 | Uncle Tom's Cabin |  |
ACT VI
SCENE I
Dark landscape. An old, roofless shed. Tom is discovered in shed, lying on some
old cotton bagging. Cassy kneels by his side, holding a cup to his lips.
Drink all ye want. I knew how it would be. It isn't the first time I've been
out in the night, carrying water to such as you.
TOM:
(Returning cup.)
Thank you, missis.
CASSY:
Don't call me missis. I'm a miserable slave like yourself—a lower
one than you can ever be! It's no use, my poor fellow, this you've been trying to
do. You were a brave fellow. You had the right on your side; but it's all in vain
for you to struggle. You are in the Devil's hands; he is the strongest, and you
must give up.
TOM:
Oh! how can I give up?
CASSY:
You see you don't know anything about it; I do. Here you are, on a
lone plantation, ten miles from any other, in the swamps; not a white person
here who could testify, if you were burned alive. There's no law here that can do
you, or any of us, the least good; and this man! there's no earthly thing that he is
not bad enough to do. I could make one's hair rise, and their teeth chatter, if I
should only tell what I've seen and been knowing to here; and it's no use
resisting! Did I want to live with him? Wasn't I a woman delicately bred? and
he!—Father in Heaven! what was he and is he? And yet I've lived with him
these five years, and cursed every moment of my life, night and day.
TOM:
Oh heaven! have you quite forgot us poor critters?
CASSY:
And what are these miserable low dogs you work with, that you
should suffer on their account? Every one of them would turn against you the
first time they get a chance. They are all of them as low and cruel to each other
as they can be; there's no use in your suffering to keep from hurting them?
TOM:
What made 'em cruel? If I give out I shall get used to it and grow,
little by little, just like 'em. No, no, Missis, I've lost everything, wife, and
children, and home, and a kind master, and he would have set me free if he'd
only lived a day longer—I've lost everything in this world, and now I can't lose
heaven, too: no I can't get to be wicked besides all.
CASSY:
But it can't be that He will lay sin to our account; he won't charge
it to us when we are forced to it; he'll charge it to them that drove us to it. Can I
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TOM:
Oh missis! I wish you'd go to Him who can give you living waters!
CASSY:
Go to him! Where is he? Who is he?
TOM:
Our Heavenly Father!
CASSY:
I used to see the picture of him, over the altar, when I was a girl but
he isn't here! there's nothing here but sin, and long, long despair! There, there,
don't talk any more, my poor fellow. Try to sleep, if you can. I must hasten
back, lest my absence be noted. Think of me when I am gone, Uncle Tom, and
pray, pray for me.
(Music. Exit Cassy. Tom sinks back to sleep.)
SCENE II
Street in New Orleans. Enter George Shelby.
At length my mission of mercy is nearly finished, I have reached
my journey's end. I have now but to find the house of Mr. St. Clare, re-purchase
old Uncle Tom, and convey him back to his wife and children, in old Kentucky.
Some one approaches; he may, perhaps, be able to give me the information I re-
quire. I will accost him. (Enter Marks.)
Pray, sir, can you tell me where Mr. St.
Clare dwells?
MARKS:
Where I don't hink you'll be in a hurry to seek him.
GEORGE:
And where is that?
MARKS:
In the grave!
GEORGE:
Stay, sir! you may be able to give me some information concern-
ing Mr. St. Clare.
MARKS:
I beg pardon, sir, I am a lawyer; I can't afford to give anything
GEORGE:
But you would have no objections to selling it?
MARKS:
Not the slightest.
GEORGE:
What do you value it at?
MARKS:
Well, say five dollars, that's reasonable.
GEORGE:
There they are. (Gives money.)
Now answer me to the best of your
ability. Has the death of St. Clare caused his slaves to be sold?
MARKS:
It has.
GEORGE:
How were they sold?
MARKS:
At auction—they went dirt cheap.
GEORGE:
How were they bought—all in one lot?
MARKS:
No, they went to different bidders.
GEORGE:
Was you present at the sale?
MARKS:
I was.
GEORGE:
Do you remember seeing a negro among them called Tom?
MARKS:
What, Uncle Tom?
GEORGE:
The same—who bought him?
MARKS:
A Mr. Legree.
GEORGE:
Where is his plantation?
MARKS:
Up in Louisiana, on the Red River; but a man never could find it,
unless he had been there before.
GEORGE:
Who could I get to direct me there?
MARKS:
Well, stranger, I don't know of any one just at present 'cept
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are a mind to come down handsomely, why, I'll do it.
GEORGE:
The reward shall be ample.
MARKS:
Enough said, stranger; let's take the steamboat at once. (Exeunt.)
SCENE III
A Rough Chamber. Enter Legree. Sits.
Plague on that Sambo, to kick up this yer row between Tom and the new
hands. (Cassy steals on and stands behind him.)
The fellow won't be fit to work
for a week now, right in the press of the season.
CASSY:
Yes, just like you.
LEGREE:
Hah! you she-devil! you've come back, have you? (Rises)
CASSY:
Yes, I have; come to have my own way, too.
LEGREE:
You lie, you jade! I'll be up to my word. Either behave yourself
or stay down in the quarters and fare and work with the rest.
CASSY:
I'd rather, ten thousand times, live in the dirtiest hole at the
quarters, than be under your hoof!
LEGREE:
But you are under my hoof, for all that, that's one comfort; so sit
down here and listen to reason. (Grasps her wrist.)
CASSY:
Simon Legree, take care! (Legree lets go his hold.)
You're afraid of me,
Simon, and you've reason to be; for I've got the Devil in me!
LEGREE:
I believe to my soul you have. After all, Cassy, why can't you be
friends with me, as you used to?
CASSY:
(Bitterly.)
Used to!
LEGREE:
I wish, Cassy, you'd behave yourself decently.
CASSY:
You talk about behaving decently! and what have you been doing?
You haven't even sense enough to keep from spoiling one of your best hands,
right in the most pressing season, just for your devilish temper.
LEGREE:
I was a fool, it's fact, to let any such brangle come up. Now when
Tom set up his will he had to be broke in.
CASSY:
You'll never break him in.
LEGREE:
Won't I? I'd like to know if I won't? He'd be the first nigger that
ever come it round me! I'll break every bone in his body but he shall give up.
(Enter Sambo, with a paper in his hand, stands bowing.)
What's that, you dog?
SAMBO:
It's a witch thing, mas'r.
LEGREE:
A what?
SAMBO:
Something that niggers gits from witches. Keep 'em from feeling
when they's flogged. He had it tied round his neck with a black string.
(Legree takes the paper and opens it. A silver dollar drops on the stage, and a long
curl of light hair twines around his finger.)
Damnation. (Stamping and writhing, as if the hair burned him.)
Where
did this come from? Take it off! burn it up! (Throws the curl away.)
What did you bring it to me for?
SAMBO:
(Trembling.)
I beg pardon, mas'r; I thought you would like to see um.
LEGREE:
Don't you bring me any more of your devilish things. (Shakes his
fist at Sambo who runs off. Legree kicks the dollar after him.)
Blast it! where
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did he get that? If it didn't look just like—whoo! I thought I'd forgot that. Curse
me if I think there's any such thing as forgetting anything, any how.
CASSY:
What is the matter with you, Legree? What is there in a simple curl
of fair hair to appall a man like you—you who are familiar with every form of
cruetly.
LEGREE:
Cassy, to-night the past has been recalled to me—the past that I
have so long and vainly striven to forget.
CASSY:
Has aught on this earth power to move a soul like thine?
LEGREE:
Yes, for hard and reprobate as I now seem, there has been a time
when I have been rocked on the bosom of a mother, cradled with prayers and
pious hymns, my now seared brow bedewed with the waters of holy baptism.
CASSY:
(Aside.)
What sweet memories of childhood can thus soften down
that heart of iron?
LEGREE:
In early childhood a fair-haired woman has led me, at the sound
of Sabbath bells, to worship and to pray. Born of a hard-tempered sire, on
whom that gentle woman had wasted a world of unvalued love, I followed in
the steps of my fgather. Boisterous, unruly and tyrannical, I despised all her
counsel, and would have none of her reproof, and, at an early age, broke from
her to seek my fortunes on the sea. I never came home but once after that; and
then my mother, with the yearning of a heart that must love something, and
had nothing else to love, clung to me, and sought with passionate prayers and
entreaties to win me from a life of sin.
CASSY:
That was your day of grace, Legree; then good angels called you,
and mercy held you by the hand.
LEGREE:
My heart inly relented; there was a conflict, but sin got the victory,
and I set all the force of my rough nature against the conviction of my cons-
cience. I drank and swore, was wilder and more brutal than ever. And one
night, when my mother, in the last agony of her despair, knelt at my feet, I
spurned her from me, threw her senseless on the floor, and with brutal curses fl-
ed to my ship.
CASSY:
Then the fiend took thee for his own.
LEGREE:
The next I heard of my mother was one night while I was carous-
ing among drunken companions. A letter was put in my hands. I opened it, and
a lock of long, curling hair fell from it, and twined about my fingers, even as
that lock twined but now. The letter told me that my mother was dead, and that
dying she blest and forgave me! (Buries his face in his hands.)
CASSY:
Why did you not even then renounce your evil ways?
LEGREE:
There is a dread, unhallowed necromancy of evil, that turns
things sweetest and holiest to phantoms of horror and afright. That pale, loving
mother,—her dying prayers, her forgiving love,—wrought in my demoniac
heart of sin only as a damning sentence, bringing with it a fearful looking for of
judgment and fiery indignation.
CASSY:
And yet you would not strive to avert the doom that threatened you.
LEGREE:
I burned the lock of hair and I burned the letter; and when I saw
them hissing and crackling in the flame, inly shuddered as I thought of
everlasting fires! I tried to drink and revel, and swear away the memory; but
often in the deep night, whose solemn stillness arraings the soul in forced com-
munion with itself, I have seen that pale mother rising by my bed-side, and felt
the soft twining of that hair around my fingers, 'till the cold sweat would roll
down my face, and I would spring from my bed in horror—horror! (Falls in
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chair—After a pause.)
What the devil ails me? Large drops of sweat stand on
my forehead, and my heart beats heavy and thick with fear. I thought I saw
something white rising and glimmering in the gloom before me, and it seemed
to bear my mother's face! I know one thing; I'll let that fellow Tom alone, after
this. What did I want with his cussed paper? I believe I am bewitched sure
enough! I've been shivering and sweating ever since! Where did he get that hair?
It couldn't have been that! I burn'd that up, I know I did! It would be a joke if
hair could rise from the dead! I'll have Sambo and Quimbo up here to sing and
dance one of their dances, and keep off these horrid notions. Here, Sambo!
Quimbo! (Exit.)
CASSY:
Yes, Legree, that golden tress was charmed; each hair had in it a
spell of terror and remorse for thee, and was used by a mightier power to bind
thy cruel hands from inflicting uttermost evil on the helpless! (Exit.)
SCENE IV
Street. Enter Marks meeting Cute, who enters dressed in an old faded uniform
By the land, stranger, but it strikes me that I've seen you somewhere
before.
CUTE:
By chowder! do you know now, that's just what I was a going to say?
MARKS:
Isn't your name Cute?
CUTE:
You're right, I calculate. Yours is Marks, I reckon.
MARKS:
Just so.
CUTE:
Well, I swow, I'm glad to see you. (They shake hands.)
How's your
wholesome?
MARKS:
Hearty as ever. Well, who would have thought of ever seeing you
again. Why, I thought you was in Vermont?
CUTE:
Well, so I was. You see I went there after that rich relation of mine—
but the speculation didn't turn out well.
MARKS:
How so?
CUTE:
Why, you see, she took a shine to an old fellow—Deacon Abraham
Perry—and married him.
MARKS:
Oh, that rather put your nose out of joint in that quarter.
CUTE:
Busted me right up, I tell you. The Deacon did the hand-some thing
though, he said if I would leave the neighborhood and go out South again, he'd
stand the damage. I calculate I didn't give him much time to change his mind.
and so, you see, here I am again.
MARKS:
What are you doing in that soldier rig?
CUTE:
Oh, this is my sign.
MARKS:
Your sign?
CUTE:
Yes; you see, I'm engaged just at present in an all-fired good
speculation, I'm a Fillibusterow.
MARKS:
A what?
CUTE:
A Fillubusterow! Don't you know what that is? It's Spanish for
Cuban Volunteer; and means a chap that goes the whole perker for glory and all
that ere sort of thing.
MARKS:
Oh! you've joined the order of the Lone Star!
CUTE:
You've hit it. You see I bought this uniform at a second hand
clothing store, I puts it on and goes to a benevolent individual and I says to
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got massacred by the bloody Spaniards. I'm in a destitute condition—give me a
trifle to pay my passage back, so I can whop the tyrannical cusses and avenge
my brave fellow soger what got slewed there.
MARKS:
How pathetic!
CUTE:
I tell you it works up the feelings of benevolent individuals dreadful-
ly. It draws tears from their eyes and money from their pockets. By chowder!
one old chap gave me a hundred dollars to help on the cause.
MARKS:
I admire a genius like yours.
CUTE:
But I say, what are you up to?
MARKS:
I am the traveling companion of a young gentleman by the name
of Shelby, who is going to the plantation of a Mr. Legree of the Red River, to
buy an old darkey who used to belong to his father.
CUTE:
Legree—Legree? Well, now, I calculate I've heard that ere name
afore.
MARKS:
Do you remember that man who drew a bowie knife on you in
New Orleans?
CUTE:
By chowder! I remember the circumstance just as well as if it was
yesterday; but I can't say that I recollect much about the man, for you see I was
in something of a hurry about that time and didn't stop to take a good look at
him.
MARKS:
Well, that man was this same Mr. Legree.
CUTE:
Do you know, now, I should like to pay that critter off!
MARKS:
Then I'll give you an opportunity.
CUTE:
Chowder! how will you do that?
MARKS:
Do you remember the gentleman that interfered between you and
Legree?
CUTE:
Yes—well?
MARKS:
He received the blow that was intended for you, and died from
the effects of it. So, you see, Legree is a murderer, and we are only witnesses of
the deed. His life is in our hands.
CUTE:
Let's have him right up and make him dance on nothing to the tune
of Yandee Doodle!
MARKS:
Stop a bit. Don't you see a chance for a profitable speculation?
CUTE:
A speculation! Fire away, don't be bashful, I'm the man for a
speculation.
MARKS:
I have made a deposition to the Governor of the state on all the
particulars of that affair at Orleans.
CUTE:
What did you do that for?
MARKS:
To get a warrant for his arrest.
CUTE:
Oh! and have you got it?
MARKS:
Yes; here it is. (Takes out paper.)
CUTE:
Well, now, I don't see how you are going to make anything by that
bit of paper?
MARKS:
But I do. I shall say to Legree, I have got a warrant against you
for murder; my friend, Mr. Cute, and myself are the only witnesses who can ap-
pear against you. Give us a thousand dollars, and we will tear the warrant and
be silent.
CUTE:
Then Mr. Legree forks over a thousand dollars, and your friend
Cute pockets five hundred of it, is that the calculation?
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If you will join me in the undertaking.
CUTE:
I'll do it, by chowder!
MARKS:
Your hand to bind the bargain.
CUTE:
I'll stick by you thro' thick and thin.
MARKS:
Enough said.
CUTE:
Then shake.
(They shake hands.)
But I say, Cute, he may be contrary and show fight.
CUTE:
Never mind, we've got the law on our side, and we're bound to stir
him up. If he don't come down handsomely we'll present him with a neck-tie
made of hemp!
MARKS:
I declare you're getting spunky.
CUTE:
Well, I reckon, I am. Let's go and have something to drink. Tell you
what, Marks, if we don't get him, we'll have his hide, by chowder!
(Exeunt,
arm in arm.)
SCENE V
Rough Chamber. Enter Legree, followed by Sambo.
Go and send Cassy to me.
SAMBO:
Yes, mas'r. (Exit.)
LEGREE:
Curse the woman! she's got a temper worse than the devil; I shall
do her an injury one of these days, if she isn't careful. (Re-enter Sambo,
frightened.)
What's the matter with you, you black scoundrel?
SAMBO:
S'help me, mas'r, she isn't dere.
LEGREE:
I suppose she's about the house somewhere?
SAMBO:
No, she isn't, mas'r; I's been all over de house and I can't find
nothing of her nor Emmeline.
LEGREE:
Bolted, by the Lord! Call out the dogs! saddle my horse. Stop! are
you sure they really have gone?
SAMBO:
Yes, mas'r; I's been in every room 'cept the haunted garret and dey
wouldn't go dere.
LEGREE:
I have it! Now, Sambo, you jest go and walk that Tom up here,
right away! (Exit Sambo.)
The old cuss is at the bottom of this yer whole matter;
and I'll have it out of his infernal black hide, or I'll know the reason why! I hate
him—I hate him! And isn't he mine? Can't I do what I like with him? Who's to
hinder, I wonder? (Tom is dragged on by Sambo and Quimbo, Legree grimly
confronting Tom.)
Well, Tom, do you know I've made up my mind to kill you?
TOM:
It's very likely, Mas'r.
LEGREE:
I—have—done—just—that—thing, Tom, unless you'll tell me what
do you know about these yer gals? (Tom is silent.)
D'ye hear? Speak!
TOM:
I han't got anything to tell, mas'r.
LEGREE:
Do you dare to tell me, you old black rascal, you don't know?
Speak! Do you know anything?
TOM:
I know, mas'r; but I can't tell anything. I can die!
LEGREE:
Hark ye, Tom! ye think, 'cause I have let you off before, I don't mean
what I say; but, this time, I have made up my mind, and counted the cost.
You've always stood it out agin me; now, I'll conquer ye or kill ye! one or
t'other. I'll count every drop of blood there is in you, and take 'em, one by one,
'till ye give up!
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Mas'r, if you was sick, or in trouble, or dying, and I could save you, I'd
give you my heart's blood; and, if taking every drop of blood in this poor old
body would save your precious soul, I'd give 'em freely. Do the worst you can,
my troubles will be over soon; but if you don't repent yours won't never end.
(Legree strikes Tom down with the butt of his whip.)
How do you like that?
SAMBO:
He's most gone, mas'r!
TOM:
(Rises feebly on his hands.)
There an't no more you can do. I forgive
you with all my soul. (Sinks back, and is carried off by Sambo and Quimbo.)
LEGREE:
I believe he's done for finally. Well, his mouth is shut up at last—
that's one comfort. (Enter George Shelby, Marks and Cute.)
Strangers! Well
what do you want?
GEORGE:
I understand that you bought in New Orleans a negro named
Tom?
LEGREE:
Yes, I did buy such a fellow, and a devil of a bargain I had of it,
too! I believe he's trying to die, but I don't know as he'll make it out.
GEORGE:
Where is he? Let me see him?
SAMBO:
Dere he is. (Points to Tom).
LEGREE:
How dare you speak? (Drives Sambo and Quimbo off. George exits.)
CUTE:
Now's the time to nab him.
MARKS:
How are you, Mr. Legree?
LEGREE:
What the devil brought you here?
MARKS:
This little bit of paper. I arrest you for the murder of Mr. St.
Clare. What do you say to that?
LEGREE:
This is my answer! (Makes a blow at Marks, who dodges, and Cute
receives the blow—he cries out and runs off, Marks fires at Legree, and follows
Cute.)
I am hit!—the game's up! (Falls dead. Quimbo and Sambo return and
carry him off laughing.)
(George Shelby enters, supporting Tom. Music. They advance to front and Tom
falls.)
Oh! dear Uncle Tom! do wake—do speak once more! look up!
Here's Master George—your own little Master George. Don't you know me?
TOM:
(Opening his eyes and speaking in a feeble tone.)
Mas'r George! Bless de
Lord! it's all I wanted! They hav'n't forgot me! It warms my soul; it does my old
heart good! Now I shall die content!
GEORGE:
You shan't die! you mustn't die, nor think of it. I have come to
buy you, and take you home.
TOM:
Oh, Mas'r George, you're too late. The Lord has bought me, and is
going to take me home.
GEORGE:
Oh! don't die. It will kill me—it will break my heart to think what
you have suffered, poor, poor fellow!
TOM:
Don't call me, poor fellow! I have been poor fellow; but that's all past and
gone now. I'm right in the door, going into glory! Oh, Mas'r George! Heaven
has come! I've got the victory, the Lord has given it to me! Glory be to His
name! (Dies.)
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(Solemn music. George covers Uncle Tom with his cloak, and kneels over him.
Clouds work on and conceal them, and then work off.)
SCENE VII
Gorgeous clouds, tinted with sunlight. Eva, robed in white, is discovered on the
back of a milk-white dove, with expanded wings, as if just soaring upward. Her
hands are extended in benediction over St. Clare and Uncle Tom who are kneeling
and gazing up to her. Expressive music. Slow curtain.
| Uncle Tom's Cabin | |