CHAPTER III. DINNER TALK.
America furnishes to the world her share of politicians. The United States, with her free government, her freedom of thought, freedom of speech and freedom of press, is prolific in their production. One who had given the subject but little thought, and no investigation, would be amazed to know their number. Nearly every boy born in the United States becomes a politician, with views more or less pronounced, and the subject is by no means neglected by the feminine portion of the community. That part of Virginia, the scene of our story, abounded with "village tavern and cross-roads politicians." Snagtown, on Briar creek, was a village not more than three miles from Mr. Tompkins'. It boasted of two taverns and three saloons, where loafers congregated to talk about the weather, the doings in Congress, the terrible state of the country, and their exploits in catching "runaway niggers." A large per cent of our people pay more attention to Congressional matters than to their own affairs. We do not deny that it is every man's right to understand the grand machinery of this Government, but he should not devote to it the time which should be spent in caring for his family. Politics should not intoxicate men and lead them from the paths of honest industry, and furnish food for toughs to digest at taverns and street corners.
Anything which affords a topic of conversation is eagerly welcomed by the loafer; and it is little wonder that politics is a theme that rouses all his enthusiasm. It not only affords him food, but drink as well, during a campaign. Many are the neglected wives and starving children who, in cold and cheerless homes, await the return of the husband and father, who sits, warm and comfortable, in some tavern, laying plans for the election of a school director or a town overseer.
Snagtown could tell its story. It contained many such neglected homes, and the thriftless vagabonds who constituted the voting majority never failed to raise an excitement, to provoke bitter feelings and foment quarrels on election day.
Plump, and short, and sleek was Mr. Hezekiah Diggs, the justice of the peace of Snagtown. Like many justices of the peace, he brought to the performance of his duties little native intelligence, and less acquired erudition; but what he lacked in brains he made up in brass. He was one of the foremost of the political gossipers of Snagtown, and had filled his present position for several years.
'Squire Diggs was hardly in what might be termed even moderate circumstances, though he and his family made great pretension in society. He was one of that rare class in Virginia—a poor man who had managed by some inexplicable means, to work his way into the better class of society. His wife, unlike himself, was tall, slender and sharp visaged. Like him, she was an incessant talker, and her gossip frequently caused trouble in the neighborhood. Scandal was seized on as a sweet morsel by the hungry Mrs. Diggs, and she never let pass an opportunity to spread it, like a pestilence, over the town.
They had one son, now about twelve years of age, the joy and pride of their hearts, and as he was capable of declaiming, "The boy stood on the burning deck," his proud father discovered in him the future orator of America, and determined that Patrick Henry Diggs should study law and enter the field of politics. The boy, full of his father's conviction, and of a conceit all his own, felt within his soul a rising greatness which one day would make him the foremost man of the Nation. He did not object to his father's plan; he was willing to become either a statesman or a lawyer, but having read the life of Washington, he would have chosen to be a general, only that there were now no redcoats to fight. Poor as Diggs' family was, they boasted that they associated only with the elite of Southern society.
'Squire Diggs had informed Mr. Tompkins that he and his family would pay him a visit on a certain day, as he wished to consult him on some political matters, and Mr. Tompkins and his hospitable lady, setting aside social differences, prepared to make their visitors welcome. On the appointed day they were driven up in their antiquated carriage, drawn by an old gray horse, and driven by a negro coachman older than either. Mose was the only slave that the 'Squire owned, and though sixty years of age, he served the family faithfully in a multiform capacity. He pulled up at the door of the mansion, and climbing out somewhat slowly, owing to age and rheumatism, he opened the carriage door and assisted the occupants to alight.
Though Mrs. Tompkins felt an unavoidable repugnance for the gossiping Mrs. Diggs, she was too sensible a hostess to treat an uninvited guest otherwise than cordially.
"I've been just dying to come and see you," said Mrs. Diggs, as soon as she had removed her wraps and taken her seat in an easy chair, with a bottle of smelling salts in her hand and her gold-plated spectacles on her nose, "you have been having so many strange things happen here; and I told the 'Squire we must come over, for I thought the drive might do me good, and I wanted to hear all about the murder of your husband's brother's family, and see that strange baby and the crazy boy. Isn't it strange, though? Who could have committed that awful murder? Who put that baby on your piazza, and who is this crazy boy?"
Mrs. Tompkins arrested this stream of interrogatories by saying that it was all a mystery, and they had as yet been unable to find a clew. Baffled at the very onset in the chief object of her visit, Mrs. Diggs turned her thoughts at once into new channels, and, graciously overlooking Mrs. Tompkins' inability to gratify her curiosity, began to recount the news and gossip and small scandals of the neighborhood.
'Squire Diggs was in the midst of an animated conversation on his favorite theme, the politics of the day. The slavery question was just assuming prominence. Henry Clay, Martin Van Buren, and others, had at times hinted at emancipation, while John Brown and Jared Clarkson, and a host of lesser lights, were making the Nation quake with the thunders of their eloquence from rostrum and pulpit. 'Squire Diggs was bitter in his denunciations of Northerners, believing that they intended "to take our niggers from us." He invariably emphasized the pronoun, and always spoke of niggers in the plural, as though he owned a hundred instead of one. 'Squire Diggs was one of a class of people in the South known as the most bitter slavery men, the small slaveholders—a class that bewailed most loudly the freedom of the negro, because they had few to free. At dinner he said:
"Slavery is of divine origin, and all John Brown and Jared Clarkson can say will never convince the world otherwise."
"I sometimes think," said Mr. Tompkins, "that the country would be better off with the slaves all in Siberia."
"What? My dear sir, how could we exist?" cried 'Squire Diggs, his small eyes growing round with wonder. "If the slaves were taken from us, who would cultivate these vast fields?"
"Do it ourselves, or by hired help," answered the planter.
"My dear sir, the idea is impracticable," said the 'Squire, hotly. "We cannot give up our slaves. Slavery is of divine origin. The niggers, descending from Ham, were cursed into slavery. The Bible says so, and no nigger-loving Abolitionist need deny it."
"I believe my husband is an emancipationist," said Mrs. Tompkins, with a smile.
"I am," said Mr. Tompkins; "not so much for the slaves' good as for the masters'. Slavery is a curse to both white and black, and more to the white than to the black. The two races can never live together in harmony, and the sooner they are separated the better."
"How would you like to free them and leave them among us?" asked the 'Squire.
"That even would be better than to keep them among us in bondage."
"But Henry Clay, in his great speech on African colonization in the House of Representatives, says: 'Of all classes of our population, the most vicious is the free colored.' And, my dear sir, were this horde of blacks turned loose upon us, without masters or overseers to keep them in restraint, our lives would not be safe for a day. Domineering niggers would be our masters, would claim the right to vote and hold office. Imagine, my dear sir, an ignorant nigger holding an important office like that of justice of the peace. Consider for a moment, Mr. Tompkins, all of the horrors which would be the natural result of a lazy, indolent race, incapable of earning their own living, unless urged by the lash, being turned loose to shift for themselves. Slavery is more a blessing to the slave than to the master. What was the condition of the negro in his native wilds? He was a ruthless savage, hunting and fighting, and eating fellow-beings captured in war. He knew no God, and worshiped snakes, the sun and moon, and everything he could not understand. Our slave-traders found him in this state of barbarism and misery. They brought him here, and taught him to till the soil, and trained him in the ways of peace, and led him to worship the true and living God. Our niggers now have food to eat and clothes to wear, when in their native country they were hungry and naked. They now enjoy all the blessings of an advanced civilization, whereas they were once in the lowest barbarism. Set them free, and they will drift back into their former state."
"A blessing may be made out of their bondage," replied Mr. Tompkins. "As Henry Clay said in the speech from which you have quoted, 'they will carry back to their native soil the rich fruits of religion, civilization, law and liberty. And may it not be one of the great designs of the Ruler of the universe (whose ways are often inscrutable by short-sighted mortals) thus to transform original crime into a single blessing to the most unfortunate portions of the globe? But I fear we uphold slavery rather for our own mercenary advantages than as a blessing either to our country or to either race."
"Why, Mr. Tompkins, you are advocating Abolition doctrine," said Mrs. Diggs.
"I believe I am, and that abolition is right."
"Would you be willing to lose your own slaves to have the niggers freed?" asked the astonished 'Squire.
"I would willingly lose them to rid our country of a blighting curse."
"I would not," said Mrs. Tompkins, her Southern blood fired by the discussion. "My husband is a Northern man, and advocates principles that were instilled into his mind from infancy; but I oppose abolition from principle. Slaves should be treated well and made to know their place; but to set them free and ruin thousands of people in the South is the idea of fanatics."
"I'm mamma's Democrat," said Oleah, who, seated at his mother's side, concluded it best to approve her remarks by proclaiming his own political creed.
"And I am papa's Whig," announced Abner, who was at his father's side.
"That's right, my son. You don't believe that people, because they are black, should be bought and sold and beaten like cattle, do you?" asked the father, looking down, half in jest and half in earnest, at his eldest born.
"No; set the negroes free, and Oleah and I will plow and drive wagons," he replied, quickly.
"You don't believe it's right to take people's property from them for nothing and leave people poor, do you, Oleah?" asked the mother, in laughing retaliation.
"No, I don't," replied the young Southern aristocrat.
"You are liable to have both political parties represented in your own family," said 'Squire Diggs. "Here's a difference of opinion already."
"Their differences will be easy to reconcile, for never did brothers love each other as these do," returned Mr. Tompkins, little dreaming that this difference of opinion was a breach that would widen, widen and widen, separating the loving brothers, and bringing untold misery to his peaceful home.
"What are you in favor of, Patrick Henry?" Mrs. Diggs asked, in her shrill, sharp tones, of her own hopeful son.
"I'm in favor of freedom and the Stars and Stripes," answered Patrick Henry, gnawing vigorously at the chicken bone he held in his hand.
"He is a patriot," exclaimed the 'Squire. "He talks of nothing so much as Revolutionary days and Revolutionary heroes. He has such a taste for military life that I'd send him to West Point, but his mother objects."
"Yes, I do object," put in the shrill-voiced, cadaverous Mrs. Diggs, "They don't take a child of mine to their strict military schools. Why, what if he was to get sick, away off there, and me here? I wouldn't stop day or night till I got there."
Dinner over, the party repaired to the parlor, and 'Squire Diggs asked his son to speak "one of his pieces" for the entertainment of the company.
"What piece shall I say?" asked Patrick Henry, as anxious to display his oratorical talents as his father was to have him.
"The piece that begins, 'I come not here to talk,'" said Mrs. Diggs, her sallow features lit up with a smile that showed the tips of her false teeth.
Several of the negroes, learning that a show of some kind was about to begin in the parlor, crowded about the room, peeping in at the doors and windows. Patrick Henry took his position in the centre of the room, struck a pompous attitude, standing high as his short legs would permit, and, brushing the hair from his forehead, bowed to his audience and, in a high, loud monotone, began:
He paused and bowed his head.
"We are slaves," prompted the mother, who was listening with eager interest. Mrs. Diggs had heard her son "say his piece" so often that she had learned it herself, and now served as prompter. Patrick Henry continued:
"No, sun," interrupted his mother.
The young orator was again off the track.
"And his last beam falls on a slave," again the fond mother prompted.
By being frequently prompted, Patrick Henry managed to "speak his piece through."
While the mother, alert and watchful, listened and prompted, the father, short, and sleek, and fat, leaned back in his chair, one short leg just able to reach across the other, listening with satisfied pride to his son's display.
"The poor child has forgotten some of it," said the mother, at the conclusion.
"Yes," added the father; "he don't speak much now, and so has forgotten a great deal that he knew."
Mr. Tompkins and his wife, inwardly regretting that he had not forgotten all, willingly excused Patrick Henry from any further efforts. And though they had welcomed and entertained their guests with the cordial Southern hospitality, they felt somewhat relieved when the Diggs carriage, with its ancient, dark-skinned coachman, rolled away over the hills towards Snagtown.
CHAPTER IV. MORE OF THE MYSTERY.
We have seen the perfect harmony which prevailed in the household of Mr. Tompkins, though his wife and himself were of totally different temperaments, and, on many subjects, held opposite opinions. He, with his cool Northern blood, was careful and deliberate, slow in drawing conclusions or forming a decision; but, once his stand was taken, firm as a rock. She had all the quick Southern impetuosity, that at times found rash expression, though her head was as clear and her heart as warm as her husband's. Her prejudices were stronger than his, and her reason was more frequently swayed by them.
The great Missouri Compromise was supposed to have settled the question of slavery forever, and abolition was regarded only as the dream of visionary fanatics. Though a freeholder by birth and principle, circumstances had made Mr. Tompkins a slave-holder. He seldom expressed his sentiments to his Southern neighbors, knowing how repugnant they were to their feelings; but when his opinions were asked for he always gave them freely. The movements on the political checker-board belong rather to history than to a narrative of individual lives, yet because of their effect on these lives, some of the most important must be mentioned. While the abolition party was yet in embryo, the Southern statesmen, or many of them, seeming to read the fate of slavery in the future, had declared that the Union of States was only a compact or co-partnership, which could be dissolved at the option of the contracting parties. This gave rise to the principle of States' rights and secession, and when the emancipation of the slaves was advocated, Southern politicians began to talk more and more of dissolution.
Not only in political assemblies was the subject discussed, but even in family circles, as we have seen. Mrs. Tompkins, of course, differed from her husband on the subject of "State" rights, as she did on slavery, and many were their debates on the theme. Their little sons, observing their parents' interest in these questions, became concerned themselves, and, as was very natural, took sides. Abner was the Whig and Oleah his mother's Democrat. Still, love and harmony dwelt in that happy household, though the prophetic ear might have heard in the distant future the rattle of musketry on that fair, quiet lawn, and the clash of brothers' swords in mortal combat beneath the roof which had sheltered their infancy.
Little did these fond parents dream of the deep root those seeds of political difference had taken in the breasts of their children, and the bitter fruit of misery and horror they would bear. Their lives now ran as quietly as a meadow brook. All the long Summer days they played without an angry word or thought, or if either was hurt or grieved a kiss or a tender word would heal the wound.
The tragic fate of his brother's family, and his unavailing efforts to bring the murderers to justice, directed Mr. Tompkins' thoughts into new channels. The strange baby grew in strength and beauty every day. Its mysterious appearance among them continued to puzzle the family, and all their efforts failed to bring any light on the subject. The servant to whom was assigned the washing of the clothes the baby had on when found was charged by her mistress to look closely for marks and letters upon them. When her work was done, she came to Mrs. Tompkins' room, and that lady asked:
"Have you found anything, Hannah?"
"Yes, missus; here am a word wif some letters in it," the woman answered, holding up a little undershirt and pointing to some faint lines.
Mrs. Tompkins took the garment, which, before being washed, had been so soiled that even more legible lines than these would have been undistinguishable; it was of the finest linen, and faintly, yet surely, was the word "Irene" traced with indelible ink.
"As soon as all the clothes had been washed and dried, bring them to me," said Mrs. Tompkins, hoping to find some other clew to the child's parentage.
"Yes, missus," and Hannah went back to her washing.
"Irene," repeated Mrs. Tompkins aloud, as she looked down on the baby, who was sitting on the rug, making things lively among a heap of toys Abner and Oleah had placed before her.
The baby looked up and began crowing with delight.
"Oh, bless the darling; it knows its name!" cried Mrs. Tompkins. "Poor little thing, it has seldom heard it lately. Irene! Irene! Irene!"
The baby, laughing and shouting, reached out its arms to the lady, who caught it up and pressed it to her heart.
"Oh, mamma!" cried Oleah, running into the room, with his brother at his heels, "me and Abner have just been talking about what to call the baby. He wants to call it Tommy, and that's a boy's name, ain't it, mamma?"
"Of course it is—"
"And our baby is a girl, and must have a girl's name, musn't it, mamma?"
"Yes."
"I just said Tommy was a nice name; if our baby was a boy we'd call it Tommy," explained Abner.
"But the baby has a name—a real pretty name," said the mother.
"A name! a name! What is it?" the brothers cried, capering about, and setting the baby almost wild with delight.
"Her name is Irene," said Mrs. Tompkins.
"Oh, mamma, where did you get such a pretty name?" asked Abner.
"Who said it was Irene?" put in Oleah.
"I found it written on some of the clothes it wore the morning we found it," answered the mother.
"Then we will call it Irene," said Abner, decisively.
"Irene! Irene! Little Irene! ain't you awful sweet?" cried the impetuous Oleah, snatching the baby from his mother's arms and smothering its screams of delight with kisses. So enthusiastic was the little fellow that the baby was in peril, and his mother, spite of his protestations, took it from him. As soon as released, little Irene's feet and hands began to play, and she responded, with soft cooing and baby laughter, to all the boys' noisy demonstrations.
A youth, with large sad eyes and pale face, now entered the door.
"Oh, come, Joe, come and see the baby!" cried Oleah. "Isn't it sweet? Just look at its pretty bright eyes and its cunning little mouth."
Joe had visited the plantation frequently of late, and Mr. Tompkins having given orders that he should always be kindly treated, had finally established himself there, and was now considered rather a member of the household than a guest.
The poor, insane boy came close to Mrs. Tompkins' side and looked fixedly at the baby for a few moments. An expression of pain passed over his face, as though some long forgotten sorrow was recalled to his mind.
"I remember it now," he finally said. "It was at the great carnival feast, and after the gladiators fought, this babe, which was the son of the man who was slain, was given to the lions to devour, but although it was cast in the den, the lions would not harm a hair of its head."
"Oh, no, Joe; you are mistaken," said Abner; "it was Daniel who was cast into the lions' den."
"You are right," said Crazy Joe. "It was Daniel; but I remember this baby. It was one of the two taken by the cruel uncle and placed in a trough and put in the river. The river overflowed the banks and left the babes at the root of a tree, where the wolf found them, and taking compassion on the children, came every day and furnished them nourishment from his own breast."
"No, no," interrupted Abner, who, young as he was, knew something of Roman mythology. "You are talking about Romulus and Remus."
"Ah, yes," sighed the poor youth, striving in vain to gather up his wandering faculties; "but I have seen this child before. If it was not the one concealed among the bulrushes, then what can it be?"
"It's our baby," put in Oleah, "and it wasn't in no bulrushes; it was in the clothes-basket on the porch."
"It was a willow ark," said Joe; "its mother hid it there, for a decree had gone forth that all male children of the Israelites should be exterminated—"
"No; it was a willow basket," interrupted Oleah. "Its mother shan't have it again. It's our little baby. This baby ain't a liverite, and it shan't be sterminated, shall it, mamma?"
"No, dear; no one shall harm this baby," said Mrs. Tompkins.
"It's our baby, isn't it mamma?"
"Yes, my child, unless some one else comes for it who has a better right to it."
"Who could that be, mamma?"
"Perhaps its own father or mother might come—"
"They shan't have it if they do," cried Oleah, stamping his little foot resolutely on the floor.
Joe rose from the low chair on which he had been sitting, and went out, saying something about his father coming down into Egypt.
"Mamma," said Abner, when Joe had gone out, "what makes him say such strange things? He says that he is Joseph, and that his brothers sold him into Egypt, and he calls papa the captain of the guard. He goes out into the fields and watches the negroes work, and says he is Potiphar's overseer, and must attend to his household."
"Poor boy, he is insane, my son," answered Mrs. Tompkins; "he is very unfortunate, and you must not tease him. Let him believe he is Joseph, for it will make him feel happier to have his delusion carried out by others."
"The other day, when we were playing in the barn, Joe and Oleah and me, I saw a great scar and sore place on poor Joe's head, just like some one had struck him. I asked him what did it, and he said he fell with his head on a sharp rock when his brothers threw him into the pit."
Oleah now was anxious to go back to his play, and dragged his brother out of the house to the lawn, leaving Mrs. Tompkins alone with the baby.
Several weeks after the baby and Crazy Joe became inmates of Mr. Tompkins' house, a man, dressed in trowsers of brown jeans and hunting shirt of tanned deer skin, wearing a broad-brimmed hat and heavy boots, came to the mansion. The Autumn day was delightful; it was after the Fall rains. The Indian Summer haze hung over hill, and mountain, and valley, and the sun glowed with mellowed splendor. The stranger carried a rifle, from which a wild turkey was suspended, and wore the usual bullet-pouch and powder-horn of the hunter slung across his shoulder. He was tall and wiry, about thirty-five years of age, and, to use his own expression, as "active as a cat and strong as a lion."
Daniel Martin, or "Uncle Dan," as he was more generally known, was a typical Virginia mountaineer, whose cabin was on the side of a mountain fifteen miles from Mr. Tompkins' plantation. He was noted for his bravery and his bluntness, and for the unerring aim of his rifle.
He was the friend of the rich and poor, and his little cabin frequently afforded shelter for the tourist or the sportsman. He was called "Uncle Dan" by all the younger people, simply because he would not allow himself to be called Mr. Martin.
"No, siree," he would say; "no misterin' fur me. I was never brought up to it, and I can't tote the load now." He persisted in being called "Uncle Dan," especially by the children. "It seems more home-like," he would say.
Why he had not wife and children to make his cabin "home-like" was frequently a theme for discussion among the gossips, and, as they could arrive at no other conclusion, they finally decided that he must have been crossed in love.
Mr. Tompkins, who chanced to be on the veranda, observed the hunter enter the gate, and met him with an extended hand and smile of welcome, saying:
"Good morning, Dan. It is so long since you have been here that your face is almost the face of a stranger."
"Ya-as, it's a'most a coon's age, and an old coon at that, since I been on these grounds. How's all the folks?" he answered, grasping Mr. Tompkins' out-stretched hand.
"They are all well, and will be delighted to see you Dan. Come in."
"Ye see I brought a gobbler," said Dan, removing the turkey from his shoulder. "I thought maybe ye'd be wantin' some wild meat, and I killed one down on the creek afore I came."
Mr. Tompkins took the turkey, and calling a negro boy, bade him take it to the cook to be prepared for dinner. Then he conducted his guest to the veranda. Uncle Dan placed his long rifle and accoutrements in a far corner, and sat down by Mr. Tompkins.
"Wall, how's times about heah, any how, and how's politicks?" he asked, as soon as seated.
The mountain air in America, as in Switzerland, seems to inspire those who breathe it with love of liberty. The dwellers on the mountains of Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee were chiefly Abolitionists, who hated the slave-holder as free men do tyrants, and when the great struggle came on they remained loyal to the Government. As a rule, they were poor, but self-respecting, possessing a degree of intelligence far superior to that of most of the lower class of the South.
The secret of the friendship between the planter and the hunter was that both were, at heart, opposed to human bondage, and though they seldom expressed their real sentiments, even when alone, each knew the other's feelings.
Before Mr. Tompkins could reply to the mountaineer's question, Abner and Oleah ran up to the veranda with shouts of joy and noisy demonstrations of welcome. Uncle Dan placed one on each knee, and for some time the boys claimed all his attention.
"Oh, Uncle Dan, you can't guess what we've got," Oleah cried.
"Why, no; I can't. What is it?" asked Uncle Dan, abandoning attempt to return to the social chat the boys had interrupted.
"A baby! a baby!" cried Oleah, clapping his hands.
"A baby?" repeated Uncle Dan, in astonishment.
"Yes, sir; a bran new baby, just as sweet as it can be, too."
The puzzled mountaineer, with a suspicious look at Mr. Tompkins, said: "Thought ye said the folks was all well?"
"They are," answered Mr. Tompkins, with an amused smile.
"Dinah found the baby in a clothes-basket," put in Abner.
"Oh, it's a nigger baby, is it?" asked Uncle Dan.
"No, no, no; it's a white baby—a white baby," both boys quickly replied.
"What do the children mean?" asked Uncle Dan, bewildered, looking from the boys to their father.
"They mean just what they say," said Mr. Tompkins. "A baby was left at our door a short time ago in the clothes-basket by some unknown person."
"Don't you want to see it, Uncle Dan?" Master Oleah eagerly asked.
"To be sure I do. I always liked babies; they are the perfection o' innocence."
Before he had finished his sentence, Oleah had climbed down from his knee, and was scampering away toward the nursery. Abner was not more than two seconds in following him.
"Wall, now, see heah," said the hunter; "while them young rattletraps is gone, jest tell me what all this means. Hez someone been increasin' yer family by leavin' babies a layin' around loose, or is it a big doll some one haz give the boys?"
"It's just as the boys say," Mr. Tompkins answered. "Some one did actually leave a baby about six months old on this porch, and no one knows who he was, where he came from, or where he went."
"That's mighty strange. How long ago was it?"
"About six weeks."
"Wall, now, ain't that strange? Have you any suspicion who done it?"
"Not the least."
"Wall, it is strange. Never saw no un sneakin' about the house, like?"
"No one at all."
"Humph! Well, it's dog gone strange."
At this moment the two boys, with Dinah in attendance, came out, bearing between them little Irene.
"Here it is; here is our baby! Ain't she sweet, though?" cried Oleah, as they bore their precious burden toward the mountaineer.
"Why it's a spankin' big un, by jingo! Ya-as, an' I be blessed ef I ain't seen that baby before," cried Uncle Dan.
"Where?" asked Mr. Tompkins, eagerly.
Uncle Dan took the little thing on his lap, and, as it turned its large dark-gray eyes up to his in wonder, he reflected a few minutes in silence and then said:
"I saw a baby what looked like this, and I'll bet a good deal it is the same one, too."
"Where did you see it?" again demanded the planter.
"That's jest what I'm tryin' to think up," said Uncle Dan. "Oh, yes; it war in the free nigger's cabin, on the side o' the east Twin Mountain. You know where the old cabin stands, where we used to camp when we war out huntin'!"
"Yes."
"Wall, I war roamin' by there one day, and found two nigger men and a woman livin' there. They had this baby with them, and I questioned them as to where they war gwine, but one nigger, who had a scar slaunch-ways across his face," here the narrator made an imaginary mark diagonally across his left cheek to indicate what he meant by "slaunch-ways," "said they war gwine to live thar. I asked 'em whar they got the baby, and they said its people war dead, and they war to take it to some of its relations. I left 'em soon, for I couldn't git much out o' them, but I detarmined to keep an eye on 'em. The next time I came by that way they were gone, bag and baggage."
"The free nigger's cabin is at least twenty miles from here," said Mr. Tompkins. "It is strange why they should bring the baby all that way here and leave it."
"It do look strange, but I guess they war runaway niggers what had stole the child out of spite, and when they got heah give out an' left it. I kinder think these niggers war from the South."
"Have you ever seen or heard of them since?" asked Mr. Tompkins.
"Neither har nor hide."
At this moment a stranger to Uncle Dan came sauntering up the lawn, and, stepping on the porch, addressed them with:
"Can you tell me where my brothers feed their flocks?"
"He's crazy," whispered Abner to the hunter. "He's crazy, and mamma says pretend as if he was talking sense."
"Oh, they are out thar somewhar on the hills, I reckin'," Uncle Dan answered.
Joe looked at the mountaineer for a moment, carefully examining the hunting jacket of tanned skins, the hair of which formed an ornamental fringe, and then said:
"I know you now. You are my Uncle Esau; but why should you be here in Egypt? It was you who grew angry with my father because he got your birthright for a mess of potage. You sought to slay him and he fled. Have you come to mock his son?"
"Oh, no, youngster; yer pap and me hev made up that little fuss long ago. I forgive him that little steal, an' now we ar' all squar' agin."
"But why are you in Egypt? You must be very old. My father, who is younger than you, is old—bowed down—"
"Poor boy," said Mr. Tompkins, with a sigh, "he has been a close student, and perhaps that was what turned his head."
"Does he ever git rantankerous?" asked Uncle Dan.
"No; he is always mild and harmless."
"Have you seen my father?" Joe now asked. "He has long white hair and snowy beard."
"No, youngster; I ain't got a sight o' the old man fur some time," said Uncle Dan.
"Potiphar resembles my father, but my father must be dead," and he sank into a chair, with a sad look of despair, and, burying his face in his hands, groaned as if in pain.
"He does that way a dozen times a day," Abner whispered to Uncle Dan.
"It's maughty strange," said Uncle Dan, shaking his head in a puzzled manner.
The next day, when the mountaineer was about to return to his lonely cabin, Crazy Joe asked permission to accompany his Uncle Esau. Consent was given, and he went and stayed several weeks. For years afterward he stayed alternate on Mr. Tompkins' plantation and at the home of the mountaineer.
CHAPTER V. THE MUD MAN.
Sixteen years, with all their joys and sorrows, all their pleasures and pains, have been numbered with the dead past. Boys have grown to be men, men in the full vigor of their prime have grown old, and creep about with bent forms and heads whitening, while men who were old before now slumber with the dead. Girls are women, and women have grown gray, yet father Time has touched gently some of his children.
Abner and Oleah Tompkins are no longer boys. Only the memory is left them of their childhood joys, when they played in the dark, cool woods, or by the brook in the wide, smooth lawn. Happy childhood days, when neither care nor anxiety weighed on their young hearts, or shadowed their bright faces.
Abner is twenty-five—a tall, powerful man, with dark-blue, fearless eyes, light-haired, broad-chested and muscular.
Oleah, two years younger, and not quite so tall, is yet in physical strength his brother's equal. He has the dark hair and large, dark, lustrous eyes of his Southern mother.
The brothers were alike and yet dissimilar. They had shared equally the same advantages; they had played together and studied together. Playmates in their childhood, friends as well as brothers in their young manhood, no one could question a doubt of their brotherly love. Where one had been, the other had always been at his side. No slightest difference had ever yet ruffled the smooth surface of their existence. Yet they were dissimilar in temperament. Abner was slow and cool, but perhaps more determined than his brother, and his reason predominated over his prejudice. Oleah was rash, impetuous and bold, and more liable to be moved by prejudice or passion than by reason. Abner was the exact counterpart of his Northern father, Oleah of his Southern mother.
Their political sympathies were different as their dispositions. Although of the same family, they had actually been taught opposite political creeds—one parent in a half-playful way, unconsciously advocating one idea; the other as firmly and unconsciously upholding another, and it was quite natural that the children should follow them. But this difference of opinion had bred no discord.
Sixteen years have wrought a wonderful change in Irene, the foundling. Her parentage is still a mystery, and she bears the name of her foster parents. She is just budding into womanhood, and a beautiful woman she promises to make—slender and graceful, her small, shapely head crowned with dark brown hair, her cheeks dimpling with smiles, mouth and chin firm and clear-cut and large, dark-gray eyes beneath arching brows and long silken lashes filled with a world of tenderness.
Irene could not have been loved more tenderly by the planter and his wife had she been their own child. They lavished care and affection upon her and filled her life with everything that could minister to her comfort and delight, and every one knew that they would make generous provision for the little waif who had gained so sure a place in their hearts.
Sixteen years had made some change in the planter. His hair had grown whiter, his brow more furrowed with care, and he went about with a heavy cane; yet he was vigorous and energetic. He had grown more corpulent, and his movements were less brisk than of yore. Father Time had dealt leniently with his wife. Her soft, dark hair was scarcely touched with silver; her cheeks were smooth and her eyes were still bright and lustrous. Her voice had lost none of its silver ring, her manner none of its queenly grace.
No ray of light had pierced the darkened mind of Crazy Joe. All these long, weary years he had been waiting, waiting, waiting, for his father Jacob to come down into Egypt, but he came not. He still talked as if it was but yesterday that he had been cast into the pit by his brethren, and then taken out and sold into Egypt. He spent his time in turns at the planter's and Uncle Dan's cabin. He was well known throughout the neighborhood, and pitied and kindly treated by all. His strange hallucination, although causing pain and perplexity to his shattered mind, worked no change in his gentle disposition; his sad eyes never flashed with anger; no emotion varied the melancholy monotone of his voice. When at the home of the planter, Joe divided his time between the stables, the garden and the library. He would have been a constant reader of the Bible, Josephus, Socrates, Milton's "Paradise Lost," had it not been discovered by Mrs. Tompkins that these books only tended to increase the darkness in which his mind was shrouded, and she had them kept from him. At Uncle Dan's mountain home he passed his time in hunting and trapping, becoming expert in both.
Sixteen years had wrought a great change in Uncle Dan, bowing his tall and sinewy form. His face, which he had always kept smooth shaven, had grown sharper and thinner, and his long hair hanging about his shoulders, had turned from black to gray; yet his eye was as true and his hand as steady as when, in his youthful days, he carried away the prize at the shooting match. His visits to the plantation became more frequent and his stays longer, for the old man grew lonesome in his hut, and he was ever a welcome guest at the Tompkins mansion.
Sixteen years had made a wonderful transformation in the politics of the country. The Whig party had been swallowed up by the Republican or Abolition organization. The seeds of freedom, sown by Clarkson, Brown and others, had taken root, and, in the Fall of 1860, bade fare to ripen into a bounteous harvest. The Southern feeling against the North had grown more and more bitter, and the low, rumbling thunders of a mighty storm might have been heard—a storm not far distant, and whose fury naught but the blood of countless thousands could assuage.
"In the beginning, God created Heaven and the earth, and all that was in them, in six days, and rested on the seventh."
The speaker was Crazy Joe, the time, midsummer of 1860, the place the banks of a creek at the foot of the mountains, not more than two or three hundred feet from Uncle Dan's cabin.
"Then the book says God made man out of clay. Josephus says he called the first man Adam, because Adam means red, and He made him out of red clay. Now, if man could once be made out of clay, why not now? Maybe God will let me make a man, too."
Filling his hands with mud, he set vigorously to work. No sculptor could have been more in earnest than was Crazy Joe. He rolled and patted the mud into shape, first the feet, then the legs, then the body. Occasionally the body would tumble down, but he patiently set to work again, persevering until he had body, arm and head all completed. His mud man was a little over five feet in height, and greatly admired by his maker and owner.
"Now I have accomplished almost as much as God did," soliloquized Joe. "I have made a man of clay; it only remains for him to speak and move, and he will be equal to any of us."
He went to the cabin and acquainted Uncle Dan with the wonderful work he had performed, and asked him to come and see it. The next day he went to view the object of poor Joe's two days' labor, greatly to Joe's delight. Uncle Dan then returned to his cabin for his gun, and Joe went to Snagtown, which was between Mr. Tompkins' plantation and the hunter's cabin.
Joe there informed the storekeeper, the village postmaster, and a few others, of his remarkable piece of handiwork, and asked them to come and see it. They promised to go the next day, if Joe would stay all night in the village.
Joe stayed, and that night there came a heavy rain. The creek overflowed and Joe's mud man was washed away. He conducted a party of hunters to the spot next morning, but the man of clay had vanished.
"He must have walked away," said Joe shaking his head in a puzzled manner. "He has gone off, though I cautioned him to wait until I came back."
The hunting party explained to Joe that his mud man had become tired of waiting, and left, and went off themselves, leaving the mortified Joe searching about the soft soil for tracks of the missing mud man. His search for the trail took him to Snagtown.
Patrick Henry Diggs, whom we met in his boyhood as the youthful orator at Mr. Tompkins' was, in 1860, a lawyer. His parents were dead, leaving him a limited education, a superficial knowledge of law, and a very small property. The paternal homestead was mortgaged, but Mr. Diggs still kept old Mose, for the sake of being a slaveholder and maintaining aristocratic appearance. Mr. Diggs had but little practice, and found it a difficult thing to make his own living. He was about twenty-eight years old, short and plump like his father. The most peculiar portion of his anatomy was his head. The forehead was low, and the small round head more nearly resembled a cocoanut painted white, with hair on its top, than anything else to which we can compare it. The hair was very thick and cut very short. The eyebrows were heavy and close together, the eyes dark gray and restless, the nose small and straight. The most admirable portion of his physiognomy, Mr. Diggs thought, were his side-whiskers, which were short and dark, growing half-way down his small, red cheeks and coalescing with his short mustache. Mr. Diggs was exceedingly aristocratic, and wore gold-rimmed spectacles on his short nose. These glasses, which gave him a ridiculous appearance, were removed when he wanted to read or exercise his unobstructed vision. His friends tried to persuade him to give them up, but in vain. And with his glasses on his nose, his head thrown back in order to see persons of ordinary height, and his fat little hands in his pockets, he strutted about the streets of Snagtown.
Mr. Diggs, like his father, was a politician. In the campaign of 1860 he was a candidate for the district attorneyship of his county. His dingy little office, with its scant furniture and exceedingly small library, was deserted, and he spent most of his time on the streets, discussing the political issues. On the day that Crazy Joe was in search of his mud man, Mr. Diggs, as usual was strutting about the streets, his hands in his pockets, his glasses mounted on his nose, wherefrom a very evident string extended to his neck.
"I tell you," said Mr. Diggs, closing his little fat right hand and striking therewith the palm of his little fat left hand, "I tell you, sir, I—I do not favor outlawry, but I do believe one would be doing our country a service by hanging every man who votes or attempts to vote the Abolition ticket."
"Oh, no, Mr. Diggs," said Abner Tompkins, who chanced that day to be in Snagtown, and overheard the remark; "the ballot is a constitutional privilege, and no man should be deprived of his right."
"Yes—ahem—ahem! but you see, when there is a man on the track who, if elected, will set all our niggers free, we should object. You know—no, you don't know, but we lawyers all know—that private property can not be taken for public use without a just compensation, and still the Abolition candidate will violate this portion of our constitutional law."
"You don't know yet; Mr. Lincoln has not yet declared what he will do," replied Abner.
"Has not? Hem, hem, hem!" Mr. Diggs stumped about furiously, his head inclined backward in order to see his companion's face through his ornamental glasses, while he cleared his throat for a fresh burst of thunder. "Has not, hey? Hem, hem! He might as well. We all know what he will do if elected. And I'll tell you something more," he added, walking back and forth, his hands plunged in his pockets, while seeming to grow more and more furious, "if Lincoln is elected there will be war!" (Great emphasis on the last word.)
At this moment Crazy Joe, who had reached the village in search of his mud man, came up to the excited Diggs, and, laying his hand on his arm, in a very serious voice said:
"Say, why didn't you stay where I put you until I showed you?"
"What do you mean?" demanded Mr. Diggs, pausing in his agitated walk, and gazing furiously into the lunatic's face, for he suspected some one of attempting to play a joke on him.
"What made you go away before I showed you?" said Joe, earnestly, gazing down upon the furious little fellow.
"I—I don't understand what you mean," said the puzzled Mr. Diggs, drawing himself up to his full height, which was hardly imposing.
"When I make a man of mud, and go off and leave him, to get people to come and look at him, I don't want him to go off, as you did, before I come back."
Abner Tompkins, and several others, who had heard the story of Joe's mud man, were now almost bursting with suppressed merriment.
"I can't tell what the deuce you mean?" said the angry Mr. Diggs.
"I made you out of mud and clay, and left you standing by the big tree at the creek while I went to get some people to show you to, that I might convince them that man was made out of clay, but before I got back you walked off. Now, why didn't you stay until I showed you?"
The men gathered about Mr. Diggs could no longer restrain themselves, and burst into peals of laughter, which made Mr. Diggs furious.
"This is some trick you are playing," he cried, and, turning upon his heel, he strutted away to his office, where he shut himself up for the next two hours.
The joke spread rapidly, and in two hours every one in the village knew that Crazy Joe claimed Mr. Diggs as his mud man; while poor Joe, satisfied that he had found the object of his creation, consented to go home with Abner.
CHAPTER VI. A TRANSITION PERIOD.
All Snagtown was astonished one day when a flaring handbill announcing that Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas would speak in that unpretentious little village. Their presence there was due to the accident of missing connections in passing from one city to another.
It would have been hard to say whether the citizens of Snagtown were more astonished or indignant. A public meeting was called the day before the Abolitionists were advertised to speak, to determine what means could be taken in this emergency. The Mayor presided, and the residents, not only of the village, but of all the surrounding country, were urged to be present.
"I tell you, gentlemen—hem! hem!—it will never do," said Mr. Diggs, as he strutted about, his glasses on his nose, casting upward glances into the faces of those who were discussing the question. "Hem! hem! hem! I tell you it will not do at all," and he expectorated spitefully upon the pavement. "We must prevent Lincoln's speaking here, if we have to mob him. He comes not only to deprive us of our slaves, but to destroy the flag of Washington and Marion, the glorious Stars and Stripes! I, for one, am in favor of saying he shall not speak."
"So am I," said another.
"And so am I," said a third.
"And I, and I, and I," came responses from many voices.
"Hem, hem, hem!" began Mr. Diggs, shrugging his shoulders, and moving about furiously, indicating thereby how much in earnest he had become. "I tell you we must not permit it. Why, it's treason. Yes, sir; he teaches treason, and it's our duty, as law-abiding citizens, not to permit him to speak."
"Well, now, do you make them pints, when we have our meetin' to-morrow night," said an illiterate Virginian.
"Hem, hem, hem!" began Mr. Diggs, thrusting his hands deep into his pockets, his head on one side, kicking his feet alternately one against the other. "I will. Hem, hem! I am going to make a speech just about an hour long—ha! ha! ha!—so that no one else will get a chance to put in a word, and we shall have it all our own way." The young lawyer, highly pleased with the favor that he flattered himself he was gaining politically, finished his sentence with a gleeful chuckle, and strutted about, swelling with his own importance.
All over the village could be seen groups of men, from five to twenty in number, discussing the propriety of allowing "Abe Lincoln" to speak in the village. A majority seemed opposed to it, and a few of the more reckless spirits talked of tar and feathers and fence rails.
The evening for the public meeting, which was to decide the all-important question, arrived. The town hall was crowded to its utmost capacity. Mr. Tompkins and his two sons were present, and so was Uncle Dan, the mountaineer. The meeting was called to order and the Mayor took the chair. He was a man past the meridian of life, a slaveholder and a royal Southerner. The long, white beard falling down upon his breast gave him a patriarchal look.
The uproar and confusion of tongues were hushed, and all awaited the speaker in anxious silence.
A call was made on any one present to state the object of the meeting. A man sprang at once to his feet, and succinctly informed the chairman that the "object of this meetin' is to determine the question whether or not it is best to 'low Abraham Lincoln, the great Abolitionist, to speak in the town. I believe them's all the pints to be discussed," and he sat down. Another and more voluble speaker arose and addressed the meeting. He was of the class called "fire-eaters," and was strongly and directly opposed to Lincoln's visit to Snagtown. His speech was replete with the vilest vituperations his brain could conceive, or his tongue utter, against the Republican party. He regarded them as robbers, as enemies who should be shot down at sight, and he was in favor of greeting Abe Lincoln with tar and feathers if he dared show himself in Snagtown.
Several others spoke in the same vein, and then Mr. Diggs rose. His speech of an hour proved not half so long. It was full of empty-sounding words and borrowed ideas, for there was little originality about Mr. Diggs.
All, so far, had been against the proposed debate between Lincoln and Douglas, but now a man rose in the audience whose word always carried weight. It was Mr. Tompkins, the planter.
"Mr. Chairman," he began, in even, modulated tones, "I am, indeed, surprised that men of intelligence should give vent to such expressions and such feelings as we have heard this evening—men who know the law, and claim to be law abiding citizens. Are we savages or border ruffians, that we must be swayed and controlled by mob law? Have we not a Constitution and Constitutional privileges? Have we not statute laws to protect us against wrongs which others may inflict? Then why resort to mob law? Why disgrace our fair State and put the blush of shame on all good citizens by attacking, like outlaws, a stranger among us? Our Constitution gives to all freedom of speech, and we have no right to deny any man this Constitutional privilege."
Mr. Tompkins proceeded quietly but forcibly, pointing out to the malcontents the error of their plans. In conclusion, he said:
"I may be the only one in the house who opposes these views, but as one I say this, though I be alone. I will oppose with violence the attempt to injure Mr. Lincoln. You are not compelled to vote for him, even to hear him speak; but if Mr. Lincoln comes here, by Heaven! he shall speak."
"So say I, an' I swar if any sorry hound attempts the mobbin' business, he'll have to cross my carcass fust." The speaker was Uncle Dan, and as he spoke he drew up his tall figure by the side of Mr. Tompkins, holding his ominous-looking rifle in his hand.
Abner also rose and took his place at his father's side, but Oleah kept his seat. This was the first visible difference of opinion between the brothers.
Several who had been emboldened by Mr. Tompkins' words now declared that they thought it best not to oppose Mr. Lincoln's speaking there, as it would increase his popularity in other localities.
One or two of the more fiery replied, maintaining that their case was beyond the remedy of civil law; that mob law was the only law which should be meted out to scoundrels and Abolition thieves, and if some of the citizens intended to espouse the cause of Abe Lincoln, and fight for him, now was as good as any to settle the matter. A riot seemed inevitable, but a laughable event now happened, changing anger into mirth.
Mr. Diggs, fearing that his legal knowledge would be called into question, now rose and said:
"I wish to make one other statement, in order to put myself right before the people. I knew the Constitutional law referred to by Mr. Tompkins, giving every man freedom of speech, and I can give you the book and the page—"
"Oh, you need not," said a wag in the audience. "Answer this question instead: Are you Crazy Joe's mud man, and why did you leave before he came back to exhibit you?"
"Oh, stop that nonsense! I came here to talk sense, not to hear of a fool's ravings," cried the indignant Mr. Diggs.
But everybody had heard the story of the mud man, and hostile feelings now gave way to laughter. The laugh was kept up until Mr. Diggs became enraged and left the assembly, swearing that they were "all a pack of fools."
A compromise was effected. Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Douglas were to be permitted to speak in a grove near the village, but not in the village itself. The next day Mr. Tompkins and Abner, and a few others, with the aid of their negroes, erected a speaker's stand, and arranged seats for an audience of over two thousand persons. There were still low murmurs of discontent, but the most bitter malcontents had been overawed by the firm stand taken by Mr. Tompkins. Many others had caught his spirit, and defied the hostile threats of the opponents of free speech.
The occasion had been so thoroughly advertised by the meeting and the threats and opposition of those who wanted to prevent it, that the whole country for miles around turned out. People on foot, on horseback, in carriages and in wagons, came until thousands were assembled on the spot, many prompted by curiosity to see the bold Abolitionist who dared invade the sacred soil of Virginia and propound his infamous doctrine.
About ten o'clock two carriages rolled in from the nearest railroad station, bearing the two disputants, with friends of each in attendance. There was an eager craning of necks, and a hushed whisper went through that vast audience as the two opponents for the highest political honors of the country descended from the carriage.
"Who are they?" "Where are they?" "Is that big, two-hundred-and-fifty-pounder Douglas?" "Is that short, stout-built man with big burnsides Lincoln?" and a hundred other questions of a like character were asked.
A few preliminaries were arranged. Mr. George Washington Tompkins was chosen chairman, and took his place on the stand. Two New York reporters were present with note-books and pencils.
The first speaker introduced was Mr. Stephen A. Douglas. His speech—eloquent, patriotic and straightforward—generously concluded with an exhortation to the audience to listen calmly, without any expression of bitterness, to his opponent, who chanced to differ from him on the great question of the day. When Mr. Douglas took his seat, Mr. Tompkins rose and introduced Mr. Abraham Lincoln, a tall man, wearing short, dark whiskers on his chin, and with hair slightly streaked with gray.
A subdued hiss from many lips was heard as the great "Abolition candidate" arose.
After a smile as of compassion upon his audience, Mr. Lincoln began speaking. He talked mildly and candidly, yet freely, notwithstanding the feeling evinced by some of his hearers. Those deep, rich tones rang through the surrounding grove as he clearly and forcibly expounded the principles of the Republican party, showing them to have been either misunderstood or misrepresented by his opponent. Many who had come to prevent the hated Abolitionist from speaking now listened with interest. This was not such iniquitous doctrine after all. Every point made by Mr. Douglas was successfully met, and his own argument arrayed against him. Mr. Lincoln spoke for two hours, and at the conclusion of his address his bitter enemies were forced to admit that he was a man of immense power. His oratory was so grandly sublime in effect that when he took his seat an outbreak of applause, which could not be suppressed, could not be restrained, burst from the spell-bound audience.
Mr. Tompkins went to the meeting a Douglas man, but he left with the full determination to vote for Abraham Lincoln at the coming Fall election, as did Uncle Dan and many others. This was truly a transition period, as the whole world was to learn in a few short months. The Whig party was dwindling away, and slavery was withered and scorched before the fiery eloquence of Lincoln, Sumner, and other similar orators. Freedom was dawning, but it was to be ushered in with fire, and sword, and death.
Mr. Tompkins and his sons were late in coming home that evening. Abner and Oleah sat side by side in the family carriage, yet neither spoke. Hitherto, every event had been fully discussed; every feeling shared by the brothers; but a silence that was almost coolness now sealed their lips. A thousand conflicting thoughts swept through their minds.
Abner was convicted, converted, by the new doctrine to which he had listened, and the melodious voice of the orator was still ringing in his ears as the carriage rolled homeward. He still seemed to see the tall, rugged form and plain face, lit up with something rarer than beauty by his eloquent pleading for four millions of enslaved human beings.
Oleah was in a gloomy mood. He had listened with angry impatience to the exposition of views so different from his own, and that his father should have presided over the meeting, and stood openly side by side with the Abolitionist, stung his Southern prejudices and vexed him to the soul.
The trio were driven home in silence, and parted for the night, without any reference to the events of the day.
At the table the next morning the discussion of the day before was first alluded to. Mr. and Mrs. Tompkins, Abner and Oleah, sat for some moments in silence—a silence both painful and awkward, and, in this family circle, unusual; but Irene entered the breakfast room, bright and unconscious, eager to know all that had passed at Snagtown the day before.
"We heard an excellent speech," said Abner.
"Yes; Douglas did well," put in Oleah.
"I mean Mr. Lincoln," said Abner. "Douglas' speech was good, but his position was entirely demolished by Mr. Lincoln's eloquent reasoning."
"You don't call the harangue of that contemptible old demagogue reasoning, do you?" asked Oleah, astonished and indignant.
"I certainly do," replied Abner. "His reasoning appeared to me clear, and his conclusions logical."
"And I," cried Oleah, laying down his knife and fork in his excitement, "I declare I never before heard so much sophistry, and not very plausible sophistry, either."
"You are prejudiced," said Abner, coolly.
"It is you who are prejudiced. Why he actually asserted we would be more prosperous if there was not a slave in the United States."
"Yes, and proved his assertion," said Abner.
"Oh, you let him pull the wool over your eyes." There was a sneer in his voice. "I tell you there was neither logic nor reason in what he said. No logical conclusions can be drawn from false premises; no assertions can stand unsupported by proof."
"What did he assert that he did not prove?" asked Abner.
"What did he prove that he asserted?"
"You evade my question by asking another."
"Precisely the same plan Mr. Lincoln adopted," replied Oleah.
"You are prejudiced against Mr. Lincoln, Oleah. Now, tell me what he said that any fair-minded man in the world can not agree to?"
"He said that slavery should not wither and blight another inch of territory if he could help it."
"What objection can even a believer in slavery have to that? We have an immense scope of country where slavery is permitted; then why extend it to Territories where it is unpopular?"
"But can you not see what lies in the background?" said Oleah, bitterly. "Mr. Lincoln lifted the curtain high enough for one who was not blinded by his eloquence to see what was behind it. I would not fear to wager everything I own that Mr. Lincoln, if elected, will set free every slave in the United States, before he has been in the presidential chair a twelvemonth."
"Did he not say that such emancipation would be unwise policy?"
"He said so, but his tone and manner belied his words."
"Confess now, Oleah, that you are a little prejudiced against Mr. Lincoln," said the father, good-humoredly.
"You may call it prejudice or what you like, father," Oleah answered, his flushed face showing how deep was his feeling; "but if Mr. Lincoln is elected you will not have a nigger when his term is over, if he should be permitted to take his seat."
"Why, my son, you can't think he would not be permitted to take his seat?"
"That is a question, father. Each State has its rights. Southern people have rights, and rather than be cheated of them they may resort to force."
"Now, Oleah," said Abner, "you don't for a moment suppose that if Mr. Lincoln should be chosen President by the voters of the United States, that any considerable body of intelligent people could be found who would be unfair enough, or foolhardy enough, to attempt to prevent him from taking his seat?"
"I certainly do," answered Oleah, with an air of conviction.
"You are a Democrat; do you not hold with us Democrats that the majority should rule?"
"That has nothing to do with it," said Oleah, hotly. "The North and the East outnumber the South, and they have formed a combination for her ruin, and the impoverishment of her people. They have nothing at stake in Lincoln's election; we have everything. They have nothing to lose—we, all. Our interests conflict. They see an opulent and growing South, and have set their inventive Yankee genius at work to compass its ruin. Our cotton fields, our rice fields, our sugar crops, our tobacco crops, are the production of slave labor, and the abundant wealth of the South excites the emulation of the cold and envious North. If they can deprive us of this slave labor, they will have killed the goose that lays our golden eggs, and may surpass us in wealth and power. This they have determined to do. They have tried it by legislation, and so far have failed. They outnumber us in votes, because there every worthless fellow's vote counts as much as that of a Governor or a man who owns a thousand slaves. How can they accomplish our ruin? By electing as president a man whose every breath is poison to slavery; a man who may, at any time, under the fancied exigencies of the moment, declare all slaves free. Their plans are deep and shrewd, but there are heads in the South as wise as theirs, and eyes that can see the danger in time to avert it."