# The Homes of the New World/Letter XXXIII.

LETTER XXXIII.
Matanzas, Feb. 23.
How beautiful it is here, my little heart; how good it is to be here! In this glorious air, fanned by balmy zephyrs, in this light, excellent, and, in every respect, comfortable home—the house of Mr. and Mrs. B.—where I am now staying, I feel myself, as it were, living anew. I have now been here for a whole week, which has passed like one bright, beautiful day.
It seemed to me pleasant to leave that hot, dusty Havanna early on the morning of Monday the 16th, and there also I left my headache. I parted with it the night before, when I went to bed, and had a sound sleep. That kind, cordially good, Mrs. F. was up with me at five o'clock the next morning, and had coffee brought for me and herself from a Restaurateur's, because she would not disturb her slaves so early; and after having taken a heartfelt leave of her and her husband, I seated myself in their volante, accompanied by one of the youngest sons of the house, and my favourite, Frank. The calashero cracked his whip in the air, and we rapidly swung away to the railway station. I was glad when I, with the help of my young conductor, had got safely through all the difficulties and impediments of the railway, and was seated quietly in a spacious carriage. The carriages are built in the American fashion, because Americans constructed the railway and built the carriages at Cuba. All the windows were down to allow the glorious morning air free ingress, and although ​all the gentlemen who were in the carriage—from forty to fifty in number—smoked cigars or cigaritos, there was no smell of smoke, and scarcely any to be perceived. The air of Cuba seems to have the power of annihilating smoke. I was the only lady in the carriage, and sate solitary on my sofa, and nearly solitary in my portion of the carriage; but all the more uninterruptedly could I see around me, and—ah! that morning, when I flew over the new earth, beautiful as a paradise, through a paradisiacal atmosphere, and saw around me new and enchanting scenes and objects—it was only by inward and deep thanksgiving that so much enjoyment could be sanctified.
There had been rain in the night, and splendid clouds piled themselves in masses along the horizon, and grouped themselves in fantastic shapes above the blue mountains. Now they lifted themselves in heavy draperies above them, to flee from the ascending sun; then formed a magnificent portal, with a frame of gold; and beyond it shone a sea of soft rose-coloured light; it lightened above the tops of the mountains and—the sun rose. The fantastic little blue and yellow villas, with their spendid gardens full of splendid flowers and strange plants; the palm-thatched cottages in the fields, the lofty, green palm-trees above their yellow-grey roofs; groves of mango, plantain, orange and cocoa-trees, the verdant hedges and fields, all shone fresh and beautiful amid the gushing sunshine in the moist, mild morning.
Along the whole course of the way new and lovely objects met my eye; flowers, plants, gardens, dwellings, all bade me good morning as we sped past them. But a potato-field and a large cabbage-ground greeted me as fellow-countrymen and old friends. The whole country looked like an immense garden; beautiful palms presented themselves at all distances, waving their crowns in the morning wind, and along the edge of the horizon before ​me arose a chain of dark-blue mountains, the heights of Camerioca.
I was quite well, no human being could be better; both body and soul had wings, and I flew over the beautiful, brilliant earth.
The villas disappeared by degrees, and plantations of sugar-cane and other vegetable growths which were unknown to me, took their places. We travelled through whole forests of planted banana-trees. After that the landscape became wilder, and parasite plants showed themselves on tree and meadow. Presently those got the upper hand, and seemed to choke vegetation. The crowns of many trees bore whole gardens of orchids and aloes on their branches. The appearance was queer rather than beautiful, although various of these parasitic plants had very lovely flowers, but the whole looked heavy and unnatural. In one field not far from the road, I noticed a lofty, half-dead ceiba-tree, around the gigantic stem of which the parasite Yaguay embra, a female fig-tree, had flung its hundred-fold arms in an immense embrace, entwining the tree from root to head, until it had nearly destroyed its life. This death-struggle between the ceiba-tree and the female parasite, which grows and nourishes itself with its life and finally destroys it, is a frequent sight in Cuba, and it is a very remarkable and really unpleasant spectacle. There is a complete tragedy in the picture, which reminds one of Hercules and Dejanira, of King Agne and Aslög.
The first part of the day and the journey were full of pleasures, amongst which I must reckon some excellent sandwiches and bananas which good Mrs. F. provided me with, and as I ate them I thought of her, so motherly, so kind, so thoughtful for me and for all who belong to her. Gratitude and joy in human beings is the best food of the soul. In awhile the day became too warm, and the whole of nature too much overrun with parasitic growths. It oppressed me and made me drowsy.
​Some ladies with Spanish physiognomies entered the carriage at one of the railway-stations. They seemed to be country-people, but were well dressed, and wore no covering on the head. Two of them were very handsome, were stout, and bore themselves proudly and with great hauteur and ungraciousness to a couple of gentlemen, evidently their admirers, who attended them, and who, at the last moment, presented bouquets with an air which did not look despairing, but rather full of roguishness, as they withdrew, without obtaining a glance from the proud beauties. This woke me up a little. And I was wide awake when we, in the afternoon, left behind us that region of ensnarement, and the landscape suddenly expanding itself, the city of Matanzas was before us, its glorious bay now blue—clearly, brightly blue—and in the background the lofty mountain ridge, Pan di Matanzas, so called from its form, and the opening to Yumori valley. The freshest, the most delicious breezes met us here; and at the railway-station I was met by two gentlemen, with mild, agreeable countenances, who bade me welcome. It was my countryman, Mr. F., from Götheberg, now resident at Matanzas; and Mr. J. B., who conveyed me in his volante to his handsome house, Here I was received most kindly by his handsome young wife, a Creole, but with such a fair, fresh, northern appearance, that she needed merely a helmet on her brow to have served as a model for a Valkyria.
With this agreeable young couple I am spending my time quietly and pleasantly, and invigorating myself, both soul and body, partly in their fresh, pleasant home—(my young hostess is the daughter of an Anglo-American, and everything in the house bears the impress of that cleanliness, order, and excellent management which distinguish the housewives of that race)—and partly by my solitary rambles in the neighbourhood of the city, although it is so unusual for a lady out of doors—especially with a ​bonnet on her head—to make use of her own means of promenade, instead of those of the horse or volante, that little negro boys and girls run after me shouting and laughing, and grown-up people stand and stare, and horses and oxen are sometimes frightened. People are, however, beginning now to be used to me, and to seeing me go out; and I will not, without very good reasons, give up my solitary rambles of discovery.
Will you accompany me on one of them, the first, the most charming which I have yet made, and when I, early in the morning, visited alone the Valley of Yumori? As a matter of course, you must understand that the morning was beautiful; but how beautiful nobody can understand who has not experienced the early morning hour, and the caresses of the spirit of the sea from Matanzas Bay. The Valley of Yumori lies about two hundred paces from Matanzas. You see a gorge between two lofty crags, and through the gorge a bright little river, which flows between verdant banks to unite itself to the sea—I do not say throw itself into it, because it is too tranquil for that. It is clear and calm as a mirror. Let us follow the little stream through the rocky portals, outside of which is open meadow, and the broad blue Bay of Matanzas, with ships from all the nations of the world sailing in, or lying at anchor far, far into the distance.
We walk along the banks of the Yumori river, and pass the mountain portals; and within, a wonderfully beautiful valley expands, the greensward overgrown with palms and verdurous shrubs, and enclosed on each side by lofty mountain ridges. The shadows of the hills lie cool and dusk upon that portion of the valley along which our path runs. How beautiful it is here in the cool shadow! On our left is the mirror-like river, which begins to withdraw, under our gaze, into a wood of mangrove—a species of shrub which grows in the water, and increases by throwing its twigs down to the bottom, where they take ​root and spring up afresh into green shrubs. On the opposite side of the river rises abruptly, but with a soft, waving outline, Pan de Matanzas, and on our side run sloping upwards the heights of Combre. The rock shoots out on the hill-sides in bold basaltic colonnades, scoops itself into grottos, mysterious porticos, and arches which are alone visited by the birds of heaven. The bold heights are here and there crested with palms, and heavy trails of creeping plants hang around them. Lower down, and at their feet, the vegetation becomes still more luxuriant; it is one rich mass of beautiful trees, shrubs, and flowers, among which I lost myself in delight and ignorance. I know the popular names, however, of some of the flowers. There glows the fever-flower, in gold and flame, indescribably brilliant; there is the wild heliotrope, luxuriant in growth, but as modest in colour and form as our northern hot-house heliotrope; there is the beautiful white blossom of the mangrove, with a chalice half of the convolvulus and half of the lily form, and diffusing a delicious fragrance; and there, along our path, at our very feet, see that little shrub, full of small, splendidly crimson flowers, with hundreds of little mouths or bills gaping on its stalk, upwards when they are young, and downwards towards the earth, upon which they fall, still quite crimson and fresh, as they become older; and see how little velvet green humming-birds flutter around them—how enamoured they are of them, how little afraid of us, how they dip, hovering on the wing, their long bills into the open bills of the flowers—animal life and vegetable life here meet and kiss,—it is most beautiful! This plant, with its crimson, falling flowers, is Cupid's tears, Lacrymos cupido. But Lacrymos cupido are not the pale tears of sorrow. They are the glowing tears of an overflowing, blissful heart. They are wept by the heart of nature, and winged lovers sip their sweetness.
The valley still lies before us, but its extent is hidden. ​The bend of the hills closes the view. Now, however, our path suddenly turns to the right, and the valley reveals itself. Before us on the right lies, in the bosom of the hills, and amid the most beautiful grove of palms, a little farm, a Cuban farm, with palm-leaf-thatched roof, and our path leads through groups of cocoa-palms, laden with fruit. Now we descend a little hill, and now on the right of the descent, at a short distance from the path, we find the ruins of a stone wall and a well. All around grow, in picturesque confusion, cocoa-palms, mamay, and mango-trees, cypresses, ceibas, and many other species of trees. We advance down the little hill, and towards the farm; but just below it the path winds round to the left, and now proceeds more straightforward up the valley. The valley opens to us like a vast and beautiful palm-grove, enclosed by an elliptical frame of hill-tops. We still advance for a little distance, the valley becomes broader, with softly undulating ground; and whichever way we turn, we see only palms—palms. Beneath such trees, such groves, beautiful, immortal beings might wander!
Here again lies a little farm not far from the path, with its straw-thatched house and brushwood cottage, between which shines out a large blossoming oleander. We enter to look around; we must beg a draught of water. La fermière, a thin, shrivelled, brown-eyed woman, looks as if she would give us everything which she possesses; but she does not understand us, and we do not understand her. But we obtain water for all that, and a great bunch of blossoming oleander, which she breaks off for us with a hearty good will. The sun is now beginning to be hot, let us therefore return; we will come hither again, for we must become still better acquainted with the Valley of Yumori.
And see, here come Monteros, with their heavily laden horses, the packages being laid straight across their backs. They salute us kindly with melodious voices, halt, and ​inquire good-humouredly where goes la signora, and what she wants? La signora says that she comes from Svecia. The Monteros look at her perplexed, and then at one another. They do not know such a place as Svecia, and cannot understand the wanderer. She tells them that she is from un paeso sotto la estreja del Norte! And now they believe she says that she comes from the north star, and they say “Oh!” and look at one another, and smile significantly, and wrinkle their brows; they now comprehend that la signora is somewhat wrong in the head, and, compassionately shaking their heads, they drive on their horses. I cannot tell you how gentle and good-hearted they seem: and, slowly following them, we pursue the road back to Matanzas. Still the lofty mountain wall casts its shadow over the cocoa-palm grove by the well. We seat ourselves on the broken stone wall, and breakfast on bananas, which we have taken with us; an incomparable breakfast, in that delicious morning air, in that wonderfully beautiful valley! Gentle and happy people ought to live at the farm among the palm-trees, up among the hills. Amid such beautiful, joy-giving objects in that delicious air, human beings should become gentle and good.
The sun climbs over the hills, and it is quite hot before we reach Matanzas; but we have thus spent a beautiful morning in the Valley of Yumori.
I have made some acquaintance in the city of Matanzas, and through one of these have been able to visit a large coffee and sugar plantation in the neighbourhood of the city. There I saw avenues of many rare tropical trees and plants: a kind of palm-tree which twists its gigantically strong branches like corkscrews, and bears gigantic fruit; a kind of citron-tree, which bears immense citron-like fruit, but which are not valued as such. I was most interested by making acquaintance with the sago and date palms, with arrow-root, with the guava-tree and its pleasant fruit, as well as with the wonderfully beautiful ​hibiscus flowers; and nothing delighted me more than to be surrounded with little fluttering humming-birds, which are, on the island, so remarkably fearless of man, and continually hover around the splendid red flowers with which Cuba seems to adorn herself rather than with flowers of any other colour. Their rapid, arrow-like flight, hither and thither, the fluttering movement of their wings whilst they are sipping from the flowers, are a perpetual astonishment and delight to me. They correspond with nothing which I have seen of animal or human life, and they seem to me not to be made of this earth's dust. A favourite place of resort for their building seems to be on the banks of lovely little purling brooks, shaded by thick masses of foliage, where the nests are concealed among the trees. Among the curiosities of the place, I observed many orchideous parasites hanging from the trees, as well as a large ceiba tree, encircled by its hostile mistress, Yaguay embra, and killed by its dangerous embrace.
The plantation, for the rest, had a very forlorn appearance, in consequence of the two last tornadoes, which came in rapid succession, and left it in perfect desolation; besides which the cholera had carried off a great portion of the negro slaves.
“The Lord punishes our sins, punishes our sins!” said the owner of the plantation, with an expression half of levity, half of repentance and acknowledgment of the justice of the punishment. He was an elderly man, with French manners and nervous excitability, but a very polite host. I would very willingly be his guest, but not his slave. The slave-rooms, in a low wall or building, were no better than dark pig-styes with us. There was also a hospital. It was a large, dark room, in which stood some wooden bedsteads, but without coverlets or pillows, nor was there a ray of light in the room. He was himself, he said, the only physician of the sick: he could himself let ​blood, &c. I could not help shuddering. The plantation seemed almost a desert. I saw a shrivelled old negro cripple steal past us, with a shy, submissive look. A little sharp lad waited at table with an unconcerned air, and who seemed not to trouble himself in the least about his master's violent exclamations and movements.
This gentleman was at one time very wealthy, but he has during the last few years suffered great losses, which he is said to bear with great equanimity.
Matanzas is built in the same style as Havanna, but has a more open and cheerful appearance; the streets are considerably wider, although not paved. The house of my friends here is two stories high; a piazza runs round the upper story opening into the street, and here I walk in the evenings inhaling the air, whilst my hostess in the drawing-room plays Cuban contre-danses in exquisite time, and full of abounding life. One hears these dances sounding at all distances from the houses of the city. Wherever one may be, or wherever one goes in Matanzas, this dance-music may be heard. The time and measure are derived from the children of Africa, the peculiar music from the Spanish Creoles of Cuba, and one hears in it Spanish seguidillas, national songs, and marches. Both Mr. and Mrs. B. are musical, and it is a pleasure to me to hear him play on the organ notes of the piano, the Catholic anthem, Adeste Fideles, and to hear him play the Spanish dances, Hauta Arragonesa, El Sabbatheo, &c. The most sparkling champagne of life exists in these national dances. It is amusing to compare with these our polskas and other popular dances; they are not deficient in this abounding, sparkling life, but they want refinement and grace. These dissimilar national dances stand in the same relationship as champagne, and ale and mead.
Matanzas, March 1st.
If there be one place on earth where the spirit of life has a separate individual existence, as pure, as pleasant, as full of vitality as when it first was breathed forth by the Lord of life and love, it is—here. The atmosphere here has a kind of vitalising life, which is a perpetual marvel to me and a perpetual delight. It is especially in the afternoons, after two or three o'clock, that this peculiar, wonderful life arises. It is one constant pleasant wafting, not from any particular distance, but everywhere, and from all points, which makes every light and moveable thing around you waft, and, as it were, breathe and live. That indescribable, but at the same time pleasant and life-giving wafting caresses your brow, your cheek—lightly lifts your dress, your ribbons—surrounds you, goes through you, as it were bathes you in an atmosphere of salutary, regenerating life. I feel its influence in both soul and body; I drink that wind, that air, as one might drink a renovating elixir of life, and I am ready to look round to see whether any angel is near, whether any heavenly presence sits on the crowns of the palms, which produces this wonderful life. I call it the breath of God, as I softly walk to and fro on the piazza, or lean over the iron railing and give myself up to its caresses, and until late at night inhale its salutary life. Oh my Agatha! it whispers to me wonderful emotions and anticipations of the Creator's wealth—of those hidden glories which “no eye hath seen, no ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive, but which God hath prepared for those who love Him.” This wonderful spirit of life is to me the greatest marvel of Cuba; and I cannot describe how beneficial its influence seems to me.
Since I last wrote I have spent more deliciously tranquil days at Matanzas, the beautiful, healthy situation ​of which is not subject to oppressive heats, and where I feel so wonderfully well. Early in the mornings I set forth on my solitary expeditions of discovery, and in the afternoon drive out in a volante with my kind hostess, and breathe the soft sea-breeze as we drive along la pleja.
I have spent one whole day in Yumori Valley, partly to sketch some trees and cottages, and partly to see how the country people live here. For this purpose I determined to take up my quarters at the little peasant farm with the oleander-trees; and the good B's. allowed me to drive there in their volante, and take with me one of their female negroes as a servant and interpreter. Cecilia, the negro woman, has the most beautiful dark eyes I ever saw in a dark countenance—although such have generally beautiful eyes—teeth like oriental pearls, and a quiet, gentle, and unusually serious demeanour. My poor Cecilia is ill, and probably incurably so, of consumption, and Mrs. B. wishes her now to enjoy a little country air and life. Cecilia is only lately married to a young man of her own colour; she is happy in her marriage, and happy as the slave of good owners, and would gladly live.
When we reached the peasant-farm, Cecilia preferred my request to la fermière, who, with animated gestures, immediately declared that the whole house was at my disposizion. I installed myself in the most airy of the small houses, which was furnished likewise with a rustic piazza, shaded by the palm-leaf-thatched roof. The floors were of bare earth, but the rooms were in other respects comfortable, and had well-furnished beds, and were tolerably clean. A little coloured picture on paper was pasted on the wall of the bed-room proper, representing the Virgin Mary and the child Jesus, with an inscription in Spanish. I inquired from the good housewife what was the purport of it, and she replied, with an aspect of devotion, that “it was written there that whoever bought such a picture obtained forgiveness of sin for forty days.” It was also ​printed upon the picture that such an indulgence was granted à todos los fideles, as owned una salve à nuestra Sennora del Rosario. C'est imprimé.
Below the picture stood the following verse:—
* Fragranti rosa es Maria
* En el jardin celestiel,
* Y el amparo maternel
* Del peccador cada die.
This indulgence for the sins of forty days might be bought for a quarter of a pesos (about a fourth of a dollar). It is remarkable that in a country where such permissions for sin are openly prepared, and bought and sold, that the people should still continue pious and inoffensive; but so it is. The poor country people of Cuba are said to be remarkable for their good and quiet disposition. It is certainly owing to the delicious air! The people of my rural abode were from the Canary Islands, where it is more difficult for the indigent to provide for themselves than in Cuba. For this reason a great number of poor people, whose occupation is agriculture, come hither.
At about ten o'clock my hostess went up to some high ground, and blew upon a shell, which produced a shrill but not inharmonious sound, calculated to reach to a great distance. This was the signal for the men, who were out at work in the valley, to assemble for breakfast. The breakfast was prepared for seven or eight persons in the piazza under the straw roof of the little house which contained the kitchen. A parrot (una cotorra) sat below it also, in its cage of iron-wire. Violet-blue doves flew around us hither and thither, and cocks and hens promenaded round us with the queerest twisted necks, which gave them a deformed look. The men, both old and young, with gloomy, cheerless countenances, assembled for breakfast, which consisted of stock-fish and yams, maize-bread, roasted plantains (a coarse kind of bananas), and flesh-meat, besides which was a sort of light yellow ​meal, served in a large bowl, but the name of which I could not learn, because Cecilia spoke but imperfect English. The breakfast was abundant, but badly set out and badly cooked.
The dinner consisted of boiled meat, brown beans, and boiled rice; but all so insufficiently boiled, so hard and insipid, that I could not eat anything which the kind-hearted fermière heaped up on a plate for me, and if Cecilia had not brought for herself some rice and potatoes (I would not bring more with us), which she cooked and she and I ate with fresh butter, also from my Matanzas home, I must have suffered that day from hunger. Now, however, I lived like a shepherdess in a story, and crowned my meal with bananas and delicate sugar-cake.
I talked about many things with my good Cecilia. She had been stolen as a child from Africa; she was only eight years old when she was taken from her mother, and this mother remained lovingly impressed on her memory. She remembered how her mother had loved her, how tender she had been towards her, and Cecilia wished to return to Africa that she might see her once more. She made no complaints of her master and mistress; they had always been kind to her, she said, and now especially was she happy in her situation; but she longed to see her mother once more.
And Cecilia will see her mother before long, but not on this earth.
Two little dark-eyed children, Joannito and Annita, were my playfellows in the cottage, especially the little boy, who was full of merriment, and yet in a quiet and agreeable way.
I drew a little, sitting in the piazza, under the straw roof, and when the heat of the day was over I set out with Cecilia to explore the valley to its full extent. We did so, although the ramble was a long one, and Cecilia was so fatigued that I became very anxious about her. But ​by resting at various places by the way, we at length reached the cottage in safety, though not until after the sun had set, when the stars shone brightly down into the valley. We did not meet with any one, excepting some Monteros in the twilight, who saluted us in their melodious voices with a “Buona tardi,” or “Adios!”
The valley retained to its close very much the same features; a succession of beautiful palm-groves, here and there a little group of palm-leaf-thatched houses; and towards the end of the valley, which was there also enclosed by hills, although not equal in height to Pan de Matanzas, and Combre, lay a sugar plantation, with a sugar-mill, negro slaves, a slave village, &c, belonging to it. The beautiful valley even has its share in the old curse. The crimson glow of sunset, seen above the verdant heights, and the calm splendour of heaven through the palm-trees, were indescribably beautiful, and when the stars shone forth they appeared to me larger and brighter than I had ever seen them before.
This beautiful valley has, however, no memories worthy of the pure glances of heaven. It derives its name, it is said, from the death-cry of its Indian aborigines, “Io more,” when they, in order to escape being massacred by the Spaniards, flung themselves from the heights down into the river which divides one portion of the valley. And of the little farm in the palm-grove embosomed in the hills, the loveliness of which enchanted me the first morning I was here, nothing is related excepting a bloody family-quarrel. A father dwelt there with several sons. They were to divide the farm, but a quarrel arose about the boundaries of the property, and every night one landmark or another was removed. One morning—one of those beautiful tropical mornings!—the brothers, who had quarrelled about the landmarks, came to blows; other members of the family rushed in to take one side or the other, and the result of the combat was eleven dead ​bodies. Such is the story which was told me. It occurred not so long since, and the farm is now possessed by one of the sons who remained.
Such are the traditions of Yumori Valley: and Matanzas—Matanzas, where the wafting breath of life plays round you with such enchanting vitality—Matanzas is the name for “the field of blood,” or “the battle-field,” and is so called from a bloody battle which was fought here many hundred years ago, by the Indian aborigines. It is sorrowful to think of it. It is not, however, without pleasure that I feel the breath of God in the wind pass over the formerly bloody field. It seems to say, when all scenes of murder and violence cease on the earth, He is still the same, and His life the same, eternally efficacious, eternally salutary, regenerating; and these beautiful palms, Cupid's tears, and humming-birds, and all the beautiful existences and shapes of life, shall appear with it, and—remain.
Mrs. B.'s volante came to fetch me and Cecilia in the deep twilight. We took with us sugar-cane from the plantation, which Cecilia desired for the little girls at home; and as a token of her hearty good-will, my good fermière gave me as a parting gift her indulgence for forty days' sins, and which I shall take with me to Sweden and present to Bishop Fahlcrantz.
I returned home, half-roasted, in my rural abode, and for three days afterwards had to work hard in freeing myself from swarms of fleas, which I brought back with me from my Arcadian excursion.
The number of small insects of various kinds is really one of the torments of this country, and I found this plague also in South Carolina and Georgia. If one left a little piece of cake or bread lying in the rooms, it was immediately surrounded by a swarm of little worms and creeping things. Here in Cuba it is the ants which are especially troublesome, one small kind of which will, it is said, undermine a large house.
​During the days that I amused myself by drawing my little memorials of the Valley of Yumori, and among other lovely things, the Cupid's tears kissed by the little humming-birds, I had laid some of those flowers upon the table beside me—that is to say, some of the small red blossoms, which had fallen—that I might examine at my leisure their form and veining. To my surprise, however, I observed that one after another of these blossoms disappeared from the table. I laid some fresh ones there, but it was not long before they too had vanished. I could not understand how it was. By chance, however, casting my eyes towards one of the walls of the room, I there, to my astonishment, beheld my flowers advancing in a long row up it to the very ceiling. Very, very small, light-coloured ants were dragging them up, and had made a regular line from my table up to the ceiling, where they disappeared. They were so small and light that I at first had not noticed them. One single ant dragged in this way up the wall a blossom which was twelve times larger than itself.
I was one evening one of the spectators of a great ball given by the free negroes of Matanzas for La Casa de Beneficienza in the city, to which the white public were invited by the black. The ball took place in the theatre, and the gazing public occupied the boxes. Mr. B. and my young and agreeable countryman Mr. F. accompanied me; and one of my unknown benefactors, who I believe was a Spaniard, hastened forward at the entrance to the theatre and paid the admission-fee for the foreign signora. And speaking of this, I may as well mention what I have here heard of the politeness of Spaniards to ladies which exceeds anything that I have experienced among other nations; even the chivalry of the Americans is not to be compared to it. It is true, at times it seems to be more than necessary, and it may be mere sham and hollowness; but there is nevertheless something beautiful and noble at the ​bottom, in its usages and forms. As, for instance, ladies, and even gentlemen who are strangers, will not be allowed to pay for their own purchases at fancy-shops, in eating-houses, confectioners' shops, and such like, or for their tickets at the theatres; and yet, neither the lady nor the stranger-gentleman will have any idea to whom it is that he is obliged for this politeness. Suppose, now, that you go to a perfumer's to purchase a bottle of eau-de-rose, or to a confectioner's for un libro de dulces (Cuba dulces, or sweetmeats, are very celebrated), and you are about to pay for them. You take out your pesos, but they are returned to you with a polite bow, and “It costs you nothing, signora!” And it will do no good though you should remonstrate, neither is it worth while. Some gentleman has been, or is then among the purchasers, perhaps unknown to you, but well-known to the people of the shop, and he has given a secret sign or nod, which has expressed, “I shall pay for her!” and then has left the shop, or goes on reading his newspaper, and you never know to whom you are obliged for this polite attention. Two of my lady acquaintances at Havanna told me that they were annoyed and distressed by continual politeness of this kind, and which laid them under silent obligations which they had no means of discharging; and I can very well understand that the thing may have its annoyances, but it is very polite nevertheless; and towards a foreigner and a stranger it is a politeness which is both beautiful and noble, when it declines the possibility of thanks.
But to return to the negro banquet and ball.
A banquet, arranged with flowers, lamps, and ornaments, occupied the lower part of the dancing hall. The dancers amounted to between two and three hundred persons. The black ladies were, for the most part, well dressed, after the French mode, and many of them very fine. Some couples danced, with great dignity and precision, some exceedingly tiresome minuets. What a foolish dance it is ​when it is not danced with beauty by beautiful or charming people! The principal lady in this case was so ugly, spite of her really magnificent apparel and fine carriage, as to remind me of a dressed-up ape, and the movements of the cavaliers were deficient in natural elasticity, which the negroes in general seemed to want.
But the great dance of the ball, a kind of wreath-dance, in which the whole company took part, amid innumerable artistic entanglements and disentanglements—the grouping and enwreathing themselves, in an infinite variety of ways with chains of artificial roses—all this was really lovely and picturesque, and was executed with exquisite precision; and if there had been a little less formality, and more natural animation, I could have believed that I beheld in it a type of civilised negro life. Those beautiful dark eyes, those splendid white teeth, in some pretty young girls especially, shone out joyously whilst they bent their heads and then rose from beneath the arches of rose-garlands.
Many of the negroes were wealthy, and one young negro was pointed out to me in the company as being possessed of property to the amount of 20,000 dollars.
The Spanish law for the West Indian colonies, los lejes de los Indios, has some excellent and just enactments, as regards the rights and the emancipation of negro slaves, which those of the American States are still deficient in, to their shame be it spoken! Their laws are purely opposed to the slave's acquisition of freedom and independence. The laws of the Spaniards favour the slaves in these respects. Here the slave is able to purchase his own freedom for the stipulated legal sum of five hundred dollars, and the judges (syndics) are commanded to watch over the rights of the slave. Here a mother may purchase the freedom of her child, before its birth, for fifteen dollars, and after its birth for double that sum. She may emancipate her child.
​Slaves here, at all events in the cities, have a much better chance of acquiring money than in the American Slave States; and, as free negroes, they are able to carry on trade, to rent land, to pursue agriculture and other occupations; and many free negroes have acquired property by trade. On the other hand, the condition of the slaves on the plantations here is, in general, much worse; they are worked much harder, and they lack all religious instruction. They are regarded altogether as cattle, and the slave-trade with Africa is still carried on actively, although privately. A few days ago a cargo of seven hundred negroes was secretly conveyed from Africa to Havanna. The government of the island received fifty dollars for each slave as “hush money,” and was silent. Pleasant and honourable!
The negroes in the cities look cheerful and healthy. One sees many handsome, well-grown, and not unfrequently splendidly dressed mulatto women on the promenades and in the churches. The fair mulattoes so nearly resemble the Spaniards in complexion and feature, that it is difficult to distinguish them. The Spaniards are said to be in general very kind to their domestic slaves, and not unfrequently indulgent to their weaknesses.
March 2nd.—Good morning, my little heart! I have just returned from mass in Matanzas church, for Matanzas has only one church, although it has a population of above thirty thousand souls. I heard there thundering music from the Spanish soldiery of the city, which greatly resembled the music of the dance, saw great parade of those occupying the centre aisle of the church; groups of ladies on their knees on splendid mats, many of ​them handsome, and all in grand array of silk and velvet, jewels or flowers, with bare necks and arms; all with transparent veils, black or white, thrown over the gaily-attired form, and evidently more occupied with their appearance than with their prayer-books; around them stood rows of well-dressed gentlemen, evidently more occupied with gazing at the ladies than with—anything else; divine service and devotion existed not, excepting in the hearts of two persons—at least judging from appearance—the one an elderly man, and a Spaniard, the other a mulatto woman. The rest was a grand show of priests and ceremonial. The choir of the church was in a gallery near the roof, covered with palm-branches, banners, and holy pictures. Palm-leaves were blessed and distributed. The Spanish soldiers took part in the solemnity, standing in line in the church; most of them appeared to be young men of slender figure, and refined and handsome features. Slaves, both male and female, after they had rolled out the mats for their mistresses and their
daughters, withdrew themselves into the background of the church, where they knelt upon the bare floor. A stranger and a Protestant knelt there among them and prayed—for them as well as for herself and her beloved ones. But her prayer here for herself is thanksgiving. She also received some of the blessed palm-leaves, and will convey them to her home in the remote north, in memory of this morning hour. It was a beautiful, warm, sunny morning. Life looked delicious and easy for all. Oh! if the inner life here only corresponded to the outer, how easy it would be to live and to crown oneself with garlands!
The costume of those beautiful ladies gave me pleasure, although I cannot approve of it for a church, and that Spanish mantilla, which however is said to be going more and more out of use, produces an infinitely picturesque effect. The negro and mulatto women use it mostly as a ​long shawl and of thicker material, to screen them from the sun when they are out in the middle of the day. Sometimes, and even to-day, I have seen ladies, evidently not of the lower class, dressed in garments of coarse gray sackcloth, and with this scarf of the same cloth over the head. I have been told that this is in fulfilment of some vow, or prayer, made in time of need or of sickness for themselves or their friends.
I shall to-day leave Matanzas to accompany my kind friends to a sugar-plantation belonging to Mrs. B.'s parents, at a place called Limonar, about fifteen miles off. I shall there study trees and flowers, and the Lord knows what else. After a stay of a few days at Limonar, I shall go to Madame de C.'s, who resides on a large sugar-plantation, situated between Matanzas and the city of Cardinas. Kind and hospitable people provide me here also with opportunities of seeing the country and the people; and I cannot say how thankful I am for this kindness.
Ariadne Inhegno, March 7th.
I have now been here for more than a week in the very lap of slavery, and, during the first few days of my visit, I was so depressed that I was not able to do much. Close before my window—the residence of the planter is a large one-storied house—I could not avoid seeing the whole day a group of negro-women working under the whip, the cracking of which (in the air, however,) above their heads, and the driver's (a negro) impatiently-repeated cry of “Arrea! Arrea!” be quick! get on! kept them working on without any intermission. And through the night—the whole night—I heard their weary footsteps, as they spread out to dry upon the flagged pavement, outside my window, the crushed sugar-cane which they carried from the sugar-mill. In the day time it is their work to rake up together the sun-dried canes, la bagaza, and carry them in ​baskets again to the sugar-mill, where they serve as fuel to heat the furnaces in which the sugar is boiled. The work on a sugar-plantation must go on incessantly, night and day, during the whole time of the sugar-harvest, which is in Cuba, during the whole season called la Secca, which is probably half the year. It is true that I frequently heard the women chattering and laughing during their incessant labour, untroubled by the cracking of the whip, and that during the night I often heard African songs and merry shouts, but which—sounding from the sugar-mill—lacked all melody and music. I know also that the labourers on this plantation were changed every seven hours, so that they always have six hours in every four-and-twenty for rest and refreshment; and that during two nights in the week the sugar-mill rests, and they are able to sleep—but still I could not reconcile myself to it. Neither can I now, but I can bear it better, since I have seen the cheerfulness of the slaves at their work, and their good, pleasant, and even joyous appearance, as a general rule, on this plantation.
I have several times visited the Negro-Slaves' Bohea—which is a kind of low fortress-like wall—built on the four sides of a large square court-yard, with a large gateway on one side, which is locked at night. The slaves' dwellings are within the wall—one room for each family—and open into the court. Nothing is to be seen on the outside of the wall but a row of small openings, secured with iron bars, one to each room—and so high in the wall that the slaves cannot look out from within. In the middle of the large court-yard is a building which serves as a cooking-kitchen, wash-house, &c. I have been present in this bohea, more than once, at the slaves' meal-times, and seen them fetch their calabash bowls full of snow-white rice, which had been boiled for them in an immense kettle, and which the black cook dealt out with a ladle, and with what seemed to me unreserved liberality. I have ​seen the slaves' white teeth shine out, and heard them chattering and laughing as they devoured the white rice grains, of which they are very fond (many times helping themselves to them with their fingers). They have besides salt fish and smoked meat; I saw also, in some of their rooms, bunches of bananas and tomatoes. According to law, a planter must furnish each slave with a certain measure of dried fish or salted meat per week, together with a certain number of bananas. But the slave-master, of course, does just as he pleases, for what law will call him to account? The appearance, however, of the slaves on this plantation testifies evidently of their being well fed and well contented.
I often made the inquiry as I pointed to their food, E buono? and always received in reply the words, Si e buono! with a contented and ready smile.
I have already heard it said in America that the French were considered the most judicious of slave-holders; and my host here, Mr. C., who is of French origin, born in St. Domingo, is a proof to me of the truth of this assertion. He works his slaves very hard; but he feeds them well, and takes good care of them, and they do their work cheerfully and quickly.
Mr. C. is a courteous, lively, and loquacious Frenchman, with a good deal of acuteness and sagacity of mind; and I have to thank him for much valuable information, among other things on the various negro tribes of Africa, their character, life, and social state on the coast, from which the greater number of slaves are brought hither—for the most part purchased from African chiefs, according to agreement with the white slave-dealer,—Mr. C. having himself been there, and being therefore good authority on the subject. I have also learned from him how to distinguish the different tribes by their characteristic features, and their various modes of tattooing themselves.
The Congo-negroes, called the Frenchmen of Africa, are ​a vivacious, gay, but vain people; they have depressed noses, wide mouths, thick lips, splendid teeth, and high cheek-bones; they are strong and broad built, but not tall of stature. The Gangas-negroes are kindred to the Congos. The Luccomées and Mandingos, on the contrary, the noblest of these coast-tribes, are tall of stature, with handsome and often remarkably regular, and even noble features, the expression of which is grave. The negro preachers and fortune-tellers are principally of the Mandingo tribes. The Luccomées are a proud and contentious people; they are difficult-to manage in the commencement of their life of slavery; they are lovers of freedom, and easily excited to violence; but if they are well and justly treated—(such just treatment as they can receive when they are held as slaves!)—they become in a few years the best and the most confidential labourers on the plantation. The Callavalis, or Caraballis negroes, are also a good people, although more lazy and careless. I have seen among them some magnificent figures. They have flatter noses and broader countenances than the Luccomées, and the expression is not so grave. All the negroes here are tattooed in the face; some around the eyes, others on the cheek-bones, and so on, according to the custom of the nation to which they belong. The greater number—even of the men—wear necklaces of red or of blue beads—the red, the coral-like seed of a kind of tree on the island; and the greater number, men as well as women, wear striped cotton handkerchiefs bound around the head. There is here a negro of the Fellah tribe, a little man, with delicate features, and the long, black, shining hair which is said to be peculiar to this tribe. Such are the principal of the negro tribes and characteristics with which I have become acquainted.
But I must tell you about one negro, whose history is closely connected with the family on this plantation, and which has been related to me. It is a beautiful instance ​of the peculiar nobility of the negro character when this approaches its proper development. This man is called Samedi, or Saturday, and was the servant of Mr. C.'s parents in St. Domingo when the celebrated massacre took place there, and from which he saved, at the peril of his own life, the two sons, then boys, of his master—my host being one of them. He carried them on his shoulders in the night, through all dangers, down to the harbour where he had secured for himself and the boys a passage in a small vessel to Charleston, in South Carolina. Safely arrived here, he placed the two boys at school, and hired himself out as a servant. He and the boys also had lost everything they possessed in the horrible night at St. Domingo. He had been alone able to save their lives. He now maintained and clothed them and himself by his labour. Each week he took to the boys each three dollars of his wages, and this he continued till the boys grew into young men, and he an old man.
My host went to sea, and acquired wealth by his ability and good fortune. Afterwards, when he was possessed of a plantation in Cuba, and had married, he took old Saturday to live with him; and now he took care of him in his turn, and every week gave to him three dollars as pocket-money in return for those which he had received from this magnanimous negro in his boyish years. Old Saturday lived here long and happily, and free from care, beloved and esteemed by all. He died two years since in extreme old age. He was an upright Christian, and very pious. It was, therefore, a surprise to his master after his death to find that he wore upon his breast an African amulet, a piece of folded paper printed very small, with letters and words in an African tongue, and to which the negroes appear to ascribe a supernatural power. But good Christianity does not trouble herself about such little heathenish superstition, the remains of twilight after the old night. Our good, Christian peasantry of Sweden cannot ​help still believing in fairies and witchcraft, in wise men and women, and I myself believe in them to a certain degree. There is still witchcraft enough prevailing, but
* The good can say our dear Lord's prayer,
* And fear neither witch nor devil!
still, nevertheless,
It is so dark, far, far away in the forest!
What do you now say to this negro slave? Ought indeed a race of people which can show such heroes ever to have been enslaved? But this conduct of Saturday's is by no means a solitary instance of its kind in that bloody night of St. Domingo. Many slaves saved, or endeavoured to save, their masters or their children, and many lost their lives in the attempt.
My visit to the slaves' bohea was not so consolatory to me as two visits which I paid to the cottages of the free negroes in the village of Limonar, which is very near this plantation. Early one beautiful morning I set off thither on an expedition of discovery. The small houses there, some of bark, others of woven brushwood, were all built in the form of cones, with palm-leaf roofs, and surrounded with cocoa-nut, palm, and other tropical trees; so that the whole village had an African appearance, at least according to what I have read and heard, of African huts and cities. There was a certain picturesque disorder in everything—a beauty in the beautiful trees which was refreshing after the Anglo-American regularity. The huts seemed built by guess, and with as little trouble as possible, and the trees had sprung up of themselves out of the warm earth to overshadow them. Each little homestead stood in the morning sun like an earthly paradise. And they were earthly paradises, these little farms with their bark huts and palms; they were, the greater number of them, the abodes of free negroes. I was not sure of this, as yet, this morning, but I had a presentiment of it ​as I wandered through the village. Some unusual looking trees and fruit in a little enclosure to the right attracted me, and there I determined to make a morning visit. The little gate was the most ricketty gate in the world, but the most willing to allow ingress. I passed through it, and advancing along a little sanded path, which wound round to the left, arrived at a palm-thatched, bark hut under some cocoa-palms. A little below lay a shadowy grove of banana and mango trees, and trees with a kind of white, round fruit hanging from their flexile branches; near the hut grew the tall trees, like some kind of palm, which had particularly attracted my attention; they were, I found, cactus plants and flowers. I was here struck, beyond everything else, with a general appearance of order and attention, which it is very unusual to find in and about the houses of the children of Africa. The hut was well-built and kept up, and the numerous tropical trees around it had evidently been planted con amore. The little hut had also its piazza under the palm-leaf roof, and some sugar-cane was lying on the table.
The door stood open; fire burned on the floor—a certain sign that it was inhabited by an African! The morning sun shone in through the door, and I also looked in. The interior was spacious, neat, and clean. On the left sat an old negro on his low bed, dressed in a blue shirt and woollen cap; he sat with his elbows propped on his knees, and his face resting on his hands, turned towards the fire, and evidently half asleep. He did not see me, and I therefore could look around me undisturbed. An iron-pot with a plate over it stood on the fire, and before the fire sate a tortoiseshell cat, and by her, on one leg, stood a white chicken. Fire, iron-pot, cat, and chicken, everything seemed half asleep in the sunshine which streamed in upon them. The cat just looked at me, then winked her eyes again, and gazed at the fire. It was a picture of real tropical still-life. Golden ears of maize-corn, ​fruit, and dried meat, and garden tools, hung upon the brown walls of the cottage.
In a little while the old man rose up, and without observing me, turned himself round and began to lay together his bed-clothes, very little of which however the bed possessed. He folded up sheets and coverlid, and finally rolled up a small, closely woven and handsome mat, which served as a mattress. When he had laid them aside very carefully, he again seated himself on his little bedstead, which was merely a few boards, and gazed again sleepily at the fire. Presently, however, he looked up, and became aware of me. He gave me a friendly look, as if in salutation, and said, “Cafe!” but I did not know whether he invited me to take coffee with him, or asked for some from me. The cat and the chicken seemed to smell breakfast, and began to move, and as I supposed that the breakfast hour might be at hand and the breakfast over the fire, I bade the old man, the cat, and the chicken, “Buon dios! Retornero!” and leaving them to understand that as they might, I proceeded onward around the little plantation.
I found in the banana grove two little brushwood cottages, in each of which there dwelt a large pig, which was just now enjoying its breakfast of large banana leaves. Swine are the principal wealth of the negro-husbandman, and even of the plantation-slaves. They are fattened without difficulty on banana leaves and the fruits of the earth, and are sold when fat for about fifteen dollars each. Beyond the fruit-tree and swine-grove lay a field in which maize and some kind of root were cultivated, but very indifferently. A negro man and woman were here at work, but the work was evidently ad libitum. We greeted one another, and made an attempt to converse, but it ended in laughter. They burst into peals of laughter at my words, and at my want of understanding, and I laughed at their capital hearty laughter, really ​tropical, luxuriant laughter. It cheers the very soul to see negroes chattering and laughing.
This little homestead, which seemed to be about two acres, was enclosed with a fence, in part paling, in part a stone-wall, and in part a quick hedge. After I had seen all there was to see, had laughed and shaken hands with the negroes, I returned to the sugar plantation to breakfast.
I learned from Mr. C. that the tall palm-like trees, which were hung with bunches of fruit resembling small cocoa-nuts, are called papaya, and those which bear white fruits, caimetos; that the old negro whom I visited is named Pedro, that he was born of a free mother, and has always been known as a remarkably good and honest man. He himself built his house and planted the trees on the little plot of ground, which he rented from the church for five pesos yearly. The village of Limonar was, as I imagined, principally built and inhabited by negro slaves who have purchased their own freedom and who rent land in the village; many, however, he said, were not as creditable as old Pedro; many were lazy, and maintained themselves rather by stealing sugar-cane fruit, &c, than by producing it.
At my request Mrs. C. accompanied me one afternoon on another visit to the negroes at Limonar, to act as interpreter in my conversation with them. This lady is as quiet and gentle in her demeanour as her husband is active and vivacious; she is musical, and has a voice which is real music to hear, in particular when she speaks the beautiful Spanish tongue. We visited various negro houses; most of which were inferior in all respects to that of Pedro. The negroes hold their plots of ground by the tenure of a small yearly payment, or by yielding up a portion of the produce to some Spanish Creole. I asked them if they wished to return to Africa. To which they replied, laughing, “No; they were very well ​off here!” Most of them had, nevertheless, been stolen from Africa, after they had passed the years of childhood. We met with one woman whose arm had been injured, and on Mrs. C. asking her the cause of this, she related in Spanish, with animated gestures, the story of cruel treatment which she, the defenceless slave, had received at the hands of her master or his agent. Lastly, we went to old Pedro's. I had furnished myself with some coffee for him, and with some Spanish phrases for the people who had charge of him—the man and woman whom I had seen in the field. They were now in the cottage, and old Pedro was sitting there, just as before.
The man's right arm had been crushed in the sugar-mill, which, had obliged it to be amputated above the elbow, after which he purchased his freedom for two hundred pesos; and the woman had also purchased her freedom for the same sum, if I remember correctly. I asked them whether they would like to return to Africa. They answered, with a merry laugh, “No; what should they do there? They were very happy here!” They were thoroughly contented and happy. I besought them to be kind to old Pedro, and God would recompense them! Again they laughed loudly, and replied, “Yes! yes!” Never before had I discovered how amusing I could be.
It had become dark whilst we were standing in the cottage under the cocoa and papaya trees; and the stars came forth gleaming softly from the deep blue sky. We saw from the place where we stood, and which was considerably elevated ground, the red fires shining from the furnaces of Mr. C.'s sugar-mill, and heard the wild songs and shouts which proceeded thence. There was slave-labour; life without rest; the dominion of the whip; the glowing furnace of slavery; here freedom, peace, and rest beneath this beautiful, tropical ​heaven, in the bosom of its affluent fruit-garden. The contrast was striking.
Cuba is at once the hell and the paradise of the negroes. The slave has severer labour on the plantation, but a better future, a better prospect of freedom and happiness than the slave of the United States. The slave standing by the hot furnace of the sugar-mill can look to those heights where the palm-trees are waving, and think to himself—“I too can take my rest beneath them one of these days!”
And when he does so, when he lives like old Pedro, or the man with only one arm and his wife, who can be happier than he? The sun gives him clothing, the earth yields him, with the least possible labour, abundant fare, the trees drop for him their beautiful fruits, and give him their leaves to roof his dwelling and to feed his creatures; each day, as it passes, is beautiful and free from care—each day, as it passes, affords him its enjoyment—sun, rest, fruits, existence in an atmosphere, which, merely to breathe, is happiness;—the negro desires nothing more. And when in the evening or the night he sees the red fires shining from the sugar-mill, and hears the cracking of the whip, and the shouts which resound thence, he can raise his eyes to the mild stars which glance through the palm-trees above his head, and bless the Lord of Heaven, who has prepared for the slave a way from captivity to paradise, even on earth. For he too was there by the blazing furnace, and beneath the lash of the driver, and now he is here in freedom and peace beneath his own palm-tree; and his heavily-laden brother may ere long be the same! What matters it to him that his arm was crushed; his heart is as sound as ever! He is free and happy, and none can take from him his freedom. The negro, under the dominion of the Spaniard, is possessed of a hope, and can lift up a song of thanksgiving which he cannot do under the free Eagle of the American Union.
​To-day is Sunday, and Mr. C. has done me the favour of allowing me to see the negroes of the plantation dance for an hour in the forenoon. In an ordinary way, they never dance during the dry season, la secca; they are, however, very glad to do it, if they can only get the opportunity, spite of their laborious work both night and day. I already hear the African drum beating its peculiar, distinct, and lively measures, and after the baptism of a little negro child, the dancing is to begin.
I enjoy myself very much with the kind family here, in which there seems to prevail a great deal of mutual affection, and somewhat of that cheerfulness which existed amongst us when we were so large a family altogether at home. Here are four sons and three daughters, who play and quarrel playfully one with another at all hours of the day, and the youngest, a pretty lad, is so childishly full of fun that he befools me to play with him.
In the morning and the evening I go out on my solitary rambles in the neighbourhood, generally accompanied by three large bloodhounds, which I cannot get rid of, but which are gentle as lambs, and lie down perfectly quiet around me whenever I sit down to sketch a tree or any remarkable object which takes my fancy; and it is perhaps as well for me that I have them with me, because there are said to be runaway negro slaves roving about on the island, and the dogs guard me from any surprise of this sort. These animals are so trained that, whilst they are perfectly gentle towards white people, they are dangerous to the blacks, and the blacks are afraid of them.
I have here sketched two remarkable trees; the one a beautiful ceiba in perfect health and magnificence, and a magnificent tree it really is; the other a ceiba in the arms of its terrible murderess or mistress, or both in one. In this tree one may see the parasite grasping the trunk with two gigantic hands, and, as it were, strangling it in its ​embrace. I have here also greatly enjoyed the balmy air and the wonderful beauty and novelty of the vegetation. There are some beautiful avenues—gundarajahs, as they are called in Spanish—on this plantation, one of king-palms, another of mango-trees, and so on. In the evenings we have music—for the whole family is musical—and sit with open doors whilst the delicious zephyrs sport round the room.
I could go through the whole process of sugar-making, from its very commencement to its close, that is to say, if I had sugar-cane and a sugar-mill. The process is so simple and so agreeable to witness that I think you will not be displeased to see it here on paper as I have seen it in Mr. C.'s well-kept sugar-mill. We must first, however, see the cutting of the sugar-cane.
The sugar-cane is waving there in the field, like a compact, tall, green reed; the stems, about as thick as a stout walking-stick, are yellow, some with flame-coloured stripes or spots, or with various characteristics of the cane, such as longer or shorter distances between the joints, each according to its species, for there are here many species of sugar-cane, as the Otaheitian-cane, ribbon-cane, and so on.
The cane is cut off near the root, with a sharp reaping-hook, or short, crooked scythe, one or two canes at a time; the green top is cut off, and the cane cast to one side. The negroes perform this operation with great speed and dexterity, and, as it seems, con amore. It is said that they like to destroy, and I could almost believe that it was so; there is a crashing and crackling among the vigorous canes; it is cheerful work, and those black figures, with their broad chests and sinewy arms, look well so employed. The shorn canes are loaded upon wagons drawn by oxen and conveyed away to the sugar-mill; where, as soon as it reaches the open door, it is unloaded by women, who throw the canes into a broad, raised, long trough, which ​extends into the building, where upon an elevation are placed two broad mill-stones, turning in opposite directions, the one raised a little above the other. By the side of this trough stand women who pass the canes onward and up to the grinding mill-stones (I have seen a couple of young women at work here who really were splendidly beautiful, with their dark glancing eyes, their white teeth, their coral necklaces round their throats, and the pink handkerchiefs bound round their heads) where stands a negro on a landing-place, who is called the feeder, his business being to see that all the canes pass regularly between the mill-stones. The juice is pressed out with every half revolution of the stones, and the canes which enter between them from above fall down, crushed dry, into another trough below, whence they are conveyed away by an opposite door, and then heaped up into another wagon drawn by oxen, which, as soon as it is loaded, moves off and gives place to another. This wagon, loaded with la bagaza, goes to the flagged pavement, where women unload it into baskets, and lay it out to dry as we have already seen. On one side of the building, in which the sugar-cane is ground, stands a house containing the machinery which sets the wheels in motion, and which is worked principally by oxen, which are driven as the oxen with us in the operation of thrashing. There is a driver to each pair of oxen, and it is from these that the shouts and the kind of stamping sound proceed which are heard at night. A negro shouts aloud words which he invents for the occcasion, and which are often entirely without meaning, and the others respond in chorus, repeating with some variation the given words. The shouts and the noises are unmelodious, but the negroes enliven themselves in this manner during their nocturnal labour.
The juice which flows from the crushed canes, flows between the millstones, into a porcelain trough, placed in a transverse direction to the great trough extending ​between the two doors, and through this it flows into a porcelain tank, where it is purified; after which it is again passed by another trough into the boiling-house, where it is boiled and skimmed in immense boilers, or pans, fixed in the earth, by masonry. By the side of each pan stands a negro, naked to the waist, who with an immense ladle, as tall as himself, stirs and skims the boiling juice. The juice, when it flows from the cane, is a thin liquid, of a pale green colour; it is now boiled in the pans to a thick syrup of a greyish tint; and this process being complete, it is allowed to flow into large, flat, long pans, where it is left to harden; after which it is broken up, packed into hogsheads, and sent out into the world.
Sugar is in no instance refined in Cuba; there is, therefore, no really white sugar there. The boilers are heated by furnaces, the mouths of which are in the walls, and which are continually fed by la bagaza, which when dried, makes excellent fuel.
And this is the history of the sugar-cane before it comes into your coffee cup. Alas, that its sweetness cannot—as yet—be obtained without much bitterness; and that human enjoyment costs so much human suffering. For I know very well that what I see at this place is not the darkest side of sugar cultivation. There is a far darker—of which I shall not now speak.
I will now go to the dance.
After the dance.—There stands in the grass, at the back of the house, a large Otaheitian almond-tree, the leafy head of which casts a broad shadow. In the shade of this tree were assembled between forty and fifty negroes, men and women, all in clean attire, the men mostly in shirts or ​blouses, the women in long, plain dresses. I here saw representatives of the various African nations—Congos, Mandingos, Luccomées, Caraballis, and others dancing in the African fashion. Each nation has some variations of its own, but the principal features of the dance are in all essentially the same. The dance always requires a man and a woman, and always represents a series of courtship and coquetry; during which the lover expresses his feelings, partly by tremor in all his joints, so that he seems ready to fall to pieces, as he turns round and round his fair one, like the planet around its sun, and partly by wonderful leaps and evolutions, often enfolding the lady with both his arms, but without touching her; yet still, as I said, this mode varied with the various nations. One negro, a Caraballis, threw one arm tenderly round the neck of his little lady during the dance, whilst with the other he placed a small silver coin in her mouth. And the black driver, an ugly little fellow (he under whose whip I saw the women at work), availed himself frequently of his rank, sometimes by kissing, during the dance, the prettiest of the girls that he danced with, and sometimes by interrupting the dancing of another man with a handsome young negro-girl, or with one of the best dancers, and then taking his place; for it is the custom that if any one of the bystanders can thrust a stick or a hat between two dancers, they are parted, and he can take the man's place. In this manner a woman will sometimes have to dance with three or four partners without leaving her place. Women, also, may exclude each other from the dance, generally by throwing a handkerchief between the dancers: when they take the place of the other who retires, such interruptions being generally taken in very good part, the one who retires smiling and seeming well pleased to rest a little only again to come forward, and the man laughing still more heartily to see himself the object of choice with so many. The dancing of the women ​always expresses a kind of bashfulness, mingled with a desire to charm, whilst, with downcast eyes, she turns herself round upon one spot with an air and a grace very much resembling a turkey-hen, whilst, with a neckkerchief or coloured handkerchief in her hand, sometimes one in each hand, she half drives away from her the advancing lover and half entices him to her—a mode of dancing, which, in its symbolic intention, would suit all nations and all classes of people, though—Heaven be praised—not all the beloved. The spectators stood in a ring around the dancers, one or two couples accompanying the dance with singing, which consisted of the lively, but monotonous, repetition of a few words which were given out by one person in the circle, who seemed to be a sort of improvisatore, and who had been chosen as leader of the song. Each time that a fresh couple entered the dance they were greeted by shrill cries, and the words and tune of the song were changed ; but both tune and voices were devoid of melody. It is difficult to imagine that these voices would develope that beauty, that incomparable, melodious purity, and this people, that musical talent which they have attained to in the Slave States of America. The wild African apple-tree has, when transplanted into American soil, ennobled both its nature and its fruit. The words of the singer were, I was told, insignificant, nor could I get any clue to their purport.
I have been told words used by French negro Creoles in their dances, which in their patois expressed a meaning which it seems to me would very well suit the negro dances here; they say—
Mal à tête, ce n'est pas maladie,
Mai aux dent, ce n'est pas maladie,
Mais l'amour, c'est maladie!
The dance has no distinct divisions, no development, no distinct termination, but appears to be continuous variations of one and the same theme improvised, according ​to the good humour or inspiration of the dancers, but comprised within a very circumscribed sphere, and not advancing beyond the quiverings, the twirlings, and the evolutions of which I have spoken. If either man or woman wish to choose a partner, they go out of the circle and place their handkerchief on the shoulder of the desired partner, or put a hat upon his or her head, or an ornament of some kind upon them; and I saw, on this occasion, one young negro woman whirling round with a man's hat on her head, and hung all over with handkerchiefs. It is also a common custom, but not of the most refined kind, to place a small silver coin in the mouth of the dancing lady at the close of the dance. The music consisted beside the singing, of drums. Three drummers stood beside the tree-trunk beating with their hands, their fists, their thumbs, and drumsticks upon skin stretched over hollowed tree-stems. They made as much noise as possible, but always keeping time and tune most correctly.
It was a very warm day, and I saw that the linen of the quivering and grimacing gentlemen was in a state as if it had just been taken out of the sea. Yet not the less danced they, evidently from the pleasure of their hearts, and seemed as if they would continue to dance to eternity: but a loud crack of the whip was heard not far from the dancing ground, and immediately the dancing ceased, and the dancers hastened away obediently to labour. Sugar grinding and boiling must again begin.
The slaves of Cuba have no holiday during la secca, although on Mr. C.'s plantation labour has a pause for two hours on Sunday morning.
How much more lively and full of intelligence was this dance under the almond-tree than the greater number of our dances in society, at least if we except the waltz. Our dances have not enough of natural life; this dance has perhaps too much; but it is full of animation and straight-forwardness, and has this good quality belonging to it, ​that every one in company may take part in it, either singing or dancing, or applauding. Nobody is excluded, there is no need for any body to stand against the walls, for anybody to be dull or have ennui. Long live the African dance!
I have made an interesting excursion with the family to one of those remarkable grottoes which abound in the mountains of Cuba. This is called La Loma de Lorenzo de St. Domingo, and is distant some miles from Limonar. Mrs. C. and I drove thither in their volante, the young ones riding the small Cuban horses, the most good-tempered, willing, and prettiest of all creatures of the horse-kind, and which carry the rider so lightly that he feels no fatigue; these horses are small, their action is a short and very even trot. John C., a cheerful, spirited, and very agreeable young man, ordered a couple of negroes to carry a quantity of straw and brushwood into various parts of the grotto, which was set fire to. This produced a splendid scene. Millions of terrified bats swarmed in the lofty and dark arches of the cavern; and what strange and wonderful shapes were revealed by the flames! It was a world of dreams, in which every form fashioned by nature and of which the human heart has dreamed, or had pre-visions, seemed to present itself in gloomy, chaotic outline. There seemed to be the human form wrapped as if in swaddling bands, awaiting patiently light and life; there were pulpits and thrones; wings which seemed about to loosen themselves from the walls, thousands of fantastic shapes, some lonely, some grotesque, some hideous. Ah! within these caverns of nature seem to be contained the whole of that dark world which the cavern of the human heart incloses, but the shapes of which we do not see, excepting when, in dark moments, a gloomy fire lights up its shadowy recesses. Every form which I beheld here I had seen long beforehand in—my own breast. And I know that they all exist there still, although God has allowed ​the sun to enter, and palms to spring up in those gloomy spaces. I know that beyond the light there still exist gloomy, night-like expanses unknown to myself, or at all events indistinctly known, and which will perhaps remain so through the whole of my earthy life. But then—life's caverns are only imperfectly illumined on earth!
The most definite and the most beautiful formation in these grottoes are the pillars. A drop of water distilling from the roof of the cavern falls upon the earth, and petrifies; from these petrified water-drops, grows up a conical elevation, from above also a similar cone is formed, depending from the roof, and slowly growing from petrifying water-drops; and in the course of centuries these two have met, and now form a column which seems to support the roof, and not unfrequently resembles a petrified palm-tree. Many such palm-trees stood in the vault of the grotto; many others were in process of formation. The power of a water-drop is great!
Monday morning.—I have been wandering about in the inclosed pasture-ground, el-portrero, contemplating parasitic growths and sketching trees. A wood in Cuba is a combined mass of tendrilled and thorny vegetation which it is impossible to penetrate. I have seen in the inclosed pastures some beautiful, tall trees, but many more deformed, from parasites and other causes; the beautiful and the unsightly stand there side by side. I saw to-day also a beautiful convolvulus, with large white flowers twining itself up to the very top of a dead tree, overhung with many heavy parasites. There are many kinds of the convolvulus here, which, with their beautiful flowers, constitute the principal ornament of the quick hedge which they bind together into a dense mass and cover with lovely flowers. There are many species of wild passion-flower, some very large which bear fruit, others very small. One of the most beautiful trees on this plantation is the pomme-rosa tree; it is just now in ​flower, and its blossom has an indescribably delicious fragrance. I shall shortly leave the plantation of Ariadne, but shall return both from my own wishes and those of the family. I am anxious to leave with my kind entertainers, as a remembrance of me, a portrait of the youngest boy, my little playmate.
St. Amelia Inhegno, March 15th.
St. Amelia Inhegno is a large sugar plantation, and I am now sitting in the smoke of the sugar-mill, which enters through the open window into my room—a large, excellent room, with a regular glass window, from which I obtain a fine view of the hills of Camerisca, and the palm-groves and plantations at their feet. I have everything here which I can wish for, only too much of the sugar manufacture, which is just opposite my one window, and which is on a much larger scale than on the plantation of Ariadne. Is it not singular that the word Inhegno, which here signifies an inclosed and cultivated place, and which is always used to indicate a plantation, so much resembles, both in sound and meaning, our Swedish word Inhägnad?
My hostess, Mrs. de C., is an agreeable and well-bred American lady, a widow with four children, three of whom are in the United States, and only one, a pretty girl of sixteen, remaining with her at home. She lives here with her father, an old officer of cheerful temperament, although lame, and confined for the most part to his armchair. A young American Creole, Mr. W., whose plantation adjoins, is a daily visitor in the family, and a most agreeable companion he is. He, like my hostess, is possessed of the gift of gay and easy conversation, below which lies a foundation of earnest integrity. Another young man belongs to the social circle of the evening and the dinner-table, and he is, under the old gentleman, overseer of the plantation. This young man is of great ​value to me from the candour and readiness with which he communicates any information which I may desire to possess.
This plantation is much larger than the one I visited in Limonar, and a considerable portion of the slaves—two hundred in number—have lately been brought hither from Africa, and have a much wilder appearance than those I saw at Ariadne. They are worked also with much more severity, because, here they are allowed only four-and-a-half hours out of the four-and-twenty for rest; that is to say, for their meals and sleep, and that during six or seven months of the year! Through the remaining portion of the twelve months, the “dead season,” as it is called, the slaves are allowed to sleep the whole night. It is true, nevertheless, that even now, upon this plantation, they have one night a week for sleep, and a few hours in the forenoon of each alternate Sunday, for rest. It is extraordinary how any human beings can sustain existence under such circumstances; and yet I see here powerful negroes who have been on the plantations for twenty or thirty years. When the negroes have once become accustomed to the labour and the life of the plantation it seems to agree with them; but during the first years, when they are brought here free and wild from Africa, it is very hard to them, and many seek to free themselves from slavery by suicide. This is frequently the case among the Luccomées, who appear to be among the noblest tribes of Africa, and it is not long since eleven Luccomées were found hanging from the branches of a guasima tree—a tree which has long horizontal branches. They had each one bound his breakfast in a girdle around him; for the African believes that such as die here immediately arise again to new life in their native land. Many female slaves, therefore, will lay upon the corpse of the self-murdered the kerchief, or the head-gear, which she most admires, in the belief that it ​will thus be conveyed to those who are dear to her in the mother-country, and will bear to them a salutation from her. The corpse of a suicide-slave has been seen covered with hundreds of such tokens.
I am told here that nothing but severity will answer in the treatment of slaves; that they always must know that the whip is over them; that they are an ungrateful people; that in the disturbances of 1846, it was the kindest masters who were first massacred with their whole families, while, on the other hand, the severe masters were carried off by their slaves into the woods, there to be concealed during the disturbances. I am told, that in order for a man to be loved by his slaves he must be feared. I do not believe it; such is not human nature; but there is a difference between fear and fear. There is one fear which does not exclude love, and one which produces hatred and revolution.
The slaves have here, in a general way, a dark and brooding appearance. They go to their work in the sugar-fields sleepy and weary. As they drive the oxen to and fro, I frequently see them sucking sugar-cane which they are very fond of, and of which they seem allowed here to have as much as they like. This is, at all events, a refreshment. They are not fed here on rice, but principally upon a species of root called malanga, which, it is said, they like, but which seemed to me insipid. It is yellow and something like the potato, but has a poor and somewhat bitter taste; each slave receives a portion of such root boiled for dinner, and eats it with his salt meat. They have for breakfast boiled maize, which they bruise and mix with wild tomatoes, the fruit of the plantain, or vegetables; for they are allowed a little land on the plantation where they may sow and reap for themselves, and besides this, each family has a pig, which they kill yearly and sell.
Sunday, March 17.—It is the sabbath, and forenoon; ​but the sugar-mill is still grinding, and the whip-lash sounds commanding labour. The slaves will continue to work the whole day as if it were a week-day. Next Sunday, they say, is the one on which the slaves will rest for some hours, and dance if they are inclined; but—they look so worn out!
There are in Cuba plantations where the slaves work twenty-one out of the four-and-twenty hours; plantations where there are only men who are driven like oxen to work, but with less mercy than oxen. The planter calculates that he is a gainer by so driving his slaves, that they may die within seven years, within which time he again supplies his plantation with fresh slaves, which are brought hither from Africa, and which he can purchase for two hundred dollars a-head. The continuance of the slave-trade in Cuba keeps down the price of slaves. I have heard of “gangs” of male slaves, six hundred in each gang, who are treated as prisoners, and at night locked up in a jail; but this is on the plantations in the southern part of the island.
It is amid circumstances such as these that one may become enamoured of the ideal communities of socialism, and when men such as Alcott seem like the saviours and high-priests of the earth. How beautiful appear to me associated brotherhoods on the earth, with all their extravagance of love, when compared with a social state in which human powers are so awfully abused and human rights trampled under foot! Here I feel myself more ardent than ever for those social doctrines which are labouring to advance themselves in the Free States of America; and when I return thither, I shall endeavour to become better acquainted with them and their leaders, and to do more justice to both.
Yet even here I have derived some little comfort with regard to the condition of the slaves on this plantation, at least, from the visit which I have paid to their bohea. ​This is a large, square, but low fortress-like wall, in which the slaves live as at Ariadne plantation, and in which they are secured by bolts and bars during the night. I have often visited them here during meal times, and have always felt it a refreshment to witness their vigorous life and their cheerfulness; nevertheless, I have seen countenances here steeped in such gloom, that not all the tropical sunshine would illumine, so hopeless, so bitter, so speechless were they—it was dreadful! The countenance of one young woman in particular, I shall never forget!
I cannot but often admire the herculean frames among the men, the energetic countenances in which a savage power seems united to a manly good-heartedness; which last shows itself especially in their treatment of the children, and by the very manner in which they look at them. The little ones are not here familiar and merry as they are on the plantations in America; they do not stretch out their little hands for a friendly salutation; they look at the white man with suspicious glances—they are shy: but the very little Bambinos, which are quite naked, fat, and plump, as shiny as black, or black-brown silk, dance upon their mother's knees, generally with a blue or red string of beads around the loins, and another round the neck; they are the very prettiest little things one ever saw; and the mothers with their strings of beads round their necks, their showy kerchiefs fastened, turban-wise, around the head, look very well too, especially when with delighted glances and shining pearly teeth, they are laughing and dancing with their fat, little ones. Such a young mother, with her child beneath a banana-tree, is a picture worthy the pencil of a good painter.
I saw in those dark little rooms—very like those at Ariadne plantation—more than one slave occupied during the short time allowed him for rest, in weaving little baskets and hats of palm-leaves, and one of them had ​constructed a fine head-dress of showy patches, and cock's feathers!
In other respects the slaves live in the bohea very much like cattle. Men and women live together, and part again according to fancy or whim. If a couple, after having lived together for some time, grow weary of each other, the one will give the other some cause of displeasure, and then they separate. In case of any noisy quarrel the majoral is at hand with his whip to establish peace.
“Are there here no couples who live constantly together as in proper marriage; no men and women who love one another sufficiently well to be faithful to each other, as husband and wife?” inquired I from my young, candid conductor.
“Yes,” replied he, “there are really such couples who have always remained together since they have been upon this plantation.”
“Lead me to one of these couples,” said I.
It was just dinner-time. My companion led me to one of the rooms in the wall. The door stood open, as is commonly the case to admit light and air. The man was out, the woman sate alone in the room; she might be about fifty, and was busy at some work. She had a round face, without beauty, but with a good and peaceful expression.
I asked her, through my interpreter, whether she was fond of her husband.
She replied cheerfully and without hesitation, “Yes; he is a good husband.”
I inquired whether she had been attached to him in Africa?
“Yes, in Africa,” she replied.
I asked how long she had been united to her husband; how many years?
This question seemed to trouble or perplex her; she smiled, and replied at length that she had had him always!
​Always! She did not know how vast and profound that word was on her lips. It went to my heart. Weeks, months, seasons, years, youth, strength, many changes had passed by unnoted, unobserved; hemisphere had been changed for hemisphere, freedom for slavery, the palm-tree hut for the bohea, a life of liberty for a life of labour—everything had changed; but one thing had remained stedfast, one thing had remained the same—her love—her fidelity! She had always had him, the husband whom she loved—he had always had her. Of that which was variable and evanescent she knew not, made no account—she knew merely of time as regarded that which was eternal. She had had her husband always; she should have him always. That was evidently written in her calm countenance and in her calm voice. It could not be otherwise.
“Love requires to be sustained by duty!” said Geijer to me, on one occasion when he spoke of marriage. So it does; but it is beautiful to see that the natural marriage between two kindred souls can remain firm and strong merely through the law of love, amid the wild license of the bohea. And that, in the case of two black people, two of the wild offspring of the desert!
Poets and philosophers have spoken of souls predestined for each other. Here I found two such. They had always belonged to each other. In the profound consciousness of God they had belonged to each other, and would belong to each other through all time—that is in—eternity.
The man entered whilst I was still in the room. He seemed to be about the same age as the woman, and had the same good-hearted expression; but there was in his smile a sort of imprisoned sunshine, a cheerful beam of light which, lit up from the heart itself, seemed as if it would gladly have free diffusion. I have often observed this imprisoned beam of light in the countenances of these ​children of bondage. They have brought it with them as an inheritance from their mother-country.
I went from this married pair to the prison cell, in which the slaves are placed after they have suffered punishment—women as well as men—and whilst the mind is still in a state of fermentation, after having endured bodily suffering. They are placed here in irons, made fast to a wooden frame, and here they sit, bound hands and feet—women as well as men—till their minds are again calm and their wounds healed, so that they can again go to their work. They are said to get fat while they remain here! The room was now empty, and inhabited merely by swarms of fleas.
I only wonder that suicide is not of more frequent occurrence among this people. How strong and tenacious the instinct of life must be!
The sugar-mill here affords, in its way, an interesting and picturesque scene. The athletic figures of those half-naked Africans who stand by the furnaces, or by the boiling sugar-pans, in those large, gloomy buildings, or who move about occupied in various ways, produce a singular effect. I cannot behold without amazement and pleasure the savage but calm majesty of their bearing and movement, as well as the dark energy of their countenances. Sculptors ought to see and model from these African chests and shoulders. They seem made to sustain Atlas. And though the Atlas of slavery presses heavily upon them, they are still strong—terribly strong, if the hour of vengeance should ever come; now they are silent and gloomy. The Spanish majorals in their white shirts and with their whips, or short, thin, square staves in their hands, stand or sit here and there on elevated platforms within the building, to overlook the work; and in the morning take the while, their coffee and white bread. They seem to me, as far as form and appearance goes, to be much smaller and more insignificant than many of the ​black slaves. In the Slave States of America no idea can be formed of the peculiar beauty of form of the African negro—especially those of certain tribes. The native slaves there are a weaker and gentler race. The wild raven has been tamed.
Many of the slaves also who are brought to Cuba have been princes and chiefs of their tribes, and such of their race as have accompanied them into slavery, on the plantations always show them respect and obedience. A very young man, a prince of the Luccomées, with several of his nation, was taken to a plantation on which, from some cause or other, he was condemned to be flogged, and the others, as is customary in such cases, to witness the punishment. When the young prince laid himself down on the ground to receive the lashes, his attendants did the same likewise, requesting to be allowed to share his punishment. This affecting instance of loyalty produced merely the coarse assurance, “That they should not fail of their full share of the whip when opportunity offered!”
This occurrence did not take place on this plantation.
There is more use made of machinery in this sugar-mill than in that at Ariadne. Instead of fixed troughs by which the sugar-cane is conveyed by human hands to and from the mill-stones, there are here carriages to convey the cane worked by machinery, and which run on many wheels in a long row, one after the other, from one door of the sugar-mill to the other, and it is merely at the entrance-gate that the cane is loaded by human hands.
And now you must have had enough of sugar-cane: but before I leave the bohea I must say a few words about the government of its population. This rests, after the master, upon an overseer who is called the majoral, and below him is a contra-majoral, who sometimes is a negro. On large plantations, such as this, there are many white under-majorals. The condition of the slaves and the prevailing state of feeling amongst them on a plantation ​depends very much upon the ability, prudence, and humanity of the majorals. The savage murder of a majoral in Cuba not unfrequently bears witness to the despotism of their proceedings, and to the state of frenzied excitement into which cruel oppression may bring the naturally gentle and easily subjected negro-race.
However oppressive slavery may be to the inhabitants of the bohea, and though the planters quite naïvely ignore most of the Spanish laws for the emancipation of the slave, and though the justice of the law is also here nullified at pleasure, still the wafting breezes of the life of freedom cannot be wholly excluded from the bohea. The slave knows, generally, that he can purchase his own freedom, and he knows also the means for the acquisition of money. The lottery is, in Cuba, one of the principal means for this purpose among the negro slaves, and they understand how to calculate their chances wisely. For instance, several individuals of a certain nation will unite for the purchase of a quantity of tickets, the numbers of which follow in close succession. Out of a total of consecutive numbers, one or two will commonly draw a prize, which, according to agreement, belongs to the nation, and is divided amongst all the members. In this way, I have heard that the Luccomée nation lately obtained at Havannah a prize of eleven thousand dollars, a portion of which, it is said, has been applied to purchase the freedom of slaves of their nation. And, if I mistake not, a Luccomée negro on this plantation has lately, with the consent of his owner, purchased his own freedom for two or three hundred dollars. Yes—some become free, but many, many never become so!
As far as concerns myself, my life here is as free and agreeable as I can desire. Mrs. de C. is a very charming and amiable person to associate with, and she allows me to have all the liberty I wish, and is infinitely agreeable to me. In the early mornings I go out alone; visit the ​slaves' bohea or ramble about the plantation; I enjoy the air and sketch trees and flowers; I have now become acquainted with that candelabra-like plant, which I have already mentioned. It is the flower-stalk of a plant of the aloe genus, called Peta, a shrub with stiff thorny leaves, and this flower-stalk shoots up from the root every third year, and bears upon its branches bunches of yellowish flowers which produce fruit. It shoots up to a height of five or six ells, blossoms and bears fruit all within the space of two months, after which it dies down. It has a singular but very ornamental appearance; I have made a drawing of it. Here also are a couple of remarkable ceiba trees, the one on account of its beauty, the other for its deformity—its tragical combat with the parasite. The sugar-cane fields are enclosed with lofty, untrimmed hedges in which grow wild orange and various tropical trees.
During the hottest part of the forenoon I sit quietly in my own light, excellent chamber, writing and drawing. Just before dinner I go out, look around me in the bohea, or seat myself under a mango-tree on a cross road to catch a few breezes, if I can, in its shade. In the afternoon I generally drive out with Mrs. de C. in her volante, her daughter and Mr. W. accompanying us on horseback. To be rocked over the country in an open volante, in that heavenly, delicious air, is the most soothing, delightful enjoyment that anybody can conceive.
The family assembles in the evening, and I then play American marches, “quicksteps,” and other lively pieces, with Yankee Doodle for the old gentleman, who, with these, recals his youthful achievements, and feels new life in his stiffened limbs. At a later hour I go out on the piazza to see the stars shining in the darkness of night, and to inhale the zephyrs which, though not so full of life as at Matanzas, are yet always full of delicious influence.
​Among my pleasures I must not forget the lovely humming-birds in the little garden. In the mornings, and directly after midday, one may be sure to see them hovering around the flowers, and around the red ones by preference. There are in the garden a couple of shrubs, which are now covered with most splendid red flowers, the shrub is called la coquette, and over these the little humming-birds are always hovering, they too of a splendid red, like little flames of fire. They are the most gorgeous little creatures anybody can imagine, as fat as little bulfinches and like them, having plump, brilliant breasts. They support themselves as if in the air, fluttering their wings, for a considerable time about the red flowers, into which they then dip their bills, but how gracefully I cannot describe. La coquette and her winged wooers present the most lovely spectacle. I have here seen three kinds of humming-birds. The one with the crimson colouring of morning, of which I have just spoken; a little one of a smaragdus-green and more delicate form; and a third, green with a crest of yellow rays on its head. They will sometimes all alight upon a bough, and as they fly away again, a soft, low twittering may be heard. They are quarrelsome, and pursue one another like little arrows through the air, whilst, as rivals, they approach the same flower.
Besides these most lovely little birds, I see here a black bird about as large as a jackdaw. It resembles the American blackbirds, and is called majitos or solibios (or solivios, for here there is a great confusion between “v” and “b,” and “b” and “v;” thus Havannah is frequently both written and pronounced Habannah). I see these blackbirds often sitting upon the branches of the candelabra-like peta. These queer birds are said to be a species of communists, to live in communities, to lay their eggs together, to hatch them in common, and to feed the young in the same manner, without any difference of ​mine or thine. The humming-bird is evidently of a very different temperament, and is a violent anti-communist.
The heat is now becoming excessive and I feel it so enervating that I think I shall leave Cuba on the 8th of April instead of the 28th, as I had intended. From Cuba I shall proceed to Charleston and Savannah, visit two plantations on the coast of Georgia, and so on to Virginia—the old dominion—which I must see, and where I shall probably spend the month of May; thence to Philadelphia and New York—to my dear home at Rose Cottage—then to the White Mountains in New Hampshire, pay a visit to Maine and Vermont; and thence, in the month of July, to my first beautiful home on the banks of the Hudson; then to England, and then—home!
I am now going for a few days to Cardinas, a little city on the sea-coast; but I shall return hither. The kind Mrs. de C. will lend me her volante.
* ↑ These poor creatures are not sold here publicly, but in secret. They are said to be emaciated in a high degree, and look miserable when they are first landed, after the voyage from Africa, which is a three weeks' martyrdom for them; and they require to be fed up and brought into condition before they can tempt purchasers.
* ↑ It is planted by placing the cane lengthwise in the ground, when it shoots up from the joints. The flower is not unlike that of the reed with us, and consists of a number of such minute florets that they cannot be discerned by the naked eye. But it is extremely seldom that the sugar-cane is seen here to flower. Even Mr. C. has not yet seen it.