The Press. — London, England, 1856-09-13 00:00:00

and Tiff, mindful of her power as head of the kitchen, had taken care to propitiate her good will, to Old Hundred's great annoyance :- 011 Hundred, like many other persona, felt that general attention lavished on any other celebrity was so much taken from his own merits, and, therefore, on the present occasion, sat regarding Tiff** evident popularity with a synical eye. At last, coming up like a wicked fellow as he was, he launched his javelin at old Tiff, by observing to his wife, " I's 'stonished at you, Rose ! You cook to de Gordons, and making yourself so cheap—so familiar with de poor white folk's niggers!" Had the slant fallen upon 14u self, personally, old Tiff would probably have given a jolly crow, and laughed as heartily as he generally did if he happened to be caught out in a rain-storm ; but the reflection on his family con nection fired him up like a torch, and his eyes flashed hrough his big spectacles like firelight through windows. " You go 'long, talking 'bout what you don't know nothing 'bout ! 1 like to know what you knows 'bout de old Virginny families ? Dein's de real old stock ! You Car'lina folks come from dem, stick and stock, every blest one of you! De Gordona is a nice family—an't nothing to say agin de Gordona — but whar was you rantod, dat ye didn't hear 'bout de Peytons ? Why, old Gen'ral Peyton didn't he nee to ride with six black horses afore him, as if he'd been a king? Dere want one of dem horses dat hadn't a tail as long as my arm. You never see no such critters in your life !" " I haul, howl I ? " said Old Hundred, now in his tam touched in a vital point. " Bless me, if I haul seen de Oordons riding out with der eight horses, any time o' day !" " Come, come, now, dere wasn't so many," said Bose, who had her own reasons for staying on Titf's side. " Nobody never rode with eight horses l ' " Did too ! Yon say much more, I'll make sixteen on 'em. Fore my blessed Master, how dese yer old niggers will lie ! Dey's always zaggerating der families. Makes de very her rise on my head, to hear dese yer old niggers talk; dey lie so ! " said Old Hundred. "You tink folks dat take to lying is using up your business, don't ye? " said Tiff. " But, I tell you, any one dat says a word Agin de Peytons got me to set iii " Laws, dam ohll'en an't Peytons," said Old Hundred; " day's Crippses; and I like to know who ever beam of de Crippses ? Go way ! don't tell me nothing about dem Cripeses! De 's poor white folks ! A body may see dat sticking out all over 'em." "Yon shut up !'' said Tiff. " I don't b'lieve you was bora on de Gordon place, 'cause you an't got no manners. I 'spects you some old, second-hand nigger Colonel Gordon must a took for debt, some time. from some of doss yer mean Tennessee families, dat don know how to keep der money when dey gets it. Dese niggers is alleys de meanest kind. Cause all de real Gordon niggers is ladies and genlemen—every one of 'em," said old Tiff. like a true orator, bent on carrying his audience with bias. A general shout chorused this compliment; and Tiff, under cover of the applause, shook up his reins, and rode off in triumph. "Dar, now, you aggravating old nigger," said Rose, turning to her bosom lord, " I hope yer got it now ! De old nigger dat ever I see I And you, Tom, go e a n t rand clean your knives, if yer don't mean to be cracked over." Tiff has such a multitude of avocations, and is so hardly driven to find food for his family, that he cannot prevent himself from getting continually more ragged. His care of his clothes is curiously mingled with his pious reflections : He usually wore, in compliment to his nursing duties, an apron in front ; but as his various avocations pressed hard upon his time, and as his own personal outfit was ever the last to be attended to, Tire nether garments had shown traces of that frailty whieh is incident to all human things. " Bross me," be said to himself, that morning, as he with difficulty engineered his way into them, " holes here, and boles dar! Don't want but two holes in my breeches, and I's got two dozen ! Got my foot through de wrong place Poor old Tiff ! Laws a massy ! Wish I could get hold of some of dem dar clothes day were telling 'bout at de camp meeting, dey wore forty years in de wilderness! 'Mazing handy dem ar times was! Well, anyhow, I'll tie an apron behind, and another in front. Bress de Lord, I's got aprons anyhow ! I must makeup a par of breeches, some of these yer days, when the baby's teeth is all through, and Teddy's slothes don't want no mending, and de washing is done, and dose yer weeds stops a growing in de garden. Brass if I know what de Lord want so many weeds. 'Pears, like dey comes just to plague us ; but den we doesn't know. May be dere's some good in 'em. We doesn't know but a leetle, no way." The oddity and simplicity of this character can -only be appreciated when it is studied. It is impossible to conceive a nature more loveable yet more ludicrous. Withal, the character conveys an impression of the most perfect truth. Tiff's notions of religion are rather obscure. He can never rightly make out where Canaan is, and heaven is always con nected in his mind with "de great families." All nature iu Tiff's eye worships God : I was out in din yer garden at four o'clock dis morning, and 'waxed like dese yer trees was waving like a psalm, so sort o' still you know! Kind o' spreading out der hands like dey'd have prayers, and doe was a mighty handsome star a looking down. I ?peels da: ar star is one of de eery oldest families up der. THE PRESS. When the father of the childron Tiff tends with such fidelity marries again, and brings home a coarse violent drunken woman, Tiff, after great endurance, determines on flight with the young families. There are some exquisite descriptions of natural scenery as they roam through the wilderness of the swamp. Here is a night scene:— Sometimes the soft night-winds swayed the tops of the pines with a long swell of dashing murmurs, like the breaking of a tide on a distant beach. The moonlight, as it came sliding down through the checkered leafy roof, threw fragments and gleams of tight, which moved capriciously here and there over the ground, revealing now a great silvery fern-leaf, and then a tuft of white flowers, gilding spots on the branches and trunks of the trees ; while every moment the deeper shadows were lighted up by the gleaming of tire-flies. The child would raise her bend awhile, and look ou the still scene around, and then sink on her fragrant pillow iu dreamy delight. Every thing was so still, so calm, so pure, no wonder she was prepared to believe that the angels of the Lord were to be found in the wilderness. How innocent, soft, and kind are all God's works ! From the silent shadows of the forest--the tender and loving presence which our sin exiled from the haunts of men i►ath not yet departed. Sweet fall the moonbeams through the dewy leaves, peaceful is the breeze that waves the branches of the pines, merciful and tender the little wind that shakes the small flowers and tremulous wood-grasses fluttering o►•er the heads of the motherless children. Well, they sleet there quietly all night long. Between three and four o clock an oriole who had his habitation in the vine above their heads, began a gentle twittering con• versation with some of his neighbours; not a loud song, would give you to understand, but a little low inquiry as to what o'clock it was; and then if you had been in the still wood at that time, you might have heard through all the trees of pine, beach, and holly, sweet gum and larch, a little tremulous stir and flutter of birds awaking and stretching their wings—little eyes were opening in a thousand climbing vines where soft feathery habitants had hung swinging breezily all night—low twitterings and chit-pings were heard, then a loud clear echoing chorus of harmony answering from tree to tree, jubilant and joyous as if there never had been a morning before. The morn ing sitar had not yet gone down—nor were the purple cur• tams of the east undrawn, and the moon, which had been shining full all night, stillatood like a patient late•buruing light in a quiet chamber. There are not wanting also touches of that fine imagery by which nature is personified and brought into sympathy with human passion. Thus at the end of one of Dred's harangues : The tall pines and whispering oaks, as they stood waving in the purple freshness of the dawn, seemed like broad winged attesting angels bearing witness in their serene and solemn majesty to the sublime words,—" Heaven and earth shall not pass away till these words have been ful filled." It is one purpose of the book to bring out in strong relief that principle of the States' law which declares that " the owner of a slave " cannot be indicted for the malicious, " cruel, and excessive beating of his slave, it "being the policy of the law to protect the " master from prosecution, even if the whip " ping and punishment be malicious, cruel, " and excessive." That protection which English law affords to brutes is refused in the United States to human beings; and further it seems that the hirer of a slave is equally protected, it being construed that the hirer for the time stands in place of the master. And it is another purpose of the book to illustrate the working of the principle " that the master of a slave is protected from "prosecution by express enactment if the " victim dies in the act of resistance to his will." The story of !dilly is introduced to show what may be, and often is, the practical effect of these rules of law. It overruns with tears ; there is a wail and sob in every line. Maly is a female " Uncle Tom," but repre- sented as of a higher nature. The story of Harry Gordon, and of his sister Cora, shows the monstrous injustice which results from declaring the slave to be incapable of making any contract whatever, even with his master for the purchase of his freedom. The slave is held pro nullis, pro mortuis. Harry having paid a large sum towards the purchase of his freedom, loses it all on the death of Nina; and Cont, who had been manumitted, married, and left by her husband the heir of his property, is reclaimed through an informality in the manumission, deprived of her estate, and condemned to slavery with her children. The close of her tragic story we gave last week. SATURDAY, Throughout the book there glows an intense hatred of slavery which gives it the vitality of an earnest and mighty aim. It is insisted that no reform in the institution is practica ble. Slavery commands the support of the great body of the olergy in the Southern States, and these divines are visited with un sparing satire. It is stated as a fact that Colonel Burford's regiment, famous for murder isid pillage in Kansas, was despatched from Smith Carolina with religious services by clergymen, accompanied with & presentation of bibles. It is a proof of the art with which the book is written that opportunity is adroitly taken to show the wretched condition of the white people in the slave States who have only their labour to depend o►►. The " poor white trash - is the phrase applied to them by the niggers, and they are represented as so debased as to be glad to seize the bones and offals which the slaves on plantations have cast away. The reader will observe how Governor Roeder, iu his address at New York, insists that the States which sanction slavery become closed to the industry of the white population. A direct conflict of interests is thus produced which admits of no compromise. The general impression gathered from the book is,. that in the contest neither party will, give way, while each is too strong to be coerced by the other. The conclusion is obvious, and it is a conclusion to which this work points in a most emphatic manner. There is a prospect of the Union being violently dissolved. _ As regards the question of authorship, there aro passages in the book which it is most un likely that Mrs. Stowe could have written. We invite the reader to ponder these words, put into the mouth of Frank Russel, one of the shrewdest characters of the story : Now, Clayton, to you I always speak the truth, I won't humbug you ; I worship success ; I am of Frederick the Great's creed, " that Providence goes with the strongest battalion." I wasn't made for defeat; I must have power. The preservation of this system whole and entire is to be the policy of the leaders of this generation. The fact is they stand where it must be their policy. They must spread it over the whole territory. They must get the balance of power in the country to build themselves up against the public opinion of mankind. Why, Clayton, moral sentiment, as you call it, is a humbug ! The whole world acquiesces in what goes—they always have. There is a great outcry about slavery now, but let it succeed, and there won't be. When they can outvote the Northern States, they'll put them down. They have kept them sub servient by intrigue so far, and by and by they'll have the strength to put them down by fume. England makes a fuss now, but let them only succeed, and she'll be civil as a sheep. Of course, men always make a fuss about in justice when they have nothing to gain by holding their tongues, but England's mouth will be stopped with cotton ; you'll see it. They love trade and hate war. And so the fuss of anti-slavery will die out in the world. We need not say how different all this is from the professed, and apparently sincere, senti ments of Mrs. Stowe respecting England. In the two lights in which the book may be ree-arded, it appears to us—first, most skil fully adapted to fulfil its end of rousing the north against the south, even to a contest of extremity; and, secondly, considered as a work of fiction, though entirely wanting in con structive skill—a necessity, if we regard it as the product of more than one pen—it em braces literary excellences of the highest kind and the most opposite forms. In action the character of Dred fails. It is the creation of a rhetorical poet (which, we take it, Mrs. Stowe is not), much rather than of the dramatic faculty, which we imagine her to possess. The same may be said of the character of filly. of the Claytons, and of a very large portion of the book. The Stereoscope ; its History, Theory, and Construc tion. By Sir David Brewster. London: Murray. THE history of the stereoscope is that of the history of most discoveries. First, facts are observed ; then principles are deduced from them ; next, for purposes of scientific curiosity and experiment, the principles are embodied in forms of artificial construction ; and lastly, by various modifications and improvements, the apparatus is applied to practical uses. It is the third and fourth stages of discovery, and most com monly the fourth, that give rise to disputes as to priority of invention. It is curious to note how regularly these stages can be marke I in the history of the stereoscope. The observation is as old as Euclid at least that each of the two eyes, as it surveys objects from different points of view, takes in a dissimilar picture of each object ; these dissimilar pictures are united in vision. An excellent illustration of the