The Press.
London, England, 1856-09-06 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

to sustain the reputation of the author. Of
the innumerable imitations which " Uncle
Tom " gave birth to, not one exhibited a trace
of that vital power by which it was distin-
guished.

We regard that power as the more won_
derful since we find no sign of it in any of the
previous productions of Mrs. Stowe. We
looked for some indications of it in her work
on England, but we found not a passage
to establish identity of intellect with the
author of " Uncle Tom." We are still more
puzzled with " Dred." The qualities of mind
revealed in it are so opposed and even irre-
concileable, that we can hardly believe them to
exist in the same intellect. For, while we find
a large amount of purely trivial writing—not
free from affectation, and mingled with all
kinds of faults in style—we find in it also
passages where close, concentrated, logical
thought, with thrilling passion, sublime
imagery, and intense aspiration are expressed
in composition of the purest English and
inost harmonious periods.
The question irresistibly forced on our
mind by a perusal of " Dred " is,—Can Mrs
Stowe be the unassisted author of the romances
which bear her name? If she be, her mind
is the greatest psychological marvel of which
we know any example. Such a union of
triviality with power, of massive solid intellect
with mere artificial prettiness and accom-
plishment, is incomprehensible to us.
Is it not probable that some one or more of
those earnest minds which are labouring for
the overthrow of slavery in the United States
might be willing to assist Mrs. Stowe in in-
fluencing the public mind by fiction, though
unwilling to appear openly in the work? We
have ali heard of the underground railway in
the States,—may not there be a press worked
by some agency equally secret? There was
something like organisation in the means
taken to give universal publicity. to " Uncle
Tom." The " Key " was not like woman's
work. If, unassisted, Mrs. Stowe has written
all that bears her name, she is one of the most
wonderful of all female writers.

In the examination of this 'romance we pur-
pose chiefly to confine ourselves to the episode
of Dred. But, before touching on it, let us
give an extract illustrative of one manner of
Mrs. Stowe,—that dealing with social and do-
mestic scenes. Nina Gordon is the heroine
of the story. She has been left by her father,
Colonel Gordon, the mistress of a slave estate
in South Carolina. Harry, her managing
man, is her father's son, though a slave. On
her return from New Yurk, she relates to
Harry that she is engaged to three gentle-
men:—

" But is this true, Miss Nina? Are you really
engaged?"
" Yes, to be sure I am, to three gentlemen, and going to
stay so till I find which I like best. May be, you know,
I shan't like any of them."

" Engaged to_... three gentlemen, Miss Nina!"
"To be sure. Can't you understand English, Harry?
I am now—Pict."

" Miss Nina, is that right?"
" Right ! why not ? I don't know which to take—l
positively don't ; so I took them all on trial, you know."
" Really, Miss Nina! Tell us who they are."
" Well, there's Mr. Carson ; he's a rich old bachelor,
horridly polite ; one of those little bobbing men that
always have such shining dickies and collars, and such
bright boots, and such tight straps ; and he's rich, and
perfectly wild about me. He wouldn't take No for an
answer, so I just said Yes, you know, to have a little
quiet. Resides he is very convenient about the opera and
concerts and such things."
" Well, and the next."

"Well, the next is George Emmons. He's one of your
pink-and•white men, you know, who look like cream
candy, as if they were good to eat. He's a lawyer of a
good family, thought a good deal of, and all that. Well,
really they say he has talents-I'm no judge. I know he
always bores me to death, asking me if 1 have read this
or that; marking places in books I never read. He's
your sentimental sort, writes the most romantic notes on
pink paper, and all that sort of thing."
" And the third?"

" Well, you see, I don't like him a bit, I'm sure I don't.
He's a hateful creature ; he isn't handsome ; he's proud as
Lucifer; and I'm sure I don't know how be got me to be
engaged. It was a kind of an accident. He 'a real good,
though, too good for me, that's a fact. But, then, I am
afraid of him a little."
" And his name ?"

" Well, his name is Clayton—Mr. Edward Clayton, at
your service. He's one of your high and mighty people,
with such deep-set eyes—eyes that look as if they were in
a cave—and such black hair! and his eves have a despe-
rate sort of sad look, sometimes quite Byronic. He's tall
and rather loose-jointed; has beautiful teeth; his mouth,

855

too, is—well, when he smiles, sometimes it really is quits
fascinating; and then he's so different from other gentle-
men. Lie's kind, but he don't care how he dresses, and
wears the most horrid biltled. And then, he isn't polite;
he won't jump, you know, to pick up your thread or
siissors; and sometimes he'll get into a brown study, and
let you stand ten minutes before he thinks to give you a
chair, and all such provoking things. He isn't a bit of a
lady's man. Well, the consequence is, as my lord won't
court the girls, the girls all court my lord—that's the way,
you know. And they seem to think it's such a feather in
their cap to get attention from him, because, you know,
he's horrid sensible. So, you see, that just set me out to
see what I could do with him. Well, you see, I wouldn't
court him, and I plagued him, and laughed at him, and
spited him, and got him gloriously wroth; and he said
some spiteful things about me, and then I said some more
about him, and we had a real up and•down quarrel; and
then I took a penitent turn, you know, and just went
gracefully down into the valley of humiliation—as we
witches can—and it took wonderfully, brought my lord on
his knees before he knew what he was doing. Well, really
I don't knew what was the matter just then, but he spoke
so earnest and strong that he actually got me to crying—
hateful creature !—and I promised all sorts of things, yon
know, said altogether more than will bear thinking of."
" And are you corresponding with all these lovers, Miss
Nina?"

" Yes; isn't it fun ? Their letters, you know, can't
speak; if they could, when they came rustling together in
the bag, wouldn't there be a muss?"
This extract may suffice as a sample of one
portion of the book. The portraiture may be
faithful, it may be clever, but it does not indi-
cate an order of intellect capable of magnifi-
cent conceptions. We read a little later of
Nina that while searching her boxes for bills
and letters, her " little hands went pawing
" among the heap, making the fanciful collec-
" tion fly in every direction over the carpet."
Phrases of a like kind are of perpetual occur-
rence in the lighter portions of the story, as
they were extremely common in Mrs. Stowe's
book on England. The brother of Nina, Tom
Gordon, a type of the worst class of slave-
owning gentlemen, pays her a visit, and being
offended by the independent demeanour of
Harry, and struck by the charms of Harry's
pretty wife, he is resolved to make his slave
brother feel his inferiority. A scuffle between
them compels Harry to fly, and it is then, at
page 178, that Dred appears upon the scene.
The description of his appearance is
forcible :

There was a crackling in the swamp and a movement
among the copse of briers, and at last the speaker emerged
and stood before Harry. He was a tall black man, of mag-
nificent stature and proportions. His skin was intensely
black, and polished like marble. A loose shirt of red
flannel, which opened very widest the breast, gave a display
of a neck and chest of herculean strength. The sleeves of
the shirt, rolled up nearly to the shoulders, showed the
minks of a gladiator. The head, which rose with an
imperial air from the broad shoulders, was large and mas-
sive, and developed with equal force both in the reflective
and perceptive department. The perceptive organs jutted
like dark ridges over the eyes, while that part of the head
which phrenologists attribute to the moral and intellectual
sentiments rose like au ample dome above them. The
large eyes had that peculiar and solemn effect of unfathom-
able blackness and darkness which is often a striking cha-
racteristic of the African eye. But there burned in tl'em,
like tongues of flame in a black pool of naptha, a subtle
and restless fire, that betokened habitual excitement to the
verge of insanity. If any organs were predominant in the
head, they were those of ideality, wonder, veneration, and
firmness, and the whole combination was such as might
have formed one of the wild old warrior prophets of the
heroic ages. He wore a fantastic sort of turban, appa-
rently of an old scarlet shawl, which added to the out-
landish effect of his appearance. His nether garments, of
coarse negro cloth, were girded round the waist by a strip
of scarlet flannel. in which was thrust a bowie•knife and
hatchet. Over one shoulder he carried a rifle, and a shot-
pouch was suspended to his belt. A rude game-bag hung
upon his arm. Wild and startling se the apparition might
have been, it appeared to be no stranger to Harry ; for,
after the first movement of surprise, he said in a tone of
familiar recognition, in which there was blended somewhat
of awe and respect—

I did not know that you

"0, it is you, then, Dred !
were hearing me !"
" Have I not heard?" said the speaker, raising his arm,
and his eyes gleaming with wild excitement. " How long
wilt thou halt between two opinions ? Did not Moses re-
fuse to be called the son of Pharoah's daughter? How
long wilt thou cast in thy lot with the oppressors of Israel,
who say unto thee, Bow down that we may walk over
thee?' Shall not the Red Sea be divided? Yea, with the
Lord, it shall !"

The following chapter, the nineteenth,
should be read attentively. It opens with
some close and logical reflections. The italics
are our own :--

It has been a problem to many how the system of
slavery in America should unite the two apparent incon-
sistencies of a code of slave laws more severe than that of
any other civilised nation, with an average practice at
least as indulgent as any other ; for bad as slavery is at
the best, it may yet be admitted that the practice, as a
whole, has been kits cruel in this country than in

856

many. An examination into history will show us •hat
the cruelty of the laws resulted from the effects of indulgent
practice.
During the first years of importation of slaves into
Sont,i Carolina they enjoyed many privileges. Those who
lived in intelligent families, and had any desire to learn,
were instructed in reading and writing. Liberty was
given them to meet in assemblies of worship, in class-
meetings, and otherwise, without the presence of white
witnesses ; and many were raised to situations of trust
and consequence. The result of this was the development
of a good degree of intelligence and manliness among the
slaves. There arose among them grave, thoughtful,
energetic men, with their ears and eyes open, and their
minds constantly awake to compare and reason. When
minds come into this state, in a government professing to
be founded on principles of universal equality, it follows
that almost every public speech, document, or newspaper,
becomes an incendiary publication. Of this fact the
southern slave states have ever exhibited the most
singular unconsciousness. Documents containing senti-
ments most dangerous for slaves to hear have been pub-
licly read and applauded among them. The slave has
heard, amid shouts, on the fourth of July, that his masters
held the truth to be sellevident, that all men were born
equal, and had an inalienable right to life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness, and that all governments derive their
just power from the consent of the g'iverned. Even
the mottoes of newspapers have embodied sentiments of
the most insurrectionary character. Such inscriptions as
" Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God," stand, to
this day, in large letters, at the head of southern news-
papers, while speeches of senators and public men, in
which the principles of universal democracy are asserted,
are constant matters of discussion.

An account is then given of Donmark Vesey,
the father of Dred :
Accordingly, we find that when the discussions for the
admission of Missouri as a slave state produced a wave
whose waters undulated in every part of the Union, there
were found among the slaves men of unusual thought and
vigour, who were no inattentive witnesses and listeners.
The discussions were printed in the newspapers ; and
what was printed in the newspapers was further discussed
at the post-office door, in the tavern, in the bar-room, at
the dinner-party, where black servants were listening be-
hind the chairs. A free coloured man in the city of
Charlestown, named Denmark Vesey, was the one who
had the hardihood to seek to use the electric fluid in the
cloud thus accumulated. He conceived the hopeless pro-
ject of imitating the example set by the American race,
and achieving independence for the blacks. Our know-
ledge of this man is derived entirely from the printed re-
ports of the magistrates who gave an account of the in-
s irrection of which he was the instigator, and who will
not, of course, be supposed to be unduly prejudiced in his
favour. They state that he was first brought to the
country by one Captain Vesey, a young lad, distinguished
for personal beauty and great intelligence, and that he
proved for twenty years a most faithful slave ; but on
drawing a prize of fifteen hundred dollars in a lottery, he
purchased his freedom of his master, and worked as a car-
penter in the city of Charleston. He was distinguished
for strength and activity; and, as the accounts state, main-
tained such an irreproachable character, and enjoyed so
much the confidence of the whites, that when he was
accused the charge was not only discredited, but he was
not even arrested for several days after, and not till the
proof of his guilt had become too strong to be doubted.

This whole chapter, made up from authentic
records, is a masterly piece of composition.
The boy Dred is thus introduced :

Among the children of Denmark Vesey was a boy by a
Mandingo slave woman, who was his father's particular
favorite. The Mandingos are one of the finest of African
tribes, distinguished fur intelligence, beauty of form, and
an indomitable pride and energy of nature. As slaves,
they are considered as particularly valuable by those who
have tact enough to govern them, because of their great
capability and their proud faithfulness; but they ieseut a
government of brute force, and under such are always
fractious and dangerous. This boy received from his
mother the name of Dred ; a name not unusual among the
slaves, and generally given to those of great physical force.
The development of this child's mind was so uncommon
as to excite astonishment among the negroes. He early
acquired the power of reading, by an apparent instinctive
faculty, and would often astonish those around him with
things which he had discovered in books. Like other
children of a deep and fervent nature, he developed great
religious ardour, and often surprised the elder negroes by
his questions and replies on this subject. A son so en•
dowed could not but be an object of great pride and interest
to a father like Denmark Vesey. The impression seemed
to prevail universally among the negroes that this child
was born for extraordinary things: and perhaps it was the
yearning to acquire liberty for the development of such a
mind which first led Denmark Vesey to reflect on the
nature of slavery, and the terrible weights which it lays on
the human intellect, and to conceive the project of libera•
time a race. The Bible, of which Vesey was an incessant
reader, stimulated this desire. He likened his own position
of comparative education, competence, and general esteem
among the whites, to that of Moses among the Egyptians ;
and nourished the idea that, like Moses, he was sent as a
deliverer. During the process of the conspiracy, this son,
though but ten years of age, was his father's confidant ; and
he often charged him, though he should fail in the attempt,
never to be discouraged. He impressed it upon his mind
that he should never submit tamely to the yoke of slavery ;
and nourished the idea already impressed, that some more
than ordinary destiny was reserved for him.
After the discovery of the plot, and the execution of its
leaders, those more immediately connected with them
were sold from the state, oven though not proved to have