For, by the dewy moonlight still, He fed the weary-turning mill, Or bent him in the chill morass, To pluck the long and tangled grass, And hear above his scar-worn back The heavy slave-whip's frequent crack While in his heart one evil thought In solitary madness wrought, One baleful fire surviving still The quenching of the immortal mind, One sterner passion of his kind, Which even fetters could not kill, The savage hope, to deal, erelong, A vengeance bitterer than his wrong!
Hark to that cry! long, loud, and shrill, From field and forest, rock and hill, Thrilling and horrible it rang, Around, beneath, above; The wild beast from his cavern sprang, The wild bird from her grove!
Nor fear, nor joy, nor agony Were mingled in that midnight cry; But like the lion's growl of wrath, When falls that hunter in his path Whose barbed arrow, deeply set, Is rankling in his bosom yet, It told of hate, full, deep, and strong, Of vengeance kindling out of wrong; It was as if the crimes of years-- The unrequited toil, the tears, The shame and hate, which liken well Earth's garden to the nether hell-- Had found in nature's self a tongue, On which the gathered horror hung; As if from cliff, and stream, and glen Burst on the' startled ears of men That voice which rises unto God, Solemn and stern,--the cry of blood!
It ceased, and all was still once more, Save ocean chafing on his shore, The sighing of the wind between The broad banana's leaves of green, Or bough by restless plumage shook, Or murmuring voice of mountain brook.
Brief was the silence. Once again Pealed to the skies that frantic yell, Glowed on the heavens a fiery stain, And flashes rose and fell; And painted on the blood-red sky, Dark, naked arms were tossed on high; And, round the white man's lordly hall, Trod, fierce and free, the brute he made; And those who crept along the wall, And answered to his lightest call With more than spaniel dread, The creatures of his lawless beck, Were trampling on his very neck And on the night-air, wild and clear, Rose woman's shriek of more than fear; For bloodied arms were round her thrown, And dark cheeks pressed against her own!
Where then was he whose fiery zeal Had taught the trampled heart to feel, Until despair itself grew strong, And vengeance fed its torch from wrong?
Now, when the thunderbolt is speeding; Now, when oppression's heart is bleeding; Now, when the latent curse of Time Is raining down in fire and blood, That curse which, through long years of crime, Has gathered, drop by drop, its flood,-- Why strikes he not, the foremost one, Where murder's sternest deeds are done?
He stood the aged palms beneath, That shadowed o'er his humble door, Listening, with half-suspended breath, To the wild sounds of fear and death, Toussaint L'Ouverture!
What marvel that his heart beat high!
The blow for freedom had been given, And blood had answered to the cry Which Earth sent up to Heaven!
What marvel that a fierce delight Smiled grimly o'er his brow of night, As groan and shout and bursting flame Told where the midnight tempest came, With blood and fire along its van, And death behind! he was a Man!
Yes, dark-souled chieftain! if the light Of mild Religion's heavenly ray Unveiled not to thy mental sight The lowlier and the purer way, In which the Holy Sufferer trod, Meekly amidst the sons of crime; That calm reliance upon God For justice in His own good time; That gentleness to which belongs Forgiveness for its many wrongs, Even as the primal martyr, kneeling For mercy on the evil-dealing; Let not the favored white man name Thy stern appeal, with words of blame.
Then, injured Afric! for the shame Of thy own daughters, vengeance came Full on the scornful hearts of those, Who mocked thee in thy nameless woes, And to thy hapless children gave One choice,--pollution or the grave!
Has he not, with the light of heaven Broadly around him, made the same?
Yea, on his thousand war-fields striven, And gloried in his ghastly shame?
Kneeling amidst his brother's blood, To offer mockery unto God, As if the High and Holy One Could smile on deeds of murder done!
As if a human sacrifice Were purer in His holy eyes, Though offered up by Christian hands, Than the foul rites of Pagan lands!
Sternly, amidst his household band, His carbine grasped within his hand, The white man stood, prepared and still, Waiting the shock of maddened men, Unchained, and fierce as tigers, when The horn winds through their caverned hill.
And one was weeping in his sight, The sweetest flower of all the isle, The bride who seemed but yesternight Love's fair embodied smile.
And, clinging to her trembling knee, Looked up the form of infancy, With tearful glance in either face The secret of its fear to trace.
"Ha! stand or die!" The white man's eye His steady musket gleamed along, As a tall Negro hastened nigh, With fearless step and strong.
"What, ho, Toussaint!" A moment more, His shadow crossed the lighted floor.
"Away!" he shouted; "fly with me, The white man's bark is on the sea; Her sails must catch the seaward wind, For sudden vengeance sweeps behind.
Our brethren from their graves have spoken, The yoke is spurned, the chain is broken; On all the bills our fires are glowing, Through all the vales red blood is flowing No more the mocking White shall rest His foot upon the Negro's breast; No more, at morn or eve, shall drip The warm blood from the driver's whip Yet, though Toussaint has vengeance sworn For all the wrongs his race have borne, Though for each drop of Negro blood The white man's veins shall pour a flood; Not all alone the sense of ill Around his heart is lingering still, Nor deeper can the white man feel The generous warmth of grateful zeal.
Friends of the Negro! fly with me, The path is open to the sea: Away, for life!" He spoke, and pressed The young child to his manly breast, As, headlong, through the cracking cane, Down swept the dark insurgent train, Drunken and grim, with shout and yell Howled through the dark, like sounds from hell.
Far out, in peace, the white man's sail Swayed free before the sunrise gale.
Cloud-like that island hung afar, Along the bright horizon's verge, O'er which the curse of servile war Rolled its red torrent, surge on surge; And he, the Negro champion, where In the fierce tumult struggled he?
Go trace him by the fiery glare Of dwellings in the midnight air, The yells of triumph and despair, The streams that crimson to the sea!
Sleep calmly in thy dungeon-tomb, Beneath Besancon's alien sky, Dark Haytien! for the time shall come, Yea, even now is nigh, When, everywhere, thy name shall be Redeemed from color's infamy; And men shall learn to speak of thee As one of earth's great spirits, born In servitude, and nursed in scorn, Casting aside the weary weight And fetters of its low estate, In that strong majesty of soul Which knows no color, tongue, or clime, Which still hath spurned the base control Of tyrants through all time!
Far other hands than mine may wreathe The laurel round thy brow of death, And speak thy praise, as one whose word A thousand fiery spirits stirred, Who crushed his foeman as a worm, Whose step on human hearts fell firm:
Be mine the better task to find A tribute for thy lofty mind, Amidst whose gloomy vengeance shone Some milder virtues all thine own, Some gleams of feeling pure and warm, Like sunshine on a sky of storm, Proofs that the Negro's heart retains Some nobleness amid its chains,-- That kindness to the wronged is never Without its excellent reward, Holy to human-kind and ever Acceptable to God.
1833.
THE SLAVE-SHIPS.
"That fatal, that perfidious bark, Built I' the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark."
MILTON'S Lycidas.
"The French ship Le Rodeur, with a crew of twenty-two men, and with one hundred and sixty negro slaves, sailed from Bonny, in Africa, April, 1819. On approaching the line, a terrible malady broke out,--an obstinate disease of the eyes,--contagious, and altogether beyond the resources of medicine. It was aggravated by the scarcity of water among the slaves (only half a wine-glass per day being allowed to an individual), and by the extreme impurity of the air in which they breathed. By the advice of the physician, they were brought upon deck occasionally; but some of the poor wretches, locking themselves in each other's arms, leaped overboard, in the hope, which so universally prevails among them, of being swiftly transported to their own homes in Africa. To check this, the captain ordered several who were stopped in the attempt to be shot, or hanged, before their companions. The disease extended to the crew; and one after another were smitten with it, until only one remained unaffected. Yet even this dreadful condition did not preclude calculation: to save the expense of supporting slaves rendered unsalable, and to obtain grounds for a claim against the underwriters, thirty-six of the negroes, having become blind, were thrown into the sea and drowned!" Speech of M. Benjamin Constant, in the French Chamber of Deputies, June 17, 1820.
In the midst of their dreadful fears lest the solitary individual, whose sight remained unaffected, should also be seized with the malady, a sail was discovered. It was the Spanish slaver, Leon. The same disease had been there; and, horrible to tell, all the crew had become blind! Unable to assist each other, the vessels parted. The Spanish ship has never since been heard of. The Rodeur reached Guadaloupe on the 21st of June; the only man who had escaped the disease, and had thus been enabled to steer the slaver into port, caught it in three days after its arrival.-- Bibliotheque Ophthalmologique for November, 1819.
"ALL ready?" cried the captain; "Ay, ay!" the seamen said; "Heave up the worthless lubbers,-- The dying and the dead."
Up from the slave-ship's prison Fierce, bearded heads were thrust: "Now let the sharks look to it,-- Toss up the dead ones first!"
Corpse after corpse came up, Death had been busy there; Where every blow is mercy, Why should the spoiler spare?
Corpse after corpse they cast Sullenly from the ship, Yet bloody with the traces Of fetter-link and whip.
Gloomily stood the captain, With his arms upon his breast, With his cold brow sternly knotted, And his iron lip compressed.
"Are all the dead dogs over?"
Growled through that matted lip; "The blind ones are no better, Let's lighten the good ship."
Hark! from the ship's dark bosom, The very sounds of hell!
The ringing clank of iron, The maniac's short, sharp yell!
The hoarse, low curse, throat-stifled; The starving infant's moan, The horror of a breaking heart Poured through a mother's groan.
Up from that loathsome prison The stricken blind ones cane Below, had all been darkness, Above, was still the same.
Yet the holy breath of heaven Was sweetly breathing there, And the heated brow of fever Cooled in the soft sea air.
"Overboard with them, shipmates!"
Cutlass and dirk were plied; Fettered and blind, one after one, Plunged down the vessel's side.
The sabre smote above, Beneath, the lean shark lay, Waiting with wide and bloody jaw His quick and human prey.
God of the earth! what cries Rang upward unto thee?
Voices of agony and blood, From ship-deck and from sea.
The last dull plunge was heard, The last wave caught its stain, And the unsated shark looked up For human hearts in vain.
Red glowed the western waters, The setting sun was there, Scattering alike on wave and cloud His fiery mesh of hair.
Amidst a group in blindness, A solitary eye Gazed, from the burdened slaver's deck, Into that burning sky.
"A storm," spoke out the gazer, "Is gathering and at hand; Curse on 't, I'd give my other eye For one firm rood of land."
And then he laughed, but only His echoed laugh replied, For the blinded and the suffering Alone were at his side.
Night settled on the waters, And on a stormy heaven, While fiercely on that lone ship's track The thunder-gust was driven.
"A sail!--thank God, a sail!"
And as the helmsman spoke, Up through the stormy murmur A shout of gladness broke.
Down came the stranger vessel, Unheeding on her way, So near that on the slaver's deck Fell off her driven spray.
"Ho! for the love of mercy, We're perishing and blind!"
A wail of utter agony Came back upon the wind.