The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1893-01-03

stage since the day when Wendell Phillips
said, Uncle Toms Cabin was not simply
book; it was rather en- event" So 1t
vas. The man of IS years of vge. who sees
Uncle Toms Cabin" on the dramatic
stage, can 60 back in memory to the days
when the hunt for fugitive slaves began;
when bloodhounds and all the dark side
OF that dramatic picture of dead race OPP
preston and barbarism were part Of the
shameful realism of American civilization.
On the 10Th of April, 1851, the fugitive
slave Sims was surrendered in Boston,
and the late Chief Justice Devens Of the
Massachusetts, supreme court was the
United States marshal on that occasion.
The people submitted, save the hand
ful Of abolitionists, whose pathetic and
indignant eloquence was Of no more
consequence to plutocratic Boston than
the aurora on a winters night; il was bril-
liant, erratic, beautiful, but it did not rep
resent fuel or stand for fame. And then
when all slavery-hatiug hearts were break
ing fast at the shameful sight plain, del
icate, but broad-browed woman, whose
lips were touched by the finger of God with
Pen tecostal flame. stood up and flung her
whole passionate, sympathetic soul into
the fight. and womanlike she cast her
soul on the weaker side. She warmed the
facts of her experience to white heat of
wrath and welded them together with fine
dramatic instinct: she fused her deep
heart and teeming brain into glowing
mass. stamped it "Uncle Toms Cabin"
and flung il at the head of the Moloch of
slavery IN his most insolent hour Of VIC
tory. From the day that this woman's
soul was flung into the fight, in March,
1852. it was steady march to victory with
out halt.
Eloquence, constitutional arguments,
logic, inyective, all the ordinary masculine
weapons of agitation had been discharged
at the citadel of slavery, and not stone
had been displaced on its battlements. but
here was something more than eloQuence,
or argument or Law. 1t was the ringing
cry and pealing protest of woman's
heart beating through all the pages of her
book against wrongs upon the primitive
rights of human nature; wrongs that kill
the soul before the body. wrongs whose
wide appeal whenever sounded by master
| hand echo round the earth, following as
fer as the religion of humanity reaches
through Christ to the Koran. Mothers at
| the North cried over it; mothers at the
South began it with angry contempt and
yet finished it in tears. The wonderful
dramatic pathos and power of the book
| swept all hearts by storm. The springs of
human nature were smitten SO strongly
that the angry politicians of both parties
| found themselves like the unbelieving
| cynic who went to church to scott and
remained TO pray.
| Mr.. Rhodes, in his new History of the
| United States" just published, recognizes
| the fact that one of the most important
causes that led to the triumph of the Re-
| publican party in 1860 was the publication
| of "Uncle Toms Cabin" Luther and his
| Bible were not more to the Reformation
| than this soulful woman and her book
were to the cause of the slaves. Mr..
| Rhodes says that of all the literary forces
that contributed to bring about the i'm
| mense revolution in public sentiment
| which took place between 1852 and 1860.
| the most weighty Was the influence spread
| abroad by this book.
| The book was full of literary defects
| from an artistic point of view, but the
| greatest literary critic Of its day. Macaulay,
was so impressed by it that he consid-
| cred it on the whole "the most valuable
| addition that America had made to
| English literature" and Lowell said
| that the secret of Mrs. Stoves power
| lay in genius of the same kind as that by
| which the great successes in creative
| literature have always been achieved. It
| was the most successful novel that ever
was written. Three hundred thousand
COMES of "Uncle Toms Cabin" were sold
within year in the United States, and in
| England and her colonies the sale went on
! until it reached the total of one and a half
| million copies. The book was soon trans
| lated into twenty different languages,
| l. was published as serial in
| three daily newspapers of Paris.
| Never but once before had q novel
| produced go widespread and profound
excitement. Mr.. Rhodes compares the
| impression made by it with that made BY
| Rousseau's story of the "Nouvelie
| Heloise" The latter work spoke for the
| liberty and dignity of the peasant. imply
| ing that he no less than the noble was 8
| man. Uncle Tom" pleaded for the lib
erty of the slave. The one played its part
| in the revolution OF 1882 and the other
had no less powerful influence on the
| revolution of 1860.
Mr. Rhodes points ont that the principal
| effect of the book was TO bring home the
injustice OF slavery 10 the hearts OF the
! people. especially 10 the women aud grow.
ing boys. Mr.. Rhodes says:
The mothers opinion was potent educator
| IN politics between 1852 and lSil. snQ boys IN
| their teeus in the one year were voters in tha
other. The boys OF France, who in their Won III
| read the ''Nouvelle Heioss' and Emile" be-
| came revolGlontsts IN lTS9. au1 the youth of
| America whose first ideas o. slavery vera
| formed by reading Uncle Toms CABIN" were
| ready 70 vote with thu party whose existence
was based on opposition to al extension of the
! great evil
The powerful, permanent quality Of is
! genius is shown by the fact that in lS92
| Uncle Toms Cabin" has been repub-
Nshed with fine illustrations by Kernbe:
| that wish slavery dead. with ell sentiment.