8. CHAPTER VIII.
The Author descends among the slaves, and suddenly becomes a
man of figure, and an interpreter of new doctrines.
I wasmoved with curiosity to know what they
had laid their hands on, and I descended the bank
to solve the mystery. The paper had passed from
the hands of Governor to those of a fellow named
Jim, or Parson Jim, as we usually called him; for
he was fond of praying and preaching, which he
had been allowed to do until detected in a piece
of roguery a few weeks before by Master Major,
who, besides putting a check on his clerical propensities
for the future, saluted him with two or
three kicks well laid on, on the spot. It was to
this personage and his punishment that Governor
alluded, when he cried, “What he-ah? Massa
Maja kickin' de pawson!” as mentioned above.
Although a great rogue, he was a prime favourite
among the negroes, who had a great respect for his
learning; for he could read print, and was even
thought to have some idea of writing. This fellow
was employed, on the present occasion, at the
ox-cart; and, as it is no part of a slave's system to
do the work of others, he had been sitting apart
singing a psalm, while the others were loading his
cart; and apart he had remained, until a call was
made upon him to explain so much of the paper,
being the printed portion, as Governor could not.
The paper, it is here proper to observe, had been
found by Governor among the boards and scantling;
though how it got there no one knew, nor was it
ever discovered. It was a pamphlet, or magazine,
I know not which (and the name I have unfortunately
forgotten), containing, besides a deal of
strange matter about slavery, some half a dozen or
more wood-cuts, representing negroes in chains,
under the lash, exposed in the market for sale, and
I know not what other situations; and it was these
which had afforded the delighted Governor so much
matter for mimicry and merriment. There was
one cut on the first page, serving as a frontispiece;
it represented a negro kneeling in chains,
and raising his fettered hands in beseeching to a
white man, who was lashing him with a whip.
Beneath it was a legend, which being, or being
deemed, explanatory of the picture, and at the same
time the initial sentence of the book, Parson Jim
was essaying to read: and thus it was he proceeded:—
“T-h-e, the—dat's de; f-a-t-e, fat—de fat; o-f,
ob—de fat ob; t-h-e, de—de fat ob de; s-l-a-v-e,
slave—de fat ob de slave. My gorry, what's dat?
Brederen, I can't say as how I misprehends dat.”
“Yah, yah, yah!” roared Governor; “plain as
de nose on you face. De fat ob de slave—what
he mean, heh? Why, gorry, you dumb nigga, he
mean—massa, dah, is whippin de fat out ob de
nigger! Dem hard massa dat-ah, heh? Whip de
fat out!
“Lorra-gorry, massa, don't like you whippy:
Don't sell Gubbe'nor down a Mississippi!”
“Let me read it,” said I.
“You read, you nigga! whar you larn to read?”
cried my friends. It was a question I could not
well answer; for, as I said before, the memory of
my past existence had quite faded from my mind:
nevertheless, I had a feeling in me as if I could
read; and taking the book from the parson, I succeeded
in deciphering the legend—“The Fate of
the Slave.”
“Whaw dat?” said Governor; “de chain and
de cowhide? Does de book say dat's de luck for
nigga? Don't b'leeb 'm; dem lie: Massa Cunnel
nebber lick a nigga in 'm life!”
The reading of that little sentence seemed, I
know not why, to have cast a sudden damper on
the spirits of all present. Until that moment, there
had been much shouting, laughing, and mimicking
of the pains of men undergoing flagellation. Every
picture had been examined, commented on, and
illustrated with glee; it associated only the idea
of some idle vagabond or other winning his deserts.
A new face, a new interpretation was given to the
matter by the words I had read. The chain and
scourge appeared no longer as the punishment of
an individual; they were to be regarded as the
doom of the race. The laughing and mimicry
ceased, and I beheld around me nothing but blank
faces. It was manifest, however, that the feeling
was rather indignation than anxiety; and that my
friends looked upon the ominous words as a libel
upon their masters and themselves.
“What for book say dat?” cried Governor, who,
from being the merriest, had now become the angriest
of all; “who ebber hear of chain a nigga,
escept nigga runaway, or nigga gwyin' down gin'
will to Mississippi? Who ebber hear of lash a
nigga, escept nigga sassbox, nigga thief, nigga
drunk, nigga break hoss' leg?”
“Brudders,” said Parson Jim, “this here is a
thing what is 'portant to hear on; for, blessed be
Gorra-matty, there is white men what writes books
what is friends of the Vaginnee niggur.”
“All cuss' bobbolitionist!” said Governor, with
sovereign contempt—“don't b'leeb in 'm. Who
says chain nigga in Vaginnee? who says cowhide
nigga in Vaginnee? De fate ob de slave! Cuss'
lie! An't I slave, hah? Who chains Gubbe'nor?
who licks Gubbe'nor? Little book big lie!”
And “little book big lie!” echoed all, in extreme
wrath. The parson took things more coolly. He
rolled his eyes, hitched up his collar, stroked his
chin, and suggesting the propriety of reading a
little farther, proposed that “brudder Tom, who
had an uncommon good hidear of that ar sort of
print, should hunt out the root of the matter;” and
lamented that “it was a sort of print
he could not
well get along with without his spectacles.”
