Monday, 20th.
My Dearest E——. A rather longer interval than usual has elapsed since I
last wrote to you, but I must beg you to excuse it. I have had more than a
usual amount of small daily occupations to fill my time; and, as a mere
enumeration of these would not be very interesting to you, I will tell you
a story which has just formed an admirable illustration for my observation
of all the miseries of which this accursed system of slavery is the cause,
even under the best and most humane administration of its laws and usages.
Pray note it, my dear friend, for you will find, in the absence of all
voluntary or even conscious cruelty on the part of the master, the best
possible comment on a state of things which, without the slightest desire
to injure and oppress, produces such intolerable results of injury and
oppression.
We have, as a sort of under nursemaid and assistant of my dear M——,
whose white complexion, as I wrote you, occasioned such indignation to my
southern fellow-travellers, and such extreme perplexity to the poor slaves
on our arrival here, a much more orthodox servant for these
parts, a young
woman named Psyche, but commonly called Sack, not a very graceful
abbreviation of the divine heathen appellation: she cannot be much over
twenty, has a very pretty figure, a graceful gentle deportment, and a face
which, but for its color (she is a dingy mulatto), would be pretty, and
is extremely pleasing, from the perfect sweetness of its expression; she
is always serious, not to say sad and silent, and has altogether an air of
melancholy and timidity, that has frequently struck me very much, and
would have made me think some special anxiety or sorrow must occasion it,
but that God knows the whole condition of these wretched people naturally
produces such a deportment, and there is no necessity to seek for special
or peculiar causes to account for it. Just in proportion as I have found
the slaves on this plantation intelligent and advanced beyond the general
brutish level of the majority, I have observed this pathetic expression of
countenance in them, a mixture of sadness and fear, the involuntary
exhibition of the two feelings, which I suppose must be the predominant
experience of their whole lives, regret and apprehension, not the less
heavy, either of them, for being, in some degree, vague and indefinite—a
sense of incalculable past loss and injury, and a dread of incalculable
future loss and injury.
I have never questioned Psyche as to her sadness, because, in the first
place, as I tell you, it appears to me most natural, and is observable in
all the slaves, whose superior natural or acquired intelligence allows of
their filling situations of trust or service about the house and family;
and, though I cannot and will not refuse to hear any and every tale of
suffering which these unfortunates bring to me, I am anxious to spare both
myself and them the pain of vain appeals to me for redress and help,
which, alas! it is too often utterly out of my power to give them. It is
useless, and indeed worse than useless, that they
should see my impotent
indignation and unavailing pity, and hear expressions of compassion for
them, and horror at their condition, which might only prove incentives to
a hopeless resistance on their part to a system, under the hideous weight
of whose oppression any individual or partial revolt must be annihilated
and ground into the dust. Therefore, as I tell you, I asked Psyche no
questions, but, to my great astonishment, the other day M—— asked me if
I knew to whom Psyche belonged, as the poor woman had enquired of her with
much hesitation and anguish if she could tell her who owned her and her
children. She has two nice little children under six years old, whom she
keeps as clean and tidy, and who are sad and as silent, as herself. My
astonishment at this question was, as you will readily believe, not small,
and I forthwith sought out Psyche for an explanation. She was thrown into
extreme perturbation at finding that her question had been referred to me,
and it was some time before I could sufficiently reassure her to be able
to comprehend, in the midst of her reiterated entreaties for pardon, and
hopes that she had not offended me, that she did not know herself who
owned her. She was, at one time, the property of Mr. K——, the former
overseer, of whom I have already spoken to you, and who has just been
paying Mr. —— a visit. He, like several of his predecessors in the
management, has contrived to make a fortune upon it (though it yearly
decreases in value to the owners, but this is the inevitable course of
things in the southern states), and has purchased a plantation of his own
in Alabama, I believe, or one of the south-western states. Whether she
still belonged to Mr. K—— or not she did not know, and entreated me if
she did to endeavor to persuade Mr. —— to buy her. Now, you must know
that this poor woman is the wife of one of Mr. B——’s slaves, a fine,
intelligent, active, excellent young man, whose whole family are
among
some of the very best specimens of character and capacity on the estate. I
was so astonished at the (to me) extraordinary state of things revealed by
poor Sack’s petition, that I could only tell her that I had supposed all
the negroes on the plantation were Mr. ——’s property, but that I would
certainly enquire, and find out for her if I could to whom she belonged,
and if I could, endeavor to get Mr. —— to purchase her, if she really
was not his.
Now, E——, just conceive for one moment the state of mind of this woman,
believing herself to belong to a man who, in a few days, was going down
to one of those abhorred and dreaded south-western states, and who would
then compel her, with her poor little children, to leave her husband and
the only home she had ever known, and all the ties of affection,
relationship, and association of her former life, to follow him thither,
in all human probability never again to behold any living creature that
she had seen before; and this was so completely a matter of course that
it was not even thought necessary to apprise her positively of the fact,
and the only thing that interposed between her and this most miserable
fate was the faint hope that Mr. —— might have purchased her and her
children. But if he had, if this great deliverance had been vouchsafed to
her, the knowledge of it was not thought necessary; and with this deadly
dread at her heart she was living day after day, waiting upon me and
seeing me, with my husband beside me, and my children in my arms in
blessed security, safe from all separation but the one reserved in God’s
great providence for all His creatures. Do you think I wondered any more
at the woe-begone expression of her countenance, or do you think it was
easy for me to restrain within prudent and proper limits the expression
of my feelings at such a state of things? And she had gone on from day to
day enduring this agony, till I suppose its own intolerable pressure and
M——’s sweet countenance and gentle sympathising voice and manner had
constrained her to lay down this great burden of sorrow at our feet. I
did not see Mr. —— until the evening; but in the meantime, meeting Mr.
O——, the overseer, with whom, as I believe I have already told you, we
are living here, I asked him about Psyche, and who was her proprietor,
when to my infinite surprise he told me that
he had bought her and her
children from Mr. K——, who had offered them to him, saying that they
would be rather troublesome to him than otherwise down where he was
going; ‘and so,’ said Mr. O——, ‘as I had no objection to investing a
little money that way, I bought them.’ With a heart much lightened I flew
to tell poor Psyche the news, so that at any rate she might be relieved
from the dread of any immediate separation from her husband. You can
imagine better than I can tell you what her sensations were; but she
still renewed her prayer that I would, if possible, induce Mr. —— to
purchase her, and I promised to do so.
Early the next morning, while I was still dressing, I was suddenly
startled by hearing voices in loud tones in Mr. ——’s dressing-room,
which adjoins my bed-room, and the noise increasing until there was an
absolute cry of despair uttered by some man. I could restrain myself no
longer, but opened the door of communication, and saw Joe, the young man,
poor Psyche’s husband, raving almost in a state of frenzy, and in a voice
broken with sobs and almost inarticulate with passion, reiterating his
determination never to leave this plantation, never to go to Alabama,
never to leave his old father and mother, his poor wife and children, and
dashing his hat, which he was wringing like a cloth in his hands, upon the
ground, he declared he would kill himself if he was compelled to follow
Mr. K——. I glanced from the poor wretch to Mr. ——, who was standing,
leaning against a table with his
arms folded, occasionally uttering a few
words of counsel to his slave to be quiet and not fret, and not make a
fuss about what there was no help for. I retreated immediately from the
horrid scene, breathless with surprise and dismay, and stood for some time
in my own room, with my heart and temples throbbing to such a degree that
I could hardly support myself. As soon as I recovered myself I again
sought Mr. O——, and enquired of him if he knew the cause of poor Joe’s
distress. He then told me that Mr. ——, who is highly pleased with Mr.
K——’s past administration of his property, wished, on his departure for
his newly-acquired slave plantation, to give him some token of his
satisfaction, and
had made him a present of the man Joe, who had just
received the intelligence that he was to go down to Alabama with his new
owner the next day, leaving father, mother, wife, and children behind. You
will not wonder that the man required a little judicious soothing under
such circumstances, and you will also, I hope, admire the humanity of the
sale of his wife and children by the owner who was going to take him to
Alabama, because
they would be encumbrances rather than otherwise down
there. If Mr. K—— did not do this after he knew that the man was his,
then Mr. —— gave him to be carried down to the South after his wife and
children were sold to remain in Georgia. I do not know which was the real
transaction, for I have not had the heart to ask; but you will easily
imagine which of the two cases I prefer believing.
When I saw Mr. —— after this most wretched story became known to me in
all its details, I appealed to him for his own soul’s sake not to commit
so great a cruelty. Poor Joe’s agony while remonstrating with his master
was hardly greater than mine while arguing with him upon this bitter
piece of inhumanity—how I cried, and how I adjured, and how all my sense
of justice and of
mercy and of pity for the poor wretch, and of
wretchedness at finding myself implicated in such a state of things,
broke in torrents of words from my lips and tears from my eyes! God knows
such a sorrow at seeing anyone I belonged to commit such an act was
indeed a new and terrible experience to me, and it seemed to me that I
was imploring Mr. —— to save himself, more than to spare these
wretches. He gave me no answer whatever, and I have since thought that
the intemperate vehemence of my entreaties and expostulations perhaps
deserved that he should leave me as he did without one single word of
reply; and miserable enough I remained. Towards evening, as I was sitting
alone, my children having gone to bed, Mr. O—— came into the room. I
had but one subject in my mind; I had not been able to eat for it. I
could hardly sit still for the nervous distress which every thought of
these poor people filled me with. As he sat down looking over some
accounts, I said to him, ‘Have you seen Joe this afternoon, Mr. O——?’
(I give you our conversation as it took place.) ‘Yes, ma’am; he is a
great deal happier than he was this morning.’ ‘Why, how is that?’ asked I
eagerly. ‘Oh, he is not going to Alabama. Mr. K—— heard that he had
kicked up a fuss about it (being in despair at being torn from one’s wife
and children is called
kicking up a fuss; this is a sample of overseer
appreciation of human feelings), and said that if the fellow wasn’t
willing to go with him, he did not wish to be bothered with any niggers
down there who were to be troublesome, so he might stay behind.‘ ’And
does Psyche know this?’ ‘Yes, ma’am, I suppose so.’ I drew a long breath;
and whereas my needle had stumbled through the stuff I was sewing for an
hour before, as if my fingers could not guide it, the regularity and
rapidity of its evolutions were now quite edifying. The man was for the
present safe, and I remained silently pondering
his deliverance and the
whole proceeding, and the conduct of everyone engaged in it, and above
all Mr. ——’s share in the transaction, and I think for the first time
almost a sense of horrible personal responsibility and implication took
hold of my mind, and I felt the weight of an unimagined guilt upon my
conscience; and yet God knows this feeling of self-condemnation is very
gratuitous on my part, since when I married Mr. —— I knew nothing of
these dreadful possessions of his, and even if I had, I should have been
much puzzled to have formed any idea of the state of things in which I
now find myself plunged, together with those whose well-doing is as vital
to me almost as my own.
With these agreeable reflections I went to bed. Mr. —— said not a word
to me upon the subject of these poor people all the next day, and in the
meantime I became very impatient of this reserve on his part, because I
was dying to prefer my request that he would purchase Psyche and her
children, and so prevent any future separation between her and her
husband, as I supposed he would not again attempt to make a present of
Joe, at least to anyone who did not wish to be bothered with his wife
and children. In the evening I was again with Mr. O—— alone in the
strange bare wooden-walled sort of shanty which is our sitting-room, and
revolving in my mind the means of rescuing Psyche from her miserable
suspense, a long chain of all my possessions, in the shape of bracelets,
necklaces, brooches, ear-rings, etc.., wound in glittering procession
through my brain, with many hypothetical calculations of the value of
each separate ornament, and the very doubtful probability of the amount
of the whole being equal to the price of this poor creature and her
children; and then the great power and privilege I had foregone of
earning money by my own labor occurred to me; and I think, for the first
time in my life, my
past profession assumed an aspect that arrested my
thoughts most seriously. For the last four years of my life that preceded
my marriage, I literally coined money; and never until this moment, I
think, did I reflect on the great means of good, to myself and others,
that I so gladly agreed to give up for ever, for a maintenance by the
unpaid labor of slaves—people toiling not only unpaid, but under the
bitter conditions the bare contemplation of which was then wringing my
heart. You will not wonder that, when in the midst of such cogitations I
suddenly accosted Mr. O——, it was to this effect. ‘Mr. O——, I have a
particular favor to beg of you. Promise me that you will never sell
Psyche and her children without first letting me know of your intention
to do so, and giving me the option of buying them.’ Mr. O—— is a
remarkably deliberate man, and squints, so that, when he has taken a
little time in directing his eyes to you, you are still unpleasantly
unaware of any result in which you are concerned; he laid down a book he
was reading, and directed his head and one of his eyes towards me and
answered, ‘Dear me, ma’am, I am very sorry—I have sold them.’ My work
fell down on the ground, and my mouth opened wide, but I could utter no
sound, I was so dismayed and surprised; and he deliberately proceeded: ‘I
didn’t know, ma’am, you see, at all, that you entertained any idea of
making an investment of that nature; for I’m sure, if I had, I would
willingly have sold the woman to you; but I sold her and her children
this morning to Mr. ——.’ My dear E——, though —— had resented my
unmeasured upbraidings, you see they had not been without some good
effect, and though he had, perhaps justly, punished my violent outbreak
of indignation about the miserable scene I witnessed by not telling me of
his humane purpose, he had bought these poor creatures, and so, I trust,
secured them from any such misery in future. I
jumped up and left Mr.
O—— still speaking, and ran to find Mr. ——, to thank him for what he
had done, and with that will now bid you good bye. Think, E——, how it
fares with slaves on plantations where there is no crazy Englishwoman to
weep and entreat and implore and upbraid for them, and no master willing
to listen to such appeals.
