The republic. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1849-1853, 1853-01-01
From the British Army Despatch. Dec. 8.
Uncle Toms Cabin acknowledgements ea
Thyself.


ture of that work to be 80 hostile that we could
scarcely judge of it in proper critical manner
We believe 1t to possess certain tnelo dramatic
power equal in pathos to the {. Green Bushes at
the Adelphi, and in incident to popular novel
something between the style of Eugene Sue and
George Reynolds But we believe it also to be de-
void of truth, principle, and reality, and that its
tendencies are highly mischevous and detrimental
to the interests Of mankind. In saying this we
entirely acquit its authoress, Mrs Stowe, Of any
evil desire, any wicked feeling, or intended false
hood That lady, for all we know, may be most
excellent, she is undoubtedly very talented,
person. We fully give her credit for good mo:
tives. We doubt not that she believes herself
entrusted with mission as much as ever did
any 6 eminent female" from Mary Leczlns>~
ka down to Johanna Southcote. We can ina
CINE her to be endowed with awful sense of
womanhood, and to make-if ever she condo
scended to such task-since the second edition
of her book sold-about the worst dump
ings that were placed upon dirty table-cloth
in sovenly parlor. We can magine that she
writes big, ssrawling hand, with the letters all
backwards, avoiding neatness with pains taking
precision-her voiceis probably harsh her attitude
imposing, and she will or does wear her own grey
hair in the mother of a-nation style. Still we think
it great pity that che did not do any thing rather
than what she has done, with all the busy enthu--
siasm of woman in breeches. When some time
ago, long before the work was known in England.
we CHANGED to take it up in the apartment of
American friend, we stumbled upon passage of
the first force in can't and nonsense. 1t was in the
style of those anti slavery, African coast blockade
tracts, which we remember abounded some years
since, and which assisted in betraying to destruc-
ton many brave English seamen, and cost the
lives of SO many unhappy negroes. For it is our
deliberate opinion that more crime, abominaton
Of every kind, loss of life, and misery have been
caused by our intervention to the negro race,
than thrice the number of years would have wit
messed had slavery been still the law of Europe
and all America, and been allowed its full fling
throughout the whole civilized world. To avoid
our cruisers, what forced marches and confined
adj ms
tunate blacks have been killed by our grape and
round shot How many put out of the way to
tighten the flying shaver or avoid detection !
While we, the phianthropists, have furnished the
slave monarchs with arms to take them captive
Brummagem guns, pistols, and cutlasses to hunt
down the unfortunate wretches, for whom hypo-
crisy prays while neglecting the Hindoo and starv
ing the white man Philanthropy, too, -sweetens
her tea with slave grown sugar, half penny
pound cheaper, refined by negro blood, at the ex-
pense of w est India proprietors How is the cotton
raised, let as ask, that supplies the raw material
for the white slaves of Manchester? All such
points woman never thinks of, and if che hear
them, cannot understand. We will be bound
there is 20 peg in Harriet's head whereon ssto
hang an inference" She sips her tea and cries
aloud, sis he not a man and brother9" But
Of and all tsS sanRo excuse the Duchess
thousands of their fellow eountrywomen ton IN.
aided-pale daughters of consumption whose
threads of life are woven into the trumpery lace
adorning the dazzling bosom of female philan-
v 10
ems compared to Uncle Toms Cabin? Nothing.
Wretched inconsistency of conduct! Miserable
contradiction OF sympathy! What tears must an
gels weep at these fantastic follies of manknd
However, we are straying frem intention.
We maintain that this onesided representation is
creating mischief between Great Britain and the
United States, which nothing remedy, no
treaties obviate, statesma nship hereafter avoid
We say that the sicky interference of our fine
ladies, many, nay most of whom, would shrink
from the contact OF dying needlewoman on their
doorsteps, and daily pass unheeding the miseries
OF thousands OF white women, is excess of Jolly
and hypocrisy that will be the curse of freedom
throughout the world. We question the motives
OF these ladies. Among them we see the names of
some not removed for matronIy virtues, but noto-
rious for vanity, frivoity, and fashion-that com
prehensive word which includes niue social evil
On the stage, this work. aided by the morbid talent
of its adapters and the exquisite ceyerness of such
actors and actresses are now electrifyIng an
Adelphi audience, is doing mischief which cen
fury cannot repair. Let the Lord Chamberlain
look to this We are playing the part of the des-
and the priest by insulting the nted States of
America What have to do with the internal
affairslof the American Republic? Why are We to
back this great exaggerated LIE? Let the Ameri
cans send out here and write book which shall
tell the truth-ay, one-half the truth-of London
city; let them get up drama whose scene sha III
be liz Lancashire; let them make out Britons to he
task masters, without redeeming point, over
the emasculated millions of British work people,
whose sinews they stretch and whose bones they
grind down in the name of commerce Let them
send to India or Borneo. Let them drarnatise
Warren Hastings and Rajah Brooke. Let them
throw light on the Outram business, with its op-
preston and poisonings, together with the false
hoods Of suppression and assertion on the part of
the East India Company. Let them paint famine
in Ireland For each American Legree they shall
easily find an English We forced slavery
on the Americans. We are now sowing there the
seedsof dissension, broadcast. We do not admit
that the state of the negro slave is any thing like
what it s pictured in Uncle TOMS Cabin in any
case. There may be solitary cases approaching it
in abomination. But the Americans, abolition.
lists not shall and will get rid slavery as they
please themselves, and every thing done in Eng
land, either sentimentally not, adds only force
TO opposition. Mrs. Stowe has libelIed her coun-
trymen; let them look to that. England need not
back her with Holyweu street ignorance and
Exeter Hall cant. If she do, she will SOW the wind
and reap the whirlwind. Every American in
London ia disgusted with the Uncle Tom mania
here. Ii he go to theatre, he is insulted and
shocked The English people, on the other hand,
are deluded into the falsest notions of America
When the slave in the drama escapes into British
Canada, there Is a cheer. That cheer NAV
cost US some day best alliance. At this
moment the interests of England and Ameri-
interfere on behalf of the enslaved French
people? We believe, ON the other hand, that Louis
Napoleon is popular with them. fEngand inter
iere with American slavery, she will not effect her
object, but the result may be, ere long, that she
will be enslaved herself We have no patience to
pursue this subject further. The book is false in
TACT, as the hne ladies are false in sentiment The
good and the evil to be done by this excitement on
part in comparative force and reality as the
tears of an Adelphi audience compared to the
tears of blood that are shed by nations. This in
tervention will be indeed accursed. But why
should it exist? Simply because we are peace
stricken hypocrites. Ihaddeus Of Warsa,o did
not cause US to interfere on behalf of Poland Yet
Miss Porter's work was not oyerdrawn, and in
merit how immeasurably superior to Uncle TOMS
Cabin? Alas! that the following verse should be
likely to receive an Interpretation by such
means The devil, in the likeness of Haynau, is
addressing Lord Palmerston in farewell letter:
May the negroes you strive to set free
Forge the chains of deadlier hate
Than the world has had eyes yet to
In the gloom of proud nations fate;
BE your shopkeepers ruin'd, your commerce fast
bound,
And your people by taxes and steam-engines
ground
May phiIanthropsts seize you, and Mammon con-
found
That which once was free land.