The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862. Various

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      The characters I have introduced are real. They are not drawn with the pencil of fancy, nor, I trust, colored with the tints of prejudice. The scenes I have described are true. I have taken some liberties with the names of persons and places, and, in a few instances, altered dates; but the events themselves occurred under my own observation. No one acquainted with the section of country I have described, or familiar with the characters I have delineated, will question this statement. Lest some one who has not seen the slave and the poor white man of the South, as he actually is, should deem my picture overdrawn, I will say that 'the half has not been told!' If the whole were related—if the Southern system, in all its naked ugliness, were fully exposed—the truth would read like fiction, and the baldest relation of fact like the wildest dream of romance.

      The overseer was never taken. A letter which I received from Colonel J–, shortly prior to the stoppage of the mails, informed me that Moye had succeeded in crossing the mountains into Tennessee, where, in an interior town, he disposed of the horse, and then made his way by an inland route to the free States. The horse the Colonel had recovered, but the overseer he never expected to see. Moye is now, no doubt, somewhere in the North, and is probably at this present writing a zealous Union man, of somewhat the same 'stripe' as the conductors of the New-York Herald and the Boston Courier.

      I have not heard directly from Scipio, but one day last July, after a long search, I found on one of the wharves of South street a coasting captain who knew him well, and who had seen him the month previous at Georgetown. He was at that time pursuing his usual avocations, and was as much respected and trusted as when I met him.

      A few days after the tidings of the fall of Sumter were received in New-York, and when I had witnessed the spontaneous and universal uprising of the North which followed that event, I dispatched letters to several of my Southern friends, giving them as near as I could an account of the true state of feeling here, and representing the utter madness of the course the South was pursuing. One of these letters went to my Union acquaintance whom I have called, in the preceding pages, 'Andy Jones.'

      He promptly replied, and a pretty regular correspondence ensued between us, which has continued, at intervals, even since the suspension of intercourse between the North and the South.

      Andy has stood firmly and nobly by the old flag. At the risk of every thing, he has boldly expressed his sentiments every where. With his life in his hand and—a revolver in each of his breeches-pockets, he walked the streets of Wilmington when the secession fever was at its hight, openly proclaiming his undying loyalty to the Union, and 'no man dared gainsay him.'

      But with all his patriotism, Andy keeps a bright eye on the 'main chance.' Like his brother, the Northern Yankee, whom he somewhat resembles and greatly admires, he never omits an opportunity of 'turning an honest penny.' In defiance of custom-house regulations and of our strict blockade, he has carried on a more or less regular traffic with New-York and Boston (via Halifax and other neutral ports) ever since North-Carolina seceded. His turpentine, while it was still his property, has been sold in the New-York market, under the very eyes of the government officials, and, honest reader, I have known of it.

      By various roundabout means, I have recently received letters from him. His last, dated in April, and brought to a neutral port by a shipmaster whom he implicitly trusts, has reached me since the previous chapters were written. It covers six pages of foolscap, and is written in defiance of all grammatical and orthographical principles; but as it conveys important intelligence in regard to some of the persons mentioned in this narrative, I will transcribe a portion of it.

      It gave me the melancholy tidings of the death of Colonel J–. He had joined the Confederate army, and fell, bravely meeting a charge of the Massachusetts troops, at Roanoke.

      On receiving the news of his friend's death, Andy rode over to the plantation, and found Madam P– plunged in the deepest grief. While he was there, a letter arrived from Charleston, with intelligence of the dangerous illness of her son. This second blow crushed her. For several days she was delirious and her life despaired of; but throughout the whole, the noble corn-cracker, neglecting every thing, remained beside her.

      When she returned to herself, and had in a measure recovered her strength, she learned that the Colonel had left no will; that she was still a slave, and soon to be sold, with the rest of the Colonel's personal property, according to law.

      This is what Andy writes about the affair. I give the letter as he wrote it, merely correcting the punctuation and enough of the spelling to make it intelligible:

      'W'en I hard thet th' Cunnel hadent leff no wil, I was hard put what ter dew; but arter thinkin' on it over a spell, I knowed shede har on it sumhow; so I 'cluded to tell har miseff. She tuk on d–d hard at fust, but arter a bit, grew more calm like, and then she sed it war God's wil, an' she wudent komplane. Ye knows I've got a wife, but w'en the ma'am sed thet, she luk'd so like an angel, thet d–d eff I cud help puttin' my arms round har, an' huggin' on har, till she a'moste screeched. Wal, I toled har I'd stan' by har, eff evrithing went ter h–l, an' I wil, by–.

      'I made up mi minde to onst what ter dew. It war darned harde work tur bee 'way from hum jess then, but I war in fur it; soe I put ter Charleston, ter see th' Cunnel's 'oman. Wal, I seed har, an' I toled har how th' ma'am felte, an' how mutch shede dun at makein' th' Cunnel's money, (she made nigh th' hul on it, 'case he war alers keerles, an' tuk no 'count uv things; eff 't'aden't been fur thet, hede made a wil,) an' I axed har ter see thet the ma'am had free papers ter onst. An' whot der ye s'poze she sed? Nuthin', by –, 'cept she dident no nuthin' 'bout bisniss, an' leff all uv sech things ter har loryer. Wal, then I went ter him—he ar one on them slick, ily, seceshun houn's who'd sell thar soles fur a kountterfit dollar—an' he toled me th' 'ministratur hadent sot yit, an' he cudent dew nuthin' till he hed. Ses I: 'Ye mean th' 'oman's got ter gwo ter th' hi'est bider?' 'Yas,' he sed, 'the Cunnel's got dets, an' the've got ter bee pade, an' th' persoonal prop'ty muste bee sold ter dew it.' Then I sed, 'twud bee sum time 'fore thet war dun, an' the 'oman's 'most ded an uv no use now; 'what'll ye hire har tur me fur.' He said a hun'red fur sicks months. I planked down the money ter onst, an' put off.

      'I war bilin' over, but it sumhow cum inter my hed thet the Cunnel's 'oman cudn't bee all stun; so I gose thar agin, an' I toled har what the loryer sed, an' made a reg'lar stump-'peal tew har bettur natur. I axed har ef she'd leff the 'oman who'd made har husban's fortun', who war the muther uv his chil'ren, who fur twenty yar hed nussed him in sickness an' cheered him in healtf, ef shede let thet 'oman bee auckyund off ter th' hi'est bider. I axed al thet, an' what der ye think she sed? Why, jest this. 'I doan't no nuthin' 'bout it, Mister Jones. Ye raily must talke ter mi loryer; them matters I leaves 'tirely ter him.' Then I sed I s'posed the niggers war ter bee advertist. 'O yas!' she sed, (an' ye see she know'd a d–d site 'bout thet,) 'all on 'em muss bee solde, 'case ye knows I never did luv the kuntry; 'sides I cuden't karry on the plantashun, no how.' Then sed I: 'The Orleans traders 'ill be thar, an' she wun't sell fur but one use, fur she's hansum yit; an' ma'am, ye wun't leff a 'oman as white as you is, who fur twenty yar hes ben a tru an' fatheful wife tar yer own ded husban', (I shudn't hev put thet in, but d–d ef I cud help it,) ye wun't put har up on the block, an' hev har struck down ter the hi'est bider, ter bee made a d–d – on?'

      'Wal, I s'pose she haden't forgot thet fur more'n twelve yar the Cunnel hed luv'd t'other 'oman an' onely liked har; fur w'en I sed thet, har ize snapped like h–l, an' she screetched eout thet she dident 'low no sech wurds in har hous', an' ordurd me ter leave. Mitey sqeemish thet, warn't it? bein' as shede been fur so mony yar the Cunnel's –, an' th' tuther one his raal wife.

      'Wal, I did leav'; but I leff a piece of mi mind ahind. I toled har I'de buy thet ar 'oman ef she cost all I war wuth and I had ter pawne my sole ter git the money; an' I added, jest by way uv sweet'nin' the pill, thet I СКАЧАТЬ