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THE OLD SOUTH 
 
TI f E OLD SOUTH 
 
 ESSAYS SOCIAL AND POLITICAL 
 
 WITH A NEW PREFACE 
 
 BY 
 
 THOMAS NELSON PAGE 
 
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 CHAUTAUQUA, NEW YORK 
 MCMXIX 
 
Copyright, 1892, 1919, by 
 Charles Scribner's Sons 
 
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 MY COUNTRYMEN 
 
 AND 
 
 COUNTRYWOMEN 
 
PREFACE TO NEW EDITION 
 
 A peeface is usually either intimate or didactic. 
 The first kind serves better the proper use of a preface 
 to give the reader the true spirit in which a work is 
 written and thus give the chance to read in that spirit 
 of open-mindedness, and possibly sympathy, which 
 alone can give either profit or pleasure. Without this 
 spirit no book can be read as it should. To one read- 
 ing in another spirit, a book is mere writing; poetry is 
 mere verse; romance mere fiction; history mere annals 
 or statistics, of which some one has wittily said the 
 chief use is to refute other statistics. 
 
 History, to be worth the name, must have its 
 horizon and its background. Otherwise it is simply an 
 isolated record which must be brought by some other 
 hand into its proper perspective to have value. With- 
 out this due relation, it is "no more history than loose 
 bricks are a house." 
 
 In this volume of early essays on the history of the 
 Old South, I have only fluttered the leaves of the his- 
 tory of our people, getting a glimpse only here and 
 there of its full life with many, many pages left unseen. 
 
 It is a far cry from an old plantation in Old Virginia 
 to the Quirinal Hill; from the Fork Church Road to 
 the street of the Twentieth of September. And yet, 
 looking through these essays there is a connection be- 
 tween them. In the years which these essays attempt 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 to reflect there was the movement of the same spirit 
 of Liberty which has given the ancient Sabine High 
 Road its modern name. 
 
 In those years, sitting amid the ruins of an old 
 civilization which had been swept away by war, we 
 were just facing a new life. The old was passing 
 away. The awakening was rude enough. But the 
 new life was met, and the old had its part in it. It 
 gave it that which was immortal. Strangely enough, 
 in a land where Domestic Slavery had been implanted, 
 it gave in increased measure the spirit of Liberty, It 
 gave it the Immortality of Democracy. Its expounders 
 from Jefferson to Wilson drank of the well beside the 
 gate of that Bethlehem and to-day we find the foun- 
 tain spreading into a river to water and make glad the 
 new world. What matter if its course has been dif- 
 ferent from that which the old seers foretold, if the 
 future be somewhat veiled in mist! The mist will 
 clear away, the sun will shine in the dark places and 
 the world will be made "safe for Democracy." 
 
 An old friend of mine, Joaquin Nabuco, formerly 
 Brazilian Minister to Washington, said to me once: 
 "Charon takes little luggage across to Posterity. 
 Gather together your stories and essays on the Old 
 South and its Life; pack them in small compass, and 
 try him ! " 
 
 I know that this kind speech was prompted by 
 friendship, but I treasure it the more highly for that 
 reason. Here is a part of the luggage to which he so 
 graciously referred. 
 
 Thos. Nelson Page. 
 Rome, March 27, 1919. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Several of the within essays were delivered as 
 addresses before literary Alumni Societies, and 
 revision has not wholly availed to clear them from 
 the rhetoric which insensibly crept into them. Be- 
 ing, however, upon topics as to which there is much 
 diversity of sentiment, this form of expression will 
 at least serve to show the state of feeling where 
 they were delivered and thus may not be without 
 its use. The substance of the papers is what the 
 author earnestly believes and what he is satisfied 
 history will establish. 
 
 The essays are given to the public in the hope 
 that they may serve to help awaken inquiry into 
 the true history of the Southern people and may 
 aid in dispelling the misapprehension under which 
 the Old South has lain so long. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Old South 3 
 
 Authorship in the South before the War . 57 
 Glimpses of Life in Colonial Virginia ... 95 
 Social Life in Old Virginia before the War 143 
 
 Two Old Colonial Places 189 
 
 The Old Virginia Lawyer 235 
 
 The Want of a History of the Southern 
 
 People 253 
 
 The Negro Question 277 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 In the selection of a theme for this occasion, I 
 have, curious to relate, been somewhat embarrassed. 
 Not that good subjects were not manifold, and mate- 
 rial plentiful ; but for me, on this occasion, when I 
 am to address this audience, in this presence, there 
 could be but one subject — the best. 
 
 I deem myself fortunate that I am permitted to 
 address you on this spot; for this University, 
 whose friend was George Washington and whose 
 establisher was Eobert E. Lee, impresses me as the 
 spot on earth to which my discourse is most appro- 
 priate. Broad enough to realize the magnificent 
 ideal of its first benefactor as a university where 
 the youth of this whole country may meet and 
 acquire the grand idea of this American Union, 
 it is yet so distinctly free from the materialistic 
 tendencies which of late are assailing kindred 
 institutions and insidiously threatening even the 
 existence of the Union itself, that it may be justly 
 regarded as the citadel of that conservatism which, 
 mated with immortal devotion to duty, may be 
 termed the cardinal doctrine of the Southern civili- 
 zation. 
 
 8 
 
4 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Something more than twenty years ago there fell 
 upon the South a blow for which there is no paral- 
 lel among the casualties which may happen to an 
 individual, and which has rarely in history befallen 
 nations. Under the euphemism of reconstruction 
 an attempt was made after the war to destroy the 
 South. She was dismembered, disfranchised, de- 
 nationalized. The States which composed her were 
 turned by her conquerors into military districts, 
 and their governments were subverted to military 
 tribunals. Virginia, that had given Washington, 
 Jefferson, Henry, Nelson, the Lees, Madison, Mar- 
 shall, and a host of others who had made the nation, 
 became " District No. 1." 
 
 The South was believed to be no more. It was 
 intended that she should be no more. But God in 
 his providence had his great purpose for her and 
 he called her forth. With the old spirit strong 
 within her she renewed her youth like the eagles, 
 fixed her gaze upon the sun, and once more spread- 
 ing her strong pinions, lifted herself for another 
 flight. 
 
 The outside world gazed astonished at her course, 
 and said, this is not the Old South, but a new civil- 
 ization, a New South. 
 
 The phrase by imperative inference institutes 
 invidious comparison with and implies censure of 
 something else — of some other order — of a differ- 
 ent civilization. 
 
 That order, that civilization, I propose to dis< 
 cuss briefly this evening ; to, so far as may be in 
 
THE OLD SOUTH O 
 
 the narrow limits of an address, repel this censure ; 
 show that comparison is a,bsurd, and that the New 
 South is, in fact, simply the Old South with its 
 energies directed into new lines. 
 
 The civilization which is known by this name 
 was as unique as it was distinct. It combined 
 elements of the three great civilizations which 
 since the dawn of history have enlightened the 
 world. It partook of the philosophic tone of the 
 Grecian, of the dominant spirit of the Roman, and 
 of the guardfulness of individual rights of the 
 Saxon civilization. And over all brooded a soft- 
 ness and beauty, the joint product of Chivalry and 
 Christianity. 
 
 This individuality began almost with the first 
 permanent Anglo-Saxon settlement of this conti- 
 nent; for the existence of its distinguishing char- 
 acteristics may be traced from the very beginning 
 of the colonial period. The civilization flourished 
 for two hundred and fifty years, and until its 
 vitality, after four years of invasion and war, 
 expired in the convulsive throes of reconstruc- 
 tion. 
 
 Its distinctiveness, like others of its character- 
 istics, was referable to its origin, and to its subse- 
 quent environing conditions. 
 
 Its tendency was towards exclusiveness and con- 
 servatism. It tolerated no invasion of its rights. 
 It admitted the jurisdiction of no other tribunal 
 than itself. The result was not unnatural. The 
 
6 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 world, barred out, took its revenge, and the Old 
 South stands to-day charged with sterility, with 
 attempting to perpetuate human slavery, and with 
 rebellion. 
 
 That there was shortcoming in certain directions 
 may not be denied ; but it was not what is charged. 
 
 If, when judged by the narrow standard of mere, 
 common materialism, the Southern civilization fell 
 short, yet there is another standard by which it 
 measured the fullest stature : the sudden supremacy 
 of the American people to-day is largely due to the 
 Old South, and to its contemned civilization. 
 
 The difference between the Southern civilization 
 and the Northern was the result of the difference 
 between their origins and subsequent surroundings. 
 
 The Northern colonies of Great Britain in Amer- 
 ica were the asylums of religious zealots and revo- 
 lutionists who at their first coming were bent less 
 on the enlargement of their fortunes than on the 
 freedom to exercise their religious convictions, how- 
 ever much the sudden transition from dependence 
 and restriction to freedom and license may in a 
 brief time have tempered their views of liberty and 
 changed them into proscriptors of the most tyran- 
 nical type. 
 
 The Southern colonies, on the other hand, were 
 from the first the product simply of a desire for 
 adventure, for conquest, and for wealth. 
 
 The Northern settlements were, it is true, founded 
 under the law; but it was well understood that 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 7 
 
 they contained an element which was not friendly to 
 the government and that the latter was well satisfied 
 to have the seas stretch between them. The South- 
 ern, on the other hand, came with the consent of the 
 crown, the blessing of the Church, and under the 
 auspices and favor of men of high standing in the 
 kingdom. They came with all the ceremonial of an 
 elaborate civil government — with an executive, a 
 council deputed by authorities at home, and for- 
 mal and minute instructions and regulations. 
 
 The crown hoped to annex the unknown land 
 lying between the El Dorado, which Spain had ob- 
 tained amid the summer seas, and the unbounded 
 claims of its hereditary enemy, France, to the North 
 and West. 
 
 The Church, which viewed the independence of 
 the Northern refugees as schism, if not heresy, gave 
 to this enterprise its benison in the belief that "the 
 adventurers for the plantations of Virginia were 
 the most noble and worthy advancers of the stand- 
 ard of Christ among the Gentiles." The company 
 organized and equipped successive expeditions in 
 the hope of gain ; and soldiers of fortune, and gen- 
 tlemen in misfortune, threw in their lot in the cer- 
 tainty of adventure and the probability that they 
 might better their condition. 
 
 Under such auspices the Southern colonies neces- 
 sarily were rooted in the faith of the England from 
 which they came — political, religious, and civil. 
 Thus from the very beginning the spirit of the two 
 
8 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 sections was absolutely different, and their sur- 
 rounding conditions were for a long time such as to 
 keep them diverse. 
 
 The first governor of the colony of Virginia was 
 a member of a gentle Huntingdonshire family, and 
 he was succeeded in office by a long line of men, 
 most of them of high degree. In the first ship-load 
 of colonists there were " four carpenters, twelve la- 
 borers, and fifty-four gentlemen." 
 
 John Smith, the strongest soul that planted the 
 British spirit upon this continent, and who was 
 himself a soldier of fortune, cried out in the bitter- 
 ness of his heart against such colonists ; yet he came 
 afterwards to note that these "gentlemen" cut down 
 more trees in a day than the ordinary laborers. 
 
 With the controversy as to whether or not the 
 inhabitants of the Southern colonies were generally 
 the descendants of Cavaliers it is not necessary to 
 deal. It makes no difference now to the race which 
 established this Union whether its ancestors fought 
 with the Norman conqueror on Senlac Hill or 
 whether they were among the " villains " who fol- 
 lowed the standards of Harold's earls. It may, 
 however, be averred that the gentle blood and high 
 connection which undoubtedly existed in a consid- 
 erable degree exerted widely a strengthening and 
 refining power, and were potent in their influence to 
 elevate and sustain not only the families which 
 claimed to be their immediate possessors, but 
 through them the entire colonial body, social and 
 .politic. 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 9 
 
 I make a prouder claim than this : the inhabi- 
 tants of these colonies were the strongest strains of 
 many stocks — Saxon, Celt, and Teuton ; Cavalier 
 and Puritan. 
 
 The ship-loads of artisans and adventurers who 
 came, caught in time the general spirit, and found 
 in the new country possibilities never dreamed of 
 in the old. Each man, whether gentle or simple, 
 was compelled to assert himself in the land where 
 personal force was of more worth than family 
 position, however exalted ; but having proved his 
 personal title to individual respect, he was eager to 
 approve likewise his claim to honorable lineage, 
 which still was held at high value. The royal 
 governors, with all the accompaniments of a vice- 
 regal court, only so much modified as was necessary 
 to suit the surroundings, kept before the people 
 the similitude of royal state ; and generation after 
 generation of large planters and thriving merchants, 
 with broad grants acquired from the crown or by 
 their own enterprise, as they rose, fell into the 
 tendency of the age and perpetuated or augmented 
 the spirit of the preceding generation. 
 
 With the Huguenot immigration came a new 
 accession of the same spirit, intensified in some 
 directions, if tempered in others. 
 
 As society grew more and more indulgent its 
 demands became greater ; the comforts of life be- 
 came more readily obtainable in the colonies just 
 at the time that civil and religious restrictions 
 
10 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 became more burdensome in the old country, and 
 the stream of immigration began to flow more 
 freely. 
 
 Slavery had become meantime a factor in the 
 problem — potent at first for perhaps mitigated 
 good, finally for immeasurable ill to all except 
 the slaves themselves. 
 
 This class of labor was so perfectly suited to the 
 low alluvial lands of the tide- water section that each 
 generation found itself wealthier than that which 
 had preceded it, and it was evident that the limits 
 between the mountains and the coast would soon 
 be too narrow for a race which had colonized under 
 a charter that ran " up into the land to the farthest 
 sea." 
 
 To this reason was added that thirst for adven- 
 ture and that desire for glory which is a characteris- 
 tic of the people, and in Virginia Spottswood and 
 his Knights of the Golden Horseshoe set out to 
 ride to the top of the Blue Eidge, which till then 
 was the barricade beyond which no Saxon was 
 known to have ventured, and from which it was 
 supposed the Great Lakes might be visible. They 
 found not "the unsalted seas," but one of the fair- 
 est valleys on earth stretched before them ; and the 
 Old Dominion suddenly expanded from a narrow 
 province to a land from whose fecund womb com- 
 monwealths and peoples have sprung. 
 
 By a strange destiny, almost immediately suc- 
 ceeding this discovery, the vitality of the colony 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 11 
 
 received an infusion of another element, which 
 became in the sequel a strong part of that life 
 which in its development made the " Southern 
 civilization." 
 
 This element occupied the new valley and changed 
 it from a hunting-ground to a garden. The first 
 settler, it is said, came to it by an instinct as 
 imperative as that which brought the dove back to 
 the ark of safety. It was not the dove, however, 
 which came when John Lewis settled in this valley ; 
 but an eagle, and in his eyry he reared a brood of 
 young who have been ever ready to strike for the 
 South. He had been forced to leave Ireland be- 
 cause he had slain his landlord, who was attempt- 
 ing to illegally evict him, and the curious epitaph 
 on his tomb begins, "Here lies John Lewis, who 
 slew the Irish Lord." 
 
 He was followed by the McDowells, Alexanders, 
 Prestons, Grahams, Eeids, McLaughlins, Moores, 
 Wallaces, McCluers, Mathews, Woods, Campbells, 
 Waddelis, Greenlees, Bowyers, Andersons, Breck- 
 enridges, Paxtons, Houstons, Stuarts, Gambles, 
 McCorkles, Wilsons, McISTutts, and many others, 
 whose descendants have held the highest offices in 
 the land which their fortitude created, and who 
 have ever thrown on the side of principle the cour- 
 age, resolution, and loyalty with which they held 
 out for liberty and Protestantism in the land from 
 which they came. 
 
 It was a sturdy strain which had suddenly flung 
 
12 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 itself along the frontier, and its effect has been 
 plainly discernible in the subsequent history of 
 the Old South, running a somewhat sombre thread 
 in the woof of its civilization, but giving it "a 
 body " which perhaps it might otherwise not have 
 possessed. A somewhat similar element, though 
 springing from a different source, held the frontier 
 in the other States. Its force was not towards the 
 East, but towards the West ; not towards the sea 
 and the old country, but towards the mountains 
 and the new ; and to its energy was due the Western 
 settlement, as to the other and the older class was 
 due the Eastern. 
 
 As the latter had created and opened up the first 
 tier of States along the sea-coast, so these new- 
 comers now crossed the mountains, penetrated " the 
 dark and bloody ground," and conquered the second 
 tier, hewing out of primeval forests — and holding 
 them alike against Indians, French and British — ■ 
 the States of Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee, and 
 opening up for the first time the possibility of a 
 great American continent. 
 
 They were not slave-holders to a great extent ; 
 for they were frontiersmen, who mainly performed 
 their own work ; they were not generally connected 
 with the old families of the Piedmont and Tide- 
 water, for they had in large part entered the State 
 by her northern boundary, or had been brought to 
 take up land under "cabin rights," or had come 
 across the mountain barrier and had cut their own 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 13 
 
 way into the forests, and they traced their lineage 
 to Caledonian stock ; they were not bound to them 
 by the ties of a common religion, for they repu- 
 diated the Anglican Church, with its hierarchy and 
 "malignant doctrines," as that Church had repudi- 
 ated them, and they worshipped God, according to 
 their own consciences, "in a way agreeable to the 
 principles of their education." 
 
 Thus, neither by interest, blood, nor religion, 
 were they for a time connected with the original 
 settlers of the Southern colonies ; and yet they were 
 distinctly and irrevocably an integral part of the 
 South and of the Southern civilization, — as the 
 waters of the Missouri and the upper Mississippi 
 are said to flow side by side for a hundred miles, 
 each distinguishable, yet both together mingling to 
 make the majestic Father of Waters. 
 
 There was something potent in the Southern soil, 
 which drew to it all who once rested on its bosom, 
 without reference to race, or class, or station. Let 
 men but once breathe the air of the South and gen- 
 erally they were thenceforth Southerners forever. 
 So, having crossed the mountains, this race made 
 Kentucky and Tennessee Southern States, and, 
 against the allurements of their own interest and 
 the appeals of the North, held them so, and infused 
 a strong Southern element into the State of Ohio. 
 
 Steam had not been then invented, and the infi- 
 nite forces of electricity were as yet unknown ; yet, 
 without these two great civilizers, the Southern 
 
14 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 spirit bore the ensign of the Anglo-Saxon across 
 the mountains, seized the West, and created this 
 American continent. 
 
 There is another work which the South may 
 justly claim. As it pushed advance up first against 
 the French confines and then beyond them, and 
 made this country English, so it preserved the 
 spirit of civil and religious liberty pure and unde- 
 filed, and established it as the guiding star of the 
 American people forever. 
 
 I believe that the subordination of everything 
 else to this principle is the key to the Southern 
 character. 
 
 The first charter of Virginia, the leading Southern 
 colony, "secured" to her people "the privileges, 
 franchises, and immunities of native-born English- 
 men forever," and they never forgot it nor per- 
 mitted others to overlook it. 
 
 She had a Legislative Assembly as early as 1619, 
 and the records show that it guarded with watchful 
 vigilance against all encroachments those rights 
 which, thanks to it, are to-day regarded as inalien- 
 able among all English-speaking races. 
 
 The Assembly was hardly established before it 
 struck its first blow for constitutional liberty. 
 
 "When the royal commissioners sent by James to 
 investigate the "Seditious Parliament" came and 
 demanded the records of the Assembly it refused 
 to give them up ; and when the clerk, under a bribe, 
 surrendered them, the Assembly stood him in the 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 15 
 
 pillory and cut off one of his ears. This did not 
 save their charter; but in the sequel it turned 
 out that the forfeiture of the charter was a great 
 blessing. 
 
 As early as 1623-24 the General Assembly of the 
 colony adopted resolutions defining and declaring 
 the right of the colonists, and limiting the powers 
 of the executive. 
 
 The governor was not " to lay any taxes or impo- 
 sitions upon the colony, their lands, or other way 
 than by authority of the General Assembly, to be 
 levied and employed as the General Assembly shall 
 appoint." Moreover, the governor was not to with- 
 draw the inhabitants from their labor for his ser- 
 vice, and the Burgesses attending the General 
 Assembly were to be privileged from arrest. 
 
 The colony of Maryland went farthest yet in the 
 way of liberty, and, under the direction of Lord 
 Baltimore, passed the famous Act of Toleration on 
 the 2d of April, 1649, which first established the 
 principle of freedom of conscience on the earth. 
 
 Thus early was the South striking for those great 
 principles of liberty which are fundamental now 
 mainly because of the spirit of our forefathers. It 
 was not until some years after Virginia had declared 
 herself that the issue was finally joined in England. 
 
 From this time the light of liberty flamed like a 
 beacon. The colonies declared themselves devotedly 
 loyal to the crown, but were more true to their 
 own rights ; and they frequently found themselves 
 
16 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 opposed to the government as vested in and mani- 
 fested by the royal governor. 
 
 During the time of the Commonwealth the South- 
 ern colonies held by the crown, and became the 
 asylum of many hard-pressed Cavaliers who found 
 Cromwell's interest in them too urgent to permit 
 them to remain at home. And Charles II. himself 
 was offered a crown by his loyal subjects in Vir^ 
 ginia when he was a fugitive with a price set on 
 his head. 
 
 So notorious was this fealty that the Great Pro- 
 tector was obliged to send a war fleet to Virginia 
 to quell this spirit and to make terms of peace. 
 The treaty is made as between independent powers. 
 
 The colonies were to obey the Commonwealth ; 
 but this submission was to be acknowledged a vol- 
 untary act, not forced nor constrained by a conquest 
 upon the country. The people were " to enjoy such 
 freedom and privileges as belong to free-born peo- 
 ple in England." The continuance of their Repre- 
 sentative Assembly was guaranteed. There was to 
 be total indemnity. The colony was to have free 
 trade, notwithstanding the Navigation Act. The 
 General Assembly alone was to have the power to 
 levy taxes ; and there were other provisions securing 
 those privileges and immunities which were claimed 
 as the birthright of the race. 
 
 After Cromwell's death the General Assembly 
 declared the supreme power to be "resident in" 
 itself until such command or commission should 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 17 
 
 come out of England as the General Assembly- 
 adjudged lawful. And when the king once more 
 came into his own the General Assembly accepted 
 his governor willingly, as did the colony of Mary- 
 land, but held firmly to the advantages it had 
 secured during the interregnum. 
 
 The colony welcomed the followers of Cromwell 
 in the hour of their adversity, and offered them as 
 secure an asylum as it had done a few years before 
 to the hard-pressed Cavaliers. Thus society came to 
 be knit of the strongest elements of all parties and 
 classes, who merged all factions into loyalty for 
 their collective rights. 
 
 Then came the contest with Berkeley. Charles 
 forgot the people who offered him a kingdom when 
 he was an exile and a wanderer, and his representa- 
 tive neglected their rights. 
 
 England claimed the monopoly of the colonial 
 trade, and imposed a heavy duty on their exports. 
 Not content with this, the silly king gave away 
 half of the settled portion of Virginia to two of his 
 followers. The colony sent commissioners to pro- 
 test, but before the trouble could be remedied 
 Virginia, demanding self-government, flamed into 
 revolution, with Nathaniel Bacon at its head. 
 
 We are told that the great revolution of 1688 
 established the liberties of the English people. 
 The chief Southern colony of Great Britain had 
 fought out its revolution twelve years before, and 
 although the revolution failed disastrously for its 
 
18 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 participants, and it has come down in history as a 
 rebellion, yet its ends were gained. 
 
 The troops of the fiery Bacon were beaten and 
 scattered, those who were captured were hanged as 
 insurrectionists, and the gallant leader himself 
 died of fever contracted in the trenches, a fugitive 
 and an outlaw, with a stigma so welded to his 
 name that after two centuries he is known but as 
 "Bacon the Rebel." 
 
 Judged by the narrow standard which makes suc- 
 cess the sole test, Nathaniel Bacon was a rebel, and 
 the uprising which he headed was a rebellion ; but 
 there are " rebellions " which are not rebellions, but 
 great revolutions, and there are "rebels " who, how- 
 ever absolutely their immediate purposes may have 
 failed, and however unjustly contemporary history 
 may have recorded their actions, shall yet be 
 known to posterity as patriots pure and lofty, 
 whose motives and deeds shall evoke the admira- 
 tion of all succeeding time. 
 
 Such was Nathaniel Bacon. They called him 
 rebel and outlawed him ; but he headed a revolu- 
 tion for the protection of the same rights, the same 
 " privileges, franchises, and immunities," whose 
 infringement caused another revolution just one 
 hundred years later, the leader of whose armies 
 was the rebel George Washington, the founder of 
 this University. 
 
 The elder rebel failed of his purpose for the time, 
 yet haply but for that stalwart blow struck at James- 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 19 
 
 town for the rights of the colonists there had never 
 been a Declaration of Independence, a Bunker Hill, 
 a Yorktown, or the United States of America. 
 
 The spirit never receded. The opening up of 
 lands, the increase of slaves, the extension of 
 commerce, made the Southern colonies wealthier 
 generation after generation, and their population 
 filled the territory up to the mountains and then 
 flowed over, as we have seen, into the unknown 
 regions beyond; and generation after generation, as 
 they grew stronger, they grew more self-contained, 
 more independent, more assertive of their rights, 
 more repellant of any invasion, more jealous of 
 tyranny, more loving of liberty. 
 
 Against governors, councils, metropolitans, com- 
 missaries, and clergy, in the Burgesses and in the 
 vestries, they fought the fight with steadfast cour- 
 age and persistency. 
 
 The long contest between the vestries and the 
 Church was only a different phase of this same 
 spirit, and was in reality the same struggle be- 
 tween the colony and the government at home, 
 transferred to a different theatre. The planters 
 were churchmen; but they claimed the right to 
 control the Church, and repudiated the right of 
 the Church to control them. It was the sacred 
 right of self-government for which they contended ; 
 and the first cry of " treason " was when the con- 
 test culminated in that celebrated Parsons case, in 
 which the orator of the Eevolution burst suddenly 
 into fame. 
 
20 THE OLD SOUTH. 
 
 "The gentleman has spoken treason/' declared 
 the counsel for the plaintiff ; but it was the treason 
 that was in all hearts, and was the first step of the 
 young advocate in his ascent to a fame for oratory 
 so transcending that the mind of a later and more 
 prosaic generation fails to grasp its wondrous- 
 ness, and there is nothing by which to measure it 
 since the day when the Athenian orator thundered 
 against the Macedonian tyrant. 
 
 The same principles which inspired the uprising 
 of Bacon a century before, and had animated the 
 continuous struggle since, swept the colonies into 
 revolution now. 
 
 The Stamp Act of 1766 set the colonies into 
 flame, and from this time to the outbreak of flagrant 
 war, a decade later, the people stood with steadfast 
 faces set against all encroachment ; and when the 
 time came for war the South sprang to arms. She 
 did not enter upon the enterprise from ignorance 
 of her danger, nor yet in recklessness. 
 
 The Southern planter sent his son to England to 
 be educated, and many of the men who sat in the 
 great conventions, or who subscribed the Declara- 
 tion of Independence, had been themselves educated 
 in England, and knew full well the magnitude of 
 the hazard they were assuming in instituting with 
 a handful of straggling colonies a revolution against 
 a power which made Chatham the ruler of Europe, 
 and which only a generation later tore the victori- 
 ous eagles of Napoleon himself. 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 21 
 
 Thomas Nelson, Jr., the wealthiest man in the 
 Colony of Virginia, had sat by Charles James Fox 
 at Eton and knew England and her power. Others 
 did also. 
 
 They knew all this full well ; and yet for the 
 sake of those principles, of those rights and liber- 
 ties, which they believed were theirs of right, and 
 which they meant to transmit undiminished to 
 their children, they gave up wealth and ease and 
 security, blazoned on their standard the motto 
 « Virginia for Constitutional Liberty," and launched 
 undaunted on the sea of revolution. 
 
 There is an incident connected with the signing 
 of the Declaration of Independence which illustrates 
 at once the character of the Southern planter and 
 the point I am endeavoring to make. 
 
 You may have observed, in looking over the 
 signers of the Declaration of Independence, that 
 Charles Carroll of Maryland subscribed himself 
 " Charles Carroll of Carrollton." Unless you know 
 the story it would appear that simple arrogance 
 prompted such a subscription. The facts, how- 
 ever, were these : It was a serious occasion, and a 
 solemn act this group of men were performing, 
 assembled to affix their names to this document, 
 which was to be forever a barrier between them 
 and Great Britain ; it had not been so very long 
 since the headsman's axe had fallen for a less overt 
 treason than they were then publicly declaring, and 
 if they failed they were likely to feel its weight or 
 else to meet a yet more disgraceful death. 
 
22 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Benjamin Franklin had just replied to the remark, 
 " We must all hang together," with his famous 
 pleasantry, " Yes, or we shall all hang separately," 
 when Carroll, perhaps the wealthiest man in Mary- 
 land, took the pen. As he signed his name, " Charles 
 Carroll," and rose from his seat, some one said, 
 " Carroll, you will get off easily ; there are so many 
 Charles Carrolls they will never know which one it 
 is." Carroll walked back to the table, and, seizing 
 the pen again, stooped and wrote under his name 
 " of Carrollton." 
 
 They affixed their names to the Declaration, com- 
 prehending the peril they were braving, as well as 
 they did the propositions which they were enunci- 
 ating to the world, and they intended to shoulder 
 all the responsibility of their act. 
 
 The South emerged from the Revolution mangled 
 and torn, but free, and with the Anglo-Saxon spirit 
 whetted by success and intensified. She emerged 
 also with her character already established, and 
 with those qualities permanently fixed which sub- 
 sequently came to be known through their results 
 as the Southern civilization. 
 
 Succeeding the Revolution came a period not 
 very distinctly marked in the common idea of im- 
 portant steps, but full of hazard and equally replete 
 with pregnant results — a period in which the loose 
 and impotent Confederation became through the 
 patriotism of the South this Union. 
 
 At last, the Constitution was somewhat of a com- 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 23 
 
 promise, and the powers not expressly delegated to 
 Congress were reserved to eacli State in her sover- 
 eign capacity, and it was upon this basis simply 
 that the Union was established. 
 
 It may throw light on the part that the South 
 took in this to recall the fact that when the point 
 was made that Virginia should relinquish her North- 
 western territory, Virginia ceded to the country, 
 without reservation, the territory stretching north 
 to the Great Lakes and west to the Father of Waters. 
 She granted it without consideration, and without 
 grudging, as she had always given generously 
 whenever she was called upon, and when she had 
 stripped herself of her fairest domain, in retribu- 
 tion a third of the small part which she had re- 
 tained was torn from her, without giving her even 
 a voice to protest against it. There is no act of 
 the Civil War, or of its offspring, the days of recon- 
 struction, so arbitrary, so tyrannical, and so un- 
 justifiable. 
 
 When the South emerged from the Revolutionary 
 War, her character was definitely recognized as 
 manifesting the qualities which combined to give 
 her civilization the peculiar and strongly marked 
 traits that have made it since distinctive among 
 the English-speaking races. And in the succeeding 
 years these traits became more and more prom- 
 inent. 
 
 The guiding principle of the South had steadily 
 been what may be termed public spirit ; devotion 
 
24 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 to the rights and liberties of the citizen, the embodi- 
 ment of which in a form of government was aptly 
 termed the Commonwealth. 
 
 To this yielded even the aristocratic sentiment. 
 The Southerner was attached to the British mode 
 of inheritance, yet he did away with the law of 
 primogeniture ; he was devoted to the traditions 
 of his Church, yet he declared for religious free- 
 dom, and not only disestablished the Church, but 
 confiscated and made common the Church lands, 
 and it is due to the South, to-day, that man is free 
 to worship God according to his conscience where- 
 ever the true God is known and feared. 
 
 The South changed far less after its separation 
 from Great Britain than did the North. Indeed, 
 the change was during the entire ante-bellum period 
 comparatively small when viewed beside the change 
 in the other portion of the country. 
 
 It has been said that it was provincial. It cer- 
 tainly did not so consider itself, for it held a self- 
 esteem and self-content as unquestioning and sub- 
 lime as that which pervaded Bome ; a,nd wherever 
 the provinces were, they were to the Southerner 
 assuredly beyond the confines of the Southern 
 States. Yet the naked fact is, that, assuming pro- 
 vincialism to be what it has been aptly defined to 
 be, " localism, or being on one side and apart from 
 the general movement of contemporary life," the 
 South was provincial. 
 
 African slavery, which had proven ill-adapted to 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 25 
 
 the needs and conditions of the North, and conse- 
 quently had disappeared more because of this fact 
 than because of the efforts of the Abolitionists, 
 had proved perfectly suited to the needs of the 
 South. 
 
 The negro flourished under the warm skies of the 
 South, and the granaries and tobacco fields of Mary- 
 land and Virginia, the cotton fields of the Carolinas, 
 Georgia, and Alabama, and the sugar plantations of 
 the Mississippi States, bore ample testimony to his 
 utility as a laborer. But the world was moving 
 with quicker strides than the Southern planter 
 knew, and slavery was banishing from his land all 
 the elements of that life which was keeping stride 
 with progress without. Thus, before the South- 
 erner knew it, the temper of the time had changed, 
 slavery was become a horror, and he himself was 
 left behind and was in the opposition. 
 
 Changes came, but they did not affect the South 
 — it remained as before or changed in less ratio; 
 progress was made ; the rest of the world fell into 
 the universal movement ; but the South advanced 
 more slowly. It held by its old tenets when they 
 were no longer tenable, by its ancient customs when, 
 perhaps, they were no longer defensible. All inter- 
 ference from the outside was repelled as officious 
 and inimical, and all intervention was instantly met 
 with hostility and indignation. It believed itself 
 the home of liberality when it was, in fact, neces- 
 sarily intolerant; — of enlightenment, of progress, 
 
26 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 when it had been so far distanced that it knew not 
 that the world had passed by. 
 
 The cause of this was African slavery, with 
 which the South is taunted as if she alone had 
 instituted it. For this she suffered; for this, at 
 last, she was forced to fight and pour out her blood 
 like water. 
 
 Slavery had forced the South into a position 
 where she must fight or surrender her rights. 
 
 The fight on the part of the North was for the 
 power to adapt the Constitution to its new doctrine, 
 and yet to maintain the Union ; on the part of 
 the South, it was for the preservation of guaran- 
 teed constitutional rights. 
 
 Through the force of circumstances and under 
 " an inexorable political necessity," the South 
 found itself compelled to assume finally the defence 
 of the system ; but it was not responsible either 
 for its origin or its continuance, and the very men 
 who fought to prevent external interference with 
 it had spent their lives endeavoring to solve the 
 problem of its proper abolition. 
 
 The African slave trade, dating from about the 
 year 1442 (although it did not flourish for a cen- 
 tury or more), when it was begun by Anthony 
 Gonzales, a Portuguese, was continued until the 
 present century was well installed. 
 
 It was chartered and encouraged by Queen Eliza- 
 beth, and by her royal successors, against the pro- 
 test of the Southern colonies, down to the time of 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 27 
 
 the American Eevolution. The first nation on the 
 civilized globe to protest against it as monstrous 
 was the Southern colony, Virginia. Twenty-three 
 times her people protested to the crown in public 
 acts of her Assembly. 
 
 One of the most scathing charges, brought by 
 the writer of the Declaration of Independence 
 against the crown, was that in which he arraigns 
 the king of England for having " waged cruel war 
 against human nature itself, violating its most 
 sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a 
 distant people who never offended him, captivating 
 and carrying them into slavery in another hemi- 
 sphere, or incurring a miserable death in their trans- 
 portation thither. 
 
 " This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel 
 powers, is the warfare of the Christian king of 
 Great Britain. 
 
 "Determined to keep open a market where men 
 should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his 
 negative for suppressing any legislative attempt 
 to prohibit and restrain the execrable commerce," 
 etc. 
 
 This clause was the product of Thomas Jeffer- 
 son, a Southerner, and although it was stricken out 
 in compliance with the wishes of two of the South- 
 ern colonies, yet substantially the same charge 
 was made in the Constitution of Virginia, where in 
 its preamble is set forth " the detestable and insup- 
 portable tyranny of the king of Great Britain, that 
 
28 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 he had prompted to rise in rebellion those very 
 negroes whom by any inhuman use of his royal 
 negative he had refused us permission to exclude 
 by law." 
 
 If the South had at any previous time inclined to 
 profit by the slave trade, it was only in common 
 with the rest of Christendom — particularly with 
 New England — when the most zealous and relig- 
 ious were participants in it ; when the Duke of 
 York, the future sovereign himself, was the head 
 of the company chartered under the Great Seal of 
 England, and when the queen-mother, the queen- 
 consort, Prince Eupert, the Earl of Shaftesbury, and 
 the leading men of the times were incorporators. 
 
 Even the godly John Newton was interested in 
 the traffic. 
 
 In the South, however, long before Jefferson 
 framed his famous arraignment of the king of 
 Great Britain, protest on protest had been made 
 against the iniquity, and all the ingenuity of those 
 men who produced the Declaration of Independence 
 and the Constitution of the United States had been 
 exercised to bring it to an end. 
 
 The House of Burgesses often attempted to lay a 
 duty of from £10 to £20 a head on the negro 
 slaves, and against the veto of the crown they 
 continued to levy duties, until the oppression by 
 the crown culminated, and "The gentlemen of the 
 House of Burgesses and the body of merchants 
 assembled in the old capital of Virginia on the 2d 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 29 
 
 June, 1770, resolved, among other things, that we 
 will not import or bring into the colony, or cause to 
 be imported or brought into the colony, either by 
 sea or land, any slaves, or make sale of any upon 
 commission, or purchase any slave or slaves that 
 may be imported by others, after the 1st day of 
 November next, unless the same have been twelve 
 months on the continent." 
 
 On the 1st of April, 1772, the House of Burgesses 
 addressed a hot petition to the crown, " imploring 
 his Majesty's paternal assistance in averting a ca- 
 lamity of a most alarming nature." It proceeds : 
 " The importation of slaves into the colonies from 
 the coast of Africa hath long been considered as a 
 trade of great inhumanity, and under its present 
 encouragement we have too much reason to fear 
 will endanger the very existence of your Majesty's 
 American dominions. We are sensible that some 
 of your Majesty's subjects of Great Britain may 
 reap emoluments from this sort of traffic, but when 
 we consider that it greatly retards the settlement 
 of the colonies with more useful inhabitants, and 
 may in time have the most destructive influence, 
 we presume to hope that the interest of a few will 
 be disregarded when placed in competition with the 
 security and happiness of such numbers of your 
 Majesty's dutiful and loyal servants. Deeply im- 
 pressed with these sentiments, we most humbly be- 
 seech your Majesty to remove all those restraints 
 on your Majesty's governors of the colony which 
 
30 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 inhibit their assenting to such laws as might check 
 so very pernicious a commerce." 
 
 It was not until the following year that the Phil- 
 adelphia petition to the Pennsylvania Assembly 
 was gotten up, and it accords the credit to the 
 Southern colony by asking similar action with that 
 of "the province of Virginia, whose House of Bur- 
 gesses have lately petitioned the king." 
 
 On the 5th of October, 1778, Virginia passed an 
 act forbidding the further importation of slaves, by 
 land or water, under a penalty of £1000 from the 
 seller and £500 from the buyer, and freedom to 
 the slave: thus giving to the world the first ex- 
 ample of an attempt by legislative enactment to 
 destroy the slave trade. 
 
 When the vote was taken in the Federal Congress 
 on the resolution to postpone the prohibition of the 
 trade to the year 1808, Virginia used all her influ- 
 ence to defeat the postponement, and it was carried 
 by New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connec- 
 ticut voting with Maryland, the Carolinas, and 
 Georgia. John Adams, writing of a speech of 
 James Otis in 1761, says : " Nor were the poor 
 negroes forgotten. Not a Quaker in Philadelphia, 
 nor Mr. Jefferson of Virginia, ever asserted the 
 rights of negroes in stronger terms. Young as I 
 was and ignorant as I was, I shuddered at the doc- 
 trine he taught." 
 
 The final prohibition of the slave trade by act of 
 Congress was brought about through the influence 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 31 
 
 of President Jefferson and by the active efforts of 
 Virginians. And greatly to the labors of the repre- 
 sentatives from Virginia was due the final extinc- 
 tion of the vile traffic through the act of Congress 
 declaring it to be piracy, five years before Great 
 Britain took similar action with regard to her 
 subjects. 
 
 Such is the actual record of the much-vilified 
 South relating to the African slave trade, taken 
 from official records. 
 
 Now as to slavery itself. We have seen how it 
 was brought upon the South without its fault, and 
 continued to be forced upon her against her pro- 
 tests. Let us for a moment investigate the facts 
 connected with its continuance. 
 
 The gradual system of emancipation adopted at 
 the North had undoubtedly led to many of the slaves 
 being shipped off to the South and sold. When, 
 therefore, after this "abolition," the movement, 
 from being confined to the comparatively small 
 band of liberators who were actuated by pure prin- 
 ciple, extended to those who had been their perse- 
 cutors, it aroused a suspicion at the South which 
 blinded it to a just judgment of the case. 
 
 If the South maintained slavery unjustifiably, 
 during its continuance, instead of its unnecessary 
 horrors being, as is popularly believed, augmented 
 by the natural brutality of the Southerner, the real 
 facts are that the system was at the South perhaps 
 fraught with less atrocity than it was whilst it con- 
 tinued at the North. 
 
32 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Sh. the earliest period of trie institution it was 
 justified on the ground of the slaves being heathen, 
 and a doubt was raised whether baptism would not 
 operate to emancipate. At the South it was adju- 
 dicated that it did not so operate ; but long prior 
 to this act! negroes were admitted to the Church. 
 In the leading colony at the North baptism was at 
 the time expressly prohibited. The necessary con- 
 comitants of slavery were wretched enough, and 
 the continuance of the system proved the curse of 
 the fair land where it flourished, but to the Afri- 
 can himself it was a blessing ; it gave his race the 
 only civilization it has had since the dawn of 
 history. 
 
 The statutory laws relating to slavery at the 
 South are held up as proof of the brutality with 
 which they were treated even under the law. But 
 these laws were not more cruel than were the laws 
 of England at the period when they were enacted ; 
 they were rarely put into practical execution ; and, 
 at least, Southerners never tolerated wholesale 
 burning at the stake as a legal punishment, as was 
 done in New York as late as 1741, when fourteen 
 negroes were burnt at the stake on the flimsy testi- 
 mony of a half -crazy servant girl ; and as was done 
 in Massachusetts as late as 1755, when a negro was 
 burnt for murder. 
 
 In the cotton and sugar States, where the negroes 
 were congregated in large numbers, and where a 
 certain degree of absenteeism prevailed, there was 
 naturally and necessarily more hardship. 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 33 
 
 African slavery was tolerated in Virginia and 
 the Carolinas, but it received its first express legis- 
 lative sanction from the Commonwealth of Massa- 
 chusetts. 
 
 This Commonwealth, which has done so much 
 to advance civilization, must bear the distinction 
 of being the first American colony to proclaim 
 slavery; to endorse the slave trade by legal sanc- 
 tion, and to build and equip the first slave-ship 
 which sailed from an American port. Even the 
 Mayflower, whose timbers one might have supposed 
 would be regarded as sanctified by the holy fathers 
 whose feet first touched Plymouth Bock, was, ac- 
 cording to tradition, turned to a more secular use, 
 and is reported by general tradition to have been 
 subsequently employed as an African slaver. 
 Whether this be true or not, the first American 
 slaver was the Salem ship The Desire, which was 
 built and equipped at Marblehead in 1636, and 
 was the prototype of a long line of slavers, in 
 which, through many decades, continuing long after 
 slavery was abolished in New England, and after 
 the Southern States were piling protest on protest 
 and act on act to inhibit the slave trade, New 
 England shippers, in violation of law, plied their 
 hellish traffic between the African coast and the 
 slave-holding countries. 
 
 Whatever may have been the horrors of African 
 slavery in the South, it was in its worst form and 
 under its most inhuman surroundings a mild and 
 
34 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 beneficent system, benevolent in its features and 
 philanthropic in its characteristics, when compared 
 with the slave trade itself. The horrors of "the 
 middle passage," when human beings, often to the 
 number of eight or nine hundred, were "piled 
 almost in bulk on water-casks," or were packed 
 between the hatches in a space where there was 
 "not room for a man to sit unless inclining his 
 head forward, their food half a pint of rice per day, 
 with one pint of water," with "a blazing sun above, 
 the boiling sea beneath, a withering air around," 
 had never been equalled before, and in the provi- 
 dence of God will never be again. 
 
 It is not necessary to defend slavery, to defend 
 the race which found it thrust upon it, contrary to 
 what it deemed its rights, and which, after long and 
 futile effort to rid itself of it, in accordance with 
 what it held to be consistent at once with its rights 
 and its security, refused to permit any outside 
 interference. This was not primarily because it 
 was wedded to slavery, but because it tolerated no 
 invasion of its rights under any form or upon any 
 pretext. 
 
 Vermont was the first State to lead off with eman- 
 cipation in 1777. By the census of 1790 but 
 seventeen slaves remained in the State. New 
 Hampshire and Massachusetts failed to fix a statu- 
 tory period; but the census of 1790 gives the 
 former State 158 slaves, "and one of these was still 
 reported in 1840." 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 35 
 
 Rhode Island and Connecticut about the same 
 time adopted a gradual plan of emancipation. The 
 latter State held 2759 slaves in 1790 — too many 
 to admit of immediate emancipation. 
 
 Pennsylvania had by the same census 3737 slaves, 
 and, recognizing the peril of injecting such a num- 
 ber of freedmen into the body politic, provided in 
 1780, by an act said to have been drafted by Benja- 
 min Franklin, that all slaves born after that time 
 should be free when they attained the age of 
 twenty-eight years. The census of 1840 showed 
 sixty-four still held in slavery. 
 
 In New York, by an act passed in 1799, the future 
 issue of slaves were set free — males at the age of 
 twenty-eight and females at the age of twenty-five 
 years. In 1790 there were 21,324 slaves in the 
 State. In 1800, before the act of emancipation 
 could take effect, this number had fallen off 981. 
 
 New Jersey in 1790 held 11,433 slaves. In 1804 
 her act of gradual emancipation was adopted. She 
 had 674 slaves in 1840 and 236 in 1850. 
 
 This movement was largely owing in its incep- 
 tion to the efforts of the Quakers, who have devoted 
 to peace those energies which others have given to 
 war, and who have ever been moved by the spirit 
 to take the initiative in all action which tends to 
 the amelioration of the condition of the human 
 race. 
 
 While this spirit of emancipation was passing 
 over the North, the South, to whose action in as« 
 
36 r A HE OLD SOUTH 
 
 serting general freedom and universal civil equality 
 was due the impulse, was stirring in the same di- 
 rection. With her, however, the problem was far 
 more difficult of solution, and although she ad- 
 dressed herself to it with energy and sincerity, she 
 proved finally unequal to the task, and it was re= 
 served, in the providence of an all- wise God, fo.r the 
 bitter scalpel of war to remove that which had 
 served its purpose and was slowly sapping the life- 
 blood of the South. 
 
 In the New England and Northern States, there 
 were, by the census of 1790, less than 42,000 slaves : 
 in Virginia alone, by the same census, there were 
 293,427 slayes — about seven times the number 
 contained in all the others put together. 
 
 How were they to be freed with advantage to the 
 slaves and security to the State ? 
 
 John Eandolph of Roanoke described the situa- 
 tion aptly when he said we were holding a wolf by 
 the ears, and it was equally dangerous to let go 
 and to hold on. 
 
 The problem was stupendous. But it was not 
 despaired of. Many masters manumitted their 
 slaves, the example being set by numbers of the 
 same benevolent sect to which reference has been 
 made. By the census of 1781 there were in Vir- 
 ginia 12,866 free negroes. Schemes of general 
 emancipation of the slaves in Virginia had been 
 proposed to the legislature by Jefferson in 1776; 
 by William Craighead, and by Dr. William Thorn- 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 37 
 
 ton in 1785, whilst other schemes were proposed by 
 St. George Tucker in 1796, by Thomas Jefferson 
 Eandolph in 1832, and by others from time to time. 
 The vast body of slaves in the country, however, 
 rendered it a matter so perilous as to prevent the 
 schemes from ever being effectuated. 
 
 The most feasible plan appeared to be one that 
 should lead to the colonization of the race in Africa ; 
 and the American Colonization Society was organ- 
 ized in Washington on the 1st of January, 1817, 
 with Bushrod Washington president, and William 
 H. Crawford, Henry Clay, John Taylor, and Gen- 
 eral John Mason, John Eager Howard, Samuel F. 
 Smith, and John C. Herbert of Maryland, and An- 
 drew Jackson of Tennessee among its vice-presi- 
 dents. 
 
 Auxiliary societies were organized all over Vir- 
 ginia, John Marshall being the president of that 
 established in Richmond, and ex-governors Pleas- 
 ants and Tyler being vice-presidents. James Madi- 
 son, James Monroe, and John Tyler all threw the 
 weight of their great influence to carry out the 
 purposes of the society and make it successful. 
 Strange to say, every act on the part of the South 
 leading towards liberation was viewed with suspi- 
 cion by the Abolitionists of the North, and every 
 step in that direction was opposed by them. Later 
 a new and independent State organization was 
 formed, called the Colonization Society of Virginia. 
 Its president was John Marshall ; its vice-presi- 
 
38 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 dents, James Madison, James Monroe, James Pleas- 
 ants, John Tyler, Hugh Nelson, and others ; and 
 its roll of membership embraced the most influen- 
 tial men in the State. 
 
 Everything was looking towards the gradual but 
 final extinction of African slavery. It was pre- 
 vented by the attitude of the Northern Abolition- 
 ists. Their furious onslaughts, accompanied by the 
 illegal circulation of literature calculated to excite 
 the negroes to revolt, and by the incursions of 
 emissaries whose avowed object was the liberation 
 of the slaves, but the effect of whose action was the 
 instigation of the race to rise and fling off the yoke 
 by rebellion and murder, chilled this feeling, the 
 balance of political power came into question, and 
 the temper of the South changed. 
 
 From this movement dates the unremittingly 
 hostile attitude of the two sections towards each 
 other. Before there had been antagonism; now 
 there was open hostility. Before there had been 
 conflicting righte, but they had been compromised 
 and adjusted ; from this time there was no compro- 
 mise. The Northerner was a " miserable Yankee " 
 and the Southerner was a " brutal slave-holder." 
 
 The two sections grew to be as absolutely sep- 
 arated as though a sea rolled between them. The 
 antagonism increased steadily and became intensi- 
 fied. It extended far beyond the original cause, and 
 finally became a factor in every problem, social and 
 political, which existed in the whole land, affecting 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 39 
 
 its results and often controlling its solution ; forc- 
 ing the two sections wider and wider apart, and 
 eventually dividing them by an impassable gulf. 
 Slavery, the prime cause, sank into insignificance 
 in the multitudinous and potent differences which 
 reared themselves between the two sections. It 
 was employed simply as the battle-cry of the two 
 opponents who stood arrayed against each other 
 on a much broader question. The real fight was 
 whether the conservative South should, with its 
 doctrine of States rights, of original State sov- 
 ereignty, rule the country according to a literal 
 reading of the Constitution, or whether the North 
 should govern according to a more liberal construc- 
 tion, adapted, as it claimed, by necessity to the 
 new and more advanced conditions of the nation. 
 Finally it culminated. After convulsions which 
 would have long before destroyed a less stable 
 nation, the explosion came. 
 
 The South, outraged at continual violation of 
 the Constitution, declared that it would no longer 
 act in unison with the North, and, after grave delib- 
 eration and hesitation, rendered proper by the mag- 
 nitude of the step contemplated, the far Southern 
 States exercised their sovereign right and dissolved 
 their connection with the Union. Then came the 
 President's call for troops, and finding themselves 
 forced to secede or to make war upon their sister 
 States, the border States withdrew. 
 
 The North made war upon the South, and, backed 
 
40 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 by the resources and the sentiment of the world, 
 after four years compelled her to recede from her 
 action. 
 
 Such in outline is the history of the South as it 
 relates to slavery. 
 
 What has taken place since belongs partly to the 
 New South and partly to the Old South. 
 
 The Old South made this people. One hundred 
 years ago this nation, like Athene, sprang full 
 panoplied from her brain. 
 
 It was the South that planned first the co-opera- 
 tion of the colonies, then their consolidation, and 
 finally their establishment as free and independent 
 States. 
 
 It was a Southerner, Henry, who first struck the 
 note of independence. It was a Southerner, Nelson, 
 who first moved, and the Convention of Virginia, a 
 Southern colony, which first adopted the resolution 
 " that the delegates appointed to represent this 
 colony in General Congress be instructed to pro- 
 pose to that respectable body to declare the United 
 Colonies free and independent States, absolved 
 from all allegiance to or dependence on the crown 
 or Parliament of Great Britain." 
 
 It was a Southern colony which first emblazoned 
 on her standard the emblem of her principle, Vir- 
 ginia for Constitutional Liberty. 
 
 It was a Southerner who wrote the Declaration 
 of Independence. 
 
 These acts created revolution, and a Southerner 
 
THE OLD SOFTH 41 
 
 led the armies of the revolutionists to victory ; and 
 when victory had been won it was to Southern 
 intellect and Southern patriotism which created 
 the Federal Constitution, that was due the final 
 consolidation of the separated and disjointed ele- 
 ments extended along the Atlantic coast into one 
 grand union of republics known as the United States. 
 
 From this time the South was as prominent in 
 the affairs of the nation as she had been when she 
 stood, a rock of defence, between the encroach- 
 ments of the crown and the liberties of the colonies. 
 
 Of the Presidents who had governed the United 
 States up to the time of the Civil War, the Old 
 South had contributed Washington, Jefferson, Mad- 
 ison, Monroe, Jackson, Harrison, Tyler, Polk, and 
 Taylor, and the cabinets had been filled with the 
 representatives of the same civilization. In the 
 only two wars which had ruffled the peaceful sur- 
 face of the nation's course during this period the 
 leading generals had been Southerners, and of the 
 Chief Justices, John Marshall and Roger B. Taney 
 had presided successively over the supreme bench of 
 the United States from 1801, bringing to bear upon 
 the decisions of that tribunal the force of their 
 great minds, and the philosophic thought which is 
 characteristic of the civilization of which they 
 were such distinguished exponents. 
 
 Next to George Washington John Marshall 
 probably did more than any other one man to estab- 
 lish the principles on which this government is 
 
42 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 founded; for by his decisions he settled the mutual 
 rights of the States on a firm and equitable basis, 
 and determined forever those questions which might 
 have strained the bonds of the young government. 
 
 To the South is due the fact that Louisiana is 
 not now a French republic, and that the Mississippi 
 rolls its whole length through the free land of the 
 United States ; to the South that the vast empire 
 of Texas is not a hostile government ; to the South 
 is due the establishment of this Union in. its integ- 
 rity, and of the doctrines upon which it is main- 
 tained. 
 
 Thus in the council chamber and the camp, in 
 the forum or on the field of battle, opposing invad- 
 ing armies or fighting for those principles which 
 are ingrained in the very web and woof of our 
 national life, the representatives of that contemned 
 civilization always took the lead. In the great 
 Civil War the two greatest men who stood for the 
 Union, and to whom its preservation was due, were 
 in large part the product of this civilization. Both 
 Grant and Lincoln — the great general and the still 
 greater President — sprang from Southern loins. 
 
 Can the New South make a better showing than 
 this, or trace its lineage to a stronger source ? 
 
 But as grand as is this exhibition of her genius, 
 this is not her best history. The record of battles 
 and of splendid deeds may serve to arrest admira- 
 tion and to mark the course of events, as the con- 
 stellations in the arch above us appear to the 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 43 
 
 beholder nobler than the infinite multitude of the 
 stars that fill the boundless reaches between ; but 
 the true record of the life of that civilization is 
 deeper and worthier than this. 
 
 As the azure fields that stretch away through 
 space are filled with stars which refuse their individ- 
 ual rays to the naked eye, yet are ever sending 
 light through all the boundless realms of space, so 
 under this brilliant exhibition of the South' s pub- 
 lic career lies the record of a life, of a civilization 
 so pure, so noble, that the world to-day holds noth- 
 ing equal to it. 
 
 After less than a generation it has become among 
 friends and enemies the recognized field of romance. 
 
 Its chief attribute was conservatism. Others 
 were courage, fidelity, purity, hospitality, magna- 
 nimity, honesty, and truth. 
 
 Whilst it proudly boasted itself democratic, it 
 was distinctly and avowedly anti-radical — holding 
 fast to those things which were proved, and stand- 
 ing with its conservatism a steadfast bulwark 
 against all novelties and aggressions. 
 
 No dangerous isms flourished in that placid 
 atmosphere ; against that civilization innovations 
 beat vainly as the waves lash themselves to spray 
 against the steadfast shore. 
 
 Slavery itself, which proved the spring of woes 
 unnumbered, and which clogged the wheels of prog- 
 ress and withdrew the South from sympathy with 
 the outer world, christianized a race and was the 
 
44 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 automatic balance-wheel between labor and capital 
 which prevented, on the one hand, the excessive 
 accumulation of wealth, with its attendant perils, 
 and on the other hand prevented the antithesis of 
 the immense pauper class which work for less than 
 the wage of the slave without any of his inci- 
 dental compensations. 
 
 In the sea-island cotton and rice districts, and the 
 sugar sections, it is true that there was a class which 
 accumulated wealth and lived in a splendor un- 
 known to the people of Virginia and of the interior 
 portions of the cotton and sugar States; but the 
 proportion of these to the entire population of the 
 South who in the aggregate made up the Southern 
 civilization is so small that it need scarcely be 
 taken into account. 
 
 That the Southerner was courageous the whole 
 world admits. His friends claim it ; his foes know 
 it. Probably never has such an army existed as 
 that which followed Lee and Jackson from the 
 time when, march-stained and battle-scarred, it 
 flung itself across the swamps of the Chickahom- 
 iny and stood a wall of fire between McClellan and 
 the hard-pressed capital of the Confederate South. 
 
 It was not discipline, it was not esprit de corps, 
 it was not traditional renown, it was not mere gen- 
 eralship which carried that army through. It was 
 personal, individual courage and devotion to prin- 
 ciple which welded it together and made it invin- 
 cible, until it was almost extirpated. 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 45 
 
 The mills of battle and of grim starvation ground 
 it into dust; yet even then there remained a valor 
 which might well have inspired that famous legend 
 which was one of the traditions of the conflict 
 between the Church and its assailants in earlier 
 ages, that after the destruction of their bodies 
 their fierce and indomitable spirits continued the 
 desperate struggle in the realms of air. 
 
 The tendency to hospitality was not local nor nar- 
 row ; it was the characteristic of the entire people, 
 and its concomitant was a generosity so general and 
 so common in its application that it created the 
 quality of magnanimity as a race characteristic. 
 
 It was these qualities to which the South was 
 indebted for her controlling influence in the gov- 
 ernment of the country, throughout that long period 
 which terminated only when the North abrogated 
 the solemn compact which bound the two sections 
 together. 
 
 'No section of this country more absolutely, 
 loyally, and heartily accepts the fact that slavery 
 and secession can never again become practical 
 questions in this land, than does that which a gen- 
 eration ago flung all its weight into the opposite 
 scale. But to pretend that we did not have the 
 legal, constitutional right to secede from the Union 
 is to stultify ourselves in falsification of history. 
 
 If any portion of this nation doubt the South's 
 devotion to the Union, let it attempt to impair the 
 Union. If the South is ever to be once more the 
 
46 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 leader of this nation, she must cherish the traditional 
 glory of her former station, and prove to the world 
 that her revolution was not a rebellion, but was 
 fought for a principle upon which she was estab- 
 lished as her foundation-stone — the sacred right of 
 self-government. 
 
 Government was the passion of the Southerner. 
 Trained from his earliest youth by the care and 
 mastery of slaves, and the charge of affairs which 
 demanded the qualities of mastership, the control 
 of men became habitual with him, and domination 
 became an instinct. Consequently, the only fields 
 which he regarded as desirable were those which 
 afforded him the opportunity for its exercise. 
 
 Thus every young Southerner of good social con- 
 nection who was too poor to live without work, or 
 too ambitious to be contented with his plantation, 
 devoted himself to the learned professions — the 
 law being the most desirable as offering the best 
 opportunity for forensic display, and being the 
 surest stepping-stone to political preferment. 
 
 Being emotional and impulsive, the Southerner 
 was as susceptible to the influences of rhetoric as 
 was the Athenian, and public speaking was culti- 
 vated as always a necessary qualification for public 
 position. 
 
 The South on this account became celebrated for 
 its eloquence, which, if somewhat fervid when 
 judged by the severe standard of later criticism, 
 was, when measured by its immediate effects, ex- 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 47 
 
 traordinarily successful. It contributed to preserve 
 through the decades preceding the war the suprem- 
 acy of the slave-holding South, even against the 
 rapidly growing aggressiveness of the North, with 
 the sentiment of the modern world at its back. 
 
 It is not necessary to make reference to those 
 orators who in the public halls of the nation, and in 
 their native States, whenever questions of moment 
 were agitated, evoked thunders of applause alike 
 from rapturous friends and dazzled enemies. Their 
 fame is now a part of the history of the country. 
 
 But in every circuit throughout the length and 
 breadth of the South are handed down, even now, 
 traditions of speakers who, by the impassioned elo- 
 quence of their appeals, carried juries against both 
 law and evidence, or on the hustings, in political 
 combat, swept away immense majorities by the irre- 
 sistible impetuosity of their oratory. 
 
 That the Old South was honest, no sensible man 
 who reads the history of that time can doubt, and 
 no honest man will deny. Its whole course through- 
 out its existence, whatever other criticism it may 
 be subjected to, was one of honesty and of honor. 
 Even under the perils of public life, which try 
 men's souls, the personal integrity which was a 
 fruit of the civilization in which it flourished was 
 never doubted. 
 
 In confirmation of this proposition, appeal can be 
 made with confidence to the history of the public 
 men of the South. They were generally poor men, 
 
48 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 frequently reckless men, not infrequently insolvent 
 men; but their bitterest enemies never aspersed 
 their honesty. 
 
 There was not one of them who could not say, 
 with Laurens of South Carolina, "I am a poor man 
 — God knows I am a poor man ; but your king is 
 not rich enough to buy me ! " 
 
 In this they were the representatives of their 
 people. The faintest suspicion of delinquency in 
 this respect would have blasted the chances of any 
 man at the South, however powerful or however 
 able he might have been, and have consigned him 
 to everlasting infamy. Whatever assaults may be 
 made on that civilization, its final defence is this : 
 The men were honorable and the women pure. So 
 highly were these qualities esteemed, that the. as- 
 persion of either was deemed sufficient cause to 
 take life. 
 
 If it has appeared to modern civilization that 
 life has not been held sufficiently sacred at the 
 South, this may be urged in her defence: that a 
 comparative statement, based on the statistics, does 
 not show that homicide is, or has ever been, more 
 general at the South than at the North, when all 
 classes are embraced in the statement; and if it 
 has been tolerated among the upper classes under 
 a form which has now happily passed away, it was 
 in obedience to a sentiment which although grossly 
 abused, had this much justification — that it placed 
 honor above even life. 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 49 
 
 The principal element of weakness in the civili- 
 zation of the Old South was that it was not pro- 
 ductive in material wealth. The natural agricul- 
 tural resources of the country were so great and so 
 suited to the genius of the people that there were 
 no manufactures to speak of. 
 
 The tendency of the civilization was the reduc- 
 tion of everything to principles, and not to disturb 
 them by experiment. In this way there was an 
 enormous waste. The physical resources of the 
 country and the intellectual resources of its people 
 were equally subject to this fault. 
 
 Whilst oratory flourished to a greater extent 
 than under any other civilization which has ex- 
 isted since the invention of the printing-press, 
 there was no Southern literature. Rather, there 
 were no publishers and no public. There were 
 critics who might have shone on the Edinburgh 
 Review, and writers who might have made an 
 Augustan literature; but the atmosphere was 
 against them. 
 
 A Virginian farmer sat down and wrote the great 
 Bill of Rights, the finest State paper ever penned 
 on this continent ; a Virginian was called on to draft 
 a paper in the absence of another who was to have 
 drawn it, and he wrote the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence. Another, a naval officer, laid down the 
 laws of the winds and tides, and charted the path- 
 less deep into highways, so that men come and go as 
 securely as on dry land. There was genius enough, 
 
50 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 but the spirit of the time was against it. In the 
 main the authors wrote for their diversion, and the 
 effort was not repeated. The environments were 
 not conducive to literary production, and it was not 
 called into being. The harpers were present at the 
 feast, but no one called for the song. 
 
 It was to this that the South owed her final 
 defeat. It was for lack of a literature that she 
 was left behind in the great race for outside sup- 
 port, and that in the supreme moment of her ex- 
 istence she found herself arraigned at the bar of 
 the world without an advocate and without a de- 
 fence. 
 
 Only study the course of the contest against the 
 South and you cannot fail to see how she was con- 
 quered by the pen rather than by the sword ; and 
 how unavailing against the resources of the world, 
 which the North commanded through the sym- 
 pathy it had enlisted, was the valiance of that 
 heroic army, which, if courage could have availed, 
 had withstood the universe. 
 
 That Southern army was worn away as a blade is 
 worn by use and yet retains its temper while but a 
 fragment exists. 
 
 When the supreme moment came, the South had 
 the world against her ; the North had brought to 
 its aid the sympathy of Christendom, and its force 
 was as the gravitation of the earth — imperceptible, 
 yet irresistible. 
 
 From their standpoint they were right, as we 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 51 
 
 were right from ours. Slavery was a great barrier 
 which kept out the light, and the North wrote of 
 us in the main only what it believed. 
 
 If it was ignorant, it is our fault that it was not 
 enlightened. We denied and fought, but we did 
 not argue. Be this, however, our justification, that 
 slavery did not admit of argument. Argument 
 meant destruction. 
 
 The future historian of the Old South and of its 
 civilization is yet to arise. 
 
 If in this audience to-night there be any young 
 son of the South in whose veins there beats the 
 blood of a soldier who perilled his life for that 
 civilization which has been so inadequately out- 
 lined, and who, as he has heard from his mother's 
 lips the story of his father's glorious sacrifice, has 
 felt his pulses throb and his heart burn with noble 
 aspiration, let him know that though he may never, 
 like his father, be called upon to defend his princi- 
 ples with his life, yet he has before him a work not 
 less noble, a career not less glorious : the true 
 recording of that story, of that civilization whose 
 history has never yet been written — the history of 
 the Old South. 
 
 What nobler task can he set himself than this — 
 to preserve from oblivion, or worse, from misrep- 
 resentation, a civilization which produced as its 
 natural fruit Washington and Lee ! 
 
 It is said that in all history there is no finer 
 flight of human eloquence than that in which the 
 
52 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Athenian orator aroused his countrymen by his 
 appeal to the spirits of their sires who fell at Mara- 
 thon. Shall not some one preserve the history of 
 our fathers who fell in what they deemed a cause 
 as sacred ? Can any good come forth of a genera- 
 tion that believe that their fathers were traitors ? 
 I thank God that the sword of the South will 
 nevermore be drawn except in defence of this 
 Union ; but I thank God equally that it is now 
 without a stain. The time will come when the 
 North as well as the South shall know that this 
 Union is more secure because of the one heritage 
 that our fathers have left us — the heritage of an 
 untarnished sword. 
 
 If he shall feel the impulse stirring in his bosom 
 to consecrate to this work the powers which have 
 been nurtured at the nourishing breasts of this 
 bountiful mother, there can be no fitter place for 
 his sacrament than these hallowed walls — no bet- 
 ter time than the present. 
 
 Within these sacred precincts three monuments 
 meet his gaze. Each of them, by coincidence, is 
 dedicated to the memory of one who had learnt by 
 heart the lesson which that history teaches when 
 rightly read, — the devotion of life to duty. 
 
 One of these was the leader of armies, the noblest 
 character the South has produced, the great Lee; 
 who, putting aside proffers of wealth and place and 
 honor, gave himself to teaching the South the sub- 
 lime beauty of devotion to duty — that lesson whose 
 
THE OLD SOUTH 5§ 
 
 most admirable example was his own life. One 
 was the surgeon, James M. Ambler, who refused to 
 accept his life, and died amid the snows of the Lena 
 Delta, pistol in hand, guarding the bodies of his 
 dead comrades. Who does not remember the story 
 of the young surgeon, kneeling amid the perpetual 
 snows, pointing his dying comrades to Christ the 
 crucified ! The third, William E. Lynch, was a stu- 
 dent, who while yet a lad put into action the same 
 divine lesson, and to save a fellow-student plunged 
 dauntless into the icy river and died, while yet a 
 boy, a hero's death. All three speak to us this 
 evening with sublime eloquence the heroic story of 
 the Old South ! 
 
 Here within these sacred walls, where the fore- 
 most soldier, the knightliest gentleman, the noblest 
 man of his race, taught his sublime lesson, and his 
 pupils learned to put it into such divine prac- 
 tice, the heart cannot but feel that the true story 
 of their life must be told, the song must be sung, 
 through the ages. 
 
 Not far off repose the ashes of another great 
 soldier, Stonewall Jackson, the representative of 
 the element that settled this valley, as Lee was 
 representative of that which settled the tide-water. 
 He flashed across the sky, a sudden meteor, and 
 expired with a fame for brilliancy second only to 
 Napoleon. 
 
 Near by him, and side by side with his own 
 only son, Stonewall Jackson's aide-de-camp, Colonel 
 
54 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Alexander S. Pendleton, slain in battle at the age 
 of twenty-three, lies one to whom I owe a personal 
 debt which I desire to acknowledge publicly to- 
 night : General William Nelson Pendleton, a soldier 
 who doffed the cassock for the uniform, and who 
 lived a warrior-priest, leading his men in peace as 
 he had done in war, and like his old commander, 
 the highest type of the Christian soldier. 
 
 Standing here beside the sacred ashes of the 
 noblest exponent of that civilization, which I have 
 attempted to outline, delivering my message from 
 this University, his grandest monument, I hail the 
 future historian of the Old South. 
 
AUTHORSHIP IN THE SOUTH 
 BEFORE THE WAR 
 
AUTHORSHIP IN THE SOUTH 
 BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 Discussion of Southern literature during the 
 period which preceded the late war naturally re- 
 solves itself into a consideration of the causes 
 which retarded its growth, since the absence of a 
 literature at the South during a period so prolific 
 in intellectual energy of a different kind, is one of 
 the notable conditions of a civilization which was 
 as remarkable in many respects as any that has 
 existed in modern times. 
 
 The object of this paper is to set forth the prob- 
 able causes which conduced to this absence of litera- 
 ture, to place the responsibility where it properly 
 belongs, and at the same time to direct attention to 
 those courageous spirits who, imbued with love of 
 Literature for herself alone, against the inexorable 
 destiny of the time, unrecognized and unencouraged, 
 aspired and struggled to give the South a literature 
 of her own. 
 
 The limitations of this paper, which it is pro- 
 posed to devote to the development of work of a 
 purely literary character, preclude the possibility of 
 
 67 
 
58 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 embracing in it any discussion or even mention of 
 professional and economical works, which constitute 
 so large a proportion of the writings of the South, — 
 such, for example, as the writings of Washington, 
 Jefferson, Madison, John Taylor, Calhoun, Benton, 
 Rives, Legare', Scott, and others ; the legal works of 
 the Tuckers, Lomax, Holcomb, Davis, Robinson, 
 Benjamin, Minor, Daniel, and others ; the scientific 
 works of Audubon, "Wilson, the Le Contes, Courte- 
 nay, Talcott, and others ; the works of the great 
 Maury; the historical works of writers in nearly 
 every Southern State; the philosophical works of 
 the Alexanders, Bledsoe, Breckinridge, Thornwell, 
 and many others. Owing to the environment, 
 much the larger portion of the writing done by the 
 South was philosophical or polemical, only a small 
 portion being purely literary. 
 
 It has been generally charged, and almost univer- 
 sally believed, that the want of a literature at the 
 South was the result of intellectual poverty. The 
 charge, however, is without foundation, as will be 
 apparent to any fair-minded student who considers 
 the position held by the South not only during the 
 period of the formation of the government, but also 
 throughout the long struggle between the South 
 and the North over the momentous questions 
 generated by the institution of slavery. In the 
 former crisis the South asserted herself with a 
 power and wisdom unsurpassed in the history of 
 intellectual resource ; throughout the latter period 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 59 
 
 she maintained the contest with consummate ability 
 and with transcendent vigor of intellect. 
 
 The causes of the absence of a Southern literature 
 are to be looked for elsewhere than in intellectual 
 indigence. The intellectual conditions were such 
 as might well have created a noble literature, but 
 the physical conditions were adverse to its produc- 
 tion and were too potent to be overcome. 
 
 The principal causes were the following : — 
 
 1. The people of the South were an agricultural 
 people, widely diffused, and lacking the stimulus 
 of immediate mental contact. 
 
 2. The absence of cities, which in the history of 
 literary life have proved literary foci essential for 
 its production, and the want of publishing-houses 
 at the South. 
 
 3. The exactions of the institution of slavery, 
 and the absorption of the intellectual forces of the 
 people of the South in the solution of the vital 
 problems it engendered. 
 
 4. The general ambition of the Southern people 
 for political distinction, and the application of their 
 literary powers to polemical controversy. 
 
 5. The absence of a reading public at the South 
 for American authors, due in part to the conserva- 
 tism of the Southern people. 
 
 Instead of being settled in towns and communi- 
 ties, as was the case at the North, the bent of the 
 people from the first was to hold land in severalty 
 in large bodies, and to continue the manorial sys- 
 
60 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 tern after the custom of their fathers and their 
 kinsmen in the old country, with whom they even 
 after the Revolution still kept up a sort of tradi- 
 tional association. The possession of slaves, often 
 in large numbers, and the imperative responsibilities 
 of their regulation and no less of their protection 
 which such possession entailed, fostered this inher- 
 ent tendency and eventually made the Southern 
 people 1 agricultural to the almost total exclusion 
 of manufactures. 
 
 No merely agricultural people has ever produced 
 a literature. It would appear that for the produc- 
 tion of literature some centre is requisite, where 
 men with literary instincts may commingle, and 
 where their thought may be focussed. 
 
 The life of the South was in the fields, and its 
 population was so diffused that there was always 
 lacking the mental stimulus necessary to the pro- 
 duction of a literature. There were few towns, 
 
 1 It is well to remember that this term " the Southern people," 
 although ex vi termini general in its meaning, is applicable in 
 this paper and in all discussion of this subject only to the land- 
 owning or better class of whites, as contra-distinguished not 
 only from the negroes, but also from the lower class of whites, 
 who neither possessed the advantages nor incurred the responsi- 
 bilities of the upper class. 
 
 This distinction is ordinarily overlooked in the discussion of 
 this matter. The importance of the limitation will be apparent- 
 however, when it is considered that by the census of 1850 (which 
 is assumed as a fair standard because then the growth of litera- 
 ture at the North was about at its zenith) the entire slave-hold- 
 ing and slave-hiring population of the South was only 347,525. 
 
 This embraces all white artisans and working people, whether 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE "WAR 61 
 
 and yet fewer cities. But these few — Baltimore, 
 New Orleans, Charleston, Richmond, and Louisville 
 — all attested the truth of this observation. From 
 them radiated the occasional beams of light which 
 illumined the general darkness of the period, and 
 there from time to time appeared the infallible 
 signs of literary germination, in the form of maga- 
 zines, which, struggling against adverse influences, 
 unhappily perished in the process of birth or faded 
 untimely in early youth. For example, Niles's Reg- 
 ister, which was the first magazine of any perma- 
 nence, was published in Baltimore from 1811 to 
 1849. The Pinkney s, — Edward Coate, William, and 
 ".Ninian, — John P. Kennedy, Francis Scott Key, and 
 others received its vivifying influence. Elliot's 
 and Legare's Southern Review was conducted in 
 Charleston from 1828 to 1832, and was followed in 
 1835 by The Southern Literary Journal, which ex- 
 isted only two years, and in its turn after an inter- 
 val was succeeded in 1842 by The Southern Quar- 
 
 in the towns or in the rural districts, who hired one negro 
 servant. 
 
 This was the population of the South from which alone could 
 spring a literature. Nothing was to he expected from the lower 
 class of poor whites, and of course nothing from the negroes, for 
 they had no advantages of education, a large percentage of the 
 former, and nearly all of the latter, heing unable to read and 
 write. 
 
 This ignorance on the part of the lower classes was a neces- 
 sary concomitant of slavery, for which institution, notwith- 
 standing the long-established popular belief of the outside worM, 
 the South was not responsible. 
 
62 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 terly Review, which expired in 1856. Besides which, 
 there was Simms's Southern and Western Magazine 
 and Review. After these the earnest Hayne estab- 
 lished Russell's Magazine. These literary ventures, 
 with a dozen or so of less note, such as The South- 
 ern Literary Gazette, The Cosmopolitan, The Mag- 
 nolia, etc., contributed to the evolution and develop- 
 ment of William Gilmore Simms, Hugh S. Legare, 
 Paul H. Hayne, the Timrods, Porcher, De Bow, and 
 others, and became the organs of their thought. 
 They created a literary atmosphere of a higher 
 quality than existed generally, and supported the 
 claim of Charleston to be the chief literary focus 
 of the South. De Bow's Review, though scarcely 
 to be classed as a mere literary exponent, yet with 
 other transitory periodicals subserved the literary 
 spirit of New Orleans from 1846 to the outbreak of 
 the war. 
 
 The nascent literary feeling of the West found 
 expression for a brief period in the Western Review 
 in Lexington, Kentucky, but was not strong enough 
 to maintain it above a year. But George D. Pren- 
 tice opened the Courier Journal to literary aspira- 
 tion, and made Louisville the literary centre of 
 that section. The genius of Prentice himself found 
 an outlet in his columns, and the instinct of many 
 others, such as O'Hara, the poetess Amelia B. 
 Welby, Mrs. Betts, Mrs. Warneld, and Mrs. Jeffrey, 
 was inspired by Prentice's sympathy and fostered 
 by his encouragement. 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 63 
 
 In Kichmond, Virginia, appeared, perhaps the 
 most noted literary magazine which the South 
 produced, — The Southern Literary Messenger. It 
 was undertaken as a mere business venture in 1835, 
 and through the inspiring genius of Poe, who began 
 immediately to write for it and shortly became its 
 editor, it promised for a time to bring a literature 
 into being. Although it was supported by the best 
 literary writers not only of Virginia but of the 
 South and survived until 1864, like its fellows it 
 contended against forces too potent to be success- 
 fully resisted, and never attained a very high mark 
 of literary merit. However, it had much to do 
 with sustaining the unstable Poe, and with devel- 
 oping nearly all of those writers of the South 
 whose names have survived. 
 
 The editors of these periodicals appear to have 
 possessed a sufficiently correct appreciation of what 
 was requisite, and to have striven bravely enough 
 to attain it ; but failure was their invariable lot. 
 They besought their contributors to abandon the 
 servile copying of English models and address 
 themselves to the portrayal of the life around 
 them with which they were familiar ; they enlisted 
 whatever literary ability there was to be secured ; 
 but they received no encouragement and met with 
 no success. 
 
 The habits of life and the exigencies of life at 
 the South were against them. 
 
 The constituency which should have sustained 
 
64 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 them was not only too widely diffused, but was too 
 intent on the solution of the vital problems which 
 faced it at its own doors, to give that fostering 
 encouragement which literary aspiration in its first 
 beginning absolutely demands. The South was so 
 unremittingly exercised in considering and solving 
 the questions which slavery was ever raising that 
 it had neither time nor opportunity, if it had the 
 inclination, to apply itself to other matters. The 
 intellectual powers of the South were absorbingly 
 devoted to this subject, and in consequence of the 
 exigencies of life at the South generally took the 
 direction of spoken and not of written speech. 
 Where writing was indulged in, it was almost inva- 
 riably of the philosophical, polemical character. 
 
 "Literature," says Carlyle, "is the thought of 
 thinking souls." Accepting this definition, the 
 South was rich in literature. There was sufficient 
 poetry and wisdom delivered on the porticos and in 
 the halls of the Southern people to have enriched 
 the age, had it but been transmitted in permanent 
 form ; but wanting both the means and the inclina- 
 tion to put it in an abiding form, they were wasted 
 in discourse or were spent in mere debate. 
 
 Owing to the position which the South occupied 
 because of the institution of slavery and the diffi- 
 culties engendered by that institution, the whole 
 fabric of life at the South was infused with poli- 
 tics, and oratory was universally cultivated. Thus 
 the profession of the law, which afforded the oppor 
 
AUTHOESHIP BEFOKE THE WAR 65 
 
 tunity at once for the practice and for the application 
 of oratory, and which was the chief highway to 
 political preferment, became the general avenue by 
 which all aspiring genius sought to achieve power 
 and fame, and writing was in consequence neglected, 
 as too indirect a mode to accomplish the desired 
 end. 
 
 There was much writing done, but it was of the 
 kind which is not deemed incompatible with proper 
 loyalty to the law, taking the invariable form of 
 political disquisition or of polemical discussion. 
 In these, indeed, the Southerner indefatigably in- 
 dulged, and attained a rare degree of perfection. 
 Thus, the philosophical works of such men as 
 Madison, John Taylor of Caroline, Calhoun, etc., 
 and the public prints of the day generally, ex- 
 hibit powers which abundantly refute the charge 
 that the absence of a literature was due to mental 
 poverty. In the city of Richmond alone were 
 four writers for the daily press whose brilliant 
 work is a guarantee of the success they would 
 have achieved in any department of literature they 
 might have chosen. These were Thomas Ritchie, 
 John Hampden Pleasants, Edward T. Johnston, and 
 John M. Daniel. In their time the editorial columns 
 of the Enquirer, Whig, and Examiner possessed a 
 potency which is at this time well-nigh inconceiva- 
 ble. They may be said to have almost controlled the 
 destinies of the great political parties of the coun- 
 try. The Whig and the Enquirer were the bitter- 
 
66 THE OLD 80TTTH 
 
 est antagonists, their hostility resulting finally in a 
 fatal duel between Pleasants, the editor of the 
 Wliig, and a son of his rival, " Mr. Ritchie/ 7 of the 
 Enquirer. But this antagonism may be as well 
 shown by a less tragic illustration : the Enquirer was 
 accustomed to publish original poetry in a column 
 at the head of which stood the legend, " Much yet 
 remains unsung" ; the Whig kept standing a notice 
 that "poetry" would be published at a dollar a line. 
 
 It would indeed appear that, with the potency 
 of intellectual demonstration so constantly and so 
 forcibly illustrated throughout the land, the South- 
 erner would have been irresistibly impelled to seek 
 a wider field, a more extensive audience, and would 
 inevitably have sought to put into permanent form 
 the product of his mind. 
 
 What might not the eloquence and genius of 
 Clay have effected had they been turned in the 
 direction of literature, or what the mental acumen, 
 the philosophic force, the learning, of Calhoun, of 
 whom Dr. Dwight said when he left college that 
 the young man knew enough to be President of the 
 United States ! How much did literature lose when 
 Marshall, Wirt, the Lees, Martin, Pinkney, Berrien, 
 Hayne, Preston, Cobb, Clingman, Ruffin, Legare, 
 Soule - , Davis, Roane, Johnston, Crittenden, devoted 
 all their brilliant powers to politics and the law ! 
 John Randolph boasted that he should " go down 
 to the grave guiltless of rhyme," yet his letters 
 contain the concentrated essence of intellectual 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 67 
 
 energy; his epigrams stung like a branding-iron, 
 and are the current coin of tradition throughout his 
 native State two generations after his death. 
 
 Literature stood no chance because the ambition 
 of young men of the South was universally turned 
 in the direction of political distinction, and because 
 the monopoly of advancement held by the profession 
 of the law was too well established and too clearly 
 recognized to admit of its claim being contested; 
 and once in the service of the law there be few 
 with either the inclination or the courage to assert 
 any independence. Even now the Southerner will 
 not believe that a man can be a lawyer and an 
 author. Yet it was not unnatural that the major 
 portion of such literary work as was done at the 
 South was done by lawyers. 
 
 Their profession called forth the exercise of the 
 highest intellectual powers, and necessarily they 
 occasionally strayed into the adjoining domain of 
 letters. The pity of it is that their literary work 
 was in the main but the desultory "jottings down" 
 in their hours of recreation of fragmentary sketches, 
 which were usually based on the humorous phases 
 of life with which their profession made them fa- 
 miliar, and almost the best is stamped with the 
 mark of an apparent dilettanteism. 
 
 Chief Justice Marshall took time to write a life 
 of Washington, but there was little biography 
 attempted. William Wirt early in the century 
 entertained himself amid the exactions of practice 
 
68 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 by contributing to the Bichmond Argus " The Let« 
 ters of a British Spy," and subsequently wrote his 
 " Old Bachelor " and his " Life of Patrick Henry," 
 on the last of which his present fame rests more 
 than on his reputation as a great lawyer, even 
 though he was one of the most distinguished advo- 
 cates the nation has produced, was counsel in the 
 most celebrated case which the legal annals of the 
 country contain, and was among the ablest Attorney- 
 Generals of the United States. Indeed, almost the 
 only recollection of the great Burr trial which sur- 
 vives to the general public is the extract from 
 Wirt's speech, preserved as a literary fragment, 
 describing the Isle of Blennerhassett. Happily for 
 his fame, Wirt held that, though a lawyer should 
 strive to be a great lawyer, yet he should not be " a 
 mere lawyer." 
 
 Among other writers of the South who were 
 lawyers were the Tuckers of Virginia, ■ — St. George 
 (Si\), who was a poet and an essayist as well as 
 a jurist, George, the essayist, Henry St. George, 
 Nathaniel Beverley, author of "The Partisan 
 Leader," and St. George (Jr.), author of "Hans- 
 ford, a Tale of Bacon's Bebellion." There was also 
 John Pendleton Kennedy, of Maryland. These 
 might have retrieved the reputation of the South 
 in respect to literature if the Tuckers had not de- 
 voted all their best energies to the law, and if Ken- 
 nedy had not been, as Poe said of him, " over head 
 and ears in business " relating to the bar, his seat 
 in Congress, and his seat in the Cabinet. 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 69 
 
 William Gilmore Simms began life as a lawyer, 
 but his love for literature proved irrepressible, and 
 in an evil hour for his material welfare he aban- 
 doned the profession and devoted himself to liter- 
 ature. 
 
 Others who were lawyers were Eichard Henry 
 Wilde, the poet, Joseph G. Baldwin, author of 
 " Flush Times of Alabama and Mississippi," Augus- 
 tus B. Longstreet, author of "Georgia Scenes," 
 Philip Pendleton Cooke, the poet, John Esten 
 Cooke, the novelist, the Pinkneys, Edward Coate 
 and Frederick^ Francis Scott Key, Thomas Hart 
 Benton, Hugh Swinton Legar£, Alexander B. Meek, 
 Francis Gilmer, the essayist, Charles ^tienne Ar- 
 thur Gayarrd, the historian, dramatist, and novelist, 
 Henry Timrod, Paul H. Hayne, John R. Thompson, 
 James Barron Hope, and many others. 
 
 It is a full list, nearly complete, and comprises 
 poets, novelists, essayists, and historians. Poe and 
 Lanier were almost the only notable exceptions. 
 With Poe, as he declared, poetry was "not a purpose, 
 but a passion " ; and in whatever else his besetting 
 weakness made him fickle, he at least never wa- 
 vered in his loyalty to his first and best love. 
 
 It was not remarkable that the law was preferred 
 to literature, for in sober truth it required sterner 
 stuff than most men were compounded of, and a 
 more absorbing passion than most men were ani- 
 mated by, to follow literature as a pursuit. To do 
 so was to take the vow of poverty. When Poe, 
 
70 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 even after having made a name, was receiving 
 only four dollars and a half per printed magazine 
 page for his marvellous work; when as editor of 
 the magazine he thought himself generously re- 
 warded by a salary of $520 per annum; when 
 " The Gold-Bug," written at almost the height of 
 his fame, brought only $52 and " The Raven " only 
 $10, it must have been apparent to every sensible 
 man that, whatever the rewards of literature might 
 be, a reasonable support was not among them. Re- 
 ducing the question to the unromantic level of fair 
 compensation, there were few who were willing to 
 give for a contingent interest in a niche of Fame's 
 temple, which, in the language of the law, was, at 
 best, potentia remotissima, the bread and butter and 
 bonnets and equipages which were assured at the 
 bar. 
 
 William Gilmore Simms, who was one of the 
 very first who had the temerity to brave the hard- 
 ships of a literary life, complained that he had never 
 held the position which rightfully belonged to him, 
 because he made his living as a writer. 
 
 The responsibility for the want of a literature 
 was not with the writers, but with the environ- 
 ment. There was lacking not only the mental 
 stimulus of contact between mind and mind, but 
 also that yet more essential inspiration, sympathy 
 with literary effort, which is as necessary to liter- 
 ary vitality as the atmosphere is to physical exist- 
 ence. One of Philip Pendleton Cooke's neighbors 
 
AUTHOKSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 71 
 
 said to him after he became known as the author 
 of " Florence Vane," " I wouldn't waste time on a 
 damned thing like poetry : you might make your- 
 self, with all your sense and judgment, a useful 
 man in settling neighborhood disputes and diffi- 
 culties." 
 
 It is matter for little wonder that the poet 
 declared that one had as much chance with such 
 people as a dolphin would have if in one of his 
 darts he pitched in among the machinery of a mill. 
 
 As a consequence of the South' s position during 
 this period, there was another barrier to literature. 
 The standard of literary work was not a purely 
 literary standard, but one based on public opin- 
 ion^which in its turn was founded on the general 
 consensus that the existing institution was not 
 to be impugned, directly or indirectly, on any 
 ground or by any means whatsoever. 
 
 This was an atmosphere in which literature could 
 not flourish. In consequence, where literature was 
 indulged in it was in a half-apologetic way, as if it 
 were not altogether compatible with the social dig- 
 nity of the author. ' Thought which in its expres- 
 sion has any other standard than fidelity to truth, 
 whatever secondary value it may have, cannot 
 possess much value as literature. "The Partisan 
 Leader " was secretly printed in 1836, and was after- 
 wards suppressed. It was again republished just 
 before the beginning of the war, and was a second 
 time suppressed or withdrawn. Augustus B. Long- 
 
72 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 street, although, he subsequently became a preacher, 
 was at the bar when he wrote " Georgia Scenes." 
 He was so ashamed of having been beguiled into 
 writing what is one of the raciest books of sketches 
 yet produced, a book by which alone his name is 
 now preserved, that he made a strenuous effort to 
 secure and suppress the work after its publication. 
 Even Eichard Henry Wilde, who was a poet, and 
 who should have possessed a poet's love for his art, 
 did not conceive his best poem, " My Life is like 
 the Summer Rose," worthy of acknowledgment. It 
 was "The Lament of the Captive" in an epic poem 
 which was never finished, and was published with- 
 out his authority, and he was hardly persuaded to 
 assert his claim to its authorship when, after it 
 had been for a score of years merely " attributed " 
 to him in this country, and in Great Britain had 
 been known and admired as " a poem by an Ameri- 
 can lawyer," it was unblushingly claimed and stolen 
 by several more ambitious versifiers, who, if they 
 failed to recognize the obligation of the eighth com- 
 mandment, at least appreciated the value of liter- 
 ary talent higher than the real poet. The poem 
 was as a hoax translated into Greek by Barclay, of 
 Savannah, and was attributed to a poet called Al- 
 casus, and a controversy having arisen as to whether 
 it was really written by an Irishman named O'Kelly, 
 who had published it in a volume of his poems as 
 his, or whether he had stolen it from the old Greek, 
 Mr. Wilde, who was then a member of Congress from 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 73 
 
 Georgia, was finally induced to admit that he had 
 written the poem twenty years before. This he did 
 in a letter characteristic of the time, declaring that 
 he valued " these rhymes " very differently from 
 others, and avowed their authorship only in compli- 
 ance with the wishes of those he esteemed. 
 
 This attitude on the part of the South, taken in 
 connection with the diffusion of its population, fur- 
 nishes the only reasonable solution of the singular 
 fact that the South produced so little literature not- 
 withstanding its culture ; for culture it possessed, and 
 of the best kind, — the culture of the classics, the 
 most fertilizing of all intellectual forces. If the 
 lower classes were ignorant, the upper class univer- 
 sally emphasized the distinction between them by 
 giving their children the best education that could be 
 obtained. Jefferson deplored the fact that over one- 
 half of the students at Princeton were Virginians, 
 and he founded the University of Virginia that 
 Southerners might be able to secure the best edu- 
 cation at home. Upon this sure foundation of a 
 university training was laid the superstructure of 
 constant association with the best classical authors. 
 
 These established the standard, and the South- 
 erner held in contempt any writer who did not at 
 once conform to their style and equal their merit. 
 
 Poe in his early manhood bitterly declared that 
 " one might suppose that books, like their authors, 
 improve by travel, their having crossed the sea is 
 with us so great a distinction." 
 
74 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 To any good in what was penned and published 
 on this side the Atlantic the Southerner was, as a 
 general thing, absolutely and incurably blind. If 
 the work was written south of Mason and Dixon's 
 line it was incontinently contemned as " trashy " ; if 
 it emanated from the North, it was vehemently de- 
 nounced as " Yankee." In either case it was con- 
 demned. 
 
 With this in mind, it is not surprising that, with 
 all the intellectual resources of the South, so few 
 writers should have been found with the inclination 
 or the temerity to attempt a work thus sure to ter- 
 minate in failure, if not to incur contempt. If one 
 should attempt it, where could he secure a pub- 
 lisher ? There were few at the South, and to seek a 
 publisher at the North was to hazard repulse there 
 and insure criticism at home. 
 
 Thus, the true explanation of the absence of a 
 Southern literature of a high order during this 
 epoch was not the want of literary ability. There 
 was genius enough to have founded a literature, but 
 there were no publishers generally, and there was 
 never any public. 
 
 Yet from the untoward conditions delineated 
 issued a literary genius of the first rank. 
 
 Notwithstanding the coldness and indifference 
 which he encountered in this State, Poe ever de- 
 clared himself a Virginian ; and, with all due 
 respect to certain latter-day critics, who assert the 
 contrary, it must be said that to those familiar 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 75 
 
 with the qualities and with the points of difference 
 between the Northern and Southern civilizations, 
 Poe's poems are as distinctly Southern in their 
 coloring, tone, and temper as Wordsworth's are 
 English. The wild landscape, the flower-laden 
 atmosphere, the delirious richness, are their setting, 
 and a more than tropical passion interfuses them 
 as unmistakably as the air of English lawns and 
 meadows breathes through Tennyson's master- 
 pieces. We find in them everywhere 
 
 Dim vales and shadowy floods, 
 And cloudy-looking woods, 
 "Whose forms we can't discover 
 For the trees that drip all over. 
 
 Poe, however, was limited by no boundary, geo- 
 graphical or other. The spirit-peopled air, the 
 infernal chambers of fancied inquisitions, the re- 
 gions of the moon, the imagined horrors of post- 
 mortem sentience, were equally his realm. In all 
 his vast and weird and wonderful genius roamed 
 unconfined and equally at home. In all he created 
 his own atmosphere, and projected his marvellous 
 fancies with an originality and a power whose 
 universal application is the undeniable and perfect 
 proof of his supreme genius. 
 
 That he failed of his immediate audience was 
 due, in part, to his own unfortunate disposition, 
 but yet more to the time and to the blindness 
 which visited upon works of incomparable literary 
 
76 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 merit the sins of physical frailty: the creations 
 of his genius, by reason of their very originality, 
 were contemned as the ravings of a disordered and 
 unbalanced mind, and, unrecognized at home, Poe 
 was forced to wander to an alien clime in search of 
 bread. 
 
 With his personal habits this paper is not con- 
 cerned. His life has been for more than a, genera- 
 tion the object of attack and vituperation which 
 have raged with inconceivable violence. From the 
 time that Griswold perpetrated his " immortal in- 
 famy/' vindictiveness has found in Poe's career its 
 most convenient target. Yet the works of this 
 unfortunate have caught the human heart, and are 
 to-day the common property of the English-speak- 
 ing races, whether dwelling in Virginia or Massa- 
 chusetts, Great Britain or Australia, and have been 
 translated into the language of every civilized 
 nation of Europe. A recent interview with the 
 English publishers, the Koutledges, showed that 
 twenty-nine thousand copies of Poe's Tales had 
 been sold by them in the year 1887, as against less 
 than one-third of that number of many of the most 
 popular and famous of our other American writers. 
 
 The obligation to Poe has never been duly recog- 
 nized. It is said that the Latin poems of Milton 
 first opened the eyes of the Italians to the fact that 
 the island which Csesar had conquered had become 
 civilized. The first evidence of culture which was 
 accepted abroad, after the long night of silence 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 77 
 
 which covered the South after the departure of the 
 great fathers of the Eepublic, "was the work of 
 Edgar A. Poe. It is not more to the credit of the 
 North than of the South, that when the latter 
 threw him off starving, the former failed to give 
 him more than a crust. 
 
 " The Raven " created a sensation, and still 
 thrills every poetic mind with wonder at its mar- 
 vellous music and its mysterious power, but, though 
 it secured for its author fame, it brought him only 
 ten dollars' worth of bread. If literature has not 
 advanced since that day, at least the welfare of lit- 
 erary men has done so. The writer of a short story 
 or paper which is deemed worthy of a place in one 
 of the modern monthly magazines of the better class, 
 even though he may have no reputation, receives 
 at least ten dollars per printed page ; whilst, if he 
 be at all well known, he may expect double or 
 quadruple that sum. Poe received for some of 
 his immortal works four dollars per printed page. 
 
 Poe's poetry discovered a fresh realm in the 
 domain of fancy ; but his prose works are, if pos- 
 sible, even more remarkable. His critical faculty 
 installed a new era in criticism. Up to this time 
 the literary press, too imbecile to possess, or too 
 feeble to assert independence, cringed fawning at 
 the feet of every writer whose position was assured 
 among what was recognized as the literary set, and 
 accepted with laudation, or at least with flattering 
 deference, all publications which bore the talis- 
 
78 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 manic charm of an established name. Poe un 
 doubtedly was at times too much influenced by 
 personal feeling, but, with the courage of one who 
 had vowed his life to truth, he stripped off the 
 mask of dull respectability, and relentlessly ex- 
 posed sham and vacuity under whatever name they 
 appeared. 
 
 " If," as Mr. Lowell said, " he seems at times to 
 mistake his vial of prussic acid for his inkstand," 
 yet he lifted literary criticism from the abasement 
 of snivelling imbecility into which it had sunk, and 
 established it upon a basis founded on the princi- 
 ples of analysis, philosophy, and art. 
 
 If in discussing the works of female writers his 
 susceptible nature and his chivalrous instinct unduly 
 inclined him to bestow praise on what was mere 
 trash, yet no less an authority than Mr. Lowell 
 said of him that he was " the most discriminating, 
 philosophical, and fearless critic upon imaginative 
 works who has ever written in America." 
 
 His own imaginative works created a new school, 
 and have never been equalled in their peculiar 
 vein, or surpassed in any vein whatever in the 
 qualities of originality, force, and art. 
 
 Edgar A. Poe died at the age of thirty-nine, 
 when the powers and faculties are just matured. 
 What might he not have done had he lived out the 
 full span of man's allotted life ! 
 
 He was not prolific either in prose or in verse, 
 his health or his habits frequently incapacitating 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR, 79 
 
 him from work ; but both his poems and his tales 
 not only evince his genius, but exhibit the highest 
 degree of literary art. 
 
 It has become the fashion to decry Poe and to 
 disparage his work ; but the detraction which has 
 been expended upon him for a period extending 
 over nearly two generations has only made his 
 literary fame brighter. As Mr. Gosse has aptly 
 said, he has been a veritable piper of Hamelin to 
 all American writers since his time. 
 
 If we are compelled to admit that he is the one 
 really great writer of purely literary work that the 
 South produced under its old conditions, it is no 
 reflection on the South or its civilization, for the 
 North during the same period, with an educated 
 population many times larger, can claim only three 
 or four, whilst England herself, "with all appli- 
 ances and means to boot," can number hardly more 
 than a score. 
 
 There were other writers besides Poe who braved 
 the chilling indifference of the time, and who wrote 
 and strove, devoting labor and life to the endeavor 
 to awake the South to a realization of its literary 
 abilities. 
 
 But few of them have survived to more than 
 mention in works of reference, and the most that 
 can bo done is tvj inention those whose work was 
 distinctive in its character or scope, or whe **" tkair 
 diligence and ardor may be deemed to have tot- 
 warded the cause of Southern literature. 
 
80 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Excepting Poe, who stands pre-eminent above all 
 others, the three leading literary men of the South 
 during the period which extended down to the war 
 were John Pendleton Kennedy, of Maryland, Wil- 
 liam Gilmore Simms, of South Carolina, and John 
 Esten Cooke, of Virginia. 
 
 There were others who, in prose or in verse, in a 
 short sketch or a lyric, struck perhaps a higher key 
 than these did, but the effort was rarely repeated, 
 and these were the leading literary men of the 
 South, not merely as authors, but as the friends 
 and promoters of literature. 
 
 Of these Kennedy was first in time, whilst Simms 
 was first in his devotion to literature and in the 
 work he accomplished. Indeed, no one in the his- 
 tory of Southern literature ever applied himself 
 more assiduously and loyally to its development 
 than Simms. Both of these exercised a wider in- 
 fluence upon the literary spirit of the South than 
 that which proceeded immediately from their works. 
 Kennedy, who was born in 1795 in Baltimore, where 
 he lived all of his long life, had not only made his 
 mark as a lawyer and man of affairs, but as the 
 author of " Swallow Barn " had already acquired a 
 reputation as a literary man, when in the autumn 
 of 1833 the two prizes offered by the proprietors of 
 the Saturday Visitor, a weekly literary journal 
 of Baltimore, were awarded, by the committee of 
 which he was chairman, to an unknown young man 
 named Poe. It was not deemed proper to give so 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 81 
 
 much to one person, so he received only one prize. 
 It was owing to Mr. Kennedy's interest and kind- 
 ness that the young author, who was in the most 
 desperate straits, was secured an opening in the col- 
 umns of the Southern Literary Messenger and sub- 
 sequently became its editor; and the prosperous 
 litterateur was the friend and encourager of the 
 indigent genius as long as the latter lived. 
 
 Mr. Kennedy's novels, " Swallow Barn," a story 
 of rural life in Virginia ; " Horseshoe Kobinson," a 
 tale of the Tory ascendency in South Carolina; 
 and " Eob of the Bowl," a story of Maryland, gave 
 him position among the leading novelists of his 
 day, and placed him first among the Southern liter- 
 ary men of his time. 
 
 His other works than those named are a satire 
 entitled " Annals of Quodlibet," a memoir of Wil- 
 liam Wirt, in two volumes, etc. He continued to 
 write until his death, long after the war. 
 
 William Gilmore Simms, of South Carolina, was 
 not only the most prolific, but, with the exception 
 of Poe, was the chief distinctly literary man the 
 South has produced. The measure of his industry 
 was immense. His ability was of a high order, and 
 his devotion to literature was, for the time, extraor- 
 dinary. As poet, novelist, historian, biographer, 
 essayist, he was not surpassed by any one of his 
 compeers ; and if his whole work be considered, he 
 was first. From 1827, when he brought out in 
 Charleston his first venture, a volume entitled 
 
82 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 "Lyrical and Other Poems," to the time of his deati 
 in 1870, he was assiduously and earnestly engaged 
 in the attempt to create a literature for the South 
 His first devotion was to poetry, and he publishec 
 three volumes of poems before he was twenty-six 
 years of age. Although he continued to write poetry 
 after this, it is chiefly as a writer of fiction that he 
 made his reputation and that his name is now pre- 
 served. Poe declared him the best novelist after 
 Cooper this country had produced, and, although 
 to us now his works have the faults of that time, 
 too great prolixity, too much description, and the 
 constant tendency to disquisition, they are of a 
 much higher order as romances than books of many 
 of the novelists of the present day whose works 
 receive general praise. His works comprise a series 
 of novels, most of them based on the more romantic 
 phases of the old Southern life, several volumes of 
 poems, several dramas, and several biographies. 
 " The Yemassee " is perhaps the best of his novels, 
 but many of them had a considerable vogue in their 
 day, and the renewed demand for them has recently 
 caused a new edition to be published. 
 
 John Esten Cooke, the third of the trio, was like 
 the other two both a novelist and a biographer. 
 He possessed a fine imagination, and under more 
 exacting conditions he might have reached a high 
 mark and have made a permanent name in our 
 literature. His publications before the war were 
 "Leather Stocking and Silk" (1854), "The Vir- 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 83 
 
 ginia Comedians" (2 vols., 1854), "The Youth of 
 Jefferson" (1854), "Ellie" (1855), "The Last of 
 the Foresters" (1856), and "Bonnybel Vane, or 
 The History of Henry St. John, Gentleman" 
 (1859). In addition to these, he wrote numerous 
 sketches. Candor compels the admission that, al- 
 though very popular, these earlier works are not 
 of a very high order. The war, however, in which 
 the young novelist served honorably on the staff of 
 General J. E. B. Stuart, the celebrated Confederate 
 cavalry leader, gave him a new impulse, and his 
 later works, such as "Surry of Eagle's Nest," 
 "Mohun," "Hilt to Hilt," "Hammer and Rapier," 
 and "Wearing of the Gray," are very much better 
 than the earlier; whilst his biographical and his- 
 torical works are probably best of all. These, how- 
 ever, were written under the new conditions, and 
 belong properly to the post-bellum literature of the 
 South. Cooke wrote of Virginia life as Simms 
 wrote of South Carolina life, with affection, appre- 
 ciation, and spirit, but, like both Simms and 
 Kennedy, he failed to strike the highest note. The 
 same may be said of Dr. William A. Caruthers, 
 also a Virginian, who had preceded Cooke and 
 Simms, and who is entitled with the latter and 
 Mr. Kennedy to the honor of first discovering the 
 romantic material afforded the novelist in the pic- 
 turesque life of their own section. His first book, 
 a The Cavaliers of Virginia, or the Recluse of 
 Jamestown, an Historical Romance of the Old 
 
84 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Dominion," appeared in 1832, It dealt with the 
 most romantic episode in the history of the South, 
 if not of the entire country, — Bacon's Rebellion. 
 This was followed in 1845 by the novel on which 
 his name now rests, "The Knights of the Horse- 
 shoe, a Traditionary Tale of the Cocked-Hat Gentry 
 in the Old Dominion." He also wrote a volume of 
 sketches entitled " The Kentuckian in New York, 
 or the Adventures of Three Southerners," and 
 a "Life of Dr. Caldwell." This same romantic 
 period was likewise the subject of a novel by St. 
 George Tucker (the younger), entitled "Hansford, 
 a Tale of Bacon's Rebellion," which was published 
 in 1857 by George M. West, of Richmond, Virginia, 
 and which had much popularity in its day. 
 
 These books are so good, or, more accurately, 
 they have in them so much that is good, that one 
 cannot but wonder they are not better. These 
 writers possessed the Southerner's love for the 
 South; they perfectly comprehended the value of 
 the material its life furnished, and recognized the 
 importance of preserving this life in literature ; 
 they earnestly endeavored to accomplish this, and 
 yet they failed to preserve it in its reality. It is 
 melancholy to contemplate, and it is difficult to com- 
 prehend. They wrote with spirit, with zeal, with 
 affection, and generally in the chastest and most 
 beautiful English, but somehow they just missed 
 the highest mark. It is as if they had set their 
 song in the wrong key. 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 85 
 
 The chief fault of their books was a certain imi- 
 tativeness, and adherence to old methods. Scott 
 had set the fashion, and it was so admirable that 
 it led all the writers to copying him. G. P. P. 
 James gave him in dilution. Cooper had attained 
 immense popularity, and was more easily followed ; 
 but to imitate Scott was a perilous undertaking. 
 The stripling in the king's armor was not more 
 encumbered. 
 
 Yet must this be said in defence of all these 
 writers, that we are looking at their work through 
 a different atmosphere from that in which they 
 wrote. Fashion in writing, where it is not informed 
 by genius, passes away, as in other things. Only 
 art remains ever new, ever fresh, ever true. Just 
 as Miss Burney and Eichardson doubtless appeared 
 antiquated to these, so they now appear to us, who 
 are accustomed to a different treatment, stilted and 
 unreal. 
 
 After these authors came the sketch-writers, who, 
 if Poe's dictum that a short story is the most per- 
 fect form of prose literature is correct, should be 
 placed before them. The chief of these, excepting 
 Poe himself, were Joseph G. Baldwin, Augustus B. 
 Longstreet, William Tappan Thompson, St. Leger 
 L. Carter, and George W. Bagby. 
 
 Joseph G. Baldwin was the author of "Flush 
 Times of Alabama and Mississippi," which is per- 
 haps the raciest collection of sketches yet published 
 in America. This volume within a year of its first 
 
86 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 publication in 1853 had run into its seventh edi- 
 tion. " Ovid Bolus, Esq." and " Simon Suggs, Jr., 
 Esq." became at once characters as well known 
 throughout the South as was Sam "Weller or Micky- 
 Free; whilst the case of " Higginbotham versus 
 Swink, Slander " became a cause c&lebre. 
 
 Augustus B. Longstreet, of Mississippi, was the 
 author of " Georgia Scenes, Characters, Incidents, 
 etc., in the Eirst Half-Century of the Bepublic," 
 and other sketches. He also wrote a long story 
 entitled " Master William Mitten." 
 
 William Tappan Thompson was the author of 
 "Major Jones's Courtship," "Major Jones's Chron- 
 icle of Pineville," " Major Jones's Sketches of 
 Travel," and other sketches. 
 
 Yet another was Dr. George W. Bagby, of Vir- 
 ginia, who succeeded John R. Thompson as editor 
 of The Southern Literary Messenger, and who wrote 
 before the war over the nom de plume of " Mozis 
 Addums." The quality of his serious work was 
 higher than that of the other sketch-writers enu- 
 merated; and, being wider in its scope, its value 
 was greater than theirs, though his writings were 
 never published in book form until after his death, 
 when two volumes were brought out in Richmond, 
 Virginia. Much of his writing was done after the 
 war, but prior to that period he had accomplished 
 enough to entitle him to the credit of being a lit- 
 erary man at a time when literature in the South 
 was without the compensations by which it was 
 subsequently attended. 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 87 
 
 No one has ever written so delicately of the 
 South, and his "Old Virginia Gentleman" is the 
 most beautiful sketch of life in the South that has 
 ever appeared. 
 
 Besides these classes of writers there existed 
 another class whose writings not only far exceeded 
 in volume those of the authors who have been men- 
 tioned, but were also far more successful. 
 
 The chief of these were Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz, 
 Mrs. E. D. E. K Southworth, Mrs. Catherine Ann 
 Warfield, and Miss Augusta J. Evans. They were 
 followed by a sisterhood of writers far too numerous 
 for mention, whose work, whatever its permanent 
 value, is entitled to honorable notice as evidencing 
 an ambition on the part of the Southern women to 
 create a Southern literature. There were about 
 two hundred in all, who have written novels, books 
 of travel, sketches, and volumes of poems. If they 
 have not generally soared very high, they have at 
 least lifted themselves above the common level, and 
 are entitled to the respect of the South for their 
 loyal endeavor to do their part towards her eleva- 
 tion. Both Mrs. Hentz and Mrs. Southworth wrote 
 many novels and yet more numerous sketches, the 
 popularity of which in their day was extraordinary. 
 Perhaps the best of Mrs. Hentz's romances are 
 "The Mob-Cap" (1848), "Linda" (1850), "Kena" 
 (1851), and " The Planter's Northern Bride." Mrs. 
 Southworth has written over fifty novels, besides 
 shorter stories. Her first book, "Retribution," 
 
88 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 written for the Washington National Era, was 
 subsequently published in a volume in 1849, and 
 had an immense sale. It was rapidly followed 
 by " The Deserted Wife," « The Missing Bride," 
 " Love's Labor Won," " The Lost Heiress," " Fallen 
 Pride," " Curse of Clifton," etc., to the number 
 above stated. In all of these novels the element 
 of romance is emphasized. Some of Mrs. South- 
 worth's books were vehemently assailed, but, as 
 the public is much more intent on being entertained 
 than on being elevated, they generally attained an 
 extensive popularity. The Southern life is utilized 
 by both these writers, but in so exaggerated or 
 unreal a form that the pictures are too untrue to be 
 relied on. Both authors were of Northern birth, 
 whilst their lives were spent at the South. Is it 
 significant of the fact that the Northern literary 
 press was not in "old times" open to writers of 
 Southern birth, or that public sentiment was against 
 Southern women publishing, or of both ? 
 
 Mrs. Terhune ("Marion Harland") is entitled 
 to stand in a class by herself, since her books 
 "Alone," "The Hidden Path," "Moss Side," and 
 " Nemesis," which were published before the war, 
 as well as those which have appeared since that 
 time, are in a much higher literary key than those 
 of the authors named. Like the others, she has 
 used the Southern life as. material in her work; 
 but she has exhibited a literary sense of a far higher 
 order, and an artistic touch to which the others are 
 strangers. 
 
AUTHOESHIP BEFORE THE WAR 89 
 
 There existed yet another class, whose work, 
 although not extensive in amount, was yet of a 
 quality to enlist the attention and evoke the respect 
 of American readers. The Southern poets were not 
 numerous : poetry even more peculiarly than prose 
 demands a sympathetic atmosphere. Such was not 
 to be found at the South. The standards there were 
 Shakespeare, Dryden, and Pope ; no less would be 
 tolerated. Before Wilde could admit his author- 
 ship of "My Life is like the Summer Rose" he 
 had to establish himself as a fine lawyer and an able 
 politician ; Philip Pendleton Cooke, as an offset to 
 " Florence Vane" and the "Froissart Ballads," found 
 it necessary to avouch his manhood as the crack 
 turkey-shot of the Valley of Virginia. Yet the 
 poets wrote, if not much, still real poetry, and 
 poetry which will live as a part of the best Ameri- 
 can literature. In this domain, as in others, Poe 
 soared high above all the rest. He was not profuse ; 
 but he was excellent, pre-eminent. He is one of the 
 poets of the English-speaking race. Wilde, Cooke, 
 Pinkney, Key, Meek, Lamar, Lipscomb, Vawter, and 
 others have been already referred t©. The " Sonnet 
 to a Mocking-bird " by the first is as fine as his other 
 more popular poem already mentioned. Mr. Wilde 
 resided in Italy for some time, and published the 
 result of his researches there in a work in two 
 volumes, entitled "Conjectures and Researches con- 
 cerning the Love, Madness, and Imprisonment of 
 Torquato Tasso," which contains fine translations 
 
90 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 from Tasso and is otherwise valuable. He also 
 wrote a " Life of Dante," and a long poem entitled 
 "Hesperia," besides a number of translations of 
 Italian lyrics which were not published until after 
 his death. 
 
 Cooke, besides " Florence Vane," which Poe de- 
 clared the sweetest lyric ever written in America, 
 and which has been translated into many foreign 
 languages, wrote many other lyrics, of which the 
 most popular and perhaps the best are the " Lines 
 to my Daughter Lily " and " Rosa Lee." He also 
 wrote a number of sketches, among which are " John 
 Carpe," "The Gregories of Hackwood," and "The 
 Crime of Andrew Blair." 
 
 He died at the age of thirty-three, when his bril- 
 liant powers were still in bud. 
 
 Edward Coate Pinkney was a member of a family 
 distinguished for literary taste and ability. His 
 uncle, Ninian Pinkney, as early as 1809 published 
 a book of " Travels in the South of Prance and in 
 the Interior of the Provinces of Provence and Lan- 
 guedoc," of which Leigh Hunt said, " It set all the 
 idle world to going to France to live on the charming 
 banks of the Loire." 
 
 His brother Frederick was also a poet. Pinkney's 
 poems were so exquisite that after their first pub- 
 lication in 1825 he was requested to sit for a por- 
 trait to be included in a sketch of "The Five 
 Greatest Poets of the Nation." " A Health " and 
 " The Picture Song " have an established place in 
 our literature. 
 
AUTHORSHIP BEFORE THE WAR 91 
 
 Lanier and Ticknor, of Georgia ; John E. Thomp. 
 son, of Virginia ; Dimitry, of Louisiana ; Ryan, etc., 
 belong to a later time. Sidney Lanier was easily 
 the next Southern poet to Poe, and has not been 
 surpassed by any other that this country has pro- 
 duced. 
 
 Perhaps Henry Timrod and Paul H. Hayne also 
 more properly belong to that period, but before the 
 war they had done work which by its worth and 
 volume entitles them to be ranked of all Southern 
 poets next after Poe. 
 
 Hayne in South Carolina was, with Simms and 
 others, inspiring just before the war an emulation 
 which promised a brighter literary future than there 
 had previously been ground to hope for. John E. 
 Thompson, as editor of the Southern Literary Mes- 
 senger, was performing the same work for Virginia. 
 Had Hayne and Thompson received greater encour- 
 agement, their fine talents might have yielded a 
 return which would have made their native land 
 as proud of her brilliant sons as they deserved. 
 
 Besides the authors mentioned in this paper, there 
 were very many others who, by occasional essays at 
 literature in prose or in verse, attained something 
 more than a local reputation, but they were dis- 
 tinguished rather in other professions than in lit- 
 erature, whilst most of those which have been 
 mentioned are now chiefly distinguished for the 
 literary work they accomplished. 
 
 If it shall appear from this very imperfect sum- 
 
92 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 mary of the literary work done by the South, and 
 of the causes which influenced it, that the amount 
 produced was small, attention should be called 
 again first, to the insignificant number of the 
 slave-holding whites of the South, from whom alone, 
 as the educated class, a literature could come ; and 
 secondly, to the intellectual energy which that 
 limited population displayed throughout the entire 
 period of their existence. The intellectual work 
 they accomplished will compare not unfavorably 
 with that of a similar number of any other people 
 during the same period; and the thoughtful and 
 dispassionate student, to whatever causes he may 
 deem to be due the absence of a literature among 
 the Southern people, will not attribute it to either 
 mental indigence or mental lassitude. 
 
GLIMPSES OF LIFE IN COLONIAL 
 VIRGINIA 
 
GLIMPSES OF LIFE IN COLONIAL 
 VIRGINIA 
 
 Few things relating to the South have been more 
 misunderstood than its social life. Even the South- 
 ern people themselves have not generally had a 
 very correct idea of its proportions. 
 
 Owing to the astounding indifference of our peo- 
 ple to the preservation of records ; to the extraor- 
 dinary environment in which they were placed ; to 
 the wonderful rapidity with which the country 
 advanced in its development, ever pushing its con- 
 fines further and further before the interior could 
 be filled in, there are scarcely any written records 
 of our life remaining extant. Few letters, journals, 
 or accounts have been published or even preserved, 
 and the records to which writers have gone for 
 their materials are almost exclusively the impres- 
 sions of temporary sojourners, who at one time or 
 another have passed hastily through our borders, 
 generally without either the opportunity or the 
 capacity to form other than a hasty or prejudiced 
 opinion. 
 
 The Southern civilization was in its character as 
 
 95 
 
96 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 distinctive as was that of Greece, Carthage, Eome, 
 or Venice. It has had no chronicler to tell its story 
 in that spirit of sympathy from which alone can 
 come the lights and shadings on which depend 
 perspective and real truth. 
 
 It deserves such a recorder, for it produced results 
 the consequences of which may never cease. Among 
 them is this nation. 
 
 The social life of a people embraces their daily 
 life in their homes, with all that relates to their 
 social customs and intercourse. It is at once the 
 occasion and the reflection of the character of the 
 people. Whatever may throw light on these is 
 relevant to the subject. 
 
 It is, therefore, pertinent to investigate the 
 causes which contributed to any distinctive form 
 which that life may have taken, to show that pecul- 
 iar form itself, and to touch upon the results it 
 produced. 
 
 The structure of that life was, in the first place, 
 consequent upon the origin of the people, the man- 
 ner in which they were planted here, and the condi- 
 tions of their existence ; whilst the continuance of 
 the institution of domestic slavery constituted a 
 potent force in giving to it its distinctive character. 
 
 The shadow of this institution appears to have 
 fallen upon it, and to have prevented a wholly just 
 and proper view of its true character. 
 
 But though it is impossible to do more in a 
 single paper than simply suggest the outline of the 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 97 
 
 complete picture, yet the attempt will be made tc 
 draw that outline in the hope that some abler artist 
 may one day give the world the very lines and spirit 
 of what is believed by some to have been the sweet- 
 est, purest, and most beautiful life ever lived. 
 
 And first, as to its origin. 
 
 Long before any English colony was permanently 
 established on these shores, England, in envy of 
 Spain, was looking about to assert a claim to a 
 part of the new world, the wealth of which was so 
 fabulous. 
 
 The first charter to John Cabot, in 1496, confined 
 his discoveries to the region north of 44° IS", lati- 
 tude, recognizing Spain's right, as fixed by the 
 Pope, to all that might lie south of that degree. 
 Edward VI., being Protestant, his charter to the 
 "merchant adventurers" did not regard these 
 bounds. Mary, however, shackled by religious 
 bigotry and the influence of Philip, restrained the 
 growing enterprise of her subjects, and humbly sub- 
 mitting to the Pope's decrees, once more yielded to 
 Spain all that country claimed. Elizabeth was of 
 different stuff. She flung down the gauntlet. Her 
 first parliament vested in her the supremacy claimed 
 by the Pope, with all that it implied. Erom this 
 time America became the prize between Poman 
 Catholicism and Protestantism. In 1562 Admiral 
 Coligny attempted to establish a Huguenot colony 
 in South Carolina, and two years later he settled 
 a small colony in Florida, where most of his colo- 
 
98 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 nists were subsequently killed by the Spaniards. 
 Captain John Hawkins, under the patronage of the 
 Earl of Pembroke, Lord Robert Dudley, Sir William 
 Cecil, and other nobles, voyaged to the South and 
 made explorations. This Spain would not endure. 
 In 1568 Hawkins, then on his third voyage, met 
 and had a great sea fight with the Spaniards off 
 Vera Cruz, in which he lost three of his ships. He 
 was forced to put ashore one hundred and fourteen 
 of his men, several of whom marched north along 
 the coast. The Spaniards caught most of those 
 who remained, sentenced sixty-eight of them to 
 the galleys, and burnt three of them, — America's 
 first auto dafe. 
 
 Reports of the fabulous wealth of this Southern 
 land had spread in England. The merchant adven- 
 turers had long been watching the stream of wealth 
 pouring through the plate galleons into Spain. 
 They had got an act passed extending their privi- 
 leges and setting forth their object "for the dis- 
 covery of new trades." The prize was coveted by 
 others than the merchants, and the new land was 
 claimed as "fatally reserved for England." Sir 
 Philip Sidney, in the summer of 1584, began to 
 take an interest in American enterprises. He was 
 interested in Raleigh's voyage, but projected an 
 expedition under the command of Sir Francis 
 Drake and himself, a scheme which Fulke Greville 
 says "was the exactest model Europe ever saw, 
 a conquest not to be enterprised but by Sir Philip's 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 99 
 
 reaching spirit that grasped all circumstances and 
 interests." 
 
 Elizabeth had taken into her favor a young 
 man who even in that adventurous age had dis- 
 played extraordinary qualities, a young Devon- 
 shire gentleman, described by an old chronicler as 
 "of a good presence in a well-compacted body, 
 strong, natural wit and better judgment, a bold and 
 plausible tongue, the fancy of a poet, and the chiv- 
 alry of a soldier." He was cousin to Sir Richard 
 Grenville, who brought undying fame to our race 
 when with the little Revenge he fought the Spaniard 
 at Flores, and he was half-brother to those bold, 
 adventurous navigators, Sir Humphrey, Sir John, 
 and Sir Adrian Gilbert, who with him did more 
 than any other family to wrest this continent from 
 Spain and make it an " English nation." Dashing 
 soldier as he was, queller of rebellions, patron of 
 poets, stout hater and fighter of Spain, "admiral 
 and shepherd of the ocean," it was his highest title 
 that he was " Lord and Chief Governor of Virginia." 
 It is likewise one of Virginia's chief glories that 
 she owes her name and her being, at least in its 
 peculiar form, to the stout, high-minded, and chi- 
 valric soldier, the most picturesque character in 
 modern history, — second in his work only to Chris- 
 topher Columbus, — Sir Walter Raleigh. 
 
 Although the colonies which Raleigh planted 
 perished, his mighty enterprise laid the founda- 
 tion for the final establishment of Virginia, and his 
 
100 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 spirit fixed its imperishable impress upon the work 
 and gave it its distinctive character. He was at 
 Oxford when England thrilled with the news of 
 Hawkins's third voyage. He left the University to 
 fight the Spaniard in the low country. From that 
 time Spain was his quarry. He spent his great 
 life in wresting America from her hands. He 
 awakened in England an interest in the new land 
 which never died out; made its holding a matter 
 of national pride and national principle; excited 
 British pride and religious fervor ; stimulated the 
 flagging, awakened public enthusiasm ; aroused the 
 Church, and created the spirit which, in spite of 
 numberless disasters and repeated failures, finally 
 verified his high prophecy to Sir Robert Cecil, 
 that he would "live to see Virginia an English 
 nation." 
 
 The names of the men who engaged in these 
 enterprises are enough to show how the aristocratic 
 character became fixed on the Southern settlement. 
 The South was settled not merely under the pat- 
 ronage of, but largely by, the better class in Eng- 
 land. The queen sent Sir Humphrey Gilbert an 
 anchor set with jewels, and a message that she 
 " wished him as great hap and safety to his ship as 
 if she herself were there in person." 
 
 Raleigh's high spirit gave the colony a priceless 
 benefaction. He obtained in his charter (of 1584) 
 a provision that his colonists should "have all the 
 privileges of free denizens and natives of England, 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 101 
 
 and were to be governed according to such statutes 
 as should by them be established, so that the said 
 statutes or laws conform as conveniently as may 
 be with those of England," etc. 
 
 These guaranties were the rock on which the 
 American people founded their impregnable claim 
 to those rights which are now deemed inherent and 
 inalienable. They bore an important part in the 
 social as well as the political life of the people. 
 They were renewed in the charter of 1606 under 
 which the colony came which finally secured in 
 Virginia a lasting foothold, and established here 
 the rule of the Anglo-Saxon race. They were never 
 forgot by the stout adventurers who came to endure 
 the hardships of the New World, " leaving their 
 bodies in testimonie of their minds." 
 
 They formed the foundation of that pride and in- 
 dependence which became so notable a characteristic 
 of the social life and gave it its individuality. 
 
 For many years daring young members of the 
 great families with their retainers had been going 
 abroad, taking service in the low countries, and 
 feeding their instinct for adventure. The wars 
 were now over ; London was filled with these sol- 
 diers, without means and with the wandering habit 
 strong on them, brave to recklessness, without 
 steady habits of industry, ready for any adventure. 
 Filled with the enthusiasm of exploration and col- 
 onization, fired by the tales of the Gilberts, of 
 Grenville, Hawkins, Gosnold, Stukeley, and others, 
 
102 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the colonizing spirit of the English race found here 
 a field ; and Virginia became the El Dorado of the 
 British nation. 
 
 Thus Virginia was settled with a strong English 
 feeling ingrained in her, with English customs and 
 habits of life, with English ideas modified only to 
 suit the conditions of existence here. 
 
 Among the chief factors which influenced the Vir- 
 ginia life and moulded it in its peculiar form were 
 this English feeling (which was almost strong 
 enough to be termed a race feeling) ; the aristocratic 
 tendency ; the happy combination of soil, climate 
 and agricultural product (tobacco), which made 
 them an agricultural people, and enabled them to 
 support a generous style of living as landed gentry ; 
 the Church with its strong organization ; and the 
 institution of slavery. 
 
 The fabulous reports of Virginia's wealth, so 
 well known that it was travestied upon the stage 
 as a land where the pots and pans and the very 
 chains that bound the slaves were of gold, and 
 jewels of marvellous value were picked up on the 
 seashore to adorn the savage children, undoubtedly 
 at first induced many adventurers to come to Vir- 
 ginia who had no thought of remaining longer than 
 was necessary to make fortunes which they pro- 
 posed to spend in England. These were followed 
 by others who wished not to sever altogether their 
 old ties, and for many years life here must have 
 been intolerably hard to those accustomed to the 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 103 
 
 pleasant paths of old England. Thus England for 
 several generations was to the Virginians " home." 
 
 The commerce with her through the ports of the 
 Chesapeake was direct, vessels loading with tobacco 
 from the warehouses of the planters on the rivers. 
 "Every person may, with ease, procure a small 
 plantation, can ship his tobacco at his own door, 
 and live independent," says the English traveller 
 Burnaby. 
 
 This proved a strong and ever fresh bond, pre- 
 serving as it did immediate and constant inter- 
 course between the new country and the old. 
 
 The land-holding instinct of the people displayed 
 itself from the first, and they settled large planta- 
 tions along the rivers, where the fertility of the soil 
 enabled them to raise tobacco, and the waterways 
 afforded them means to ship. Here they set up 
 establishments as nearly like those of the landed 
 gentry of England as the conditions of the new 
 land admitted. 
 
 The existence of African slaves brought in by 
 Dutch, English, and New England traders, and the 
 exportation from England of persons who were 
 sold as indented servants, enabled the Virginians 
 to cultivate their lands, and gave them the means 
 to support their pretensions as a landed gentry. 
 The institution of slavery was a potent factor. In 
 the beginning it was slow in its growth. 
 
 The first cargo were but 20, who were brought in 
 a Dutch ship, which put into Hampton Koads in 
 
104 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 1619. In 1749 there were but 300 in the colony. 
 The first American slaver, The Desire, had, how- 
 ever, been fitted out at Salem in 1636, and others 
 followed, and in 1670 there were 2000 negroes in 
 the colony ; in 1714 there were but 23,000, and in 
 1756, 120,000, 52,000 more being in the other colo- 
 nies, including New England. 
 
 The existence of slaves emphasized the class dis- 
 tinction and created a system of castes, making the 
 social system of Virginia as strongly aristocratic as 
 that in England. 
 
 The law itself recognized the distinction of class. 
 " Such persons of quality," says an act of 1835-36, 
 " as shall be found delinquent in their duties, being 
 not fitt to undergoe corporal punishment, may not- 
 withstanding be ymprisoned at the discretion of ye 
 commander." The governor was empowered to 
 " presse men of the ordinary sort " to work on the 
 State House, paying of course proper wages in 
 tobacco. 
 
 There were no titles save the " Honourables " of 
 the counsellors, the "Esquires," and the "Colo- 
 nels," who commanded in the various counties. 
 
 Titles could have added nothing to their distinc- 
 tion. They erected their brick mansions on the 
 hills above the rivers, flanked by their offices and 
 out-buildings, placed their negro quarters conven- 
 iently behind them, and ruled in a system as ma- 
 norial as that in the old country. 
 
 The royal governors aided this aristocratic ten- 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 105 
 
 dency. Many of them were men of rank at home, 
 and when they came over they set up in the Prov- 
 ince a court as nearly vice-regal as their circum- 
 stances admitted. The House of Burgesses was 
 like the House of Commons, and was composed of 
 men of any class. The King's Council of twelve 
 having the powers of a general court, besides pos- 
 sessing certain executive powers, was appointed, 
 and came insensibly to be a "miniature House of 
 Lords," untitled and not hereditary it is true, but 
 yet practically controlled by the great planter 
 families. 
 
 The English system of primogeniture and of 
 eutail prevailed in as rigid a form as in the old 
 country. The fostering sympathy of the Church 
 bore its fruit ; and the established Church at home 
 became naturally the established Church in Vir- 
 ginia, a law being passed by the General Assembly 
 (1624-32) that the colony is to conform "both in 
 canons and constitution to the Church of England, 
 as near as may be." "They made many laws 
 against the Puritans, though they were free from 
 them," writes the Rev. Hugh Jones in his " Pres- 
 ent State of Virginia," p. 23. Both " Papists " and 
 "Puritans" were dealt with vigorously, being 
 driven out either to Maryland or New England ; 
 and non-conformists were held to strict compliance 
 with the law. 
 
 Undoubtedly many, both at first and later on, 
 came to Virginia who were not of gentle birth ; but 
 
106 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the lines were too clearly drawn to admit of con- 
 fusion ; those who possessed the personal force 
 requisite, rose and were absorbed into the upper 
 class ; but the great body of them remained a elass 
 distinct from this. In the contest between Charles 
 I. and his Parliament, the people of Virginia, fol- 
 lowing their instincts, at the final rupture sided 
 overwhelmingly with the king, and Virginia had 
 become so well recognized as an aristocratic coun- 
 try that after the failure of the Royalist arms, 
 there was a notable emigration of followers of the 
 king to the colony, which, under the stout old 
 Cavalier governor, Sir William Berkeley, had been 
 unswerving in its loyalty. When the king was 
 beheaded, the House of Burgesses gave expression 
 to the general horror. One of the first acts, if not 
 the very first, speaks of him as "The late, most 
 excellent, and now undoubtedly sainted King," and 
 provides that " what person soever shall go about 
 to defend or maintain the late traitorous proceed- 
 ings against the aforesaid King of most happy 
 memory shall be adjudged an accessory, post-fac- 
 tum to the death of the aforesaid King, and shall 
 be proceeded against for the same, according to the 
 known laws of England." 
 
 Holding true to the crown the Virginians, when 
 Charles II. was a fugitive in Holland, sent commis- 
 sioners to offer him an unlapsed kingdom beyond 
 the seas, and, according to Jones, she was the last 
 to acknowledge Cromwell and the first to proclaim 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 107 
 
 king Charles II. even before the Eestoration ("Pres- 
 ent State of Virginia," p. 23). 
 
 Yet there was that in the Virginians which dis- 
 tinguished them, for all their aristocratic preten- 
 sions, from their British cousins. Grafted on the 
 aristocratic instinct was a jealous watchfulness of 
 their liberties, a guardfulness of their rights, which 
 developed into a sterling republicanism, notwith- 
 standing the aristocratic instinct. The standard 
 was not birth nor family connection; it was one 
 based on individual attainment. 
 
 Sir Walter Kaleigh had obtained a guarantee of 
 British rights in his charter. Sir Francis Wyatt 
 had brought over in 1622 a charter with an exten- 
 sion of these rights. The General Assembly, con- 
 vened in 1619 when there were only eleven boroughs, 
 jealously guarded their liberties. They refused to 
 give their records for inspection to the royal com- 
 missioners, and when their clerk disobeyed them 
 and gave them up, they cut off one of his ears and 
 put him in the pillory. They passed statutes limit- 
 ing the power of the governor to lay taxes only 
 through the General Assembly. 
 
 When Charles I., for whom they were ready to 
 vote or fight, claimed a monopoly of the tobacco 
 trade, the loyal people of Virginia protested with a 
 vigor which brought him to a stand ; when Cromwell 
 sent his governor, they deposed him and immedi- 
 ately re-elected him that he might act only by their 
 authority. They offered Charles II. a kingdom ; 
 
108 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 but when he granted the Northern Neck to Culpepper 
 and Arlington they grew ready for revolution. 
 
 Many of the best known of the older families 
 of Virginia are descended from royalist refugees. 
 
 On the Eestoration some of the adherents of the 
 Commonwealth, finding England too hot for them, 
 came over ; but they were held in no very high gen- 
 eral esteem, and the old order continued to prevail. 
 
 The spirit of the colony will appear from the 
 following act, which was adopted 18th March, 
 1660-61 : " Whereas our late surrender and submis- 
 sion to that execrable power, that soe bloodyly 
 massacred the late King Charles I. of blessed [in 
 a revision is added, " and glorious "] memory, hath 
 made us, by acknowledging them guilty of their 
 crimes, to show our serious and hearty repentance 
 and detestation of that barbarous act, Bee itt en- 
 acted that the 30th of January, the day the said 
 King was beheaded, be annually solemnized with 
 fasting and prayers that our sorrowes may expiate 
 our crime and our teares wash away our guilt" 
 (Hen. Vol. 11, p. 24). 
 
 As the eighteenth century passed, the settlement 
 pushed further and further westward. A new ele- 
 ment came in by way of the upper valley of Vir- 
 ginia, stout Scotch-Irish Presbyterian settlers, from 
 Scotland first, and then from Ireland, with the 
 colonizing spirit strong in them ; simple in their 
 life, stern in their faith, dauntless in their courage, 
 a race to found and to hold new lands against all 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 109 
 
 comers or claimants ; a race whose spirit was 
 more potent than the line of forts with which the 
 French attempted to hem them in along the Belle 
 Riviere. They founded a new colony looking to the 
 West and the new land, as the old planter settlers 
 towards the sea looked to the East and the old. 
 
 Burnaby, the traveller already quoted, paid a 
 visit to the valley in which they had first made 
 their home. " I could not but reflect with pleasure 
 on the situation of these people," says he, " and 
 think if there is such a thing as happiness in this 
 life that they enjoy it. Far from the bustle of the 
 world, they live in the most delightful climate and 
 richest soil imaginable; they are everywhere sur- 
 rounded with beautiful prospects and sylvan scenes ; 
 lofty mountains, transparent streams, falls of water, 
 rich valleys, and majestic woods ; the whole inter- 
 spersed with an infinite variety of flowering shrubs, 
 constitute the landscape surrounding them. . . . 
 They live in perfect liberty, they are ignorant of 
 want and acquainted with but few vices. . . . 
 They possess what many princes would give half 
 their dominions for, health, content, and tranquil- 
 lity of mind." 
 
 Now and then the lines crossed, and, with inter- 
 course, gradually the aristocratic tendency of the 
 seaboard and Piedmont became grafted into the 
 patriarchal system of the valley, distinctly color- 
 ing it, though the absence of slaves in numbers 
 softened the lines marking the class-distinctions. 
 
110 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 The lands were sometimes held on a feudal ten- 
 ure. William Byrd held and let his lands at the 
 Falls of James on a feudal tenure. 
 
 " And he shall become bound and obliged," runs 
 the grant, " to seat the whole number of fifty able 
 men armed and constantly furnished with sufficient 
 ammunition and provisions together with such 
 number of tithable persons, not exceeding 250 in 
 the whole on both sides of said Biver," etc. 
 
 On this spot now stands Eichmond, which in the 
 great civil war was for four years the point of 
 attack by the Northern armies. 
 
 A similar grant on the Eappahannock Biver was 
 made to Lawrence Smith, and was offered to any 
 other persons at, or near, the heads of any other of 
 the great rivers, on condition of their placing there 
 military forces and other persons " for the protec- 
 tion of his Majesty's country against our barba- 
 rous enemy, the Indians." 
 
 Indeed, the wealthy planter families from the 
 rivers, holding their places in council generation 
 after generation, and ever spreading out more and 
 more, maintained a system as nearly a copy of that 
 in England when they came over, as the condi- 
 tions of the new land admitted. 
 
 The royal governor occupied, in the capital city, 
 a mansion called the "Palace," and during the 
 sessions of the Assembly the gentle-folk of the col- 
 ony assembled at Williamsburg, and "the season" 
 was celebrated as distinctly as it was in London 
 during the sitting of Parliament. 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 111 
 
 Here is a picture of the capital : " There is one 
 handsome street in it, just a mile in length, with 
 the capitol on one side of the street ; and the 
 college of William and Mary, an old monastic 
 structure, at the other end. About the middle 
 between them on the north side, a little distance 
 retired from the street, stands the palace, the resi- 
 dence of the governor; a large, commodious and 
 handsome building." 
 
 "Here dwell several good families," says the 
 Eev. Hugh Jones, who had lived among them, 
 "and more reeide here in their own houses at 
 public times. They live in the same neat manner, 
 dress after the same modes, and behave themselves 
 exactly as the gentry in London. Most families of 
 any note having a coach, chariot, berlin, or chaise." 
 
 The people being almost universally agricultural, 
 and there being no cities and no great difference of 
 interests, the structure of society was naturally 
 simple. 
 
 The African slaves formed by position and race 
 the lowest stratum. Next to them were the indented 
 servants, and the lowest class of whites, composed 
 of indented servants and the worst element of the 
 transported whites, called in Virginia " jail birds," 
 who were shipped from the cities of England, and 
 who although as absolutely under the dominion of 
 their masters during the period of servitude as the 
 slaves themselves, yet in virtue of their race poten- 
 tiality had rights denied to the slaves, and possessed 
 
112 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the future, if not the present. Next were the small 
 farmers and new-comers of modest means, who were 
 continually increasing in numbers and who were 
 ever striving to rise, and some of them success- 
 fully, in the social scale. Finally, over all was the 
 upper class : the large planters and shippers, who 
 owned extensive lands and many slaves ; lived in 
 the style of country gentlemen of means; jealously 
 guarded their privileges, and as counsellors, com- 
 missioners, and colonels managed the colony as if 
 it had been their private estate. 
 
 "There is a greater distinction supported be- 
 tween the different classes of life here than perhaps 
 in any of the rest of the colonies," says the Eng- 
 lish traveller, Smythe, "nor does that spirit of 
 equality and levelling principle which pervades 
 the greater part of America prevail to such an 
 extent in Virginia. 
 
 " However, there appear to be but three degrees 
 of rank amongst all the inhabitants exclusive of 
 the negroes. 
 
 • "The first consists of gentlemen of the best 
 families and fortunes of the colony, who are here 
 much more respectable and numerous than in any 
 other province in America. These, in general, have 
 had a liberal education, possess enlightened under- 
 standings, and a thorough knowledge of the world, 
 that furnishes them with an ease and freedom of 
 manners and conversation highly to their advan- 
 tage in exterior, which no vicissitude of fortune or 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 113 
 
 place can divest them of ; they being actually, 
 according to my ideas, the most agreeable and best 
 companions, friends, and neighbors that need be 
 desired. 
 
 "The greater number of them keep their car- 
 riages and have handsome services of plate ; but 
 they all without exception have studs, as well as 
 sets of elegant and beautiful horses. 
 
 " Those of the second degree in rank are very 
 numerous, being perhaps half the inhabitants, and 
 consist of such a variety, singularity, and mixture 
 of characters that the exact general criterion and 
 leading feature can scarcely be ascertained. 
 
 " However, they are generous, friendly, and hos- 
 pitable in the extreme; but mixed with such an 
 appearance of rudeness, ferocity, and haughtiness, 
 which is in fact only a want of polish, occasioned 
 by their deficiencies in education and a knowledge 
 of mankind, as well as by their general intercourse 
 with slaves." 
 
 Many of these possessed fortunes superior to 
 some of the first rank, " but " says Smythe, " their 
 families are not so ancient nor respectable ; a cir- 
 cumstance here held in some estimation. 
 
 "They are all," he adds, "excessively attached 
 to every species of sport, gaming, and dissipation, 
 particularly horse-racing, and that most barbarous 
 of all diversions, that peculiar species of cruelty, 
 cock-fighting. . . . 
 
 "Numbers of them are truly valuable members of 
 
114 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 society, and few or none deficient in the excellen- 
 cies of the intellectual faculties, and a natural 
 genius which though in a great measure unim- 
 proved, is generally bright and splendid in an un- 
 common degree. 
 
 "The third, or lower class of the people (who 
 ever compose the bulk of mankind), are in Virginia 
 more few in number in proportion to the rest of 
 the inhabitants than perhaps in any other country 
 in the Universe. Even these are kind, hospitable, 
 and generous ; yet illiberal, noisy, and rude. They 
 are much addicted to inebriety, and averse to 
 labor. 
 
 "They are likewise overburdened with an im- 
 pertinent and insuperable curiosity, that renders 
 them peculiarly disagreeable and troublesome to 
 strangers.'-' 
 
 This is a strong indictment against "the third 
 or lower class " to whom it is confined in Virginia, 
 but our traveller seems not to have found this pecul- 
 iar to the Virginia poor whites, for he immediately 
 adds : 
 
 "Yet these undesirable qualities they possess 
 by no means in an equal degree with the gener- 
 ality of the inhabitants of New England, whose re- 
 ligion and government have encouraged, and indeed 
 instituted and established, a kind of inquisition of 
 forward impertinence and prying intrusion against 
 every person that may be compelled to pass through 
 that troublesome, illiberal country ; from which 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 115 
 
 description, however, there are no doubt many 
 exceptions." 
 
 On the whole, this is apparently not an inaccu- 
 rate analysis of the character of the good people of 
 Virginia at that time, as they lived their easy, 
 contented, careless lives on their plantations or 
 farms, in their orchard-embowered homes. The 
 slaves were multiplying rapidly. The laws de- 
 vised to regulate them may appear to this humani- 
 tarian generation very harsh, but most of them were 
 savages fresh from the wilds of Africa; and, at least, 
 the laws were no severer than those enacted in 
 Massachusetts and other colonies. In practical 
 operation this severity was tempered by the friend- 
 liness which sprang up between the slaves and 
 their masters, the relation between them invariably 
 becoming a sort of feudal one, and the slaves living 
 happy and contented lives. This appears to have 
 been a continual puzzle to the outsiders who 
 visited the colony. Smythe, the same traveller 
 quoted, after speaking with astonishment of the 
 laws provided for their regulation, and expressing 
 great commiseration over their condition, declares : 
 
 "Yet notwithstanding this degraded situation, 
 and rigid severity to which fate has subjected this 
 wretched race, they are certainly devoid of care, and 
 actually appear jovial, contented, and happy." 
 
 He can scarcely credit his senses ; he records 
 with astonishment the fact that after the "severe 
 labor" which he asserts continues for "some 
 
116 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 hours " after dusk, " instead of retiring to rest as 
 might naturally be concluded he would be glad to 
 do, he generally sets out from home, and walks six 
 or seven miles in the night, be the weather ever so 
 sultry, to a negroe dance in which he performs with 
 astonishing agility, and the most vigorous exer= 
 tions, keeping time and cadence most exactly, with 
 the music of the banjor, a large hollow instru- 
 ment with three strings, and a quaqua (somewhat 
 resembling a drum), until he exhausts himself, 
 and has scarcely time or strength to return home 
 before the time he is called forth to toil next 
 morning." 
 
 All his pity for the negroes, however, did not 
 prevent his purchasing one for forty pounds, along 
 with two horses to continue his journey to North 
 Carolina. In view of his abhorrence of slavery, it 
 would be interesting to know what became of this 
 boy afterwards. 
 
 Slavery in any form shocks the sensibilities of 
 this age ; but surely this banjo-playing life was not 
 so dreadful a lot for those just rescued from the 
 cannibalism of the Congo. 
 
 The relation between the poor whites and the 
 upper classes was not so intimate as that between 
 the slaves and their masters, and the former lived 
 very much as the lower peasantry do in all coun- 
 tries, standing somewhat in the relation of retain- 
 ers of or dependents on the planter class. 
 
 The distinction between the middle class, or small 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 117 
 
 farmers, and the wealthier planters was very clearly- 
 marked up to the Kevolution, at which time the 
 diffusion of the planter families had greatly in- 
 creased the number of lesser planters of good 
 family connection, and the common defence of 
 the country opened the path of distinction to all, 
 irrespective of social station. 
 
 The planters lived in a style patterned on that 
 of the landed gentry in England, maintaining large 
 establishments on their plantations, surrounded by 
 slaves and servants, dispensing a prodigal hospital- 
 ity, wearing silks and velvets imported from abroad, 
 expending their incomes, and often more than their 
 incomes, engaging in horse-racing and other gentle 
 diversions, and generally arrogating to themselves 
 all the privileges of an exclusive upper class. " At 
 the governor's house upon birth nights and at 
 balls and assemblies," says the Eev. Hugh Jones 
 in his " Present State of Virginia," " I have seen as 
 fine an appearance, as good diversion, and as splen- 
 did entertainment in Governor Spots wood's time as 
 I have seen anywhere else." 
 
 They built churches, reserving pews in the chan- 
 cels or galleries like the Lords of the Manors in Eng- 
 land. The Carters built a church at Corotoman, and 
 the congregation waited respectfully outside till the 
 family arrived and entered, when they followed them 
 in. The Wormleys, the Gryineses, the Churchills, 
 and the Berkeleys built an addition to the church 
 in Middlesex for their exclusive use. Mr. Matthew 
 
118 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Kemp, as church warden, received the commenda- 
 tion of the vestry in the same county for displac* 
 ing an unworthy woman who insisted on taking a 
 pew above her degree. 
 
 One old grand dame at her death had herself 
 buried under the transept used by the poor, that 
 in punishment for her pride they might trample 
 upon her grave. 
 
 The mansions of this class were generally set 
 back in groves of forest trees upon the heights 
 overlooking the rivers, and were heavy and roomy 
 brick structures flanked by "offices." They were 
 substantial rather than showy, though their very 
 simplicity was often impressive. Many specimens 
 of the kind still remain, though in a state of sad 
 decay, on the James, the York, and the Rappahan- 
 nock rivers. The houses of the middle classes were 
 generally of wood. 
 
 Here are bits of description from Smythe's 
 " Travels." 
 
 " On the 6th," he says, " the ship weighed anchor 
 and proceeded up James River. . . . After pass- 
 ing a great number of most charming situations on 
 each side of this beautiful river, we came to anchor. 
 
 "The principal situations that commanded my 
 notice and admiration were Shirley Hundred, a 
 seat of Charles Carter, Esq., at present in the occu- 
 pation of Mr. Bowler Cock; this is, indeed, a 
 charming place ; the buildings are of brick, large, 
 convenient, and expensive, but now falling to de- 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 119 
 
 cay; they were erected at a great charge by Mr. 
 Carter's father, who was secretary of the colony, 
 and this was his favorite seat of residence. The 
 present proprietor has a most opulent fortune, and 
 possesses such a variety of seats in situations so 
 extremely delightful, that he overlooks this sweet 
 one of Shirley and suffers it to fall into ruin, 
 although the buildings must have cost an immense 
 sum in constructing, and would certainly be expen- 
 sive to keep in repair." Arrived at the Falls where 
 now stands Richmond, then a collection of small vil- 
 lages, he, after speaking of its situation, bursts forth, 
 filled with admiration at the beauty of the land: 
 
 "Whilst the mind is filled with astonishment 
 and novel objects, all the senses are gratified. 
 
 "The flowering shrubs which overspread the 
 land regale the smell with odoriferous perfumes ; 
 and fruits of exquisite relish and flavor delight the 
 taste and afford a most grateful refreshment." 
 
 As the tide of settlement rolled westward, sim- 
 ple wooden houses were often built by the slaves, 
 of timber, cut and sawed by hand upon the place, 
 to which wings were added for convenience, as the 
 family increased. There was not generally much 
 display in the buildings themselves, the extrava- 
 gance being reserved for the cheer dispensed within. 
 The furniture, however, was often elaborate and 
 handsome, being imported from England, and gen- 
 erally of the finest wood, such as mahogany and 
 rosewood. Chariots and four were the ordinary 
 
120 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 mode of travel, the difficulties of country roads 
 giving the gentry a reasonable excuse for gratify- 
 ing their pride in this respect. 
 
 Their love of fine horses very early displayed 
 itself, and laws were enacted at an early time for 
 improving the strain of their blood in Virginia. 
 "They are such lovers of riding," says the Rev. 
 Mr. Jones, in his "Present State of Virginia," 
 "that almost every ordinary person keeps a 
 horse, and I have known some spend the morning 
 in ranging several miles in the woods to find and 
 catch their horses only to ride two or three miles 
 to church, to the court-house, or to a horse-race." 
 
 "The horses are fleet and beautiful," says Bur- 
 naby, "and the gentlemen of Virginia, who are 
 exceedingly fond of horse-racing, have spared no 
 expense or trouble to improve the breed of these 
 by importing great numbers from England." 
 
 Each spring and fall there were races at Wil- 
 liamsburg, where two, three, and four mile heats 
 were run for purses as high as a hundred pounds, 
 besides matches and sweepstakes for considerable 
 sums, " the inhabitants almost to a man being quite 
 devoted to the diversion of horse-racing." " Very 
 capital horses are started here," says the traveller 
 Smythe, " such as would make no despicable figure 
 at Newmarket ; nor is their speed, bottom, or blood 
 inferior to their appearance, the gentlemen of Vir- 
 ginia sparing no pains, trouble, or expense in im- 
 porting the best stock and improving the excellence 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 121 
 
 of the breed by proper and judicious crossing. 
 Indeed nothing can be more elegant and beautiful 
 than the horses bred here, either for the turf, the 
 field, the road, or the coach." 
 
 " Virginians," he adds, " of all ranks and denom- 
 inations are excessively fond of horses and espe- 
 cially those of the race breed. The gentlemen of 
 fortune expend great sums on their studs, generally 
 keeping handsome carriages and several sets of 
 horses, as well as others for the race and road ; 
 even the most indigent person has his saddle horse 
 which he rides to every place and on every occasion ; 
 for in this country nobody walks on foot the small- 
 est distance except when hunting." He, too, ob- 
 serves that " a man will frequently go five miles to 
 catch a horse, to ride only one mile upon after- 
 wards." 
 
 The traveller knew something of Virginia life. 
 
 The Rev. Andrew Burnaby, rector of Greenwich, 
 where he confines himself to what he saw, is 
 picturesque and reliable ; when he does not, he 
 is simply picturesque. Virginians struck him 
 as "indolent, easy, and good-natured, extremely 
 fond of society, and much given to convivial pleas- 
 ures." In consequence of this, charges Burnaby, 
 "they seldom show any spirit of enterprise or 
 expose themselves to fatigue." They were, he 
 thought, " vain and imperious and entire strangers 
 to that elegance of sentiment which is so peculiarly 
 characteristic of refined and polished nations." He 
 
122 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 has the grace to admit that " general characters are 
 always liable to many exceptions. In Virginia I 
 have had the pleasure to know several gentlemen 
 adorned with many virtues and accomplishments 
 to whom the following description is by no means 
 applicable." 
 
 As to this absence of refined feeling, we shall see 
 presently. 
 
 " The public or political character of the Vir- 
 ginians," he says, "corresponds with their private 
 one ; they are haughty and jealous of their liber- 
 ties, impatient of restraint, and can scarcely bear 
 the thought of being controlled by any superior 
 power. Many of them consider the colonies as inde- 
 pendent States, not connected with Great Britain, 
 otherwise than by having the same common King, 
 and being bound to her with natural affection." 
 
 Perhaps this independence was not agreeable to 
 the reverend rector of Greenwich's loyal instincts. 
 
 He was not so accurate in his observations on the 
 private character of the Virginians as on their polit- 
 ical. He noted that they never refuse any necessary 
 supplies for the support of the government when 
 called upon, and are a generous and loyal people. 
 
 Here is what he says of the Virginia women: 
 " The women are, upon the whole, rather handsome, 
 but not to be compared with our fair countrywomen 
 in England. [He was writing for publication in 
 England.] They have but few advantages and con- 
 sequently are seldom accomplished; this makes 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 123 
 
 them reserved and unequal to any interesting and 
 refined conversation. They are immoderately fond 
 of dancing, and indeed it is almost the only amuse- 
 ment they partake of." He then describes the 
 country dances and "jijjs" they dance, which may 
 give an idea of the society in which he generally 
 moved. 
 
 (The Eev. Hugh Jones in his "Present State of 
 Virginia" sufficiently discriminates the two classes 
 of society with their diversions to show that al- 
 though the English traveller mentioned may have 
 occasionally been entertained at a gentleman's 
 house, yet the people whom he described belonged 
 unquestionably to the second class.) 
 
 "The Virginia ladies," he proceeds, "excepting 
 these amusements and now and then a party of 
 pleasure into the woods to partake of a barbecue, 
 chiefly spend their time in sewing and taking care 
 of their families. They seldom read or endeavor 
 to improve their minds ; however, they are in gen- 
 eral good housewives, and though they have not, I 
 think, quite as much tenderness and sensibility as 
 the English ladies, yet they make as good wives 
 and as good mothers as any in the world." 
 
 It is surprising that he should have passed so 
 general a stricture on the lack of enterprise of the 
 Virginians, for he records the famous feat of Wash- 
 ington in going with a single companion to the 
 " Ohio Eiver " with letters to the French com- 
 mander, M. St. Pierre, in 1753, but a few years 
 
124 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 before, and. he certainly did not underestimate the 
 act. 
 
 The distance was more than four hundred miles, 
 two hundred of which lay through a trackless forest 
 inhabited by treacherous and merciless savages, and 
 the season was unusually severe. 
 
 It was less than fifteen years after this that these 
 Virginians, with a mightiness of enterprise which 
 must have shaken the reverend traveller's confi- 
 dence in his judgment, helped to build a nation and 
 tear from England the richest possession any coun- 
 try ever owned. 
 
 The hospitality of the good people of the colony 
 early became noted, and its exercise was so un- 
 stinted, so universal, so cordial, that it has acquired 
 for itself the honor of a special designation, and, 
 the world over, has set the standard as " Virginia 
 hospitality." 
 
 " They shall be reputed to entertain those of 
 curtesie with whom they make not a certaine 
 agreement," says the old Statute of 1661-62 (Hen. 
 1661-62, 1667). 
 
 Here is what the traveller Smythe says of his 
 experience in this regard : " The Virginians are 
 generous, extremely hospitable, and possess very 
 liberal sentiments. ... To communicate an idea 
 of the general hospitality that prevails in Virginia, 
 and, indeed, throughout all the Southern provinces, 
 it may not be improper to represent some peculiar 
 customs that are universal ; for instance : 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 125 
 
 " If a traveller, even a negro, observes an orchard 
 full of fine fruit, either apples or peaches, in or near 
 his way, he alights without ceremony, and fills - his 
 pockets, or even a bag, if he has one, without asking 
 permission ; and if the proprietor should see him, he 
 is not in the least offended, but makes him perfectly 
 welcome, and assists him in choosing out the finest 
 fruit." He explains that this was not to be won- 
 dered at as fruit was so plentiful that peaches were 
 fed to the hogs ; and proceeds : " When a person of 
 more genteel figure than common calls at an ordi- 
 nary (the name of their inns), for refreshment 
 and lodging for a night, as soon as any of the gen- 
 tlemen of fortune in the neighborhood hears of it, 
 he either comes for him himself, or sends him a polite 
 and pressing invitation to his home, where he meets 
 with entertainment and accommodation infinitely 
 superior in every respect to what he could have 
 received at the inn. If he should happen to be 
 fatigued with travelling, he is treated in the most 
 hospitable and genteel manner, and his servants 
 and horses also fare plenteously, for as long a time 
 as he chooses to stay. All this is done with the 
 best grace imaginable, without even a hint being 
 thrown out of a curiosity or wish to know his 
 name." 
 
 Are these the people that Parson Burnaby says 
 are " entire strangers to that elegance of sentiment 
 which is so peculiarly characteristic of refined and 
 polished nations " ? 
 
126 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 , If you would hare a picture of a country family 
 of that time, here. is one by the Chevalier de Chas- 
 tellux who was a Major-General under Rochambeau 
 in the Eevolutionary Army, and who wrote an ac- 
 count of his travels in Virginia in 1780-82. He 
 relates a visit he paid General Nelson's family 
 at Offiey, an unpretentious country place in Han- 
 over County. He says : 
 
 " In the absence of the General (who had gone 
 to Williamsburg) his mother and wife received us 
 with all the politeness, ease, and cordiality natural 
 to his family. But, as in America, the ladies are 
 never thought sufficient to do the honors of the 
 house, five or six Nelsons were assembled to receive 
 us, among others : Secretary Nelson, uncle to the 
 General, his two sons, and two of the General's 
 brothers. These young men were married, and 
 several of them were accompanied by their wives 
 and children, and distinguished only by their Chris- 
 tian names ; so that during the two days which I 
 spent in this truly patriarchal house, it was impos- 
 sible for me to find out their degrees of relationship. 
 The company assembled either in the parlor or 
 saloon, especially the men, from the hour of break- 
 fast to that of bed-time ; but the conversation was 
 always agreeable and well supported. If you were 
 desirous of diversifying the scene, there were some 
 good French and English authors at hand. An ex- 
 cellent breakfast at nine o'clock, a sumptuous dinner 
 at two, tea and punch in the afternoon, and an ele- 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 127 
 
 gant little supper divided the day most happily for 
 those whose stomachs were never unprepared. It 
 is worth observing that on this occasion, where fif- 
 teen or twenty people (four of whom were strangers 
 to the family and the country) were assembled 
 together, and by bad weather forced to stay often 
 in doors, not a syllable was said about play. How 
 many parties of trictrac, whist, and lotto would 
 with us have been the consequence of such obstinate 
 bad weather ! " (Chastellux's "Travels.") 
 
 The observations of the Chevalier de Chastellux 
 sufficiently contradict the charge of the Greenwich 
 preacher that Virginia ladies were " unequal to any 
 interesting or refined conversation." 
 
 Colonel Byrd, with his inimitable drollery, fur- 
 nishes us bits of description from which we get pic- 
 tures of almost every rank of Virginia life in his 
 time, 1732 (" Journey to the Mines "). He shows us 
 the scolding overseer's wife ; the widow expectant 
 of a lover with " an air becoming to a weed " ; 
 the spinster "bewailing her virginity and expend- 
 ing her affections upon her dog " ; the wife push- 
 ing on against all remonstrance through weather 
 and mud to join her husband in the new settle- 
 ment in Goochland ; the family group at Tuck- 
 ahoe listening to the "Beggar's Opera" read 
 aloud; we get the tragical story "of the young 
 gentlewoman's marriage with her uncle's overseer," 
 with the Colonel's reflection that "had she run 
 away with a gentleman or a pretty fellow there 
 
128 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 might have been some excuse for her, though he 
 were of inferior fortune, but to stoop to a dirty 
 plebeian without any kind of merit is the lowest 
 prostitution " ; we see the elegant home of Colonel 
 Spotswood at Germana, surrounded by its garden 
 and terraced walks, the tame deer coming into the 
 house, smashing the pier glass, knocking over the 
 tea-table, and committing havoc with the china, 
 and giving Mrs. Spotswood the opportunity to show 
 her calm and beautiful temper; the gentlemen 
 walking in the garden discussing iron manufacture 
 and politics; the ladies taking the visitor to see 
 their " small animals," their fowls ; the rides about 
 the woods ; the fine appetites and capital cheer. It 
 is a pleasant picture. 
 
 As we come down the century the prospect sim- 
 ply widens; the gentry live upon their great es- 
 tates, working their tobacco, managing their slaves 
 and the affairs of the colony; breeding their fine 
 horses, and racing them in good old English style ; 
 asserting and maintaining their privileges ; dispens- 
 ing a lavish and lordly hospitality; visiting and 
 receiving visits ; marrying and giving in marriage ; 
 their wives rolling about in their coaches and four, 
 dressed in satins and brocades brought in their own 
 ships from London ; their daughters in fine raiment, 
 often made by their own fair hands (" Journal of a 
 Young Lady of Virginia"), dancing, reading, and 
 marrying; vying with their husbands and lovers in 
 patriotism ; sealing up their tea, and giving up all 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 129 
 
 silk from England except for hats and bonnets (a 
 charming touch) ; their sons going to William and 
 Mary or across to Oxford or Cambridge, and grow- 
 ing up like their sires, gay, pleasure-loving, winning 
 and losing garters on wagers, jealous of privilege, 
 proud, assertive of their rights, ready to fight and 
 stake all on a point of principle, and forming that 
 society which was the virile soil from which sprang 
 this nation. 
 
 Here is an " Inventory of Wedding Clothes " of 
 one of the daughters of the Nelson House, at 
 Yorktown : 
 
 A fashionable Lushing Sacque and Coat, 
 
 A rose white Satin Sacque and Coat, 
 
 A fine suit of Mechlin lace, 
 
 A fashionable Lushing gown, 
 
 A white Sattin Capuchin and bonnet, 
 
 A white Sattin quilted petticoat, 
 
 One piece of purple and white linen, 
 
 One piece of dark brown cotton, 
 
 One piece of fine corded dimity, 
 
 One piece of Cambrick, One piece ditto colored, 
 
 Six fine lawn handkerchiefs with striped borders, 
 
 Two fine sprigged lawn aprons, 
 
 Six pair Greshams, black Calamanca pumps, 
 
 Two pair green leather, two pair purple leather pumps, 
 
 One pair ditto white Sattin, one pair ditto pink, 
 
 One ditto white Sattin embroidered, 
 
 One dozen pair women's best woolen stockings, 
 
 Two pair ditto white silk, 
 
 One dozen women's best French gloves, 
 
 One ditto mitts, 
 
130 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 One pound pins, one ditto short whites, 
 
 One pair tanned stays, 
 
 One pound of best Scotch thread sorted, 
 
 Six white silk laces, one set of combs, 
 
 A fashionable stomacher and knot, 
 
 Two Ivory stick fans, 
 
 A wax necklace and earrings, 
 
 A pink Sattin quilted petticoat, 
 
 Two fashionable gaus caps, one ditto blonde lace. 
 
 The time-stained record does not state who was 
 the fortunate lover of the little lady who wanted 
 the " fashionable lushing sacque and coat," and 
 other " fashionable " articles ; but I know she 
 looked charming in her " white sattin capuchin and 
 bonnet," her " rose white sattin sacque and coat," 
 and her dainty " white sattin embroidered pumps." 
 What pretty feet she must have had to have been 
 so careful about her " pumps," — thirteen pair she 
 ordered. I wonder whose grandmother she was ! 
 
 No pen could do justice to the fair bride of 
 the " white sattin capuchin and bonnet " ; but here 
 is a picture of a young gentleman of the period 
 drawn by himself and furnished me by a descend- 
 ant of the gentleman to whom the letters were 
 addressed. The writer is Mr. Peter Randolph, 
 of Chatsworth, and the letters are to his friend, 
 Mr. Carr. They have never before been published, 
 and are worth giving in full. 
 
 Dear Carr : — Your attack upon the barrenness of en- 
 tertainment which universally pervades James Eiver, I 
 acknowledge to be supported by the strictest justice, . . . 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 131 
 
 Providence never formed a place in which dulness and mel- 
 ancholy held such extensive empire as on the once festive 
 banks of James River. . . . You mention that you have 
 heard I was paying my addresses to J. Randolph. Whoever 
 informed you that I was actually laying siege to her too 
 well defended castle did not obtain his information from a 
 proper source. I confess I most sincerely love her ; but I 
 am so apprehensive of a frown from the terrific brows of 
 her old mother that I am afraid to venture to Tuckahoe. 
 There she is at present and there she will be for some time. 
 However, even at the expense of a horsewhipping from the 
 old beldame, I must shortly make a commencement, fame 
 having so universally spread my intentions that I shall be 
 accused of fickleness if I do not proceed. Something tho' 
 more powerful than that would urge me to the attack, viz. : 
 a most serious and unalterable attachment. But pray, my 
 dear friend, where did you obtain your information with 
 respect to E. N. and what is the purport of it? Who is 
 your author ? By heaven, I still have a sincere regard for 
 her ; and tho' fettered by love in another quarter cou'd I 
 succeed with her, rather than run the risk of losing either 
 priae, I wou'd make an attack upon her who seemed most 
 disposed to favour me. I think it wou'd make a curious 
 question in morals whether or no love can be at the same 
 time real and duplicate ? It wou'd seem curious to support 
 the affirmative, but if I can form any idea of the feelings of 
 others by myself, if I am not of a mould and composition 
 entirely different from the rest of my species, it may be 
 supported with success. If I were to be this moment exe- 
 cuted I do not know which of these two girls I love most ; 
 and yet I declare for each I have a most violent fondness. 
 With either of them I know I cou'd be perfectly happy, and 
 with either I shou'd of course be content. When J. R. is 
 present I think the scale of affection preponderates in her 
 favour. When E. N. is with me, I feel a superior fondness 
 
132 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 for her, and when both are absent, I cannot determine who 
 can justly claim the superiority. Pray write me by the 
 next post every thing you have heard relating to E. N. and 
 you may depend on the greatest secrecy : also, your author 
 that I may be able to judge what credit may be given to his 
 report. Remember me to all friends and as usual I am 
 
 Your Friend, Peter Randolph. 
 
 This letter, though without date, must have been 
 prior to the one following ; for the writer has evi- 
 dently decided to try J. E. and has even braved a 
 frown from the terrific brows of the " old beldame," 
 her mother. Here is the other : 
 
 July 28th, 1787. 
 Dear Carr : — The requisitions of a friend are always to 
 me most pleasing •ommands, which whilst they carry with 
 them all the force of obedience of which the mandates of an 
 Eastern despot can boast, nevertheless convey the most un- 
 feigned satisfaction. They are, to be sure, marks of esteem 
 and confidence which the man who makes them thinks can no 
 where be so properly placed as in the person of whom he so- 
 licits the favour. I really tho' was somewhat surprised when 
 I found your request of the nature it was. I did not suppose 
 there was a man in the world to whom the history of my 
 transactions could have afforded the smallest entertainment. 
 [" Transactions " is good.] To be sure if originality 
 has any right to attention many of my adventures may lay 
 claim to it. But the originality was of so peculiar a nature 
 that I supposed there were but few who could divine any satis- 
 faction from hearing it. However, as I have found you of so 
 extraordinary a mould as to wish the trifling satisfaction, as 
 you have even particularly requested it, I shall conclude 
 you are one of the few to whom the originality of P. R.'s 
 original maneuvres are pleasing and interesting and shall 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 133 
 
 therefore give you the whole history. I set out from Chats- 
 worth on Monday, accompanied by old Abraham, on my 
 way to Tuckahoe, resolved, if possible, to storm the citadel 
 in which was contained Miss Judah's virtue and accomplish- 
 ments. I first regulated my wardrobe as follows : I laid out 
 for my first day's appearance; a thin and genteel riding 
 coat and waistcoat, a pair of Nankeen breeches, white stock- 
 ings and a beautiful pair of half boots. This you observe 
 was for the first day's exhibition when mounted on the 
 little roane I appeared at the terrestrial elysium Tuckahoe. 
 The next thing on the docket was my red coat, in all its 
 pristine effulgence glittering in the sun as if trimmed with 
 gold. The black silk breeches which you, Champ, and my- 
 self got a pair of ; a nice silk waistcoat and a pair of most 
 elegant white silk stockings. For the next, a very elegant 
 lead-coloured coat, a pair of Nankeen breeches, and very 
 fine cotton stockings, with a most elegant dimmety waist- 
 coat. This, sir, was the manner in which my extensive 
 wardrobe was to be regulated. At the expiration of these 
 three days, as I shou'd have sho'n all my cloaths I imag- 
 ined they wou'd be nearly tired of me, I proposed taking 
 my departure. But after having reached Richmond, some 
 money which I expected to get there cou'd not be obtained. 
 I thought it most prudent, therefore, to send old Abraham 
 on and follow him in the morning. For you know nothing 
 so soon signalizes a man as a fine gentleman, as being able 
 to say to one servant, here, my boy, take this dollar for the 
 trouble I have given you since my arrival, and to another 
 this half dollar and so on. But to proceed with my story. 
 When the morning arrived I found it as impossible to obtain 
 money as I had done the night before. So I resolved to 
 depend altogether on my own merit and go without. As I 
 was going on in full tilt, I met Colonel Tom himself, who 
 persuaded me much to stay and dine with him that day at 
 Pennock's, and take the cool of the evening for it, as it was 
 
134 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 then very warm. I for some time hesitated, hut considering 
 from whom the request came I resolved to assent. I spent 
 a very agreeable day at Pennock's, and the evening coming 
 on apace I mounted my horse to go hut had not proceeded 
 far before I was stopped by the rain. In this dilemma noth- 
 ing cou'd exceed my anxiety. I had sometimes an inclina- 
 tion to push thro' the violent storm, let the consequence 
 be what it wou'd ; for I was afraid lest old Abraham, who 
 had gone up the night before carrying a huge portmanteau 
 wou'd give me out and return. My prognostication proved 
 too true. Early in the morning on which I intended to set 
 out, who shou'd I see pacing into town but the old fellow 
 with his portmanteau. Nothing cou'd now exceed my dis- 
 tress. I hated not to go, and still feared to set out for 
 Tuckahoe. However, I changed my cloaths, dressed very 
 genteelly, and resolved to set out unaccompanied by a ser- 
 vant. Doctr. Currie happened to be going up to visit Mrs. 
 Randolph and we both pushed off together. After an agree- 
 able ride we at length reached the house about 2 o'clock, 
 just about the time when Miss J.'s beauty was in its merid- 
 ian splendor. We found her doing the honours of the table 
 with the most ineffable sweetness and grace. She rose as 
 we entered to salute us. She rose ! heavens with what an- 
 gelic majesty tempered with all that sweetness and modesty 
 of which human nature in its most perfect state is capable. 
 If, Carr, you have never known the force of beauty. If you 
 have been never warmed by the genial influence of love and 
 are anxious not to experience its powerful effects until you 
 have seen the sun of several years more, you may account 
 yourself fortunate that you were not present at this interest- 
 ing and commanding moment. The coldest anchorite who 
 had not for 20 years before been agitated by the sudden im- 
 pulse of any human passion, whose heart was formed of such 
 insensible materials that his joy had never curdled at an- 
 other's woe, who had not once in his whole life experienced 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 135 
 
 the magic influence of a beautiful woman on the human 
 soul, wou'd on this occasion have found that the ice of 
 nature was converted into heat, and that he himself was 
 re-animated into something more similar to the genius and 
 disposition of a son of Adam. As she spoke to me a small 
 border of red, occasioned by the blush of ingenuous mod- 
 esty, tinged her lovely face, which opposed to the snowy 
 whiteness of her skin formed an enchanting spectacle not 
 much inferior to that which is exhibited in the eastern sky, 
 just at the moment when aurora is about to dispense the 
 beams of her effulgence to the whole animate world. For 
 my part, I own I was transported with rapture, especially 
 as I thought myself the cause of her making so lovely an 
 appearance. "What her blushes proceeded from I cannot 
 tell, unless it was the eyes of the whole household fixing 
 upon us two since every member of the family knew my 
 attachment to her and conceived I had come with determi- 
 nation to pay my addresses to her. Be that as it may, I sat 
 down to dinner but cou'd scarcely swallow a mouthful. My 
 hand trembled, my heart palpitated and my eyes too well 
 evinced my internal commotion. After dinner we assem- 
 bled in the hall where the sweet Judah favored us with a 
 good deal of her incomparable musick. She played as if she 
 had been inspired by some deity of musick, and tho' excel- 
 ling in so peculiar a manner, seemed to do it with a mod- 
 esty which appeared to indicate an opinion of her own 
 deficiency which few so eminent as herself wou'd have 
 thought they possessed. Thus my friend, have I en- 
 deavoured as circumstantially as possible to give you an 
 account of my visit to the most perfect of her sex. In doing 
 this I think I have said enough of her to enable you to form 
 a proper idea of her worth. Shou'd you have been unfortu- 
 nate enough not to have attained this knowledge, believe me 
 when I tell you in plain words ; She is beautiful, sensible, 
 affable, polite, good-tempered, agreeable and to crown the 
 
136 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 whole, truly calculated both by her virtues and accomplish- 
 ments to render any man happy. 
 
 Your friend, Peter S. Randolph. 
 
 [This admirable summing up of his ladylove's 
 virtues shows that the young coxcomb was at bot- 
 tom a very sensible fellow.] 
 
 N.B. — If I can get the Nankeen for you I will, and 
 have it made by Bob who, I assure you, will make it better 
 and cheaper than any Taylor down there. Get your meas- 
 ure and inclose it to me and the breeches shall be done as 
 quick as possible. 
 
 With true wit he gives not a hint of the outcome 
 of his expedition. 
 
 After the close of the Eevolution there came a 
 period in which the conditions were somewhat 
 changed. The rights for which the colonies had 
 contended had been recognized ; independence had 
 been secured ; success, full and satisfying, had been 
 achieved. Much military renown had been won. 
 Meantime, the government of the States had been 
 formed and established on a basis which satisfied 
 the thoughtfulness and high-mindedness of the 
 constructers. But all this was not without cost. 
 
 The great fortunes had melted away in the patri- 
 otic fervor of the owners. The men who made 
 the war and won it paid for it. George Mason had 
 found his wish gratified ; he had got the liberty for 
 which he had striven, and with it had got also the 
 crust of bread with which he had promised to be 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 137 
 
 contented. The wealthiest man in Virginia, Thomas 
 Nelson, Jr., who had been the Revolutionary gov- 
 ernor of Virginia, and the commander-in-chief of 
 her forces, leading them in person, and at Yorktown 
 pointing the guns at his own mansion, had pledged 
 his entire private fortune for the pay of the troops, 
 and had afterwards, in his seat as a Virginia rep- 
 resentative, upon a motion to repudiate British 
 claims, sworn that others might do as they pleased, 
 but as for him, so help him God, he would pay his 
 debts like an honest man. This he had done. When 
 he died, on one of his outlying places, of exposure 
 and overwork, it is tradition that his body was con- 
 veyed away in the night and carried to his home to 
 avoid the danger of having it seized by rapacious 
 creditors. His widow, formerly the wealthiest 
 woman in Virginia, was left in her old age with but 
 one piece of property, her children's mammy. 
 Other fortunes had gone likewise. 
 
 The stern demands of war had welded the dif- 
 ferent elements into an extraordinarily homogeneous 
 people. The sudden creation of a new government 
 which was participated in by all and had done 
 away with privilege, had given every one a per- 
 sonal interest in the State. At the same time the 
 methods of life of those who had been the leaders 
 had given the standard, and whether it was in the 
 Tidewater or Piedmont, in the valley or beyond 
 the mountain, land-holding in considerable quan- 
 tity, and planter life in its carelessness and lavish- 
 ness, became the style in vogue. 
 
138 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 The new order found the Virginian established 
 in his habits and exhibiting in his life a distinctive 
 civilization with which he was entirely content and 
 which he proposed to preserve and transmit to his 
 children. 
 
 There was naturally the destruction of the equi- 
 poise which always succeeds war ; the impairment 
 of values, the change in the relation of things, which 
 is the consequence of such a convulsion ; the great 
 fortunes went to pieces in the storm and left only 
 the debris, to which the owners clung till they, too, 
 were swept away by the currents. But if the Vir- 
 ginians came out of the war broken in fortune, 
 they had gained an accession of spirit. What they 
 had lost in wealth they had more than gained in 
 pride. The fire of the seven years' struggle had 
 tried their metal and proved its quality. The 
 glory of the victory was in large part theirs. Their 
 sons had behaved with gallantry on every field. 
 A Virginian had become the personification of Amer- 
 ican valor and success. Victory seemed embodied 
 in George Washington. The mighty men were yet 
 in the prime of their intellectual vigor ; they had 
 sprung suddenly from subjects fighting for their 
 rights, to peers owning no superiors, to law-makers 
 knowing no laws but those which they framed. If 
 they were proud they were likewise great. What 
 they did was on a grand scale. To aid the country 
 she had preserved ; to establish the United States 
 which without her could not have been, the great 
 
LIFE IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 139 
 
 State changed her government, surrendered her in- 
 comparable position, and with a splendid generosity 
 which was little appreciated and ill requited, ceded 
 her vast transmontane possessions. She continued to 
 maintain her prestige. In all public matters her sons 
 continued to take the lead. President after presi- 
 dent was chosen from among them. Her Marshall 
 was selected to preside over the highest tribu- 
 nal of the land as chief justice, and by the extraor- 
 dinary powers which he displayed at once took 
 place amongst the great judges of the world. She 
 had already taken her position as the greatest 
 colonizer of modern times. Kentucky beyond the 
 mountains was really but her western district, set- 
 tled by her sons, who had planted there Virginian 
 homes and established in them the Virginian faith 
 and customs. 
 
 But her sons had also gone elsewhere ; South and 
 West they turned their faces, carrying their Vir- 
 ginian blood and social life, and planting wherever 
 they settled a little Virginian colony which gave 
 to that place something of the Virginia spirit. 
 
 A traveller sailing to Virginia, records that when 
 two days from the coast, " the air was richly scented 
 with the fragrance of the pine trees, wafted to 
 them across the sea." In the same way, far beyond 
 her borders was felt the Virginian influence sweet- 
 etring and purifying the life of the people. 
 
SOCIAL LIFE IN OLD VIRGINIA 
 BEFORE THE WAR 
 
SOCIAL LIFE IN OLD VIRGINIA 
 BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 Let me see if I can describe an old Virginia 
 home recalled from a memory stamped with it 
 when it was a virgin page. It may, perhaps, be 
 idealized by the haze of time ; but it will be as I 
 now remember it. 
 
 The house was a plain " weather-board " build- 
 ing, one story and a half above the half-basement 
 ground floor, set on a hill in a grove of primeval 
 oaks and hickories filled in with ash, maples, and 
 feathery-leafed locusts without number. It was 
 built of timber cut by the "servants" (they were 
 never termed slaves except in legal documents ) 
 out of the virgin forest, not long after the Kevolu- 
 tion, when that branch of the family moved from 
 Yorktown. It had quaint dormer windows, with 
 small panes, poking out from its sloping upstairs 
 rooms, and long porches to shelter its walls from 
 the sun and allow house life in the open air. 
 
 A number of magnificent oaks and hickories 
 (there had originally been a dozen of the former, 
 and the place from them took its name, "Oakland,") 
 
 143 
 
144 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 under which Totapottamoi children may have 
 played, spread their long arms about it, sheltering 
 nearly a half -acre apiece ; while in among them and 
 all around were a few ash and maples, an evergreen 
 or two, lilacs and syringas and roses, and locusts of 
 every age and size, which in springtime filled the 
 air with honeyed perfume, and lulled with the 
 " murmur of innumerable bees." 
 
 There was an "office" in the yard; another 
 house where the boys used to stay, and the right 
 to sleep in which was as eagerly looked forward to 
 and as highly prized as was by the youth of Rome 
 the wearing of the toga virilis. There the guns 
 were kept; there the dogs might sleep with their 
 masters, under, or occasionally, in cold weather, 
 even on, the beds ; and there charming bits of gos- 
 sip were retailed by the older young gentlemen, 
 and delicious tales of early wickedness related, all 
 the more delightful because they were veiled in 
 chaste language phrased not merely to meet the 
 doctrine, maxima reverentia pueris debetur, but to 
 meet the higher truth that no gentleman would use 
 foul language. 
 
 Off to one side was the orchard, in springtime 
 a bower of pink and snow, and always making a 
 pleasant spot in the landscape ; beyond which 
 peeped the ample barns and stables. 
 
 The fields that stretched around were poor, and 
 in places red " galls " showed through, but the til- 
 lage was careful and systematic. At the best, it 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 145 
 
 was a boast that a dish, of blackberries could not 
 be got on the place. The brown worm fences ran 
 in lateral lines across, and the ditches were kept 
 clean except for useful willows. 
 
 The furniture was old-timey and plain ; mahog- 
 any and rosewood bedsteads and dressers black 
 with age, and polished till they shone like mirrors, 
 hung with draperies white as snow ; straight-backed 
 chairs generations old interspersed with common 
 new ones ; long sofas ; old shining tables with slen- 
 der, brass-tipped legs, straight or fluted, holding 
 some fine old books, and in springtime a blue or 
 flowered bowl or two with glorious roses ; book- 
 cases filled with brown-backed, much-read books. 
 This was all. 
 
 The servants' houses, smoke-house, wash-house, 
 and carpenter shop were set around the "back 
 yard" with "mammy's house" a little nicer than 
 the others ; and farther off, upon and beyond the 
 quarters hill, " the quarters " — whitewashed, sub- 
 stantial buildings, each for a family, with chicken- 
 houses hard by, and with or without yards closed in 
 by split palings, filled with fruit trees, which some- 
 how bore cherries, peaches, and apples in a myste- 
 rious profusion even when the orchard failed. 
 
 The gardens (there were two : the vegetable gar- 
 den and the flower garden) were separate. The 
 former was the test of the mistress's power ; for 
 at the most critical times she took the best hands 
 on the place to work it. The latter was the proof 
 
146 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 of her taste. It was a strange affair ; pyrocanthus 
 hedged it on the outside ; honeysuckle ran riot over 
 its palings, perfuming the air ; yellow cowslips in 
 well-regulated tufts edged some borders, while 
 sweet peas, pinks, and violets spread out recklessly 
 over others ; jonquilles yellow as gold, and, once 
 planted, blooming every spring as certainly as the 
 trees budded or the birds nested, grew in thick 
 bunches, and everywhere were tall lilies, white as 
 angels' wings and stately as the maidens that walked 
 among them; big snowball bushes blooming with 
 snow, lilacs purple and white and sweet in the 
 spring, and always with birds' nests in them with 
 the bluest of eggs ; and in places rosebushes, and 
 tall hollyhock stems filled with rich rosettes of 
 every hue and shade, made a delicious tangle. In 
 the autumn rich dahlias and pungent-odored chrys- 
 anthemums closed the season. 
 
 But the flower of all others was the rose. There 
 were roses everywhere ; clambering roses over the 
 porches and windows, sending their fragrance into 
 the rooms ; roses beside the walks ; roses around 
 the yard and in the garden ; roses of every hue and 
 delicate refinement of perfume ; rich yellow roses 
 thick on their briery bushes, coming almost with 
 the dandelions and buttercups, before any others 
 dared face the April showers to learn if March had 
 truly gone, sweet as if they had come from Paradise 
 to be worn upon young maidens' bosoms, as they 
 might well have done — who knows ? — followed 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 147 
 
 by the Giant of Battles on their stout stems, 
 glorious enough to have been the worthy badge of 
 victorious Lancastrian kings ; white Yorks hardly 
 less royal ; cloth-of-golds ; dainty teas ; rich dam- 
 asks ; old sweet hundred-leafs sifting down their 
 petals on the grass, and always filling with two the 
 place where one had fallen. These and many more 
 made the air fragrant, while the catbirds and mock- 
 ing-birds fluttered and sang among them, and the 
 robins foraged in the grass for their yellow-throated 
 little ones waiting in the half-hidden nests. 
 
 Looking out over the fields was a scene not to be 
 forgotten. Let me give it in the words of one who 
 knew and loved Virginia well, and was her best in- 
 terpreter — Dr. George W. Bagby. His " Old Vir- 
 ginia Gentleman " is perhaps the best sketch yet 
 written in the South. To it I am doubtless in- 
 debted for much that I say in this paper. His 
 description might do for a picture of Staunton 
 Hill resting in delicious calm on its eminence above 
 the Staunton River. 
 
 "A scene not of enchantment, though contrast 
 often made it seem so, met the eye. Wide, very 
 wide fields of waving grain, billowy seas of green 
 or gold as the season chanced to be, over which 
 the scudding shadows chased and played, gladdened 
 the heart with wealth far spread. Upon lowlands 
 level as the floor the plumed and tasselled corn 
 stood tall and dense, rank behind rank in military 
 alignment — a serried army lush and strong. The 
 
148 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 rich, dark soil of the gently swelling knolls [it was 
 not always rich] could scarcely be seen under the 
 broad lapping leaves of the mottled tobacco. The 
 hills were carpeted with clover. Beneath the tree- 
 clumps fat cattle chewed the cud, or peaceful sheep 
 reposed, grateful for the shade. In the midst of 
 this plenty, half hidden in foliage, over which the 
 graceful shafts of the Lombard poplar towered, with 
 its bounteous garden and its orchards heavy with 
 fruit near at hand, peered the old mansion, white, 
 or dusky red, or mellow gray by the storm and 
 shine of years. 
 
 "Seen by the tired horseman halting at the 
 woodland's edge, this picture, steeped in the in- 
 tense quivering summer moonlight, filled the soul 
 with unspeakable emotions of beauty, tenderness, 
 peace, home. 
 
 " How calm could we rest 
 In that bosom of shade with the friends we love best ! 
 
 " Sorrows and care were there — where do they 
 not penetrate ? But, oh ! dear God, one day in 
 those sweet tranquil homes outweighed a fevered 
 lifetime in the gayest cities of the globe. Tell me 
 nothing ; I undervalue naught that man's heart de- 
 lights in. I dearly love operas and great pageants ; 
 but I do know — as I know nothing else — that 
 the first years of human life, and the last, yea, if it 
 be possible, all the years, should be passed in the 
 country. The towns may do for a day, a week, a 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 149 
 
 month at most ; but Nature, Mother Nature, pure 
 and clean, is for all time ; yes, for eternity itself." 
 
 The life about the place was amazing. There 
 were the busy children playing in troops, the boys 
 mixed up with the little darkies as freely as any 
 other young animals, and fcrming the associations 
 which tempered slavery and made the relation one 
 of friendship. There they were stooping down 
 and jumping up ; turning and twisting their heads 
 close together, like chickens over an "invisible 
 repast," their active bodies always in motion, busy 
 over their little matters with that ceaseless energy 
 of boyhood which could move the world could it 
 but be concentrated and conserved. They were all 
 over the place ; in the orchard robbing birds' nests, 
 getting into wild excitement over catbirds, which 
 they ruthlessly murdered because they "called 
 snakes " ; in spring and summer fishing or " wash- 
 ing " in the creek, riding the plough-horses whenever 
 they could, running the calves and colts, and being 
 as mischievous as young mules. 
 
 There were the little girls in their great sunbon- 
 nets, often sewed on to preserve the wonderful 
 peach-blossom complexions, with their small female 
 companions playing about the yard or garden, run- 
 ning with and wishing they were boys, and getting 
 scoldings from mammy for being tomboys and 
 tearing their aprons and dresses. There, in the 
 shade, near her " house," was the mammy and her 
 assistants, with her little charge in her arms, sleep- 
 
150 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 ing in her ample lap, or toddling about her, with 
 broken, half-framed phrases, better understood than 
 formed. There passed young negro girls, blue- 
 habited, running about bearing messages ; or older 
 women moving at a statelier pace, doing with de- 
 liberation the little jobs which were their "work" ; 
 while about the office, or smoke-house, or dairy, or 
 wood-pile there were always some movement and 
 life. The recurrent hum on the air of spinning- 
 wheels, like the drone of some great insect, sounded 
 from the cabins where the turbaned spinners spun 
 their fleecy rolls into yarn for the looms which were 
 clacking from the loom-rooms making homespun 
 for the plantation. 
 
 From the back yard and quarters the laughter of 
 women and the shrill, joyous voices of children 
 came. Far off, in the fields, the white-shirted 
 "ploughers " followed singly their slow teams in the 
 fresh furrows, wagons rattled and ox-carts crawled 
 along, or gangs of hands in lines performed their 
 work in the corn or tobacco fields, loud shouts and 
 peals of laughter, mellowed by the distance, float- 
 ing up from time to time, telling that the heart 
 was light and the toil not too heavy. 
 
 At special times there was special activity : at 
 ice-getting time, at corn-thinning time, at fodder- 
 pulling time, at threshing-wheat time, but above 
 all at corn-shucking time, at hog-killing time, and 
 at " harvest." Harvest was spoken of as a season. 
 It was a festival. The severest toil of the year 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 151 
 
 was a frolic. Every " hand " was eager for it. It 
 was the test of the men's prowess and the women's 
 skill; for it took a man to swing his cradle through 
 the long June days and keep up with the bare- 
 necked, knotted-armed leader as he strode and 
 swung his cradle ringing through the heavy wheat. 
 So it demanded a strong back and nimble fingers to 
 " keep up " and bind the sheaves. The young men 
 looked forward to it as the young bucks looked to 
 the war-path. How gay they appeared, moving in 
 oblique lines around the " great parallelograms," 
 sweeping down the yellow grain, and, as they 
 neared the starting-point, chanting with mellow 
 voices the harvest song " Cool Water " ! How 
 musical was the cadence as, taking time to get 
 their wind, they whetted their ringing blades in 
 unison ! There was never any loneliness ; it was 
 movement and life without bustle ; while somehow, 
 in the midst of it all, the house seemed to sit en- 
 throned in perpetual tranquillity, with outstretched 
 wings under its spreading oaks, sheltering its chil- 
 dren like a great gray dove. 
 
 Even at night there was stirring about : the ring 
 of an axe, the infectious music of the banjos, the 
 laughter of dancers, the festive noise and merri- 
 ment of the cabin, the distant, mellowed shouts of 
 'coon or 'possum hunters, or the dirge-like chant of 
 some serious and timid wayfarer passing along the 
 paths over the hills or through the woods, and solac- 
 ing his lonely walk with religious song. 
 
152 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Such, was the outward scene. What was there 
 within ? That which has been much misunder- 
 stood ; that which was like the roses, wasteful 
 beyond measure in its unheeded growth and blow- 
 ing; but sweet beyond measure, too, and filling 
 with its fragrance not only the region round about, 
 but sending it out unstintedly on every breeze that 
 wandered by. 
 
 There were the master and the mistress ; the old 
 master and old mistress, the young masters and 
 young mistresses, and the children; besides some 
 aunts and cousins, and the relations or friends who 
 did not live there, but were only always on visits. 
 
 Properly, the mistress should be mentioned first, 
 as she was the most important personage about the 
 home, the presence which pervaded the mansion, 
 the master willingly and proudly yielding her the 
 active management of all household matters and 
 simply carrying out her directions, confining his 
 ownership within the curtilage exclusively to his 
 old "secretary," which on her part was as sacred 
 from her touch as her bonnet was from his. There 
 were kept mysterious folded papers, and equally 
 mysterious parcels, frequently brown with the 
 stain of dust and age. Had the papers been the 
 lost sibylline leaves instead of old receipts and 
 bills, and the parcels contained diamonds instead 
 of long-dried melon-seed or old flints, now out of 
 date but once ready to serve a useful purpose, they 
 could not have been more sacredly guarded by the 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 153 
 
 mistress. The master generally had to hunt for a 
 long period for any particular paper, whilst the 
 mistress could in a half-hour have arranged every- 
 thing in perfect order ; but the chaos was regarded 
 by her with veneration as real as that with which 
 she regarded the mystery of the heavenly bodies. 
 On the other hand, outside of this piece of furni- 
 ture there was nothing which the master even pre- 
 tended to know of. It was all in her keeping; 
 whatever he wanted he called for and she produced 
 with a certainty and promptness which appeared to 
 him a perpetual miracle. Her system struck him 
 as being the result of a wisdom as profound as that 
 which fixed and held the firmament. He would not 
 have dared to interfere, not because he was afraid, 
 but because he recognized her superiority. It would 
 no more have occurred to him to make a suggestion 
 about the management of the house than about that 
 of one of his neighbors, indeed not so readily ; simply 
 because he knew her and acknowledged her infalli- 
 bility. She was, indeed, a surprising creature — 
 often delicate and feeble in frame, and of a ner- 
 vous organization so sensitive as to be a great suf- 
 ferer; but her force and her character pervaded 
 and directed everything, as unseen yet as unmis- 
 takably as the power of gravity controls the par- 
 ticles that constitute the earth. 
 
 It has been assumed by the outside world that 
 our people lived a life of idleness and ease, a 
 kind of " hammock-swung," " sherbet-sipping " ex- 
 
154 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 istence, fanned by slaves, and, in their pride, 
 served on bended knees. No conception could be 
 further from the truth. The ease of the master of 
 a big plantation was about that of the head of any 
 great establishment where numbers of operatives 
 are employed ; and to the management of which are 
 added the responsibilities of the care and complete 
 mastership of the liberty of his operatives and their 
 families His work was generally sufficiently sys- 
 tematized to admit of enough personal independence 
 to enable him to participate in the duties of hos- 
 pitality; but any master who had a successfully 
 conducted plantation was sure to have given it his 
 personal supervision with an unremitting attention 
 which would not have failed to secure success in 
 any other calling. If this was true of the master, 
 it was much more so of the mistress. The master 
 might, by having a good overseer and reliable 
 headmen, shift a portion of the burden from his 
 'shoulders ; the mistress had no such means of 
 relief. She was the necessary and invariable func- 
 tionary ; the keystone of the domestic economy 
 ivhich bound all the rest of the structure and gave 
 it its strength and beauty. From early morn till 
 morn again the most important and delicate con- 
 cerns of the plantation were her charge and care. 
 From superintending the setting of the turkeys 
 to fighting a pestilence, there was nothing which 
 was not her work. She was mistress, manager, 
 doctor, nurse, counsellor, seamstress, teacher, house- 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 155 
 
 keeper, slave, all at once. She was at the beck 
 and call of every one, especially of her husband, 
 to whom she was " guide, philosopher, and friend." 
 
 One of them, being told of a broken gate by her 
 husband, said, "Well, my dear, if I could sew it 
 with my needle and thread, I would mend it for 
 you." 
 
 What she was only her husband knew, and 
 even he stood before her in dumb, half-amazed 
 admiration, as he might before the inscrutable 
 vision of a superior being. What she really was, 
 was known only to God. Her life was one long 
 act of devotion — devotion to God, devotion to 
 her husband, devotion to her children, devotion 
 to her servants, to her friends, to the poor, to all 
 humanity. Nothing happened within the range of 
 her knowledge that her sympathy did not reach 
 and her charity and wisdom did not ameliorate. 
 She was the head and front of the church; an 
 unmitred bishop in partibus, more effectual than 
 the vestry or deacons, more earnest than the rec- 
 tor; she managed her family, regulated her ser- 
 vants, fed the poor, nursed the sick, consoled the 
 bereaved. Who knew of the visits she paid to the 
 cabins of her sick and suffering servants ! often, at 
 the dead of night, " slipping down " the last thing 
 to see that her directions were carried out ; with 
 her own hands administering medicines or food; 
 ever by her cheeriness inspiring new hope, by her 
 strength giving courage, by her presence awaking 
 
156 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 faith; telling in her soft voice to dying ears the 
 story of the suffering Saviour ; soothing the troubled 
 spirit, and lighting the path down into the valley 
 of the dark shadow. What poor person was there, 
 however inaccessible the cabin, that was sick or 
 destitute and knew not her charity ! who that was 
 bereaved that had not her sympathy ! The train- 
 ing of her children was her work. She watched 
 over them, inspired them, led them, governed them ; 
 her will impelled them ; her word to them, as to 
 her servants, was law. She reaped the reward. 
 If she admired them, she was too wise to let them 
 know it ; but her sympathy and tenderness were 
 theirs always and they worshipped her. 
 
 There was something in seeing the master and 
 mistress obeyed by the plantation and looked up 
 to by the neighborhood which inspired the children 
 with a reverence akin to awe which is not known 
 at this present time. It was not till the young 
 people were grown that this reverence lost the awe 
 and became based only upon affection and admira- 
 tion. Then, for the first time, they dared to jest 
 with her ; then, for the first time, they took in 
 that she was like them once, young and gay and 
 pleasure-loving, with lovers suing for her; with 
 coquetries and maidenly ways ; and that she still 
 took pleasure in the recollection — this gentle, 
 classic, serious mother among her tall sons and 
 radiant daughters. How she blushed as they 
 laughed at her and teased her to tell of her con* 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAH 157 
 
 quests, her confusion making her look younger and 
 prettier than they remembered her, and opening 
 their eyes to the truth of what their father had 
 told them so often, that not one of them was as 
 beautiful as she. 
 
 She became timid and dependent as they grew 
 up and she found them adorned with new fashions 
 and ways which she did not know ; she gave her- 
 self up to their guidance with a helpless kind of 
 diffidence; was tremulous over her ignorance of 
 the novel fashions which made them so beautiful ; 
 yet, when the exactions of her position came upon 
 her, she took the lead, and, by her instinctive dig- 
 nity, her self-possession, and her force, eclipsed 
 them all as naturally as the full moon in heaven 
 dims the stars. 
 
 As to the master himself it is hard to generalize. 
 Yet there were indeed certain generic characteris- 
 tics, whether he was quiet and severe, or jovial 
 and easy. There was the foundation of a certain 
 pride based on self-respect and consciousness of 
 power. There were nearly always the firm mouth 
 with its strong lines, the calm, placid, direct gaze, 
 the quiet speech of one who is accustomed to com- 
 mand and have his command obeyed ; there was a 
 contemplative expression due to much communing 
 alone, with weighty responsibilities resting upon 
 him ; there was absolute self-confidence, and often a 
 look caused by tenacity of opinion. There was not 
 a doubtful line in the face nor a doubtful tone in 
 
158 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the voice ; his opinions were convictions ; he was a 
 partisan to the backbone ; he was generally incapa- 
 ble of seeing more than one side. This prevented 
 breadth, but gave force. He was proud, but never 
 haughty except to dishonor. To that he was inex- 
 orable. He believed in God, he believed in his 
 wife, he believed in his blood. He was chivalrous, 
 he was generous, he was usually incapable of fear 
 or meanness. To be a Virginia gentleman was the 
 first duty ; it embraced being a Christian and all 
 the virtues. He lived as one; he left it as a 
 heritage to his children. He was fully appreciative 
 of both the honors and the responsibilities of his 
 position. He believed in a democracy, but under- 
 stood that the absence of a titled aristocracy had 
 to be supplied by a class more virtuous than he 
 believed them to be. This class was, of course, 
 that to which he belonged. He purposed in his 
 own person to prove that this was practicable. He 
 established that it was. This and other responsi- 
 bilities made him grave. He had inherited gravity 
 from his father and grandfather before him. The 
 latter had been a performer in the greatest work 
 of modern times, with the shadow of the scaffold 
 over him if he failed. The former had faced the 
 weighty problems of the new government, with 
 ever many unsolved questions to answer. He him- 
 self faced problems not less grave. The greatness 
 of the past, the time when Virginia had been the 
 mighty power of the New World, loomed even 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 15 & 
 
 above him. It increased his natural conservatism. 
 He saw the change that was steadily creeping on. 
 The conditions that had given his class their power 
 and prestige had altered. The fields were worked 
 down, and agriculture that had made his class rich 
 no longer paid. The cloud was already gathering 
 in the horizon ; the shadow already was stretching 
 towards him. He could foresee the danger that 
 threatened Virginia. A peril ever sat beside his 
 door. He was "holding the wolf by the ears." 
 Outside influences hostile to his interest were being 
 brought to bear. Any movement must work him 
 injury. He sought the only refuge that appeared. 
 He fell back behind the Constitution that his 
 fathers had helped to establish, and became a 
 strict constructionist for Virginia and his rights. 
 These things made him grave. He reflected much. 
 Out on the long verandas in the dusk of the sum- 
 mer nights, with his wide fields stretching away 
 into the gloom, and " the woods " bounding the 
 horizon, his thoughts dwelt upon serious things ; 
 he pondered causes and consequences ; he resolved 
 everything to prime principles. He communed 
 with the Creator, and his first work, Nature. 
 
 He was a wonderful talker. He discoursed of phil- 
 osophy, politics, and religion. He read much, gener- 
 ally on these subjects, and read only the best. His 
 book-cases held the masters (in mellow Elzevirs 
 and Lintots) who had been his father's friends, 
 and with whom he associated and communed more 
 
160 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 intimately than with his neighbors. Horace, Virgil, 
 Ovid, Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden, Goldsmith, 
 " Mr. Pope," were his poets ; Bacon, Burke, and 
 Dr. Johnson were his philosophers. These "new 
 fellows " that his sons raved over he held in so 
 much contempt that his mere statement of their 
 inferiority was to his mind an all-convincing argu- 
 ment. 
 
 Yet, if he was generally grave, he was at times, 
 among his intimates and guests, jovial, even gay. 
 On festive occasions no one surpassed him in cheer- 
 iness. When the house was full of guests he was 
 the life of the company. He led the prettiest girl 
 out for the dance. At Christmas he took her under 
 the mistletoe and paid her compliments which 
 made her blush and courtesy with dimpling face and 
 dancing eyes. But whatever was his mood, what- 
 ever his surroundings, he was always the exponent 
 of that grave and knightly courtesy which under 
 all conditions has become associated with the title 
 "Virginia gentleman." 
 
 Whether or not the sons were, as young men, 
 peculiarly admirable may be a question. They 
 possessed th,e faults and the virtues of young men 
 of their kind and condition. They were much 
 given to self-indulgence; they were not broad in 
 their limitations ; they were apt to contemn what did 
 not accord with their own established views (for their 
 views were established before their mustaches) ; 
 they were wasteful of time and energies beyond 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 161 
 
 belief ; they were addicted to the pursuit of pleasure, 
 and blind to opportunities which were priceless. 
 They exhibited the customary failings of their kind 
 in a society of an aristocratic character. But they 
 possessed in full measure the corresponding virtues. 
 They were brave, they were generous, they were 
 high-spirited. Indulgence in pleasure did not de- 
 stroy them. It was the young French noblesse 
 who affected to eschew exertion even to the point 
 of having themselves borne on litters on their 
 boar-hunts, who yet, with a hundred pounds of iron 
 buckled on their frames, charged like furies at 
 Fontenoy. So these same languid, philandering 
 young gentlemen of Virginia at the crucial time 
 suddenly appeared as the most dashing and indom- 
 itable soldiery of modern times. It was the Nor- 
 folk company known as the " Dandies " that was 
 extirpated in a single day. 
 
 But, whatever may be thought of the sons, there 
 can be no question as to the daughters. They were 
 like the mother ; made in her own image. They 
 filled a peculiar place in the civilization ; the key 
 was set to them ; they held by a universal consent 
 the first place in the system, all social life revolving 
 around them. So generally did the life shape itself 
 about the young girl that it was almost as if a bit 
 of the age of chivalry had been blown down the 
 centuries and lodged in the old State. She instinc- 
 tively adapted herself to it. In fact, she was made 
 for it. She was gently bred : her people for gener- 
 
162 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 ations (since they had come to Virginia) were gen- 
 tlefolk. They were so well satisfied that they had 
 been the same in the mother country that they had 
 never taken the trouble to investigate it. She was 
 the incontestable proof of their gentility. In right 
 of her blood (the beautiful Saxon, tempered by the 
 influences of the genial Southern clime), she was 
 exquisite, fine, beautiful ; a creature of peach-blos- 
 som and snow ; languid, delicate, saucy ; now impe- 
 rious, now melting, always bewitching. She was 
 not versed in the ways of the world, but she had 
 no need to be ; she was better than that ; she was 
 well bred. She had not to learn to be, because she 
 was born a lady. Generations had given her that 
 by heredity. But ignorance of the world did not 
 make her provincial. Her instinct was an infallible 
 guide. When a child she had in her sunbonnet 
 and apron met the visitors at the front steps and 
 entertained them in the parlor until her mother 
 was ready. Thus she had grown up to the duties 
 of hostess. Her manners were as perfectly formed 
 as her mother's, with perhaps a shade more self- 
 possession. Her beauty was a title which gave 
 her a graciousness that befitted her. She never 
 " came out," because she had never been in ; and 
 the line between girlhood and young-ladyhood was 
 never known. She began to have beaux certainly 
 before she reached the line ; but it did her no harm : 
 she would long walk herself " fancy free " ; a pro- 
 tracted devotion was required of her lovers, and 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 163 
 
 they began early. They were willing to serve long, 
 for she was a prize worth winning. Her beauty, 
 though it was often dazzling, was not her chief 
 attraction ; that was herself. It was that indefin- 
 able charm : the result of many attractions, in 
 combination and in perfect harmony, which made 
 her herself. She was delicate, she was dainty, she 
 was sweet. She lived in an atmosphere created for 
 her — the pure, clean, sweet atmosphere of her 
 country home. She made its sunshine. She was a 
 coquette, often an outrageous flirt. It did not 
 imply heartlessness. It was said that the worst 
 flirts made the most devoted wives. It was simply 
 an instinct, an inheritance ; it was in the life. Her 
 heart was tender towards every living thing but 
 her lovers ; even to them it was soft in every way 
 but one. Had they had a finger-ache she would 
 have sympathized with them. But in the matter 
 of love she was inexorable, remorseless. She played 
 upon every chord of the heart. Perhaps it was 
 because, when she gave up, the surrender was to 
 be absolute. From the moment of marriage she 
 was the worshipper. She was a strange being. 
 Dressed in her muslin and lawn, with her delicious, 
 low, slow, musical speech ; accustomed to be waited 
 on at every turn, with servants to do her every 
 bidding, unhabituated often even to putting on 
 her dainty slippers or combing her soft hair, she 
 possessed a reserve force which was astounding. 
 She was accustomed to have her wishes obeyed 
 
164 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 as commands. It did not make her imperious; it 
 simply gave her the habit of control. At marriage 
 she was prepared to assume the duties of mistress 
 of her establishment, whether it were great or 
 small. 
 
 Thus, when the time came, the class at the South 
 which had been deemed the most supine suddenly 
 appeared as the most active and the most indom- 
 itable. The courage which was displayed in battle 
 was wonderful; but it was nothing to what the 
 Southern women exemplified at home. There was 
 perhaps not a doubtful woman within the limits of 
 the Confederacy. While their lovers and husbands 
 fought in the field, they performed the harder part 
 of waiting at home. With more than a soldier's 
 courage they bore more than a soldier's hardship. 
 For four long years they listened to the noise of 
 the guns, awaiting with blanched faces but un- 
 daunted hearts the news of battle after battle ; 
 buried their beloved dead with tears, and still amid 
 their tears encouraged the survivors to fight on. It 
 was a force which has not been duly estimated. 
 It was in the blood. 
 
 She was, indeed, a strange creature, that delicate, 
 dainty, mischievous, tender, God-fearing, inexplica- 
 ble Southern girl. With her fine grain, her silken 
 hair, her satiny skin, her musical speech; pleas- 
 ure-loving, saucy, bewitching — deep down lay the 
 bed-rock foundation of innate virtue, piety, and 
 womanliness, on which were planted all to which 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 165 
 
 human nature can hope, and all to which it can 
 aspire. Words fail to convey an idea of what she 
 was ; as well try to describe the beauty of the rose 
 or the perfume of the violet. To appreciate her 
 one must have seen her, have known her, have 
 adored her. 
 
 There are certain characters without mention of 
 which no description of the social life of old Vir- 
 ginia or of the South would be complete — the old 
 mammies and family servants about the house. 
 These were important functionaries. The mammy 
 was the zealous, faithful, and efficient assistant of 
 the mistress in all that pertained to the training of 
 the children. Her authority was recognized in all 
 that related to them directly or indirectly, second 
 only to that of the mistress and master. She regu- 
 lated them, disciplined them, having authority in- 
 deed in cases to administer correction. Her rigime 
 extended frequently through two generations, occa- 
 sionally through three. From their infancy she 
 was the careful and faithful nurse, the affection 
 between her and the children she nursed being 
 often more marked than that between her and her 
 own children. She may have been harsh to the 
 latter ; she was never anything but tender with the 
 others. Her authority was, in a measure, recog- 
 nized through life, for her devotion was unques- 
 tionable. The young masters and mistresses were 
 her " children " long after they had children of their 
 own. They embraced her, when they parted from 
 
166 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 her or met with her again after separation, with 
 the same affection as when in childhood she "led 
 them smiling into sleep." She was worthy of the 
 affection. At all times she was their faithful ally, 
 shielding them, excusing them, petting them, aiding 
 them, yet holding them up to a certain high account- 
 ability. Her influence was always for good. She 
 received, as she gave, an unqualified affection; if 
 she was a slave, she at least was not a servant, but 
 was an honored member of the family, universally 
 beloved, universally cared for — " the Mammy." 
 
 Next to her were the butler and the carriage- 
 driver. These were the aristocrats of the family, 
 who trained the children in good manners and 
 other exercises ; and uncompromising aristocrats 
 they were. The butler was apt to be severe, and 
 was feared ; the driver was genial and kindly, and 
 was adored. I recall a butler, " Uncle Tom," an 
 austere gentleman, who was the terror of the juniors 
 of the connection. One of the children, after watch- 
 ing him furtively as he moved about with grand air, 
 when he had left the room and his footsteps had 
 died away, crept over and asked her grandmother, 
 his mistress, in an awed whisper, " Grandma, are 
 you 'fraid of Unc' Tom ? " Perhaps even grandma 
 stood a little in awe of him. The driver was the 
 ally of the boys, and consequently had an ally in 
 their mother, the mistress. As the head of the 
 stable, he was an important personage in their 
 eyes. This comradeship was never forgot ; it 
 
SOGIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 167 
 
 lasted through life ; the years might grow on him, 
 but he was left in command even when he was too 
 feeble to hold the horses ; and to the end he was 
 always " the Driver of Mistress's carriage." 
 
 Other servants there were with special places 
 and privileges — gardeners and "boys about the 
 house," comrades of the boys ; and " own maids " 
 of the ladies, for each girl had her " own maid " 
 — they all formed one great family in the social 
 structure now passed away, a structure incredible 
 by those who knew it not, and now, under new 
 conditions, almost incredible by those who knew it 
 best. 
 
 The social life formed of these elements in com- 
 bination was one of singular sweetness and freedom 
 from vice. If it was not filled with excitement, it 
 was replete with happiness and content. It is 
 asserted that it was narrow. Perhaps it was. It 
 was so sweet, so charming, that it is little wonder 
 if it asked nothing more than to be let alone. 
 
 They were a careless and pleasure-loving people ; 
 but, as in most rural communities, their festivities 
 were free from dissipation. There was sometimes 
 too great an indulgence on the part of young men 
 in the State drink — the julep; but whether it was 
 that it killed early or that it was usually abandoned 
 as the responsibilities of life increased, an elderly 
 man of dissipated habits was almost unknown. 
 They were fond of sport, and excelled in it, being 
 generally fine shots and skilled hunters. Love of 
 
168 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 horses was a race characteristic, and fine horseman- 
 ship was a thing" little considered only because it 
 was universal. 
 
 The life was gay. In addition to the perpetual 
 round of ordinary entertainment, there was always 
 on hand or in prospect some more formal festivity 
 — a club meeting ; a fox-hunt ; a party ; a tourna- 
 ment; a wedding. Little excuse was needed to 
 bring them together where every one was social, 
 and where the great honor was to be the host. 
 Scientific horse-racing was confined to the regular 
 race-tracks, where the races were not little dashes, 
 but four-mile heats which tested speed and bottom 
 alike. But good blood was common, and a ride even 
 with a girl in an afternoon generally meant a dash 
 along the level through the woods, where, truth to 
 tell, she was very apt to win. Occasionally there 
 was even a dash from the church. The high-swung 
 carriages, having received their precious loads of 
 lily-fingered, pink-faced, laughing girls, with teeth 
 like pearls and eyes like stars, helped in by young 
 men who would have thrown not only their cloaks 
 but their hearts into the mud to keep those dainty 
 feet from being soiled, would go ahead ; and then, 
 the restive saddle-horses being untied from the 
 swinging limbs, the young gallants would mount, 
 and, by an instinctive common impulse, starting all 
 together, would make a dash to the first hill, on top 
 of which the dust still lingered, a nimbus thrown 
 from the wheels that rolled their goddesses. 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 169 
 
 The chief sport, however, was fox-hunting. It 
 was, in season, almost universal. Who that lived 
 in Old Virginia does not remember the fox-hunts 
 — the eager chase after " grays " or " old reds " ! 
 The grays furnished more fun, the reds more excite- 
 ment. The grays did not run so far, but usually 
 kept near home, going in a circuit of six or eight 
 miles. "An old red," generally so called irrespec- 
 tive of age, as a tribute of respect for his prowess, 
 was apt to lead the dogs all day, and might wind 
 up by losing them as evening fell, after taking them 
 in a dead stretch for thirty miles. The capture of a 
 gray was what men boasted of; a chase after " an old 
 red" was what they "yarned" about. Some old reds 
 became historical characters, and were as well known 
 and as much discussed in the counties they inhabited 
 as the leaders of the bar or the crack speakers of the 
 circuit. The wiles and guiles of each veteran were 
 the pride of his neighbors and hunters. Many of 
 them had names. Gentlemen discussed them at 
 their club dinners ; lawyers told stories about them 
 in the " Lawyers' Rooms " at the court-houses ; 
 young men, while they waited for the preacher to 
 get well into the service before going into church, 
 bragged about them in the churchyards on Sundays. 
 There was one such that I remember; he was 
 known as "Nat Turner," after the notorious negro 
 of that name, who, after inciting the revolt in 
 Southampton County, in the year 1832, known as 
 " Nat Turner's Rebellion," in which some fifty per- 
 
170 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 sons were massacred, remained out in hiding for 
 weeks after all his followers were taken before he 
 was captured. 
 
 Great frolics these old red hunts were ; for there 
 were the prettiest girls in the world in the country- 
 houses around, and each young fellow was sure to 
 have in his heart some brown-eyed or blue-eyed 
 maiden to whom he had promised the brush, and to 
 whom, with feigned indifference but with mantling 
 cheek and beating heart, he would carry it if, as he 
 counted on doing, he should win it. Sometimes the 
 girls came over themselves and rode, or more likely 
 were already there visiting, and the beaux followed 
 them, and got up the hunt in their honor. 
 
 Even the boys had their sweethearts, and rode 
 for them on the colts or mules : not the small girls 
 of their own age (no, sir, no "little girls" for them) 
 — their sweethearts were grown young ladies, with 
 smiling eyes and silken hair and graceful mien, 
 whom their grown cousins courted, and whom they 
 with their boys' hearts worshipped. Often a half- 
 dozen were in love with one — always the prettiest 
 one — and, with the generous democratic spirit of 
 boys in whom the selfish instinct has not awakened, 
 agreed among themselves that they would all ride 
 for her, and that whichever of them got the brush 
 should present it on behalf of all. 
 
 What a sight it was ! The appearance of the 
 hunters on the far hill, in the evening, with their 
 packs surrounding them ! Who does not recall the 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 171 
 
 excitement at the house ; the arrival in the yard, 
 with horns blowing, hounds baying, horses pranc- 
 ing, and girls laughing ; the picture of the girls on 
 the front portico with their arms round each other's 
 dainty waists — the slender, pretty figures, the 
 bright faces, the sparkling eyes, the gay laughter 
 and musical voices as they challenged the riders 
 with coquettish merriment, demanding to blow the 
 horns themselves or to ride some specially hand- 
 some horse next morning ! The way, the challenge 
 being accepted, they tripped down the steps to get 
 the horn, some shrinking from the bounding dogs 
 with little subdued screams, one or two with stouter 
 hearts, fixed upon higher game, bravely ignoring 
 them and leaving their management to their mas- 
 ters, who at their approach sprang to the ground to 
 meet them, hat in hand and the telltale blood mount- 
 ing to their sunburned faces, handsome with the 
 beauty of youth ! 
 
 I am painfully aware of the inadequacy of my 
 picture. But who could do justice to the truth ! 
 
 It was owing to all these and some other charac- 
 teristics that the life was what it was. It was on 
 a charming key. It possessed an ampleness and 
 generosity which were not splendid because they 
 were refined. 
 
 Hospitality had become a recognized race charac- 
 teristic, and was practised as a matter of course. 
 It was universal ; it was spontaneous. It was one 
 of the distinguishing features of the civilization; 
 
172 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 as much a part of the social life as any other of 
 the domestic relations. Its generosity secured it 
 a distinctive title. The exactions it entailed were 
 engrossing. Its exercises occupied much of the 
 time, and exhausted much of the means. The con- 
 stant intercourse of the neighborhood, with its per- 
 petual round of dinners, teas, and entertainments, 
 was supplemented by visits of friends and relatives 
 from other sections, who came, with their families, 
 their equipages, and personal servants, to spend a 
 month or two, or as long a time as they pleased. 
 A dinner invitation was not so designated. It was, 
 with more exactitude, termed " spending the day." 
 On Sundays every one invited every one else from 
 church, and there would be long lines of carriages 
 passing in at the open gates. 
 
 It is a mystery how the house ever held the 
 visitors. Only the mistress knew. Her resources 
 were enormous. The rooms, with their low ceilings, 
 were wide, and had a holding capacity which was 
 simply astounding. The walls seemed to be made 
 of india-rubber, so great was their stretching power. 
 No one who came, whether friend or stranger, was 
 ever turned away. If the beds were full — as when 
 were they not ! — pallets were put down on the 
 floor in the parlor or the garret for the younger 
 members of the family, sometimes even the pas- 
 sages being utilized. Often children spent half 
 their lives on pallets " made up " on the floors. 
 Frequently at Christmas the master and mistress 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFOKE THE WAR 173 
 
 were compelled to resort to the same refuge, their 
 pallet being placed in the garret. 
 
 It was this intercourse, following the intermar- 
 riage and class feeling of the old families, which 
 made Virginians clannish and caused a single dis- 
 tinguishable common strain of blood, however dis- 
 tant, to be counted as kinship. 
 
 Perhaps this universal entertainment might not 
 now be considered elegant ; perhaps. 
 
 It was based upon a sentiment as pure as can 
 animate the human mind. It was easy, generous, 
 and refined. The manners of the entertainers and 
 entertained were gentle, cordial, simple, with, to 
 strangers, a slight trace of stateliness. 
 
 The conversation was surprising; it was of the 
 crops, the roads, politics, mutual friends, including 
 the entire field of neighborhood matters, related not 
 as gossip, but as affairs of common interest, which 
 every one knew or was expected and entitled to 
 know. 
 
 The fashions came in, of course, among the 
 ladies, embracing particularly " patterns." 
 
 Politics took the place of honor among the gen- 
 tlemen, their range embracing not only State and 
 national politics, but British as well, as to which 
 they possessed astonishing knowledge, interest in 
 English matters having been handed down from 
 father to son as a class test. " My father's " opinion 
 was quoted as a conclusive authority on this and 
 all points, and in matters of great importance his 
 
174 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 torically "my grandfather, sir," was cited. The 
 peculiarity of the whole was that it possessed a lit- 
 erary flavor of a high order ; for, as has been said, 
 the classics, Latin and English, with a fair sprink- 
 ling of good old French authors, were in the book- 
 cases, and were there not for show, but for compan- 
 ionship. There was nothing for show in that life ; 
 it was all genuine, real, true. 
 
 The great fete of the people was Christmas. 
 Spring had its special delights : horseback rides 
 through the budding woods, with the birds singing; 
 fishing parties down on the little rivers, with out- 
 of-doors lunches and love-making ; parties of various 
 kinds from house to house. Summer had its pleas- 
 ures : handsome dinners, and teas with moonlight 
 strolls and rides to follow ; visits to or from rela- 
 tions, or even to the White Sulphur Springs, called 
 simply " the White." The Fall had its pleasures. 
 But all times and seasons paled and dimmed before 
 the festive joys of Christmas. It had been handed 
 down for generations ; it belonged to the race. It 
 had come over with their forefathers. It had a 
 peculiar significance. It was a title. Religion had 
 given it its benediction. It was the time to 
 "Shout the glad tidings." It was The Holidays. 
 There were other holidays for the slaves, both of 
 the school-room and the plantation, such as Easter 
 and Whit-Monday ; but Christmas was distinctively 
 "The Holidays." Then the boys came home from 
 school or college with their friends ; the members 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 175 
 
 of the family who had moved away returned ; 
 pretty cousins came for the festivities ; the neigh- 
 borhood grew merry ; the negroes were all to have 
 holiday, the house-servants taking turn and turn 
 about, and the plantation made ready for Christ- 
 mas cheer. It was by all the younger population 
 looked back to half the year, looked forward to the 
 other half. Time was measured by it ; it was either 
 so long "since Christmas," or so long "before Christ- 
 mas." The affairs of the plantation were set in 
 order against it. The corn was got in; the hogs 
 were killed; the lard " tried " ; sausage-meat made; 
 mince-meat prepared; the turkeys fattened, with 
 "the old big gobbler" specially devoted to the 
 " Christmas dinner " ; the servants' new shoes and 
 winter clothes stored away ready for distribution ; 
 and the plantation began to be ready to prepare 
 for Christmas. 
 
 In the first place, there was generally a cold 
 spell which froze up everything and enabled the 
 ice-houses to be filled. [The seasons, like a good 
 many other things, appear to have changed since 
 the war.] This spell was the harbinger; and 
 great fun it was at the ice-pond, where the big 
 rafts of ice were floated along, with the boys on 
 them. The rusty skates with their curled runners 
 and stiff straps were got out, and maybe tried for 
 a day. Then the stir began. The wagons all were 
 put to hauling wood — hickory ; nothing but hick- 
 ory now; other wood might do for other times, but 
 
176 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 at Christmas only hickory was used; and the 
 wood-pile was heaped high with the logs ; while to 
 the ordinary wood-cutters " for the house " were 
 added three, four, a half-dozen more, whose shining 
 axes rang around the wood-pile all day long. With 
 what a vim they cut, and how telling was that 
 " Ha'nh ! " as they drove the ringing axes into the 
 hard wood, sending the big white chips flying ! It 
 was always the envy of the boys, that simultaneous, 
 ostentatious expulsion of the breath, and they used 
 vainly to try to imitate it. 
 
 In the midst of it came the wagon or the ox-cart 
 from "the depot," with the big white boxes of 
 Christmas things, the black driver feigning hypo- 
 critical indifference as he drove through the chop- 
 pers to the storeroom. Then came the rush of all 
 the wood-cutters to help him unload; the jokes 
 among themselves, as they pretended to strain in 
 lifting, of what "master" or "mistis" was going to 
 give them out of those boxes, uttered just loud 
 enough to reach their master's or mistress's ears 
 where they stood looking on, while the driver took 
 due advantage of his temporary prestige to give 
 many pompous cautions and directions. 
 
 The getting the evergreens and mistletoe was 
 the sign that Christmas had come, was really here. 
 There were the parlor and hall and dining-room, 
 and, above all, the old church, to be "dressed." 
 The last was a neighborhood work ; all united 
 in it, and it was one of the events of the year. 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFOEE THE WAR 177 
 
 Young men rode thirty and forty miles to " help " 
 dress that church. They did not go home again 
 till after Christmas. The return from the church 
 was the beginning of the festivities. 
 
 Then by "Christmas Eve's eve" the wood was 
 all cut and stacked high in the wood-house and on 
 and under the back porticos, so as to be handy, 
 and secure from the snow which was almost certain 
 to come. Then came the snow. It seems that 
 Christmas was almost sure to bring it in old times ; 
 at least it is closely associated with it. The excite- 
 ment increased ; the boxes were unpacked, some of 
 them openly, to the general delight, others with a 
 mysterious secrecy which stimulated the curiosity 
 to its highest point and added to the charm of the 
 occasion. The kitchen filled up with assistants 
 famed for special skill in particular branches of the 
 cook's art, who bustled about with glistening faces 
 and shining teeth, proud of their elevation and eager 
 to add to the general cheer. 
 
 It was now Christmas Eve. From time to time the 
 "hired out" servants came home from Richmond 
 or other places where they had been hired or had 
 hired out themselves, their terms having been by 
 common custom framed, with due regard to then- 
 rights to the holiday, to expire in time for them to 
 spend the Christmas at home. 1 There was much hi- 
 larity over their arrival, and they were welcomed 
 like members of the family as, with their new winter 
 
 1 The hiring contracts ran from New Year to CUriatmas. 
 
178 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 clothes donned a little ahead of time, they came to 
 pay their "bespec's to master and mistis." 
 
 Then the vehicles went off to the distant station 
 for the visitors — for the visitors and the boys. 
 Oh, the excitement of that! the drag of the long 
 hours at first, and then the eager expectancy as the 
 time approached for their return ; the " making up " 
 of the fires in the visitors' rooms (of the big fires ; 
 there had been fires there all day "to air" them, 
 but now they must be made up afresh) ; the hurry- 
 ing backwards and forwards of the servants ; the 
 feverish impatience of every one, especially of the 
 children, who are sure the train is late or that 
 something has happened, and who run and "look 
 up towards the big gate " every five minutes, not- 
 withstanding the mammy's oft-repeated caution 
 that a "watch' pot never b'iles." There was an 
 exception to the excitement : the mistress, calm, 
 deliberate, unperturbed, moved about with her 
 usual serene composure, her watchful eye seeing 
 that everything was " ready " (her orders had been 
 given and her arrangements made days before, 
 such was her system). The girls, having finished 
 dressing the parlor and hall, had disappeared. Sat- 
 isfied at last with their work, after innumerable 
 final touches, every one of which was an undeniable 
 improvement to that which already appeared per- 
 fect, they had suddenly vanished — vanished as 
 completely as a dream — to appear again later on 
 at the parlor door, radiant visions of loveliness, 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 179 
 
 or, maybe, if certain unlooked-for visitors unex- 
 pectedly arrived, to meet accidentally in the less em- 
 barrassing and safer precincts of the dimly lighted 
 passages. When they appeared, what a transforma- 
 tion had taken place ! If they were bewitching 
 before, now they were entrancing. The gay, laugh- 
 ing, saucy creature who had been dressing the 
 parlors and hanging the mistletoe with many jests 
 and parries of the half-veiled references was now a 
 demure or stately maiden in all the dignity of a 
 new gown and with all the graciousness of a young 
 countess. 
 
 But this is after the carriages return. They 
 have not yet come. They are late — they are al- 
 ways late — and it is dark before they come ; the 
 glow of the fires and candles shines out through 
 the windows on the snow, often blackened by the 
 shadows of little figures whose noses are pressed to 
 the panes, which grow blurred with their warm 
 breath. Meantime the carriages, piled up outside 
 and in, are slowly making their way homeward 
 through the frozen roads, followed by the creaking 
 wagon filled with trunks, on which are perched 
 several small muffled figures, whose places in the 
 carriages are taken by unexpected guests. The 
 drivers still keep up a running fire with their young 
 masters, though they have long since been pumped 
 dry by " them boys " as to every conceivable 
 matter connected with "home," in return for which 
 they receive information as to school and college 
 
180 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 pranks. At last the " big gate " is reached ; a half- 
 frozen figure rolls out and runs to open it, flapping 
 his arms in the darkness like some strange, uncanny 
 bird; they pass through; the gleam of a light 
 shines away off on a far hill. The shout goes up, 
 " There she is ; I see her ! " The light is lost, but 
 a little later appears again. It is the light in the 
 mother's chamber, the curtains of the windows of 
 which have been left up intentionally, that the wel- 
 coming gleam may be seen afar off by her boys on 
 the first hill — a blessed beacon shining from home 
 and her mother's heart. 
 
 Across the white fields the dark vehicles move, 
 then toil up the house hill, filled with their eager 
 occupants, who can scarce restrain themselves; ap- 
 proach the house, by this time glowing with lighted 
 windows, and enter the yard just as the doors open 
 and a swarm rushes out with joyful cries of, "Here 
 they are ! " "Yes, here we are !" comes in cheery 
 answer, and one after another they roll or step out, 
 according to age and dignity, and run up the steps, 
 stamping their feet, the boys to be taken fast into 
 motherly arms, and the visitors to be given warm 
 handclasps and cordial welcomes. 
 
 Later on the children were got to bed, scarce able 
 to keep in their pallets for excitement ; the stock- 
 ings were all hung up over the big fireplace ; and 
 the grown people grew gay in the crowded par- 
 lors. Mark you, there was no splendor, nor show, 
 nor style as it would be understood now. Had 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 181 
 
 there been, it could not have been so charming. 
 There were only profusion and sincerity, hearti- 
 ness and gayety, fun and merriment, cordiality 
 and cheer, and withal genuineness and refinement. 
 
 Next morning before light the stir began. 
 White-clad little figures stole about in the gloom, 
 with bulging stockings clasped to their bosoms, 
 opening doors, shouting " Christmas gift ! " into 
 dark rooms at sleeping elders, and then scurrying 
 away like so many white mice, squeaking with 
 delight, to rake open the embers and inspect their 
 treasures. At prayers, "Shout the glad tidings" 
 was sung by fresh young voices with due fervor. 
 
 How gay the scene was at breakfast ! What 
 pranks had been performed in the name of Santa 
 Claus ! Every foible had been played on. What 
 lovely telltale blushes and glances and laughter 
 greeted the confessions ! The larger part of the day 
 was spent in going to and coming from the beauti- 
 fully dressed church, where the service was read, 
 and the anthems and hymns were sung by every- 
 body, for every one was happy. 
 
 But, as in the beginning of things, " the evening 
 and the morning were the first day." Dinner was 
 the great event. It was the test of the mistress 
 and the cook, or, rather, the cooks ; for the kitchen 
 now was full of them. It is impossible to describe 
 it. The old mahogany table, stretched diagonally 
 across the dining-room, groaned; the big gobbler 
 filled the place of honor; a great round of beef 
 
182 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 held the second place ; an old ham, with every 
 other dish that ingenuity, backed by long expe- 
 rience, could devise, was at the side, and the shin- 
 ing sideboard, gleaming with glass, scarcely held 
 the dessert. The butler and his assistants were 
 supernaturally serious and slow, which bespoke 
 plainly too frequent a recourse to the apple-toddy 
 bowl; but, under stimulus of the mistress's eye, 
 they got through all right, and their slight un- 
 steadiness was overlooked. 
 
 It was then that the fun began. 
 
 After dinner there were apple-toddy and egg- 
 nogg, as there had been before. 
 
 There were games and dances — country dances, 
 the lancers and quadrilles. The top of the old 
 piano was lifted up, and the infectious dancing- 
 tunes rolled out under the flying fingers. There 
 was some demur on the part of the elder ladies, 
 who were not quite sure that it was right ; but it 
 was overruled by the gentlemen, and the master in 
 his frock coat and high collar started the ball by 
 catching the prettiest girl by the hand and leading 
 her to the head of the room right under the noses 
 of half a dozen bashful lovers, calling to them 
 meantime to "get their sweethearts and come along." 
 Round dancing was not yet introduced. It was 
 regarded as an innovation, if nothing worse. It 
 was held generally as highly improper, by some as 
 " disgusting." As to the german, why, had it been 
 known, the very, name would have been sufficient 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 183 
 
 to damn it. Nothing foreign in that civilization ! 
 There was fun enough in the old-fashioned country- 
 dances, and the " Virginia reel" at the close; who- 
 ever could not be satisfied with that was hard to 
 please. 
 
 There were the negro parties, where the ladies 
 and gentlemen went to look on, the suppers hav- 
 ing been superintended by the mistresses, and the 
 tables being decorated by their own white hands. 
 There was almost sure to be a negro wedding dur- 
 ing the holidays. The ceremony might be per- 
 formed in the dining-room or in the hall by the 
 master, or in a quarter by a colored preacher ; but 
 it was a gay occasion, and the dusky bride's trous- 
 seau had been arranged by her young mistress, and 
 the family was on hand to get fun out of the enter- 
 tainment. 
 
 Other weddings there were, too, sometimes fol- 
 lowing these Christmas gayeties, and sometimes 
 occurring " just so," because the girls were the love- 
 liest in the world, and the men were lovers almost 
 from their boyhood. How beautiful our mothers 
 must have been in their youth to have been so 
 •beautiful in their age ! 
 
 There were no long journeys for the young mar- 
 ried folk in those times ; the travelling was usually 
 done before marriage. When a wedding took place, 
 however, the entire neighborhood entertained the 
 young couple. 
 
 Truly it was a charming life. There was a vast 
 
184 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 "waste ; but it was not loss. Every one had food, 
 every one had raiment, every one had peace. There 
 was not wealth in the base sense in which we know 
 it and strive for it and trample down others for it 
 now. But there was wealth in a good old sense in 
 which the litany of our fathers used it. There 
 was weal. There was the best of all wealth ; there 
 was content, and "a quiet mind is richer than a 
 crown." 
 
 We have gained something by the change. The 
 South under her new conditions will grow rich, will 
 wax fat; nevertheless we have lost much. How 
 much only those who knew it can estimate; to 
 them it was inestimable. 
 
 That the social life of the Old South had its 
 faults I am far from denying. What civilization 
 has not ? But its virtues far outweighed them ; 
 its graces were never equalled. For all its faults, 
 it was, I believe, the purest, sweetest life ever lived. 
 It has been claimed that it was non-productive, that 
 it fostered sterility. Only ignorance or folly could 
 make the assertion. It largely contributed to pro- 
 duce this nation ; it led its armies and its navies ; it 
 established this government so firmly that not even 
 it could overthrow it ; it opened up the great West ; 
 it added Louisiana and Texas, and more than trebled 
 our territory ; it christianized the negro race in a 
 little over two centuries, impressed upon it regard 
 for order, and gave it the only civilization it has 
 ever possessed since the dawn of history. It has 
 
SOCIAL LIFE BEFORE THE WAR 185 
 
 maintained the supremacy of the Caucasian race, 
 upon which all civilization seems now to de- 
 pend. It produced a people whose heroic fight 
 against the forces of the world has enriched the 
 annals of the human race. — a people whose forti- 
 tude in defeat has been even more splendid than 
 their valor in war. It made men noble, gentle, and 
 brave, and women tender and pure and true. It 
 may have fallen short in material development in 
 its narrower sense, but it abounded in spiritual 
 development ; it made the domestic virtues as com- 
 mon as light and air, and filled homes with purity 
 and peace. 
 
 It has passed from the earth, but it has left its 
 benignant influence behind it to sweeten and sus- 
 tain its children. The ivory palaces have been 
 destroyed, but myrrh, aloes, and cassia still breathe 
 amid their dismantled ruins. 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 
 OLD YORKTOWN AND OLD EOSEWELL 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 
 
 OLD YORKTOWN 
 
 One hundred years ago, the eyes of a few colonies 
 along the Atlantic seaboard were turned anxiously 
 toward " Little York," a small town in Virginia, sit- 
 uated on the curve of York River, in Indian days 
 the great "Pamunkee," just above where its white 
 current mingles with the green waters of Chesa- 
 peake Bay. There was being fought the death 
 struggle between Great Britain and her revolution- 
 ary colonies, — between the Old and the New. 
 
 Affairs had assumed a gloomy aspect. The army 
 of the South had been defeated and driven back into 
 Virginia, barely escaping annihilation by forced 
 marches, and by the successful passage of the deep 
 rivers which intersect the country through which it 
 retreated ; Virginia, the backbone of the Revolution, 
 had been swept by two invasions; and Cornwallis 
 with his victorious army was marching trium- 
 phantly through her borders, trying by every means 
 he could devise to bring his only opponent, a young 
 French officer, to an engagement. Had "the boy," 
 
 189 
 
190 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Lafayette, proved as reckless as the British com« 
 mander believed him, the end would have come be- 
 fore De Grasse with his fleet anchored in the Chesa- 
 peake. He was, however, no boy in the art of war, 
 and at length Cornwallis, wearied of trying to catch 
 him, retired to York, and intrenching himself, 
 awaited re-enforcements from the North. Just at 
 this time, Providence directed the French admiral 
 to the Virginia coast, and the American commander- 
 in-chief, finding himself suddenly possessed of a 
 force such as he had never hoped for in his wildest 
 dreams, and knowing that he could count on the new 
 re-enforcements for only a few weeks, determined to 
 put his fate to the touch, and win if possible by a 
 coup de main. With this end in view, he withdrew 
 from. New York, and came down to Jersey as if to 
 get near his ovens, a move which misled the British 
 commander, who knew that a good meal was a suffi- 
 cient inducement to carry the hungry American 
 troops farther than that, and did not suspect the 
 ulterior object until he learned that Washington 
 was well on his way to Virginia. In the last days 
 of September, the colonial general arrived before 
 York and threw the die. Before the end of three 
 weeks, the British troops marched out with cased 
 colors, prisoners of war. The details of the sur- 
 render included an act of poetic retribution. When 
 General Lincoln had, not long before, surrendered 
 at Charleston to Cornwallis, the British marquis 
 appointed an inferior officer to receive his sword; 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 191 
 
 this affront General Washington now avenged by- 
 appointing General Lincoln to receive Cornwallis's 
 sword. 
 
 When the British prime minister received the 
 intelligence of the surrender, he threw up his 
 hands, exclaiming, " My God ! it is all over ! " 
 And it was all over — America was free. 
 
 A hundred years have passed by since that time, 
 and with natural pride the people of these United 
 States are preparing to celebrate the centennial an- 
 niversary of the great event which secured their in- 
 dependence. Once more the little sleepy Virginia 
 town, which has for a century lain as if under a 
 spell, awakes with a start to find itself the centre of 
 interest. 
 
 Had the siege of Yorktown taken place a dozen 
 centuries ago, the assailants, instead of hammering 
 the fortifications down as fast as they were repaired, 
 might have been forced to wait until the grim ally, 
 starvation, compelled the besieged to capitulate. 
 Even at this day the place gives evidence of its 
 advantages as a fortified camp. High ramparts and 
 deep fosses, which might have satisfied a Roman 
 consul, surround it on three sides, and on the fourth 
 is a precipitous bluff above the deep, wide York 
 which could be defended by a handful. These forti- 
 fications, however, have not come down from the 
 Revolution ; they bear witness to a later strife. Ma- 
 gruder began them in those early days of 1861, when 
 each side thought the Civil War sport for a summer 
 
192 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 holiday ; and later on, when the magnitude of the 
 struggle was understood, McClellan strengthened 
 them. Together with the few antique brick build- 
 ings with massive walls and peaked roofs, which 
 have survived the assaults of three successive wars, 
 and of that more insidious destro} r er, Time, they 
 give the place the impressiveness of an old walled 
 town. All new ways and things seem to have been 
 held at bay. 
 
 The town is about one hundred and eighty-five 
 years old. It looks much older, but repeated wars 
 have an aging effect. 
 
 Its founder was Thomas Nelson, a young settler 
 from Penrith, on the border of Scotland, who was 
 for that reason called " Scotch Tom." His father 
 was a man of substance and position in Cumberland 
 and was a warden of the church in Penrith. The 
 warden's son Thomas looking to the New World to 
 enlarge his fortune, after making one or two trips 
 across, finally settled at the mouth of York Eiver. 
 Here he married Margaret Reid, and soon became 
 one of the wealthiest men in the colony. His 
 dwelling, known as the " Nelson House," still stands, 
 with its lofty chimneys and solid walls — tower- 
 ing among the surrounding buildings ; an endur- 
 ing pre-eminence which would probably have grat- 
 ified the pride which tradition says moved him 
 to have the corner-stone passed through the hands 
 of his infant heir. The massive door and small 
 windows, with the solid shutters, look as if the 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 193 
 
 house had been constructed more with a view to 
 defence than to architectural grace. Within, every- 
 thing is antique ; modern paint has recently, with 
 doubtful success, if not propriety, attempted to 
 freshen up the old English wainscoting; but the 
 old-time air of the place cannot be banished. Mem- 
 ory grows busy as she walks through the lofty 
 rooms and recalls the scenes they have witnessed. 
 Here, in " ye olden tyme," dwelt a race which grew 
 to wealth and power noted even in that age, when 
 the mere lapse of years, opening up the broad, wild 
 lands to the westward, and multiplying the slaves, 
 doubled and quadrupled their possessions without 
 care or thought of the owners. Here, in this home 
 of the Nelsons, have been held receptions at which 
 have gathered Grymeses, Digges, Custises, Carys, 
 Blands, Lees, Carters, Randolphs, Burwells, Pages, 
 Byrds, Spottswoods, Harrisons, and all the gay 
 gentry of the Old Dominion. Up the circular 
 stone steps, where now the dust of the street lies 
 thick, blushing, laughing girls have tripped, fol- 
 lowed by stately mammas, over whose precious 
 heads the old-time " canopies " were held by careful 
 young lovers, or lordly squires whose names were 
 to become as imperishable as the great Declaration 
 which they subscribed. Coming down to a later 
 period, a more historical interest attaches itself to 
 the mansion. George Mason and Washington and 
 Jefferson have slept here ; Cornwallis established 
 his headquarters here during the last days of the 
 
194 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 great siege, when his first headquarters. Secretary 
 Nelson's house, had been shelled to pieces. Even 
 here the guns aimed by the master of the mansion, 
 then Governor of Virginia ami commander-in-chief 
 of her forces, reached him as the splintered rafters 
 and the solid shot stuck in the wall testify. La- 
 fayette, no longer the boyish adventurer with a mind 
 wild with romantic dreams of the Cid, and chased 
 like a fugitive by Ins sovereign, but the honored 
 and revered guest of a mighty nation, returning in 
 his old age to witness the greatness of the New 
 World toward which his valor had so much con- 
 tributed, slept here and added another to the many 
 associations which already surrounded the mansion. 
 Thomas Nelson, having built his house, died and 
 was buried in the churchyard of the old church. 
 His handsome tomb is one of the two antique mon- 
 uments which, in spite of war and weather, still 
 remain notable relics of old York. It stands in 
 the uninclosed common near the old church on the 
 bluff, not a stone's throw from the centre of the 
 town. On the four sides, cherubs' faces, elaborately 
 carved, look forth from clouds. Once, a crown was 
 being placed on the head of one ; another, trumpet 
 in mouth, was proclaiming "All glory to God," 
 but the ascription under the wear and tear of time 
 has disappeared. The weather and the vandal have 
 marred and wasted the carving; but enough yet 
 remains to show that on it some excellent sculptor 
 used his utmost skill. The coat of arms on the top 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 195 
 
 shows the fleur de lis as his crest, while the in- 
 scription and heraldic insignia declare the founder 
 of Yorktown to have been a " gentleman." At his 
 feet, beneath a less imposing tomb, lies Scotch Tom's 
 eldest son, William Nelson, called "President" 
 Nelson from his having been president of the King's 
 Council, and as such, during an interregnum, gov- 
 ernor of the colony. At his feet, in turn, sleeps, 
 in an unmarked grave, the president's eldest son, 
 General Thomas Nelson, the most illustrious of the 
 race, the mover in the great Virginia Convention of 
 1776 of the resolution first instructing her dele- 
 gates in Congress to move that body to declare the 
 colonies free and independent States; — signer of 
 the Declaration of Independence, war governor of 
 Virginia, and one of the most brilliant of that body 
 of great men who stand, a splendid galaxy, in the 
 firmament of our nation's history. 
 
 "The old store," which for two generations 
 yielded the Nelsons a harvest of golden guineas, 
 stood on the open space now called " the common." 
 It survived the siege, but was destroyed in the War 
 of 1812. The custom-house, however, where their 
 goods were entered, still stands a score of yards off, 
 with moss-covered, peaked roof, thick walls, and 
 massive oaken doors and shutters. This is one of 
 the most notable relics of York, for it is said to have 
 been one of the first custom-houses erected in Amer- 
 ica. In the colonial period, it was the fashionable 
 rendezvous of the gentlemen of the town and sur- 
 
196 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 rounding country. There the young bucks in vel- 
 vet and ruffles gathered to talk over the news or to 
 plan new plots of surprising a governor or a lady- 
 love. It was there that the haughty young aristo- 
 crats, as they took snuff and fondled their hounds, 
 probably laughed over the story of how that young 
 Washington, who had thought himself good enough 
 for anybody, had courted pretty Mary Gary, and 
 had been asked out of the house by the old colonel, 
 on the ground that his daughter had been accus- 
 tomed to ride in her own coach. There it was 
 doubtless told how Tom Jefferson, leaving his 
 clients and studies on the Eivanna, had come back 
 to try his fate at Becky Burwell's dainty feet, 
 and had been sent off for much-needed consolation 
 to his old friend and crony, John Page, who had 
 just induced little Frances, her cousin, to come and 
 be mistress of Bosewell. Sometimes graver topics 
 were discussed there; as, whether the Metropoli- 
 tan's license and the recommendation of the gov- 
 ernor were sufficient to override the will of the ves- 
 tries in fixing an obnoxious rector in the parishes ; 
 whether Great Britain had a right to a monopoly 
 of the colonial trade, or whether she could lawfully 
 prevent them inhibiting the landing of slaves in 
 their ports, with other questions which showed the 
 direction of the popular mind. 
 
 It would be difficult to find a fitter illustration of 
 the old colonial Virginia life than that which this 
 little town affords. It was a typical Old Dominion 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 197 
 
 borough, and was one of the eight boroughs into 
 which Virginia was originally divided. One or two 
 families owned the place, ruling with a sway despotic 
 in fact, though in the main temperate and just, for 
 the lower orders were too dependent and inert to 
 dream of thwarting the " gentlefolk," and the South- 
 erner when uncrossed was ever the most amiable of 
 men. If there were more than one great family, they 
 nevertheless got on amicably, for they had usually 
 intermarried until their interests were identical. 
 
 Nearly all the " old " families in the colony were 
 allied, and the clannish instinct was as strong as 
 among the Scotch. The ambition of the wealthy 
 families in the colony, perhaps more than the 
 usually accepted aristocratic instinct, excluded from 
 the circle all who did not come up to their some- 
 what difficult standard. Government was their 
 passion, and everything relating to it interested 
 them. It was the only matter which excited them, 
 and every other feeling took its tone from this. It 
 influenced them in all their relations, domestic as 
 well as public. Even and smooth as seemed the tem- 
 perament of the nonchalant, languid Virginian, — 
 not splenitive or rash, — yet had it in it something 
 dangerous. His political opinions were sacred to 
 him ; he had inherited them from his father, whom 
 he regarded as the impersonation of wisdom and vir- 
 tue. To oppose them roused him at once, and made 
 him intolerant and violent. He could not brook 
 opposition. The feeling has not altogether dis» 
 
198 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 appeared even at the present day. Yet, singular as 
 it may seem, with this existed the deeply ingrained 
 love of liberty and devotion to principle from which 
 sprang the constitutional securities of liberty of 
 speech, freedom of the press, the right to bear arms, 
 and the statute of religious freedom. 
 
 In York, the Nelson family was the acknowledged 
 leader in county affairs. President Nelson had 
 sent his eldest son, Tom, when a lad of fourteen, 
 to Eton, where he was a desk-mate of Charles James 
 Fox, and afterward to Cambridge, where he was 
 graduated with some distinction. The style in 
 which the president of the Council lived is ex- 
 hibited by the casual remark, in a letter written to 
 a friend who was in charge of this son, that he had 
 just bought Lord Baltimore's six white coach-horses, 
 and meant to give his own six black ones a run in 
 his Hanover pastures. In 1761, the young squire 
 came home ; and it shows the influence of his family 
 that, while yet on his voyage across, he was returned 
 as a member of the House of Burgesses. About 
 a year afterwards, he married Lucy Grymes, the 
 eldest daughter of Colonel Philip Grymes, of 
 Brandon, in Middlesex. The Grymeses enjoyed 
 the reputation of being the cleverest family in the 
 Dominion. Little Lucy was a cousin of Light- 
 Horse Harry Le© and of Thomas Jefferson. An 
 old MS. states that the latter was one of her many 
 lovers, but the story appears to lack confirmation, 
 as the lady denied it even in after years. 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 199 
 
 During the years that followed, York maintained 
 her position as an influential borough in the direc- 
 tion of affairs. When the crisis came, Secretary 
 Thomas Nelson, "the President's" younger brother, 
 was at the head of the moderate party. He received 
 in the Convention forty-five votes for Virginia's 
 first governor, but was beaten by Patrick Henry. 
 He was, however, put in the Privy Council. The 
 Marquis de Chastillux gives a pretty picture of the 
 old gray-haired gentleman being brought out of 
 York under a flag of truce by his two sons, officers 
 in Washington's army. His nephew and namesake, 
 Thomas Nelson, Jr., was one of the leaders of the 
 ultra patriots, and with his cousin and connection, 
 Dudley Digges, took so conspicuous a part in the 
 early revolutionary action of the State, that Captain 
 Montague, the commander of the British ship Fowey, 
 threatened to bombard York. The manifestation 
 of the Virginians' anger took a singular turn, which 
 at the same time shows the naive character of the 
 old Virginia gentry. They solemnly resolved that 
 this officer's action had been so inhuman that he 
 should not be further recognized as a gentleman. It 
 is possible that however determined the men were 
 not to recognize Captain Montague, the women 
 were less resolute, as he was remarkable for his 
 great personal beauty, — so remarkable, indeed, 
 that it was said Lord Dunmore's daughter, Lady 
 Augusta Murray, who afterward married the Duke 
 of Sussex, and who was herself declared to be the 
 
200 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 handsomest woman in the three kingdoms, used to 
 repeat at the end of each verse in the 136th Psalm, 
 whenever it occurred in the church service : 
 
 Praise Montague, Captain of the Fowey, 
 For his beauty endureth forever. 
 
 Dudley Digges, young Nelson's colleague in the 
 House of Burgesses, was a member of the Privy 
 Council, and of the Committee of Safety, He was 
 the worthy lineal descendant of that brave Sir 
 Dudley who flung at Charles the First's powerful 
 and insolent favorite, Buckingham, the retort, " Do 
 you jeer, my lord ? I can show you where a greater 
 man than your lordship, as high in power, and as 
 deep in the king's favor, has been hanged for as 
 small a crime as these articles contain." 
 
 Such was York, the patriotic little Virginia town 
 into which Cornwallis retired in the summer of 
 1781, when he received orders from Sir Henry 
 Clinton to intrench himself on the coast and await 
 instructions. At this time it boasted among its citi- 
 zens the governor of the State, for young Nelson 
 had attained the highest dignity in Virginia. He 
 had been one of the leaders in the great move- 
 ment which had separated the colonies from the 
 mother country. He had been a conspicuous mem- 
 ber of all the great conventions. He had made the 
 motion in committee of the whole in May, 1776, that 
 Virginia should instruct her delegates in Congress 
 to try and induce that body to declare the United 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 201 
 
 Colonies free and independent States ; he had him- 
 self carried this instruction to Philadelphia; he had, 
 as one of Virginia's delegates, signed the great 
 Declaration ; and now he had been chosen to take 
 the chief control of the State, and, with almost dic- 
 tatorial powers, to manage both her military and civil 
 polity. " His popularity was unbounded," says the 
 historian. Certainly his patriotism was. The father 
 of a modern English statesman, speaking of his 
 son's free-trade views, said he might be exalting the 
 nation, but he was ruining his family. The same 
 criticism might have been passed on General Nel- 
 son's administration. His patriotism was of a 
 nature that now strikes one as rather antique. 
 When money was wanted to pay the troops and 
 run the government, Virginia's credit was low, but 
 the governor was told that he could have plenty 
 on his personal security, so he borrowed the sum 
 needed, and went on; when regiments mutinied 
 and refused to march, the governor simply drove 
 over to Petersburg, raised the money on his indi- 
 vidual credit, and paid them off. Consequently, 
 when the war closed, what old George Mason 
 declared he would be willing to say his nunc di- 
 mittis on, viz. the heritage to his children of a crust 
 of bread and liberty, had literally befallen Governor 
 Nelson. 
 
 When it was discovered that Cornwallis was 
 marching on York, the feelings of the inhabitants 
 were doubtless not enviable. Arnold had not long 
 
202 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 before swept over the State, with a traitor's rancor, 
 leaving red ruin in his track. Colonel Tarleton, 
 Cornwallis's lieutenant, had procured for himself 
 a not very desirable reputation, having an eye for a 
 good horse and a likely negro, and a conscience not 
 over scrupulous about the manner of obtaining them. 
 Arnold was so much dreaded that, when he was 
 expected to fall on York, Mrs. Nelson, the gen- 
 eral's wife, with her young children, fled to the 
 upper country. On this occasion it was that Jimmy 
 Ridout, the carriage driver, in emulation of Cacus, 
 had his horses shod at night with the shoes reversed, 
 so that if they were followed their pursuers might 
 be misled. When Cornwallis marched on York, 
 Mrs. Nelson once more set out for her upper plan- 
 tations in Hanover. 
 
 Cornwallis, expecting additional forces from Sir 
 Henry Clinton, fortified himself in York. His let- 
 ter to his chief, conveying the announcement of his 
 surrender, declares that he never saw this post in a 
 very favorable light, and nothing but the hope of re- 
 lief would have induced him to attempt its defence. 
 This letter gave mortal offence to the superior offi- 
 cer, who was sensible of the justice of the grave 
 charge so delicately conveyed. He had sacrificed his 
 subordinate and the last chances of Great Britain. 
 
 Strolling over the green fields at present, it requires 
 an effort to picture the scenes they witnessed one 
 hundred years ago. There are fortifications still 
 standing, green with blackberry bushes and young 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 203 
 
 locusts, but they tell of a more recent strife ; the 
 Revolutionary earthworks have totally disappeared, 
 except on " Secretary's Hill," where formerly stood 
 Secretary Nelson's fine house, in which Cornwallis 
 first established his headquarters. A few signs 
 are still discernible there, due to the possible fact 
 that his lordship had his headquarters protected 
 by works of unusual strength. If this be the 
 explanation, the precaution proved futile, for when 
 it was known in the Eevolutionary camp that it 
 was the British commander's headquarters, the 
 house was made their special mark, and was almost 
 demolished. The butler was killed in the act of 
 placing a dish on the dinner-table. 
 
 Outside the town, there are several spots which 
 may be accurately fixed. Up the river, on the rise 
 beyond the small, dull stream, to the left of the 
 Williamsburg road going out, were posted the 
 French batteries — the regiments of Touraine, Age- 
 nois, and Gatinois — the Royal Auvergne — "Au- 
 vergne sans tacJie." On the creek, a little nearer the 
 town, fell Scammel on the first day of the siege, 
 treacherously shot in the back after he had surren- 
 dered, which " cast a gloom over the camp." His 
 death was avenged afterward by his troops, as they 
 charged over the redoubts with the battle-cry, " Re- 
 member Scammel ! " Below the town, on the other 
 side, the redoubts were stormed and taken at night 
 by the picked troops of the French and American 
 armies. The short grass now grows smooth over 
 
204 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the spot where the Royal Auvergne won back their 
 lost name and fame ; but as we stand where they 
 stood that night with empty guns, panting to use the 
 bayonet, steadfast though their ranks were being 
 mowed down in the darkness, we feel stirred as 
 though it had all occurred but yesterday. Mean- 
 time the American stormers of the other redoubt, 
 led by the dashing young Colonel Alexander Hamil- 
 ton, had plunged through the abatis and gained 
 their prize. What a speech that must have been 
 which the young officer made his men as he halted 
 them under the walls ! 
 
 " Did you ever hear such a speech ? " asked one 
 officer of another. "With that speech I could 
 storm hell ! " 
 
 The striking incidents of the siege were not very 
 numerous. It was a steady and unreceding ad- 
 vance on one side and retrogression on the other ; 
 but this particular night was somewhat noted for 
 its romantic episodes. When Hamilton, arrived 
 inside his redoubt, sent to inform the French leader 
 of the other storming party of the fact and to in- 
 quire if he was in his, "No, but I will be in five 
 minutes," he answered, and he kept his word. Many 
 a blue lapel was stained with heart blood ; but their 
 king wrote with his own hand, " Bon pour Royal 
 Auvergne" and posterity says, Amen ! They died 
 not in vain. " The work is done and well done," 
 said Washington, when the signal was given that 
 the redoubts were won. 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 205 
 
 A few days before this eventful night, the gov- 
 ernor of Virginia, who was present in person, com- 
 manding the Virginia State forces, had displayed 
 his patriotism by an act which attracted much 
 attention. Observing that his own house within 
 the town had escaped injury from the shells, he 
 learned that General Washington had given orders 
 that the gunners should not aim at it. He im- 
 mediately had a gun turned on it, and offered a 
 prize of five guineas to the gunner who should 
 strike it. 
 
 Three-quarters of a mile back of the two captured 
 redoubts, and outside of the first parallel, stood, 
 and still stands, an old weather-board and weather- 
 stained mansion. Its antique roof, its fireplaces 
 set across the corners, and its general old-time air, 
 even a hundred years ago, bespoke for it reverence 
 as a relic of a long bygone age. It was historical 
 even then, for it had been the country residence of 
 Governor Spottswood, who had been the great 
 Marlborough's aide-de-camp, and the best royal gov- 
 ernor of the colony. He had come, bringing his 
 virtues and his graces, to the Old Dominion, and 
 had in the quaint old house on the river bank held 
 his mimic court, forming royal plans for the devel- 
 opment of the kingly domain he ruled, entertaining 
 his knights of the Golden Horseshoe, drinking 
 healths which amaze even this not over temperate 
 generation. He established the first iron foundry 
 ever erected on American soil. 
 
206 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Hither his body was brought from Maryland, 
 where he died. But one hundred years ago, to the 
 many associations connected with the old house 
 was added one which to this generation dwarfs all 
 others. In its sitting-room were drawn up the 
 articles of capitulation of the British army, by 
 which was ended the strife, and the colonies be- 
 came free and independent States. Imagination 
 almost always paints in high colors the scene of 
 any great act in the world's drama, but a milder 
 and more peaceful picture can scarcely be conceived 
 than that which this spot now presents. The house 
 was owned at the time of the surrender by Mrs. 
 Moore, " Aunt Moore," as she was called by nearly 
 all the people of York. It is now unoccupied, and 
 the cellar has been utilized as a stable. About it 
 the mild-eyed Alderneys browse the white clover, or 
 gaze sleepily at the unwonted pilgrim. The river 
 sleeps just beyond, in the summer sunshine, with 
 a single white sail set like a pearl on its bosom. 
 The spot looks an "ancient haunt of peace," but war 
 has stalked about it since first the English came. 
 The peaceful-looking hedges beyond the old orchard, 
 and on the bluff, are breastworks overgrown with 
 bushes. The great Civil War, the War of 1812, 
 and the Revolution, all have passed over these 
 green, quiet fields ; and yonder in the " Temple " 
 lies the relic of a still older strife — the grave of a 
 soldier who had won his laurels and lain down his 
 sword long before Sir Alexander Spottswood earned 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 207 
 
 his spurs at Blenheim. A mystery of more ancient 
 date than the Kevolution hangs about the spot, 
 and is associated with the name. Some authorities 
 state that Governor Spottswood built a temple of 
 worship here, whence came the name of the planta- 
 tion, " Temple Farm " ; but the Temple is doubtless 
 of older date than this account would make us be- 
 lieve. The more probable explanation is that the 
 building, whose foundations alone remain at present, 
 was erected in the early days of the colony. The 
 double walls, one within the other, give credit to 
 the story that it was so built for defence against 
 the Indians, and the date on Major Gooch's tomb, 
 October, 1655, corroborates it. The tomb of the 
 royal governor has long since disappeared. A frag- 
 ment of Major Gooch's epitaph remains. It reads: 
 
 Within this tomb there doth interred lie, 
 No shape hut substance, true nobility, 
 Itself though young in years, just twenty-nine, 
 Yet grac'd with virtues morall and divine, 
 The church from him did good participate. 
 In counsell rare fit to adorn a state. 
 
 Could the young soldier have had a fitter resting- 
 place or a better epitaph ? 
 
 Eight below the Temple sleeps Wormley's 
 Creek, with its myriad water-lilies resting on its 
 tranquil breast; and not a hundred yards above 
 stands the modern successor to the mill, where the 
 first shot in the siege was fired. The old structure 
 
208 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 has disappeared, but the old customs still remain. 
 Here, twice a week, on Tuesdays and Fridays (for it 
 takes three days to " catch a head of water "), come 
 the negroes and country folk, bringing their "turns" 
 of corn, some in bags on their heads, or, if they are 
 of larger means and appetites, in little carts with 
 generally a single bull harnessed in the shafts. 
 The established rule of " each in his turn ' • prevails, 
 and they wait patiently, sometimes the livelong 
 day, until their time comes. They are not in a 
 hurry; for a hundred years this same life has 
 gone on as placid and serene as the stream down 
 among the " cow collards " ; to hurry would be to 
 violate the most ancient and time-honored tradition 
 of the fathers. 
 
 It is easy to see that "Little York" never re- 
 covered from its bombardment. The scene in the 
 street to-day is an idyl, — a few massive old brick 
 houses scattered among modern shanties like so 
 many old-time gentlemen at a modern ward-meet- 
 ing ; a couple of negro children kicking up the dust 
 in the street a hundred yards away ; two citizens 
 sitting under an awning " resting," and a small ox- 
 cart moving uncertainly nearer, as the little brindled 
 bull in the shafts browses the short grass on the 
 side of the street. The most lively things in sight 
 are a small, boy and the string of fish he is carry- 
 ing ; for the latter have just come from the water 
 and are still fluttering. Such is the scene now pre- 
 sented in the street where a hundred years ago 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 209 
 
 anxious red-coats double-quicked along or stole 
 sullenly by, trying to shelter themselves from the 
 searching messengers from the batteries out on the 
 heights beyond the creeks. 
 
 The Nelson house still remains in the family ; 
 but to the Nelsons, peace came with poverty ; the 
 governor's vast estate went for his public debts. 
 He gave the whole of it. When a question arose 
 in the Virginia Convention as to the confiscation of 
 British claims, he stopped the agitation by rising 
 in his seat, and declaiming, " Others may do as they 
 please ; but as for me, I am an honest man, and so 
 help me God ! I will pay my debts." Years after- 
 ward, Virginia did tardy and partial justice to the 
 memory of Nelson's great services by placing his 
 statue among the group of her great ones in her 
 beautiful Capitol Square; and, in company with 
 Washington, Jefferson, Marshall, Henry, Mason, 
 and Lewis, he stands in bronze tendering the bonds 
 with his outstretched hands, in perpetuam rei me- 
 moriam. No recompense, however, was ever made 
 to the family for the vast sums Governor Nelson 
 had expended, and his widow, once the wealthiest 
 woman in the colony, was left blind in her old age, 
 with only one piece of property, her children's 
 mammy. Some forty or fifty years after his death, 
 evidence of his great losses was collected for the 
 purpose of applying to Congress for compensation ; 
 but a bill being brought in meantime for the relief 
 of the widow of the young colonel who made the 
 
210 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 speech to his storming party that night undei the 
 walls of the redoubt at Yorktown, and who had 
 rendered besides some other small services to the 
 country, a member asked if there were no poor- 
 houses in New York, that Mrs. Hamilton came 
 begging to Congress ; and after that, one of Gov- 
 ernor Nelson's sons, who was in Congress at the 
 time, refused to proceed further in the matter, de- 
 claring that he would not permit his mother's name 
 to be brought before a body which tolerated such a 
 speech. 
 
 It seems extraordinary that, after only a hundred 
 years, much doubt exists as to the actual spot where 
 the British laid down their arms. Immediately 
 after the surrender, Congress enacted that a suit- 
 able monument should be erected there, to tell the 
 story to succeeding generations. But all things 
 concerning Yorktown sleep, and the memorial was 
 neglected until the very spot was forgotten. There 
 was built up, however, a mighty nation, zealous for 
 liberty, 
 
 Monumsntum aere perenniua 
 Regalique situ pyramidum altius. 
 
 This was, to use the closing words of the articles 
 of Cornwallis's capitulation, " done in the trenches 
 before Yorktown, in Virginia, October 19th, 1781." 
 
II 
 
 ROSEWELL 
 
 As York, the territory of the Nelsons, witnessed 
 the last act in Virginia's colonial drama, so Eose- 
 well, the seat of the Pages, saw the first act. The 
 places are only a few miles apart, bnt are separated 
 by the York River. 
 
 Taking a small boat at the Yorktown pier, you 
 may, by promising an extra quarter, wake the leth- 
 argic boatman into positive activity, and get under 
 way to Gloucester Point in something under a half- 
 hour. Your boatman, as black as Charon, rows with 
 a deliberation which would gratify you if cross- 
 ing the Styx. You are apt to question him about 
 the surrender. Oh, yes ! he knows all about it. 
 If his immediate predecessor, " Old Unc' Felix," 
 who was gathered last fall to his fathers at the age 
 of sixty-five years, and whose funeral sermon was 
 preached last Sunday, were alive, he would have 
 assured you that he remembered all about the siege 
 of Yorktown, and waited on both Generals Wash- 
 ington and Cornwallis. 
 
 After a while you reach Gloucester Point, liter- 
 ally a " point," and tread the ground invested by 
 
 211 
 
212 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Weedon, De Choisy, and the dashing, bragging De 
 Lauzun. 
 
 A ride of a few miles up the river bank brings 
 you to an old place called Shelly, once a part of 
 the Rosewell estate, and still owned by Governor 
 Page's descendants. However appropriate the 
 name may seem, in view of the great beds of shell 
 down on the river bank, it does not call up the 
 associations connected with the name borne by the 
 place in colonial days — " Werowocomoco." Next 
 to Jamestown, this plantation is perhaps the spot 
 most celebrated in the colonial annals of Virginia. 
 It was here that Powhatan reigned like Egbert of 
 old, with kings, less poetic but not more savage, to 
 pull his canoe. Between his wives, his enemies, 
 and his English friends, the old Werowance had a 
 hard time. Doubtless he found much consolation 
 in his oysters. And judging from the mounds of 
 oyster-shells, those Indians must have had royal ap- 
 petites. It was at this place that the most romantic 
 incident of Virginia's history occurred, when the 
 little tender-hearted Indian maiden, touched with 
 pity for an intrepid young captive, prayed in vain 
 for his life, and then flung herself beneath the 
 executioners' axes and clasped the victim in her 
 arms, risking her own life, but saving John Smith 
 and the colony of Virginia. 
 
 Other memories cluster around the place : of the 
 ghastly decorations of Payanketank scalps; the 
 ballet dance of Indian nymphs attired in the most 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 213 
 
 ancient of recorded costumes ; the coronation of old 
 Powhatan, who with royal instinct refused to stoop 
 while the crown was placed on his head. The 
 whole place is quick with memories. 
 
 It has always been my opinion that the world 
 has not done justice to Captain John Smith. He 
 deserves to be ranked with the greatest explorers 
 of all time. At the age of thirty he had left the 
 Virginias and returned to England, having accom- 
 plished what Raleigh, with all his wealth, power, 
 and zeal, could not do. Well might the old chron- 
 icles call him "the Father of the Colony." Had 
 the die turned differently on the spot where we 
 now stand, Virginia might have lain a hundred 
 years more a wilderness and a waste place, and the 
 destinies of the world have been different. Until a 
 few years ago one might have said of " oure Cap- 
 taine " as the Spartan said to a Sophist offering to 
 deliver a eulogy on Hercules — " Why, who has 
 ever blamed Hercules ? " But of late the wise 
 critics have attacked him virulently. Here, how- 
 ever, is what was said of him by one who had 
 shared his dangers : 
 
 " What shall I say but thus ; we lost him that in 
 all his proceedings made justice his first guide and 
 experience his second, ever hating baseness, sloath, 
 pride and indignitie more than any dangers ; that 
 never allowed more for himselfe than his souldiers 
 with him ; that upon no dangers would send them 
 where he would not lead them himselfe ; that would 
 
214 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 never see vs want what he either had, or could by 
 any means get vs ; that would rather want then bor- 
 row, or starve then not pay ; that loved action more 
 then words, and hated falshood and covetousness 
 worse than death ; whose adventures were our lives, 
 and whose losse our deaths." 
 
 A few miles below here on the bluff the Powha- 
 tan's Chimney, the sole remaining relic of the 
 royalty of the old Indian king. It stood until a 
 few years ago, when owing to our shameful neglect 
 of all things historical, it fell and now it lies 
 prone. It had the honor of being built by Cap- 
 tain Smith, and was erected on the requisition of 
 the Emperor for "a house, a grind-stone, fifty 
 swords, some guns, a cock and hen, with much 
 copper and many beads." The fireplace is wide 
 enough to roast an ox, and there is grave sus- 
 picion that it has served to roast other cattle — 
 Payanketank rebels and the like. All this land 
 about here was a part of the old Page estate, Pose- 
 well. Away to the left it stretches, taking in all 
 of Timber Neck, which came to the Pages in 1690 
 with Mary Mann, whom Matthew Page married. 
 
 That broad stream down there is Carter's Creek. 
 There it was that Powhatan and his people used to 
 land in pre-colonial days, and brown canoes, driven 
 by dark warriors or dusky maidens, shot in and out. 
 Later on, in the spring evenings, white-winged sail- 
 boats, with proud-faced dames and portly, ruddy 
 gentlemen, or with laughing girls in rich attire, and 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 215 
 
 gay young gallants, glided to and fro, now drifting 
 wide apart, now near together, side by side, amid 
 mirth and shouts and laughter. 
 
 Across the creek, a hundred yards, stands Eose- 
 well, the ancient Page mansion, massive, stark, and 
 lonely, a solid cube of ninety feet. Once it had long 
 colonnades and ample wings, the ruins of which latter 
 yet stand, and it was flanked by great and numer- 
 ous out-buildings — stables, barns, warehouses, and 
 negro quarters. All have vanished before the years, 
 and nothing is left except the stately old mansion. 
 
 When it was built in 1725-30, it was the largest 
 mansion in Virginia, and continued such for many 
 years. Indeed, there are but few as large now. 
 The great hall was wainscoted with mahogany, 
 and the balustrade of the grand stairway, also 
 of mahogany, was beautifully carved by hand to 
 represent baskets of fruit, flowers, etc. The roof 
 over the windows was originally covered with lead, 
 but during the Eevolution it was stripped off for 
 bullets by its master, the fiery patriot, John Page, 
 who presented the lead to the State and was 
 hardly persuaded at last to receive for it even con- 
 tinental money. The letter of Edmund Pendleton 
 regarding it is still in existence. The master of 
 Rosewell came out of the war with broken for- 
 tunes, his large plantations going one after another 
 to pay his debts. Shortly after his death, the 
 place was sold for twelve thousand dollars to a 
 man, who after making a fortune by selling every- 
 
216 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 thing lie could sell, from the trees on the lawn to 
 the wainscoting in the hall, sold the place, stripped 
 and denuded as it was, at a large advance. The 
 vandal not only sold the bricks around the grave- 
 yard, and the fine old cedars in the avenue, but what 
 was even worse, whitewashed the superb carved 
 mahogany wainscoting and balustrade. Once again 
 it is in the hands of gentlefolk. 
 
 There is a tradition that Thomas Jefferson, while 
 absent from his seat in Congress in 1775-76, spent 
 some time at this house, in reflection and study, 
 crystallizing into worthy expression those principles 
 which he was shortly afterward to set forth in the 
 " Great Declaration." It is said that he then sub- 
 mitted his rough draft of that great paper to his 
 friend John Page before it was seen by any one 
 else, and when independence was no more than a 
 possibility. There was then a summer-house on 
 the roof, and the place where it stood is pointed 
 out as the spot where the paper was read and dis- 
 cussed. There is, perhaps, nothing to substantiate 
 the legend, except that it has always been one of 
 the traditions of the house. 
 
 The founder of the Page family in Virginia was 
 " Collonel John Page," who, thinking that a princi- 
 pality in Utopia might prove better than an acre 
 in Middlesex, where he resided, came over in 1656. 
 He came from the pretty little village of Bedfont, 
 Middlesex, where the Pages had for generations 
 been lords of the small manor of Pate, and where 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 217 
 
 they lie buried in the chancel of the quaint little 
 Norman church. He was a literary man, and in 
 his latter days wrote a book of religious medita- 
 tions which he dedicated to his son. It was entitled 
 "A Deed of Gift," and is written in the quaint and 
 earnest style of the seventeenth century. It shows 
 him to have been a man of no mean ability and of 
 deep piety. He gave the land on which is built the 
 old church in Williamsburgh, and a fragment of his 
 tombstone recording his virtues used to lie across 
 the walk doing service as a paving flag until a few 
 years ago, when it was removed by a pious descend- 
 ant to the interior of the church, and a monument 
 was erected to his memory. He had an eye for 
 "bottom-land," and left his son Matthew an im- 
 mense landed estate, which he dutifully increased 
 by marrying Mary Mann, the rich heiress of Tim- 
 ber Neck. Their son, Mann, was a lad thirteen 
 years old when his father died. After being sent 
 to Eton, he came back and took his place at the 
 "Council Board," as his fathers had done before 
 him and his descendants did after him. 
 
 Mann Page built the Kosewell mansion. The 
 bricks and material were all brought from England, 
 and the stately pile grew slowly under the Virginia 
 sun to be a marvel of pride and beauty for that 
 time. The long inscription upon the tomb " piously 
 erected to his memory by his mournfully surviving 
 lady " presents a complete biography of Mann, who, 
 together with his pride, possessed the independence, 
 
218 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the dignity, and the virtue so often found combined 
 in the old colonial gentleman. He possessed the 
 colonial instinct, and fought the tax which the home 
 government wished to place on tobacco. The tradi- 
 tion is that he died just as he completed the man- 
 sion, and that the first time the house was used 
 was when his body was laid out in the great hall. 
 The three surviving sons of Mann were Mann, John, 
 and Bobert, who became the heads respectively of 
 the Rosewell, the North End, and the Broadneck 
 branches of the family. Mann's eldest son, John, was 
 a most ardent patriot, and would undoubtedly have 
 been hanged if General Washington had surren- 
 dered to Cornwallis, instead of the latter to him. 
 He and Thomas Jefferson were at William and 
 Mary College together, and that closest of bonds, a 
 college friendship, commenced there and lasted 
 throughout their lives. As college students, they 
 together stood at the door of the House of Bur- 
 gesses, and, looking in, heard Patrick Henry ring 
 out his famous warning to George III. From that 
 time, the two young men were rebels, and their 
 views were of the most advanced order. There re- 
 main a number of rattling " college-boy " letters 
 which passed between the cronies at a time when 
 the light of the world, to them, were "Nancy's" 
 and " Belinda's " eyes, and Fame's siren voice had 
 not sounded in their ears. In a letter bearing date 
 Christmas Day, 1762, Jefferson, frozen up in his 
 Albemarle home, wrote his friend : 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 219 
 
 " You cannot conceive the satisfaction it would 
 give me to have a letter from you. Write me 
 circumstantially everything which happened at the 
 wedding. Was she there ? Because, if she was, I 
 ought to have been at the devil for not being there 
 too." 
 
 The " she " alluded to was his ladylove, Miss 
 Rebecca Burwell. The letter goes on : 
 
 " Tell Miss Alice Corbin that I verily believe 
 the rats knew I was to win a pair of garters from her, 
 or they never would have been so cruel as to carry 
 mine away. This very consideration makes me so 
 sure of the bet that I shall ask everybody I see 
 from that part of the world what pretty gentleman 
 is making his addresses to her. I would fain ask 
 Miss Becca Burwell to give me another watch paper 
 of her own cutting, which I should esteem much 
 more, though it were a plain round one, than the 
 nicest in the world cut by other hands." 
 
 A few weeks later, he writes to his friend a 
 mournful, woful epistle, like that of any other love- 
 lorn swain. After inveighing against the dulness 
 of his life, he says : 
 
 " How have you done since I saw you ? How 
 did Xancy look at you when you danced with her 
 at Southall's ? Have you any glimmering of hope ? 
 How does R. B. do ? Had I better stay here and 
 do nothing, or go down and do less ? Or, in other 
 words, had I better stay here while I am here or go 
 down, that I may have the pleasure of sailing up the 
 
220 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 river again in a full-rigged flat ? Inclination tells 
 me to go, receive my sentence, and be no longer in 
 suspense ; but reason says, if you go, and your at- 
 tempt proves unsuccessful, you will be ten times 
 more "wretched than ever. ... I hear that Ben Harri- 
 son has been to Wilton. Let me know his success." 
 
 Ben Harrison's success at Wilton, where he was 
 courting Anne Randolph, a cousin of both Jefferson 
 and Page, was greater than that of either the writer 
 of the letter with " R. B." or of the recipient with 
 "Nancy." Miss Anne, after leading her lover a 
 reasonable dance, married him, and had the honor of 
 being the wife of a governor of Virginia. " Nancy " 
 and " Little Becky " might themselves have sat in 
 even higher places than they did sit in had they 
 only smiled a little more on their lovers. Cupid, 
 however, lacks the gift of prophecy ; and Fame will 
 not tell her secrets till the time comes, for the 
 sweetest lips that ever smiled. 
 
 Young Page, having failed with Nancy, found 
 consolation at the feet of his sweet cousin, Frances 
 Burwell, daughter of Colonel Burwell of Carter's 
 Creek, and the niece of President and Secretary 
 Nelson. When quite a young man he became a 
 member of the King's Council and of the Board of 
 Trustees of the College, and represented that insti- 
 tution in the General Assembly. 
 
 When the storm came, Page, although the young- 
 est member of the King's Council, was the head of 
 the Republican element in the Council. He repre- 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 221 
 
 sented Gloucester in the Great Convention, was 
 elected president of the Privy Council, and was a 
 member of the Committee of Safety that had control 
 of the Virginia forces. He served as a colonel in 
 the army. He was also a member of the first Con- 
 gress, and continued a representative from Virginia 
 for eight years, and until, as he said, John Adams 
 and Alexander Hamilton shut him out. 
 
 He was a man of great culture as well as of large 
 wealth. His classical library was probably as fine 
 us any in the colonies ; and he was, for his time, a 
 man of scientific attainments. His calculations of 
 eclipses still exist, and it indicates the spirit of the 
 period, that he made them not for Virginia, but 
 " for Kosewell." He was a stanch Republican, and 
 the selection of Virginia's famous motto, Sic Sem- 
 per Tyrannis, and of the figure of Liberty on our 
 coin was due to him. 
 
 Like their kinsmen, the Nelsons, the Pages were 
 Episcopalians, living after the straitest sect of their 
 religion so strictly that they were regarded as the 
 pillars of the establishment in the colony. Yet, 
 great as was their love for the Church, their love of 
 liberty was not less, and they took an active part in 
 the disestablishment. The purity of their motives 
 will be understood when it is learned that the fami- 
 lies were such rigid churchmen that Mrs. General 
 Nelson never was in a " meeting-house " in her life, 
 and never heard a " dissenter " preach, except 
 when, being present with her husband in Philadel- 
 
222 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 phia, in July, 1776, her patriotism overcame her 
 principles, and she went to hear Doctor Wither- 
 spoon preach before Congress. 
 
 John Page was a great churchman, and was 
 urged to stand for orders and take the Virginia 
 mitre when it was first decided to send a bishop to 
 the colony, but he declined. The importunity of 
 his friends at length worried him so, that he said 
 " he'd be damned if he would be their bishop " — 
 a resolution this expression of which probably 
 saved him further trouble on that score. 
 
 After the Revolution, the master of Rosewell 
 became governor of Virginia, and continued to be 
 re-elected until, after three terms, he became in- 
 eligible by constitutional limitation. 
 
 So long as the master lived, Rosewell, although 
 mortgaged for debts contracted for the cause of 
 liberty, was kept up, a grand old Virginia mansion, 
 open to all, gentle and simple, the home of hospi- 
 tality more boundless than the wealth of all its 
 owners. But after that it passed out of the family. 
 It is, perhaps, the most interesting, as it is the 
 largest, colonial relic in the South. 
 
 The following sketch of Colonel John Page 
 of Rosewell, sometime governor of the Common- 
 wealth of Virginia, was written by him in the form 
 of a letter to Skelton Jones, Esq., of Richmond, 
 Virginia. It was in answer to one which was 
 addressed to Colonel Page, dated August, 1808, 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 223 
 
 submitting certain queries concerning his life, char- 
 acter, etc., and requesting him to give answers 
 thereto, which might be embodied in a narrative, 
 and published in a work which Mr. Jones was 
 about to issue from the press, probably the contin- 
 uation of Burke's " History of Virginia." 
 
 I was born on the 17th day of April, old style, Anno 
 Domini, 1743, at Kosewell. I discover from the tomb 
 stones in Williamsburg Churchyard, and from others in 
 my Grandfather's burying ground, at his family seat, Rose- 
 well, 1st, that one of my ancestors named John Page, 
 was a highly respectable character, and had long been 
 one of the King's Council in this Colony, when he died, 
 viz. on the 23d January, 1691-2 ; his manuscripts which I 
 have seen, prove that he was learned and pious. 2d. That 
 his Son Matthew Page, was one of the Council, and his 
 Son Mann also, whose letters to his friends, and theirs to 
 him, exhibit as a patriotic, well educated, and truly ami- 
 able gentleman. He had his classical education at Eton 
 school in England. He was my father's father, who might 
 also have been appointed to the office of a Councillor, 
 but he declined it in favour of his younger brother John 
 Page, who, my father said, having been brought up in the 
 study of the law regularly, was a much more proper per- 
 son for that office than he was. The John Page above 
 first mentioned was, as we find by an old picture, a Sir 
 John Page, a merchant of London, supposed to have been 
 knighted, as Sir John Randolph long after was, for pro- 
 posing a regulation of the Tobacco trade and a duty 
 thereon. Which if it was the case, I think his patriotism 
 was premature, and perhaps misplaced ; his dear, pure 
 minded, and American patriotic grand son, my grandfather, 
 Mann Page, in his days checked the British Merchants from 
 
224 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 claiming even freight on their goods from England, declaring 
 that their freight on our Tobacco, and homeward bound 
 articles, added to their monopoly of our Trade, ought to 
 satisfy avarice itself: this he expressed repeatedly to his 
 mercantile friends, and some near relations who were To- 
 bacco merchants in London ; however he lived not long 
 after ! The fashion or practice then was for men of landed 
 property here, to dispose of their children in the following 
 manner: they entailed all their lands on their eldest son, 
 brought up their others, according to their genius and dis- 
 position, physicians, or lawyers, or merchants, or ministers 
 of the church of England, which commonly maintained 
 such as were frugal and industrious. My father was fre- 
 quently urged by friends, but not relations, to pay court to 
 Sir Gregory Page, whose heir from his Coat of Arms, and 
 many circumstances, he was supposed to be. But he de- 
 spised titles sixty years ago, as much as you and I do 
 now; and would have nothing to say to the rich silly 
 Knight, who died, leaving his estate and title to a sillier 
 man than himself, his sister's son, a Mr. Turner, on con- 
 dition that he would take the name and title of Sir Gregory 
 Page, which he did by act of Parliament, as I was told, or read. 
 I was early taught to read and write, by the care and 
 attention of my grandmother, one of the most sensible, and 
 best informed women I ever knew. She was a daughter of 
 the Hon. Kobert Carter, who was President of the King's 
 Council, and Secretary of Virginia, and who at the same 
 time, held the rich office of Proprietor of the Northern neck, 
 by purchase, from the Lord Proprietor, his friend, who was 
 contented to receive but 300L per annum for it, as the re- 
 port in the family stated. My Grandmother excited in my 
 mind an inquisitiveness, which, whenever it was proper, she 
 gratified, and very soon I became so fond of reading, that I 
 read not only all the little amusing and instructing books 
 which she put in my hands, but many which I took out of 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 225 
 
 my father's and grandfather's collection, which was no 
 contemptible library. 
 
 But in the year 1752, when I was nine years old, my 
 father put me into a grammar school, at the glebe house of 
 our parish, where the Rev'd Mr. Wm, Yates had under- 
 taken the tuition of twelve scholars. I found there Lewis 
 Willis (the late Col. L. W.) of Fredericksburg, Edward 
 Carter, (his brother, Charles Carter of Shirley, had just left 
 this school and gone to William and Mary College,) Severn 
 Eyre, of the Eastern Shore, Peter Beverley Whiting, and 
 his brother John, Thos. Nelson, (the late Gen. Nelson,) 
 Christopher Robinson of Middlesex, Augustine Cook, and 
 John Fox of Gloster ; so that I made up, or kept up the 
 number which Yates required ; but in a short time, his pas- 
 sionate disposition induced L. Willis, and Edward Carter to 
 leave him, and Severn Eyre not long after followed the 
 Carters to our College, where Edward had joined his brother 
 Charles. The two Whitings followed them, and Mr. Nelson, 
 and Col. Tucker, took their sons and sent them to England, 
 to finish their education ; and at the end of my year, Robin- 
 son, Cooke, and Fox, went to College, and my father and 
 Mr. Willis procured a most excellent tutor for their sons, 
 instead of sending them there. I had been totally inter- 
 rupted in my delightful reading of Histories, and Novels, 
 for twelve months tied down to get by heart an insipid and 
 unintelligible book, called Lilly's Grammer, one sentence in 
 which my master never explained. But happily, my new 
 tutor Mr. Wm. Price, at Mr. Willis's, soon enabled me to 
 see that it was a complete Grammer, and an excellent Key 
 to the Latin Language. This faithful and ingenious young 
 man, who was about 20 years of age, and had been studying 
 the language at his leisure, as he was intended for the 
 church, into which he could not enter till he was 24 years 
 of age, was happily of a most communicative disposition, 
 and possessed the happiest talents of explaining what he 
 
226 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 taught, and rendering it an agreeable, and most desirable 
 object ; was beloved and strictly attended to by me. After 
 3 years close application to my studies under Mr. Price, 
 some circumstances occurred which induced him to accept 
 of the office of Secretary to the Hon. Philip Ludwell, who 
 was deputed by the Governor to meet a Convention of Gov- 
 ernors, or their deputies, at New York, to resolve on the 
 quotas of money that each colony should furnish to carry 
 on the war against France, and his mind had been so in- 
 flamed by the military ardour displayed in the letters of 
 Capt. George Mercer, (afterwards Colonel of the 2d Va. 
 Regiment,) another old fellow collegian, who had quitted 
 the academic groves there for the field of Mars, which he 
 had always read to me with enthusiasm, that he resolved to 
 abandon the humble employment he was in, and to fly to 
 the Royal standard, to fight as it seemed necessary then 
 to do, pro Aris et Focis, instead of going to England for a 
 License to come back, and preach and pray. For Brad- 
 dock's defeat had terrified all but the brave, and every 
 coward believed and said that we were on the point of 
 destruction. My dearly beloved Tutor, however, after hav- 
 ing enjoyed Lieutenancy a few months in the British army, 
 died! 
 
 It is highly probable that Mr. Price's Whiggish princi- 
 ples, and his inducing me to admire Roman and Grecian 
 Heroes, and to delight in reading of wars and battles, and 
 to enquire on what the success of those interesting events 
 turned, " gave the colour and complexion" to my prospects 
 and conduct through life ; otherwise I know not what could 
 have borne me up to defy the terrible threats of George the 
 3d, and at last actually oppose his troops in arms, aa the 
 heroical militia of Gloster, now Gloster and Mathews, enabled 
 me to do. 
 
 After I had lost my tutor Mr. Price, my father entered 
 me in the Grammar School at William and Mary College, 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 227 
 
 when I was 13 years of age, instead of sending me to 
 England, as he had promised my mother he would, before I 
 should arrive at that age. But fortunately for me, several 
 Virginians, about this time, had returned from that place 
 (where we were told learning alone existed) so inconceiv- 
 ably illiterate, and also corrupted and vicious, that he swore 
 no son of his should ever go there, in quest of an education. 
 The most remarkable of these was his own Cousin Eobert 
 Carter, of Nominy, who however in a course of years, after 
 he had got a seat at the Council board, studied Law, His- 
 tory, and Philosophy, and although his knowledge was very 
 limited, and his mind confused by studying without the 
 assistance of a tutor, he conversed a great deal with our 
 highly enlightened Governor, Fauquier, and Mr. Wm. Small, 
 the Professor of Mathematics at the College of Wm. and 
 Mary, from whom he derived great advantages. And his 
 understanding was so enlarged, that he discovered the cruel 
 tyrannical designs of the British government, and when I 
 found him at the Council Board, in the time of Lord Dun- 
 more, he was a pure and steady patriot. At College, as my 
 father put me to lodge, board, &c, at the President's, 
 Thomas Dawson, a younger brother of Dr. William Dawson, 
 at whose death Thomas succeeded to his office of President 
 of William and Mary College, and the Bishop of London's 
 Commissary in Virginia, and of course became his suc- 
 cessor in the Council ; for the Bishop of London always had 
 sufficient weight with the King, to place his Deputy Bishop, 
 as we may call him, in that mimick deputy House of Lords 
 — I gay at College, as I lived with the President, who my 
 Father had feed handsomely to be my private tutor, and he, 
 finding me far better graduated in Latin than many boya 
 much older than myself, was proud to introduce his pupil 
 to the particular attention, first of Governor Dinwiddle, an 
 old Scotch gentleman, who was fond of appearing a patron 
 of learning, and secondly, to Governor Fauquier, to whose 
 
228 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 much greater learning and judgment my ever to be beloved 
 Professor, Mr. Small, had held me up as -worthy of his 
 attention ; — I had finished my regular course of studies, in 
 the Philosophy Schools, after having gone through the 
 Grammar School, before the death of Governor Fauquier; 
 and having married Miss Prances Burwell, only daughter of 
 the Hon. Robert Burwell, and of his wife Sarah Nelson, the 
 half sister of William Nelson, and Thos. Nelson, (two broth- 
 ers and members of the King's Council,) I was by these 
 gentlemen, introduced to Lord Botetourt's attention, when 
 he arrived here as Governor, and, after his death, to Lord 
 Dunmore, on his arrival. These circumstances contributed 
 to introduce me into public life ; and added to my having 
 been twice elected, by the President and Professor of Wm. 
 and Mary College, to represent it in our general Assembly, 
 and had been appointed by the Governor and visitors, a 
 visitor of the College. 
 
 As a visitor, I faithfully supported the rights and privi- 
 leges of both Professors and Students ; and notwithstanding 
 I had been placed at the Council Board by Lord Dunmore, 
 I opposed his nomination of John Randolph as a visitor, 
 boldly declaring that as he had been rejected en a former 
 occasion, as not possessing the disposition and character, 
 moral and religious, which the Charter and Statutes of the 
 College required, he ought not again to be nominated, till 
 it could be proved that he had abandoned his former princi- 
 ples, and practices, which no one could venture to say he 
 had. I then proposed Nathaniel Burwell, in the place of 
 Lord Dunmore's nomination, and he was elected I think by 
 every voice except Dunmore's. For this, although he never 
 shewed any marks of resentment, I found I had incurred 
 his displeasure, and that of his Secretary, Capt. Edward 
 Foy, who resented my conduct so much before some of my 
 friends, that I was obliged to call him to an account for it — ■ 
 and he, like a brave and candid man, made full reparation 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 229 
 
 to me, and my friend James Innes, at that time Usher of 
 the Grammar School in "William and Mary College, after- 
 wards the well-known Col. Innes. I continued to discharge 
 the duty of a visitor till I was elected a memher of Con- 
 gress, when finding that I could not attend the visitations, I 
 resigned my office of visitor. As a member of the General 
 Assembly, I voted always in favour of civil and religious 
 liberty ; that is for the enaction of those laws that would 
 promote either, and for the abolition of entails. In the 
 Council, I adhered to my former Whiggish principles, and 
 of course opposed the Tory principles of the Governor, a 
 pupil of Lord Bute ; for he boasted that he was the com- 
 panion of George III. during his tuition under that Earl— . 
 ("Par nobile Fratrum!"'). At one Board, I joined with 
 those patriotic members who advised the issuing of new 
 writs for the election and call of an Assembly, and at a 
 time when it was dangerous (as far as a loss of office went) 
 to propose it, as the Governor had plainly given us to under- 
 stand, that the King was determined to rule the Colonies 
 without their check, or controul ; and at another Board, I 
 boldly advised the Governor to give up the Powder and 
 Arms, which he had removed from the Magazine. But he 
 flew into an outrageous passion, smiting his fist on the table, 
 saying, " Mr. Page, I am astonished at you." \ calmly re- 
 plied I had discharged my duty, and had no other advice to 
 give. As the other Councillors neither seconded or opposed 
 me, he was greatly embarassed. As I was never summoned 
 to attend another Board, I might well suspect I was sus- 
 pended from my office ; but as I cared nothing about that, I 
 never enquired whether I was or not. P. Henry, afterwards 
 so famous for his military parade against Dunmore, did 
 actually bully him, but they appeared to me to be mutually 
 afraid of each other. I never refused any office, however 
 humble, or however perilous. I served as Col. of a Regi- 
 ment of Militia, which was offered me during a serious inva- 
 
230 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 sion; and resigned but that of Councillor, after having 
 served, as I expressed in my letter to the General Assembly, 
 beyond what I conceived was the time contemplated by the 
 Constitution. 
 
 In 1784, I served as an Academician, with Bishop 
 Madison, Mr. K. Andrews, and Andrew Ellicott, in ascer- 
 taining and fixing the boundary between Pennsylvania and 
 Virginia ; and in 1785, as a Lay Deputy of the Protestant 
 Episcopal Church, deputed by the Convention of Virginia 
 with the Kev. Dr. Griffiths, and the Rev. Mr. McCroskey to 
 
 represent in the Grand Convention, at New York. I 
 
 then served my native county as a representative in Assem- 
 bly, till the new Constitution threw me into Congress, 
 where I served my country eight years with a safe con- 
 science,^ till John Adams and A. Hamilton shut me out ; 
 I however repeatedly struggled to get in again, but in vain. 
 
 I would require volumes to describe what I did whilst 
 in the Committee of Safety, Council, and Congress, and no 
 small one to relate the interesting and hazardous services 
 I performed with my brave associates in Gloster and 
 Mathews. If I live my Memoirs shall do justice to the 
 brave and patriotic county, Lieut. Peyton, and many 
 others who deserve; but my Lieut. Col. Thomas Baytop, 
 and his brave patriotic brother, who served under him 
 freely during those times, and Capt. Camp, now Colonel, 
 are alive, as is also Capt. Hudgins, now of Mathews, who 
 displayed, with many other officers, bravery and skill, par- 
 ticularly Col. J. Baytop. 
 
 I next served in the military character as Lieut. Col. 
 Commandant in Gloster, and took my tour of duty, as Com- 
 mander of a Regiment, composing part of the quota called 
 from Virginia, to quell the insurgents in the Western 
 Country. Though sick, I marched and joined my Brigadier 
 at Winchester, and my Major General at Frankfort, near 
 the foot of the Alleghany, who finding me actually ill, 
 
TWO OLD COLONIAL PLACES 231 
 
 torrote me a consolatory letter, and advised me to return 
 tome by slow marches. 
 
 Before I had the benefit of a Philosophical education at 
 College, with Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Walker, Dabney Carr, and 
 others, under the illustrious Professor of Mathematics, 
 Wm. Small, Esq. , afterwards well known as the great Dr. 
 Small, of Birmingham, the darling friend of Darwin, His- 
 tory, and particularly military and naval History, attracted 
 my attention. But afterwards, natural and experimental 
 Philosophy, Mechanics, and, in short, every branch of the 
 Mathematics, particularly Algebra, and Geometry, warmly 
 engaged my attention, till they led me on to Astronomy, 
 to which after I had left College, till some time after I was 
 married, I devoted my time. I never thought, however, 
 that I had made any great proficiency in any study, for 
 I was too sociable, and fond of the conversation of my 
 friends to study as Mr. Jefferson did, who could tear him- 
 self away from his dearest friends, to fly to his studies. 
 
 The memoir was never completed, having been 
 interrupted by the illness and death of its author. 
 He succeeded James Monroe as governor of Vir- 
 ginia in 1802. This office he held for three suc- 
 cessive terms, — the longest period allowed by the 
 Constitution, — and was thereafter appointed by 
 Mr. Jefferson Commissioner of Loans for Virginia, 
 which office he held at the time of his death, on 
 the 11th of October, 1808. In 1790, while a mem- 
 ber of Congress, he married his second wife, Miss 
 Margaret Lowther of New York, who survived 
 him, as did also children of each marriage. 
 
232 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 He lies buried in the churchyard of " Old St. 
 John's," 1 Richmond, Virginia, close to the walls 
 which he held sacred to the service of God and his 
 country. 
 
 1 Here met on the 20th of March, 1775, the Second Virginia 
 Convention, which lasted a week, and adjourned after taking 
 steps for putting the colony in a "posture of defence." It was 
 during the debate on this subject that Patrick Henry made the 
 famous speech concluding with the well-known sentence, " Give 
 me liberty, or give me death." 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 
 
 I knew him only in his latter days ; bnt I hare 
 known those who knew him well, and thus I have 
 come to have some knowledge of him ; and as he has 
 passed away it seems to me well that some memory 
 of him should be preserved. He was a notable per- 
 sonage ; a character well worth preserving ; a con- 
 stituent part of our civilization. He was the most 
 considerable man of the county. The planter, the 
 preacher, and the doctor were all men of position 
 and consideration ; but the old lawyer surpassed 
 them all. Without the wealth of the planter, the 
 authority of the clergyman, or the personal affection 
 which was the peculiar possession of the family 
 physician, the old lawyer held a position in the 
 county easily first. He was, indeed, as has been 
 aptly said, a planter, though he was not that pri- 
 marily. Primarily he was a lawyer. He managed 
 his farm only by the way. 
 
 Often, perhaps generally, he was of good family 
 and social connection ; or if he was not, he was a 
 man of such native force of mind and character that 
 he had made and maintained his position without 
 such adventitious aids, in a social system to the 
 
 235 
 
236 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 aristocratic exclusiveness of which his case was the 
 single exception. Generally, he was both clever 
 and ambitions ; for only the exceptionally clever 
 and ambitious were put at the bar. 
 
 He had the prestige of a college education (except 
 in the instance mentioned, where by his natural 
 powers he had, without such aid, made himself), 
 and his education was an education indeed, not 
 a mere cramming of the memory with so many 
 facts or so many statements concerning so many 
 things. His knowledge was not rudis indigestaque 
 moles. 
 
 Thus when he left college he had a mind trained 
 to work on whatever was before it like a well- 
 adjusted machine, and not a mere shell littered up 
 with indiscriminate information. He was ambi- 
 tious, and his aspirations were high ; otherwise 
 he would not have taken to the bar. Probably 
 he had taken a turn at politics as a young man, 
 usually on the losing side. If he was success- 
 ful, he generally continued in politics, and thus 
 was not an "old lawyer," but a statesman or poli- 
 tician who might or might not practise law by 
 the way. 
 
 His training was not always that of the modern 
 law-class ; but it was more than a substitute for it ; 
 and it was of its own kind, complete. He " read 
 law under " some old lawyer, some friend of his 
 father or himself, who, although not a professor, 
 was, without professing it, an admirable teacher. 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 237 
 
 He associated with him constantly, in season and 
 out of season ; he saw him in his every mood ; he 
 observed him in intercourse with his clients, with 
 his brothers of the bar, with the outside world ; he 
 heard him discourse of law, of history, of literature, 
 of religion, of philosophy ; he learned from him to 
 ponder every manifestation of humanity; to con- 
 sider the great underlying principles into which 
 every proposition was resolvable ; he found in him 
 an exemplification of much that he inculcated, and 
 a frank avowal of that wherein he failed. He 
 learned to accept Lord Coke's dictum: "melior est 
 petere fontes quam sectari rivulos" — to look to the 
 sources rather than to tap the streams ; he fed upon 
 the strong meat of the institutes and the commen- 
 taries, with the great leading cases which stand now 
 as principles ; he received by absorption the tra- 
 ditions of the profession. On these, like a healthy 
 child, he grew strong without taking note. Thus 
 in due time when his work came he was fully 
 equipped. His old tutor had not only taught him 
 law ; he had taught him that the law was a science, 
 and a great, if not the greatest science. 
 
 He had impressed him with the principles which 
 he himself held, and they were sound; he had, 
 indeed, stamped upon his mind the conviction that 
 he, his tutor, was the greatest lawyer of his time, a 
 conviction which no subsequent observation nor 
 experience ever served to remove. 
 
 His law library was a curious one ; it embraced 
 
238 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the great text-writers, only the greatest — Bracton, 
 Coke upon Littleton, Blackstone — generally in old 
 editions with marginal notes in the handwriting 
 of his early and ambitious days ; it had probably 
 the Virginia Reports and a few, a very few, old 
 English reports, the decisions of Lord Hardwick 
 and Lord Mansfield being among them, generally 
 in odd volumes, the others having been borrowed 
 and never returned. 
 
 On circuit he carried his library and his ward- 
 robe in his saddle-bags. 
 
 If, however, his law library was scant, his gen- 
 eral library was much more complete ; on the shelves 
 of his book-presses were the classics, both Latin 
 and English, all testifying use, for nothing there 
 was for show. These he knew ; he not only read 
 them, but loved them ; he associated with them ; 
 he revelled in them. The poets and sages of the 
 past were his teachers, his friends. 
 
 He had made his mark, perhaps unexpectedly, 
 in some case in which the force of his maturing 
 intellect had suddenly burst forth, astonishing 
 alike the bar and the bench, and enrapturing the 
 public. Perhaps it was a criminal case; perhaps 
 one in which equity might be on his side, with the 
 law dead against him ; and which was regarded by 
 older men with the conservatism of age as impos- 
 sible until, by his brilliant effort, he unexpectedly 
 won it. As like as not he rode forty miles that 
 night to give a flower to his sweetheart. 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 239 
 
 From this time his reputation, his influence, and 
 his practice increased. His professional position 
 was henceforth assured. He had risen from a tyro 
 to be an old lawyer. 
 
 He married early, and for love, the daughter of a 
 gentleman, very likely of the old lawyer with whom 
 he had read law ; perhaps a beauty and a belle, 
 who, with many suitors, chose the young lawyer, 
 whom older men were beginning to speak of, and 
 younger men were already following ; who had 
 brought her the news of his victory that night, and 
 who could cope with her father in a discussion or 
 disdainfully destroy a younger disputant. He took 
 her to live on some poor plantation, in an old house 
 which stood amid great oaks and hickories, with 
 scanty furniture and few luxuries, yet which, 
 under their joint influence, became an old Virginia 
 home, and a centre of hospitality and refinement. 
 Here he lived, not merely had his being, a machine 
 or part of a machine ; but lived, and what a life it 
 was ! The body fed and kept in health ; the soul 
 free from vice and debasement, dwelling in con- 
 stant intercourse with a beautiful being ; in com- 
 munion, if not with God, at least with his two 
 chief ministers : Nature and a gracious, gentle, and 
 pure woman; the intellect nourished by associa- 
 tion with a pure spirit, by contact with the best 
 thought of ancient and modern times, and by con- 
 stant and philosophic reflection. The world pros- 
 pered ; friends surrounded him ; young children 
 
240 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 with, their mother's eyes came and played about 
 his feet, with joyous voices making his heart con- 
 tent. Thus he grew, his circle ever widening as 
 the circle of our horizon widens when we climb 
 towards heaven. These were some of the influ- 
 ences which created him. 
 
 Let me mention one of the chief. It was his 
 wife. She believed in him ; she worshipped him. 
 She knew he ought to be Chief Justice of the 
 United States. She was the supreme presence 
 which made his home and gave him in large part 
 his distinctive character. She ruled his house, 
 regulated his domestic affairs, and was his chief 
 minister. In all matters within the curtilage, in- 
 deed, she was the head. Within this boundary 
 and in all that pertained thereto, with a single 
 exception, she was supreme. That exception was 
 his old desk or "secretary." It was sacred even 
 from her, consecrated to him alone. There were 
 kept piles of old letters, and bundles of old papers 
 in what appeared to her orderly mind a strange 
 confusion ; but which he always declared was the 
 perfection of order, though it invaria,bly took him 
 a long time to find any particular paper he might 
 want, a difficulty which he attributed to the occa- 
 sion when she had once shortly after marriage 
 attempted in his absence to "put things in order." 
 Since then she had regarded the desk and its con- 
 tents with profound reverence. He repaid her by 
 holding her as the incarnation of all wisdom and 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 241 
 
 vtrtue. He stood before her as before an inscru- 
 table and superior being. He intrusted to her all 
 his personal affairs, temporal and spiritual. He 
 could not have secured an abler administrator. 
 She was his complement, the unseen influence 
 which made him what he was. She created the 
 atmosphere in which he shone. 
 
 His professional life, once begun, went on. The 
 law is an enlistment for life and the battle is ever 
 in array. No client who appeared with the requi- 
 site certificate of clientage was ever refused. 
 There was no picking and choosing. The old law- 
 yer was a sworn officer of the court, a constituent 
 element of the great juridical system of the 
 country. Whoever wanted legal advice, and applied 
 to him for it, was entitled to it and received it. 
 From that moment the relation of counsel and 
 client began. It was a sacred relation. His clients 
 were his " clients " in the good old original sense of 
 the term. They were not merely persons who came 
 into an office and bought and paid for so much pro- 
 fessional service; they were his clients, who con- 
 fided in his protection as their patron, and received 
 it. The requisite preliminaries, it is true, had to be 
 satisfactorily arranged ; the client had to recognize 
 his importance ; his authority as his counsel 5 the 
 good fortune he had in securing his services ; he 
 had to promise to transfer to him a proper portion 
 of his personal estate as a proof that he did under- 
 stand the full measure of this good fortune, and 
 
242 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 then he became his counsel. From this moment 
 the client had obtained the use of a new force. 
 From this moment he "had counsel." Every power 
 and every resource were devoted to his service. 
 No time was too precious to be spent, no labor too 
 arduous to be endured in his behalf. Body, mind, 
 and soul, his counsel had flung himself into his 
 cause ; guided by his professional instinct, spurred 
 by his professional pride, he identified himself 
 with his client's cause, ready to live for it, fight 
 for it, and if necessary even die for it. Public 
 opinion had nothing to do with his undertaking a 
 ease. He thought but of his profession. He would, 
 if applied to, defend a client whom if he had not 
 been applied to he would willingly have hung. 
 
 Once in a case, he never gave up ; if possible he 
 carried it on to success, or if he were defeated he 
 expended every intellectual resource in trying to 
 recover ; he was ready to move for new trials, to 
 appeal, to apply for rehearings, and if at the end 
 he were still unsuccessful, he went down damning 
 every one opposed to him, counsel, client, and bench, 
 as a parcel of fools who did not know the law when 
 he put it under their very noses. No wonder that 
 the clients regarded their counsel with veneration ! 
 
 In a trial he was a new being ; his eye bright- 
 ened ; his senses quickened ; his nerves thrilled ; 
 his form straightened; every power, every force, 
 was called into play ; he was no longer a mere law- 
 yer, he was a gladiator in an intellectual contest 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 243 
 
 where the intellect was strung to its highest pitch; 
 a soldier fighting for a cause where reason was 
 wrought in plain, pure, unmistakable nakedness ; 
 where every force of the human mind was called 
 into action, and every chord of the human heart 
 was at hand to be played upon. 
 
 Before a judge he was powerful; for he ar- 
 gued from the bed-rock principles. This was his 
 strength. He was trained to it. Often retained 
 on the court green just before the case was called 
 at bar, in out-of-the-way places where there were 
 no books, he was forced to rely upon his reason; 
 and his reason and his cause equally prospered. 
 One of his maxims was, " Common law is common 
 sense." Another was, "The reason of the law is 
 the life of the law." He did not need books ; as 
 was said, no man had more contempt for author- 
 ities, no man had more respect for authority. 
 
 But if he was potent before a judge, before a 
 jury he was supreme. For pleading he had little 
 or no respect. It was to be accepted as one of the 
 eccentricities of the profession ; it was like some of 
 the unaccountable and inscrutable things in the old 
 dispensation, to be accepted in silence; it was a 
 mystery. His great aim was to come to the jury. 
 He often filed a blank declaration, secure in the 
 knowledge that his opponent would take no advan- 
 tage of him, knowing that next time he might file 
 a blank declaration himself. The real thing was, in 
 the words of one of them, " to brush way the little 
 
244 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 chinquapin bush p'ints and get at the guts of the 
 case." 
 
 He held men generally in some contempt ; but as 
 they approached in the scale to the dignity of mem- 
 bers of the bar, his estimation of them rose. The 
 old clerks, as standing in a close relation to the bar, 
 were his friends, stood high in his regard, and were 
 admitted to a share of his intimacy. The bench he 
 treated with all respect, his true feelings for the 
 persons who sat on it being perhaps sometimes 
 veiled, as it was the position not the man that he 
 respected ; but his affection, his enthusiasm, were 
 reserved for the bar. The profession of the law 
 was to him the highest of all professions. It was a 
 brotherhood ; it was sacred ; it maintained the rights 
 of man, preserved the government, controlled the 
 administration of law. It was the profession of 
 Bacon, and Coke, and Clarendon; of Lord Hard- 
 wick and Lord Mansfield ; of Pratt and El don and 
 Erskine ; of Pendleton, Henry, and Wythe, and the 
 greatest of his race and kind. It was the profes- 
 sion which created the liberties of man and pre- 
 served the rights of man. 
 
 Membership in it was a patent to the possessor, 
 a freemasonry, a tie like that of close common 
 blood which made every member of the bar "a 
 brother lawyer." Every member was assumed to 
 be all right, in virtue of his position, without fur- 
 ther question; when one failed and was found 
 wanting, he dropped out. Special terms of repro- 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 245 
 
 bation were adopted, such as " Shyster " and " Pet- 
 tifogger," the full significance of which was known 
 only to the profession. The extreme penalty was 
 disbarring. It was deemed as great a disgrace as any 
 other criminal sentence. Shrewdness might pos- 
 sibly save the malefactor this extreme result ; but 
 if he were guilty he was sentenced by the opinion 
 of the bar in its severest term. He was "unpro- 
 fessional." 
 
 These things maintained an exalted standard in 
 the profession. They created a sustaining atmos- 
 phere. Wherever the old lawyer went he felt it 
 sensibly. He could not be a lawyer and not be a 
 better and a stronger man. He recognized it ; he 
 made others recognize it; it was a controlling 
 motive in his life. He practised on this basis, and 
 as a result he elevated his profession and made it 
 better than he found it. 
 
 In conversation he was brilliant. The whole 
 field of law, of literature, history, philosophy, was 
 his domain. In all of them he ranged at will, 
 exhibiting a knowledge, an intelligence, a critical 
 faculty, which were astonishing. Though he never 
 wrote a line, he was a philosopher, a wit, a poet. 
 His knowledge of human nature was profound. It 
 Was his chief study. He nearly always spoke of 
 men in the aggregate with contempt ; of the times 
 as " degenerate " ; yet in actual intercourse his 
 conduct was at variance with his talk ; he treated 
 every one with respect. He was in ordinary inter- 
 
246 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 course serious even to gravity, as one who bore 
 heavy responsibilities; it was only with his par- 
 ticular friends at home, or with his "brothers of 
 the bar " on circuit, that he unbent. His fund of 
 anecdote was inexhaustible. He told stories which 
 kept his companions roaring ; told them with in- 
 imitable aptness and delicious humor ; among them 
 he was a boy, jovial, rollicking ; yet, let but a fool 
 approach, and he was dignity itself. To young law- 
 yers he was all kindness. He treated them with a 
 courtesy which was knightly, with a gentleness and 
 consideration which were almost tenderness. In 
 private intercourse he called them by their names, 
 with that flattering familiarity so pleasing to young 
 men. In public he referred to them as "the learned 
 counsel" or "my distinguished young brother." 
 They repaid it by worshipping him. 
 
 It was when he discoursed of law that the real 
 power of his intellect was shown. He spoke of it 
 with affection, with reverence, with enthusiasm. 
 Under his analysis the most intricate problems 
 appeared plain, the most eccentric phases resolved 
 themselves into reason, the "common law was 
 common sense." It was not the law as adminis- 
 tered by fallible judges in petty courts ; it was the 
 law on which Littleton and Coke and Blackstone 
 and Tucker had expended their powers ; the law in 
 its roundness, its beauty, its perfection, worthy to 
 have for its seat "the bosom of God," and for its 
 voice " the harmony of Nature." 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 247 
 
 He was sometimes profane, but never blasphe- 
 mous ; lie was not even generally profane, for he re- 
 garded speech as a fine instrument to be employed 
 rightly. But on occasion he swore with vehemence, 
 with power, with unction ; properly employing his 
 oaths for purposes of superlative malediction. 
 
 In his opinions, outside of the law, he was earnest, 
 bigoted, intolerant. His speech was often fero- 
 cious ; his action was ever the reverse. He was 
 generous to lavishness. He kept open house, and 
 dispensed a boundless hospitality, usually living 
 up to and often beyond his means ; if he did 
 not spend his money, some friend for whom he 
 had gone security almost infallibly would. He 
 was frequently in pecuniary embarrassment; yet 
 he was honest. He sometimes even borrowed 
 money from his clients; but it was done in an 
 open way, with their consent, and always without 
 the least idea of not repaying it. The case may be 
 cited of one who in a suit, being asked what he did 
 with his client's money which he had collected, 
 replied : " Put it in my bank, sir, to my credit, and 
 drew on it at my own sweet will, as is customary 
 among gentlemen of ample means and greater ex- 
 pectations." 
 
 He was more charitable than the rector ; no one 
 ever appealed to him for aid in vain ; he would lend 
 even if he had to borrow to do it. "His pity gave 
 ere charity began." 
 
 He knew every man in his circuit, knew him and 
 
248 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 his father, and often had known his grandfather 
 before him ; knew his history and all his concerns ; 
 was privy (not in the legal sense) to his whole life, 
 and to his every act, frequently to the lives of his 
 parents ; for his familiarity with the affairs of his 
 section was minute, universal. Perhaps it was not 
 to be wondered at that with this intimate knowl- 
 edge he held men at large in some contempt. He 
 was not always a professing Christian; often he 
 was not a member of any church; but his wife 
 was, and this made it all right in his eyes. His 
 failure to be a professing Christian was usually 
 caused less by want of piety than by humility, 
 a sense of personal unworthiness ; but he did jus- 
 tice, loved mercy, and walked humbly with his God, 
 
 His reputation, like his infirmities, increased with 
 his years. Often in his latter days he was forced 
 against his will into political life, where he achieved 
 immediate renown. If be did not enter politics, 
 often he was more potent than if he did. Fre- 
 quently he was called on in times of great popular 
 fervor or excitement to speak to the people, who 
 relied upon him and wanted his council. Gen- 
 erally his eloquence was overwhelming. He made 
 speeches the reputation of which long survived him. 
 
 He died poor, leaving no written memorial of his 
 labors ; often his very name was in a generation or 
 two forgot. But he was the best missed man in 
 his section. He was missed by all; but most of 
 all by the poor, by the helpless; by widows and 
 
THE OLD VIRGINIA LAWYER 249 
 
 orphans. It was only after he passed away that 
 his deeds of kindness were known; that his full 
 worth was recognized. As when a great oak is 
 overthrown by the tempest, its magnitude can be 
 told by the rent it has made, so after he passed from 
 them men came to know how great he had been by 
 the void he left. 
 
 Tradition took up his name and handed down 
 stories of his prowess at the bar which lived, 
 though as time passed they were attached to other 
 names, and his was lost. There was recorded no 
 memorial of his work at the bar ; but for all that 
 his work survived. He left as the fruit of his 
 labors that which he himself would have deemed 
 the highest reward: large services rendered his 
 fellowmen ; much charity done in secret ; a good 
 name, and an unsullied profession. 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY OF 
 THE SOUTHERN PEOPLE 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY OF THE 
 SOUTHERN PEOPLE 
 
 Do we know the true history of the South? I 
 confess that I do not, nor do I know where it may 
 be learned. 
 
 When Phaon, the Sophist, consulted the oracle, 
 he was directed to inquire of the dead. 
 
 " How may this be ? " said the people, " seeing 
 that the dead cannot speak ? " 
 
 The philosopher turned to the records of their 
 wisdom, and there found the answer he sought. 
 
 If the South to-day should consult the oracle and 
 receive this answer, whither should she turn? 
 
 The eloquence which once reverberated from one 
 end of the earth to the other is now an echo ; and 
 the wisdom which created a nation is now the 
 property of every beggar who dares to assert a 
 claim. 
 
 There is no true history of the South. In a few 
 years there will be no South to demand a history. 
 What of our history is known by the world to-day ? 
 What is our position in history ? How are we 
 regarded ? Nothing or next to nothing is known 
 
 263 
 
254 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 of our true history by the world at large. By a 
 limited class in England there is a vague belief 
 founded on a sentiment that the South was the 
 aristocratic section of this country, and that it 
 stood for its rights, even with an indefensible 
 cause. By a somewhat more extended class its 
 heroism is admired sufficiently to partly condone 
 its heresies. But these are a small part of the 
 public. By the world at large we are held to have 
 been an ignorant, illiterate, cruel, semi-barbarous 
 section of the American people, sunk in brutality 
 and vice, who have contributed nothing to the 
 advancement of mankind : a race of slave-drivers, 
 who, to perpetuate human slavery, conspired to de- 
 stroy the Union, and plunged the country into war. 
 Of this war, precipitated by ourselves, two salient 
 facts are known — that in it we were whipped, 
 and that we treated our prisoners with barbarity. 
 Libby Prison and Andersonville have become by- 
 words which fill the world with horror. Why 
 should this be, when the real fact is that Libby was 
 the best lighted and ventilated prison on either 
 side ; when the horrors of Andersonville were 
 greatly due to the terrible refusal of the Northern 
 government to exchange prisoners or to send medi- 
 cines to their sick ; when the prisoners there fared 
 as well as our men in the field and when the treat- 
 ment of Southern prisoners in Northern prisons 
 was as bad if not worse and the rate of mortality 
 was as great there as in ours ? 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 255 
 
 We are paraded as still exhibiting unconquered 
 the same qualities untempered by misfortune; as 
 nullifying the Constitution, falsifying the ballot, 
 trampling down a weaker race in an extravagance 
 of cruelty, and with shameless arrogance imperil- 
 ling the nation as much now as when we went to 
 war. 
 
 This is concisely what the outer world thinks of 
 us, and, in the main, honestly thinks of us. As 
 the issues stand and with the record as it is at 
 present made up, this is what posterity will think 
 of us. 
 
 The Encyclopedia Britannica is generally deemed 
 a standard authority. It may be assumed to be 
 impartial on all American matters as any other 
 authority. In its article on "American Litera- 
 ture," Vol. 1, p. 719, it says this of the South: 
 "The attractive culture of the South has been 
 limited iu extent and degree. The hothouse 
 fruit of wealth and leisure, it has never struck its 
 roots deeply into native soil. Since the Revolution 
 days when Virginia was the nurse of statesmen, the 
 few thinkers of America, born south of Mason and 
 Dixon's line, outnumbered by those belonging to 
 the single State of Massachusetts, have commonly 
 emigrated to New York or Boston in search of a 
 university training. In the world of letters, at 
 least, the Southern States have shone by reflected 
 light; nor is it too much to say that mainly by 
 their connection with the North the Carolinas have 
 
256 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 been saved from sinking to the level of Mexico 01 
 the Antilles." 
 
 Think of this ! this said of the section that largely 
 has made America, governed her, administered jus- 
 tice from her highest tribunal, commanded her 
 armies and navies, doubled her territory, created 
 her greatness. 
 
 How many are here in this audience who cannot 
 tell the name of the ship that brought the Pilgrim 
 Fathers to New England, and then went, according 
 to tradition, on a less paternal pilgrimage ? Prob- 
 ably not one ! 
 
 Now how many are there who can tell the names 
 of the vessels that brought first to the shores of the 
 South the Anglo-Saxon race which reclaimed Amer- 
 ica, and made it forever the home of liberty and 
 Christianity ? 
 
 They were the Discovery, the Good-Speed, and 
 the Susan-Constant. 
 
 Does not the relative notoriety of the two prove 
 that the history of the South has been regarded 
 with indifference ? The men borne hither by these 
 three vessels, and not the passengers on the May- 
 flower, were the Argonauts who first took the 
 Golden Fleece, this golden land. 
 
 From that day to this the South has been content 
 to act, and has not cared for the judgment of her 
 contemporaries, much less of posterity. From that 
 day the deeds which have added a new continent 
 to Christendom and have perpetuated the spirit of 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 257 
 
 liberty have been left without other memorial than 
 their own existence to the all-engulfing maw of time. 
 
 A people has lived, and after having crowded 
 into two centuries and a half a mightiness of force, 
 a vastness of results, which would have enriched a 
 thousand years, has passed away, and has left no 
 written record of its life. A civilization has existed 
 more unique than any other since the dawn of his- 
 tory, as potent in its influence, and yet no chron- 
 icle of it has been made by any but the hand of. 
 hostility. 
 
 Is there any history of this country which you 
 can place in your boy's hands and say, " This is 
 the true history of your native land " ? 
 
 I do not belittle the local chroniclers who have 
 preserved from absolute oblivion the records of 
 their native States. On the contrary, I hold them 
 and their unrequited toil in all honor. Except for 
 their labors of love the story of the Old South 
 would have been lost in the abyss of the irreclaim- 
 able past ; we should have been forced to say as 
 we used to say in the old games of our childhood, 
 " Rats have eaten it and fire has burnt it." 
 
 The very records of the country by which our 
 rights of citizenship are established have been lost 
 by reason of this national negligence. 
 
 The muniments of title to the property we hold, 
 nay, the very proof of our identity and position, 
 social and legal, have been disregarded and de- 
 stroyed. 
 
258 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 I doubt if a large proportion of the respectable 
 people in the South would not, if they were called 
 on to establish the legal marriage of their grand- 
 parents, find themselves compelled to rely on gen- 
 eral reputation. 
 
 The universal indifference at the South to the 
 preservation of public records is appalling. 
 
 It is almost incredible that a race so proud of its 
 position, so assertive of its rights, so jealous of its 
 reputation, should have been so indifferent to all 
 transmission of their memorial. 
 
 The solution of the mystery is to be found, I think, 
 in the wonderful rapidity of the development of the 
 country. The progress of the nation was so marvel- 
 lous that there was no time to record it. Action 
 was so intense and so absorbing that no leisure 
 was found to give to its contemplation. The race 
 was so momentous that young Atalanta had no 
 time to pause even to secure the apples of the 
 Hesperides. 
 
 When the stern exactions of colonial life gave 
 place to the gentler phase which advancing civili- 
 zation brought, the transition was so great and so 
 sudden that the senses were lulled in a sweet ob- 
 livion to the demands of the future, and were satis- 
 fied with enjoyment of the present. It was a life 
 which the outer world misunderstood and mis- 
 judged. The spirit of the Southerner, accustomed 
 as he was to domination, was not such as to take 
 misjudgment meekly. He met it with a pride 
 
THE WANT OP A HISTORY 259 
 
 which success did not temper and defeat could not 
 quell. 
 
 He was eminently self-contained, and his own 
 self-respect satisfied, he cared not for the world's 
 applause. He was content to live according to his 
 own will, and as there was no human tribunal to 
 which he wished to submit his acts, why should he 
 keep a record of his life ? 
 
 Thus it is, that the only history of the South is 
 that contained in the journals of the time, and in 
 the fragmentary minutes of the polemic warfare 
 in which a large part of the population was unceas- 
 ingly engaged, and the South is to-day practically 
 without a written history. I cannot accept as her 
 true history the dissertations composed in part of 
 the disjointed records divorced from the circum- 
 stances which called them into being, and for the 
 rest, of the lubrications of the hostile or the un- 
 sympathetic commentator. Her history must have 
 another source than this. 
 
 From the birth of the American people the two 
 sections of the country were the North and the 
 South. Mason and Dixon's line stretched from the 
 East to the West before it received its baptismal 
 name. 
 
 The origins of the two populations were differ- 
 ent. The tendencies were yet more diverse. Two 
 essentially diverse civilizations were the result. 
 That of the North was compact, cohesive, and com- 
 mercial. The settlement was in towns or town* 
 
260 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 ships. The municipality possessed and exercised 
 powers which never could have been tolerated at 
 the South. That of the South was diffusive and 
 agricultural. It tended to the development of the 
 individual, and to guardfulness of his rights. As- 
 sertion of the rights, privileges, and franchises of 
 the individual was the cardinal doctrine of the 
 South. The Southerner bore this with him as an 
 inalienable heritage wherever he went, into prime- 
 val forests and across mountain ranges. Kentucky- 
 had yet hard work to hold her own against the sav- 
 age when she was adopting her celebrated resolu- 
 tions. 
 
 The New Englander went to his meeting-house 
 to receive instruction and to accept direction from 
 the authorized powers, spiritual and temporal. 
 
 The Southerner rode through trackless forests 
 to argue questions as to their powers and their 
 authority. 
 
 At first the interests of the two sections were 
 not merely not identical, but were conflicting, until 
 the coalition between the French and the Indian, 
 bringing identity of danger, created identity of in- 
 terest. The tyranny of the British crown continued 
 this cause and brought the two sections, for the pur- 
 pose of common defence, into a close confederation. 
 The restrictions and the impotency of this confeder- 
 acy were so great, and the advantages of a " more 
 perfect union " were so manifest, that the Articles of 
 Confederation gave way to a new compact, embrac* 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 261 
 
 ing such "alterations and provisions" as seemed 
 necessary to "render the Federal Constitution ad- 
 equate to the exigencies of government ajid the 
 preservation of the Union." 
 
 The result was the Constitution of the United 
 States. 
 
 Hardly had the Union been established before 
 the divergent interests of the two sections reas- 
 serted themselves. From this time the struggle 
 on the part of each was to obtain ascendency, and 
 to control the government, each jealously opposing 
 every attempt on the part of the other to ex- 
 tend its power. Unfortunately, a factor remained 
 which rendered harmony impossible. African 
 slavery, which at one time had been as acceptable 
 at the North as at the South, had been found not 
 suited to the latitude nor to the peculiar civilization 
 which existed there. It was, therefore, in process 
 of abolition, and in a comparatively brief period, 
 through the instrumentalities of emancipation, and 
 of transference, it disappeared at the North. 
 
 After a time hostility to this institution be- 
 came the excitant of the popular mind against the 
 South, and was the lever with which the politi- 
 cians worked the overthrow of this section. At 
 the period of which I speak, however, its legality 
 was as frankly admitted at the North as at the 
 South ; it was, indeed, expressly recognized in the 
 Constitution of the United States, and it was only 
 one of a number of differences which brought the 
 
262 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 two sections into opposition, and finally precipi- 
 tated a war. 
 
 The real cause of the antagonism of the two sec- 
 tions at that day was the sectional rivalry which 
 existed between them. The Southern States at 
 first had a large excess of territory ; but when the 
 first census was taken in 1790 there was but a small 
 numerical excess over the population of the North, 
 and counting the States about to be admitted, each 
 section had the same number of States. 
 
 In order to disarm jealousy growing out of excess 
 of area, and to facilitate the union, Virginia, the 
 largest and most powerful State, stripped herself 
 of her vast northwestern territory and ceded to the 
 general government that region from which, since 
 then, have been carved the States of Ohio, Indiana, 
 Illinois, Michigan, and a large part of Minnesota. 
 
 Then she gave her heart, Kentucky. These 
 States, with one exception, were settled by a North- 
 ern population, and became Northern in sentiment, 
 throwing a heavy preponderance into the Northern 
 scale, and destroying the equilibrium which had 
 existed, and upon which depended the peace and 
 security of the nation. 
 
 From this time, the South was never permitted 
 to increase her power without a corresponding in- 
 crement to the North. Every step taken to restore 
 the old equipoise was met and resisted as tending 
 to Southern aggrandizement, and as a blow at the 
 rights and privileges of the North. The purchase 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 263 
 
 of the vast territory of Louisiana as early as 1803, 
 and the admission of a State carved from the new 
 acquisition, excited such violent opposition at the 
 North that warnings came from New England 
 threatening to dissolve the Union, which implied a 
 view of the social compact not altogether consistent 
 with that subsequently taken by New England 
 statesmen. In 1812-15 New England, her trade 
 being injured by the war with Great Britain, again 
 threatened to secede. Not a great many years 
 afterward, in 1819-20, the attempt to bring into 
 the Union another portion of the vast Louisiana 
 domain as the State of Missouri brought the strug- 
 gle to a climax, and the existence of the Union 
 was again seriously imperilled by the menace on 
 the part of Northern States to dissolve it. 
 
 The difficulty was finally temporarily arranged 
 by the noted Missouri Compromise, which admitted 
 Missouri as a State, but prohibited slavery in all 
 that portion of the Louisiana territory (except Mis- 
 souri only) lying north of 36° 30' north latitude. 
 
 It may be supposed that this philanthropic pro- 
 vision, which was effected by the Northern vote, 
 was due to abhorrence of the peculiar institution 
 which existed at the South. The histories we have 
 been brought up on teach this. The fact is other- 
 wise. Long subsequent to this, Abolitionists were 
 held in equal contempt and encountered equal oblo- 
 quy at the North and at the South. 
 
 The provision embraced in the Missouri Com- 
 
264 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 promise was based on the facts that a considerable 
 portion of the property of Southerners consisted of 
 slaves ; that when the Southerner emigrated, he, 
 like Abraham of old, carried his slaves with him ; 
 and that if he could not take them, he remained 
 where he was. It was an effective means of pre- 
 venting the extension of Southern influence. This 
 was the first time that the sentiment against slavery- 
 was utilized as a lever to aid the North in its 
 struggle for sectional supremacy. It was not des- 
 tined to be the last time. It was found to be so 
 potent a power that it was employed until event- 
 ually the Northern people came to believe them- 
 selves the chosen people of Israel and looked on 
 the Southerners as the outcasts of the Gentiles. 
 
 It was in this controversy that the term " Seces- 
 sion " was first applied as indicating the action of 
 a State in withdrawing from the Union. 
 
 In the light of subsequent events it is interesting 
 to know that its use in this sense was due to a 
 Northerner who threatened the South with a seces- 
 sion on the part of his people. This fixed intention 
 on the part of the North to retain supremacy was 
 manifested when Southern sagacity and statesman- 
 ship annexed the empire of Texas. 
 
 Again the North resisted this extension of the 
 Union even to the point of a threat to secede and 
 destroy it. It was exhibited again upon the acqui- 
 sition of California and New Mexico from Mexico. 
 The line of the Missouri Compromise was extended 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 265 
 
 West through, the Texan territory, because Texas 
 was Southern already, but when the Mexican do- 
 main was acquired, the North repudiated the prin- 
 ciple of extension and claimed and took it all. 
 
 By these acts it was strong enough to maintain 
 its supremacy in the government, and its power 
 was exercised to establish a system of protection 
 which fostered the manufacturers of the North and 
 imposed the principal burden of taxation on the 
 non-manufacturing South. Whilst the South gov- 
 erned the country, maintained her credit, extended 
 her limits, fought her battles, and established her 
 fame, the North secured protection and under its 
 influences waxed fat. 
 
 Meantime the doctrine of abolition had nourished. 
 In a generation it attained full growth. The sacred 
 name of Liberty inspires the human heart. 
 
 The propagandists of abolition appealed not to 
 the Northern people, but to Christendom, and the 
 South stood at once with the forces of the world 
 arrayed against her. Her every act was misjudged, 
 her every word was misinterpreted. 
 
 She met this censure with sublime scorn. Ar- 
 raigned at the judgment bar, she hurled defiance 
 at her judges. 
 
 She devoted all her intellectual resources, and 
 they were immense, to polemical warfare. In her 
 intemperate anger she permitted herself to abandon 
 her point of vantage. She exercised her constitu- 
 tional privilege and seceded. A great sentiment 
 
266 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 for the Union suddenly thrilled the North. It 
 declared war. The result is known. 
 
 It is to this section, heretofore inherently inca- 
 pable of comprehending her, that the South has left 
 the writing of the history of her civilization. It 
 may appear to be not a matter of importance who 
 writes the story of this country. Manifestly the 
 South has so regarded it. It is, however, a sad 
 fallacy. 
 
 The writings of the propagandists of the North 
 destroyed the power of the South and brought her 
 to destruction. 
 
 And now unless we look to it we shall go down 
 to posterity as a blot on our time, and a reproach 
 to American civilization. 
 
 Does this seem to you a small thing ? In it lies 
 the difference between fame and infamy, between 
 corruption and immortality. 
 
 Does it appear to you impossible ? Do we not 
 now stand at the bar of history, charged with the 
 crime of attempting to perpetuate human slavery, 
 and for this purpose with conspiracy to destroy 
 the best government the world has ever seen — 
 the American Union ? 
 
 We do stand so charged, and if we refuse to make 
 our defence, the judgment of history will be against 
 us for all time. 
 
 Before fifty years shall have passed, unless we 
 look to it, the South's action will have gone into 
 history as the defence of human slavery, and it 
 
THE WANT OP A HISTORY 267 
 
 will be deemed the world over to have been as great 
 a crime against nature as the slave trade itself. 
 
 How may this be avoided ? By establishing the 
 fact that it was not the South, but the time, which 
 was responsible for slavery ; and that this slavery 
 with all its evils, and they were many, was the only 
 civilizer that the African has yet known. By re- 
 cording ere it be too late the true history of the 
 South ; by preserving and transmitting the real life 
 of that civilization, so that future ages may know 
 not what its enemies thought it to be, but what it 
 in truth was. 
 
 Up to the present more than half of the material 
 for a history of this nation has been overlooked — 
 the material contained in the life of the Southern 
 people. The history that has been written is as an 
 ancient palimpsest, in which the writing that is 
 read is but a monkish legend, whilst underneath, un- 
 noticed and effaced, lies the record of eternal truth. 
 
 It remains now to suggest a few elements of the 
 material from which the only true history of the 
 South and of this nation is to be constructed. 
 
 One of the chief elements of strength in the old 
 civilization of the South was self-respect. Arro- 
 gant, as it is charged to have been, and as it may 
 have been, pride lifted it above all meanness and 
 elevated it into the realm of greatness. Its stan- 
 dard was so high that contemplation of it made men 
 upright, and aspiration to it made them noble. I 
 belong to the new order of Southern life. I am one 
 
268 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 of those who can feel the thrill of new energies fill 
 my heart ; I think I can see and admit the incal- 
 culable waste, the narrow limitations of the old. 
 I give my loyal and enthusiastic adherence to the 
 present, with all its fresh and glorious possibilities ; 
 but I shall never forget that it is to the Old South 
 that the New South owes all that is best and noblest 
 in its being. 
 
 Can we ever secure the respect of the world if 
 we have no self-respect ? 
 
 Reverence for the greatness of its past, pride of 
 race, are two cardinal elements in national strength. 
 
 They made the Greek ; they made the Roman ; 
 they made the Saxon ; they made the Southerner. 
 
 We are the inheritors of a thousand years of 
 courage and of devotion to principle. And without 
 these two things we should deserve the contempt 
 of mankind and the reprobation of God. 
 
 Contemporary history is being recorded by writ- 
 ers organically disabled to comprehend the action 
 of the South. It rests with the South whether she 
 shall go down to posterity as they have pictured 
 her — the breeder of tyrants, the defender of slav- 
 ery, the fomenter of treason. 
 
 Scripta ferunt annos. 
 
 We are not a race to pass and leave no memorial 
 on our time. We live with more than Grecian 
 energy. We must either leave our history to be 
 written by those who do not understand it, or we 
 must write it ourselves. 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 269 
 
 If we are willing to be handed down to coming 
 time as a race of slave-drivers and traitors, it is as 
 well to continue in our state of lethargy and acqui- 
 escence ; but if we retain the instincts of men, 
 and desire to transmit to our children the untar- 
 nished name and spotless fame which our fore- 
 fathers bequeathed to us, we must awake to the 
 exigencies of the matter. We stand charged at the 
 judgment bar of history with these crimes. It is 
 useless to close our eyes to the fact. We stand so 
 indicted, and posterity is the tribunal that shall 
 try us. If we refuse to plead, the opportunity will 
 pass away, the verdict of time will be "guilty," 
 and the punishment will be the peine forte et dure. 
 To leave us perpetually bound under the burden of 
 guilt which some would bind on our shoulders, 
 would be to withdraw from the divine heritage of 
 patriotism the best soil for its growth on this conti- 
 nent ; to debar from its influences the best material 
 for war that the Anglo-American race has produced. 
 
 Whatever else may be said, of this much are we 
 sure, that the South and its civilization produced a 
 race of soldiers which has never been surpassed. 
 Present history may multiply her numbers and 
 magnify her resources, but the original archives 
 show with a conclusiveness which cannot be with- 
 stood, the splendid heroism of the fight which, 
 under the inspiration of what she deemed a sacred 
 cause, she made not against the Union, but against 
 the world. 
 
270 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 It was not for interest that she fought ; for war 
 was not to her interest. It was not to dissolve the 
 Union that she seceded ; for secession was again 
 and again rejected by the border States. It was 
 only when war was declared and the Constitution 
 was set aside that these States, driven to their last 
 resort, and, by Mr. Lincoln's call for troops, forced 
 to take the one side or the other, to secede or to 
 invade their sister States, exercised their constitu- 
 tional rights and withdrew from the Union. 
 
 A proof of the deep sincerity of their principles 
 is the unanimity with which the South accepted the 
 issue. From the moment that war was declared, 
 the whole people were in arms. It was not merely 
 the secessionist who enlisted, but the stanch Union 
 man; not simply the slave-holder, but the moun- 
 taineer ; the poor white fought as valorously as the 
 great land-owner ; the women fought as well as the 
 men; for, whilst the men were in the field the 
 women and children at home waited and starved 
 without a murmur and without a doubt. 
 
 Some years ago I was shown a worn and faded 
 letter written on old Confederate paper with pale 
 Confederate ink. It had been taken from the 
 breast-pocket of a dead private soldier of a Georgia 
 regiment after one of the battles around Rich- 
 mond. It was from his sweetheart. They were 
 plain and illiterate people, for it was badly written 
 and badly spelled. In it she told him that she 
 loved him ; that she had always loved him since 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 271 
 
 they had gone to school together, in the little log 
 schoolhouse in the woods ; that she was sorry she 
 had always treated him so badly, and that now, if 
 he would get a furlough and come home, she would 
 marry him. 
 
 Then, as if fearful that this temptation might 
 prove too strong to be resisted, there was a little 
 postscript scrawled across the blue Confederate 
 paper : " Don't come without a furlough, for if 
 you don't come honorable, I won't marry you." 
 
 Was this the spirit of rebellion ? A whole people 
 was in arms. A nation had arisen. It was the 
 apotheosis of a race. 
 
 When Varro lost the battle of Cannae, where 
 the flower of the Roman knighthood was cut clown, 
 the Roman Senate voted thanks to the consul quod 
 de republica non desperasset ; when Lee, with tat- 
 tered standards and broken battalions, recrossed 
 the Potomac, after Gettysburg, the South exhibited 
 greater devotion to him than when he forced Burn- 
 side staggering back across the Rappahannock. 
 When he abandoned Richmond and started on his 
 march Southward, the South still trusted him as 
 implicitly as when, with consummate generalship 
 and a loss to the enemy of more than his own 
 entire army, he had at Spottsylvania wedged Grant 
 from his prey. 
 
 That last retreat surpasses in heroism the retreat 
 of the Ten Thousand. There was but a handful 
 left of the army of Northern Virginia. The attri- 
 
272 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 ticra of four years of war had worn away the heroic 
 army. Starvation had destroyed a part of what the 
 sword had left, and had shrunken the forms of the 
 small remnant; but the glorious courage, the in- 
 domitable spirit of the Southern soldiery gleamed 
 forth; and it had no more thought of surrender 
 then than when it had first burst into flame on the 
 victorious field of Bull Run. It was the crystalli- 
 zation of Southern courage. 
 
 Across the desolated land it retired like a 
 wounded lion, sore pressed by unnumbered foes — 
 stopping only to fight, for there was no rest nor 
 food, until at last on that fateful morning it found 
 the horizon filled with steel. It was hemmed in by 
 the enemy, by the best equipped army that has 
 stood on American soil, led by one of the greatest 
 generals, the magnanimous Grant, and the Southern 
 general saw that resistance was annihilation. Even 
 in that hour of its extremity, the one cry of the 
 little band to the adored Lee was to be led against 
 them once more. 
 
 The chronicler, who can see in this only the per- 
 verseness of rebellion, lacks the essential spirit of 
 the historian. The politician who can discuss it 
 with derision or can view it with indifference will 
 never rise to the plane of statesmanship. 
 
 The deliberate and persistent endeavor to hold 
 in contempt the people that could produce so sub- 
 lime a spectacle and to forbid them participation in 
 the Union, is a greater wrong to the Nation than 
 
THE WANT OF A HISTORY 273 
 
 ■was secession. It is an attempt to keep alienated 
 from the Union a race that has ever hated with 
 fervor but loved with passion ; of a race that with- 
 drew from the Union under a belief in a principle 
 so sincere, so deep, that it was almost idolatrous; 
 of a race that has now under new conditions turned 
 to the Union all the devotion which under different 
 teaching and conditions was once given to the sev- 
 eral States ; devotion which when directed against 
 the Union shook it to its foundation, and now is 
 destined to guard it and preserve it throughout its 
 existence. 
 
 The history of the South is yet to be written. 
 He who writes it need not fear for his reward. 
 Such a one must have at once the instinct of the 
 historian and the wisdom of the philosopher. He 
 must possess the talisman that shall discover truth 
 amid all the heaps of falsehood, though they were 
 piled upon it like Pelion on Ossa. He must have 
 the sagacity to detect whatever of evil existed in 
 the civilization he shall chronicle, though it be 
 gleaming with the gilding of romance ; he must 
 have the fortitude to resist all temptation to deflect 
 by so much as a hair's breadth from the absolute 
 and the inexorable facts, even if an angel should 
 attempt to beguile him. He must know and tell 
 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
 truth, so help him, God! 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 
 
 To any calm observer of the present condition of 
 our country painfully apparent must be the differ- 
 ence between the state of what from long usage we 
 are accustomed to term " the two sections." 
 
 We have one language, one blood, one religion, 
 one common end, one government ; but the North 
 and the South are still " the two sections," as they 
 were one hundred years ago, when the bands of the 
 Constitution were hardly cooled from the welding, 
 or as they were in 1860, when they stood, armed 
 to the teeth, facing each other, and the cloud of 
 revolution was hovering above them soon to burst 
 in the dread thunder of civil war. 
 
 Should one, hearing the phrase "the two sec- 
 tions," take the map of the American Union and 
 study its salient features, he would declare that the 
 two sections were by natural geographical division 
 the East and the West ; should he study the com- 
 merce of the country with its vast currents and 
 tides, its fields of agriculture and manufacture, he 
 would be impelled to declare that by all the inex- 
 orable laws of interest they were the East and the 
 West. And yet we who stand amid the incontest- 
 
 277 
 
278 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 able evidences of events know that against all laws, 
 against all reason, against all right, there are two 
 sections of this country, and they are not the East 
 and the West, but the South and the rest of the 
 Union. 
 
 It is proposed to show briefly why this unhappy 
 condition exists ; and to suggest a few things which, 
 if earnestly considered and patiently advocated, 
 may, in the providence of God, contribute to the 
 solution of the distressing difficulties which con- , 
 front us. 
 
 The divergence of the " two sections " was coeval 
 with the planting of the continent ; it preceded the 
 establishment of the nation. It steadily increased 
 until an irrepressible conflict became inevitable ; 
 and it was not until after this conflict had spent 
 itself that reconcilement became possible. 
 
 The causes of that divergence, with the exception 
 of one, it is not necessary to discuss. This one has 
 survived even the cauterization of war. Other 
 causes have passed away. The right of secession 
 is no longer an active issue. It has been adjudi- 
 cated. That it once existed and was utilized on 
 occasion by other States than those which actually 
 exercised it is undeniable; that it passed away 
 with the Confederate armies at Appomattox is 
 equally beyond controversy. The very men who 
 once asserted it and shed their blood to establish it, 
 would now, whilst still standing by the Tightness 
 of their former position, admit that in the light of 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 279 
 
 altered conditions the Union is no longer dissoluble. 
 They are ready if need be to maintain the fact. It 
 is, however, important to make it clear that the 
 right did exist, because on this depends largely the 
 South' s place in history. Without this we were 
 mere insurgents and rebels ; with it, we were a 
 great people in revolution for our rights. In 1861 
 the South stood aligned against the Union and 
 apparently for the perpetoiation of slavery. The 
 sentiment of the whole world was against it. We 
 were defeated, overwhelmed. Unless we possess 
 strength sufficient to maintain ourselves even in 
 the face of this, the verdict of posterity will be 
 against us. It is not unlikely that in fifty years 
 the defence of slavery will be deemed the world 
 over to have been as barbarous as we now deem 
 the slave-trade to have been. There is but one 
 way to prevent the impending disaster : by estab- 
 lishing the real fact, that, whatever may have been 
 the immediate and apparent occasion, the true and 
 ultimate cause of the action of the South was her 
 firm and unwavering adherence to the principle of 
 self-government and her jealous devotion to her 
 inalienable rights. By perpetuating the true and 
 splendid story of the real position of the South, 
 and of the heroic stand which she made for her 
 rights during those four years of trial, want, and 
 battle, we can wrest fame from defeat and establish 
 her true place in history. 
 
 But if the other causes which kept the country 
 
280 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 divided have passed away as practical issues, one 
 still survives and is, under a changed form, as vital 
 to-day and as pregnant with evil as it was in 1861. 
 
 This is the question which ever confronts the 
 South ; the question which after twenty-five years 
 of peace and prosperity still keeps the South " one 
 section " and the rest of the nation the other. This 
 is the ever-present, ever-menacing, ever-growing 
 negro question. 
 
 It is to-day the most portentous as the most 
 dangerous problem which confronts the American 
 people. 
 
 The question is so misunderstood that even the 
 terminology for it in the two sections varies irrec- 
 oncilably. The North terms it simply the ques- 
 tion of the civil equality of all citizens before the 
 law; the South denominates it the question of 
 negro domination. More accurately it should be 
 termed the race question. 
 
 Whatever its proper title may be, upon its cor- 
 rect solution depend the progress and the security, 
 if not the very existence, of the American people. 
 
 In order that it may be solved it is necessary, 
 first, that its real gravity shall be understood, and 
 its true difficulties apprehended. 
 
 We have lived in quietude so long, and have be- 
 come so accustomed to the condition of affairs, that 
 we are sensible of no apprehension, but rest in the 
 face of this as of other dangers, content and calm. 
 So rest Alpine dwellers who sleep beneath masses 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 281 
 
 of snow which have accumulated for years, and yet, 
 quiet as they appear upon the mountain-sides above, 
 may at any time without warning, by the breaking 
 of a twig or the fall of a pebble, be transformed 
 into the resistless and overwhelming avalanche. 
 
 There are signs of impending peril about us. 
 
 There is, first, the danger incident to the exigence 
 under which the South has stood, and is standing, 
 of wresting if not of subverting the written law to 
 what she deems the inexorable exactions of her 
 condition. 
 
 It is charged that the written law is not always 
 fully and freely observed at the South in matters 
 relating to the exercise of the elective franchise. 
 The defence is not so much a denial of the charge 
 as it is a confession and avoidance. To the accusa- 
 tion it is replied that the written law, when sub- 
 verted at all, is so subverted only in obedience to 
 a higher law founded on the instinct of self-protec- 
 tion and self-preservation. 
 
 If it be admitted that this is true, is it nothing 
 to us that a condition exists which necessitates the 
 subversion of any law ? Is it not an injury to our 
 people that the occasion exists which places them 
 in conflict with the law, and compels them to 
 assert the existence of a higher duty ? Can law 
 be overridden without creating a spirit which will 
 override law ? a spirit ready to constitute itself the 
 judge of what shall and what shall not be consid- 
 ered law ; a spirit which eventually substitutes its 
 
282 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 will for law and confounds its interest with right ? 
 Is it a small matter that our people or any part of 
 them should be compelled, by any exigency what- 
 ever, to go armed at any time in any place in 
 defiance of law ? 
 
 This is a grave matter and is to be considered 
 with due deliberation; for on its right solution 
 much depends. The first step to cure is ever com- 
 prehension of the disease. The first step toward 
 the proper solution of our trouble is to secure a 
 perfect comprehension of it. To do this we must 
 first comprehend it ourselves, and then only can 
 we hope to enlighten others. 
 
 Obedience to law, willing and invariable submis- 
 sion to law, is one of the highest qualities of a 
 nation, and one of the chief promoters of national 
 elevation. Antagonism to law, a spirit which re- 
 jects the restraints of law, retards national progress. 
 
 Can any fraud, evasion, or contrivance whatever 
 be practised or connived at, without by so much 
 impairing the moral sense and character of a people 
 as well as of an individual ? Can any deflection 
 whatsoever, no matter how inexorable the occasion, 
 from the path of absolute rectitude be tolerated 
 without inflicting an injury on that sense of justice 
 and right, which, allied to unflinching courage, con- 
 stitutes a nation's virtue ? Who will say that the 
 moral sense of our people now is as lofty as it was 
 in the days of our fathers, when men voted with 
 uplifted faces for the candidate of their choice ? 
 
THE NEGRO QTJESTION" 283 
 
 The press of a portion of the land is filled with 
 charges of injuries to the negro. The real injury 
 is not to him, but to the white. From opposition 
 to law to actual lawlessness is but a step. This is 
 the first danger. 
 
 The physical peril from the overcrowding among 
 our people of an ignorant and hostile race is not 
 more real than this which threatens our mora] 
 rectitude ; but it is more apparent. 
 
 Senator Hoar of Massachusetts, speaking on the 
 floor of the United States Senate on the 23d of Feb- 
 ruary, 1889, in speaking of the South, said : 
 
 " I make these remarks with full knowledge of 
 the difficult problem that awaits us, and the prob- 
 lem that especially concerns our friends south of 
 Mason and Dixon's line ; but I remember when I 
 make them that the person hears the sound of my 
 voice this moment who, in his lifetime, will see 
 fifty million negroes dwelling in those States." 
 
 Can language paint in stronger colors the peril 
 which confronts us ? The senator went on to 
 depict the evils which might ensue. "If you go 
 on," he said, "with these methods which are re- 
 ported to us on what we deem pretty good evidence, 
 you are sowing in the breast of that race a seed 
 from which is to come a harvest of horror and 
 blood, to which the French Revolution or San Do- 
 mingo is light in comparison." 
 
 Senator Hoar, like most others of his latitude, 
 thinks that he knows the negro, and understands 
 
284 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the pending question. He does not. Had he under- 
 stood the true gravity of that problem, his cheek, 
 as he caught the echo of his own words, would have 
 blanched at the thought of the peril he is trans- 
 mitting to his children and grandchildren ; not the 
 peril perhaps of fire and massacre, but a peril as 
 deadly, the peril of contamination from the over- 
 crowding of an inferior race. All other evils are 
 but corollaries ; the evil of race-conflict, though not 
 so awful as the French Revolution or San Domingo ; 
 the evil of growing armies with their menace to 
 liberty ; the evil of race-degeneration from enforced 
 and constant association with an inferior race : these 
 are some of the perils which spring from that state 
 of affairs and confront ns. At one more step they 
 confront the rest of the Anglo-American people 
 to-day. For the only thing that stands to-day 
 between the people of the North and the negro is 
 the people of the South. 
 
 The chief difficulty in the solution of the ques- 
 tion exists in the different views held as to it by 
 the two sections. They do not understand it alike. 
 They stand as widely divided as to it to-day as they 
 stood twenty-five years ago. Their ultimate inter- 
 ests are identical ; their present interests are not 
 very widely divergent. Their opposite attitudes as 
 to it must, therefore, be due to error somewhere. 
 One or the other section must be in error as to it ; 
 possibly neither may be exactly right. 
 
 This much we know and can assert : there must 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 285 
 
 be an absolutely right position. It is imperatively 
 necessary that we find it ; for on our discovery of 
 it and our planting ourselves firmly on it depends 
 our security. If we have not found it the sooner 
 we realize that fact the better for us and for those 
 that shall come after us ; if we have found it the 
 sooner we make it understood the better. 
 
 One thing is certain, there is no security in 
 silence ; no safety in inaction. If fifty million 
 negroes, or even a much smaller number, are to 
 come with San Domingo and the French Kevolu- 
 tion in their train, the white race has need to 
 awake and bestir itself. 
 
 The recent census has happily showed that Sena- 
 tor Hoar and others like him have overestimated 
 the ratio of increase. 1 But the problem is grave 
 enough as it is. 
 
 The first step to be taken is to turn the light on 
 the subject. Let it be examined, measured, com- 
 prehended, and then dealt with as shall be found to 
 be just and right. The old method of crimination 
 and defiance will no longer avail ; we must deal 
 with the question calmly, rationally, philosophi- 
 cally. We must abandon all untenable positions 
 whatsoever, place ourselves on the impregnable 
 
 1 The percentage of increase of the negro race is shown to be 
 considerably less than that of the white; the percentage of 
 deaths among the former race being largely in excess of that of 
 the latter. See " Vital Statistics of the Negro," by Frederick 
 L. Hoffman, The Arena, April No., p. 529. 
 
286 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 ground of right, and then whatever may befall 
 meantime, we can calmly await the inevitable jus- 
 tification of events. 
 
 In the first place, let us disembarrass ourselves 
 by discarding all irrelevant and extraneous ques- 
 tions : let us make it primarily understood that the 
 pending question has no connection whatever with 
 the question of slavery, or with that of disloyalty to 
 the Union. Putting aside all mere prejudice what- 
 ever, whether springing from the negro's former 
 condition of servitude or from other causes, let us 
 base our argument on facts and the final issue can- 
 not be doubtful. 
 
 Whatever prejudice may exist, a constant, firm, 
 and philosophic presentation of the facts of the 
 case must in the end establish the truth, and secure 
 the right remedy. The spirit of civilization must 
 overcome at last, and whatever obstacles it shall 
 encounter, right must eventually triumph. 
 
 The North deems the pending question merely 
 one of the enforcement or subversion of an elective 
 franchise law ; it has never accepted the proposition 
 that it is a great race question on which hinges the 
 preservation of the Union, the security of the people, 
 white and black alike, and the progress of American 
 civilization. Perhaps no clearer or more authorita- 
 tive exposition of the views held by the North on 
 this question can be found than that set forth in 
 a recent address by Mr. G. W. Cable delivered be- 
 fore the Massachusetts Club of Boston on the 22d 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 287 
 
 of February, 1890. The favor with which it was 
 received by the class to whom it was delivered 
 testifies not the hostility of that class, but the ex- 
 tent to which the question is misunderstood in that 
 section. 
 
 Mr. Cable, after negativing the Southern idea of 
 the question, declares : " The problem is whether 
 American citizens shall not enjoy equal rights in 
 the choice of their rulers. It is not a question of 
 the negro's right to rule. It is simply a question of 
 their right to choose rulers; and as in reconstruction 
 days they selected "more white men for office than men 
 of their own race, they would probably do so now." 
 This is quoted with approval by even so liberal 
 and well informed a thinker as the Rev. Henry M. 
 Field, who certainly bears only good-will to the 
 South, as to the rest of mankind. The endorse- 
 ment of these views by such a man proves that 
 the North absolutely misapprehends the true ques- 
 tion which confronts the nation at this time. It 
 has from constant iteration accepted as facts cer- 
 tain statements such as those quoted, and these 
 constitute its premises, on which it bases all its 
 reasoning and all its action. 
 
 The trouble is that its first premise is fallacious. 
 Its teachers, its preachers, its writers, its orators, 
 its philosophers, its politicians, have with one voice, 
 and that a mighty voice, been for a hundred years 
 instilling into its mind the uncontradicted doctrine 
 that the South brought the negro here and bound 
 
288 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 him in slavery ; that the South kept the negro in 
 slavery ; that to perpetuate this enormity the South 
 plunged the nation in war, and attempted to de- 
 stroy the Union; that the South still desires the 
 re-establishment of slavery, and that meantime it 
 oppresses the negro, defies the North, and stands 
 a constant menace to the Union. 
 
 The great body of the Northern people, bred on 
 this food, never having heard any other relation, 
 believes this implicitly, and all the more dangerously 
 because honestly. If they are wrong and we right 
 it behooves us to enlighten them. 
 
 There are, without doubt, some whom nothing 
 can enlighten ; who would not believe though one 
 rose from the dead. They are not confined to one 
 latitude. There are, with equal certainty, others 
 who for place and profit trade in their brother's 
 blood, and keep open the wounds which peace, but 
 for them, would long ago have healed; who for a 
 mess of pottage would sell the birthright of the 
 nation ; the professional Haman can never sleep 
 whilst Mordecai so much as sits at the gate ; but 
 we can have an abiding faith in the ultimate good 
 sense and sound principles of the great Anglo-Saxon 
 race wherever it may dwell ; and to this we must 
 address ourselves. 
 
 The second thing necessary to the solution of the 
 question is to enlighten the people of the North. 
 If we can show that the question is not, as Mr. 
 Cable states and as the North believes, merely 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 289 
 
 whether the negro shall or shall not have the right 
 to choose his ruler, but is a great race question on 
 which depends the future as the present salvation 
 of the nation, we need have no fear as to the ulti- 
 mate result ; sound sense and right judgment will 
 prevail. 
 
 That there exists a race question of some sort 
 must be apparent to every person who passes 
 through the South. Where six millions of people 
 of one color and one race live in contact with 
 twelve millions of another color and race, there 
 must of necessity be a race issue. The negro has 
 not behaved unnaturally : he has indeed in the 
 main behaved well ; but the race issue exists and 
 grows. The feeling has not yet reached the point 
 of personal hostility ; at least, on the part of the 
 whites ; but as the older generation which knew 
 the ties between master and servant passes away, 
 the race feeling is growing intenser. The negro 
 becomes more assertive ; the white more firm. 
 
 There are a multitude of men and women at the 
 North who do not know that slavery ever really 
 existed at the North. They may accept it histori- 
 cally in a dim, sort of theoretical way, as we accept 
 the fact that men and women were once hanged for 
 forgery or for stealing a shilling ; but they do not 
 take it in as a vital fact. 
 
 Will it not aid the solution of our problem if we 
 can show that New England had as much, if not 
 more, to do with the establishment of African 
 
290 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 slavery on this continent than had the South, 
 though it survived longest in the latter section; 
 that slavery at the North was, whilst it continued, 
 as rigorous a system as ever it was at the South ; 
 that abolition was at the North in the main deemed 
 as illegal, and its advocates encountered as much 
 obloquy there as at the South ; that the emancipa- 
 tion of the slaves was effected not by the Northern 
 people at large, but by a limited band of enthusi- 
 asts and in the wise providence of God ; that the 
 emancipation proclamation was not based on the 
 lofty moral principle of universal freedom, to which 
 it has been the custom to accredit it, but was a war- 
 measure, resorted to only on "necessity of war," 
 and as a means of restoring the Union ; that the 
 investment of the negro with the elective franchise 
 was not the result of a high moral sentiment 
 founded on the rights of man, but was effected in 
 a spirit of heat if not of revenge, and under a 
 misapprehension of the true bearing of such an 
 act; that the negro has not used the power vested 
 in him for the advantage of himself or of any one 
 else, but in a reckless, unreasonable, and dangerous 
 way ; that whilst there have been cases of injustice 
 to him, in the main the restraints thrown around 
 him at the South have been merely such as were 
 rendered necessary to preserve the South from ab- 
 solute and irretrievable ruin; that the same in- 
 stincts under which the South has acted, prevail 
 at the North ; that the negro has been and is being 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 291 
 
 educated by the South to an extent far beyond his 
 right to claim, or the abilities of the white to con- 
 tribute to it ; that he is as yet incapable, as a race, 
 of self-government; that unless the white race 
 continues to assert itself and retains control, a 
 large section of the nation will become hopelessly 
 Africanized, and American civilization relapse and 
 possibly perish ? 
 
 If we can establish the statements which precede 
 the last and no relief shall be given, then that one 
 also will follow as a necessary consequence. 
 
 Slavery was until within, historically speaking, 
 a very recent period, as much a Northern institu- 
 tion as it was a Southern one ; it existed in full 
 vigor in all of the original thirteen colonies, and 
 whilst it existed it was quite as rigorous a system 
 at the North as at the South. Every law which 
 formed its code at the South had its counterpart in 
 the North, and with less reason; for while there 
 were at the South not less than 600,000 slaves, — 
 Virginia having, by the census of 1790, 293,427, — 
 there were at the North, by the census of 1790, less 
 than 42,000. 
 
 Regulations not wholly compatible with absolute 
 freedom of will are necessary concomitants of any 
 system of slavery, especially where the slaves are 
 in large numbers ; and it may move the hearts of 
 our brethren at the North to greater patience with 
 us if we show them that they too are not " without 
 sin." Massachusetts has the honor of being the 
 
292 ' THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 first community in America to legalize the slave- 
 trade and slavery by legislative act; the first to 
 send out a slave-ship, and the first to secure a 
 fugitive slave law. 
 
 Slavery having been planted here, not by the 
 South, as has been reiterated until it is the gener- 
 ally received doctrine, but by a Dutch ship, which 
 in 1619 landed a cargo of " twenty negers " in a 
 famished condition at Jamestown ; it shortly took 
 general root, and after a time began to flourish. 
 Indeed, it flourished here and elsewhere, so that in 
 1636, only sixteen years later, a ship, The Desire, 
 was built and fitted out at Marblehead as a slaver, 
 and thus became the first American slave-ship, but 
 by no means the last. In the early period of the 
 institution it was conceived that as it was justified 
 on the ground that the slaves were heathen, con- 
 version to Christianity might operate to emancipate 
 them. In Virginia, the leading Southern colony, it 
 was adjudicated that this did not so operate ; but 
 long prior to that, and whilst it was the accepted 
 theory, negroes are shown, by the church records, 
 to have been baptized. In Massachusetts, at that 
 time, baptism was expressly prohibited. 
 
 The fugitive slave law, which proved ultimately 
 and naturally so powerful an excitant in the history 
 of slavery, and which is generally believed to have 
 been the product of only Southern cupidity and 
 brutality, had its prototype in the Articles of the 
 Confederation of the United Colonies of New Eng« 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 293 
 
 land (19th May, 1643), in which Massachusetts was 
 the ruling colony. " The commissioners of the 
 United Colonies found occasion to complain to the 
 Dutch governor in New Netherlands in 1646 of the 
 fact that the Dutch agent in Hartford had harbored 
 a fugitive Indian slave-woman, of whom they say in 
 their letter : ' Such a servant is parte of her mas- 
 ter's estate, and a more considerable parte than a 
 beaste.' A provision for the rendition of fugitives, 
 etc., was afterwards made by treaty between the 
 Dutch and the English" (Moore's "History of 
 Slavery in Massachusetts," p. 28, citing Plymouth 
 Colony, Kec. IX. 6, 64, 190). 
 
 Many of the good people of Massachusetts, in 
 their zeal and their misapprehension of the facts, 
 have been accustomed to regard their own skirts as 
 free from all taint whatsoever of the accursed doc- 
 trine of property in human beings, and have been 
 wont to boast that slavery never existed by virtue 
 of law in that grand old Commonwealth, and that 
 certainly no human creature was ever born a slave 
 on her sacred soil. For refutation one need go no 
 further than the work of Mr. George H. Moore, 
 entitled " History of Slavery in Massachusetts." 
 Mr. Moore was librarian of the Historical Society 
 of New York, and corresponding member of the 
 Historical Society of Massachusetts. He says, page 
 19: "It has been persistently asserted and repeated 
 by all sorts of authorities, historical and legal, up to 
 that of the chief justice of the Supreme Court of the 
 
294 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Commonwealth, that 'slavery to a certain extent 
 seems to have crept in; not probably by force of 
 any law, for none such is found or known to exist.' 
 Citing Commonwealth vs. Aves, 18 Pick., Shaw, 
 C. J." He says further: "In Mr. Sumner's famous 
 speech in the Senate, June 28, 1854, he boldly as- 
 serted that ' in all her annals no person was ever 
 born a slave on the soil of Massachusetts'; and, 
 says he, ' if in point of fact the issue of slaves was 
 sometimes held in bondage, it was never by sanction 
 of any statute law of colony or commonwealth.' 
 And 'recent writers of history in Massachusetts 
 have assumed a similar lofty and positive tone on 
 this subject.' Mr. Palfrey says : ( In fact, no person 
 was ever born into legal slavery in Massachusetts ' 
 ("History New England," II. 30, note); Moore, p. 
 21. Mr. Justice Gray, in an elaborate historical 
 note to the case of Oliver vs. Sale, Quincy's R. 29, 
 says : ' Previously to the adoption of the state consti- 
 tution in 1780, negro slavery existed to some extent 
 and negroes held in slavery might be sold ; but all 
 children of slaves were by law free.' " 
 
 Is it any ground for wonder that with these 
 authoritative statements ever iterated and reiter- 
 ated before them, the people of Massachusetts 
 should really have believed that no child had ever 
 been born into slavery on the sacred soil of Massa- 
 chusetts, and that slavery itself only existed to 
 " some extent " ? 
 
 Mr. Moore, with authorities in hand, shows that 
 
THIS TSTEGRO QUESTION 295 
 
 tnese efcolrtiutions are unfounded, and states the 
 uncomfortable but real facts. He quotes the ninety- 
 first article of "The Body of Liberties," which 
 appears in the first edition under the head of " Lib- 
 reties of Forreiners & Strangers," and in the sec- 
 ond edition, that of 1660, under the title of " Bond- 
 Slavery." 
 
 " 91. There shall never be any bond-slaverie, vil- 
 linage or captivity amongst us unles it be lawfull 
 captives taken in just warres, and such strangers 
 as willingly sell themselves or are sold to us. 
 And these shall have all the liberties and Chris- 
 tian usages which the law of God established in 
 Israel concerning such persons doeth morally re- 
 quire. This exempts none from servitude who 
 shall be judged thereto by authoritie" (M. H. S. 
 Coll. Ill, VIII. 231). 
 
 After showing the evolution of this law, Mr. 
 Moore, on page 18, says : 
 
 "Based on the Mosaic Code, it is an absolute 
 recognition of slavery as a legitimate status, and 
 of the right of one man to sell himself, as well as 
 that of another man to buy him. It sanctions the 
 slave-trade and the perpetual bondage of Indians 
 and negroes, their children and their children's 
 children, and entitles Massachusetts to precedence 
 over any and all other colonies in similar legisla- 
 tion. It anticipates by many years anything of the 
 sort to be found in the statutes of Virginia or 
 Maryland, or South Carolina, and nothing like it 
 
296 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 is to be found in the contemporary codes of her 
 sister colonies in New England" (Compare Hil- 
 dreth, I. 278). 
 
 Chief Justice Parsons, in the leading Massachu- 
 setts case of Winchendon vs. Hatfield in error, 
 referring to the dictum of C. J. Dana in a previous 
 case, that a negro born in that colony prior to the 
 Constitution of 1780 was free, though born of slave 
 parents, admits candidly, "It is very certain that 
 the general practice and common usage had been 
 opposed to this opinion." 
 
 These and other authorities cited by Mr. Moore 
 would seem to place the matter absolutely beyond 
 all question. 
 
 Now as to the abolition of slavery : 
 
 What are the historical facts as to this ? It is 
 true that slavery had been abolished at the North ; 
 but this was under conditions which, had they pre- 
 vailed at the South, would have been taken advan- 
 tage of there also; and when the institution was 
 abolished in the Northern States, it had become so 
 unprofitable that no great credit can attach to the 
 act of abolition. 1 It is also true that there were 
 throughout the North a considerable body of men 
 and women who, from a very long time back, be- 
 lieved sincerely that human slavery was a crime 
 
 1 " The breeding of slaves was not regarded with favor. Dr. 
 Belknap says that negro children were considered an incum- 
 brance in a family; and when weaned were given away like pup- 
 pies " (Moore, p. 57, citing M. H. S. Coll. 1, IV. 200). 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 297 
 
 against nature, and strove zealously and persist- 
 ently to overthrow it. At the South there were 
 also many who labored with not less earnestness 
 to effect the same end; though, owing to differ- 
 ent conditions, the same means could not be em- 
 ployed; and, standing face to face with the im- 
 mense slave population which existed at the South, 
 they saw the same danger which faces us to-day, 
 and sought in colonization the means at once to 
 abolish slavery, to free America, and to christianize 
 Africa. 
 
 As to actual, immediate emancipation, however, 
 it was no more the intentional work of the North 
 as a people than it was of the South. 
 
 The credit for it, even so far as creating a public 
 opinion which rendered it eventually possible, is 
 due to a band of emancipators, who, for a long time 
 absolutely insignificant in numbers, and ever com- 
 paratively few when contrasted with the great body 
 of the people of the North, devoted their energies, 
 their labors, their lives, to the accomplishment of 
 this end. During their labors they encountered no 
 less obloquy, and experienced scarcely less peril at 
 the North than at the South, with this difference, 
 that at the North the outrages perpetrated upon 
 them were inspired by a mere sentiment, whilst at 
 the South the vast number of slaves made any inter- 
 ference with them intolerable, and the treatment 
 abolitionists received was based on a recognition of 
 the fact that the doctrines they promulgated might 
 
298 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 at any moment plunge the South into the horrors 
 of insurrection. 
 
 It was not at the South, but at the North, in 
 Connecticut, that Prudence Crandall was, for teach- 
 ing colored girls, subjected to a persecution as bar- 
 barous as it was persistent. After being sued and 
 pursued by every process of law which a ISTew 
 England community could devise, she was finally 
 driven forth into exile in Kansas. 
 
 She opened her school in Canterbury, Connecti- 
 cut, in April, 1833, and was at once subjected to the 
 bitterest persecution conceivable. It was all well 
 enough to hold theories about the equal rights of 
 all mankind ; well enough to abuse the institution of 
 slavery in Virginia, in South Carolina, in Georgia, or 
 in Louisiana; but to actually start "a nigger school" 
 in Canterbury, Connecticut, was monstrous. The 
 town-meeting promptly voted to " petition for a 
 law against the bringing of colored people from 
 other towns and States for any purpose, and more 
 especially for the purpose of dissemination of the 
 principles and doctrines opposed to the benevolent 
 colonization scheme." " In May an act prohibiting 
 private schools for non-resident colored persons, and 
 providing for the expulsion of the latter, was pro- 
 cured from the legislature, amid the greatest rejoic- 
 ings in Canterbury, even to the ringing of church- 
 bells." The most vindictive and inhuman measures 
 were adopted against the offender ; the shops and 
 meeting-houses were closed against her and her 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 299 
 
 pupils ; " carriage in public conveyances was denied 
 them ; physicians would not wait upon them ; Miss 
 Crandall's own family and friends were forbidden 
 under penalty of heavy fines to visit her ; the well 
 was filled with manure, and water from other sources 
 refused ; the house itself was smeared with filth, 
 assailed with rotten eggs, and finally set on fire " 
 ("Life of William Lloyd Garrison," I. p. 321). 
 
 It was not at the South, but at Canaan, New 
 Hampshire, that on August 10, 1835, " the building 
 of the Noyes Academy, open to pupils of both colors, 
 in pursuance of a formal town-meeting vote that 
 it be 'removed,' was dragged by one hundred yoke 
 of oxen from the land belonging to the corporation, 
 and left on the common, three hundred yeomen of 
 the county participating. The teacher and colored 
 pupils were given a month in which to quit the 
 town" {lb. p. 494). 
 
 Throughout New England, less than thirty years 
 before the promulgation of the emancipation proc- 
 lamation abolitionists encountered not only oppro- 
 brium but violence. When George Thompson, the 
 English abolitionist, went throughout the North in 
 1835, "his windows were broken in Augusta, Maine, 
 where a State anti-slavery convention was in prog- 
 ress, and a committee of citizens requested him to 
 leave town immediately under pain of being mobbed 
 if he re-entered the convention. At Concord, New 
 Hampshire, he was interrupted with missiles while 
 addressing a ladies' meeting. At Lowell, Massachu- 
 
300 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 setts, on his second visit, in the town hall a brickbat 
 thrown from without through the window narrowly- 
 escaped his head, and in spite of the manliness of 
 the selectmen a meeting the next evening was aban- 
 doned in the certainty of fresh and deadly assaults" 
 ("Life of William Lloyd Garrison," I. p. 452). 
 
 Here is an extract from a letter of Mr. William 
 Lloyd Garrison : " Our brother Thompson had a 
 narrow escape from the mob at Concord, and Whit- 
 tier was pelted with mud and stones " (" Life," p. 
 517). 
 
 " At a convention in Lynn, George Thompson was 
 stoned. The next evening he was mobbed by three 
 hundred men. All this in New England. Finally, 
 the English missionary was driven out of the coun- 
 try, being in danger, as Garrison wrote, of assassina- 
 tion even in the streets of Boston" (Letter from 
 Garrison to his wife, November 9, 1835). Indeed, 
 mobs were as frequent at that period in New Eng- 
 land as they could have been in Virginia or South 
 Carolina had the abolitionists attempted to preach 
 their doctrines here. William Lloyd Garrison 
 himself was assailed and denounced, and even in 
 the city of Boston was subjected to the bitterest 
 and most persistent persecution. He was notified 
 to close up the office of his paper, The Liberator, 
 under penalty of tar and feathers. A placard was 
 circulated, stating that a purse of one hundred dol- 
 lars had been raised to reward the first man who 
 should lay hands on the "infamous foreign scoun- 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 301 
 
 drel Thompson/' so that he might be brought to 
 the tar-kettle before dark. 
 
 Finally, Garrison himself was mobbed in Boston, 
 torn out of the house in which was the office of the 
 Anti-Slavery Society, where he was attending a meet- 
 ing of women, and was dragged through the streets 
 of Boston with a rope around him, and but for the 
 cleverness of two sensible men who got him into the 
 City Hall he would have been killed. Even there 
 he was in such peril that he was put into the jail 
 to keep him from the mob, which came near getting 
 possession of him a second time. This mob was 
 not, as may be supposed, a mob of the creatures 
 who usually constitute such an assembly, but is 
 said to have been composed of respectable and 
 well-dressed persons. Garrison, attacking the mayor 
 afterwards, in the press, for not taking his part 
 more firmly, declared that if it had been a mob of 
 workingmen assaulting a meeting of merchants, 
 no doubt he would have acted with energy, "but 
 broadcloth and money alter the case," he says 
 (Lib. 5, 197). Indeed, the mayor acknowledged 
 that "the city government did not very much dis- 
 approve of the mob to put down such agitators as 
 Garrison and those like him" ("Life of William 
 Lloyd Garrison," II. p. 35). 
 
 It is notable that the entire press of Boston, 
 with hardly more than one or two exceptions, 
 approved the action of the mob and censured Gar- 
 rison. 
 
302 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Hear what Garrison himself had to say of it- 
 
 " 1. The outrage was perpetrated in Boston, the 
 cradle of liberty, the city of Hancock and Adams, 
 the headquarters of refinement, literature, intelli- 
 gence, and religion. No comments can add to the 
 infamy of this fact. 
 
 " 2. It was perpetrated in the open daylight of 
 heaven, and was therefore most unblushing and 
 daring in its features." 
 
 "4. It was dastardly beyond precedent, as it 
 was an assault of thousands upon a small body of 
 helpless females. Charleston and New Orleans 
 have never acted so brutally. 
 
 "5. It was planned and executed, not by the 
 rabble or the workingmen, but by ' gentlemen of 
 property and standing, from all parts of the city,' 
 — and now (October 25th) that time has been 
 afforded for reflection, it is still either openly 
 justified or coldly disapproved by the 'highei 
 classes,' and exultation among them is general 
 throughout the city. ..." 
 
 " 7. It is evidently winked at by the city authori- 
 ties. No efforts have been made to arrest the lead- 
 ing lis/tdESL . -. .. 
 
 All of this was within three years of the time 
 when a bill to abolish slavery in Virginia W& 
 failed in her General Assembly by only one vote. 
 
 There is surely no necessity to pile up more 
 authority on this point. If there were it could be 
 done ; for not only in New England, but elsewhere 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 303 
 
 in the North, instances can be cited in which vio- 
 lence, and once even murder, occurred. Elijah P. 
 Lovejoy, after having his printing office sacked 
 three times, fell a martyr to the ferocity of a mob 
 in Illinois for having, under an instinct of humanity, 
 aided a fugitive slave to escape. On one thing, how- 
 ever, the North may with justice pride itself : that 
 in the end, there was awakened in it a general senti- 
 ment for emancipation. For this it was indebted to 
 a work of genius produced by a woman ; a romance 
 which touched the heart of Christendom. " Uncle 
 Tom's Cabin " overruled the Supreme Court of the 
 United States, and abrogated the Constitution. By 
 arousing the general sentiment of the world against 
 slavery, it contributed more than any other one 
 thing to its abolition in that generation. 
 
 But not even then did the North set out to 
 abolish slavery. President Lincoln is universally 
 accredited as the emancipator of the African. It 
 is his hand which is represented in bronze and 
 marble as striking the shackles from the slave. 
 He was the chosen and great standard-bearer of the 
 most advanced element of the North, the great rep- 
 resentative of their ideas, the idolized chief magis- 
 trate, and the trusted commander of their armies. 
 
 His words on this subject must be authoritative. 
 
 On the 22d of December, 1860, after South Caro- 
 lina had seceded, he says : " Do the Southern people 
 really entertain fears that a Kepublican administr?' 
 tion would directly or indirectly interfere with J.>, 
 
304 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 slaves or with them about their slaves ? . . . The 
 South would be in no more danger in this respect 
 than it was in the days of Washington." 
 
 On the 4th of March, 1861, in his official utter- 
 ance, his inaugural address, he says : " I have no 
 purpose directly or indirectly to interfere with the 
 institution of slavery in the States where it now 
 exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, 
 and I have no inclination to do so." 
 
 If there can possibly be a more authoritative 
 declaration than this, we have it in a resolution 
 passed by Congress of the United States, and signed 
 by Lincoln as President in July, 1861, after the 
 battle of Manassas : 
 
 " Resolved . . . that this war is not waged upon 
 our part in any spirit of oppression, nor for any 
 purpose of conquest or subjugation, nor purpose of 
 overthrowing or interfering with the rights or estab- 
 lished institutions of those States, but to defend 
 and maintain the supremacy of the Constitution and 
 to preserve the Union with all the dignity, equality, 
 and rights of the several States unimpaired," etc. 
 
 Slave-holding even in Federal territory was not 
 forbidden until June 19, 1862, which was just a 
 month before the bill was passed providing that 
 all "slaves of persistent rebels found in any place 
 occupied or commanded by the forces of the Union 
 should not be returned to their masters [as they 
 had hitherto been under the law], and providing 
 that they might be enlisted to fight for the Union." 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 305 
 
 A Constitutional Amendment (the thirteenth), 
 abolishing and prohibiting evermore the enslave- 
 ment of human beings, failed to pass in the House 
 of Representatives in the session of 1864, and would 
 have failed altogether had not a member from 
 Ohio changed his vote in order to move a recon- 
 sideration and keep it alive till the following ses- 
 sion, when Mr. Lincoln having been re-elected, 
 and having recommended its passage, and the war 
 being evidently near its end, it was passed by a 
 vote of 119 yeas to 57 noes. 
 
 Indeed, before Mr. Lincoln issued his emancipa- 
 tion proclamation he gave one hundred days' warn- 
 ing to the revolutionary States to lay down their 
 arms, and in the proclamation he places the entire 
 matter forever at rest by declaring in terms in 
 that unmistakable English of which he was a mas- 
 ter that the measure was adopted " upon military 
 necessity." 
 
 No one can read this record and not admit that 
 slavery was abolished in the providence of God, 
 against the intention of the North and of the 
 South alike, because its purpose had been accom- 
 plished, and the time was ripe for its ending. 
 
 The next step is the discussion of the attitude 
 in which we, the white people of the South, stand 
 to the negro. This attitude is too striking, if not 
 too anomalous, not to have attracted wide atten- 
 tion. A race with an historic and glorious past, in 
 a high stage of civilization, stands confronted by 
 
306 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 a race of their former slaves, invested with every 
 civil and political right which they themselves pos- 
 sess, and supported by an outside public senti- 
 ment, which if not inimical to the dominant race, 
 is at least unsympathetic. The two races cannot 
 be termed with exactness hostile, — in many re- 
 spects, not even unfriendly; but they are suspi- 
 cious of each other; their interests are in some 
 essential particulars conflicting, and in others may 
 easily be made so ; the former slave race is politi- 
 cally useful to the outsiders by whose sentiment 
 they are sustained, and the former dominant race 
 is unalterably assertive of the imperative necessity 
 that it shall govern the inferior race and not be 
 governed by it. 
 
 Now what is the question ? Is it merely the 
 question, as stated by Mr. Cable, "whether the 
 negro shall not have the right to choose his own 
 rulers " ; or is it a great race issue between the 
 negro and the white ? 
 
 If it is a question of mere perverse imposition 
 by the white on the black, by the stronger on the 
 weaker, a refusal to recognize his just rights, then 
 the advocates of that side are right. If, however, it 
 be the other, then the stronger race should be sus- 
 tained, or else the people of the North are guilty 
 of the fatuity which destroys nations. 
 
 The chief complication of the matter arises from 
 the possession of the elective franchise by the newly 
 emancipated negro, and the peculiar circumstances 
 
THE NEGBO QUESTION 807 
 
 which surround this possession. The very method 
 of the bestowal of this franchise was pregnant with 
 baleful results. It was given him not as a righteous 
 and reasonable act ; not because he was considered 
 capable of exercising the highest function of citizen- 
 ship, the making of laws, and the execution of 
 laws ; not with the philosophic deliberation which 
 should characterize an act by which four millions 
 of new citizens of a distinct and inferior race are 
 suddenly added to the nation; but in heat, in a 
 spirit of revenge, and chiefly because the cabal 
 which then controlled the republic thought that 
 with the negro as an ally it could govern the South 
 and perpetuate its own power. The South, just 
 from the furious struggle of war, physically pros- 
 trate, but with its dauntless spirit unbroken, con- 
 fiding in its own integrity of purpose, and vainly 
 believing that as the Constitution was the aegis 
 under which the North had claimed to fight, the 
 constitutional rights for which it had itself con- 
 tended would be observed and respected, accepted 
 the emancipation of the negro, but not unnaturally 
 found itself unwilling, indeed unable, to accept all 
 that this emancipation might import. The North 
 partly in distrust of the sincerity of even the meas- 
 ure of acceptance which the South admitted ; partly 
 in the belief in the minds of a considerable portion 
 of its people that the negro might thus be elevated, 
 and that he would, at least, be enabled to protect 
 himself; but mainly to govern the intrepid and 
 
308 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 difficult South, at the instance of the partisan 
 leaders who then directed the destinies of the 
 republic, struck down constitutional government 
 throughout the South, and restored it only when 
 it had placed it in the negro's hands. 
 
 No such act of fatuity ever emanated from a 
 nation. Justification it can have none; its best 
 excuse must be that it was accomplished under a 
 certain enthusiasm just after a bitter war, and 
 before passion had cooled sufficiently for reason to 
 reassert her sway. It was a people's insanity. 
 The "Reconstruction of the South" was, on the 
 part of the people of the North at large, simply 
 that which in national life is worse than a crime, a 
 blunder ; on the part of the leaders who planned it 
 and carried it through, it was a cool, deliberate, 
 calculated act, violative of the terms on which the 
 South had surrendered and disbanded her broken 
 armies, and perpetrated for the purpose of securing 
 not peace, not safety, not righteous acknowledg- 
 ment of lawfully constituted authority, but per- 
 sonal power, to the leaders of the party which at 
 that time was dominant, power with all that it 
 implied of gain and revenge. For this they took 
 eight millions of the Caucasian race, a people 
 which in their devotion and their self-sacrifice, in 
 their transcendent vigor of intellect, their intrepid 
 valor in the field, and their fortitude in defeat, 
 had just elevated their race in the eyes of mankind, 
 and placed them under the domination of their 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 309 
 
 former slaves. There is nothing like it in modern 
 history. 
 
 Within two months after Lee's surrender at Ap- 
 pomattox there was not a Confederate within the 
 limits of the Southern States who had not accepted 
 honestly the status of affairs. On the 18th of 
 December, 1865, General Grant, who had been sent 
 through the South to inspect and make a report on 
 its condition, in his report to the President said : 
 
 "I am satisfied the mass of thinking men in the 
 South accept the present situation of affairs in 
 good faith. The questions which have hitherto 
 divided the sentiment of the people of the two sec- 
 tions — slavery and State-rights, or the right of the 
 State to secede from the Union, — they regard as 
 having been settled forever by the highest tribunal, 
 that of arms, that man can resort to." 
 
 Shortly after the assembling of Congress in 
 December, 1865, the President was able to report 
 that the people of North Carolina, South Carolina, 
 Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, 
 and Tennessee had reorganized their State govern- 
 ments. The conventions of the seceding States 
 had all repealed or declared null and void the ordi- 
 nances of secession. The laws were in full opera- 
 tion, and the States were in reality back in the 
 Union, with duly elected representatives, generally 
 men who had been Union men, waiting to be ad- 
 mitted to Congress when it should assemble. 
 
 Had Lincoln but been here, how different might 
 
310 THE OLD SOOTH 
 
 have been the story ! His wisdom, his sound sense, 
 his catholic spirit, his pride in the restored Union 
 which he had preserved, his patriotism, would have 
 governed. For two years the influence of his views 
 remained too potent to be overcome. Johnson, 
 who had not much love for the South, had caught 
 enough of his liberal and patriotic spirit to attempt 
 the continuance of his pacific, constitutional, and 
 sagacious policy. But he lacked his wisdom, and 
 by the end of two years the dominent will of Thad. 
 Stevens and his lieutenants had sufficiently depraved 
 public opinion to bend it to their pleasure and 
 subvert it to their purpose. Thad. Stevens gave the 
 keynote. On the 14th of December, 1865, he said : 
 " According to my judgment they (the insurrection- 
 ary States) ought never to be recognized as capable 
 of acting in the Union, or of being counted as valid 
 States, until the Constitution shall have been so 
 amended as to make it what its makers intended, 
 and so as to secure perpetual ascendency to the party 
 of the Union." 
 
 Charles Sumner was not behind him. He de- 
 clared in January, 1867, that unless universal 
 suffrage were conferred on all negroes in the dis- 
 organized States, "you will not secure the new 
 allies who are essential to the national cause." 
 
 In pursuance of the scheme of Stevens, in March, 
 1867, acts were passed by Congress, virtually wip- 
 ing out the States of Virginia, North and South 
 Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION" 311 
 
 Arkansas, Florida, and Texas, and dividing the ter- 
 ritory into military districts, under military rulers, 
 who were to hare absolute power over life, property, 
 and liberty, subject only to the proviso that death 
 sentences should be approved by the President. 
 
 When they were again created States, and brought 
 back into the Union, the whites had been disfran- 
 chised, and the negro had been created a voter, 
 drafted into the Union League, drilled under his 
 carpet-bag officers, and accepted as the new ally 
 through whom was to be secured "the perpetual 
 ascendency of the party of the Union." 
 
 Lincoln in his wisdom and patriotism had never 
 dreamt of such a thing. His only "suggestion" 
 had been to let in " some of the colored people, . . . 
 as, for instance, the very intelligent." (Lincoln's 
 letter to Governor Hahn, March 13, 1864.) 
 
 The history of that period, of the reconstruction 
 period of the South, has never been fully told. It 
 is only beginning to be written. A valuable contri- 
 bution to it, entitled "Noted Men on the Solid 
 South," has recently appeared, and to the papers 
 comprised in it I am indebted for much material in 
 this branch of my subject. When that history 
 shall be told it will constitute the darkest stain on 
 the record of the American people. The sole ex- 
 cuse which can be pleaded at the bar of posterity, is 
 that the system was inaugurated in a time of excite- 
 ment which was not short of frenzy. 
 
 Ever since the negro was given the ballot he has, 
 
312 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 true to his teaching, steadily remained the ally of 
 the party which gave it to him, following its lead 
 with more than the obedience of the slave, and on 
 all issues, in all times, opposing the respectable 
 white element with whom he dwelt with a steadfast 
 habitude which is only explicable on the ground of 
 steadfast purpose. The phenomenon has been too 
 marked to escape observation. The North has 
 drawn from it the not unnatural inference that the 
 negro is oppressed by the white, and thus asserts 
 at once his independence and attempts to obtain 
 his rights. The South, knowing that he is not 
 oppressed, draws therefrom the juster inference 
 that he naturally, wilfully, and inevitably aligns 
 himself against the white simply upon a race line 
 and stands, irrespective of reason, in persistent op- 
 position to all measures which have their advocacy. 
 
 The North sees in the negro's attitude only the 
 proper and laudable aspiration of a citizen and a 
 man ; the South detects therein a determination to 
 dominate, a menace to all that the Anglo-American 
 race has effected on this continent, and to the 
 hopes in which that race established this nation. 
 
 To ascertain which is the correct view it is well 
 at this point to examine the negro himself and his 
 capacity as a citizen. 
 
 In discussing this matter we are fortunately not 
 relegated to the shadowy and uncertain domain of 
 mere theory ; we can base our argument on the 
 firm and assured foundation of actual experience. 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 313 
 
 In the first place, whatever a sentimental philan- 
 thropy may say ; whatever a modern and misguided 
 humanitarianism may declare, there underlies the 
 whole matter the indubitable, potent, and myste- 
 rious principle of race quality. Scientifically, his- 
 torically, congenitally, the white race and the negro 
 race differ. 
 
 Slavery will not alone account for it all. In the 
 recorded experience of mankind slavery — mere 
 slavery — has not repressed intelligence; the bonds 
 of the person however tightly drawn have not 
 served to shackle the mind. Slavery existed among 
 the Greeks, the Eomans, the Phoenicians, among 
 our own ancestors of the Teuton race ; slavery as 
 absolute, as inexorable as ever was African slavery. 
 Indeed, under some of those systems there was 
 absolute chattel slavery, which never existed with 
 us, for the Greek and the Roman possessed over 
 their slaves the absolute power of life and death ; 
 they might slay them as an exhibition for their 
 guests, or might cast them into their fish-ponds as 
 food for their lampreys. 
 
 Yet under these systems, differentiated from 
 African slavery by the two conditions of race simi- 
 larity and intellectual potentiality, slaves attained 
 not unfrequently to high position, and from them 
 issued some of the most notable productions of 
 those times ; iEsop, Terence, Epictetus the Stoic 
 were slaves. These and many more have proved 
 that where the intellectual potentiality exists it 
 
314 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 will burst through the encumbering restraints of 
 servitude, and establish the truth that bondage 
 cannot enthrall the mind. 
 
 What of value to the human race has the negro 
 mind as yet produced? In art, in mechanical 
 development, in literature, in mental and moral 
 science, in all the range of mental action, no notable 
 work has up to this time come from a negro. 
 
 In the earliest records of the human race, the 
 monuments of Egypt and Syria, he is depicted as a 
 slave bearing burdens ; after tens of centuries he 
 is still a menial. Four thousand years have not 
 served to whiten the pigments of the frame, nor 
 developed the forces of the intellect. The leopard 
 cannot change his spots to-day, nor the Ethiopian 
 his skin, any more than they could in the days of 
 Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah. 
 
 It is not argued that because a negro is a negro 
 he is incapable of any intellectual development. On 
 the contrary, my observation has led me to think 
 that under certain conditions of intellectual envi- 
 ronment, of careful training, and of sympathetic 
 encouragement from the stronger races he may 
 individually attain a fair, and in uncommon in- 
 stances a considerable degree, of mental develop- 
 ment. To deny this is to deny the highest attri- 
 bute of the intellectual essence, and is to shut the 
 door of hope upon a race of God's human creatures 
 to whom I give my sympathy and my good-will. 
 But the incontestable proof is that such cases of 
 
THE NEGKO QUESTION 315 
 
 intellectual development are exceptional instances, 
 and that after long, elaborate, and ample trial the 
 negro race has failed to discover the qualities 
 which have inhered in every race of which his- 
 tory gives the record, which has advanced civili- 
 zation, or has shown capacity to be itself greatly 
 advanced. 
 
 Where the negro has thriven it has invariably 
 been under the influence and by the assistance of 
 the stronger race. Where these have been wanting, 
 whatever other conditions have existed, he has 
 invariably and sensibly reverted towards the orig- 
 inal type. Liberia, Hayti, Congo, are all in one 
 line. 
 
 His history on his native continent is pregnant. 
 Far as the East is from the West, negro- Africa is 
 from the land of civilization. Generations have 
 come and gone ; centuries have followed centuries ; 
 peoples have succeeded peoples ; nations have been 
 grafted on nations, more and more crowned with 
 the sunlight of progress and of civilization; but 
 no faintest beam has ever pierced the impenetrable 
 gloom of the "Dark Continent," and the African 
 explorer's latest book is " Darkest Africa." 
 
 This has not been because opportunity has been 
 wanting. Civilization first lit her golden torch 
 upon her borders. The swelling waters of the Nile 
 spread through a lettered and partly enlightened 
 people when the Tiber crept through swamps and 
 wilderness; when the Acropolis was a wild, and 
 
316 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the seven hills of the Eternal City a range for 
 wolves, Thebes and Memphis and Heliopolis con- 
 tained a civilization which in some of its mani- 
 festations has never been equalled since. Rome 
 stretched across the Mediterranean, and sent her 
 civilizing power along the northern shore of the 
 continent ; and later, the Moors possessed a civili- 
 zation there which is yet a marvel even to our race. 
 In that record which all Christendom holds as its 
 most precious possession we catch glimpses of a 
 commerce and even of a civilization situate some- 
 where within the boundaries of Africa, and meeting 
 that of the greatest monarch of the time. The 
 curtain suddenly lifts and we get a view all the 
 more dazzling, because so mysterious, of a queen of 
 Ethiopia coming with wonderful gifts to visit Solo- 
 mon himself. 
 
 Since then civilization has swept triumphant 
 over a large part of the earth. Only the land of 
 the negro has never yielded to her illumining and 
 vivifying influence. The Roman has succeeded 
 the Greek ; the Gaul and the Frank have risen on 
 the Roman ; the Teuton, the Saxon, and the Celt 
 have surpassed the Gaul. Only in negro-Africa has 
 barbarism held unbroken rule, and savagery main- 
 tained perpetual dominion. 
 
 Stanley, Ward, Glave and Emin Pasha found but 
 a year or two since the great Congo country as bar- 
 barous, as savage, as cannibal, as it was five thou- 
 sand years ago, province preying on province, and 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 317 
 
 village feeding on village, as debased and brutish 
 as the beasts of the jungle about them. 
 
 But it is not only in Africa that the negro has 
 exhibited the absence of the essential qualities of 
 a progressive race. It is everywhere. Since the 
 dawn of history, the negro has been in one place 
 or another, in Egypt, in Rome, in other European 
 countries, brought in contact with civilization, yet 
 he has failed to receive the vitalizing current under 
 which other races have risen in greater or less 
 degree. 
 
 Here in America for over two hundred years he 
 has been under the immediate influence of the most 
 potent race the world has known, and within the 
 sweep of the ripest period of the world's history. 
 
 It may be charged that as a slave he has never 
 had an opportunity to give his faculties that exer- 
 cise which is necessary to their development. But 
 the answer is complete. He has not been a slave 
 in all places, at all times. In Africa he was not 
 a slave, save to himself and his own instincts ; in 
 Borne he was no more a slave than was the Teu- 
 ton, the Greek, or the Gaul ; in New England he 
 has not been a slave for over a hundred years, and 
 may be assumed to have had there as much encour- 
 agement, and to have received as sustaining an 
 influence as will ever be accorded him by the white. 
 What has been the result even in New England ? 
 
 Dr. Henry M. Field has recently written a book of 
 travels in the South and of his reflections thereon. 
 
318 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Dr. Field comes of a distinguished Northern family, 
 of which the whole country is proud. He is a 
 close observer, a fair recorder, and the friend of 
 the whole human race. He will not be accused 
 of prejudice. Speaking of the present intellectual 
 condition of the negro in Massachusetts, he says : 
 
 " Yet here we are doomed to great disappoint- 
 ment. The black man has had every right that 
 belongs to his white neighbor ; not only the natu- 
 ral rights which, according to the Declaration of 
 Independence, belong to every hixman being, — the 
 right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, 
 — but the right to vote, and to have a part in mak- 
 ing the laws. He could own his little home, and 
 there sit under his own vine and fig-tree with none 
 to molest or make him afraid. His children could 
 go to the same common schools, and sit on the 
 same benches, and learn the same lessons as white 
 children. 
 
 " With such advantages, a race that had natural 
 genius ought to have made great progress in a hun- 
 dred years. But where are the men that it should 
 have produced to be the leaders of their people ? 
 We find not one who has taken rank as a man of 
 action or a man of thought; as a thinker or a 
 writer ; as artist or poet ; as discoverer or inventor. 
 The whole race has remained on one dead level of 
 mediocrity. 
 
 " If any man ever proved himself a friend of the 
 African race it was Theodore Parker, who endured 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 319 
 
 all sorts of persecution and social ostracism, who 
 faced mobs and was hissed and hooted in public 
 meetings, for his bold championship of the rights 
 of the negro race. But rights are one thing, and 
 capacity is another. And while he was ready to 
 fight for them he was very despondent as to their 
 capacity for rising in the scale of civilization. 
 Indeed, he said in so many words, ' In respect to 
 the power of civilization, the African is at the 
 bottom, the American Indian next.' In 1857 he 
 wrote to a friend : ' There are inferior races which 
 have always borne the same ignoble relation to the 
 rest of men and always will. In two generations 
 what a change there will be in the condition and 
 character of the Irish in New England. But in 
 twenty generations the negro will stand just where 
 they are now; that is, if they have not disap- 
 peared.' " Dr. Field goes on : 
 
 "That was more than thirty years ago. But 
 to-day I look about me here in Massachusetts, and 
 I see a few colored men ; but what are they doing ? 
 They work in the fields, they hoe corn, they dig 
 potatoes ; the women take in washing. I find colored 
 barbers and white-washers, shoe-blacks and chim- 
 ney-sweeps ; but I do not know a single man who 
 has grown to be a merchant or a banker, a judge 
 or a lawyer, a member of the legislature or a jus- 
 tice of the peace, or even a selectman of the town. 
 In all these respects they remain where they were 
 in the days of our fathers. The best friends of the 
 
320 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 colored race, of whom I am one, must confess that 
 it is disappointing and discouraging to find that 
 with all these opportunities they are little removed 
 from where they were a hundred years ago." 1 
 
 But suppose that the statements of others, whose 
 observation has enabled them to pick out a well-to- 
 do lawyer or dentist or doctor or restaurateur, be 
 different, it only proves that in individual instances 
 they may rise to a fair level ; it simply emphasizes 
 the fact that these are exceptions to the great rule, 
 and does not in the least affect the argument which 
 is that the negroes as a race have never exhibited 
 any capacity to advance ; that as a race they are 
 inferior. 
 
 Opportunity is afforded us to examine the negro's 
 progress in two countries in which a civilization 
 was created for him, and he was surrounded by 
 every condition helpful to progress. 
 
 The first is Liberia : here he had a model republic 
 founded by the Caucasian solely for his benefit, 
 with freedom grafted in its name. It was founded 
 in as splendid hopes as even this republic itself. 
 Christendom gave it its assistance and its prayers. 
 How has the negro progressed there ? Let one of 
 his own race tell the story, one who was thought 
 competent to represent there the United States. 
 Mr. Charles H. J. Taylor, late Minister from the 
 United States to Liberia, has given a picture of life 
 in Liberia, which cannot be equalled save in some 
 i " Sunny Skies and Dark Shadows," p. 144. 
 
THE NEGKO QUESTION 321 
 
 other country under the same rule. He says, in a 
 paper published in the Kansas City Times, April 
 22, 1888 : 
 
 " Not a factory, mill, or workshop, of any kind, 
 is to be found there. They (the government) have 
 no money or currency in circulation of any kind. 
 They have no boats of any character, not even a 
 canoe, the two gun-boats England gave them lying 
 rotten on the beach." ... " Look from morn till 
 night you will never see a horse, a mule, a donkey, 
 or a broken-in ox. They have them not. There 
 is not a buggy, a wagon, a cart, a slide, a wheel- 
 barrow, in the four counties. The natives carry 
 everything on their heads." The whole picture 
 presented is hopeless. 
 
 If this were an isolated picture we might think 
 that climatic influences or the proximity of a great 
 savage continent had affected the result. But we 
 have nearer home a yet more striking illustration, 
 a yet more convincing proof that the real cause was 
 the negro's inability to govern, his incapacity to 
 rise. 
 
 For a hundred years now the negro has cast his 
 influence over sundry of the West Indies, and has 
 had sole possession of one. With this republic 
 constructed by our fathers before him for a model, 
 he has since 1804 been masquerading at governing 
 Hayti, one of the most fertile spots that Spain ever 
 ruled. 
 
 A more fantastic mummery never disgraced a 
 
322 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 people or degraded a land. From the time of Tous. 
 saint L'Ouverture to the present there has not been 
 a break in the darkness which settled upon San 
 Domingo. 
 
 The bloody Dessalines aping Napoleon, and with 
 the oath of allegiance to the republic yet warm on 
 his lips, crowning himself "Emperor" of half an 
 island, the brutal G-onaives, Boyer, Soulouque, and 
 their like, following each other, each as brutal and 
 swinish as the other, or with degrees limited only 
 by their capacity, present a picture such as history 
 cannot duplicate. 
 
 We have accounts of Hayti by two Englishmen, 
 one the historian Froude, the other, Sir Spencer 
 St. John, for years British resident at Hayti, both 
 of whom assert that they have no race antipathy, 
 and what a picture do they present ! San Domingo, 
 once the Queen of the Antilles, has in less than a 
 hundred years of negro rule sunk well-nigh into a 
 state of primeval barbarism. 
 
 Sir Spencer St. John, in his astounding work "The 
 Black Republic," has given a picture of Hayti under 
 negro rule which is enough to give pause alike to 
 the wildest theorist and the most vindictive par- 
 tisan. He takes pains to tell us that he has lived 
 for thirty -five years among colored people of various 
 races, and has no prejudice against them ; that the 
 most frequent and not the least honored guests at 
 his table in Hayti for twelve years were of the black 
 and colored races. The picture he has presented 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 323 
 
 is the blackest ever drawn : revolution succeeding 
 revolution, and massacre succeeding massacre ; the 
 country once, under white rule, teeming with wealth 
 and covered with beautiful villas and plantations, 
 with "a considerable foreign commerce, now in a 
 state of decay and ruin, without trade or resources 
 of any kind, peculation and jobbery paramount in 
 all public offices " ; barbarism substituted for civili- 
 zation, Voudou worship in place of Christianity, 
 and oftener than once human flesh actually sold in 
 the market-place of Port au Prince, the capital of 
 the country. 
 
 Sir Spencer St. John says that a Spanish colleague 
 once said to him : "If we could return to Hayti fifty 
 years hence, we should find the negresses cooking 
 their bananas on the site of these warehouses." 
 On which he remarks : " It is more than proba- 
 ble — unless in the meantime influenced by some 
 higher civilization — that this prophecy will come 
 true. The negresses are, in fact, cooking their 
 bananas amid the ruins of the best houses of the 
 capital." 
 
 If it shall seem to those who have no actual 
 knowledge upon the subject that I have overdrawn 
 the picture, I would refer them to the papers which 
 I have cited, and the works which I have quoted, 
 and to the great body of the Southern people who 
 have had experience of what negro domination 
 imports. 
 
 What has been stated has been said in no feeling 
 
824 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 of personal hostility, or even unfriendliness to the 
 negro, for I have no unfriendliness towards any 
 negro on earth ; on the contrary, I have a feeling 
 of real friendliness towards many of that race, and 
 am the well-wisher of the whole people. 
 
 What is said in this paper is said under a sense 
 of duty, with the hope and in the belief that it may 
 serve to call attention to the real facts in the case ; 
 that it may help to discard from the discussion all 
 mere sentimentality or prejudice, and to base the 
 future consideration of the matter upon the only 
 solid ground — the ground of naked fact. 
 
 These examples cited, if they establish anything, 
 establish the fact that the negro race does not pos- 
 sess, in any development which he has yet attained, 
 the elements of character, the essential qualifica- 
 tions to conduct a government, even for himself, 
 and that if the reins of government be intrusted to 
 his unaided hands, he will fling reason to the winds, 
 and drive to ruin. Were this, however, only Hayti 
 or Liberia, we might bear it with such philosophic 
 patience as our philanthropy admits of, but we have 
 nearer home a proof not less overwhelming of this 
 truth. The negro has had control of the govern, 
 ment in the Southern States ; for eight years a 
 number of Southern States were partly, and thre& 
 of them were wholly, given up to the control of the 
 negroes, directed by men of, at least, ability and 
 experience, and sustained by the invigorating influ- 
 ence of the entire North. 
 
THE NEGKO QUESTION 325 
 
 The reconstruction acts gave the black the abso- 
 lute right of suffrage, and disfranchised the whites. 
 The negro was invested with absolute power, and 
 turned loose. He selected his rulers. The entire 
 weight of the government — an immense force — 
 was under the misapprehension, born of the excite- 
 ment which then reigned, thrown blindly in their 
 favor ; whatever they asserted was believed ; what- 
 ever they demanded was done ; the ballot was given 
 them, and all the forms established by generations 
 of Caucasian patriots and jurists, and consecrated 
 by centuries of Caucasian blood, were solemnly set 
 up and solemnly followed. The negro then selected 
 his own rulers. The negro had thus his oppor- 
 tunity then, if ever. The North had put him up as 
 a citizen against the protest of the South, and stood 
 obliged to sustain him. What was the result ? 
 Such a riot of folly and extravagance, such a trav- 
 esty of justice, such a mummery of government as 
 was never witnessed, save in those countries in 
 which he had himself furnished the illustration. 
 
 In Virginia, where the negroes were in a numeri- 
 cal minority and where the prowess of the whites 
 had been but now displayed before their eyes in an 
 impressive manner which they could not forget, we 
 escaped the inconveniences of carpet-baggism, and 
 the Hunnycuts, Underwoods, and such vultures 
 kept the carcass for their own picking, and were 
 soon gorged and put to flight. But it was not so 
 where the negroes were in a large majority; in 
 
326 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 South Carolina, in Louisiana, in Mississippi, and in 
 other Southern States there was a very carnival of 
 riot and rapine. 
 
 Space will not permit the going into detail. I 
 can only refer to one or two facts, from which the 
 whole dreadful story may be gathered. Louisiana 
 will be first cited. 
 
 Warmouthism and Kellogism, in Louisiana, and 
 carpet-baggism generally, with all their environ- 
 ments of chicanery and venality, and all their train 
 of poverty and profligacy, cannot be done justice 
 to in a paper of this character. I would refer to 
 the valuable paper contributed by the Hon. B. J. 
 Sage, to the series which has recently been brought 
 out in a volume under the head of " Noted Men on 
 the Solid South," to which volume acknowledgment 
 is made for much of my material in this branch 
 of my subject. Such a relation of theft, debauch- 
 ery, and crime has not been found outside of those 
 countries in which carpet-baggism has ruled, with 
 the negro as its facile and ignorant instrument. 
 
 In Louisiana, soon after Warmouth came into 
 office, he stated in his message of 4th January, 1868, 
 to his legislature : " Our debt is smaller than that 
 of almost any State in the Union, with a tax -roll of 
 $251,000,000, and a bonded debt that can at will be 
 reduced to $6,000,000. There is no reason that our 
 credit should not be at par." This was too good 
 a field for Warmouth and his associates to lose. 
 Says Mr. Sage : " The census of 1870 showed the 
 
THE 2STEGR0 QUESTION 327 
 
 debt of the State to have increased to $25,021,734, 
 and that of the parishes and niuncipalities to 
 $ 28,065,707. Within a year the State debt was 
 increased fourfold, and the local indebtedness had 
 doubled. Louisiana, according to the census, stood, 
 in the matter of debt, at the head of the Union " 
 ("Noted Men on the Solid South," p. 404). 
 
 This was but the beginning. The total cost of 
 four years and five months of Eepublican rule 
 amounted to $106,020,337, or $24,040,089 per year. 
 "To this," says Mr. Sage, "must be added the 
 privileges and franchises given away and the State 
 property stolen" (J6. p. 406). Taxation went up in 
 proportion — in some places to 7 or 8 per cent (lb- 
 p. 406) ; in others as high as 16 per cent (Dr. Henry 
 M. Field, " Bright Skies and Dark Shadows ") . This 
 was confiscation. 
 
 The public printing of the State had, in previous 
 years, cost about $37,000 per year. During the 
 first two years of Warmouth's regime the New 
 Orleans Republican, in which he was a principal 
 stockholder, received $1,140,881.77 for public print- 
 ing ("Noted Men on the Solid South," p. 408). 
 
 When Warmouth ran for governor, he was so 
 poor that a mite chest was placed beside the ballot 
 box to receive contributions to pay his expenses to 
 Washington. When he had been in office only a 
 year, it was estimated that he was worth $225,000, 
 and when he retired he was said to have had one of 
 the largest fortunes in Louisiana. 
 
328 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 The Louisiana State Lottery, with all the de- 
 bauchery of morals and sentiment which it has 
 occasioned, was chartered by Warmouth and his 
 gang, and is a legacy which they have left to the 
 people of that State, an octopus which they have 
 vainly striven to shake off. Time fails to tell of 
 the rapine, the vice, the profligacy in which the 
 government — State and municipal — was the prize 
 which was tossed about like a shuttlecock, from 
 one faction to the other; of the midnight orders 
 to seize the government, the carnival of corruption 
 and crime, until the whites were forced to band 
 themselves into a league to prevent absolute an- 
 archy. It suffices to say that it was in Louisiana 
 under negro rule that troops were marched into the 
 State House, and drove out the assembled repre- 
 sentatives of the State, at the point of the bayo- 
 net, a thing which has happened during peace only 
 twice before in the history of modern civilization, 
 once under Cromwell and once under Napoleon. 
 
 " The vampire Warmouthism had reduced the 
 wealth of New Orleans from $146,718,790 at War- 
 mouth's advent, to $88,613,930 at Kellog's exit — 
 a net decline of $58,104,860 in eight years ; while 
 real estate in the country parishes had shrunk in 
 value from $99,266,839.85 to $47,141,696, or about 
 one-half. During this period the Republican lead- 
 ers had squandered nearly $150,000,000, giving 
 the State little or nothing to show therefor " {lb. 
 p. 427.) 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 329 
 
 In Mississippi the corruption was almost as 
 great, and the result almost as disastrous. The 
 State levy for 1871 was four times what it was in 
 1869 ; for 1872 it was four times as great ; for 
 
 1873 it was eight and a half times as great; for 
 
 1874 it was fourteen times as great. Six million 
 four hundred thousand acres of land, comprising 
 20 per cent of all the lands in the State, had been 
 forfeited for non-payment of taxes. 
 
 In South Carolina, if it were possible, the situa- 
 tion was even worse, and the paper contributed to 
 the series to which I have already alluded, by the 
 Hon. John J. Hemphill, to which I wish to acknowl- 
 edge my indebtedness, outlines briefly the condition 
 of affairs, and presents a picture which ought to be 
 read by every man in the Union. The General As- 
 sembly, which convened in 1868, in Columbia, con- 
 sisted of 72 whites and 85 negroes. In the house 
 were 14 Democrats, and in the senate 7; the re- 
 maining 136 were Eepublicans. One of the first 
 acts passed was somewhat anomalous. After de- 
 fending the rights of the colored man on railroads, 
 in theatres, etc., it provided that if a person whose 
 rights under the act were claimed to be violated, 
 was a negro, then the burden of proof should 
 shift and be on the defendant, and he should 
 be presumed to be guilty until he established his 
 innocence. 
 
 When the legislature met, they proceeded to fur- 
 nish the halls at a cost of $50,000, for which they 
 
330 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 appropriated $95,000. This hall has since been 
 entirely furnished at a cost of $3061. They paid 
 out in four years, for furniture, over $200,000, and 
 when, in 1877, the matter was investigated, it was 
 found that, even placing what remained at the 
 original purchase price, there was left by them in 
 the State House only $17,715 worth; the rest had 
 disappeared. 
 
 " They opened another account, known under the 
 vague but comprehensive head of l Supplies, sun- 
 dries, and incidentals.' This amounted, in a single 
 session, to $350,000. For six years they ran an 
 open bar in one of the legislative committee rooms, 
 open from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., at which all the offi- 
 cials and their friends helped themselves, without 
 cost — save to the unfortunate and helpless tax- 
 payers." 
 
 They organized railroad frauds, election frauds, 
 census frauds, general frauds — whatever they or- 
 ganized was filled with fraud. They enlisted and 
 equipped an armed force, the governor — one Scott 
 — refusing to accept any but colored companies. 
 Ninty-six thousand colored men were enrolled at a 
 cost, for the simple enrolment, of over $200,000. 
 One thousand Winchester rifles were obtained, for 
 which the State was charged about $38,000 ; 
 1,000,000 cartridges cost the State $37,000; 10,000 
 Springfield muskets were bought, and charged at a 
 cost, they claim, of $187,050; it was all charged 
 to the State at $250,000. The troops, as organ- 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 331 
 
 ized, were employed by Scott and the notorious 
 Moses as their heelers and henchmen. The armed 
 force, or constabulary, were armed and maintained 
 for the same purpose (lb. Mr. Hemphill's paper, 
 p. 94). 
 
 Governor Scott spent $374,000 of the funds of 
 the State in his canvass (lb. p. 95). Eight porters 
 were employed in the State House ; they issued 
 certificates to 238; eight laborers and from five 
 to twenty pages were employed; certificates were 
 issued to 159 of the former and 124 of the latter. 
 One lot of 150 certificates were issued at once — all 
 fraudulent. During one session pay certificates 
 were issued to the amount of $1,168,255, all of 
 which but $200,000 was untarnished robbery (lb. 
 p. 99). 
 
 The public printing was another field for their 
 robbery. The total cost of the printing in South 
 Carolina for the eight years of Republican domina- 
 tion, 1868-76, was $1,326,589. The total cost 
 for printing for 78 years previous — from 1790 
 to 1868 — was $609,000, showing an excess for the 
 cost of printing in eight years, over 78 years pre- 
 vious, of $717,589. The average cost of the public 
 printing under the Republican administration, per 
 year, was $165,823 ; average cost per annum under 
 Hampton's administration, $6178. The amount 
 appropriated for one year, 1872-73, by the Repub- 
 licans, for printing, was $450,000 ; amount appro- 
 priated in 25 years ending in 1866, $278,251. 
 
332 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Excess of one year's appropriation over 25 years, 
 $171,749. The cost of printing in South Caro- 
 lina, exceeded in one year by $122,932.13 the 
 cost of like work in Massachusetts, New York, 
 Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Maryland together (lb. 
 p. 100). 
 
 In 1860 the taxable values in the State amounted 
 to $490,000,000, and the tax to a little less than 
 $400,000. In 1871 the taxable value had been re- 
 duced to $184,000,000, and the tax increased to 
 $2,000,000. In 19 counties taken together, 93,293 
 acres of land were sold in one year for unpaid taxes. 
 After four years of Republican rule, the debt of the 
 State had increased from $5,407,306 to $18,515,033. 
 There had been no public works of any importance, 
 and the "entire thirteen millions of dollars repre- 
 sented nothing but unnecessary and profligate ex- 
 penditures and stealings" (lb. p. 102.) 
 
 The governor's pardon was a matter of mere 
 bargain and sale. During Moses's term of two 
 years, he issued 457 pardons — pardoning during 
 the last month of his tenure of office 46 of the 168 
 convicts whom he had hitherto left in jail. 
 
 In May, 1875, Governor Chamberlayne declared, 
 in an interview with a correspondent of the Cincin- 
 nati Commercial, that when at the end of Moses's 
 administration he entered on his duties as governor, 
 200 trial justices were holding offices by executive 
 appointment who could neither read nor write (lb. 
 p. 104). 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 333 
 
 These statements are but fragments taken from 
 the papers by Mr. Hemphill, Governor Hampton, 
 and others, who cite the public records, and are 
 simply statistics. No account has been taken of 
 the imposition practised throughout the South 
 during the period of negro domination ; of the vast, 
 incredible, and wanton degradation of the South- 
 ern people by the malefactors, who, with hoards of 
 ignorant negroes just from the bonds of slavery as 
 their instruments, trod down the once stately South 
 at their will. No wonder that Governor Chamber- 
 layne, Republican and carpet-bagger as he was, 
 should have declared, as he did in writing to the 
 New England Society : " The civilization of the 
 Puritan and Cavalier, of the Roundhead and 
 Huguenot, is in peril." 
 
 A survey of the field and a careful consideration 
 of the facts have convinced me that I am within 
 the domain of truth, when I say that the Southern 
 States, with the exception perhaps of one or two of 
 the border States, were better off in 1868, when 
 reconstruction went into force, than they were in 
 1876, when the carpet-bag governments were finally 
 overthrown; and that the eight years of negro 
 domination in the South cost the South more than 
 the entire cost of the war, inclusive of the loss of 
 values in slave property. I think if Mr. Cable, and 
 those who accept his theorem, will study the history 
 of the Southern States, even as written only in the 
 statistics, taking no account, if they please, of the 
 
334 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 suffering and the degradation inflicted upon the 
 white race of the South during the period in which 
 the South was under the dominion of the rulers se- 
 lected by the negroes, they will find that there is not 
 so much difference between the proposition which 
 he formulates and that which the South states, 
 when it declares that the pending question is one 
 of race domination, on which depends the future 
 salvation of the American people. 
 
 Twenty-seven years have rolled by since the negro 
 was given his freedom ; nearly twenty-five years 
 have passed since he was given a part in the gov- 
 ernment, and was taken up to be educated. The 
 laws were so adapted that there is not now a 
 negro under forty years old who has not had the 
 opportunity to receive a public school education. 
 Through private philanthropy these public schools 
 (many of which are of a high grade) have been sup- 
 plemented by institutions established on private 
 foundations. That the negroes have had a not 
 ungeneral ambition to attend school is apparent 
 from the school attendance of the race, as shown 
 by the statistics. The negro enrolment in the 
 schools for the session 1878-88 being 1,140,405, 
 or a little over one-half of their entire school pop- 
 ulation. 
 
 Besides this, every profession, every trade, every 
 department of life have been open to him as to the 
 white; he has had his own race as his constitu- 
 ency ; he has possessed the backing of the North, 
 
THE KEGEO QUESTION 335 
 
 and the good-will of the South. But what has he 
 done ? What has he attained ? 
 
 The South has viewed his political course with 
 suspicion, and has opposed him with all her re- 
 sources ; but she has not been mean or niggardly 
 towards him. On the contrary, in every place, at 
 all times, even whilst she was resisting and assail- 
 ing him for his political action, she has displayed 
 towards him in the expenditures for his educa- 
 tion a liberality which, in relation to her ability, 
 amounted to lavishness. 
 
 The Eev. Dr. A. D. Mayo, eminent alike for his 
 learning and philanthropy, and a Northern edu- 
 cator, declared not long ago : " No other people in 
 human history has made an effort so remarkable 
 as the people of the South in re-establishing their 
 schools and colleges. Overwhelmed by war and 
 bad government, they have done wonders, and with 
 the interest and zeal now felt in public schools in 
 the South, the hope for the future is brighter than 
 ever." "Last year," he says, speaking in 1888, 
 "these sixteen States paid nearly $1,000,000 each 
 for educational purposes, a sum greater according 
 to their means than ten times the amount now paid 
 by most of the New England States." 
 
 Virginia has expended on her public schools, in- 
 cluding the session of 1890-91, according to the 
 figures of Colonel Ruffin, the Second Auditor of 
 Virginia, taken from official sources, $23,380,309.97. 
 Her negro schools cost her for the year 1889-90, by 
 
336 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 the same estimate, $420,000, of which the negroes 
 paid about $ 60,000. 1 
 
 1 Total amount of State and Local Taxes expended 
 in Virginia on Public Schools from 1870-71 to 
 
 1890-91 — 20 years $22,759,249.38 
 
 Amount received from Peabody Fund 296,134.00 
 
 Private contributions 324,926.59 
 
 Total 23,380,309.97 
 
 Cost of Negro education in Public Schools, in- 
 cluding total Current Expenses $4,792,290.60 
 
 Amounts appropriated by the State to Hampton 
 
 and Virginia Normal Institutes 471,708.72 
 
 Cost of permanent improvements, sites, buildings, 
 
 etc., for Colored Schools 588,223.05 
 
 Total cost of Colored Public Schools and Normal 
 
 Institutes for 20 years 5,852,222.57 
 
 Total cost of White Schools for same period 17,528,087,60 
 
 Total of all Public Schools for same period 23,380,309.97 
 
 Percentage of whole fund expended on white 
 
 Schools 75.00 
 
 Percentage of whole fund expended on Colored 
 
 Schools 25.00 100.00 
 
 Actual statistics for 1891 show the following facts : 
 
 Total Taxes. Per cent of Whole. 
 
 White $1,796,576.06 91.7 
 
 Colored 163,175.67 8.3 
 
 Total $1,959,751.73 100.0 
 
 The U. S. Census for 1890 shows the population of Virginia to 
 be as follows : 
 
 Whites .1,015,123 = 61.3% 
 
 Colored 640,857 = 38.7% 
 
 Total 1,655,980 = 100.0% 
 
 Thus showing that while the negroes comprise nearly four-tenths 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 337 
 
 Governor Gordon, of Georgia, in a recent address, 
 said of that State : " When her people secured pos- 
 session of the State government, they found about 
 six thousand colored pupils in the public schools, 
 with the school exchequer bankrupt. To-day, in- 
 stead of six thousand, we have over one hundred 
 and sixty thousand colored pupils in the public 
 schools, with the exchequer expanding and the 
 schools multiplying year by year." He says fur- 
 ther, "The negroes pay one-thirtieth of the ex- 
 pense, and the other twenty-nine thirtieths are 
 paid by the whites." 
 
 The other Southern States have not been behind 
 Virginia and Georgia in this matter. 
 
 Now what has the negro accomplished in this 
 quarter of a century ? The picture drawn by 
 
 of the population, they furnish less than one-tenth of the amount 
 expended on public schools. 
 
 The number of Public Schools for the year f White, 5358 1 _ .. 
 
 1889-90 was 1 Colored, 2153 J 
 
 The total cost of Public Schools for the year 1889- 
 
 90 was $1,604,508.80 
 
 The cost of Negro Schools for the same year was 
 
 about 420,000.00 
 
 Now, if we use the percentages given above, and allow all 
 the taxes paid by negroes (on both personal and real property) 
 to go into the School Fund, we will see that there was a deficit 
 of $256,824.33 to be made up from the taxes paid by white peo- 
 ple, or, in other words, the total amount of taxes on personal 
 and real property paid by the negroes will cover less than half 
 the expense of their schools alone. 
 
338 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 Dr. Field of his accomplishment in Massachusetts 
 would do for the South. 
 
 "They work in the fields, they hoe corn, they 
 dig potatoes ; the women take in washing." They 
 are barbers and white-washers, shoe-blacks and 
 chimney-sweeps. Here and there we find a lawyer 
 or two, unhappily with their practice in inverse 
 ratio to their principle. Or now and then there is 
 a doctor. But almost invariably these are men 
 with a considerable infusion of white blood in their 
 veins. And even they have, in no single instance, 
 attained a position which in a white would be 
 deemed above mediocrity. Fifteen years ago there 
 were in Richmond a number of negro tobacco and 
 other manufacturers in a small way. Now there 
 are hardly any except undertakers. 
 
 They do not appear to possess the faculties which 
 are essential to conduct any business in which rea- 
 son has to be applied beyond the immediate act in 
 hand. 
 
 They lack the faculty of organization on which 
 rests all successful business enterprise. 
 
 They have been losing ground as mechanics. 
 Before the war, on every plantation there were 
 first-class carpenters, blacksmiths, wheelwrights, 
 etc. Half the houses in Virginia were built by 
 negro carpenters. Now where are they ? In Bich- 
 mond there may be a few blacksmiths and a dozen 
 or two carpenters ; but where are the others ? 
 
 A great strike occurred last year in one of the 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 339 
 
 large iron-works of the city of Richmond. The 
 president of the company told me afterwards that, 
 although the places at the machines were filled 
 later on by volunteers, and although there were 
 many negroes employed in the works who did not 
 strike, it never occurred to either the management 
 or to the negroes that they could work at the 
 machines, and not one had ever suggested it. 
 
 The question naturally arises, Have they im- 
 proved ? Many persons declare that they have 
 not. My observation has led to- a somewhat dif- 
 ferent conclusion. Where they have been brought 
 into contact with the stronger race under condi- 
 tions in which they derived aid, as in cities, they 
 have in certain directions improved ; where they 
 have lacked this stimulating influence, as in sec- 
 tions of the country where the association has 
 steadily diminished, they have failed to advance. 
 In the cities, where they are in touch with the 
 whites, they are, I think, becoming more dignified, 
 more self-respecting, more reasonable ; in the coun- 
 try, where they are left to themselves, I fail to see 
 this improvement. 
 
 This improvement, however, such as it is, does 
 not do away with the race issue. So far from it, it 
 rather intensifies the feeling, certainly on the part 
 of the negro, and makes the relation more strained. 
 Yet it is our only hope. The white race, it is 
 reasonably certain, is not going to be ruled by the 
 negro either North or South. That day is far off, 
 
340 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 and neither Lodge bills nor any other bills can 
 bring it until they can reverse natural law, enact 
 that ignorance shall be above intelligence, and 
 exalt feebleness over strength. The history of 
 that race is a guaranty that this cannot be. It has 
 been a conquering race from its first appearance, 
 like the Scandinavians of old from which it partly 
 came, 
 
 Firm to resolve and steadfast to endure. 
 
 The section of it which inhabits the United 
 States is not yet degenerate. That part of it at 
 the South is not. It is not necessary to recall its 
 history. It is one of the finest pages in the his- 
 tory of the human race. Let one who has not 
 been generally regarded as unduly biassed in favor 
 of the South speak for it. Senator Hoar, speaking 
 of the people of the South on the floor of the Sen- 
 ate, in the speech already referred to, said : 
 
 They have some qualities which I cannot even presume 
 to claim in an equal degree for the people among whom I, 
 myself, dwell. They have an aptness for command which 
 makes the Southern gentleman, wherever he goes, not a 
 peer only, but a prince. They have a love for home ; they 
 have, the best of them, and the most of them, inherited 
 from the great race from which they come, the sense of 
 duty and the instinct of honor as no other people on the 
 face of the earth. They are lovers of home. They have 
 not the mean traits which grow up somewhere in places 
 where money-making is the chief end of life. They have, 
 above all, and giving value to all, that supreme and superb 
 constancy which, without regard to personal ambition and 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 341 
 
 without yielding to the temptation of wealth, without get- 
 ting tired and without getting diverted, can pursue a great 
 public object, in and out, year after year and generation 
 after generation. 
 
 This is the race which the negro confronts. It 
 is a race which, whatever perils have impended, 
 has always faced thern with a steadfast mind. 
 
 Professor James Bryce in a recent paper on the 
 negro question arrives at the only reasonable con- 
 clusion : that the negro be let alone and the solu- 
 tion of the problem be left to the course of events. 
 Friendship for the negro demands this. It has 
 become the fashion of late for certain negro leaders 
 to talk in conventions held outside of the South of 
 fighting for their rights. For their own sake and 
 that of their race, let them take it out in talking. 
 A single outbreak would settle the question. To 
 us of the South it appears that a proper race pride 
 is one of the strongest securities of our nation. 
 ISTo people can become great without it. Without 
 it no people can remain great. We propose to 
 stand upon it. 
 
 The question now remains, What is to become 
 of the negro ? It is not likely that he will remain 
 in his present status, if, indeed, it is possible for 
 him to do so. Many schemes have been suggested, 
 none of them alone answerable to the end pro- 
 posed. The deportation plan does not seem practi- 
 cable at present. It is easy to suggest theories, 
 but much more difficult to substantiate them. I 
 
342 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 hazard one based upon much reflection on the sub. 
 ject. It is, that the negro race in America will 
 eventually disappear, not in a generation or a cen- 
 tury, — it may take several centuries. The means 
 will be natural. Certain portions of the Southern 
 States will for a while, perhaps, be almost given 
 up to him ; but in time he will be crowded out 
 even there. Africa may take a part ; Mexico and 
 South America a part ; the rest will, as the coun- 
 try fills up, as life grows harder and competition 
 fiercer, become diffused and will disappear, a por- 
 tion, perhaps, not large, by absorption into the 
 stronger race, the residue by perishing under condi- 
 tions of life unsuited to him. The ratio of the 
 death rate of the race is already much larger than 
 that of the white. Consumption and zymotic dis- 
 eases are already making their inroads. 1 
 
 Meantime he is here, and something must be 
 done. In the first place, let us have all the light 
 that can be thrown on the subject. Form an 
 organization to consider and deal with the subject, 
 not in the spirit of narrowness or temper, but in a 
 spirit of philosophic deliberation, such as becomes 
 a great people discussing a great question which 
 concerns not only their present but their future 
 position among the nations. We shall then get at 
 the right of the matter. 
 
 Let us do our utmost to eliminate from the ques- 
 tion the complication of its political features. 
 1 See " Vital Statistics of the Negro." Cited supra. 
 
THE NEGRO QUESTION 343 
 
 Get politics out of it, and the problem will be 
 more than half solved. Senator Hampton stated 
 not long ago in a paper contributed by him, I 
 think, to the North American Review, that, to get 
 the negro out of politics, he would gladly give up 
 the representation based on his vote. Could any- 
 thing throw a stronger light on the apprehension 
 with which the negro in politics is regarded at the 
 South ? 
 
 There never was any question more befogged 
 with demagogism than that of manhood suffrage. 
 Let us apply ourselves to the securing some more 
 reasonable and better basis for the suffrage. Let 
 us establish such a proper qualification as a condi- 
 tion to the possession of the elective franchise 
 as shall leave the ballot only to those who hav& 
 intelligence enough to use it as an instrument to 
 secure good government rather than to destroy it. 
 In taking this step we have to plant ourselves on 
 a broader principle than that of a race qualifica- 
 tion. It is not merely the negro, it is ignorance 
 and venality which we want to disfranchise. If we 
 can disfranchise these we need not fear the voter, 
 whatever the color. At present it is not the negro 
 who is disfranchised, but the white. We dare not 
 divide. 
 
 Having limited him in a franchise which he hab 
 not in a generation learned to use, continue to 
 teach him. It is from the educated negro, that is, 
 the negro who is more enlightened than the gen- 
 
344 THE OLD SOUTH 
 
 eral body of his race, that order must come. The 
 ignorance, venality, and superstition of the average 
 negro are dangerous to us. Education will divide 
 them and will uplift them. They may learn in 
 time that if they wish to rise they must look to 
 the essential qualities of good citizenship. In this 
 way alone can the race or any part of the race look 
 for ultimate salvation. 
 
 It has appeared to some that the South has not 
 done its full duty by the negro. Perfection is, 
 without doubt, a standard above humanity , but, at 
 least, we of the South can say that we have done 
 much for him; if we have not admitted him to 
 social equality, it has been under an instinct 
 stronger than reason, and in obedience to a law 
 higher than is on the statute books : the law of 
 self-preservation. Slavery, whatever its demerits, 
 was not in its time the unmitigated evil it is 
 fancied to have been. Its time has passed. No 
 power could compel the South to have it back. 
 But to the negro it was salvation. It found him a 
 savage and a cannibal and in two hundred years gave 
 seven millions of his race a civilization, the only 
 civilization it has had since the dawn of history. 
 
 We have educated him ; we have aided him ; we 
 have sustained him in all right directions. We are 
 ready to continue our aid ; but we will not be dom- 
 inated by him. When we shall be, it is our settled 
 conviction that we shall deserve the degradation 
 into which we shall have sunk. 
 
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