CHAPTER III.TOM'S MISTRESS AND HER OPINIONS "AND now, Marie," said St. Clare, "your golden days are dawning. Here is our practical, business-like New England cousin, who will take the whole budget of cares off your shoulders, and give you time to refresh yourself, and grow young and handsome. The ceremony of delivering the keys had better come off forthwith." This remark was made at the breakfast-table, a few mornings after Miss Ophelia had arrived. "I'm sure she's welcome," said Marie, leaning her head languidly on her hand. "I think she'll find one thing, if she does, and that is, that it's we, mistresses, that are the slaves, down here." "Oh, certainly, she will discover that, and a world of wholesome truths besides, no doubt," said St. Clare. "Talk about our keeping slaves, as if we did it for our convenience," said Marie. "I'm sure, if we consulted that, we might let them all go at once." Evangeline fixed her large, serious eyes on her mother's face, with an earnest and perplexed expression, and said, simply, "What do you keep them for, mamma?" "I don't know, I'm sure, except for a plague; they are the plague of my life. I believe that more of my ill-health is caused by them than by any one thing; and ours, I know, are the very worst that ever anybody was plagued with." "Oh, come, Marie, you've got the blues, this morning," said St. Clare. "You know 'tisn't so. There's Mammy, the best creature living,—what could you do without her?" "Mammy is the best I ever knew," said Marie; "and yet Mammy, now, is selfish,—dreadfully selfish; it's the fault of the whole race." Eva, the beautiful Eva, had stood listening to her mother, with that expression of deep and
mystic earnestness which was peculiar to her.
She walked softly round to her mother's chair, and put her arms around her neck. "Well, Eva, what now?" said Marie. "Mamma, couldn't I take care of you one night,—just one ? I know I shouldn't make you nervous, and I shouldn't sleep. I often lie awake nights, thinking—" "Oh, nonsense, child,—nonsense!" said Marie; "you are such a strange child!" "But may I, mamma? I think," she said, timidly, "that Mammy isn't well. She told me her head ached all the time, lately." "Oh, that's just one of Mammy's fidgets! Mammy is just like all the rest of them,—makes such a fuss about every little headache or finger-ache; it'll never do to encourage it,—never! I'm principled about this matter," said she, turning to Miss Ophelia; "you'll find the necessity of it. If you encourage servants in giving way to every little disagreeable feeling, and complaining of every little ailment, you'll have your hands full. I never complain myself,—nobody knows what I endure. I feel it a duty to bear it quietly, and I do." Miss Ophelia did not exactly know what she was expected to answer to this. While she was thinking what to say, Marie gradually wiped away her tears, and smoothed her plumage in a general sort of way, as a dove might be supposed to make toilet after a shower, and as soon as St. Clare had left the room, with Eva tripping away after him, began a housewifely chat with Miss Ophelia, concerning cupboards, closets, linen-presses, storerooms, and other matters, of which the latter was, by common understanding, to assume the direction. "And now," said Marie, "I believe I've told you everything; so that, when my next sick turn comes on, you'll be able to go forward entirely, without consulting me;—only about Eva,—she requires watching." "She seems to be a good child, very," said Miss Ophelia; "I never saw a better child." "Eva's peculiar," said her mother, "very. She always was disposed to be with servants;
and I think that well enough with some children. Now, I always played with father's little
negroes,—it never did me any harm. But Eva
somehow always seems to put herself on an equality with every creature that comes near her. It's a strange thing about the child. I never have been able to break her of it. St. Clare, I believe, encourages her in it. The fact is, St. Clare indulges every creature under this roof but his own wife." Again Miss Ophelia sat in blank silence. "Now, there's no way with servants," said Marie, "but to put them down, and keep them down. It was always natural to me, from a child. Eva is enough to spoil a whole houseful. What she will do when she comes to keep house herself, I'm sure I don't know. I hold to being kind to servants,—I always am; but you must make 'em know their place. Eva never does; there's no getting into the child's head the first beginning of an idea what a servant's place is! You heard her offering to take care of me nights, to let Mammy sleep! That's just a specimen of the way the child would be doing all the time, if she was left to herself." "Why," said Miss Ophelia, bluntly, "I suppose you think your servants are human crea-
tures, and ought to have some rest when they are tired." "Certainly, of course. I'm very particular in letting them have everything that comes convenient,—anything that doesn't put one at all out of the way, you know. But you don't realize, and you can't, the daily, hourly trials that beset a housekeeper from them, everywhere and every way. It's no use to complain to St. Clare. He talks the strangest stuff. He says we have made them what they are, and ought to bear with them. He says their faults are all owing to us, and that it would be cruel to make the fault and punish it too. He says we shouldn't do any better, in their place; just as if one could reason from them to us, you know." "Don't you believe that the Lord made them of one blood with us?" said Miss Ophelia, shortly. "No, indeed, not I! A pretty story, truly! They are a degraded race." "Don't you think they've got immortal souls?" said Miss Ophelia, with increasing indignation. "Oh, well," said Marie, yawning, "that, of
course—nobody doubts that. But as to putting them on any sort of equality with us, you know, as if we could be compared, why, it's impossible!" A gay laugh from the court rang at this moment through the silken curtains of the veranda. "What is it?" said Miss Ophelia, coming to the railing. There sat Tom, on a little mossy seat in the court, every one of his buttonholes stuck full of cape jessamines, and Eva, gaily laughing, was hanging a wreath of roses round his neck; and then she sat down on his knee, like a chip-sparrow, still laughing. "Oh, Tom, you look so funny!" Tom had a sober, benevolent smile, and seemed, in his quiet way, to be enjoying the fun quite as much as his little mistress. St. Clare had meantime entered, and was watching Eva, as she tripped off, leading Tom with her.
"What would the poor and lowly do, without children?" he said. "Your little child is your only
true democrat. Tom, now, is a hero to Eva; his stories are wonders in her
eyes, his songs and Methodist hymns are better than an opera, and the traps and little bits of trash in his pocket a mine of jewels, and he the most wonderful Tom that ever wore a black skin. This is one of the roses of Eden that the Lord has dropped down expressly for the poor and lowly, who get few enough of any other kind." In Tom's external situation, at this time, there was, as the world says, nothing to complain
of. Little Eva's fancy for him—the instinctive gratitude and loveliness of a noble nature—had
led her to petition her father that he might be her especial attendant, whenever she needed the
escort of a servant, in her walks or rides; and Tom had general orders to let everything else go,
and attend to Miss Eva whenever she wanted him,—orders which our readers may fancy were far from
disagreeable to him. He was kept well dressed, for St. Clare was fastidiously particular on this
point. His stable services were merely a sinecure, and consisted simply in a daily care and
inspection, and directing an under-servant in his duties;
for Marie St. Clare declared that she could not have any smell of the horses about him when he came near her, and that he must positively not be put to any service that would make him unpleasant to her, as her nervous system was entirely inadequate to any trial of that nature; one snuff of anything disagreeable being, according to her account, quite sufficient to close the scene, and put an end to all her earthly trials at once. Tom, therefore, in his well-brushed broadcloth suit, smooth beaver, glossy boots, faultless wristbands and collar, with his grave, good-natured, black face, looked respectable enough to be a Bishop of Carthage, as men of color were, in other ages. Then, too, he was in a beautiful place, a consideration to which his sensitive race are never indifferent; and he did enjoy, with a quiet joy, the birds, the flowers, the fountains, the perfume, and light and beauty of the court, the silken hangings, and pictures, and lustres, and statuettes, and gilding, that made the parlors within a kind of Aladdin's palace to him. If ever Africa shall show an elevated and cultivated race,—and come it must, sometime,
her turn to figure in the great drama of human improvement,—life will awake there with a gorgeousness and splendor of which our cold Western tribes faintly have conceived. In that far-off mystic land of gold, and gems, and spices, and waving palms, and wondrous flowers, and miraculous fertility, will awake new forms of art, new styles of splendor; and the negro race, no longer despised and trodden down, will, perhaps, show forth some of the latest and most magnificent revelations of human life. Was this what Marie St. Clare was thinking of, as she stood, gorgeously dressed, on the
veranda, on Sunday morning, clasping a diamond bracelet on her slender wrist? Most likely it was.
Or, if it wasn't that, it was something else; for Marie patronized good things, and she was going
now, in full force,—diamonds, silk, and lace, and jewels, and all,—to a fashionable church, to
be very religious. Marie always made a point to be very pious on Sundays. There she stood, so
slender, so elegant, so airy and undulating in all her motions, her lace scarf enveloping her
like a mist. She looked a graceful creature, and she felt very good and very
elegant indeed. Miss Ophelia stood at her side, a perfect contrast. It was not that she had not as handsome a silk dress and shawl, and as fine a pocket-handkerchief; but stiffness, and squareness, and bolt-uprightness enveloped her with as indefinite yet appreciable a presence as did grace her elegant neighbor; not the grace of God, however,—that is quite another thing! "Where's Eva?" said Marie. "The child stopped on the stairs, to say something to Mammy." And what was Eva saying to Mammy on the stairs? Listen, reader, and you will hear, though Marie does not. "Dear Mammy, I know your head is aching dreadfully." "Lord bless you, Miss Eva! my head allers aches lately. You don't need to worry." "Well, I'm glad you're going out; and here,"—and the little girl threw her arms around her,—"Mammy, you shall take my vinaigrette." "What! your beautiful gold thing thar, with them diamonds? Lor, Miss, 'twouldn't be proper, no ways." "Why not? You need it and I don't. Mamma always uses it for headache, and it'll make you feel better. No, you shall take it to please me now." "Do hear the darling talk!" said Mammy, as Eva thrust it into her bosom, and, kissing her, ran down-stairs to her mother. "What were you stopping for?" "I was just stopping to give Mammy my vinaigrette, to take to church with her." "Eva!" said Marie, stamping impatiently,—"your gold vinaigrette to Mammy! When will you learn what's proper? Go right and take it back, this moment!" Eva looked downcast and aggrieved, and turned slowly. "I say, Marie, let the child alone; she shall do as she pleases," said St. Clare. "St. Clare, how will she ever get along in the world?" said Marie. "The Lord knows," said St. Clare; "but she'll get along in heaven better than you or I." "Oh, papa, don't," said Eva, softly touching his elbow; "it troubles mother." "Well, cousin, are you ready to go to meeting?" said Miss Ophelia, turning square about on St. Clare. "I'm not going, thank you." "I do wish St. Clare ever would go to church," said Marie; "but he hasn't a particle of religion about him. It really isn't respectable." "I know it," said St. Clare. "You ladies go to church to learn how to get along in the world, I suppose, and your piety sheds respectability on us. If I did go at all, I would go where Mammy goes; there's something to keep a fellow awake there, at least." "What! those shouting Methodists? Horrible!" said Marie. "Anything but the dead sea of your respectable churches, Marie. Positively, it's too much to ask of a man. Eva, do you like to go? Come, stay at home and play with me." "Thank you, papa; but I'd rather go to church." "Isn't it dreadful tiresome?" said St. Clare. "I think it is tiresome, some," said Eva; "and I am sleepy, too, but I try to keep awake." "What do you go for, then?" "Why, you know, papa," she said, in a whisper, "cousin told me that God wants to have us; and he gives us everything, you know; and it isn't much to do it, if he wants us to. It isn't so very tiresome, after all." "You sweet, little obliging soul!" said St. Clare, kissing her; "go along, that's a good girl, and pray for me." "Certainly, I always do," said the child, as she sprang after her mother into the carriage. St. Clare stood on the steps and kissed his hand to her, as the carriage drove away; large tears were in his eyes. "Oh! Evangeline! rightly named," he said; hath not God made thee an evangel to me?" So he felt a moment; and then he smoked a cigar, and read the Picayune, and forgot his little gospel. Was he much unlike other folks? "You see, Evangeline," said her mother, "it's always right and proper to be kind to
servants, but it isn't proper to treat them just as we would our
relations, or people in our own class of life.
Now, if Mammy was sick, you wouldn't want to put her in your bed." "I should feel just like it, mamma," said Eva, "because then it would be handier to take care of her, and because, you know, my bed is better than hers." Marie was in utter despair at the entire want of moral perception evinced in this reply. "What can I do to make this child understand me?" she said. "Nothing," said Miss Ophelia, significantly. Eva looked sorry and disconcerted for a moment; but children, luckily, do not keep to one impression long, and in a few moments she was merrily laughing at various things which she saw from the coach windows, as it rattled along. "I say, what do you think, pussy?" said her father to Eva, who ran in, with a flower in her hand, while the family were seated around the dinner-table, discussing the ever-absorbing subject of slavery. "What about, papa?" "Why, which do you like the best,—to live
as they do at your uncle's, up in Vermont, or to have a houseful of servants, as we do?" "Oh, of course, our way is the pleasantest," said Eva. "Why so?" said St. Clare, stroking her head. "Why, it makes so many more round you to love, you know," said Eva, looking up earnestly. "Now, that's just like Eva," said Marie; "just one of her odd speeches." "Is it an odd speech, papa?" said Eva, whisperingly, as she got upon his knee. "Rather, as this world goes, pussy," said St. Clare. " But where has my little Eva been, all dinner-time?" "Oh, I've been up in Tom's room, hearing him sing, and Aunt Dinah gave me my dinner." "Hearing Tom sing, hey?" "Oh, yes! he sings such beautiful things about the New Jerusalem, and bright angels, and the land of Canaan." "I dare say ; it's better than the opera, isn't it?" "Yes, and he's going to teach them to me." "Singing lessons, hey?—you are coming on." "Yes, he sings for me, and I read to him in my Bible; and he explains what it means, you know." "On my word," said Marie, laughing, "that is the latest joke of the season." |