Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1846-11-12
For the Green Mountain Freeman.
"The Greeks are at the Door, Madam"

Ma. EDITOR:-l love to group together incOngrui-
ties and opposites, and take obque glances at men
and things, because in this manner can get better
analysis of the motives which prompt the strange ca
pers of that stranges creature in creaton-nan. Be-
low is an instance.
Some few years since, party of pious, uery pOus)
ladies were assembled in the luxurious paror of
of our substantial Virginia planters engaged in reduc
ing to practice cardinal precept of Christ and the
apostles. They were benevolent sewing society,
making clothing for gratuitous distribution to the sut
fering Greeks, during that memorable struggle with
the Turks, which so generally enlisted the warmest
sympahies of Chrstendom. The occasion and OBJ
iect was Just OF that kind best calculated to enlist
the commiseration of the susceptible hearts of
ladies' for on the one part, the most desperate
tcrOng-dOmg, and on the other the most desperate
,Orong-Su6ering Look at the beaming countenances
of this group and see if it not How plainly OBJ
servabe the fact that the suferngs of these unforu
nate victims Of Turkish barbarty has stirred the deep
est fountains of human tenderness in their souls. With
what nervous energy each tiny finger, which seldom
tasked with labor in Old Virginia, plies the needle,
while every is absorbed in the tale of woe which
of the party is reNdng from the latest newspaper
Surely here is no morbid sympathy-no narrow be-
nevolence but one which would reach out its lone
arms and grasp the universal world of man; would
seek the srckered and sorrowng, and administer the
oil of consolation to every bruised spirit Have
care ye pudish censors, how ye impugn the religious
character of your southern brethren in Christ Did We
more than they, felt ye than they for the OPP
pressed in Greece? Were your tears warmer, your
hands reader for relief than was theirs?
Present at this interesting scene was one, well known
in the public world both for his talents and eccentr
city. A close observer was John Randolph of Roam
oak. No man knew better than he to appreciate
good or lash with scorpion satie, bad, feature in
character. Looking from the open easement just as
the gang of negroes belonging to the plantation were
returning from their days toll, and observing in them
those unaing marks of scanty fare, which is said al
ways to be exhibited by the badly fed negro* he
turned to the benevolent mistress of the house with the
cutting rebuke which heads this artcle;-"7he Greeks
are athe door, madam"
One would have supposed that such rebuke, I'M
der such circumstances, would have reached the adys
consclence:-but no! she knew no such Greeks as
those They were only negros, and therefore shut out
from the pale of sympathy.
Now, we may not, perhaps call in question the piety
benevoence of these ladies' although they exhibit to
our northern trained senses, gross incongruity in
character but may discourse, without stint, upon
that SYSTEM OF THINGS which so perverts the moral
feelings as to render society and individuals insensi-
BILE to such defects;-and who shall prescribe limits to
effects, when the cause is of the magnitude and mighty
influence possessed by slavery?-or who would stand
sponsor for the purity of any moral social sentiment
in the hands of those whose hearts are so sadly per-
verted, and whose moral vision is so completely re-
verse1. NJ
Montpelier, Nov. 5.
+The badly fed and clothed negro, said be of peculiar
wan aow and pached complexion. The well fed one sprgh
y, oily skinned, "FAT .LEEK."