University of Virginia Library

46. CHAPTER XLVI.
THE HURRICANE COMMENCES.

Our comedy is almost finished. Having conducted Captain
Ralph and Lanky, Mr. Effingham and his friend Hamilton,
to say nothing of Henrietta, Clare, Miss Alethea and Donsy,
even Will and Kate, very nearly to the hymeneal altar, the
history pauses, like a wind which, rising in a whisper, swells
and ever grows, and then dies away in silent murmurs in the
distance.

But there are necessary to the narrative one or two more
scenes, which we must briefly speak of.

All Williamsburg is in terrific commotion; a moral storm
is raging there, and men look about them, measuring each
other with doubtful eyes. At the office of the “Virginia
Gazette,” an enormous crowd is collected, and within, are
heard the presses rolling rapidly, and vainly striving to
strike off sufficient copies of the journal, to supply the
eager hands held out to take them.

The street is full of people passing to and fro; the
crowd undulates; a murmur rises which at times swells into
a great shout.

Suddenly the multitude raises its startled head. A bell
begins to toll—slowly, solemnly, with a melancholy expression,
which seems to echo the feeling of the crowd.

The explanation of the gathering, of the demand for
copies of the journal, of the tolling bell, is simple. The
vessel lying yonder at the port of York, and just from
London, has brought the intelligence of the passage of the
Stamp Act.

For this reason the crowd murmurs, and stretches out its
Briarean hands towards the printing office, where an additional
number has been hastily composed, containing the
provisions of the act.

As they receive the papers unfolded, they hastily glue
their eyes to them, and with dozens of persons looking
over their shoulders, scan the ominous words. Upon a
barrel, at some distance, is mounted a man who reads to that
portion of the crowd next him, the contents of his paper.

The population of the town flow backward and forward,
as the blood flows in the veins and arteries. But the office
of the journal is the heart, to which all the streams return,
from which the flood pours, ever making way for others.

The crowd is for the most part composed of men who
seem to be of humble rank, such as are not accustomed to
criticise very strongly any acts of government; but among
these rude forms are seen great numbers of the richly clad
members of the House of Burgesses, whose powdered heads
and embroidered doublets present a strong contrast to the
coarse fustian of the commoners.

The faces of the burghers are troubled—doubtful; they

are to act, not merely murmur, as the popular voice murmurs;
and the crisis is enough to try the soul. On one
side, England with her tremendous strength, her overwhelming
power by land and sea, and her immemorial prestige of
sovereignty; upon the other, a few weak colonies, scattered
over a wild continent, and scarcely knowing each other—or
whether if one rises in opposition, the rest will not march
to put her down. On one side an act of Parliament armed
with all the weight of a solemn resolution of that great
government; upon the other, a mere popular sentiment,
which only stammers “Liberty—the liberty of free born
Englishmen!”

And this very day the trial comes:—for Governor Fauquier
will open the House of Burgesses, and officially communicate
to that body the intelligence of the passage of the
act:—and they must at once make submission or throw down
the gauntlet of defiance.

The crowd, as they respectfully make way for them, follow
them with their eyes:—they seek to read in the faces of the
burghers what reply they deign to make to his serene Excellency.

Those men whom we have seen at the Governor's ball
formerly, pass through the crowd—with animated faces, eagle
eyes. That stately Roman head stooping forward upon the
shoulders to which a hand in a black bandage is raised from
time to time, towers above the press, and with clear strong
eyes, surveys the excited throng with philosophic interest.

The bland lover of Anacreon reads hastily his journal.

The benevolent looking gentleman whose silvery voice
we have alluded to, whom we have seen lately at the mansion
of the soldier Captain Waters, raises his serene face above
the crowd, and one hand placed upon his heart seems to be
saying to that heart, “Be calm—rashness is worst, not best
—wait for the hour—be still—be moderate—exhaust the
means of protest—until all is trampled on do not strike!”

And there beside him is the man who has uttered many
words in this history: who eternally brooding with fiery
soul over one grand idea, now revels in the rising storm, and
feels his heart bound at the muttering tempest. He wraps
his old red cloak around him; elbows his way with scant
courtesy from group to group; listens to every word; gauges

the height of the flood as it rises and begins to foam, and estimates
the strength which it will finally possess, when, striking
the great dyke which opposes it, the water shall break
loose. He smiles grimly from time to time, and utters detached
sentences in his vigorous, somewhat affected patois,
which very plainly is meant only to open his way to the rude
natures gathering around him.

His words—even his chance words—burn: for they have
fire in them. He condenses volumes into a sentence, and
utters bitter taunts.

“Strip your shoulders, strip!” he says, “the lash is
ready—you are slaves!”

And to others:

“Go crawl and grovel in the dirt! who knows but your
masters may take pity!”

And each of these words, cold, yet fiery—calm, yet
stormy, lashes the great popular commotion into huger
waves, from which gleam bloodshot eyes, and over which rise
threatening arms, clenched hands. The man in the red
cloak moulds the common mind as he goes, with a master
hand—he works it in his grasp like moistened clay: he
laughs at it, and taunts it, and overwhelms it with contemptuous
sarcasms, and pushes scornfully aside the menacing
breasts, and stands the very impersonation of their thoughts
and feelings, with a grim smile on his lips, a lurid fire in his
eyes which makes him lord of them—lord of their hearts
and arms.

The commotion ever rises higher, and the great wave,
extending from the governor's palace to the capital, the whole
length of Gloucester-street, surges to and fro, and breaks
into a foam of cries and furious gestures everywhere. And
still the bell tolls mournfully, and ever and anon rise those
shouts which mount to the gathering clouds above.

But now another sound startles the multitude. A cannon
roars from the palace, sending its hoarse sombre voice
upon the wind which now begins to rise. And then a drum
is heard.

The governor has set out from the palace for the capital,
there to open the House of Burgesses. Before him ride his
body-guard with drawn sabres, and the face of the old man
is seen through the window of his splendid chariot, which is

drawn slowly onward by six glossy horses, who toss their
rosetted heads and push aside the muttering crowd with
their chests.

The crowd mutters inarticulately: gazes sidewise at the
cortège slowly passing.

The governor raises his head, and pointing with his white,
jewelled finger through the window of the chariot, says to
one of the gentlemen who ride with him:

“What is that bell?”

“They began tolling it upon the intelligence this morning,
your Excellency.”

The governor shakes his head and sinks back in his
chariot, muttering, “Well, well, the die is thrown!”

The crowd mutter too, and with ever-increasing rage:
the cavalcade is followed by groans and murmurs which are
menacing murmurs.

So it continues all day: the chariot goes slowly back
again under the now lurid sky, and disappears within the
palace gates.

The crowd is increasing even yet: the windows of the
houses are filled with the excited faces of women, who exchange
whispers and wave their handkerchiefs to those they
recognize in the tumultuous throng below.

That throng, like a forest trembling at the approaching
whirlwind, moans and sighs and utters a crackling noise like
grating boughs: a rumbling like breakers on the coast.

The Raleigh tavern is full of heads. Men pass to and
fro, and a meeting is held in the Apollo room, where many
words are uttered. History has spoken of the place, the
words, the men.

Without, the tumult increases always as the night draws
on.

The man in the red cloak is still passing from group to
group, and when he leaves each group, it utters murmurs,
menaces and curses; he is master of the storm, and revels
in it.

On the great square especially the crowd is densest, and
sweeps more irresistibly than elsewhere from side to side,
swaying about and uttering hoarse cries. A dozen speakers,
mounting one after another upon the temporary platform,
near the centre, strive vainly to be heard.

The material storm rising in the lurid sky above, from
which thunder begins to mutter, might permit them to be
heard; the moral tornado is too furious.

Suddenly, a half silence falls upon the multitude, and
they listen to a man wrapped in an old red cloak, whose face
awes them: the time has come.

As he speaks, with awkward and slovenly gestures, in his
rude, harsh voice, the multitude are silent; they only look
at his eyes. Those eyes are fine. He rises in height; he
thunders; he lightens: the crowd shudder, and rise up and
shout.

“They are there at York!” he thunders, with a curling
lip; “are you afraid?”

And, descending from the platform, he hears a roar
which drowns the thunder overhead.

Yes, the blank stamps are in the vessel at the port of
York, and fifty horsemen whirl out of the town. Hundreds
of men follow on foot, shouting; they will have them; they
will burn them here before the palace of the royal governor.

The man in the red cloak wraps himself up grimly and
pushes through the crowd; he can wait.

He approaches the Raleigh; he raises his eyes: he sees
standing before him a man of the people, holding a staff in
his hand, and covered with dust. This man's eyes have the
expression of a madman's; his face is pale, his lips are white.
He gazes at the stranger; he scarcely hears him speak.

“Well met!” the stranger says; “see the storm which
I spoke of!”

The wayfarer says nothing.

“You miss a great feast,” the stranger goes on, grimly;
“you are too happy in your mountain.”

“I am there no longer.”

“Your wife—”

“I have none.”

And the face flushes passionately, and two bitter tears
roll down the pale, wan cheeks.

“No wife!” the stranger says, looking at him.

“God took her to himself.”

And bending down, he uttered a moan, and remained
silent—pale, gloomy, and despairing.

“Rouse! rouse!” the stranger says, “it is not the time
to grieve!”

The wayfarer looks at him, and his eyes make the stranger
tremble.

“I am calm,” he says.

“Come in here with me,” says the stranger, “we must
wait.”

And they enter the Raleigh.

Night draws on, lurid and tempestuous; the sky is dark
with clouds, from which issue thunder and lightning. The
wind moans.

The crowd has not moved, and is almost silent, until a
light appears approaching from the side of York.

They shout then, and surge backward and forward,
tumultuously going to meet the light.

Through the press comes slowly onward a wagon, whose
six horses foam at the mouth and pant, covered with sweat.
They have galloped all the way from Yorktown.

The wagon pauses in the middle of the square, and is
buried almost beneath the surge of men who throw themselves
upon it.

The horses, unhitched hastily, are lashed, and disappear
like shadows, but shadows which overthrew men as they
ploughed their furious way into the darkness.

The wagon is rifled with the rapidity of lightning. The
boxes containing the blank stamps are hurled out and piled
into a mass. The crowd utters a hoarse shout, and the
torch is applied to them.

The flame licks and clasps them, winding round and
through the pile of half broken boxes. Then it soars aloft,
and throws its glare upon the crowd, whose faces but now
were concealed by the darkness—faces full of rage,—rude
faces of the common people, who hear still that thunder of
the stranger, louder than the storm about to burst.

Then it is that they see two figures on the platform;
and they shout.

One is a man in a red cloak; the other younger, with a
pale, fiery face, which makes them shudder. The latter
speaks; the man in the red cloak listens.

The thunder roars, but it does not drown that stranger's
wild voice, which sounds like a wail from the other world.
The fire throws a crimson glare upon all faces; his is pale.

He strikes them with his burning words as with hot fire-brands;
he ploughs his way through the bosoms of the

surging multitude with a tremendous, gigantic passion; he
hurls upon them an eloquence which makes them shudder.
He arraigns England at the bar of eternal justice and brands
her; he lashes her with a whip of fire; he plunges the weapon
into her breast, and the blood spouts hot and gurgling. The
great multitude hold their breath—then roar.

The speaker sways to and fro, with his hair streaming
from his brow, his neck bare, his eyes full of blood, his lips
stained with a red foam.

He pours upon them a flood of passion which overwhelms
them—he rides upon the wave of popular commotion like a
whirlwind; he trembles, and they tremble with him; he
shouts, and they utter a roar which drowns the storm.

He raises his clenched hands to heaven, and with an overpowering,
terrible vehemence, which burns, and strikes, and
obliterates, speaks of the grinding oppression of all ages;—
facts glow and take vitality under his quivering hands; they
blaze like the roaring flame before him.

He staggers with the gigantic grandeur of his passion;
raves almost with his writhing lips, but with a madness
which bends all down with its terrible, inexorable method.
He totters from side to side, and again rises.

The multitude look at him with pale faces, then faces
flushed with wrath, terror, and indignation; and every word
he utters burns into them like a hot iron, leaving an ineffaceable
impression upon every heart. He speaks the
thoughts, the feelings, and the passions of them all.

And as he raises his pale brow to the storm, his fiery eyes,
his bleeding lips, a sudden flash of lightning blinds all eyes
with its terrible radiancy, lighting up tree and house, and all
the great surging crowd; and then comes a crash of thunder
like a thousand cannon, which seems to trample out the very
fire, for the flame crumbles into gloom, and disappears.

Pale, overwhelmed, and staggering, his mouth filled
with bloody foam, the speaker falls back fainting into the
outstretched arms of the man in the red cloak, who holds
him on his breast.

“Good!” murmured Patrick Henry, smiling grimly,
“the Revolution is begun!”