The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, No. 65, March, 1863

"With sports like these were all their cares beguiled;
The sports of children satisfy the child."

And—the poet might have added—they often do much to satisfy the child of larger growth. It was thus that the old man kept alive the embers of his youth.

Charles Lamb once, considering whom of the world's vanished worthies he would rather evoke, singled out Fulke Greville, and also—if our memory is correct—Sir Thomas Browne. He thought, very sensibly, that any reasonable human being, if permitted to summon spirits from the vasty deep, would base his choice upon personal qualities, and not on mere general reputation. There would be an elective affinity, a principle of natural selection, (not Darwinian,) by which each would aim to draw forth a spirit to his liking. One would not summon the author of such and such a book, but this or that man. Milton wrote an admirable epic, but he would be awful in society. Shakspeare was a splendid dramatist, but one would hardly ask him for a boon-companion. Who could feel at ease under that omniscient eye? But, if the Plutonian shore might, for a few brief moments, render to our call its waiting shades, there are not very many for whom our lips would sooner syllable the word of resurrection than for Christopher North. Only to look upon him in his prime would be worth much. To have a day with him on the moors, or an ambrosial night, would be a possession forever.

Even now we can almost see him standing radiant before us, illuminated and transfigured by the halo streaming round him. A huge man, towering far above his fellows; with Herculean shoulders, deep chest, broad back, sturdy neck, brawny arms, and massive fists; a being with vast muscle and tense nerve; of choicest make, and finest tone and temper,—robust and fine, bulky and sinewy, ponderous and agile, stalwart and elastic; a hammer to give, and a rock to receive blows; with the light tread of the deer, and the fell paw of the lion; crowned with a dome-like head, firm-set, capacious, distinctive, cleanly cut, and covered with long, flowing, yellow hair; a forehead broad, high, and rounded, strongly and equally marked by perception and imagination, wit and fancy; light blue eyes, capable of every expression, and varying with every mood, but generally having a far, dim, dreamy look into vacancy,—the gaze of the poet seeing visions; a firm, high, aquiline nose, indicating both intellect and spirit; flexile lips, bending to every breath of passion; a voice of singular compass and pliancy, responding justly to all his wayward humors and all his noble thoughts, now tremulous with tender passion, now rough with a partisan's fury; a man of strange contradictions and inconsistencies every way; a hand of iron with a glove of silk; a tiger's claw sheathed in velvet; one who fought lovingly, and loved fiercely; champion of the arena, passionate poet, chastiser of brutes, caresser of children, friend of brawlers, lover of beauty; a pugilistic Professor of Moral Philosophy, who, in a thoroughly professional way, gayly put up his hands and scientifically floored his man in open day, at a public fair;[1 - One who met him many years ago in Edinburgh, at the conclusion of a lecture, tells us, as we write these closing sentences, of his splendid figure, as he saw him twirl an Irish shillalah and show off its wonderful properties as an instrument of fun at a fair.] sometimes of the oak, sometimes of the willow; now bearing grief without a murmur, now howling in his pain like the old gods and heroes, making all Nature resonant with his cries; knowing nothing of envy save from the reports of others, yet never content to be outdone even in veriest trifles; a tropical heart and a cool brain; full of strong prejudices and fine charities, generous and exacting, heedless and sympathetic, quick to forgive, slow to resent, firm in love, transient in hate; to-day scaling the heavens with frantic zeal, to-morrow relaxing in long torpor; fond of long, solitary journeys, and given to conviviality; tender eyes that a word or a thought would fill, and hard lips that would never say die; a child of Nature thrilled with ecstasy by storm and by sunshine, and a cultured scholar hungering for new banquets; dreamer, doer, poet, philosopher, simple child, wisest patriarch; a true cosmopolitan, having largest aptitudes,—a tree whose roots sucked up juices from all the land, whose liberal fruits were showered all around; having a key to unlock all hearts, and a treasure for each; hospitable friend, husband-lover, doting father; a boisterous wit, fantastic humorist, master of pathos, practical joker, sincere mourner; always an extremist, yielding to various excess; an April day, all smiles and tears; January and May met together; a many-sided fanatic; a universal enthusiast; a large-hearted sectarian; a hot-headed judge; a strong sketch full of color, with neutral tints nowhere, but fall of fiery lights and deep glooms; buoyant, irrepressible, fuming, rampant, with something of divine passion and electric fire; gentle, earnest, true; a wayward prodigal, loosely scattering abroad where he should bring together; great in things indifferent, and indifferent in many great ones; a man who would have been far greater, if he had been much less,—if he had been less catholic and more specific; immeasurably greater in his own personality than in any or all of his deeds either actual or possible;—such was the man Christopher North, a Hercules-Apollo, strong and immortally beautiful,—a man whom, with all his foibles, negligences, and ignorances, we stop to admire, and stay to love.

"CHOOSE YOU THIS DAY WHOM YE WILL SERVE."

Yes, tyrants, you hate us, and fear while you hate
The self-ruling, chain-breaking, throne-shaking State!
The night-birds dread morning,—your instinct is true,—
The day-star of Freedom brings midnight for you!

Why plead with the deaf for the cause of mankind?
The owl hoots at noon that the eagle is blind!
"We ask not your reasons,—'t were wasting our time,—
Our life is a menace, our welfare a crime!

"We have battles to fight, we have foes to subdue,—
Time waits not for us, and we wait not for you!
The mower mows on, though the adder may writhe
And the copper-head coil round the blade of his scythe!

"No sides in this quarrel," your statesmen may urge,
Of school-house and wages with slave-pen and scourge!—
No sides in the quarrel! proclaim it as well
To the angels that fight with the legions of hell!

They kneel in God's temple, the North and the South,
With blood on each weapon and prayers in each mouth.
Whose cry shall be answered? Ye Heavens, attend
The lords of the lash as their voices ascend!

"O Lord, we are shaped in the image of Thee,—
Smite down the base millions that claim to be free,
And lend Thy strong arm to the soft-handed race
Who eat not their bread in the sweat of their face!"

So pleads the proud planter. What echoes are these?
The bay of his bloodhound is borne on the breeze,
And, lost in the shriek of his victim's despair,
His voice dies unheard.—Hear the Puritan's prayer!

"O Lord, that didst smother mankind in Thy flood,
The sun is as sackcloth, the moon is as blood,
The stars fall to earth as untimely are cast
The figs from the fig-tree that shakes in the blast!

"All nations, all tribes in whose nostrils is breath,
Stand gazing at Sin as she travails with Death!
Lord, strangle the monster that struggles to birth,
Or mock us no more with Thy 'Kingdom on Earth'!

"If Ammon and Moab must reign in the land
Thou gavest Thine Israel, fresh from Thy hand,
Call Baäl and Ashtaroth out of their graves
To be the new gods for the empire of slaves!"

Whose God will ye serve, O ye rulers of men?
Will ye build you new shrines in the slave-breeder's den?
Or bow with the children of light, as they call
On the Judge of the Earth and the Father of All?

Choose wisely, choose quickly, for time moves apace,—
Each day is an age in the life of our race!
Lord, lead them in love, ere they hasten in fear
From the fast-rising flood that shall girdle the sphere!

* * * * *

THE HORRORS OF SAN DOMINGO.[2 - See Numbers LVI., LVIII., and LIX. of this magazine.]

CHAPTER V

INTRODUCTION OF SLAVERY—THE SLAVE-TRADE—AFRICAN TRIBES—THE CODE NOIR—THE MULATTOES

It will be necessary for the present to omit the story of the settlement and growth of the French Colony, and of the pernicious commercial restrictions which swelled the unhappy heritage of the island, in order that we may reach, in this and a succeeding article, the great points of interest connected with the Negro, his relation to the Colony and complicity with its final overthrow.

The next task essential to our plan is to trace the entrance of Negro Slavery into the French part of the island, to describe the victims, and the legislation which their case inspired.

The first French Company which undertook a regular trade with the west coast of Africa was an association of merchants of Dieppe, without authority or privileges. They settled a little island in the Senegal, which was called St. Louis. This property soon passed into the hands of a more formal association of Rouen merchants, who carried on the trade till 1664, the date of the establishment of the West-India Company, to which they were obliged to sell their privileges for one hundred and fifty thousand livres. This great Company managed its African business so badly, that it was withdrawn from their hands in 1673, and made over as a special interest to a Senegal Company. The trade, in palm-oil, ivory, etc., was principally with France, and negro slaves for the colonies do not yet appear in numbers to attract attention.[3 - Du Tertre, the missionary historian of the Antilles, proudly says, previously to this date, that the opinion of France in favor of personal liberty still shielded a French deck from the traffic: "Selon les lois de la France, qui abhorre la servitude sur toutes les nations du monde, et ou tous les esclaves recouvrent heureusement la liberté perdue, sitost qu'ils y abordent, et qu'ils en touchent la terre."] But in 1679 this Company engaged with the Crown to deliver yearly, for a term of eight years, two thousand negroes, to be distributed among the French Antilles. This displaced a previous engagement, made in 1675, for the delivery of eight hundred negroes. The Company had also to furnish as many negroes for the galleys at Marseilles as His Majesty should find convenient. And the Crown offered a bounty of thirteen livres per head for every negro, to be paid in "pieces of India."

This is a famous phrase in the early annals of the slave-trade. Reckoning by "pieces" was customary in the transaction of business upon the coast of Africa. Merchandise, provisions, and presents to the native princes had their value thus expressed, as well as slaves. If the negro merchant asked ten pieces for a slave, the European trader offered his wares divided into ten portions, each portion being regarded as a "piece," without counting the parts which made it up. Thus, ten coarse blankets made one piece, a musket one piece, a keg of powder weighing ten pounds was one, a piece of East-India blue calico four pieces, ten copper kettles one piece, one piece of chintz two pieces, which made the ten for which the slave was exchangeable: and at length he became commercially known as a "piece of India." The bounty of thirteen livres was computed in France upon the wholesale value of the trinkets and notions which were used in trade with Africa.

The traffic by pieces is as old as the age of Herodotus;[4 - Melpomene, § 196.] it was originally a dumb show of goods between two trading parties ignorant of each other's language, but at length it represented a transaction which the parties should have been ashamed to mention.

Although this second Senegal Company was protected by the rigid exclusion, under pain of fine and confiscation, of all other Frenchmen from the trade, it soon fell into debt and parted with its privilege to a third Company, and this in turn was restricted by the formation of a Guinea Company, so that it soon sold out to a fourth Senegal Company, which passed in 1709 into the hands of Rouen merchants who started a fifth; and this too was merged in the West-India Company which was formed in 1718. So little did the agriculture of the islands, overstocked with engagés, justify as yet the slave-traders in the losses and expenses which they incurred.

The Guinea Company was bound to import only one thousand yearly into all the French Antilles; but it did not flourish until it became an Asiento Company, when, during the War of Succession, a Bourbon mounted the throne of Spain. It was called Asiento because the Spanish Government let, or farmed by treaty, the privilege of supplying its colonies with slaves. The two principal articles of this contract, which was to expire in 1712, related to the number of negroes and the rent of the privilege. If the war continued, the French Company was bound to furnish Spain with thirty-eight thousand negroes during the ten years of the contract, but in case of peace, with forty-eight thousand. Each negro that the Company could procure was let to it for 33-1/3 piastres, in pieces of India. In consequence of this treaty, the ports of Chili and Peru, and those in the South Sea, from which all other nations were excluded, stood open to the French, who carried into them vast quantities of merchandise besides the slaves, and brought home great sums in coin and bars. The raw gold and silver alone which they imported for the year 1709 was reckoned at thirty millions of livres.

But at the Peace of Utrecht, Louis XIV., exhausted by an unprofitable war, relinquished his asiento to the English, who were eager enough to take it. It was for this advantage that Marlborough had been really fighting; at least, it was the only one of consequence that Blenheim and Malplaquet secured to his country.

The reign of Louis XV. commenced in 1715. By letters-patent which he issued on the 16th of January, 1716, he granted permission to all the merchants in his kingdom to engage in the African trade, provided their ships were fitted out only in the five ports of Rouen, Rochelle, Bordeaux, Nantes, and St. Malo; nine articles were specially framed to encourage the trade in slaves, as by the Peace of Utrecht all the South-Sea ports were closed to the French, and only their own colonies remained. France no longer made great sums of money by the trade in slaves, but her colonies began to thrive and demand a new species of labor. The poor white emigrants were exhausted and demoralized by an apprenticeship which had all the features of slavery, and by a climate which will not readily permit a white man to become naturalized even when he is free.

It is the opinion of some French anti-slavery writers that the engagés might have tilled the soil of Hayti to this day, if they had labored for themselves alone. This is doubtful; the white man can work in almost every region of the Southern States, but he cannot raise cotton and sugar upon those scorching plains. It is not essential for the support of an anti-slavery argument to suppose that he can. Nor is it of any consequence, so far as the question of free-labor is concerned, either to affirm or to deny that the white man can raise cotton in Georgia or sugar in Louisiana. The blacks themselves, bred to the soil and wonted to its products, will organize free-labor there, and not a white man need stir his pen or his hoe to solve the problem.