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Page 21
I will again remark, that strictly honest, upright negroes, those
remarkable for their good qualities, and those who are withal, negroes
of more than ordinary value, are never sold to negro traders. The
statement that Shelby was guilty of such an act, under the
circumstances, as detailed in the preceding pages, is too absurd, too
futile, too foolish to deceive or mislead any one who knows anything
about the institution of slavery in the South; or the customs, habits,
or manners of slaveholders. The work, however, was prepared for those
whoso minds were warped by prejudice, whose judgments were beclouded
and perverted by sectional hatred and bigotry, and whose imaginations
were bewildered and distempered by the reading of abolition
publications and novels. To such it has proved a treat, yea, they have
read it with avidity and delight.
Mrs. Stowe, presuming on the gullibility of her readers, has made
other statements that I will notice. The wife of this very
kind-hearted, humane and gentlemanly man, Shelby, had a maid-servant,
by name Eliza; and Eliza had an only child; a very remarkable boy
indeed! probably about five or six years of age; if there is any truth
in her tale. Eliza was a delicate bright mulatto girl; a great
favorite with her mistress; and her child of course a great favorite
with the entire family. But, as if determined to break his wife's
heart, Shelby sells Eliza's child also, to the negro trader, Haley.
Here is another, to say the least of it, very improbable statement. If
Shelby was the man that she represents him, he would have sold the
entire dozen woolly heads that were perched on the veranda railings,
on the morning after the transaction, before he would have sold the
only child of his wife's maid-servant. The estimation in which
maid-servants and their children are held by Southern ladies, is
probably unknown to most of my Northern readers. Unless driven to it
by dire necessity, a Southern gentleman would almost as soon part
with his own children, as with his wife's maid-servant, or her
children, except for crime. Eliza is represented by Mrs. Stowe as all
perfection and beauty, and her darling boy as a little angel.
Maid-servants occupy a position in Southern families far above that of
any other class of servants; but little below the white members of the
family. I resided forty-four years in the Southern States, and it is
with pride that I record the fact, that a Southern gentleman would
dispose of anything--everything--carriages, horses, stocks, tenements
and lands, before he would dispose of such servants as Uncle Tom, and
his wife's maid-servant's child, and thereby break his wife's heart.
No! far be it from Southern men; their wives are their all; and far be
it from them, to say or do aught in opposition to the will of their
wives, anything that will deeply mortify or afflict them. A man would
be hooted from genteel society in the Southern States, for such an
ignoble act. Whatever the faults of Southern men may be, they feel
themselves bound to treat their wives with consideration, respect and
kindness. But I must return to Eliza and her boy. Eliza, overhearing
the conversation between Mr. and Mrs. Shelby, on the night after the
interview between Shelby and Haley, she cautiously and quietly takes
her boy out of the bed, and elopes. She hastens with all possible
speed to the State of Ohio. Haley returns to Shelby's on the
succeeding morning for the purpose of taking possession of Tom, and
Eliza's child; but Eliza having decamped with the child, he and a
couple of Shelby's negro men go in pursuit of her. They overtook her
at the river; and Mrs. Stowe tells us, that she fled precipitately
across the river on floating fragments of ice, with her boy in her
arms! She tells us, that the ice was floating, and that a boat was
expected to pass over the river that night. Was ever a more glaring
falsehood penned. As well might she have told us, that Eliza walked
over the river on the water, with a boy who was probably five or six
years of age, in her arms! How inconsistent! How foolish! How
superlatively ridiculous are such tales!! It is enough; I need not
wade through the entire work, in order to show the falsity of Mrs.
Stowe's tale.
She has calumniated her countrymen, and the slander has gone with
electric speed on the pinions of the press, to the ends of the earth.
Her country lies bleeding at her feet; its institutions totter. But
ah! if she can but luxuriate in her ill-gotten gains, but little does
she care what becomes of her country. She, truly, has been well paid
for her services. She has received a "large fee," and all this was
done under the pretense of serving the cause of liberty! Yes, truly,
she is serving the cause of liberty with a vengeance. Had all the
despots of earth leagued themselves together, for the purpose of
crushing civil liberty, they could not have given it such a shock, as
has been done by the publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Well may the
friends of republican institutions bow their heads with shame and
regret. The moral influence of the great American republic is
destroyed. The friends of liberty throughout the world, mourn the
disaster.
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