Uncle Tom's Cabin
“Why, Mary, you are getting to be a politician, all at once.”
“No, nonsense! I wouldn’t give a fig for all your politics, generally,
but I think this is something downright cruel and unchristian. I hope,
my dear, no such law has been passed.”
“There has been a law passed forbidding people to help off the slaves
that come over from Kentucky, my dear; so much of that thing has been
done by these reckless Abolitionists, that our brethren in Kentucky are
very strongly excited, and it seems necessary, and no more than
Christian and kind, that something should be done by our state to quiet
the excitement.”
“And what is the law? It don’t forbid us to shelter those poor
creatures a night, does it, and to give ’em something comfortable to
eat, and a few old clothes, and send them quietly about their
business?”
“Why, yes, my dear; that would be aiding and abetting, you know.”
Mrs. Bird was a timid, blushing little woman, of about four feet in
height, and with mild blue eyes, and a peach-blow complexion, and the
gentlest, sweetest voice in the world;—as for courage, a moderate-sized
cock-turkey had been known to put her to rout at the very first gobble,
and a stout house-dog, of moderate capacity, would bring her into
subjection merely by a show of his teeth. Her husband and children were
her entire world, and in these she ruled more by entreaty and
persuasion than by command or argument. There was only one thing that
was capable of arousing her, and that provocation came in on the side
of her unusually gentle and sympathetic nature;—anything in the shape
of cruelty would throw her into a passion, which was the more alarming
and inexplicable in proportion to the general softness of her nature.
Generally the most indulgent and easy to be entreated of all mothers,
still her boys had a very reverent remembrance of a most vehement
chastisement she once bestowed on them, because she found them leagued
with several graceless boys of the neighborhood, stoning a defenceless
kitten.
“I’ll tell you what,” Master Bill used to say, “I was scared that time.
Mother came at me so that I thought she was crazy, and I was whipped
and tumbled off to bed, without any supper, before I could get over
wondering what had come about; and, after that, I heard mother crying
outside the door, which made me feel worse than all the rest. I’ll tell
you what,” he’d say, “we boys never stoned another kitten!”
On the present occasion, Mrs. Bird rose quickly, with very red cheeks,
which quite improved her general appearance, and walked up to her
husband, with quite a resolute air, and said, in a determined tone,
“Now, John, I want to know if you think such a law as that is right and
Christian?”
“You won’t shoot me, now, Mary, if I say I do!”
“I never could have thought it of you, John; you didn’t vote for it?”
“Even so, my fair politician.”
“You ought to be ashamed, John! Poor, homeless, houseless creatures!
It’s a shameful, wicked, abominable law, and I’ll break it, for one,
the first time I get a chance; and I hope I _shall_ have a chance, I
do! Things have got to a pretty pass, if a woman can’t give a warm
supper and a bed to poor, starving creatures, just because they are
slaves, and have been abused and oppressed all their lives, poor
things!”
“But, Mary, just listen to me. Your feelings are all quite right, dear,
and interesting, and I love you for them; but, then, dear, we mustn’t
suffer our feelings to run away with our judgment; you must consider
it’s a matter of private feeling,—there are great public interests
involved,—there is such a state of public agitation rising, that we
must put aside our private feelings.”
“Now, John, I don’t know anything about politics, but I can read my
Bible; and there I see that I must feed the hungry, clothe the naked,
and comfort the desolate; and that Bible I mean to follow.”
“But in cases where your doing so would involve a great public evil—”
“Obeying God never brings on public evils. I know it can’t. It’s always
safest, all round, to _do as He_ bids us.
“Now, listen to me, Mary, and I can state to you a very clear argument,
to show—”
“O, nonsense, John! you can talk all night, but you wouldn’t do it. I
put it to you, John,—would _you_ now turn away a poor, shivering,
hungry creature from your door, because he was a runaway? _Would_ you,
now?”
Now, if the truth must be told, our senator had the misfortune to be a
man who had a particularly humane and accessible nature, and turning
away anybody that was in trouble never had been his forte; and what was
worse for him in this particular pinch of the argument was, that his
wife knew it, and, of course was making an assault on rather an
indefensible point. So he had recourse to the usual means of gaining
time for such cases made and provided; he said “ahem,” and coughed
several times, took out his pocket-handkerchief, and began to wipe his
glasses. Mrs. Bird, seeing the defenceless condition of the enemy’s
territory, had no more conscience than to push her advantage.
“I should like to see you doing that, John—I really should! Turning a
woman out of doors in a snowstorm, for instance; or may be you’d take
her up and put her in jail, wouldn’t you? You would make a great hand
at that!”
“Of course, it would be a very painful duty,” began Mr. Bird, in a
moderate tone.
“Duty, John! don’t use that word! You know it isn’t a duty—it can’t be
a duty! If folks want to keep their slaves from running away, let ’em
treat ’em well,—that’s my doctrine. If I had slaves (as I hope I never
shall have), I’d risk their wanting to run away from me, or you either,
John. I tell you folks don’t run away when they are happy; and when
they do run, poor creatures! they suffer enough with cold and hunger
and fear, without everybody’s turning against them; and, law or no law,
I never will, so help me God!”
“Mary! Mary! My dear, let me reason with you.”
“I hate reasoning, John,—especially reasoning on such subjects. There’s
a way you political folks have of coming round and round a plain right
thing; and you don’t believe in it yourselves, when it comes to
practice. I know _you_ well enough, John. You don’t believe it’s right
any more than I do; and you wouldn’t do it any sooner than I.”
At this critical juncture, old Cudjoe, the black man-of-all-work, put
his head in at the door, and wished “Missis would come into the
kitchen;” and our senator, tolerably relieved, looked after his little
wife with a whimsical mixture of amusement and vexation, and, seating
himself in the arm-chair, began to read the papers.
After a moment, his wife’s voice was heard at the door, in a quick,
earnest tone,—“John! John! I do wish you’d come here, a moment.”
He laid down his paper, and went into the kitchen, and started, quite
amazed at the sight that presented itself:—A young and slender woman,
with garments torn and frozen, with one shoe gone, and the stocking
torn away from the cut and bleeding foot, was laid back in a deadly
swoon upon two chairs. There was the impress of the despised race on
her face, yet none could help feeling its mournful and pathetic beauty,
while its stony sharpness, its cold, fixed, deathly aspect, struck a
solemn chill over him. He drew his breath short, and stood in silence.
His wife, and their only colored domestic, old Aunt Dinah, were busily
engaged in restorative measures; while old Cudjoe had got the boy on
his knee, and was busy pulling off his shoes and stockings, and chafing
his little cold feet.
“Sure, now, if she an’t a sight to behold!” said old Dinah,
compassionately; “‘pears like ’t was the heat that made her faint. She
was tol’able peart when she cum in, and asked if she couldn’t warm
herself here a spell; and I was just a-askin’ her where she cum from,
and she fainted right down. Never done much hard work, guess, by the
looks of her hands.”
“Poor creature!” said Mrs. Bird, compassionately, as the woman slowly
unclosed her large, dark eyes, and looked vacantly at her. Suddenly an
expression of agony crossed her face, and she sprang up, saying, “O, my
Harry! Have they got him?”
The boy, at this, jumped from Cudjoe’s knee, and running to her side
put up his arms. “O, he’s here! he’s here!” she exclaimed.
“O, ma’am!” said she, wildly, to Mrs. Bird, “do protect us! don’t let
them get him!”
“Nobody shall hurt you here, poor woman,” said Mrs. Bird,
encouragingly. “You are safe; don’t be afraid.”
“God bless you!” said the woman, covering her face and sobbing; while
the little boy, seeing her crying, tried to get into her lap.
With many gentle and womanly offices, which none knew better how to
render than Mrs. Bird, the poor woman was, in time, rendered more calm.
A temporary bed was provided for her on the settle, near the fire; and,
after a short time, she fell into a heavy slumber, with the child, who
seemed no less weary, soundly sleeping on her arm; for the mother
resisted, with nervous anxiety, the kindest attempts to take him from
her; and, even in sleep, her arm encircled him with an unrelaxing
clasp, as if she could not even then be beguiled of her vigilant hold.
Mr. and Mrs. Bird had gone back to the parlor, where, strange as it may
appear, no reference was made, on either side, to the preceding
conversation; but Mrs. Bird busied herself with her knitting-work, and
Mr. Bird pretended to be reading the paper.
“I wonder who and what she is!” said Mr. Bird, at last, as he laid it
down.
“When she wakes up and feels a little rested, we will see,” said Mrs.
Bird.
“I say, wife!” said Mr. Bird after musing in silence over his
newspaper.
“Well, dear!”
“She couldn’t wear one of your gowns, could she, by any letting down,
or such matter? She seems to be rather larger than you are.”
A quite perceptible smile glimmered on Mrs. Bird’s face, as she
answered, “We’ll see.”
Another pause, and Mr. Bird again broke out,
“I say, wife!”
“Well! What now?”
“Why, there’s that old bombazin cloak, that you keep on purpose to put
over me when I take my afternoon’s nap; you might as well give her
that,—she needs clothes.”
At this instant, Dinah looked in to say that the woman was awake, and
wanted to see Missis.
Mr. and Mrs. Bird went into the kitchen, followed by the two eldest
boys, the smaller fry having, by this time, been safely disposed of in
bed.
The woman was now sitting up on the settle, by the fire. She was
looking steadily into the blaze, with a calm, heart-broken expression,
very different from her former agitated wildness.
“Did you want me?” said Mrs. Bird, in gentle tones. “I hope you feel
better now, poor woman!”
A long-drawn, shivering sigh was the only answer; but she lifted her
dark eyes, and fixed them on her with such a forlorn and imploring
expression, that the tears came into the little woman’s eyes.
“You needn’t be afraid of anything; we are friends here, poor woman!
Tell me where you came from, and what you want,” said she.
“I came from Kentucky,” said the woman.
“When?” said Mr. Bird, taking up the interogatory.
“Tonight.”
“How did you come?”
“I crossed on the ice.”
“Crossed on the ice!” said every one present.
“Yes,” said the woman, slowly, “I did. God helping me, I crossed on the
ice; for they were behind me—right behind—and there was no other way!”
“Law, Missis,” said Cudjoe, “the ice is all in broken-up blocks, a
swinging and a tetering up and down in the water!”
“I know it was—I know it!” said she, wildly; “but I did it! I wouldn’t
have thought I could,—I didn’t think I should get over, but I didn’t
care! I could but die, if I didn’t. The Lord helped me; nobody knows
how much the Lord can help ’em, till they try,” said the woman, with a
flashing eye.
“Were you a slave?” said Mr. Bird.