صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

but he had not quite presence of mind for that; he gagged a little, colored crimson, and staggered on:

"For him no minstrel raptures swell;

High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim,
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentered all in self,

[ocr errors]

and here the poor fellow choked, could not go on, but started up, swung the book into the sea, vanished into his stateroom, "And, by Jove," said Phillips, "we did not see him for two months again. And I had to make up some beggarly story to that English surgeon why I did not return his Walter Scott to him."

That story shows about the time when Nolan's braggadocio must have broken down. At first, they said, he took a very high tone, considered his imprisonment a mere farce, affected to enjoy the voyage, and all that; but Phillips said that after he came out of his stateroom he never was the same man again. He never read aloud again, unless it was the Bible, or Shakespeare, or something else he was sure of. But it was not that merely. He never entered in with the other young men exactly as a companion again. . .

I first came to understand anything about "the man without a country" one day when we overhauled a dirty little schooner which had slaves on board. An officer was sent to take charge of her, and after a few minutes, he sent back his boat to ask that some one might be sent him who could speak Portuguese. But none of the officers did; and just as the captain was sending forward to ask if any of the people could, Nolan stepped out and said he should be glad to interpret, if the captain wished, as he understood the language. The captain thanked him,

fitted out another boat with him, and in this boat it was my luck to go.

When we got there, it was such a scene as you seldom see, and never want to: Nastiness beyond account, and chaos run loose in the midst of the nastiness. There were not a great many of the negroes; but by way of making what there were understand that they were free, Vaughan had had their handcuffs and ankle cuffs knocked off, and, for convenience' sake, was putting them upon the rascals of the schooner's crew. The negroes were, most of them, out of the hold, and swarming all around the dirty deck, with a central throng surrounding Vaughan and addressing him in every dialect, and patois of a dialect..

...

"Tell them they are free," said Vaughan, "and tell them that these rascals are to be hanged as soon as we can get rope enough."

Nolan "put that into Spanish,"

that is, he explained

1

it in such Portuguese as the Kroomen 1 could understand, and they in turn to such of the negroes as could understand them. Then there was such a yell of delight, clinching of fists, leaping and dancing, kissing of Nolan's feet, and a general spontaneous worship of Vaughan, as the deus ex machina 2 of the occasion.

"Tell them," said Vaughan, well pleased, "that I will take them all to Cape Palmas."

This did not answer so well. Cape Palmas was practically as far from the homes of most of them as New Orleans or Rio Janeiro was; that is, they would be eter

1 Native boatmen of West Africa.

2 "God from the machine," a phrase which comes from ancient theatrical traditions of days when figures of the gods appearing in plays were moved by a machine.

nally separated from home there. And their interpreters, as we could understand, instantly said, "Ah, non Palmas," and began to propose infinite other expedients in most voluble language. Vaughan was rather disappointed at this result of his liberality, and asked Nolan eagerly what they said. The drops stood on poor Nolan's white forehead, as he hushed the men down, and said:

"He says, 'Not Palmas.' He says, 'Take us home, take us to our own country, take us to our own house, take us to our own pickaninnies and our own women.' He says he has an old father and mother who will die if they do not see him. And this one says he left his people all sick, and paddled down to Fernando to beg the white doctor to come and help them, and that these devils caught him in the bay just in sight of home, and that he has never seen anybody from home since then. And this one says," choked out Nolan, "that he has not heard a word from his home in six months, while he has been locked up in an infernal barracoon." 1

Vaughan always said he grew gray himself, while Nolan struggled through this interpretation. I, who did not understand anything of the passion involved in it, saw that the very elements were melting with fervent heat, and that something was to pay somewhere. Even the negroes themselves stopped howling, as they saw Nolan's agony, and Vaughan's almost equal agony of sympathy. As soon as he could get words, he said:

"Tell them yes, yes, yes; tell them they shall go to the Mountains of the Moon, if they will. If I sail the schooner through the Great White Desert, they shall go home!"

And after some fashion Nolan said so.

1 Slave pen.

As we lay back in the stern sheets and the men gave way, he said to me:

“Youngster, let that show you what it is to be without a family, without a home, and without a country. And if you are ever tempted to say a word or to do a thing that shall put a bar between you and your family, your home, and your country, pray God in His mercy to take you that instant home to His own heaven. Stick by your family, boy; forget you have a self, while you do everything for them. Think of your home, boy; write and send, and talk about it. Let Let it be nearer and nearer to your thought, the farther you have to travel from it; and rush back to it, when you are free, as that poor black slave is doing now. And for your country, boy," and the words rattled in his throat, "and for that flag," and he pointed to the ship, "never dream a dream but of serving her as she bids you, though the service carry you through a thousand hells. No matter what happens to you, no matter who flatters you or who abuses you, never look at another flag, never let a night pass but you pray God to bless that flag. Remember, boy, that behind all these men you have to do with, behind officers, and government, and people even, there is the country herself, your country, and that you belong to her as you belong to your own mother. Stand by her, boy, as you would stand by your mother, if those devils there had got hold of her today!"

THE MORAL QUALITY IN PATRIOTISM 1

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS (1824-1892)

As you have contemplated the brief glory of our summer, where the clover almost blooms out of snowdrifts and the red apples drop almost with the white blossoms, you have, perhaps, remembered that the flower upon the tree was only the ornament of a moment, a brilliant part of the process by which the fruit was formed, and that the perfect fruit itself was but the seed vessel by which the race of the tree was continued from year to

year.

Then, have you followed the exquisite analogy — that youth is the aromatic flower upon the tree; the grave life of maturer years its sober, solid fruit; and the principles and character deposited by that life the seeds by which the glory of this race, also, is perpetuated?

The flower in your hand fades while you look at it; the dream that allures you glimmers and is gone. But both flower and dream, like youth itself, are buds and prophecies. For where, without the perfumed blooming of the spring orchards all over the hills and among the valleys of New England and New York, would the happy harvests of New York and New England be? and where, without the dreams of the young men lighting the future

1 The oration containing this selection was delivered before the graduating class at Union College, Schenectady, July 20, 1857. As journalist, orator, and essayist, George William Curtis was identified with civil service reform and other movements for good government during the greater part of his life.

From Orations and Addresses of George William Curtis, Vol. I. Copyright, 1893, by Harper & Brothers, New York. Used by permission of the publishers.

« السابقةمتابعة »