 | Uncle Tom's Cabin |  |
SCENE I
Chamber. Enter St. Clare, followed by Tom.
(Giving money and papers to Tom.)
There, Tom, are the bills, and
the money to liquidate them.
TOM:
Yes, mas'r.
ST. CLARE:
Well, Tom, what are you waiting for? Isn't all right there?
TOM:
I'm fraid not, mas'r.
ST. CLARE:
Why, Tom, what's the matter? You look as solemn as a judge.
TOM:
I feel very bad, mas'r. I allays have thought that mas'r would be good
to everybody.
ST. CLARE:
Well, Tom, haven't I been? Come, now, what do you want?
There's something you haven't got, I suppose, and this is the preface.
TOM:
Mas'r allays been good to me. I haven't nothing to complain of on
that head; but there is one that mas'r isn't good to.
ST. CLARE:
Why, Tom, what's got into you? Speak out—what do you
mean?
TOM:
Last night, between one and two, I thought so. I studied upon the
matter then—mas'r isn't good to himself.
ST. CLARE:
Ah! now I understand; you allude to the state in which I came
home last night. Well, to tell the truth, I was slightly elevated—a little more
champagne on board than I could comfortably carry. That's all, isn't it?
TOM:
(Deeply affected—clasping his hands and weeping.)
All! Oh! my dear young
mas'r, I'm 'fraid it will be loss of all—all, body and soul. The good book says “it
biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder,” my dear mas'r.
ST. CLARE:
You poor, silly fool! I'm not worth crying over.
TOM:
Oh, mas'r! I implore you to think of it before it gets too late.
ST. CLARE:
Well, I won't go to any more of their cursed nonsense, Tom—
on my honor, I won't. I don't know why I haven't stopped long ago; I've always
despised it, and myself for it. So now, Tom, wipe up your eyes and go about
your errands.
TOM:
Bless you, mas'r. I feel much better now. You have taken a load from
poor Tom's heart. Bless you!
ST. CLARE:
Come, come, no blessings; I'm not so wonderfully good, now.
[Description: 916EAF. Page 103.]
I'll keep my faith with him, too.
OPHELIA:
(Without.)
Come along, you shiftless mortal!
ST. CLARE:
What new witchcraft has Topsy been brewing? That commo-
tion is of her raising, I'll be bound.
(Enter Ophelia, dragging in Topsy.)
Come here now; I will tell your master.
ST. CLARE:
What's the matter now?
OPHELIA:
The matter is that I cannot be plagued with this girl any longer.
It's past all bearing; flesh and blood cannot endure it. Here I locked her up and
gave her a hymn to study; and what does she do but spy out where I put my key,
and has gone to my bureau, and got a bonnet-trimming and cut it all to pieces to
make dolls' jackets! I never saw anything like it in my life!
ST. CLARE:
What have you done to her?
OPHELIA:
What have I done? What haven't I done? Your wife says I ought
to have her whipped till she couldn't stand.
ST. CLARE:
I don't doubt it. Tell me of the lovely rule of woman. I never
saw above a dozen women that wouldn't half kill a horse or servant, either, if
they had their own way with them—let alone a man.
OPHELIA:
I am sure, St. Clare, I don't know what to do. I've taught and
taught—I've talked till I'm tired; I've whipped her, I've punished her in every
way I could think of, and still she's just what she was at first.
ST. CLARE:
Come here, Tops, you monkey! (Topsy crosses to St. Clare, grin-
ning.)
What makes you behave so?
TOPSY:
'Spects it's my wicked heart—Miss Feely says so.
ST. CLARE:
Don't you see how much Miss Ophelia has done for you? She
says she has done everything she can think of.
TOPSY:
Lord, yes, mas'r! old missis used to say so, too. She whipped me a
heap harder, and used to pull my ha'r, and knock my head agin the door; but it
didn't do me no good. I 'spects if they's to pull every spear of ha'r out o' my
head, it wouldn't do no good neither—I's so wicked! Laws! I's nothin' but a nig-
ger, no ways! (Goes up.)
OPHELIA:
Well, I shall have to give her up; I can't have that trouble any
longer.
ST. CLARE:
I'd like to ask you one question.
OPHELIA:
What is it?
ST. CLARE:
Why, if your doctrine is not strong enough to save one heathen
child, that you can have at home here, all to yourself, what's the use of sending
one or two poor missionaries off with it among thousands of just such? I suppose
this girl is a fair sample of what thousands of your heathen are.
OPHELIA:
I'm sure I don't know; I never saw such a girl as this.
ST. CLARE:
What makes you so bad, Tops? Why won't you try and be
good? Don't you love any one, Topsy?
TOPSY:
(Comes down.)
Dunno nothing 'bout love; I loves candy and sich,
that's all.
OPHELIA:
But, Topsy, if you'd only try to be good, you might.
TOPSY:
Couldn't never be nothing but a nigger, if I was ever so good. If I
could be skinned and come white, I'd try then.
[Description: 916EAF. Page 104.]
People can love you, if you are black, Topsy. Miss Ophelia
would love you, if you were good. (Topsy laughs.)
Don't you think so?
TOPSY:
No, she can't b'ar me, 'cause I'm a nigger—she'd's soon have a
toad touch her. There can't nobody love niggers, and niggers can't do nothin'! I
don't car'! (Whistles.)
ST. CLARE:
Silence, you incorrigible imp, and begone!
TOPSY:
He! he! he! didn't get much out of dis chile! (Exit.)
OPHELIA:
I've always had a prejudice against negroes, and it's a fact—I
never could bear to have that child touch me, but I didn't think she knew it.
ST. CLARE:
Trust any child to find that out, there's no keeping it from
them. but I believe all the trying in the world to benefit a child, and all the
substantial favors you can do them, will never excite one emotion of gratitude,
while that feeling of repugnance remains in the heart. It's a queer kind of a fact,
but so it is.
OPHELIA:
I don't know how I can help it—they are disagreeable to me,
this girl in particular. How can I help feeling so?
ST. CLARE:
Eva does, it seems.
OPHELIA:
Well, she's so loving. I wish I was like her. She might teach me a
lesson.
ST. CLARE:
It would not be the first time a little child had been used to
instruct an old disciple, if it were so. Come, let us seek Eva, in her favorite
bower by the lake.
OPHELIA:
Why, the dew is falling, she mustn't be out there. She is unwell,
I know.
ST. CLARE:
Don't be croaking, cousin—I hate it.
OPHELIA:
But she has that cough.
ST. CLARE:
Oh, nonsense, of that cough—it is not anything. She has taken
a little cold, perhaps.
OPHELIA:
Well, that was just the way Eliza Jane was taken—and Ellen—
ST. CLARE:
Oh, stop these hobgoblin, nurse legends. You old hands get so
wise, that a child cannot cough or sneeze, but you see desperation and ruin at
hand. Only take care of the child, keep her from the night air, and don't let her
play too hard, and she'll do well enough. (Exeunt.)
| Uncle Tom's Cabin | |