University of Virginia Library

98. XCVIII.
THE PATRIARCHAL SYSTEM. — AN AFFECTING
APPEAL IN BEHALF OF A FRIEND.

Yesterday I happened to pick up a copy uv a friteful depraved
Ablishin paper, and my horror-stricken eyes wuz glued
to the follerin passage, which I read: —

“I am happy to state to you that our free negroes are doing
finely. We have no trouble with them. They have all gone
to work manfully. They give an impetus to trade that we
never before had. I have sold John Guttle's negroes, this year
and last, more goods than I ever sold Guttle, and he owned
two hundred and fifty slaves. So you see the free negro system
is working well with us.”

Ez I peroozed them lines, tears started involuntarily from
my beamin eyes, and coursed in torrents down my venerable
cheeks. I know John Guttle well, I may say intimately. He
wuz a dear friend, — one uv the few wich I call friend in the
most comprehensive sense uv the word. He holds my note
for eighteen dollars and 63 cents; and I hev sumwhere among
my papers, wich I have always carefully preserved for reference,
a memorandum uv his address, that I might be shoor not
to forget to send it to him. I give him the note becoz he furnished
the paper, and it made him easy in his mind — I put
down the memorandum becoz it looked business-like. Benevolence
is a prominent trait in my character. When givin my
note for borrered money will do a man good, I never begrudge
the trouble uv writin it.

But wat I wuz a goin to say wuz, that the feendishnis uv
that item passes belief. The writer puts it in print to show
that the Ablishn uv slavery benefitted sumbody. I grant him
that the merchant, who undoubtedly wuz born in Massachoosetts,
wuz benefitted by the change; so are the greasy mechanics
who are now pollutin the soil uv Alabama; and so, probably,
are the 250 niggers; but, in the name uv Liberty, in the name

uv Justice, in the name uv the Constitooshun uv the United
States, and the flag uv our Common Country, I ask, How about
John Guttle?

John Guttle is robbed. John Guttle is deprived uv his
property. The bread is taken from John Guttle's mouth; his
staff is broken; his dependence is gone; he is bereft.

Never shall I forget John Guttle or his hospitable mansion,
ez I knowed it in the happy years afore the crooel war. He
wuz a gentleman uv the old school — one uv the few left us
in these degenerate days. His home wuz wun uv unalloyed
happiness. Situated just back uv Mobeel, he had the finest
plantashun in that section, and hed on it 250 niggers. All
shades wuz represented. There wuz the coal-black Cuffee,
whose feechers denoted the pure Afrikin, and whose awkward
manners showed that he wuz not long from Afrika. There
wuz the civilized mulatto, in whose veins the Guttle blood
showed; the quadroon, in whom the good old Guttle blood
predominated; and the octoroon, which wuz mostly Guttle.
The Guttleses wuz eminently a Christian generation. They
wuz devoutly pious; and there never wuz one uv the name
who cood not repeat, without the book, all uv the texts bearin
on slavery. The passages in which Onesimus and Hager figger
wuz favorites with em; but on “cussid be Canaan” they wuz
strong. For generations they had mourned over the hard fate
uv the sons uv Ham, doomed to perpetual bondage becoz uv
the sin uv their father; and with a missionary spirit ekaled by
few and excelled by none, they did their part towards redoosin
that cuss, by makin ez many of em ez possible half-brothers to
the more favored race uv Japhet, and thus bringing uv em out
uv the cuss; and they hed mellered the color uv their charges
down from the hideous black to a bright yeller. Under the
old patriarkle system, time passed off smoothly and pleasantly
with the Guttle family. Them 250 niggers wuz obliged, uv
course, to work, and their labor wuz money. John bought
each uv the male sons uv Ham two soots uv clothes per annum,
and each uv the female sons uv Ham one soot. It wuz considered
healthy for the young ones to go naked, which they
wuz religiously allowed to do, ez none uv the Guttles uv that
family wood do any thing agin nater or her laws. The girls

hed pianos, and wuz educated at the North; the boys wuz
celebrated for horse racing and their skill at losin money at
faro. They wuz hospitable and generous to a fault. Their
house wuz open house, and their beverages wuz alluz the best.
Money wuz no objick to them; for when they had a severe
attack of poker, or faro, or hoss racin, they hed plenty uv
octoroons and quadroons, with the real Guttle nose, wich brand
wuz well known in Noo Orleans, and wood alluz command the
highest possible figger that wuz paid in that market; or, ef
they had no more than they wanted at home uv that style, why,
a few field hands wood be sold, and the remainin ones wood be
persuaded by the overseer to do the work uv the whole. John
Guttle's sons wuz all in the Confederit army. His daughters,
willin to sacrifice every thing fur the cause, heroically pledged
theirselves to whip the niggers theirselves doorin their absence.

Now all is changed! A shadder hez fallen across that peaceful
home. The nigger quarters is there, but the niggers is
not. The broad plantashun is divided up into small farms, and
half uv it is owned by Ablishnists from the North, who work
theirselves, and who hev a meetin house on one corner uv it,
and the niggers a school house on the tother. The race track
is plowed up and in cotton; the whippin-post and the stocks is
taken down and burned; all, all the evidences uv civilizashun
hez faded afore the ruthless hand uv the invader. John Guttle
— that generous old man — subsists by the labor uv his own
hands. One uv his sons ekes out a miserable existence running
a dray in Mobeel; another, who is gifted with no ordinary
intelleck, earns a respectable living playing seven-up, in a small
way, with his former niggers; and the two girls is runnin a
sewing masheen.

Talk not to me uv benefits. What is a dozen tradesmen and
two hundred and fifty niggers to the glorious old Dimocratic
John Guttle? What is the interest uv a dozen or so uv Noo
England mechanics, and the niggers aforesaid, when compared
to that glorious aristocracy which can never exist beside em?
Kin I go and borrer eighteen dollars and sixty-three cents uv
one uv them? No. Becoz, working for their paltry livins,
they place a higher value on money, and will not spread it
around ez profoosely ez the noble race which preceded em.

Another great wrong is done in this setting free uv John
Guttle's niggers. John Guttle hez, uv course, no further
interest in the Dimocratic party. Slavery wuz the umbillikle
cord which united the Southern slaveholder and the Northern
Dimocrat; and, that cord cut, why hez John Guttle any more
interest in Dimocracy? We stood ez a Chinese wall between
them and the rushin flood uv Ablishn fanaticism; and we made
the wall biznis pay. They furnished money, and we did the
work; and, there bein but few uv us, the orfisis wuz easily
divided. Alas! our occupashin's gone. The South is forever
lost to us; for she hez no dirty work for us to do.

I appeal to the United States uv America. In behalf uv
John Guttle, I say, give him back his niggers. In behalf uv
the Dimocrisy North, who are out uv employment, give him
back his niggers. In behalf uv his son who is runnin a dray,
give him back his niggers. In behalf uv his daughters runnin
a sewin machine, give him back his niggers. Make things
Normal agin. Like John the Baptist, the Guvernment shall
hear the voice uv one howlin in the wilderness until all these
is done.