A FOOL'S ERRAND & Its Sequel, Bricks Without Straw. Albion Winegar Tourgée
"an' I believe you're very much in earnest, both in preachin' an' practicin'. Oh! did I tell you?" he added suddenly, "my son Jesse, he's heard the colonel speak once or twice, an' he's clean carried away with him. Says he's got more sense than anybody he ever heard talk about such matters. He's quite took up that notion you spoke of a while ago, — that freein' the slaves is the best thing that's ever happened for the white folks of the South. Maybe he's right, but it sounds right queer to hear him talk so. He's like you say, though, — practicin' what he preaches, an' is going in to work as if he'd been raised to it all his life. It looks hard, and sounds queer; but maybe he's right. Good-evening, ma'am! Tell the colonel I'm right sorry he was not at home. I'll come again when I've read these through," — touching the books with his pipe, — "an' hope I may catch him then."
Servosse was not quite pleased when his wife told him that night of what she had done. He had been very careful not to give any just ground of offense, as he thought, to their neighbors. While he did not hesitate to avow his opinions upon any question of present interest, he did not think it well to open the controversies of the past, and had studiously avoided all reference to them, unless it became necessary in considering the present. He did not say much, however; and when, a few nights afterwards, the Squire came over to return the books, the Fool was rather glad she had loaned them.
The old man had evidently come for a chat. One could see that as he laid down his hat and stick, filled his pipe, and drew up his chair to the corner of the wide fireplace, in which the dry hickory and black-jack was blazing brightly, and coaxed their little golden-haired pet to sit beside him.
"Well, Colonel," he said, after he had chatted a while with the child, "I've brought back the books I borrowed of the madam the other day."
"So I see," laughed Servosse. "Well, I hope you enjoyed reading them?"
"That I did, Colonel," he answered, — "more, I suppose than you would ever imagine that I could."
"Indeed!" said Servosse. "I was half afraid they would make you so angry that you would feel like visiting your displeasure on me."
"No, indeed!" said the old man with a sort of chuckle. "I had no notion of being angry; though, now I come to think on't, I can't imagine why I am not. There's certainly hard things enough in those books about me and my people to make any man mad. But the truth is, Colonel, it seems to be all about the past, — what is all over and done with now, — so that I seem to be reading of somebody else, and some other time than my own. Do you know, Colonel, that I never read any 'abolition' books before, only some of the milder sort? and I am of the notion now, that our folks made a mistake in keeping them out of the South. I was a little surprised when the madam here," — waving his hand gallantly towards Metta, — "asked me if any one really believed in slavery. If it had been you, I should have asked if any one really believed in 'abolitionism.' But I am satisfied that the people who wrote those books believed what they were writing; and it does seem as if they had good reason to do so. It's a thousand pities we couldn't have talked these things over, and have come to the right understanding of them without this terrible war."
"That was quite impossible, Squire," said Servosse. "We could never have agreed. I have learned enough of the former state of affairs here already to see that. Each party distrusted the other's sincerity, and despised the other's knowledge. War was inevitable: sooner or later it must have come. Why, even now we can not agree in regard to the incidents flowing from emancipation, — the mere corollaries of the problem God has wrought out for us in the blood of our best."
"That's true, too true," sighed the old man. "And it's curious too. It's all common sense at the last. Why can't we agree to hunt together until we find it?"
"It seems to be human nature, Squire."
"That's it, Colonel; an' when you've said that you've said all We can't go no further, nor learn any more. It's human nature, and there's no more use of asking questions of human nature than of an owl. 'What' and 'why' are things that don't concern human nature. It don't care no more for reason than a mule does for persuasion. Human nature is a sullen, obstinate, unreasonable brute; but it always has its own way with all on us. Ain't that so, Colonel?" he asked with a self-appreciative chuckle.
"Just so, Squire," replied Servosse. "And almost always disappointing too. Now, I can not see why the South should not have seen its own interest to have lain in the way of gradual emancipation long ago."
"The very idea I was going to advance as to the North," laughed the old man. "I never could make out what interest they had in the matter at all. Now, the people who wrote those books I can understand. With them it was a principle, a religious idea. They thought it was a wrong and a sin which they would do God's service to exterminate. They are what we call 'fanatics.' No one can blame them, only for not crediting us with like sincerity. They might have done that, I should suppose. They made too much, too, out of the abuses of slavery. It was abused, — no doubt of that, — and many bad things done by bad men under cover of it; but they might have credited us with honesty, at least. We were not all bad, nor all cruel and unjust. Some of us thought the master's relation one of divine duty; and others, who weren't quite so clear upon that point, or didn't care so much whether it was true or not, felt that the institution was on our hands, had come to be there lawfully, and we didn't see how we were to get rid of it without immense loss and sacrifice. So we just let it float along. But we were not hard masters, nor cruel owners. We did feel bound to protect the institution. Not only your interests, but the safety of society as we honestly thought, depended on its continuance, unimpaired and perfect, until something else should take its place, at least. As long as the nigger was here, we were all satisfied that he must be a slave. A good many of us thought it would not be any injury if they could all be removed somewhere else."
"No doubt you are right," said Servosse. "And it is not surprising, either, that you should have felt so, or that those who wrote these books should have misconceived your motive. Slavery did two things which naturally prevented such knowledge from being obtained: it excluded the stranger from its inner sanctuary with rigorous care, and persecuted with unsparing severity all who rejected its dogmas."
"Yes, yes, I see," laughed the Squire. "You and I are getting back to human nature again in our anxiety to excuse our respective sides. But do you know I have a still greater reason for being angry, after reading one of those books, on my own personal, individual account? — I, Nathaniel Hyman?"
"No, indeed, I did not," said Servosse. "You are not one of the characters, are you?"
"That's exactly what I am," was the reply, "and not cast in a very enviable rôle, either. Besides, the worst of it is, that the author takes pains to write a note about the matter, and tell everybody who was meant to be represented by the character. Hadn't you noticed it?"
"I had no idea of it," said Servosse, flushing. "I have never read the book since it first came out, and had then no personal interest in the individual characters."
"No, of course not," assented Hyman "though I did think the madam's hesitation the other day might have sprung from that. I'd heard of the fact before, and was anxious to see if it were true. That's why I wanted to read the book."
Metta assured him that she had no knowledge of it, and he continued, —
"Well, I don't know as I mind it, though one hardly likes to go down to posterity as one of the black sheep of his day. The affair of which so much is made was a very trifling matter, and I had mighty little to do with it, at best."
Then he read aloud the passage and the note, and explained: "Now, the whole matter was this. There were a couple of Northern ministers, — Wesleyans, I believe they called themselves, who couldn't make out to hold their tongues, but were a spoutin' an' argyfyin' around here as if the Lord hadn't given them any instructions, only to abuse and denounce slaveholders and slavery. I went to hear 'em once or twice just to satisfy myself. They were very imprudent and very intemperate. I spoke to one of them after meeting was out that day, an' told him so. He wouldn't listen at all, but rattled off more Scripture at me than I ever heard in the same time from any body else on earth. I didn't quarrel with him (you know I never quarrel with anybody, Colonel), an' I presume I did tell him I was his friend. I'm everybody's friend, an'