Chapter VI: Part 6

I wish that I had something that would add to the literary value of your laudable enterprise. In so great a cause as that of human liberty, every great interest in society ought to have a voice and a decisive testimony. Art should be in sympathy with freedom and literature, and all human learning should speak with _unmistakable_ accents for the elevation, evangelization, and liberation of the oppressed. In a future day, the historian cannot purge our political history from the shame of wanton and mercenary oppression. But there is not, I believe, a book in the literature of our country that will be alive and known a hundred years hence, in which can be found the taint of despotism. The literature of the world is on the side of liberty.

I am very truly yours,

A Day spent at Playford Hall.

It was a pleasant morning in May,--I believe that is the orthodox way of beginning a story,--when C. and I took the cars to go into the country to Playford Hall. "And what's Playford Hall?" you say. "And why did you go to see it?" As to what it is, here is a reasonably good picture before you. As to why, it was for many years the residence of Thomas Clarkson, and is now the residence of his venerable widow and her family.

Playford Hall is considered, I think, the oldest of the fortified houses in England, and is, I am told, the only one that has water in the moat. The water which is seen girdling the wall in the picture, is the moat; it surrounds the place entirely, leaving no access except across the bridge, which is here represented.

After crossing this bridge, you come into a green court-yard, filled with choice plants and flowering shrubs, and carpeted with that thick, soft, velvet-like grass, which is to be found nowhere else in so perfect a state as in England.

The water is fed by a perpetual spring, whose current is so sluggish as scarcely to be perceptible, but which yet has the vitality of a running stream.

It has a dark and glassy stillness of surface, only broken by the forms of the water plants, whose leaves float thickly over it.

The walls of the moat are green with ancient moss, and from the crevices springs an abundant flowering vine, whose delicate leaves and bright yellow flowers in some places entirely mantled the stones with their graceful drapery.

The picture I have given you represents only one side of the moat. The other side is grown up with dark and thick shrubbery and ancient trees, rising and embowering the whole place, adding to the retired and singular effect of the whole. The place is a specimen of a sort of thing which does not exist in America. It is one of those significant landmarks which unite the present with the past, for which we must return to the country of our origin.

Playford Hall is a thing peculiarly English, and Thomas Clarkson, for whose sake I visited it, was as peculiarly an Englishman,--a specimen of the very best kind of English mind and character, as this is of characteristic English architecture.

We Anglo-Saxons have won a hard name in the world. There are undoubtedly bad things which are true about us.

Taking our developments as a race, both in England and America, we may be justly called the Romans of the nineteenth century. We have been the race which has conquered, subdued, and broken in pieces, other weaker races, with little regard either to justice or mercy. With regard to benefits by us imparted to conquered nations, I think a better story, on the whole, can be made out for the Romans than for us. Witness the treatment of the Chinese, of the tribes of India, and of our own American Indians.

But still there is an Anglo-Saxon blood, a vigorous sense of justice, as appears in our Habeas Corpus, our jury trials, and other features of State organization, and, when this is tempered in individuals, with the elements of gentleness and compassion, and enforced by that energy and indomitable perseverance which are characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon mind, they form a style of philanthropists peculiarly efficient. In short, the Anglo-Saxon is efficient, in whatever he sets himself about, whether in crushing the weak, or lifting them up.

Thomas Clarkson was born in a day when good, pious people, imported cargoes of slaves from Africa, as one of the regular Christianized modes of gaining a subsistence, and providing for them and their households. It was a thing that everybody was doing, and everybody thought they had a right to do. It was supposed that all the coffee, tea, and sugar in the world were dependent on stealing men, women, and children, and could be got no other way; and as to consume coffee, sugar, rice, and rum, were evidently the chief ends of human existence, it followed that men, women, and children, must be stolen to the end of time.

Some good people, when they now and then heard an appalling story of the cruelties practiced in the slave ship, declared that it was really too bad, sympathetically remarked, "What a sorrowful world we live in," stirred their sugar into their tea, and went on as before, because, what was there to do--hadn't everybody always done it, and if they didn't do it, wouldn't somebody else?

It is true that for many years individuals, at different times, remonstrated, had written treatises, poems, stories, and movements had been made by some religious ladies, particularly the Quakers, but the opposition had amounted to nothing practically efficient.

The attention of Clarkson was first turned to the subject by having it given out as the theme for a prize composition in his college class, he being at that time a sprightly young man, about twenty-four years of age. He entered into the investigation with no other purpose than to see what he could make of it as a college theme.

He says of himself: "I had expected pleasure from the invention of arguments, from the arrangement of them, from the putting of them together, and from the thought, in the interim, that I was engaged in an innocent contest for literary honor, but all my pleasures were damped by the facts, which were now continually before me.

"It was but one gloomy subject from morning till night; in the day time I was uneasy, in the night I had little rest, I sometimes never closed my eyelids for grief."

It became not now so much a trial for academical reputation as to write a work which should be useful to Africa. It is not surprising that a work, written under the force of such feelings, should have gained the prize, as it did. Clarkson was summoned from London to Cambridge, to deliver his prize essay publicly. He says of himself, on returning back to London: "The subject of it almost wholly engrossed my thoughts. I became at times very seriously affected while on the road. I stopped my horse occasionally, dismounted, and walked.

"I frequently tried to persuade myself that the contents of my essay could not be true, but the more I reflected on the authorities on which they were founded, the more I gave them credit. Coming in sight of Wade's Mill, in Hertfordshire, I sat down disconsolate on the turf by the roadside, and held my horse. Here a thought came into my mind, that if the contents of the essay were true, it was time that somebody should see these calamities to an end."

These reflections, as it appears, were put off for awhile, but returned again.

This young and noble heart was of a kind that could not comfort itself so easily for a brother's sorrow as many do.

He says of himself: "In the course of the autumn of the same year, I walked frequently into the woods that I might think of the subject in solitude, and find relief to my mind there; but there the question still recurred, 'are these things true?' Still the answer followed as instantaneously, 'they are;' still the result accompanied it,--surely some person should interfere. I began to envy those who had seats in Parliament, riches, and widely-extended connections, which would enable them to take up this cause.

"Finding scarcely any one, at the time, who thought of it, I was turned frequently to myself, but here many difficulties arose. It struck me, among others, that a young man only twenty-four years of age could not have that solid judgment, or that knowledge of men, manners, and things, which were requisite to qualify him to undertake a task of such magnitude and importance; and with whom was I to unite? I believed, also, that it looked so much like one of the feigned labors of Hercules, that my understanding would be suspected, if I proposed it."

He however resolved to do something for the cause by translating his essay from Latin into English, enlarging and presenting it to the public. Immediately on the publication of this essay, he discovered to his astonishment and delight, that he was not the only one who had been interested in this subject.

Being invited to the house of William Dillwyn, one of these friends to the cause, he says: "How surprised was I to learn, in the course of our conversation, of the labors of Granville Sharp, of the writings of Ramsey, and of the controversy in which the latter was engaged, of all which I had hitherto known nothing. How surprised was I to learn that William Dillwyn had, himself, two years before, associated himself with five others for the purpose of enlightening the public mind on this great subject.

"How astonished was I to find, that a society had been formed in America for the same object. These thoughts almost overpowered me. My mind was overwhelmed by the thought, that I had been providentially directed to this house; the finger of Providence was beginning to be discernible, and that the day-star of African liberty was rising."

After this he associated with many friends of the cause, and at last it became evident that in order to effect anything, he must sacrifice all other prospects in life, and devote himself exclusively to this work.

He says, after mentioning reasons which prevented all his associates from doing this: "I could look, therefore, to no person but myself; and the question was, whether I was prepared to make the sacrifice. In favor of the undertaking, I urged to myself that never was any cause, which had been taken up by man, in any country or in any age, so great and important; that never was there one in which so much misery was heard to cry for redress; that never was there one in which so much good could be done; never one in which the duty of Christian charity could be so extensively exercised; never one more worthy of the devotion of a whole life towards it; and that, if a man thought properly, he ought to rejoice to have been called into existence, if he were only permitted to become an instrument in forwarding it in any part of its progress.

"Against these sentiments, on the other hand, I had to urge that I had been designed for the church; that I had already advanced as far as deacon's orders in it; that my prospects there on account of my connections were then brilliant; that, by appearing to desert my profession, my family would be dissatisfied, if not unhappy. These thoughts pressed upon me, and rendered the conflict difficult.

"But the sacrifice of my prospects staggered me, I own, the most. When the other objections which I have related, occurred to me, my enthusiasm instantly, like a flash of lightning, consumed them; but this stuck to me, and troubled me. I had ambition. I had a thirst after worldly interest and honors, and I could not extinguish it at once. I was more than two hours in solitude under this painful conflict. At length I yielded, not because I saw any reasonable prospect of success in my new undertaking, for all cool-headed and cool-hearted men would have pronounced against it; but in obedience, I believe, to a higher Power. And I can say, that both on the moment of this resolution, and for some time afterwards, I had more sublime and happy feelings than at any former period of my life."

In order to show how this enterprise was looked upon and talked of very commonly by the majority of men in these times, we will extract the following passage from Boswell's Life of Johnson, in which Bozzy thus enters his solemn protest: "The wild and dangerous attempt, which has for some time been persisted in, to obtain an act of our Legislature, to abolish so very important and necessary a branch of commercial interest, must have been crushed at once, had not the insignificance of the zealots, who vainly took the lead in it, made the vast body of planters, merchants and others, whose immense properties are involved in that trade, reasonably enough suppose, that there could be no danger. The encouragement which the attempt has received, excites my wonder and indignation; and though some men of superior abilities have supported it, whether from a love of temporary popularity, when prosperous; or a love of general mischief, when desperate, my opinion is unshaken.

"To abolish a statute which in all ages God has sanctioned, and man has continued, would not only be robbery to an innumerable class of our fellow-subjects, but it would be extreme cruelty to the African savages, a portion of whom it saves from massacre, or intolerable bondage in their own country, and introduces into a much happier state of life; especially now, when their passage to the West Indies, and their treatment there, is humanely regulated. To abolish this trade, would be to

'---- shut the gates of mercy on mankind.'"

One of the first steps of Clarkson and his associates, was the formation of a committee of twelve persons, for the collection and dissemination of evidence on the subject.

* * * * *

The contest now began in earnest, a contest as sublime as any the world ever saw.

The Abolition controversy more fully aroused the virtue, the talent, and the religion of the great English nation, than any other event or crisis which ever occurred.

Wilberforce was the leader of the question in Parliament. The other members of the Anti-slavery Committee performed those labors which were necessary out of it.

This labor consisted principally in the collection of evidence with regard to the traffic, and the presentation of it before the public mind. In this labor Clarkson was particularly engaged. The subject was hemmed in with the same difficulties that now beset the Anti-slavery cause in America. Those who knew most about it, were precisely those whose interest it was to prevent inquiry. An immense moneyed interest was arrayed against investigation, and was determined to suppress the agitation of the subject. Owing to this powerful pressure, many who were in possession of facts which would bear upon this subject, refused to communicate them; and often after a long and wearisome journey in search of an individual who could throw light upon the subject, Clarkson had the mortification to find his lips sealed by interest or timidity. As usual, the cause of oppression was defended by the most impudent lying; the slave-trade was asserted to be the latest revised edition of philanthropy. It was said that the poor African, the slave of miserable oppression in his own country, was wafted by it to an asylum in a Christian land; that the middle passage was to the poor negro a perfect elysium, infinitely happier than anything he had ever known in his own country. All this was said while manacles, and hand-cuffs, and thumb-screws, and instruments to force open the mouth, were a regular part of the stock for a slave ship, and were hanging in the shop windows of Liverpool for sale.

For Clarkson's attention was first called to these things by observing them in the shop window, and on inquiring the use of one of them, the man informed him that many times negroes were sulky and tried to starve themselves to death, and this instrument was used to force open their jaws.

Of Clarkson's labor in this investigation some idea may be gathered from his own words, when stating that for a season he was compelled to retire from the cause, he thus speaks. "As far as I myself was concerned, all exertion was then over. The nervous system was almost shattered to pieces. Both my memory and my hearing failed me. Sudden dizzinesses seized my head. A confused singing in the ear followed me wherever I went. On going to bed the very stairs seemed to dance up and down under me, so that, misplacing my foot, I sometimes fell. Talking, too, if it continued but half an hour, exhausted me so that profuse perspirations followed, and the same effect was produced even by an active exertion of the mind for the like time.

These disorders had been brought on by degrees, in consequence of the severe labors necessarily attached to the promotion of the cause. For seven years I had a correspondence to maintain with four hundred persons, with my own hand; I had some book or other annually to write in behalf of the cause. In this time I had traveled more than thirty-five thousand miles in search of evidence, and a great part of these journeys in the night. All this time my mind had been on the stretch. It had been bent too to this one subject, for I had not even leisure to attend to my own concerns. The various instances of barbarity which had come successively to my knowledge within this period, had vexed, harrassed, and afflicted it. The wound which these had produced was rendered still deeper by those cruel disappointments before related, which arose from the reiterated refusals of persons to give their testimony, after I had traveled hundreds of miles in quest of them. But the severest stroke was that inflicted by the persecution, begun and pursued by persons interested in the continuance of the trade, of such witnesses as had been examined against them; and whom, on account of their dependent situation in life, it was most easy to oppress. As I had been the means of bringing these forward on these occasions, they naturally came to me, when thus persecuted, as the author of their miseries and their ruin. From their supplications and wants it would have been ungenerous and ungrateful to have fled. These different circumstances, by acting together, had at length brought me into the situation just mentioned; and I was therefore obliged, though very reluctantly, to be borne out of the field, where I had placed the great honor and glory of my life."

I may as well add here that a Mr. Whitbread, to whom Clarkson mentioned this latter cause of distress, generously offered to repair the pecuniary losses of all who had suffered in this cause. One anecdote will be a specimen of the energy with which Clarkson pursued evidence. It had been very strenuously asserted and maintained that the subjects of the slave trade were only such unfortunates as had become prisoners of war, and who, if not carried out of the country in this manner, would be exposed to death or some more dreadful doom in their own country. This was one of those stories which nobody believed, and yet was particularly useful in the hands of the opposition, because it was difficult legally to disprove it. It was perfectly well known that in very many cases slavetraders made direct incursions into the country, kidnapped, and carried off the inhabitants of whole villages, but the question was, how to establish it? A gentleman whom Clarkson accidentally met on one of his journeys, informed him that he had been in company, about a year before, with a sailor, a very respectable looking young man, who had actually been engaged in one of these expeditions; he had spent half an hour with him at an inn; he described his person, but knew nothing of his name or the place of his abode, all he knew was that he belonged to a ship of war in ordinary, but knew nothing of the port. Clarkson determined that this man should be produced as a witness, and knew no better way than to go personally to all the ships in ordinary, until the individual was found. He actually visited every sea-port town, and boarded every ship, till in the very _last_ port and on the very _last_ ship which remained, the individual was found, and found to be possessed of just the facts and information which were necessary. By the labors of Clarkson and his contemporaries an incredible excitement was produced throughout all England. The pictures and models of slave ships, accounts of the cruelties practised in the trade, were circulated with an industry which left not a man, woman, or child in England uninstructed. In disseminating information, and in awakening feeling and conscience, the women of England were particularly earnest, and labored with that whole-hearted devotion which characterizes the sex.

It seems that after the committee had published the facts, and sent them to every town in England, Clarkson followed them up by journeying to all the places, to see that they were read and attended to. Of the state of feeling at this time, Clarkson gives the following account:

"And first I may observe, that there was no town through which I passed, in which there was not some one individual who had left off the use of sugar. In the smaller towns there were from ten to fifty, by estimation, and in the larger, from two to five hundred, who made this sacrifice to virtue. These were of all ranks and parties. Rich and poor, churchmen and dissenters had adopted the measure. Even grocers had left off trading in the article in some places. In gentlemen's families, where the master had set the example, the servants had often voluntarily followed it; and even children, who were capable of understanding the history of the sufferings of the Africans, excluded with the most virtuous resolution the sweets, to which they had been accustomed, from their lips. By the best computation I was able to make, from notes taken down in my journey, no fewer than three hundred thousand persons had abandoned the use of sugar." It was the reality, depth, and earnestness of the public feeling, thus aroused, which pressed with resistless force upon the government; for the government of England yields to popular demands, quite as readily as that of America.

After years of protracted struggle, the victory was at last won. The slave-trade was finally abolished through all the British empire; and not only so, but the English nation committed, with the whole force of its national influence, to seek the abolition of the slave-trade in all the nations of the earth. But the wave of feeling did not rest there; the investigations had brought before the English conscience the horrors and abominations of slavery itself, and the agitation never ceased till slavery was finally abolished through all the British provinces. At this time the religious mind and conscience of England gained, through this very struggle, a power which it never has lost. The principle adopted by them was the same so sublimely adopted by the church in America, in reference to the Foreign Missionary cause: "The field is the world." They saw and felt that as the example and practice of England had been powerful in giving sanction to this evil, and particularly in introducing it into America, that there was the greatest reason why she should never intermit her efforts till the wrong was righted throughout the earth.

Clarkson to his last day never ceased to be interested in the subject, and took the warmest interest in all movements for the abolition of slavery in America.

One of his friends, during my visit at this place, read me a manuscript letter from him, written at a very advanced age, in which he speaks with the utmost ardor and enthusiasm of the first anti-slavery movements of Cassius Clay in Kentucky. The same friend described him to me as a cheerful, companionable being,--frank and simple-hearted, and with a good deal of quiet humor.

It is remarkable of him that with such intense feeling for human suffering as he had, and worn down and exhausted as he was, by the dreadful miseries and sorrows with which he was constantly obliged to be familiar, he never yielded to a spirit of bitterness or denunciation.

The narrative which he gives is as calm and unimpassioned, and as free from any trait of this kind, as the narrative of the evangelist.

I have given this sketch of what Clarkson did, that you may better appreciate the feelings with which I visited the place.

The old stone house, the moat, the draw-bridge, all spoke of days of violence long gone by, when no man was safe except within fortified walls, and every man's house literally had to be his castle.

To me it was interesting as the dwelling of a conqueror, as one who had not wrestled with flesh and blood merely, but with principalities and powers, and the rulers of the darkness of this world, and who had overcome, as his great Master did before him, by faith, and prayer, and labor.

We were received with much cordiality by the widow of Clarkson, now in her eighty-fourth year. She has been a woman of great energy and vigor, and an efficient co-laborer in his plans of benevolence.

She is now quite feeble. I was placed under the care of a respectable female servant, who forthwith installed me in a large chamber overlooking the court-yard, which had been Clarkson's own room; the room where for years, many of his most important labors had been conducted, and from whence his soul had ascended to the reward of the just.

The servant who attended me seemed to be quite a superior woman; like many of the servants in respectable English families. She had grown up in the family, and was identified with it; its ruling aims and purposes had become hers. She had been the personal attendant of Clarkson, and his nurse during his last sickness; she had evidently understood, and been interested in his plans, and the veneration with which she therefore spoke of him, had the sanction of intelligent appreciation.

A daughter of Clarkson, who was married to a neighboring clergyman, with her husband, was also present on this day.

After dinner we rode out to see the old church, in hose enclosure the remains of Clarkson repose. It was just such a still, quiet, mossy old church, as you have read of in story-books, with the grave-yard spread all around it, like a thoughtful mother, who watches the resting of her children.

The grass in the yard was long and green, and the daisy, which in other places lies like a little button on the ground, here had a richer fringe of crimson, and a stalk about six inches high. It is, I well know, the vital influence from the slumbering dust beneath, which gives the richness to this grass and these flowers; but let not that be a painful thought; let it rather cheer us, that beauty should spring from ashes, and life smile brighter from the near presence of death. The grave of Clarkson was near the church, enclosed by a railing and marked by a simple white marble slab; it was carefully tended and planted with flowers. In the church was an old book of records, and among other curious inscriptions, was one recording how a pious committee of old Noll's army had been there, knocking off saints' noses, and otherwise purging the church from the relics of idolatry.

Near by the church was the parsonage, the home of my friends, a neat, pleasant, sequestered dwelling, of about the style of a New England country parsonage.

The effect of the whole together was inexpressibly beautiful to me. For a wonder, it was a pleasant day, and this is a thing always to be thankfully acknowledged in England. The calm stillness of the afternoon, the seclusion of the whole place, the silence only broken by the cawing of the rooks, the ancient church, the mossy graves with their flowers and green grass, the sunshine and the tree shadows, all seemed to mingle together in a kind of hazy dream of peacefulness and rest. How natural it is to say of some place sheltered, simple, cool, and retired, here one might find peace, as if peace came from without, and not from within. In the shadiest and stillest places may be the most turbulent hearts, and there are hearts which, through the busiest scenes, carry with them unchanging peace. As we were walking back, we passed many cottages of the poor.

I noticed, with particular pleasure, the invariable flower garden attached to each. Some pansies in one of them attracted my attention by their peculiar beauty, so very large and richly colored. On being introduced to the owner of them, she, with cheerful alacrity, offered me some of the finest. I do not doubt of there being suffering and misery in the agricultural population of England, but still there are multitudes of cottages, which are really very pleasant objects, as were all these. The cottagers had that bright, rosy look of health which we seldom see in America, and appeared to be both polite and self-respecting.

In the evening we had quite a gathering of friends from the neighborhood--intelligent, sensible, earnest, people--who had grown up in the love of the anti-slavery cause as into religion. The subject of conversation was: "The duty of English people to free themselves from any participation in American slavery, by taking means to encourage the production of free cotton in the British provinces."

It is no more impossible or improbable that something effective may be done in this way, than that the slave-trade should have been abolished. Every great movement seems an impossibility at first. There is no end to the number of things declared and proved impossible, which have been done already, so that this may do something yet.

Mrs. Clarkson had retired from the room early; after a while she sent for me to her sitting-room. The faithful attendant of whom I spoke was with her. She wished to show me some relics of her husband, his watch and seals, some of his papers and manuscripts; among these was the identical prize essay with which he began his career, and a commentary on the Gospels, which he had written with great care, for the use of his grandson. His seal attracted my attention--it was that kneeling figure, of the negro, with clasped hands, which was at first adopted as the badge of the cause, when every means was being made use of to arouse the public mind and keep the subject before the attention. Mr. Wedgewood, the celebrated porcelain manufacturer, designed a cameo, with this representation, which was much worn as an ornament by ladies. It was engraved on the seal of the Anti-Slavery Society, and was used by its members in sealing all their letters. This of Clarkson's was handsomely engraved on a large, old-fashioned cornelian, and surely if we look with emotion on the sword of a departed hero, which, at best, we can consider only as a necessary evil, we may look with unmingled pleasure on this memorial of a bloodless victory.

When I retired to my room for the night I could not but feel that the place was hallowed--unceasing prayer had there been offered for the enslaved and wronged race of Africa by that noble and brotherly heart. I could not but feel that that those prayers had had a wider reach than the mere extinction of slavery in one land or country, and that their benign influence would not cease till not a slave was left upon the face of the earth.

Teaching the Slave to Read.

Much has been discussed and written, both at the North and South, concerning the policy and propriety of permitting those in bondage to gain the rudiments of a common education.

Many who _conscientiously_ (for having lived among them, I do believe that there _are_ "conscientious" slave-owners) hold their laborers in servitude, believe that the experiment might be successfully tried. Indeed, it is often tried on plantations, even in States where the law enforces strict penalties against it. They believe that the slaves, if permitted to learn to read, would be more moral, faithful and obedient; and they cannot reconcile it with their sense of duty to keep from them the perusal of the Bible.

The majority, however, think differently; and the majority will always make the laws. _They_ believe that there is a talismanic power in even the alphabet of knowledge, to arouse in the bondsman powers which they would crush for ever. They believe that one truth leads on to another, and that the mind, once aroused to inquiry, will never rest until it has found out its native independence of man's dominion. They point triumphantly, in proof of the policy of their system, to the "spoiled slave," as they term many of those in whose training the opposite course has been pursued. More trouble, vexation, and insubordination, they confidently allege, has been caused by permitting slaves to learn to read, than by any other indulgence.

It may be so; it is certain that, in many instances, masters have failed to win the gratitude to which they thought themselves justly entitled, for their kindness and care. They have found their servants growing discontented and idle, where they hoped to make them docile and happy. Searching for the cause of this, they perhaps turn upon the course of training they have followed, and accuse it of being opposed to the best interests of the slave. Could such reasoners but look upon the matter in its true perspective, they would cease to wonder that "good" should, in their view, "work out evil." _Learning_ and _Slavery_ can never compromise; they are as the antagonistic poles of the magnet.

In the first place, Slavery blunts the mind, and renders it, in its early years, unsusceptible to those impressions which are generally so lasting, when made upon youthful minds. Many who have tried to educate colored children, have been led to accuse _the race_ of natural inferiority in its capacity to gain knowledge. We have no right to draw _that_ inference from the few attempts which have been made on a part of the race whose mental faculties have, through many generations, been crippled by disuse.

I had once under my charge, for a short time, a negro girl, born in Africa--"Margru" of the "Armistad," with whose history most are familiar. On _her_ ancestory hung no clog of depression, except that of native wildness. There was no lack of aptitude to learn in her case. She astonished all by the ease with which she acquired knowledge, particularly in mathematical science. That a native heathen should be a better recipient of knowledge than one brought up in the midst of American civilization, speaks well for "the race," but ill for "the system," which has trained the latter.

Not only is this native dulness to be overcome, but _time_ for study is to be found--time enough for the faculties to unbend from the pressure of labor, and fix themselves upon the mental task. This is what few employers consider themselves able to afford. Once a week, in their opinion, is quite often enough for the slave to repeat his lesson; and through the week he may forget it. No wonder that both the indulgent master and the teacher--yes, and the learner, too, often become discouraged, and give up the task before the Word of God is unlocked to "the poor," for whom it was expressly written!

I speak as one who has _felt_ these obstacles, having, with the approval of one of the class to whom I have alluded, taken charge of a Sunday school among his servants. More attentive and grateful pupils I never had, but it has pained my heart to feel the difficulty of leading them even to the _threshold_ of knowledge; and there leaveing them!

In an adjoining household, however, it was still worse. George, a light-colored "boy" of twenty-five, the "factotum" of his mistress, was the husband of our cook, Letty. I had succeeded in taking Letty through several chapters in the New Testament, and this had aroused the ambition of George.

"What do you think?" exclaimed one of the family to me, one morning; "Mrs. ---- has been _whipping_ George!"

"Why! for what could that have been? I thought he was a favorite servant!"

"For taking lessons of Letty in the spelling-book!"

It was even so. The poor fellow wanted to learn to stammer in his Testament, and Letty, like any true-hearted wife, had given him the little assistance she could render. The whipping failed of its intended effect, however. Going one evening, at a late hour, into Letty's cabin, I found George seated by her on the floor, in the corner of their mud fire-place, poring intently over the forbidden spelling-book! He started up confused, but seeing who it was, he was reassured, and went on with his lesson! Whether George, Letty, or any of those who have gained the rudiments of science, will be _more happy_ in their servitude, is to me exceedingly doubtful. Thus far the severer classes of masters have the right; a slave, to be perfectly contented _as_ a slave, must be in total ignorance. But better, far better, greater suffering, if it bring enlargement of man's higher being, than that system that would _smother_ the soul in its bodily case. Let the slave have the key to the gate of Life Eternal, even if his pathway through this life must be more thickly sown with thorns. Let the opposing principles wage, until the right of _one_ is asserted. And, oh! above all pray for the day when these fetters shall be stricken from the souls God has created, wherewith to people, we firmly trust, no mean "tabernacle" of His New Jerusalem!

THIBODAUX, Nov. 25, 1853.

FUN-JOTTINGS;

OR,

LAUGHS I HAVE TAKEN A PEN TO!

BY N. P. WILLIS

The Most Popular Author Before the Public!

ONE VOLUME 12MO. MUSLIN--PRICE $1.25.

* * * * *

FOURTH THOUSAND IN SIXTY DAYS!

* * * * *

ALDEN, BEARDSLEY & Co., Auburn, N. Y., }
} Publishers.
WANZER, BEARDSLEY & Co., Rochester, N. Y., }

* * * * *

Extracts from Notices of the Press.

"From the title of the volume one would suppose that it was made up exclusively of funny anecdotes and amusing stories. Such, however, is not the fact. Many incidents narrated in the book, will be read with other feelings than those inspired by the perusal of laughable anecdotes. But they, as well as the _real_ 'Fun-Jottings,' will be perused with interest. The work is written in Willis' peculiar and happy style. It will unquestionably meet with a wide sale. It is printed in the best style of the art, and handsomely bound."--_Auburn Daily Adv._

"Some twenty choice love stories, all ending in fun, and redolent with mirth, are related with humor and sentiment, which are decidedly captivating."--_Syracuse Journal._

"These Fun Jottings' embrace the best of Willis' livelier efforts. * * * The most clever, graphic, and entertaining sketches ever produced in this country."--_Boston Post._

"It is a good book, and will be read by thousands."--_Chicago Journal_.

"Some of Mr. Willis' happiest hits and most graceful specimens of compositions are here included."--_N. Y. Evangelist._

"Fresh, lively, gay, and gossipping, these 'Fun Jottings' deservedly merit the enduring garb in which they appear."--_Home Gazette_.

"One of Willis' pleasant books, in which the reader is always sure to find entertainment."--_Philadelphia Mirror_.

"The contents are better than the title."--_N. Y. Tribune_.

"A volume of light sketches, written in Mr. Willis' most amusing style, and will be read by everybody."--_Detroit Advertiser_.

"It contains the best specimen of the prose writings of Mr. Willis."--_Montgomery Gazette_.

"The book is entertaining and spicy--just the kind of reading to keep one 'wide awake' during the long nights that are now approaching."--_Phil. News_.

"For laughter without folly, for a specific in innocent mirthfulness against _ennui_ and _hypo_--as a cordial to the animal spirits when drooping with care or flagging with excess of labor--this volume of 'Fun-Jottings' bears the palm."--_N. Y. Independent_.

"It is funny and fascinating--a collection of Willis' dashing sketches--half comic, half pathetic."--_Cincinnati Herald_.

"Mr. Willis' reputation as a story writer, has long been well established, and lovers of this kind of reading will find a rich entertainment in this volume."--_Hartford Times_.

THE FARM AND THE FIRESIDE;

OR,

THE ROMANCE OF AGRICULTURE,

BEING

HALF HOURS OF LIFE IN THE COUNTRY, FOR RAINY DAYS AND WINTER EVENINGS.

BY REV. JOHN L. BLAKE, D. D.

AUTHOR OF FARMER'S EVERY-DAY BOOK; THE FARMER AT HOME; AND A GENERAL BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY.

* * * * *

COMMENDATIONS OF THE PERIODICAL PRESS.

From the Ohio Farmer.

DR. BLAKE is justly regarded as one of the best agricultural writers in the country, and the work before us is one of the most interesting productions of his pen. Its peculiar merit, as a work for the fireside, consists in the variety of its topics, its plain and simple, yet attractive style, its fine engravings, and the interesting romance which the author has thrown around Rural and Agricultural Life. In this respect, "The Farm and the Fireside" is a work well adapted to the youthful mind. We hope it may be extensively read, as it cannot fail to improve the taste and promote inquiry in the most useful and practical of all departments of science.

* * * * *

From the New-York Evangelist.

The aim of the author has been to throw over labor, home and agricultural life, their true dignity and charm; to introduce the farmer to the delights and privileges of his lot; to embellish the cares of toil with those kindly sentiments so naturally associated with the country and its employments. It is a pleasant book--one that will enliven the fireside, elevate and purify the thoughts, and, at the same time, impart a great deal of valuable agricultural knowledge. We know not how the natural trains of thought of the farmer could be more aptly met or more safely and agreeably led, than they are by these brief and varied discussions. The range is as wide as life itself--morals, religion, business, recreation, education, home, wife and daughters--every relation and duty is touched upon, genially and instinctively.

* * * * *

From the New-York Tribune.

We have here another highly instructive and entertaining volume from an author, who had laid the community under large obligations by the enterprise and tact with which he has so frequently catered to the popular taste for descriptions of rural life. Its contents are of a very miscellaneous character, embracing sketches of natural history, accounts of successful farming operations, anecdotes of distinguished characters, singular personal reminiscences, pithy moral reflections, and numerous pictures of household life in the country. No family can add this volume to their collection of books without increasing their sources of pleasure and profit.

* * * * *

From the Northern Christian Advocate.

The venerable author of this work is entitled to the warmest thanks of the public for his numerous and valuable contributions to our literature. He is truly an American classic. We have been conversant with his writings for the last twenty years, and have always found them both useful and entertaining in a high degree. His writings on Agriculture contain much real science, with numerous illustrative incidents, anecdotes, and aphorisms, all in the most lively and pleasing manner. By this means the dry details of farming business are made to possess all the interest of romance. The style is clear, easy, and dignified; the matter instructive, philosophical, and persuasive. This work is an eloquent plea for the noble and independent pursuit of Agriculture.

* * * * *

From the National Magazine.

We return our thanks for the new volume of Dr. Blake, "The Farm and the Fireside, or the Romance of Agriculture, being Half Hours and Sketches of Life in the Country," a charming title, certainly, and one that smacks of the man as well as of the country. Eschewing the dryness of scientific forms and erudite details, the author presents detached, but most entertaining, and often very suggestive articles on a great variety of topics--from the "Wild Goose" to "Conscience in the Cow,"--from the "Value of Lawyers in a Community" to the "Objections to early Marriages." The book is, in fine, quite unique, and just such a one as the farmer would like to pore over at his fireside on long winter evenings.

* * * * *

From the New-York Recorder.

"The Farm and the Fireside," is a most interesting and valuable work, being a series of Sketches relating to Agriculture and the numerous kindred arts and sciences, interspersed with miscellaneous moral instruction, adapted to the life of the farmer.

* * * * *

From the Germantown Telegraph.

We have looked through this work and read some of the "Sketches," and feel a degree of satisfaction in saying that it possesses decided merit, and will commend itself, wherever known, as a volume of much social interest and entertainment. The sketches comprise "Country Life" generally--some of them are just sufficiently touched with romance to give them additional zest; while others are purely practical, and relate to the farmer's pursuit. We regard it as a valuable book, and are sorry our limits will not admit of bestowing upon it such a notice as it really deserves.

* * * * *

From Harper's New Monthly Magazine.

This work is a collection of miscellaneous sketches on the Romance of Agriculture and Rural Life. Matters of fact, however, are not excluded from the volume, which is well adapted for reading in the snatches of leisure enjoyed at the farmer's fireside.

* * * * *

From the True Democrat.

Dr. Blake's publications are all of a high order, and are doing a most important work towards refining the taste, improving the intellect, and rendering attractive the various branches of Agricultural science. Indeed we know no author who has so successfully blended the romantic, the rural and beautiful with the poetical, the useful, and true, as has Dr. Blake. This is a peculiar feature of all his works. His style is plain, simple, and perspicuous; and, with unusual tact and judgment, he so manages to insinuate himself upon you, that you are at once amused, delighted, and instructed with the subject he is discussing. In this respect he relieves the study of agricultural science from the abstruseness of technical science, and thus renders himself easily comprehended by all classes of readers.

* * * * *

From the New-York Evening Post.

The author's object is to improve the soil through the mind--not so much to place in the hands of farmers the best methods of raising large crops--for these he refers them to Leibig's Agricultural Chemistry, and to treatises of the like description--but to make them feel how useful, agreeable, and ennobling, is the profession of agriculture, and, above all, how profitable the business must become when skilfully and economically carried on. These money-making considerations are, we suspect, the best moral guano that can be applied to the farmer's spiritual soil. The author writes well of the countryman's independence, the good effect of fresh salubrious air upon his health, and the moral influence of his every-day intimacy with nature upon his mind.

"The Farm and the Fireside" is a kind of Bucolical annual--to be read in seasons of leisure--intended for the Phyllises and Chloes, as well as for the Strephons and Lindors. Dr. Blake has enriched it with curious anecdotes of domestic animals, and of the best way of raising and selling them. He describes model-farms, and the large incomes made from them. He expatiates on the advantages of matrimony in rural life, expounds the true theory of choosing a helpmate, discusses the advantages of Sunday-Schools, and recommends neatness of attire and punctuality in bathing. In short, this volume is as diversified in its aspect as the small garden of a judicious cultivator, where, in a limited space, useful cabbages, potatoes, and all the solid esculent greens, grow side by side with choice fruits and pleasant flowers.

IMMENSE SALE!

* * * * *

LEWIE;

OR,

THE BENDED TWIG!

BY COUSIN CICELY

Author of "SILVER LAKE STORIES."

* * * * *

EIGHTH THOUSAND NOW PRINTING!

* * * * *

NO BOOK sells like it--None so well supplies the demand! Superbly Printed and Beautifully Bound.

Price from $1.00 to $1.75, according to style.

ALDEN, BEARDSLEY & Co., Auburn, N. Y., }
} Publishers.
WANZER, BEARDSLEY & Co., Rochester, N. Y., }

* * * * *

What the Press Say:

COUSIN CICELY is very industrious--whether in penciling lights or shadows, in describing domestic scenery, or inculcating religious principles, the fair author possesses a happy facility, so as to render her productions alike agreeable and instructive.--_Protestant Churchman._

This book is written in a style well calculated to please, and contains an inestimable moral--plain, concise, and void of superfluities, that a child may understand it--characters life-like and well sustained, and the whole plan of the work is good.--_Yates Co. Whig._

The contents of the work are of the first order and unexceptionable.--_Rochester Daily Union._

The story is not only well written, but it has merits in the dramatic grouping of incidents, graphic delineation of character, and the affecting interest which attracts and supports the reader's attention through the whole work, from the opening scene to the finale.--_Rochester Daily Democrat._

This is a new work from the pen of the gifted author of the "Silver Lake Stories." It is got up in a style of mechanical elegance equal to the issues of Putnam and Appleton, and the quality of its contents will not be found behind that of three-fourths of the publications that emanate from the pens of more wide-known authors, and from publishing houses that employ none but the _best writers_.--_Canandaigua Messenger._

It is a story designed to illustrate the deplorable effects of a neglect of proper parental discipline in infancy; in a well-written preface, the authoress, "Cousin Cicely," assures us it is substantially a narrative of facts. It traces the career of a spoiled and petted boy, whose mother was too weak and indolent to restrain him as she ought, through the several stages of a perverse childhood, a reckless boyhood, and a passionate, ungovernable youth, till this victim of a parent's folly is found in a felon's cell, with the mark of Cain on his brow.--_Auburn Daily Advertiser._

The authoress, who, by the way, need not be afraid to sail under her own proper colors hereafter, claims that most of the incidents are taken from real life; a very creditable averment, as the work, with slight modifications in each individual case, would prove a faithful portraiture of the early training and subsequent career of nine-tenths of the victims of the gallows, and of the penitentiary.--_Mirror, Lyons, N. Y._

The writer of this, and of many other pleasant volumes--"Cousin Cicely," as she chooses to be called--is gifted with rare talents, which she is wisely devoting to useful ends. Her charming "Silver Lake Stories," have effected much good, and this work is well calculated to do the same, both with children of the larger and of the smaller growth. * * * Difficulties of various natures arise, on the last and most important of which hangs the catastrophe of the story. But what that is, and how the book ends, is for the reader to find out, not for us to tell.--_Albany Eve Journal._

* * * One of the domestic sort--speaking of home, dwelling upon home affections and family character, and the incidents of common life, yet as deeply interesting as the most romantic narrative. It has not been paraded before the public with ostentatious praise; but it will be far more acceptable to the reader than many works that have thus attracted interest in advance, without being able to meet and repay it.--_Albany Atlas._

* * * * *

[Transcriber's Notes:

The transcriber made the following changes to the text:

1. p. 24, "two" changed to italic "two" 3. p. 68, Cries she; "but let ... no closing quote 4. p. 84, "warant" changed to "warrant" 5. p. 110, "jeweleries" changed to "jewelries" 6. p. 192, "outage, But" changed to "outage. But" 7. p. 214, will of Legree?" closing quote deleted 8. p. 216, "contend its exists" changed to "contend it exists" 9. p. 234, "manisfestation, They" changed to "manisfestation. They" 10. p. 235, But the Spirit said, "Not so; ... no closing quote 11. Footnote #7, "Ye christian Bondous" changed to "Ye Christian Bondous" 12. p. 293, "cotemporaries" changed to "contemporaries" 13. p. 302, "procelain" changed to "porcelain"

Several page numbers in the Contents are not correct.