The Hour and the Man, An Historical Romance. Harriet Martineau

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СКАЧАТЬ And what has your protection been?”

      “Very kind, my dear, I am sure. I have spent on your education money which I should be very glad of now. When people flatter you, Thérèse (as they will do; for there is not a negress in all the island to compare with you)—remember who made you a lady. You will promise me that much, Thérèse, at parting?”

      “Remember who made me a lady!—I have forgotten too long who made me a woman,” said Thérèse, devoutly upraising her eyes. “In serving Him and loving my husband, I will strive to forget you.”

      “All alike!” muttered Papalier, as the pair went out. “This is what one may expect from negroes, as the General will leant when he has had enough to do with them. They are all alike.”

      This great event in the life of Jacques Dessalines did not delay his proceedings for more than half-an-hour. Noon was but just past, when he led forth his wife from the presence of the priest, mounted her on his own horse before his tent, and sent her forward under the escort of his personal servant, promising to overtake her almost as soon as she should have crossed the river. When she was gone, he sent the word through the negro soldiery, who gathered round him almost to a man, and with the quietness which became their superior force. Jean Français and Biasson were left with scarcely twenty followers each; and those few would do nothing. The whites felt themselves powerless amidst the noonday heats, and opposed to threefold numbers: and their officers found that nothing was to be done but to allow them to look on quietly, while Jacques led away his little army, with loud music and a streaming white flag. A few horsemen led the van, and closed in the rear. The rest marched, as if on a holiday trip, now singing to the music of the band, and now making the hills ring again with the name of Toussaint Breda.

      As General Hermona, entirely indisposed for his siesta, watched the march through his glass from the entrance of his tent, while the notes of the wind-instruments swelled and died away in the still air, one of his aides was overheard by him to say to another—

      “The General has probably changed his opinion since he said to you this morning, of Toussaint Breda, that God could not visit a soul more pure. We have all had to change our minds rather more rapidly than suits such a warm climate.”

      “You may have changed your opinions since the sun rose, gentlemen,” said Hermona; “but I am not sure that I have.”

      “How! Is it possible? We do not understand you, my lord.”

      “Do you suppose that you understand him? Have we been of a degraded race, slaves, and suddenly offered restoration to full manhood and citizenship? How otherwise can we understand this man? I do not profess to do so.”

      “You think well of him, my lord?”

      “I am so disposed. Time, however, will show. He has gone away magnanimously enough, alone, and believing, I am confident, from what Father Laxabon tells me, that his career is closed; but I rather think we shall hear more of him.”

      “How these people revel in music!” observed one of the staff. “How they are pouring it forth now!”

      “And not without reason, surely,” said Hermona. “It is their exodus that we are watching.”

Chapter Eight.

       Table of Contents

      Breda again.

      The French proclamation was efficiently published along the line of march of the blacks. They shouted and sang the tidings of their freedom, joining with them the name of Toussaint Breda. These tidings of freedom rang through the ravines, and echoed up the sides of the hills, and through the depths of the forests, startling the wild birds on the mountain-ponds and the deer among the high ferns; and bringing down from their fastnesses a multitude of men who had fled thither from the vengeance of the whites and mulattoes, and to escape sharing in the violence of the negro force which Jean Français had left behind him, to pursue uncontrolled their course of plunder and butchery. Glad, to such, were the tidings of freedom, with order, and under the command of one whose name was never mentioned without respect, if not enthusiasm. The negro who did not know that there was any more world on the other side the Cibao peaks, had yet learned to be proud of the learning of Toussaint. The slave who conceived of God as dwelling in the innermost of the Mornes, and coming forth to govern His subjects with the fire of the lightning and the scythe of the hurricane, was yet able to revere the piety of Toussaint. The black bandit who had dipped his hands in the blood of his master, and feasted his ear with the groans of the innocent babes who had sat upon his knee, yet felt that there was something impressive in the simple habit of forgiveness, the vigilant spirit of mercy which distinguished Toussaint Breda from all his brethren in arms—from all the leading men of his colour, except his friend Henri Christophe. At the name of Toussaint Breda, then, these flocked down into the road by hundreds, till they swelled the numbers of the march to thousands. The Spanish soldiers, returning to their camp by such by-ways as they could find, heard again and again from a distance the cries of welcome and of triumph; and one or two of them chanced to witness from a high point of rock, or through a thick screen of foliage, the joyous progress of the little army, hastening on to find their chief. These involuntary spies gathered at every point of observation news which would gall the very soul of Jean Français, if they should get back to the camp to tell it.

      Jacques knew where to seek his friend, and led the way, on descending from the hills, straight across the plain to the Breda estate, where Toussaint meant to await his family. How unlike was this plantation to what it was when these negroes had seen it last! The cane-fields, heretofore so trim and orderly, with the tall canes springing from the clean black soil, were now a jungle. The old plants had run up till they had leaned over with their own weight, and fallen upon one another. Their suckers had sprung up in myriads, so that the racoon which burrowed among them could scarcely make its way in and out. The grass on the little enclosed lawns grew so rank, that the cattle, now wild, were almost hidden as they lay down in it; and so uneven and unsightly were the patches of growth, that the blossoming shrubs with which it had been sprinkled for ornament, now looked forlorn and out of place, flowering amidst the desolation. The slave-quarter was scarcely distinguishable from the wood behind it, so nearly was it overgrown with weeds. A young foal was browsing on the thatch, and a crowd of glittering lizards darted out and away on the approach of human feet.

      Jacques did not stay at the slave-quarter; but he desired his company to remain there and in the neighbouring field, while he went with Thérèse to bring out their chief to them. They went up to the house; but in no one of its deserted chambers did they find Toussaint.

      “Perhaps he is in his own cottage,” said Thérèse.

      “Is it possible,” replied Jacques, “that, with this fine house all to himself, he should take up with that old hut?”

      “Let us see,” said Thérèse; “for he is certainly not here.”

      When they readied Toussaint’s cottage, it was no easy matter to know how to effect an entrance. Enormous gourds had spread their network over the ground, like traps for the feet of trespassers. The front of the piazza was completely overgrown with the creepers which had been brought there only to cover the posts, and hang their blossoms from the eaves. They had now spread and tangled themselves, till they made the house look like a thicket. In one place, however, between two of the posts, they had been torn down, and the evening wind was tossing the loose coils about. Jacques entered the gap, and immediately looked out again, smiling, and beckoning Thérèse to come and see. There, in the piazza, they found Toussaint, СКАЧАТЬ