." Mr. Johnson (for such was the name by which Clotel now went) remained in his room, to avoid, as far as possible, conversation with others. After a passage of seven days they arrived at Louisville, and put up at Gough's Hotel. Here they had to await the departure of another boat for the North. They were now in their most critical position. They were still in a slave state, and John C. Calhoun, a distinguished slave-owner, was a guest at this hotel. They feared, also, that trouble would attend their attempt to leave this place for the North, as all persons taking Negroes with them have to give bail that such Negroes are not runaway slaves. The law upon this point is very stringent: all steamboats and other public conveyances are liable to a fine for every slave that escapes by them, besides paying the full value for the slave. After a delay of four hours, Mr. Johnson and servant took passage on the steamer Rodolph, for Pittsburgh. It is usual, before the departure of the boats, for an officer to examine every part of the vessel to see that no slave secretes himself on board. "Where are you going?" asked the officer of William, as he was doing his duty on this occasion. "I am going with marser," was the quick reply. "Who is your master?" "Mr. Johnson, sir, a gentleman in the cabin." "You must take him to the office and satisfy the captain that all is right, or you can't go on this boat." William informed his master what the officer had said. The boat was on the eve of going, and no time could be lost, yet they knew not what to do. At last they went to the office, and Mr. Johnson, addressing the captain, said, "I am informed that my boy can't go with me unless I give security that he belongs to me. "Yes," replied the captain, "that is the law." "A very strange law indeed," rejoined Mr. Johnson, "that one can't take his property with him." After a conversation of some minutes, and a plea on the part of Johnson that he did not wish to be delayed owing to his illness, they were permitted to take their passage without farther trouble, and the boat was soon on its way up the river. The fugitives had now passed the Rubicon, and the next place at which they would land would be in a Free State. Clotel called William to her room, and said to him, "We are now free, you can go on your way to Canada, and I shall go to Virginia in search of my daughter." The announcement that she was going to risk her liberty in a Slave State was unwelcome news to William. With all the eloquence he could command, he tried to persuade Clotel that she could not escape detection, and was only throwing her freedom away. But she had counted the cost, and made up her mind for the worst. In return for the money he had furnished, she had secured for him his liberty, and their engagement was at an end. After a quick passage the fugitives arrived at Cincinnati, and there separated. William proceeded on his way to Canada, and Clotel again resumed her own apparel, and prepared to start in search of her child. As might have been expected, the escape of those two valuable slaves created no little sensation in Vicksburgh. Advertisements and messages were sent in every direction in which the fugitives were thought to have gone. It was soon, however, known that they had left the town as master and servant; and many were the communications which appeared in the newspapers, in which the writers thought, or pretended, that they had seen the slaves in their disguise. One was to the effect that they had gone off in a chaise; one as master, and the other as servant. But the most probable was an account given by a correspondent of one of the Southern newspapers, who happened to be a passenger in the same steamer in which the slaves escaped, and which we here give:— "One bright starlight night, in the month of December last, I found myself in the cabin of the steamer Rodolph, then lying in the port of Vicksburgh, and bound to Louisville. I had gone early on board, in order to select a good berth, and having got tired of reading the papers, amused myself with watching the appearance of the passengers as they dropped in, one after another, and I being a believer in physiognomy, formed my own opinion of their characters. "The second bell rang, and as I yawningly returned my watch to my pocket, my attention was attracted by the appearance of a young man who entered the cabin supported by his servant, a strapping Negro. "The man was bundled up in a capacious overcoat; his face was bandaged with a white handkerchief, and its expression entirely hid by a pair of enormous spectacles. "There was something so mysterious and unusual about the young man as he sat restless in the corner, that curiosity led me to observe him more closely. "He appeared anxious to avoid notice, and before the steamer had fairly left the wharf, requested, in a low, womanly voice, to be shown his berth, as he was an invalid, and must retire early: his name he gave as Mr. Johnson. His servant was called, and he was put quietly to bed. I paced the deck until Tyhee light grew dim in the distance, and then went to my berth. "I awoke in the morning with the sun shining in my face; we were then just passing St. Helena. It was a mild beautiful morning, and most of the passengers were on deck, enjoying the freshness of the air, and stimulating their appetites for breakfast. Mr. Johnson soon made his appearance, arrayed as on the night before, and took his seat quietly upon the guard of the boat. "From the better opportunity afforded by daylight, I found that he was a slight build, apparently handsome young man, with black hair and eyes, and of a darkness of complexion that betokened Spanish extraction. Any notice from others seemed painful to him; so to satisfy my curiosity, I questioned his servant, who was standing near, and gained the following information. "His master was an invalid—he had suffered for a long time under a complication of diseases, that had baffled the skill of the best physicians in Mississippi; he was now suffering principally with the 'rheumatism,' and he was scarcely able to walk or help himself in any way. He came from Vicksburgh, and was now on his way to Philadelphia, at which place resided his uncle, a celebrated physician, and through whose means he hoped to be restored to perfect health. "This information, communicated in a bold, off-hand manner, enlisted my sympathies for the sufferer, although it occurred to me that he walked rather too gingerly for a person afflicted with so many ailments." After thanking Clotel for the great service she had done him in bringing him out of slavery, William bade her farewell. The prejudice that exists in the Free States against coloured persons, on account of their colour, is attributable solely to the influence of slavery, and is but another form of slavery itself. And even the slave who escapes from the Southern plantations, is surprised when he reaches the North, at the amount and withering influence of this prejudice. William applied at the railway station for a ticket for the train going to Sandusky, and was told that if he went by that train he would have to ride in the luggage-van. "Why?" asked the astonished Negro. "We don't send a Jim Crow carriage but once a day, and that went this morning." The "Jim Crow" carriage is the one in which the blacks have to ride. Slavery is a school in which its victims learn much shrewdness, and William had been an apt scholar. Without asking any more questions, the Negro took his seat in one of the first-class carriages. He was soon seen and ordered out. Afraid to remain in the town longer, he resolved to go by that train; and consequently seated himself on a goods' box in the luggage van. The train started at its proper time, and all went on well. Just before arriving at the end of the journey, the conductor called on William for his ticket. "I have none," was the reply. "Well, then, you can pay your fare to me," said the officer. "How much is it?" asked the black man. "Two dollars." "What do you charge those in the passenger-carriage?" "Two dollars." "And do you charge me the same as you do those who ride in the best carriages?" asked the Negro. "Yes," was the answer. "I shan't pay it," returned the man. "You black scamp, do you think you can ride on this road without paying your fare?" "No, I don't want to ride for nothing; I only want to pay what's right." "Well, launch out two dollars, and that's right." "No, I shan't; I will pay what I ought, and won't pay any more." "Come, come, nigger, your fare and be done with it," said the conductor, in a manner that is never used except by Americans to blacks. "I won't pay you two dollars, and that enough," said William. "Well, as you have come all the way in the luggage-van, pay me a dollar and a half and you may go." "I shan't do any such thing." "Don't you mean to pay for riding?" "Yes, but I won't pay a dollar and a half for riding up here in the freight-van. If you had let me come in the carriage where others ride, I would have paid you two dollars." "Where were you raised? You seem to think yourself as good as white folks." "I want nothing more than my rights." "Well, give me a dollar, and I will let you off." "No, sir, I shan't do it." "What do you mean to do then, don't you wish to pay anything?" "Yes, sir, I want to pay you the full price." "What do you mean by full price?" "What do you charge per hundred-weight for goods?" inquired the Negro with a degree of gravity that would have astonished Diogenes himself. "A quarter of a dollar per hundred," answered the conductor. "I weigh just one hundred and fifty pounds," returned William, "and will pay you three eighths of a dollar." "Do you expect that you will pay only thirty-seven cents for your ride?" "This, sir, is your own price. I came in a luggage-van, and I'll pay for luggage." After a vain effort to get the Negro to pay more, the conductor took the thirty-seven cents, and noted in his cash-book, "Received for one hundred and fifty pounds of luggage, thirty seven cents." This, reader, is no fiction; it actually occurred in the railway above described. Thomas Corwin, a member of the American Congress, is one of the blackest white men in the United States. He was once on his way to Congress, and took passage in one of the Ohio river steamers. As he came just at the dinner hour, he immediately went into the dining saloon, and took his seat at the table. A gentleman with his whole party of five ladies at once left the table. "Where is the captain?" cried the man in an angry tone. The captain soon appeared, and it was sometime before he could satisfy the old gent, that Governor Corwin was not a nigger. The newspapers often have notices of mistakes made by innkeepers and others who undertake to accommodate the public, one of which we give below. On the 6th inst., the Hon. Daniel Webster and family entered Edgartown, on a visit for health and recreation. Arriving at the hotel, without alighting from the coach, the landlord was sent for to see if suitable accommodation could be had. That dignitary appearing, and surveying Mr. Webster, while the hon. senator addressed him, seemed woefully to mistake the dark features of the traveller as he sat back in the corner of the carriage, and to suppose him a coloured man, particularly as there were two coloured servants of Mr. W. outside. So he promptly declared that there was no room for him and his family, and he could not be accommodated there at the same time suggesting that he might perhaps find accommodation at some of the huts up back, to which he pointed. So deeply did the prejudice of looks possess him, that he appeared not to notice that the stranger introduced himself to him as Daniel Webster, or to be so ignorant as not to have heard of such a personage; and turning away, he expressed to the driver his astonishment that he should bring black people there for him to take in. It was not till he had been repeatedly assured and made to understand that the said Daniel Webster was a real live senator of the United States, that he perceived his awkward mistake and the distinguished honour which he and his house were so near missing. In most of the Free States, the coloured people are disfranchised on account of their colour. The following scene, which we take from a newspaper in the state of Ohio, will give some idea of the extent to which this prejudice is carried. "The whole of Thursday last was occupied by the Court of Common Pleas for this county in trying to find out whether one Thomas West was of the VOTING COLOUR, as some had very constitutional doubts as to whether his colour was orthodox, and whether his hair was of the official crisp! Was it not a dignified business? Four profound judges, four acute lawyers, twelve grave jurors, and I don't know how many venerable witnesses, making in all about thirty men, perhaps, all engaged in the profound, laborious, and illustrious business, of finding out whether a man who pays tax, works on the road, and is an industrious farmer, has been born according to the republican, Christian constitution of Ohio—so that he can vote! And they wisely, gravely, and 'JUDGMATICALLY' decided that he should not vote! What wisdom—what research it must have required to evolve this truth! It was left for the Court of Common Pleas for Columbian county, Ohio, in the United States of North America, to find out what Solomon never dreamed of—the courts of all civilised, heathen, or Jewish countries, never contemplated. Lest the wisdom of our courts should be circumvented by some such men as might be named, who are so near being born constitutionally that they might be taken for white by sight, I would suggest that our court be invested with SMELLING powers, and that if a man don't exhale the constitutional smell, he shall not vote! This would be an additional security to our liberties." William found, after all, that liberty in the so-called Free States was more a name than a reality; that prejudice followed the coloured man into every place that he might enter. The temples erected for the worship of the living God are no exception. The finest Baptist church in the city of Boston has the following paragraph in the deed that conveys its seats to pewholders: "And it is a further condition of these presents, that if the owner or owners of said pew shall determine hereafter to sell the same, it shall first be offered, in writing, to the standing committee of said society for the time being, at such price as might otherwise be obtained for it; and the said committee shall have the right, for ten days after such offer, to purchase said pew for said society, at that price, first deducting therefrom all taxes and assessments on said pew then remaining unpaid. And if the said committee shall not so complete such purchase within said ten days, then the pew may be sold by the owner or owners thereof (after payment of all such arrears) to any one respectable white person, but upon the same conditions as are contained in this instrument; and immediate notice of such sale shall be given in writing, by the vendor, to the treasurer of said society." Such are the conditions upon which the Rowe Street Baptist Church, Boston, disposes of its seats. The writer of this is able to put that whole congregation, minister and all, to flight, by merely putting his coloured face in that church. We once visited a church in New York that had a place set apart for the sons of Ham. It was a dark, dismal looking place in one corner of the gallery, grated in front like a hen-coop, with a black border around it. It had two doors; over one was B. M.—black men; over the other B. W.—black women. CHAPTER XX A TRUE DEMOCRAT "Who can, with patience, for a moment see The medley mass of pride and misery, Of whips and charters, manacles and rights, Of slaving blacks and democratic whites, And all the piebald policy that reigns In free confusion o'er Columbia's plains? To think that man, thou just and gentle God! Should stand before thee with a tyrant's rod, O'er creatures like himself, with souls from thee, Yet dare to boast of perfect liberty!"—Thomas Moore. EDUCATED in a free state, and marrying a wife who had been a victim to the institution of slavery, Henry Morton became strongly opposed to the system. His two daughters, at the age of twelve years, were sent to the North to finish their education, and to receive that refinement that young ladies cannot obtain in the Slave States. Although he did not publicly advocate the abolition of slavery, he often made himself obnoxious to private circles, owing to the denunciatory manner in which he condemned the "peculiar institution." Being one evening at a party, and hearing one of the company talking loudly of the glory and freedom of American institutions, he gave it as his opinion that, unless slavery was speedily abolished, it would be the ruin of the Union. "It is not our boast of freedom," said he, "that will cause us to be respected abroad. It is not our loud talk in favour of liberty that will cause us to be regarded as friends of human freedom; but our acts will be scrutinised by the people of other countries. We say much against European despotism; let us look to ourselves. That government is despotic where the rulers govern subjects by their own mere will—by decrees and laws emanating from their uncontrolled will, in the enactment and execution of which the ruled have no voice, and under which they have no right except at the will of the rulers. Despotism does not depend upon the number of the rulers, or the number of the subjects. It may have one ruler or many. Rome was a despotism under Nero; so she was under the triumvirate. Athens was a despotism under Thirty Tyrants; under her Four Hundred Tyrants; under her Three Thousand Tyrants. It has been generally observed that despotism increases in severity with the number of despots; the responsibility is more divided, and the claims more numerous. The triumvirs each demanded his victims. The smaller the number of subjects in proportion to the tyrants, the more cruel the oppression, because the less danger from rebellion. In this government, the free white citizens are the rulers—the sovereigns, as we delight to be called. All others are subjects. There are, perhaps, some sixteen or seventeen millions of sovereigns, and four millions of subjects. "The rulers and the ruled are of all colours, from the clear white of the Caucasian tribes to the swarthy Ethiopian. The former, by courtesy, are all called white, the latter black. In this government the subject has no rights, social, political, or personal. He has no voice in the laws which govern him. He can hold no property. His very wife and children are not his. His labour is another's. He, and all that appertain to him, are the absolute property of his rulers. He is governed, bought, sold, punished, executed, by laws to which he never gave his assent, and by rulers whom he never chose. He is not a serf merely, with half the rights of men like the subjects of despotic Russia; but a native slave, stripped of every right which God and nature gave him, and which the high spirit of our revolution declared inalienable which he himself could not surrender, and which man could not take from him. Is he not then the subject of despotic sway? "The slaves of Athens and Rome were free in comparison. They had some rights—could acquire some property; could choose their own masters, and purchase their own freedom; and, when free, could rise in social and political life. The slaves of America, then, lie under the most absolute and grinding despotism that the world ever saw. But who are the despots? The rulers of the country—the sovereign people! Not merely the slaveholder who cracks the lash. He is but the instrument in the hands of despotism. That despotism is the government of the Slave States, and the United States, consisting of all its rulers all the free citizens. Do not look upon this as a paradox, because you and I and the sixteen millions of rulers are free. The rulers of every despotism are free. Nicholas of Russia is free. The grand Sultan of Turkey is free. The butcher of Austria is free. Augustus, Anthony, and Lepidus were free, while they drenched Rome in blood. The Thirty Tyrants—the Four Hundred—the Three Thousand, were free while they bound their countrymen in chains. You, and I, and the sixteen millions are free, while we fasten iron chains, and rivet manacles on four millions of our fellowmen—take their wives and children from them—separate them—sell them, and doom them to perpetual, eternal bondage. Are we not then despots—despots such as history will brand and God abhor? "We, as individuals, are fast losing our reputation for honest dealing. Our nation is losing its character. The loss of a firm national character, or the degradation of a nation's honour, is the inevitable prelude to her destruction. Behold the once proud fabric of a Roman empire—an empire carrying its arts and arms into every part of the Eastern continent; the monarchs of mighty kingdoms dragged at the wheels of her triumphal chariots; her eagle waving over the ruins of desolated countries; where is her splendour, her wealth, her power, her glory? Extinguished for ever. Her mouldering temples, the mournful vestiges of her former grandeur, afford a shelter to her muttering monks. Where are her statesmen, her sages, her philosophers, her orators, generals? Go to their solitary tombs and inquire. She lost her national character, and her destruction followed. The ramparts of her national pride were broken down, and Vandalism desolated her classic fields. Then let the people of our country take warning ere it is too late. But most of us say to ourselves, "'Who questions the right of mankind to be free? Yet, what are the rights of the Negro to me? I'm well fed and clothed, I have plenty of pelf— I'll care for the blacks when I turn black myself.' "New Orleans is doubtless the most immoral place in the United States. The theatres are open on the Sabbath. Bull-fights, horse-racing, and other cruel amusements are carried on in this city to an extent unknown in any other part of the Union. The most stringent laws have been passed in that city against Negroes, yet a few years since the State Legislature passed a special act to enable a white man to marry a coloured woman, on account of her being possessed of a large fortune. And, very recently, the following paragraph appeared in the city papers:— "'There has been quite a stir recently in this city, in consequence of a marriage of a white man, named Buddington, a teller in the Canal Bank, to the Negro daughter of one of the wealthiest merchants. Buddington, before he could be married was obliged to swear that he had Negro blood in his veins, and to do this he made an incision in his arm, and put some of her blood in the cut. The ceremony was performed by a Catholic clergyman, and the bridegroom has received with his wife a fortune of fifty or sixty thousand dollars.' "It seems that the fifty or sixty thousand dollars entirely covered the Negro woman's black skin, and the law prohibiting marriage between blacks and whites was laid aside for the occasion." Althesa felt proud, as well she might, at her husband's taking such high ground in a slaveholding city like New Orleans. CHAPTER XXI THE CHRISTIAN'S DEATH "O weep, ye friends of freedom weep! Your harps to mournful measures sweep." ON the last day of November, 1620, on the confines of the Grand Bank of Newfoundland, lo! we behold one little solitary tempest-tost and weather-beaten ship; it is all that can be seen on the length and breadth of the vast intervening solitudes, from the melancholy wilds of Labrador and New England's ironbound shores, to the western coasts of Ireland and the rock defended Hebrides, but one lonely ship greets the eye of angels or of men, on this great throughfare of nations in our age. Next in moral grandeur, was this ship, to the great discoverer's: Columbus found a continent; the May-flower brought the seedwheat of states and empire. That is the May-flower, with its servants of the living God, their wives and little ones, hastening to lay the foundations of nations in the accidental lands of the setting-sun. Hear the voice of prayer to God for his protection, and the glorious music of praise, as it breaks into the wild tempest of the mighty deep, upon the ear of God. Here in this ship are great and good men. Justice, mercy, humanity, respect for the rights of all; each man honoured, as he was useful to himself and others; labour respected, law-abiding men, constitution-making and respecting men; men, whom no tyrant could conquer, or hardship overcome, with the high commission sealed by a Spirit divine, to establish religious and political liberty for all. This ship had the embryo elements of all that is useful, great, and grand in Northern institutions; it was the great type of goodness and wisdom, illustrated in two and a quarter centuries gone by; it was the good genius of America. But look far in the South-east, and you behold on the same day, in 1620, a low rakish ship hastening from the tropics, solitary and alone, to the New World. What is she? She is freighted with the elements of unmixed evil. Hark! hear those rattling chains, hear that cry of despair and wail of anguish, as they die away in the unpitying distance. Listen to those shocking oaths, the crack of that flesh-cutting whip. Ah! it is the first cargo of slaves on their way to Jamestown, Virginia. Behold the May-flower anchored at Plymouth Rock, the slave-ship in James River. Each a parent, one of the prosperous, labour-honouring, law-sustaining institutions of the North; the other the mother of slavery, idleness, lynch-law, ignorance, unpaid labour, poverty, and duelling, despotism, the ceaseless swing of the whip, and the peculiar institutions of the South. These ships are the representation of good and evil in the New World, even to our day. When shall one of those parallel lines come to an end? The origin of American slavery is not lost in the obscurity of by-gone ages. It is a plain historical fact, that it owes its birth to the African slave trade, now pronounced by every civilised community the greatest crime ever perpetrated against humanity. Of all causes intended to benefit mankind, the abolition of chattel slavery must necessarily be placed amongst the first, and the Negro hails with joy every new advocate that appears in his cause. Commiseration for human suffering and human sacrifices awakened the capacious mind, and brought into action the enlarged benevolence, of Georgiana Carlton. With respect to her philosophy—it was of a noble cast. It was, that all men are by nature equal; that they are wisely and justly endowed by the Creator with certain rights, which are irrefragable; and that, however human pride and human avarice may depress and debase, still God is the author of good to man—and of evil, man is the artificer to himself and to his species. Unlike Plato and Socrates, her mind was free from the gloom that surrounded theirs; her philosophy was founded in the school of Christianity; though a devoted member of her father's church, she was not a sectarian. We learn from Scripture, and it is a little remarkable that it is the only exact definition of religion found in the sacred volume, that "pure religion and undefiled before God, even the Father, is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world." "Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others." "Remember them that are in bonds as bound with them." "Whatsoever ye would that others should do to you, do ye even so to them." This was her view of Christianity, and to this end she laboured with all her energies to convince her slaveholding neighbours that the Negro could not only take care of himself, but that he also appreciated liberty, and was willing to work and redeem himself. Her most sanguine wishes were being realized when she suddenly fell into a decline. Her mother had died of consumption, and her physician pronounced this to be her disease. She was prepared for this sad intelligence, and received it with the utmost composure. Although she had confidence in her husband that he would carry out her wishes in freeing the Negroes after her death, Mrs. Carlton resolved upon their immediate liberation. Consequently the slaves were all summoned before the noble woman, and informed that they were no longer bondsmen. "From this hour," said she, "you are free, and all eyes will be fixed upon you. I dare not predict how far your example may affect the welfare of your brethren yet in bondage. If you are temperate, industrious, peaceable, and pious, you will show to the world that slaves can be emancipated without danger. Remember what a singular relation you sustain to society. The necessities of the case require not only that you should behave as well as the whites, but better than the whites; and for this reason: if you behave no better than they, your example will lose a great portion of its influence. Make the Lord Jesus Christ your refuge and exemplar. His is the only standard around which you can successfully rally. If ever there was a people who needed the consolations of religion to sustain them in their grievous afflictions, you are that people. You had better trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. Happy is that people whose God is the Lord. Get as much education as possible for yourselves and your children. An ignorant people can never occupy any other than a degraded station in society; they can never be truly free until they are intelligent. In a few days you will start for the state of Ohio, where land will be purchased for some of you who have families, and where I hope you will all prosper. We have been urged to send you to Liberia, but we think it wrong to send you from your native land. We did not wish to encourage the Colonization Society, for it originated in hatred of the free coloured people. Its pretences are false, its doctrines odious, its means contemptible. Now, whatever may be your situation in life, 'Remember those in bonds as bound with them.' You must get ready as soon as you can for your journey to the North." Seldom was there ever witnessed a more touching scene than this. There sat the liberator, pale, feeble, emaciated, with death stamped upon her countenance, surrounded by the sons and daughters of Africa; some of whom had in former years been separated from all that they had held near and dear, and the most of whose backs had been torn and gashed by the Negro whip. Some were upon their knees at the feet of their benefactress; others were standing round her weeping. Many begged that they might be permitted to remain on the farm and work for wages, for some had wives and some husbands on other plantations in the neighbourhood, and would rather remain with them. But the laws of the state forbade any emancipated Negroes remaining, under penalty of again being sold into slavery. Hence the necessity of sending them out of the state. Mrs. Carlton was urged by her friends to send the emancipated Negroes to Africa. Extracts from the speeches of Henry Clay, and other distinguished Colonization Society men, were read to her to induce her to adopt this course. Some thought they should he sent away because the blacks are vicious; others because they would be missionaries to their brethren in Africa. "But," said she, "if we send away the Negroes because they are profligate and vicious, what sort of missionaries will they make? Why not send away the vicious among the whites for the same reason, and the same purpose?" Death is a leveller, and neither age, sex, wealth, nor usefulness can avert when he is permitted to strike. The most beautiful flowers soon fade, and droop, and die; this is also the case with man; his days are uncertain as the passing breeze. This hour he glows in the blush of health and vigour, but the next he may be counted with the number no more known on earth. Although in a low state of health, Mrs. Carlton had the pleasure of seeing all her slaves, except Sam and three others, start for a land of freedom. The morning they were to go on board the steamer, bound for Louisville, they all assembled on the large grass plot, in front of the drawing-room window, and wept while they bid their mistress farewell. When they were on the boat, about leaving the wharf, they were heard giving the charge to those on shore—"Sam, take care of Misus, take care of Marser, as you love us, and hope to meet us in de Hio (Ohio), and in heben; be sure and take good care of Misus and Marser." In less than a week after her emancipated people had started for Ohio, Mrs. Carlton was cold in death. Mr. Carlton felt deeply, as all husbands must who love their wives, the loss of her who had been a lamp to his feet, and a light to his path. She had converted him from infidelity to Christianity; from the mere theory of liberty to practical freedom. He had looked upon the Negro as an ill-treated distant link of the human family; he now regarded them as a part of God's children. Oh, what a silence pervaded the house when the Christian had been removed. His indeed was a lonesome position. "'Twas midnight, and he sat alone The husband of the dead, That day the dark dust had been thrown Upon the buried head." In the midst of the buoyancy of youth, this cherished one had drooped and died. Deep were the sounds of grief and mourning heard in that stately dwelling, when the stricken friends, whose office it had been to nurse and soothe the weary sufferer, beheld her pale and motionless in the sleep of death. Oh what a chill creeps through the breaking heart when we look upon the insensible form, and feel that it no longer contains the spirit we so dearly loved! How difficult to realise that the eye which always glowed with affection and intelligence; that the ear which had so often listened to the sounds of sorrow and gladness; that the voice whose accents had been to us like sweet music, and the heart, the habitation of benevolence and truth, are now powerless and insensate as the bier upon which the form rests. Though faith be strong enough to penetrate the cloud of gloom which hovers near, and to behold the freed spirit safe, for ever, safe in its home in heaven, yet the thoughts will linger sadly and cheerlessly upon the grave. Peace to her ashes! she fought the fight, obtained the Christian's victory, and wears the crown. But if it were that departed spirits are permitted to note the occurrences of this world, with what a frown of disapprobation would hers view the effort being made in the United States to retard the work of emancipation for which she laboured and so wished to see brought about. In what light would she consider that hypocritical priesthood who gave their aid and sanction to the infamous "Fugitive Slave Law." If true greatness consists in doing good to mankind, then was Georgiana Carlton an ornament to human nature. Who can think of the broken hearts made whole, of sad and dejected countenances now beaming with contentment and joy, of the mother offering her free-born babe to heaven, and of the father whose cup of joy seems overflowing in the presence of his family, where none can molest or make him afraid. Oh, that God may give more such persons to take the whip-scarred Negro by the hand, and raise him to a level with our common humanity! May the professed lovers of freedom in the new world see that true liberty is freedom for all! and may every American continually hear it sounding in his ear:— "Shall every flap of England's flag Proclaim that all around are free, From 'farthest Ind' to each blue crag That beetles o'er the Western Sea? And shall we scoff at Europe's kings, When Freedom's fire is dim with us, And round our country's altar clings The damning shade of Slavery's curse?" CHAPTER XXII A RIDE IN A STAGE-COACH WE shall now return to Cincinnati, where we left Clotel preparing to go to Richmond in search of her daughter. Tired of the disguise in which she had escaped, she threw it off on her arrival at Cincinnati. But being assured that not a shadow of safety would attend her visit to a city in which she was well known, unless in some disguise, she again resumed men's apparel on leaving Cincinnati. This time she had more the appearance of an Italian or Spanish gentleman. In addition to the fine suit of black cloth, a splendid pair of dark false whiskers covered the sides of her face, while the curling moustache found its place upon the upper lip. From practice she had become accustomed to high-heeled boots, and could walk without creating any suspicion as regarded her sex. It was a cold evening that Clotel arrived at Wheeling, and took a seat in the coach going to Richmond. She was already in the state of Virginia, yet a long distance from the place of her destination. A ride in a stage-coach, over an American road, is unpleasant under the most favourable circumstances. But now that it was winter, and the roads unusually bad, the journey was still more dreary. However, there were eight passengers in the coach, and I need scarcely say that such a number of genuine Americans could not be together without whiling away the time somewhat pleasantly. Besides Clotel, there was an elderly gentleman with his two daughters—one apparently under twenty years, the other a shade above. The pale, spectacled face of another slim, tall man, with a white neckerchief, pointed him out as a minister. The rough featured, dark countenance of a stout looking man, with a white hat on one side of his head, told that he was from the sunny South. There was nothing remarkable about the other two, who might pass for ordinary American gentlemen. It was on the eve of a presidential election, when every man is thought to be a politician. Clay, Van Buren, and Harrison were the men who expected the indorsement of the Baltimore Convention. "Who does this town go for?" asked the old gent with the ladies, as the coach drove up to an inn, where groups of persons were waiting for the latest papers. "We are divided," cried the rough voice of one of the outsiders. "Well, who do you think will get the majority here?" continued the old gent. "Can't tell very well; I go for 'Old Tip,'" was the answer from without. This brought up the subject fairly before the passengers, and when the coach again started a general discussion commenced, in which all took a part except Clotel and the young ladies. Some were for Clay, some for Van Buren, and others for "Old Tip." The coach stopped to take in a real farmer-looking man, who no sooner entered than he was saluted with "Do you go for Clay?" "No," was the answer. "Do you go for Van Buren?" "No." "Well, then, of course you will go for Harrison." "No." "Why, don't you mean to work for any of them at the election?" "No." "Well, who will you work for?" asked one of the company. "I work for Betsy and the children, and I have a hard job of it at that," replied the farmer, without a smile. This answer, as a matter of course, set the new corner down as one upon whom the rest of the passengers could crack their jokes with the utmost impunity. "Are you an Odd Fellow?" asked one. "No, sir, I've been married more than a month." "I mean, do you belong to the order of Odd Fellows?" "No, no; I belong to the order of married men." "Are you a mason?" "No, I am a carpenter by trade." "Are you a Son of Temperance?" "Bother you, no; I am a son of Mr. John Gosling." After a hearty laugh in which all joined, the subject of Temperance became the theme for discussion. In this the spectacled gent was at home. He soon showed that he was a New Englander, and went the whole length of the "Maine Law." The minister was about having it all his own way, when the Southerner, in the white hat, took the opposite side of the question. "I don't bet a red cent on these teetotlars," said he, and at the same time looking round to see if he had the approbation of the rest of the company. "Why?" asked the minister. "Because they are a set who are afraid to spend a cent. They are a bad lot, the whole on 'em." It was evident that the white hat gent was an uneducated man. The minister commenced in full earnest, and gave an interesting account of the progress of temperance in Connecticut, the state from which he came, proving, that a great portion of the prosperity of the state was attributable to the disuse of intoxicating drinks. Every one thought the white hat had got the worst of the argument, and that he was settled for the remainder of the night. But not he; he took fresh courage and began again. "Now," said he, "I have just been on a visit to my uncle's in Vermont, and I guess I knows a little about these here teetotlars. You see, I went up there to make a little stay of a fortnight. I got there at night, and they seemed glad to see me, but they didn't give me a bit of anything to drink. Well, thinks I to myself, the jig's up: I sha'n't get any more liquor till I get out of the state." We all sat up till twelve o'clock that night, and I heard nothing but talk about the 'Juvinal Temperence Army,' the 'Band of Hope,' the 'Rising Generation,' the 'Female Dorcas Temperance Society,' 'The None Such,' and I don't know how many other names they didn't have. As I had taken several pretty large 'Cock Tails' before I entered the state, I thought upon the whole that I would not spite for the want of liquor. The next morning, I commenced writing back to my friends, and telling them what's what. Aunt Polly said, 'Well, Johnny, I s'pose you are given 'em a pretty account of us all here.' 'Yes,' said I; I am tellin' 'em if they want anything to drink when they come up here, they had better bring it with 'em.' 'Oh,' said aunty, 'they would search their boxes; can't bring any spirits in the state.' Well, as I was saying, jist as I got my letters finished, and was going to the post office (for uncle's house was two miles from the town), aunty says, 'Johnny, I s'pose you'll try to get a little somethin' to drink in town won't you?' Says I, 'I s'pose it's no use. 'No,' said she, 'you can't; it ain't to be had no how, for love nor money.' So jist as I was puttin' on my hat, 'Johnny,' cries out aunty, 'What,' says I. 'Now I'll tell you, I don't want you to say nothin' about it, but I keeps a little rum to rub my head with, for I am troubled with the headache; now I don't want you to mention it for the world, but I'll give you a little taste, the old man is such a teetotaller, that I should never hear the last of it, and I would not like for the boys to know it, they are members of the "Cold Water Army."' "Aunty now brought out a black bottle and gave me a cup, and told me to help myself, which I assure you I did. I now felt ready to face the cold. As I was passing the barn I heard uncle thrashing oats, so I went to the door and spoke to him. 'Come in, John,' says he. 'No,' said I; 'I am goin' to post some letters,' for I was afraid that he would smell my breath if I went too near to him. 'Yes, yes, come in.' So I went in, and says he, 'It's now eleven o'clock; that's about the time you take your grog, I s'pose, when you are at home.' 'Yes,' said I. 'I am sorry for you, my lad; you can't get anything up here; you can't even get it at the chemist's, except as medicine, and then you must let them mix it and you take it in their presence.' 'This is indeed hard,' replied I; 'Well, it can't be helped,' continued he: 'and it ought not to be if it could. It's best for society; people's better off without drink. I recollect when your father and I, thirty years ago, used to go out on a spree and spend more than half a dollar in a night. Then here's the rising generation; there's nothing like settin' a good example. Look how healthy your cousins are there's Benjamin, he never tasted spirits in his life. Oh, John, I would you were a teetotaller.' 'I suppose,' said I, 'I'll have to be one till I leave the state.' 'Now,' said he, 'John, I don't want you to mention it, for your aunt would go into hysterics if she thought there was a drop of intoxicating liquor about the place, and I would not have the boys to know it for anything, but I keep a little brandy to rub my joints for the rheumatics, and being it's you, I'll give you a little dust.' So the old man went to one corner of the barn, took out a brown jug and handed it to me, and I must say it was a little the best cognac that I had tasted for many a day. Says I, 'Uncle, you are a good judge of brandy.' 'Yes,' said he, 'I learned when I was young.' So off I started for the post office. In returnin' I thought I'd jist go through the woods where the boys were chopping wood, and wait and go to the house with them when they went to dinner. I found them hard at work, but as merry as crickets. 'Well, cousin John, are you done writing?' 'Yes,' answered I. 'Have you posted them?' 'Yes.' 'Hope you didn't go to any place inquiring for grog.' 'No, I knowed it was no good to do that.' 'I suppose a cock-tail would taste good now.' 'Well, I guess it would,' says I. The three boys then joined in a hearty laugh. 'I suppose you have told 'em that we are a dry set up here?' 'Well, I ain't told em anything else.' 'Now, cousin John,' said Edward, 'if you wont say anything, we will give you a small taste. For mercy's sake don't let father or mother know it; they are such rabid teetotallers, that they would not sleep a wink to-night if they thought there was any spirits about the place.' 'I am mum,' says I. And the boys took a jug out of a hollow stump, and gave me some first-rate peach brandy. And during the fortnight that I was in Vermont, with my teetotal relations, I was kept about as well corned as if I had been among my hot water friends in Tennessee." This narrative, given by the white hat man, was received with unbounded applause by all except the pale gent in spectacles, who showed, by the way in which he was running his fingers between his cravat and throat, that he did not intend to "give it up so." The white hat gent was now the lion of the company. "Oh, you did not get hold of the right kind of teetotallers," said the minister. "I can give you a tale worth a dozen of yours, continued he. "Look at society in the states where temperance views prevail, and you will there see real happiness. The people are taxed less, the poor houses are shut up for want of occupants, and extreme destitution is unknown. Every one who drinks at all is liable to become an habitual drunkard. Yes, I say boldly, that no man living who uses intoxicating drinks, is free from the danger of at least occasional, and if of occasional, ultimately of habitual excess. There seems to be no character, position, or circumstances that free men from the danger. I have known many young men of the finest promise, led by the drinking habit into vice, ruin, and early death. I have known many tradesmen whom it has made bankrupt. I have known Sunday scholars whom it has led to prison-teachers, and even superintendents, whom it has dragged down to profligacy. I have known ministers of high academic honours, of splendid eloquence, nay, of vast usefulness, whom it has fascinated, and hurried over the precipice of public infamy with their eyes open, and gazing with horror on their fate. I have known men of the strongest and clearest intellect and of vigorous resolution, whom it has made weaker than children and fools—gentlemen of refinement and taste whom it has debased into brutes—poets of high genius whom it has bound in a bondage worse than the galleys, and ultimately cut short their days. I have known statesmen, lawyers, and judges whom it has killed—kind husbands and fathers whom it has turned into monsters. I have known honest men whom it has made villains; elegant and Christian ladies whom it has converted into bloated sots." "But you talk too fast," replied the white hat man. "You don't give a feller a chance to say nothin'." "I heard you," continued the minister, "and now you hear me out. It is indeed wonderful how people become lovers of strong drink. Some years since, before I became a teetotaller I kept spirits about the house, and I had a servant who was much addicted to strong drink. He used to say that he could not make my boots shine, without mixing the blacking with whiskey. So to satisfy myself that the whiskey was put in the blacking, one morning I made him bring the dish in which he kept the blacking, and poured in the whiskey myself. And now, sir, what do you think?" "Why, I s'pose your boots shined better than before," replied the white hat. "No," continued the minister. "He took the blacking out, and I watched him, and he drank down the whiskey, blacking, and all." This turned the joke upon the advocate of strong drink, and he began to put his wits to work for arguments. "You are from Connecticut, are you?" asked the Southerner. "Yes, and we are an orderly, pious, peaceable people. Our holy religion is respected, and we do more for the cause of Christ than the whole Southern States put together." "I don't doubt it," said the white hat gent. "You sell wooden nutmegs and other spurious articles enough to do some good. You talk of your 'holy religion'; but your robes' righteousness are woven at Lowell and Manchester; your paradise is high per centum on factory stocks; your palms of victory and crowns of rejoicing are triumphs over a rival party in politics, on the questions of banks and tariffs. If you could, you would turn heaven into Birmingham, make every angel a weaver, and with the eternal din of looms and spindles drown all the anthems of the morning stars. Ah! I know you Connecticut people like a book. No, no, all hoss; you can't come it on me." This last speech of the rough featured man again put him in the ascendant, and the spectacled gent once more ran his fingers between his cravat and throat. "You live in Tennessee, I think," said the minister. "Yes," replied the Southerner, "I used to live in Orleans, but now I claim to be a Tennessean." "Your people of New Orleans are the most ungodly set in the United States," said the minister. Taking a New Orleans newspaper from his pocket he continued, "Just look here, there are not less than three advertisements of bull fights to take place on the Sabbath. You people of the Slave States have no regard for the Sabbath, religion, morality or anything else intended to, make mankind better." Here Clotel could have borne ample testimony, had she dared to have taken sides with the Connecticut man. Her residence in Vicksburgh had given her an opportunity of knowing something of the character of the inhabitants of the far South. "Here is an account of a grand bull fight that took place in New Orleans a week ago last Sunday. I will read it to you." And the minister read aloud the following: "Yesterday, pursuant to public notice, came off at Gretna, opposite the Fourth District, the long heralded fight between the famous grizzly bear, General Jackson (victor in fifty battles), and the Attakapas bull, Santa Anna. "The fame of the coming conflict had gone forth to the four winds, and women and children, old men and boys, from all parts of the city, and from the breezy banks of Lake Pontchartrain and Borgne, brushed up their Sunday suit, and prepared to ace the fun. Long before the published hour, the quiet streets of the rural Gretna were filled with crowds of anxious denizens, flocking to the arena, and before the fight commenced, such a crowd had collected as Gretna had not seen, nor will be likely to see again. "The arena for the sports was a cage, twenty feet square, built upon the ground, and constructed of heavy timbers and iron bars. Around it were seats, circularly placed, and intended to accommodate many thousands. About four or five-thousand persons assembled, covering the seats as with a Cloud, and crowding down around the cage, were within reach of the bars. "The bull selected to sustain the honour and verify the pluck of Attakapas on this trying occasion was a black animal from the Opelousas, lithe and sinewy as a four year old courser, and with eyes like burning coals. His horns bore the appearance of having been filed at the tips, and wanted that keen and slashing appearance so common with others of his kith and kin; otherwise it would have been 'all day' with Bruin—at the first pass, and no mistake. "The bear was an animal of note, and called General Jackson, from the fact of his licking up everything that came in his way, and taking 'the responsibility' on all occasions. He was a wicked looking beast, very lean and unamiable in aspect, with hair all standing the wrong way. He had fought some fifty bulls (so they said), always coming out victorious, but that neither one of the fifty had been an Attakapas bull, the bills of the performances did not say. Had he tackled Attakapas first it is likely his fifty battles would have remained unfought. "About half past four o'clock the performances commenced. "The bull was first seen, standing in the cage alone, with head erect, and looking a very monarch in his capacity. At an appointed signal, a cage containing the bear was placed alongside the arena, and an opening being made, bruin stalked into the battle ground—not, however, without sundry stirrings up with a ten foot pole, he being experienced in such matters, and backwards in raising a row. "Once on the battle-field, both animals stood, like wary champions, eyeing each other, the bear cowering low, with head upturned and fangs exposed, while Attakapas stood wondering, with his eye dilated, lashing his sides with his long and bushy tail, and pawing up the earth in very wrath. "The bear seemed little inclined to begin the attack, and the bull, standing a moment, made steps first backward and then forward, as if measuring his antagonist, and meditating where to plant a blow. Bruin wouldn't come to the scratch no way, till one of the keepers, with an iron rod, tickled his ribs and made him move. Seeing this, Attakapas took it as a hostile demonstration, and, gathering his strength, dashed savagely at the enemy, catching him on the points of his horns, and doubling him up like a sack of bran against the bars. Bruin 'sung out' at this, 'and made a dash for his opponent's nose.' "Missing this, the bull turned to the 'about face,' and the bear caught him by the ham, inflicting a ghastly wound. But Attakapas with a kick shook him off, and renewing the attack, went at him again, head on and with a rush. This time he was not so fortunate, for the bear caught him above the eye, burying his fangs in the tough hide, and holding him as in a vice. It was now the bull's turn to 'sing out,' and he did it, bellowing forth with a voice more hideous than that of all the bulls of Bashan. Some minutes stood matters thus, and the cries of the bull, mingled with the hoarse growls of the bear, made hideous music, fit only for a dance of devils. Then came a pause (the bear having relinquished his hold), and for a few minutes it was doubtful whether the fun was not up. But the magic wand of the keeper (the ten foot pole) again stirred up bruin, and at it they went, and with a rush. "Bruin now tried to fasten on the bull's back, and drove his tusks in him in several places, making the red blood flow like wine from the vats of Luna. But Attakapas was pluck to the back bone, and, catching bruin on the tips of his horns, shuffled him up right merrily, making the fur fly like feathers in a gale of wind. Bruin cried 'Nuff' (in bear language), but the bull followed up his advantage, and, making one furious plunge full at the figure head of the enemy, struck a horn into his eye, burying it there, and dashing the tender organ into darkness and atoms. Blood followed the blow, and poor bruin, blinded, bleeding, and in mortal agony, turned with a howl to leave, but Attakapas caught him in the retreat, and rolled him over like a ball. Over and over again this rolling over was enacted, and finally, after more than an hour, bruin curled himself up on his back, bruised, bloody, and dead beat. The thing was up with California, and Attakapas was declared the victor amidst the applause of the multitude that made the heavens ring." "There," said he, "can you find anything against Connecticut equal to that?" The Southerner had to admit that he was beat by the Yankee. During all this time, it must not be supposed that the old gent with the two daughters, and even the young ladies themselves, had been silent. Clotel and they had not only given their opinions as regarded the merits of the discussion, but that sly glance of the eye, which is ever given where the young of both sexes meet, had been freely at work. The American ladies are rather partial to foreigners, and Clotel had the appearance of a fine Italian. The old gentleman was now near his home, and a whisper from the eldest daughter, who was unmarried but marriageable, induced him to extend to "Mr. Johnson" an invitation to stop and spend a week with the young ladies at their family residence. Clotel excused herself upon various grounds, and at last, to cut short the matter, promised that she would pay them a visit on her return. The arrival of the coach at Lynchburgh separated the young ladies from the Italian gent, and the coach again resumed its journey. CHAPTER XXIII TRUTH STRANGER THAN FICTION "Is the poor privilege to turn the key Upon the captive, freedom? He's as far From the enjoyment of the earth and air Who watches o'er the chains, as they who wear." DURING certain seasons of the year, all tropical climates are subject to epidemics of a most destructive nature. The inhabitants of New Orleans look with as much certainty for the appearance of the yellow-fever, small-pox, or cholera, in the hot season, as the Londoner does for fog in the month of November. In the summer of 1831, the people of New Orleans were visited with one of these epidemics. It appeared in a form unusually repulsive and deadly. It seized persons who were in health, without any premonition. Sometimes death was the immediate consequence. The disorder began in the brain, by an oppressive pain accompanied or followed by fever. The patient was devoured with burning thirst. The stomach, distracted by pains, in vain sought relief in efforts to disburden itself. Fiery veins streaked the eye; the face was inflamed, and dyed of a dark dull red colour; the ears from time to time rang painfully. Now mucous secretions surcharged the tongue, and took away the power of speech; now the sick one spoke, but in speaking had a foresight of death. When the violence of the disease approached the heart, the gums were blackened. The sleep, broken, troubled by convulsions, or by frightful visions, was worse than the waking hours; and when the reason sank under a delirium which had its seat in the brain, repose utterly forsook the patient's couch. The progress of the heat within was marked by yellowish spots, which spread over the surface of the body. If, then, a happy crisis came not, all hope was gone. Soon the breath infected the air with a fetid odour, the lips were glazed, despair painted itself in the eyes, and sobs, with long intervals of silence, formed the only language. From each side of the mouth spread foam, tinged with black and burnt blood. Blue streaks mingled with the yellow all over the frame. All remedies were useless. This was the Yellow Fever. The disorder spread alarm and confusion throughout the city. On an average, more than 400 died daily. In the midst of disorder and confusion, death heaped victims on victims. Friend followed friend in quick succession. The sick were avoided from the fear of contagion, and for the same reason the dead were left unburied. Nearly 2000 dead bodies lay uncovered in the burial-ground, with only here and there a little lime thrown over them, to prevent the air becoming infected. The Negro, whose home is in a hot climate, was not proof against the disease. Many plantations had to suspend their work for want of slaves to take the places of those carried off by the fever. Henry Morton and wife were among the thirteen thousand swept away by the raging disorder that year. Like too many, Morton had been dealing extensively in lands and stocks; and though apparently in good circumstances was, in reality, deeply involved in debt. Althesa, although as white as most white women in a southern clime, was, as we already know, born a slave. By the laws of all the Southern States the children follow the condition of the mother. If the mother is free the children are free; if a slave, they are slaves. Morton was unacquainted with the laws of the land; and although he had married Althesa, it was a marriage which the law did not recognise; and therefore she whom he thought to be his wife was, in fact, nothing more than his slave. What would have been his feelings had he known this, and also known that his two daughters, Ellen and Jane, were his slaves? Yet such was the fact. After the disappearance of the disease with which Henry Morton had so suddenly been removed, his brother went to New Orleans to give what aid he could in settling up the affairs. James Morton, on his arrival in New Orleans, felt proud of his nieces, and promised them a home with his own family in Vermont; little dreaming that his brother had married a slave woman, and that his nieces were slaves. The girls themselves had never heard that their mother had been a slave, and therefore knew nothing of the danger hanging over their heads. An inventory of the property was made out by James Morton, and placed in the hands of the creditors; and the young ladies, with their uncle, were about leaving the city to reside for a few days on the banks of Lake Pontchartrain, where they could enjoy a fresh air that the city could not afford. But just as they were about taking the train, an officer arrested the whole party; the young ladies as slaves, and the uncle upon the charge of attempting to conceal the property of his deceased brother. Morton was overwhelmed with horror at the idea of his nieces being claimed as slaves, and asked for time, that he might save them from such a fate. He even offered to mortgage his little farm in Vermont for the amount which young slave women of their ages would fetch. But the creditors pleaded that they were "an extra article," and would sell for more than common slaves; and must, therefore, be sold at auction. They were given up, but neither ate nor slept, nor separated from each other, till they were taken into the New Orleans slave market, where they were offered to the highest bidder. There they stood, trembling, blushing, and weeping; compelled to listen to the grossest language, and shrinking from the rude hands that examined the graceful proportions of their beautiful frames. After a fierce contest between the bidders, the young ladies were sold, one for 2,300 dollars, and the other for 3,000 dollars. We need not add that had those young girls been sold for mere house servants or field hands, they would not have brought one half the sums they did. The fact that they were the grand-daughters of Thomas Jefferson, no doubt, increased their value in the market. Here were two of the softer sex, accustomed to the fondest indulgence, surrounded by all the refinements of life, and with all the timidity that such a life could produce, bartered away like cattle in Smithfield market. Ellen, the eldest, was sold to an old gentleman, who purchased her, as he said, for a housekeeper. The girl was taken to his residence, nine miles from the city. She soon, however, knew for what purpose she had been bought; and an educated and cultivated mind and taste, which made her see and understand how great was her degradation, now armed her hand with the ready means of death. The morning after her arrival, she was found in her chamber, a corpse. She had taken poison. Jane was purchased by a dashing young man, who had just come into the possession of a large fortune. The very appearance of the young Southerner pointed him out as an unprincipled profligate; and the young girl needed no one to tell her of her impending doom. The young maid of fifteen was immediately removed to his country seat, near the junction of the Mississippi river with the sea. This was a most singular spot, remote, in a dense forest spreading over the summit of a cliff that rose abruptly to a great height above the sea; but so grand in its situation, in the desolate sublimity which reigned around, in the reverential murmur of the waves that washed its base, that, though picturesque, it was a forest prison. Here the young lady saw no one, except an old Negress who acted as her servant. The smiles with which the young man met her were indignantly spurned. But she was the property of another, and could hope for justice and mercy only through him. Jane, though only in her fifteenth year, had become strongly attached to Volney Lapuc, a young Frenchman, a student in her father's office. The poverty of the young man, and the youthful age of the girl, had caused their feelings to be kept from the young lady's parents. At the death of his master, Volney had returned to his widowed mother at Mobile, and knew nothing of the misfortune that had befallen his mistress, until he received a letter from her. But how could he ever obtain a sight of her, even if he wished, locked up as she was in her master's mansion? After several days of what her master termed "obstinacy" on her part, the young girl was placed in an upper chamber, and told that that would be her home, until she should yield to her master's wishes. There she remained more than a fortnight, and with the exception of a daily visit from her master, she saw no one but the old Negress who waited upon her. One bright moonlight evening as she was seated at the window, she perceived the figure of a man beneath her window. At first, she thought it was her master; but the tall figure of the stranger soon convinced her that it was another. Yes, it was Volney! He had no sooner received her letter, than he set out for New Orleans; and finding on his arrival there, that his mistress had been taken away, resolved to follow her. There he was; but how could she communicate with him? She dared not trust the old Negress with her secret, for fear that it might reach her master. Jane wrote a hasty note and threw it out of the window, which was eagerly picked up by the young man, and he soon disappeared in the woods. Night passed away in dreariness to her, and the next morning she viewed the spot beneath her window with the hope of seeing the footsteps of him who had stood there the previous night. Evening returned, and with it the hope of again seeing the man she loved. In this she was not disappointed; for daylight had scarcely disappeared, and the moon once more rising through the tops of the tall trees, when the young man was seen in the same place as on the previous night. He had in his hand a rope ladder. As soon as Jane saw this, she took the sheets from her bed, tore them into strings, tied them together, and let one end down the side of the house. A moment more, and one end of the rope ladder was in her hand, and she fastened it inside the room. Soon the young maiden was seen descending, and the enthusiastic lover, with his arms extended, waiting to receive his mistress. The planter had been out on an hunting excursion, and returning home, saw his victim as her lover was receiving her in his arms. At this moment the sharp sound of a rifle was heard, and the young man fell weltering in his blood, at the feet of his mistress. Jane fell senseless by his side. For many days she had a confused consciousness of some great agony, but knew not where she was, or by whom surrounded. The slow recovery of her reason settled into the most intense melancholy, which gained at length the compassion even of her cruel master. The beautiful bright eyes, always pleading in expression, were now so heart-piercing in their sadness, that he could not endure their gaze. In a few days the poor girl died of a broken heart, and was buried at night at the back of the garden by the Negroes; and no one wept at the grave of her who had been so carefully cherished, and so tenderly beloved. This, reader, is an unvarnished narrative of one doomed by the laws of the Southern States to be a slave. It tells not only its own story of grief, but speaks of a thousand wrongs and woes beside, which never see the light; all the more bitter and dreadful, because no help can relieve, no sympathy can mitigate, and no hope can cheer. CHAPTER XXIV THE ARREST "The fearful storm—it threatens lowering, Which God in mercy long delays; Slaves yet may see their masters cowering, While whole plantations smoke and blaze!" —Carter. IT was late in the evening when the coach arrived at Richmond, and Clotel once more alighted in her native city. She had intended to seek lodging somewhere in the outskirts of the town, but the lateness of the hour compelled her to stop at one of the principal hotels for the night. She had scarcely entered the inn, when she recognised among the numerous black servants one to whom she was well known; and her only hope was, that her disguise would keep her from being discovered. The imperturbable calm and entire forgetfulness of self which induced Clotel to visit a place from which she could scarcely hope to escape, to attempt the rescue of a beloved child, demonstrate that overwillingness of woman to carry out the promptings of the finer feelings of her heart. True to woman's nature, she had risked her own liberty for another. She remained in the hotel during the night, and the next morning, under the plea of illness, she took her breakfast alone. That day the fugitive slave paid a visit to the suburbs of the town, and once more beheld the cottage in which she had spent so many happy hours. It was winter, and the clematis and passion flower were not there; but there were the same walks she had so often pressed with her feet, and the same trees which had so often shaded her as she passed through the garden at the back of the house. Old remembrances rushed upon her memory, and caused her to shed tears freely. Clotel was now in her native town, and near her daughter; but how could she communicate with her? How could she see her? To have made herself known, would have been a suicidal act; betrayal would have followed, and she arrested. Three days had passed away, and Clotel still remained in the hotel at which she had first put up; and yet she had got no tidings of her child. Unfortunately for Clotel, a disturbance had just broken out amongst the slave population in the state of Virginia, and all strangers were eyed with suspicion. The evils consequent on slavery are not lessened by the incoming of one or two rays of light. If the slave only becomes aware of his condition, and conscious of the injustice under which he suffers, if he obtains but a faint idea of these things, he will seize the first opportunity to possess himself of what he conceives to belong to him. The infusion of Anglo-Saxon with African blood has created an insurrectionary feeling among the slaves of America hitherto unknown. Aware of their blood connection with their owners, these mulattoes labour under the sense of their personal and social injuries; and tolerate, if they do not encourage in themselves, low and vindictive passions. On the other hand, the slave owners are aware of their critical position, and are ever watchful, always fearing an outbreak among the slaves. True, the Free States are equally bound with the Slave States to suppress any insurrectionary movement that may take place among the slaves. The Northern freemen are bound by their constitutional obligations to aid the slaveholder in keeping his slaves in their chains. Yet there are, at the time we write, four millions of bond slaves in the United States. The insurrection to which we now refer was headed by a full-blooded Negro, who had been born and brought up a slave. He had heard the twang of the driver's whip, and saw the warm blood streaming from the Negro's body; he had witnessed the separation of parents and children, and was made aware, by too many proofs, that the slave could expect no justice at the hand of the slave owner. He went by the name of "Nat Turner." He was a preacher amongst the Negroes, and distinguished for his eloquence, respected by the whites, and loved and venerated by the Negroes. On the discovery of the plan for the outbreak, Turner fled to the swamps, followed by those who had joined in the insurrection. Here the revolted Negroes numbered some hundreds, and for a time bade defiance to their oppressors. The Dismal Swamps cover many thousands of acres of wild land, and a dense forest, with wild animals and insects, such as are unknown in any other part of Virginia. Here runaway Negroes usually seek a hiding place, and some have been known to reside here for years. The revolters were joined by one of these. He was a large, tall, full-blooded Negro, with a stern and savage countenance; the marks on his face showed that he was from one of the barbarous tribes in Africa, and claimed that country as his native land; his only covering was a girdle around his loins, made of skins of wild beasts which he had killed; his only token of authority among those that he led, was a pair of epaulettes made from the tail of a fox, and tied to his shoulder by a cord. Brought from the coast of Africa when only fifteen years of age to the island of Cuba, he was smuggled from thence into Virginia. He had been two years in the swamps, and considered it his future home. He had met a Negro woman who was also a runaway; and, after the fashion of his native land, had gone through the process of oiling her as the marriage ceremony. They had built a cave on a rising mound in the swamp; this was their home. His name was Picquilo. His only weapon was a sword, made from the blade of a scythe, which he had stolen from a neighbouring plantation. His dress, his character, his manners, his mode of fighting, were all in keeping with the early training he had received in the land of his birth. He moved about with the activity of a cat, and neither the thickness of the trees, nor the depth of the water could stop him. He was a bold, turbulent spirit; and from revenge imbrued his hands in the blood of all the whites he could meet. Hunger, thirst, fatigue, and loss of sleep he seemed made to endure as if by peculiarity of constitution. His air was fierce, his step oblique, his look sanguinary. Such was the character of one of the leaders in the Southampton insurrection. All Negroes were arrested who were found beyond their master's threshhold, and all strange whites watched with a great degree of alacrity. Such was the position in which Clotel found affairs when she returned to Virginia in search of her Mary. Had not the slaveowners been watchful of strangers, owing to the outbreak, the fugitive could not have escaped the vigilance of the police; for advertisements, announcing her escape and offering a large reward for her arrest, had been received in the city previous to her arrival, and the officers were therefore on the look-out for the runaway slave. It was on the third day, as the quadroon was seated in her room at the inn, still in the disguise of a gentleman, that two of the city officers entered the room, and informed her that they were authorised to examine all strangers, to assure the authorities that they were not in league with the revolted Negroes. With trembling heart the fugitive handed the key of her trunk to the officers. To their surprise, they found nothing but woman's apparel in the box, which raised their curiosity, and caused a further investigation that resulted in the arrest of Clotel as a fugitive slave. She was immediately conveyed to prison, there to await the orders of her master. For many days, uncheered by the voice of kindness, alone, hopeless, desolate, she waited for the time to arrive when the chains were to be placed on her limbs, and she returned to her inhuman and unfeeling owner. The arrest of the fugitive was announced in all the newspapers, but created little or no sensation. The inhabitants were too much engaged in putting down the revolt among the slaves; and although all the odds were against the insurgents, the whites found it no easy matter, with all their caution. Every day brought news of fresh outbreaks. Without scruple and without pity, the whites massacred all blacks found beyond their owners' plantations: the Negroes, in return, set fire to houses, and put those to death who attempted to escape from the flames. Thus carnage was added to carnage, and the blood of the whites flowed to avenge the blood of the blacks. These were the ravages of slavery. No graves were dug for the Negroes; their dead bodies became food for dogs and vultures, and their bones, partly calcined by the sun, remained scattered about, as if to mark the mournful fury of servitude and lust of power. When the slaves were subdued, except a few in the swamps, bloodhounds were put in this dismal place to hunt out the remaining revolters. Among the captured Negroes was one of whom we shall hereafter make mention. CHAPTER XXV DEATH IS FREEDOM "I asked but freedom, and ye gave Chains, and the freedom of the grave."—Snelling. THERE are, in the district of Columbia, several slave prisons, or "Negro pens," as they are termed. These prisons are mostly occupied by persons to keep their slaves in, when collecting their gangs together for the New Orleans market. Some of them belong to the government, and one, in particular, is noted for having been the place where a number of free coloured persons have been incarcerated from time to time. In this district is situated the capital of the United States. Any free coloured persons visiting Washington, if not provided with papers asserting and proving their right to be free, may be arrested and placed in one of these dens. If they succeed in showing that they are free, they are set at liberty, provided they are able to pay the expenses of their arrest and imprisonment; if they cannot pay these expenses, they are sold out. Through this unjust and oppressive law, many persons born in the Free States have been consigned to a life of slavery on the cotton, sugar, or rice plantations of the Southern States. By order of her master, Clotel was removed from Richmond and placed in one of these prisons, to await the sailing of a vessel for New Orleans. The prison in which she was put stands midway between the capitol at Washington and the President's house. Here the fugitive saw nothing but slaves brought in and taken out, to be placed in ships and sent away to the same part of the country to which she herself would soon be compelled to go. She had seen or heard nothing of her daughter while in Richmond, and all hope of seeing her now had fled. If she was carried back to New Orleans, she could expect no mercy from her master. At the dusk of the evening previous to the day when she was to be sent off, as the old prison was being closed for the night, she suddenly darted past her keeper, and ran for her life. It is not a great distance from the prison to the Long Bridge, which passes from the lower part of the city across the Potomac, to the extensive forests and woodlands of the celebrated Arlington Place, occupied by that distinguished relative and descendant of the immortal Washington, Mr. George W. Custis. Thither the poor fugitive directed her flight. So unexpected was her escape, that she had quite a number of rods the start before the keeper had secured the other prisoners, and rallied his assistants in pursuit. It was at an hour when, and in a part of the city where, horses could not be readily obtained for the chase; no bloodhounds were at hand to run down the flying woman; and for once it seemed as though there was to be a fair trial of speed and endurance between the slave and the slave-catchers. The keeper and his forces raised the hue and cry on her pathway close behind; but so rapid was the flight along the wide avenue, that the astonished citizens, as they poured forth from their dwellings to learn the cause of alarm, were only able to comprehend the nature of the case in time to fall in with the motley mass in pursuit (as many a one did that night), to raise an anxious prayer to heaven, as they refused to join in the pursuit, that the panting fugitive might escape, and the merciless soul dealer for once be disappointed of his prey. And now with the speed of an arrow—having passed the avenue—with the distance between her and her pursuers constantly increasing, this poor hunted female gained the "Long Bridge," as it is called, where interruption seemed improbable, and already did her heart begin to beat high with the hope of success. She had only to pass three-fourths of a mile across the bridge, and she could bury herself in a vast forest, just at the time when the curtain of night would close around her, and protect her from the pursuit of her enemies. But God by his Providence had otherwise determined. He had determined that an appalling tragedy should be enacted that night, within plain sight of the President's house and the capitol of the Union, which should be an evidence wherever it should be known, of the unconquerable love of liberty the heart may inherit; as well as a fresh admonition to the slave dealer, of the cruelty and enormity of his crimes. Just as the pursuers crossed the high draw for the passage of sloops, soon after entering upon the bridge, they beheld three men slowly approaching from the Virginia side. They immediately called to them to arrest the fugitive, whom they proclaimed a runaway slave. True to their Virginian instincts as she came near, they formed in line across the narrow bridge, and prepared to seize her. Seeing escape impossible in that quarter, she stopped suddenly, and turned upon her pursuers. On came the profane and ribald crew, faster than ever, already exulting in her capture, and threatening punishment for her flight. For a moment she looked wildly and anxiously around to see if there was no hope of escape. On either hand, far down below, rolled the deep foamy waters of the Potomac, and before and behind the rapidly approaching step and noisy voices of pursuers, showing how vain would be any further effort for freedom. Her resolution was taken. She clasped her hands convulsively, and raised them, as she at the same time raised her eyes towards heaven, and begged for that mercy and compassion there, which had been denied her on earth; and then, with a single bound, she vaulted over the railings of the bridge, and sunk for ever beneath the waves of the river! Thus died Clotel, the daughter of Thomas Jefferson, a president of the United States; a man distinguished as the author of the Declaration of American Independence, and one of the first statesmen of that country. Had Clotel escaped from oppression in any other land, in the disguise in which she fled from the Mississippi to Richmond, and reached the United States, no honour within the gift of the American people would have been too good to have been heaped upon the heroic woman. But she was a slave, and therefore out of the pale of their sympathy. They have tears to shed over Greece and Poland; they have an abundance of sympathy for "poor Ireland"; they can furnish a ship of war to convey the Hungarian refugees from a Turkish prison to the "land of the free and home of the brave." They boast that America is the "cradle of liberty"; if it is, I fear they have rocked the child to death. The body of Clotel was picked up from the bank of the river, where it had been washed by the strong current, a hole dug in the sand, and there deposited, without either inquest being held over it, or religious service being performed. Such was the life and such the death of a woman whose virtues and goodness of heart would have done honour to one in a higher station of life, and who, if she had been born in any other land but that of slavery, would have been honoured and loved. A few days after the death of Clotel, the following poem appeared in one of the newspapers: "Now, rest for the wretched! the long day is past, And night on yon prison descendeth at last. Now lock up and bolt! Ha, jailor, look there! Who flies like a wild bird escaped from the snare? A woman, a slave-up, out in pursuit. While linger some gleams of day! Let thy call ring out!—now a rabble rout Is at thy heels—speed away! "A bold race for freedom!—On, fugitive, on! Heaven help but the right, and thy freedom is won. How eager she drinks the free air of the plains; Every limb, every nerve, every fibre she strains; From Columbia's glorious capitol, Columbia's daughter flees To the sanctuary God has given— The sheltering forest trees. "Now she treads the Long Bridge—joy lighteth her eye— Beyond her the dense wood and darkening sky— Wild hopes thrill her heart as she neareth the shore: O, despair! there are men fast advancing before! Shame, shame on their manhood! they hear, they heed The cry, her flight to stay, And like demon forms with their outstretched arms, They wait to seize their prey! "She pauses, she turns! Ah, will she flee back? Like wolves, her pursuers howl loud on their track; She lifteth to Heaven one look of despair— Her anguish breaks forth in one hurried prayer Hark! her jailor's yell! like a bloodhound's bay On the low night wind it sweeps! Now, death or the chain! to the stream she turns, And she leaps! O God, she leaps! "The dark and the cold, yet merciful wave, Receives to its bosom the form of the slave: She rises—earth's scenes on her dim vision gleam, Yet she struggleth not with the strong rushing stream: And low are the death-cries her woman's heart gives, As she floats adown the river, Faint and more faint grows the drowning voice, And her cries have ceased for ever! "Now back, jailor, back to thy dungeons, again, To swing the red lash and rivet the chain! The form thou would'st fetter—returned to its God; The universe holdeth no realm of night More drear than her slavery— More merciless fiends than here stayed her flight— Joy! the hunted slave is free! "That bond-woman's corpse—let Potomac's proud wave Go bear it along by our Washington's grave, And heave it high up on that hallowed strand, To tell of the freedom he won for our land. A weak woman's corpse, by freemen chased down; Hurrah for our country! hurrah! To freedom she leaped, through drowning and death— Hurrah for our country! hurrah!" CHAPTER XXVI THE ESCAPE "No refuge is found on our unhallowed ground, For the wretched in Slavery's manacles bound; While our star-spangled banner in vain boasts to wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!" WE left Mary, the daughter of Clotel, in the capacity of a servant in her own father's house, where she had been taken by her mistress for the ostensible purpose of plunging her husband into the depths of humiliation. At first the young girl was treated with great severity; but after finding that Horatio Green had lost all feeling for his child, Mrs. Green's own heart became touched for the offspring of her husband, and she became its friend. Mary had grown still more beautiful, and, like most of her sex in that country, was fast coming to maturity. The arrest of Clotel, while trying to rescue her daughter, did not reach the ears of the latter till her mother had been removed from Richmond to Washington. The mother had passed from time to eternity before the daughter knew that she had been in the neighbourhood. Horatio Green was not in Richmond at the time of Clotel's arrest; had he been there, it is not probable but he would have made an effort to save her. She was not his slave, and therefore was beyond his power, even had he been there and inclined to aid her. The revolt amongst the slaves had been brought to an end, and most of the insurgents either put to death or sent out of the state. One, however, remained in prison. He was the slave of Horatio Green, and had been a servant in his master's dwelling. He, too, could boast that his father was an American statesman. His name was George. His mother had been employed as a servant in one of the principal hotels in Washington, where members of Congress usually put up. After George's birth his mother was sold to a slave trader, and he to an agent of Mr. Green, the father of Horatio. George was as white as most white persons. No one would suppose that any African blood coursed through his veins. His hair was straight, soft, fine, and light; his eyes blue, nose prominent, lips thin, his head well formed, forehead high and prominent; and he was often taken for a free white person by those who did know him. This made his condition still more intolerable; for one so white seldom ever receives fair treatment at the hands of his fellow slaves; and the whites usually regard such slaves as persons who, if not often flogged, and otherwise ill treated, to remind them of their condition, would soon "forget" that they were slaves, and "think themselves as good as white folks." George's opportunities were far greater than most slaves. Being in his master's house, and waiting on educated white people, he had become very familiar with the English language. He had heard his master and visitors speak of the down-trodden and oppressed Poles; he heard them talk of going to Greece to fight for Grecian liberty, and against the oppressors of that ill-fated people. George, fired with the love of freedom, and zeal for the cause of his enslaved countrymen, joined the insurgents, and with them had been defeated and captured. He was the only one remaining of these unfortunate people, and he would have been put to death with them but for a circumstance that occurred some weeks before the outbreak. The court house had, by accident, taken fire, and was fast consuming. The engines could not be made to work, and all hope of saving the building seemed at an end. In one of the upper chambers there was a small box containing some valuable deeds belonging to the city; a ladder was placed against the house, leading from the street to the window of the room in which the box stood. The wind blew strong, and swept the flames in that direction. Broad sheets of fire were blown again and again over that part of the building, and then the wind would lift the pall of smoke, which showed that the work of destruction was not yet accomplished. While the doomed building was thus exposed, and before the destroying element had made its final visit, as it did soon after, George was standing by, and hearing that much depended on the contents of the box, and seeing no one disposed to venture through the fiery element to save the treasure, mounted the ladder and made his way to the window, entered the room, and was soon seen descending with the much valued box. Three cheers rent the air as the young slave fell from the ladder when near the ground; the white men took him up in their arms, to see if he had sustained any injury. His hair was burnt, eyebrows closely singed, and his clothes smelt strongly of smoke; but the heroic young slave was unhurt. The city authorities, at their next meeting, passed a vote of thanks to George's master for the lasting benefit that the slave had rendered the public, and commanded the poor boy to the special favour of his owner. When George was on trial for participating in the revolt, this "meritorious act," as they were pleased to term it, was brought up in his favour. His trial was put off from session to session, till he had been in prison more than a year. At last, however, he was convicted of high treason, and sentenced to be hanged within ten days of that time. The judge asked the slave if he had anything to say why sentence of death should not be passed on him. George stood for a moment in silence, and then said, "As I cannot speak as I should wish, I will say nothing." "You may say what you please," said the judge. "You had a good master," continued he, "and still you were dissatisfied; you left your master and joined the Negroes who were burning our houses and killing our wives." "As you have given me permission to speak," remarked George, "I will tell you why I joined the revolted Negroes. I have heard my master read in the Declaration of Independence 'that all men are created free and equal,' and this caused me to inquire of myself why I was a slave. I also heard him talking with some of his visitors about the war with England, and he said, all wars and fightings for freedom were just and right. If so, in what am I wrong? The grievances of which your fathers complained, and which caused the Revolutionary War, were trifling in comparison with the wrongs and sufferings of those who were engaged in the late revolt. Your fathers were never slaves, ours are; your fathers were never bought and sold like cattle, never shut out from the light of knowledge and religion, never subjected to the lash of brutal task-masters. For the crime of having a dark skin, my people suffer the pangs of hunger, the infliction of stripes, and the ignominy of brutal servitude. We are kept in heathenish darkness by laws expressly enacted to make our instruction a criminal offence. What right has one man to the bones, sinews, blood, and nerves of another? Did not one God make us all? You say your fathers fought for freedom; so did we. You tell me that I am to be put to death for violating the laws of the land. Did not the American revolutionists violate the laws when they struck for liberty? They were revolters, but their success made them patriots—We were revolters, and our failure makes us rebels. Had we succeeded, we would have been patriots too. Success makes all the difference. You make merry on the 4th of July; the thunder of cannon and ringing of bells announce it as the birthday of American independence. Yet while these cannons are roaring and bells ringing, one-sixth of the people of this land are in chains and slavery. You boast that this is the 'Land of the Free'; but a traditionary freedom will not save you. It will not do to praise your fathers and build their sepulchres. Worse for you that you have such an inheritance, if you spend it foolishly and are unable to appreciate its worth. Sad if the genius of a true humanity, beholding you with tearful eyes from the mount of vision, shall fold his wings in sorrowing pity, and repeat the strain, 'O land of Washington, how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not; behold your house is left unto you desolate.' This is all I have to say; I have done." Nearly every one present was melted to tears; even the judge seemed taken by surprise at the intelligence of the young slave. But George was a slave, and an example must be made of him, and therefore he was sentenced. Being employed in the same house with Mary, the daughter of Clotel, George had become attached to her, and the young lovers fondly looked forward to the time when they should be husband and wife. After George had been sentenced to death, Mary was still more attentive to him, and begged and obtained leave of her mistress to visit him in his cell. The poor girl paid a daily visit to him to whom she had pledged her heart and hand. At one of these meetings, and only four days from the time fixed for the execution, while Mary was seated in George's cell, it occurred to her that she might yet save him from a felon's doom. She revealed to him the secret that was then occupying her thoughts, viz. that George should exchange clothes with her, and thus attempt his escape in disguise. But he would not for a single moment listen to the proposition. Not that he feared detection; but he would not consent to place an innocent and affectionate girl in a position where she might have to suffer for him. Mary pleaded, but in vain. George was inflexible. The poor girl left her lover with a heavy heart, regretting that her scheme had proved unsuccessful. Towards the close of the next day, Mary again appeared at the prison door for admission, and was soon by the side of him whom she so ardently loved. While there the clouds which had overhung the city for some hours broke, and the rain fell in torrents amid the most terrific thunder and lightning. In the most persuasive manner possible, Mary again importuned George to avail himself of her assistance to escape from an ignominious death. After assuring him that she, not being the person condemned, would not receive any injury, he at last consented, and they began to exchange apparel. As George was of small stature, and both were white, there was no difficulty in his passing out without detection; and as she usually left the cell weeping, with handkerchief in hand, and sometimes at her face, he had only to adopt this mode and his escape was safe. They had kissed each other, and Mary had told George where he would find a small parcel of provisions which she had placed in a secluded spot, when the prison-keeper opened the door and said, "Come, girl, it is time for you to go." George again embraced Mary, and passed out of the jail. It was already dark, and the street lamps were lighted, so that our hero in his new dress had no dread of detection. The provisions were sought out and found, and poor George was soon on the road towards Canada. But neither of them had once thought of a change of dress for George when he should have escaped, and he had walked but a short distance before he felt that a change of his apparel would facilitate his progress. But he dared not go amongst even his coloured associates for fear of being betrayed. However, he made the best of his way on towards Canada, hiding in the woods during the day, and travelling by the guidance of the North Star at night. With the poet he could truly say, "Star of the North! while blazing day Pours round me its full tide of light, And hides thy pale but faithful ray, I, too, lie hid, and long for night." One morning, George arrived on the banks of the Ohio river, and found his journey had terminated, unless he could get some one to take him across the river in a secret manner, for he would not be permitted to cross in any of the ferry boats, it being a penalty for crossing a slave, besides the value of the slave. He concealed himself in the tall grass and weeds near the river, to see if he could embrace an opportunity to cross. He had been in his hiding place but a short time, when he observed a man in a small boat, floating near the shore, evidently fishing. His first impulse was to call out to the man and ask him to take him over to the Ohio side, but the fear that the man was a slaveholder, or one who might possibly arrest him, deterred him from it. The man after rowing and floating about for some time fastened the boat to the root of a tree, and started to a neighbouring farmhouse. This was George's moment, and he seized it. Running down the bank, he unfastened the boat, jumped in, and with all the expertness of one accustomed to a boat, rowed across the river and landed on the Ohio side. Being now in a Free State, he thought he might with perfect safety travel on towards Canada. He had, however, gone but a very few miles when he discovered two men on horseback coming behind him. He felt sure that they could not be in pursuit of him, yet he did not wish to be seen by them, so he turned into another road leading to a house near by. The men followed, and were but a short distance from George, when he ran up to a farmhouse, before which was standing a farmer-looking man, in a broad-brimmed hat and straight-collared coat, whom he implored to save him from the "slave-catchers." The farmer told him to go into the barn near by; he entered by the front door, the farmer following, and closing the door behind George, but remaining outside, and gave directions to his hired man as to what should be done with George. The slaveholders by this time had dismounted, and were in front of the barn demanding admittance, and charging the farmer with secreting their slave woman, for George was still in the dress of a woman. The Friend, for the farmer proved to be a member of the Society of Friends, told the slave-owners that if they wished to search his barn, they must first get an officer and a search warrant. While the parties were disputing, the farmer began nailing up the front door, and the hired man served the back door in the same way. The slaveholders, finding that they could not prevail on the Friend to allow them to get the slave, determined to go in search of an officer. One was left to see that the slave did not escape from the barn, while the other went off at full speed to Mount Pleasant, the nearest town. George was not the slave of either of these men, nor were they in pursuit of him, but they had lost a woman who had been seen in that vicinity, and when they saw poor George in the disguise of a female, and attempting to elude pursuit, they felt sure they were close upon their victim. However, if they had caught him, although he was not their slave, they would have taken him back and placed him in jail, and there he would have remained until his owner arrived. After an absence of nearly two hours, the slave-owner returned with an officer and found the Friend still driving large nails into the door. In a triumphant tone and with a corresponding gesture, he handed the search-warrant to the Friend, and said, "There, sir, now I will see if I can't get my nigger." "Well," said the Friend, "thou hast gone to work according to law, and thou canst now go into my barn." "Lend me your hammer that I may get the door open," said the slaveholder. "Let me see the warrant again." And after reading it over once more, he said, "I see nothing in this paper which says I must supply thee with tools to open my door; if thou wishest to go in, thou must get a hammer elsewhere." The sheriff said, "I will go to a neighbouring farm and borrow something which will introduce us to Miss Dinah;" and he immediately went in search of tools. In a short time the officer returned, and they commenced an assault and battery upon the barn door, which soon yielded; and in went the slaveholder and officer, and began turning up the hay and using all other means to find the lost property; but, to their astonishment, the slave was not there. After all hope of getting Dinah was gone, the slave-owner in a rage said to the Friend, "My nigger is not here." "I did not tell thee there was any one here." "Yes, but I saw her go in, and you shut the door behind her, and if she was not in the barn, what did you nail the door for?" "Can't I do what I please with my own barn door? Now I will tell thee; thou need trouble thyself no more, for the person thou art after entered the front door and went out at the back door, and is a long way from here by this time. Thou and thy friend must be somewhat fatigued by this time; won't thou go in and take a little dinner with me?" We need not say that this cool invitation of the good Quaker was not accepted by the slaveholders. George in the meantime had been taken to a friend's dwelling some miles away, where, after laying aside his female attire, and being snugly dressed up in a straight collared coat, and pantaloons to match, was again put on the right road towards Canada. The fugitive now travelled by day, and laid by during night. After a fatiguing and dreary journey of two weeks, the fugitive arrived in Canada, and took up his abode in the little town of St. Catherine's, and obtained work on the farm of Colonel Street. Here he attended a night-school, and laboured for his employer during the day. The climate was cold, and wages small, yet he was in a land where he was free, and this the young slave prized more than all the gold that could be given to him. Besides doing his best to obtain education for himself, he imparted what he could to those of his fellow-fugitives about him, of whom there were many. CHAPTER XXVII THE MYSTERY GEORGE, however, did not forget his promise to use all the means in his power to get Mary out of slavery. He, therefore, laboured with all his might to obtain money with which to employ some one to go back to Virginia for Mary. After nearly six months' labour at St. Catherine's, he employed an English missionary to go and see if the girl could be purchased, and at what price. The missionary went accordingly, but returned with the sad intelligence that, on account of Mary's aiding George to escape, the court had compelled Mr. Green to sell her out of the state, and she had been sold to a Negro trader, and taken to the New Orleans market. As all hope of getting the girl was now gone, George resolved to quit the American continent for ever. He immediately took passage in a vessel laden with timber, bound for Liverpool, and in five weeks from that time he was standing on the quay of the great English seaport. With little or no education, he found many difficulties in the way of getting a respectable living. However he obtained a situation as porter in a large house in Manchester, where he worked during the day, and took private lessons at night. In this way he laboured for three years, and was then raised to the situation of clerk. George was so white as easily to pass for a white man, and being somewhat ashamed of his African descent, he never once mentioned the fact of his having been a slave. He soon became a partner in the firm that employed him, and was now on the road to wealth. In the year 1842, just ten years after George Green (for he adopted his master's name) arrived in England, he visited France, and spent some days at Dunkirk. It was towards sunset, on a warm day in the month of October, that Mr. Green, after strolling some distance from the Hotel de Leon, entered a burial ground, and wandered along, alone among the silent dead, gazing upon the many green graves and marble tombstones of those who once moved on the theatre of busy life, and whose sounds of gaiety once fell upon the ear of man. All nature around was hushed in silence, and seemed to partake of the general melancholy which hung over the quiet resting-place of departed mortals. After tracing the varied inscriptions which told the characters or conditions of the departed, and viewing the mounds beneath which the dust of mortality slumbered, he had now reached a secluded spot, near to where an aged weeping willow bowed its thick foliage to the ground, as though anxious to hide from the scrutinising gaze of curiosity the grave beneath it. Mr. Green seated himself upon a marble tomb, and began to read Roscoe's Leo X., a copy of which he had under his arm. It was then about twilight, and he had scarcely gone through half a page, when he observed a lady in black, leading a boy, some five years old, up one of the paths; and as the lady's black veil was over her face, he felt somewhat at liberty to eye her more closely. While looking at her, the lady gave a scream, and appeared to be in a fainting position, when Mr. Green sprang from his seat in time to save her from falling to the ground. At this moment, an elderly gentleman was seen approaching with a rapid step, who, from his appearance, was evidently the lady's father, or one intimately connected with her. He came up, and, in a confused manner, asked what was the matter. Mr. Green explained as well as he could. After taking up the smelling bottle which had fallen from her hand, and holding it a short time to her face, she soon began to revive. During all this time the lady's veil had so covered her face, that Mr. Green had not seen it. When she had so far recovered as to be able to raise her head, she again screamed, and fell back into the arms of the old man. It now appeared quite certain, that either the countenance of George Green, or some other object, was the cause of these fits of fainting; and the old gentleman, thinking it was the former, in rather a petulant tone said, "I will thank you, sir, if you will leave us alone." The child whom the lady was leading, had now set up a squall; and amid the death-like appearance of the lady, the harsh look of the old man, and the cries of the boy, Mr. Green left the grounds, and returned to his hotel. Whilst seated by the window, and looking out upon the crowded street, with every now and then the strange scene in the grave-yard vividly before him, Mr. Green thought of the book he had been reading, and, remembering that he had left it on the tomb, where he had suddenly dropped it when called to the assistance of the lady, he immediately determined to return in search of it. After a walk of some twenty minutes, he was again over the spot where he had been an hour before, and from which he had been so unceremoniously expelled by the old man. He looked in vain for the book; it was nowhere to be found: nothing save the bouquet which the lady had dropped, and which lay half-buried in the grass from having been trodden upon, indicated that any one had been there that evening. Mr. Green took up the bunch of flowers, and again returned to the hotel. After passing a sleepless night, and hearing the clock strike six, he dropped into a sweet sleep, from which he did not awaken until roused by the rap of a servant, who, entering his room, handed him a note which ran as follows:—"Sir,—I owe you an apology for the inconvenience to which you were subjected last evening, and if you will honour us with your presence to dinner to-day at four o'clock, I shall be most happy to give you due satisfaction. My servant will be in waiting for you at half-past three. I am, sir, your obedient servant, J. Devenant. October 23. To George Green, Esq." The servant who handed this note to Mr. Green, informed him that the bearer was waiting for a reply. He immediately resolved to accept the invitation, and replied accordingly. Who this person was, and how his name and the hotel where he was stopping had been found out, was indeed a mystery. However, he waited impatiently for the hour when he was to see this new acquaintance, and get the mysterious meeting in the grave-yard solved. CHAPTER XXVIII THE HAPPY MEETING "Man's love is of man's life, a thing apart; 'Tis woman's whole existence."—Byron. THE clock on a neighbouring church had scarcely ceased striking three, when the servant announced that a carriage had called for Mr. Green. In less than half an hour he was seated in a most sumptuous barouche, drawn by two beautiful iron greys, and rolling along over a splendid gravel road completely shaded by large trees, which appeared to have been the accumulating growth of many centuries. The carriage soon stopped in front of a low villa, and this too was embedded in magnificent trees covered with moss. Mr. Green alighted and was shown into a superb drawing room, the walls of which were hung with fine specimens from the hands of the great Italian painters, and one by a German artist representing a beautiful monkish legend connected with "The Holy Catherine," an illustrious lady of Alexandria. The furniture had an antique and dignified appearance. High backed chairs stood around the room; a venerable mirror stood on the mantle shelf; rich curtains of crimson damask hung in folds at either side of the large windows; and a rich Turkey carpet covered the floor. In the centre stood a table covered with books, in the midst of which was an old-fashioned vase filled with fresh flowers, whose fragrance was exceedingly pleasant. A faint light, together with the quietness of the hour, gave beauty beyond description to the whole scene. Mr. Green had scarcely seated himself upon the sofa, when the elderly gentleman whom he had met the previous evening made his appearance, followed by the little boy, and introduced himself as Mr. Devenant. A moment more, and a lady—a beautiful brunette—dressed in black, with long curls of a chestnut colour hanging down her cheeks, entered the room. Her eyes were of a dark hazel, and her whole appearance indicated that she was a native of a southern clime. The door at which she entered was opposite to where the two gentlemen were seated. They immediately rose; and Mr. Devenant was in the act of introducing her to Mr. Green, when he observed that the latter had sunk back upon the sofa, and the last word that he remembered to have heard was, "It is her." After this, all was dark and dreamy: how long he remained in this condition it was for another to tell. When he awoke, he found himself stretched upon the sofa, with his boots off, his neckerchief removed, shirt collar unbuttoned, and his head resting upon a pillow. By his side sat the old man, with the smelling bottle in the one hand, and a glass of water in the other, and the little boy standing at the foot of the sofa. As soon as Mr. Green had so far recovered as to be able to speak, he said, "Where am I, and what does this mean?" "Wait a while," replied the old man, "and I will tell you all." After a lapse of some ten minutes he rose from the sofa, adjusted his apparel, and said, "I am now ready to hear anything you have to say." "You were born in America?" said the old man. "Yes," he replied. "And you were acquainted with a girl named Mary?" continued the old man. "Yes, and I loved her as I can love none other." "The lady whom you met so mysteriously last evening is Mary," replied Mr. Devenant. George Green was silent, but the fountains of mingled grief and joy stole out from beneath his eyelashes, and glistened like pearls upon his pale and marble-like cheeks. At this juncture the lady again entered the room. Mr. Green sprang from the sofa, and they fell into each other's arms, to the surprise of the old man and little George, and to the amusement of the servants who had crept up one by one, and were hid behind the doors, or loitering in the hall. When they had given vent to their feelings, they resumed their seats, and each in turn related the adventures through which they had passed. "How did you find out my name and address?" asked Mr. Green. "After you had left us in the grave-yard, our little George said, 'O, mamma, if there aint a book!' and picked it up and brought it to us. Papa opened it, and said, 'The gentleman's name is written in it, and here is a card of the Hotel de Leon, where I suppose he is stopping.' Papa wished to leave the book, and said it was all a fancy of mine that I had ever seen you before, but I was perfectly convinced that you were my own George Green. Are you married?" "No, I am not." "Then, thank God!" exclaimed Mrs. Devenant. "And are you single now?" inquired Mr. Green. "Yes," she replied. "This is indeed the Lord's doings," said Mr. Green, at the same time bursting into a flood of tears. Mr. Devenant was past the age when men should think upon matrimonial subjects, yet the scene brought vividly before his eyes the days when he was a young man, and had a wife living. After a short interview, the old man called their attention to the dinner, which was then waiting. We need scarcely add, that Mr. Green and Mrs. Devenant did very little towards diminishing the dinner that day. After dinner the lovers (for such we have to call them) gave their experience from the time that George left the jail dressed in Mary's clothes. Up to that time Mr. Green's was substantially as we have related it. Mrs. Devenant's was as follows:—"The night after you left the prison," said she, "I did not shut my eyes in sleep. The next morning, about eight o'clock, Peter the gardener came to the jail to see if I had been there the night before, and was informed that I had, and that I had left a little after dark. About an hour after, Mr. Green came himself, and I need not say that he was much surprised on finding me there, dressed in your clothes. This was the first tidings they had of your escape." "What did Mr. Green say when he found that I had fled?" "Oh!" continued Mrs. Devenant, "he said to me when no one was near, I hope George will get off, but I fear you will have to suffer in his stead. I told him that if it must be so I was willing to die if you could live." At this moment George Green burst into tears, threw his arms around her neck, and exclaimed, "I am glad I have waited so long, with the hope of meeting you again." Mrs. Devenant again resumed her story:—"I was kept in jail three days, during which time I was visited by the magistrates, and two of the judges. On the third day I was taken out, and master told me that I was liberated, upon condition that I should be immediately sent out of the state. There happened to be just at the time in the neighbourhood a Negro-trader, and he purchased me, and I was taken to New Orleans. On the steamboat we were kept in a close room, where slaves are usually confined, so that I saw nothing of the passengers on board, or the towns we passed. We arrived at New Orleans, and were all put into the slave-market for sale. I was examined by many persons, but none seemed willing to purchase me, as all thought me too white, and said I would run away and pass as a free white woman. On the second day, while in the slave-market, and while planters and others were examining slaves and making their purchases, I observed a tall young man, with long black hair, eyeing me very closely, and then talking to the trader. I felt sure that my time had now come, but the day closed without my being sold. I did not regret this, for I had heard that foreigners made the worst of masters, and I felt confident that the man who eyed me so closely was not an American. "The next day was the Sabbath. The bells called the people to the different places of worship. Methodists sang, and Baptists immersed, and Presbyterians sprinkled, and Episcopalians read their prayers, while the ministers of the various sects preached that Christ died for all; yet there were some twenty-five or thirty of us poor creatures confined in the 'Negro Pen,' awaiting the close of the holy Sabbath, and the dawn of another day, to be again taken into the market, there to be examined like so many beasts of burden. I need not tell you with what anxiety we waited for the advent of another day. On Monday we were again brought out and placed in rows to be inspected; and, fortunately for me, I was sold before we had been on the stand an hour. I was purchased by a gentleman residing in the city, for a waiting-maid for his wife, who was just on the eve of starting for Mobile, to pay a visit to a near relation. I was then dressed to suit the situation of a maid-servant; and upon the whole, I thought that, in my new dress, I looked as much the lady as my mistress. "On the passage to Mobile, who should I see among the passengers but the tall, long-haired man that had eyed me so closely in the slave-market a few days before. His eyes were again on me, and he appeared anxious to speak to me, and I as reluctant to be spoken to. The first evening after leaving New Orleans, soon after twilight had let her curtain down, and pinned it with a star, and while I was seated on the deck of the boat near the ladies' cabin, looking upon the rippled waves, and the reflection of the moon upon the sea, all at once I saw the tall young man standing by my side. I immediately rose from my seat, and was in the act of returning to the cabin, when he in a broken accent said, 'Stop a moment; I wish to have a word with you. I am your friend.' I stopped and looked him full in the face, and he said, 'I saw you some days since in the slavemarket, and I intended to have purchased you to save you from the condition of a slave. I called on Monday, but you had been sold and had left the market. I inquired and learned who the purchaser was, and that you had to go to Mobile, so I resolved to follow you. If you are willing I will try and buy you from your present owner, and you shall be free.' Although this was said in an honest and off-hand manner, I could not believe the man to be sincere in what he said. 'Why should you wish to set me free?' I asked. 'I had an only sister,' he replied, 'who died three years ago in France, and you are so much like her that had I not known of her death, I would most certainly have taken you for her.' 'However much I may resemble your sister, you are aware that I am not her, and why take so much interest in one whom you never saw before?' 'The love,' said he, 'which I had for my sister is transferred to you.' I had all along suspected that the man was a knave, and this profession of love confirmed me in my former belief, and I turned away and left him. "The next day, while standing in the cabin and looking through the window, the French gentleman (for such he was) came to the window while walking on the guards, and again commenced as on the previous evening. He took from his pocket a bit of paper and put it into my hand, at the same time saying, 'Take this, it may some day be of service to you; remember it is from a friend,' and left me instantly. I unfolded the paper, and found it to be a 100 dollars bank note, on the United States Branch Bank, at Philadelphia. My first impulse was to give it to my mistress, but, upon a second thought, I resolved to seek an opportunity, and to return the hundred dollars to the stranger. "Therefore I looked for him, but in vain; and had almost given up the idea of seeing him again, when he passed me on the guards of the boat and walked towards the stem of the vessel. It being now dark, I approached him and offered the money to him. He declined, saying at the same time, 'I gave it to you keep it.' 'I do not want it,' I said. 'Now,' said he, 'you had better give your consent for me to purchase you, and you shall go with me to France.' 'But you cannot buy me now,' I replied, 'for my master is in New Orleans, and he purchased me not to sell, but to retain in his own family.' 'Would you rather remain with your present mistress than be free?' 'No,' said I. 'Then fly with me tonight; we shall be in Mobile in two hours from this, and when the passengers are going on shore, you can take my arm, and you can escape unobserved. The trader who brought you to New Orleans exhibited to me a certificate of your good character, and one from the minister of the church to which you were attached in Virginia; and upon the faith of these assurances, and the love I bear you, I promise before high heaven that I will marry you as soon as it can be done.' This solemn promise, coupled with what had already transpired, gave me confidence in the man; and rash as the act may seem, I determined in an instant to go with him. My mistress had been put under the charge of the captain; and as it would be past ten o'clock when the steamer would land, she accepted an invitation of the captain to remain on board with several other ladies till morning. I dressed myself in my best clothes, and put a veil over my face, and was ready on the landing of the boat. Surrounded by a number of passengers, we descended the stage leading to the wharf, and were soon lost in the crowd that thronged the quay. As we went on shore we encountered several persons announcing the names of hotels, the starting of boats for the interior, and vessels bound for Europe. Among these was the ship Utica, Captain Pell, bound for Havre. 'Now,' said Mr. Devenant, 'this is our chance.' The ship was to sail at twelve o'clock that night, at high tide; and following the men who were seeking passengers, we went immediately on board. Devenant told the captain of the ship that I was his sister, and for such we passed during the voyage. At the hour of twelve the Utica set sail, and we were soon out at sea. "The morning after we left Mobile, Devenant met me as I came from my state-room, and embraced me for the first time. I loved him, but it was only that affection which we have for one who has done us a lasting favour: it was the love of gratitude rather than that of the heart. We were five weeks on the sea, and yet the passage did not seem long, for Devenant was so kind. On our arrival at Havre we were married and came to Dunkirk, and I have resided here ever since." At the close of this narrative, the clock struck ten, when the old man, who was accustomed to retire at an early hour, rose to take leave, saying at the same time, "I hope you will remain with us to-night." Mr. Green would fain have excused himself, on the ground that they would expect him and wait at the hotel, but a look from the lady told him to accept the invitation. The old man was the father of Mrs. Devenant's deceased husband, as you will no doubt long since have supposed. A fortnight from the day on which they met in the grave-yard, Mr. Green and Mrs. Devenant were joined in holy wedlock; so that George and Mary, who had loved each other so ardently in their younger days, were now husband and wife. A celebrated writer has justly said of woman, "A woman's whole life is a history of the affections. The heart is her world; it is there her ambition strives for empire; it is there her avarice seeks for hidden treasures. She sends forth her sympathies on adventure; she embarks her whole soul in the traffic of affection; and, if shipwrecked, her case is hopeless, for it is a bankruptcy of the heart." Mary had every reason to believe that she would never see George again; and although she confesses that the love she bore him was never transferred to her first husband, we can scarcely find fault with her for marrying Mr. Devenant. But the adherence of George Green to the resolution never to marry, unless to his Mary, is, indeed, a rare instance of the fidelity of man in the matter of love. We can but blush for our country's shame when we recall to mind the fact, that while George and Mary Green, and numbers of other fugitives from American slavery, can receive protection from any of the governments of Europe, they cannot return to their native land without becoming slaves. CHAPTER XXIX CONCLUSION MY narrative has now come to a close. I may be asked, and no doubt shall, Are the various incidents and scenes related founded in truth? I answer, Yes. I have personally participated in many of those scenes. Some of the narratives I have derived from other sources; many from the lips of those who, like myself, have run away from the land of bondage. Having been for nearly nine years employed on Lake Erie, I had many opportunities for helping the escape of fugitives, who, in return for the assistance they received, made me the depositary of their sufferings and wrongs. Of their relations I have made free use. To Mrs. Child, of New York, I am indebted for part of a short story. American Abolitionist journals are another source from whence some of the characters appearing in my narrative are taken. All these combined have made up my story. Having thus acknowledged my resources, I invite the attention of my readers to the following statement, from which I leave them to draw their own conclusions:—"It is estimated that in the United States, members of the Methodist church own 219,363 slaves; members of the Baptist church own 226,000 slaves; members of the Episcopalian church own 88,000 slaves; members of the Presbyterian church own 77,000 slaves; members of all other churches own 50,000 slaves; in all, 660,563 slaves owned by members of the Christian church in this pious democratic republic!" May these facts be pondered over by British Christians, and at the next anniversaries of the various religious denominations in London may their influence be seen and felt! The religious bodies of American Christians will send their delegates to these meetings. Let British feeling be publicly manifested. Let British sympathy express itself in tender sorrow for the condition of my unhappy race. Let it be understood, unequivocally understood, that no fellowship can be held with slaveholders professing the same common Christianity as yourselves. And until this stain from America's otherwise fair escutcheon be wiped away, let no Christian association be maintained with those who traffic in the blood and bones of those whom God has made of one flesh as yourselves. Finally, let the voice of the whole British nation be heard across the Atlantic, and throughout the length and breadth of the land of the Pilgrim Fathers, beseeching their descendants, as they value the common salvation, which knows no distinction between the bond and the free, to proclaim the Year of Jubilee. Then shall the "earth indeed yield her increase, and God, even our own God, shall bless us; and all the ends of the earth shall fear Him." *** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLOTEL; OR, THE PRESIDENT'S DAUGHTER *** Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will be renamed. 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