Three Years in Europe Part 10

Education, though obtained by a little at a time, and that, too, over the midnight lamp, will place its owner in a position to be respected by all, even though he be black. I know that the obstacles which the laws of the land, and of society, place between the coloured man and education in the United States, are very great, yet if _one_ can break through these barriers, more can; and if our people would only place the right appreciation upon education, they would find these obstacles are easier to be overcome than at first sight appears. A young man once asked Carlyle, what was the secret of success. His reply was, "Energy; whatever you undertake, do it with all your might." Had it not been for the possession of energy, I might now have been working as a servant for some brainless fellow who might be able to command my labour with his money, or I might have been yet toiling in chains and slavery. But thanks to energy, not only for my being to-day in a land of freedom, but also for my dear girls being in one of the best seminaries in France, instead of being in an American school, where the finger of scorn would be pointed at them by those whose superiority rests entirely upon their having a whiter skin. But I am straying too far from the purpose of this letter.

Oxford is indeed one of the finest located places in the kingdom, and every inch of ground about it seems hallowed by interesting a.s.sociations. The University, founded by the good King Alfred, still throws its shadow upon the side-walk; and the lapse of ten centuries seems to have made but little impression upon it. Other seats of learning may be ent.i.tled to our admiration, but Oxford claims our veneration. Although the lateness of the night compelled me, yet I felt an unwillingness to tear myself from the scene of such surpa.s.sing interest. Few places in any country as noted as Oxford is, but what has some distinguished person residing within its precincts. And knowing that the City of Palaces was not an exception to this rule, I resolved to see some of its lions. Here, of course, is the head quarters of the Bishop of Oxford, a son of the late William Wilberforce, Africa's n.o.ble champion. I should have been glad to have seen this distinguished pillar of the Church, but I soon learned that the Bishop's residence was out of town, and that he seldom visited the city except on business. I then determined to see one who, although a lesser dignitary in the church, is nevertheless, scarcely less known than the Bishop of Oxford. This was the Rev. Dr. Pusey, a divine, whose name is known wherever the religion of Jesus is known and taught, and the acknowledged head of the Puseyites. On the second morning of my visit, I proceeded to Christ Church Chapel, where the rev. gentleman officiates. Fortunately I had an opportunity of seeing the Dr., and following close in his footsteps to the church. His personal appearance is anything but that of one who is the leader of a growing and powerful party in the church. He is rather under the middle size, and is round shouldered, or rather stoops. His profile is more striking than his front face, the nose being very large and prominent. As a matter of course, I expected to see a large nose, for all great men have them. He has a thoughtful, and somewhat sullen brow, a firm and somewhat pensive mouth, a cheek pale, thin, and deeply furrowed. A monk fresh from the cloisters of Tintern Abbey, in its proudest days, could scarcely have made a more ascetic and solemn appearance than did Dr. Pusey on this occasion. He is not apparently above forty-five, or at most fifty years of age, and his whole aspect renders him an admirable study for an artist. Dr. Pusey's style of preaching is cold and tame, and one looking at him would scarcely believe that such an apparently uninteresting man could cause such an eruption in the Church as he has. I was glad to find that a coloured young man was among the students at Oxford.

A few months since, I paid a visit to our countryman, Alexander Crummel, who is still pursuing his studies at Cambridge--a place, though much inferior to Oxford as far as appearance is concerned, is yet said to be greatly its superior as a place of learning. In an hour's walk through the Strand, Regent, or Piccadilly Streets in London, one may meet half a dozen coloured young men, who are inmates of the various Colleges in the metropolis. These are all signs of progress in the cause of the sons of Africa. Then let our people take courage, and with that courage let them apply themselves to learning. A determination to excel is the sure road to greatness, and that is as open to the black man as the white. It was that which has accomplished the mightiest and n.o.blest triumphs in the intellectual and physical world. It was that which has made such rapid strides towards civilization, and broken the chains of ignorance and superst.i.tion, which have so long fettered the human intellect. It was determination which raised so many worthy individuals from the humble walks of society, and from poverty, and placed them in positions of trust and renown. It is no slight barrier that can effectually oppose the determination of the will--success must ultimately crown its efforts. "The world shall hear of me," was the exclamation of one whose name has become as familiar as household words. A Toussaint, once laboured in the sugar field with his spelling-book in his pocket, amid the combined efforts of a nation to keep him in ignorance. His name is now recorded among the list of statesmen of the past. A Soulouque was once a slave, and knew not how to read. He now sits upon the throne of an Empire.

In our own country, there are men who once held the plough, and that too without any compensation, who are now presiding at the editor's table. It was determination that brought out the genius of a Franklin, and a Fulton, and that has distinguished many of the American Statesmen, who but for their energy and determination would never have had a name beyond the precincts of their own homes.

It is not always those who have the best advantages, or the greatest talents, that eventually succeed in their undertakings; but it is those who strive with untiring diligence to remove all obstacles to success, and who, with unconquerable resolution, labour on until the rich reward of perseverance is within their grasp. Then again let me say to our young men--Take courage; "There is a good time coming." The darkness of the night appears greatest just before the dawn of day.

LETTER XX.

_Fugitive Slaves in England._

The love of freedom is one of those natural impulses of the human breast which cannot be extinguished. Even the brute animals of the creation feel and show sorrow and affection when deprived of their liberty.

Therefore is a distinguished writer justified in saying, "Man is free, even were he born in chains." The Americans boast, and justly, too, that Was.h.i.+ngton was the hero and model patriot of the American Revolution--the man whose fame, unequalled in his own day and country, will descend to the end of time, the pride and honour of humanity. The American speaks with pride of the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill; and when standing in Faneuil Hall, he points to the portraits of Otis, Adams, Hanc.o.c.k, Quincy, Warren, and Franklin, and tells you that their names will go down to posterity among the world's most devoted and patriotic friends of human liberty.

It was on the first of August, 1851, that a number of men, fugitives from that boasted land of freedom, a.s.sembled at the Hall of Commerce in the City of London, for the purpose of laying their wrongs before the British nation, and at the same time, to give thanks to the G.o.d of Freedom for the liberation of their West India brethren, on the first of August, 1834. Little notice had been given of the intended meeting, yet it seemed to be known in all parts of the city. At the hour of half-past seven, for which the meeting had been called, the s.p.a.cious hall was well filled, and the fugitives, followed by some of the most noted English Abolitionists, entered the hall, amid the most deafening applause, and took their seats on the platform. The appearance of the great hall at this juncture was most splendid. Besides the committee of fugitives, on the platform there were a number of the oldest and most devoted of the Slave's friends. On the left of the chair sat Geo. Thompson, Esq., M.P.; near him was the Rev. Jabez Burns, D.D.; and by his side the Rev. John Stevenson, M.A., Wm. Farmer, Esq., R. Smith, Esq.; while on the other side were the Rev. Edward Mathews, John Cunliff, Esq., Andrew Paton, Esq., J.P. Edwards, Esq., and a number of coloured gentlemen from the West Indies. The body of the hall was not without its distinguished guests. The Chapmans and Westons of Boston, U.S., were there. The Estlins and Tribes had come all the way from Bristol to attend the great meeting. The Patons of Glasgow had delayed their departure, so as to be present. The Ma.s.sies had come in from Upper Clapton. Not far from the platform sat Sir Francis Knowles, Bart., still farther back was Samuel Bowly, Esq., while near the door were to be seen the greatest critic of the age, and England's best living poet. Macaulay had laid aside the pen, entered the hall, and was standing near the central door, while not far from the historian stood the newly-appointed Poet Laureat. The author of "In Memoriam" had been swept in by the crowd, and was standing with his arms folded, and beholding for the first time (and probably the last) so large a number of coloured men in one room. In different parts of the hall were men and women from nearly all parts of the kingdom, besides a large number who, drawn to London by the Exhibition, had come in to see and hear these oppressed people plead their own cause.

The writer of this sketch was chosen Chairman of the meeting, and commenced its proceedings by delivering the following address, which we cut from the columns of the _Morning Advertiser_:--

"The Chairman, in opening the proceedings, remarked that, although the metropolis had of late been inundated with meetings of various character, having reference to almost every variety of subject, yet that the subject they were called upon that evening to discuss differed from them all. Many of those by whom he was surrounded, like himself, had been victims to the inhuman inst.i.tution of Slavery, and were in consequence exiled from the land of their birth. They were fugitives from their native land, but not fugitives from justice, and they had not fled from a monarchical, but from a so-called republican government.

They came from amongst a people who declared, as part of their creed, that all men were born free, but who, while they did so, made slaves of every sixth man, woman, and child in the country (hear, hear). He must not, however, forget that one of the purposes for which they were met that night was to commemorate the emanc.i.p.ation of their brothers and sisters in the isles of the sea. That act of the British Parliament, and he might add in this case with peculiar emphasis, of the British nation, pa.s.sed on the 12th day of August, 1833, to take effect on the first day of August, 1834, and which enfranchised 800,000 West Indian slaves, was an event sublime in its nature, comprehensive and mighty in its immediate influences and remote consequences, precious beyond expression to the cause of freedom, and encouraging beyond the measure of any government on earth to the hearts of all enlightened and just men. This act was the commencement of a long course of philanthropic and Christian efforts on the part of some of the best men that the world ever produced. It was not his intention to go into a discussion or a calculation of the rise and fall of property, or whether sugar was worth more or less by the act of emanc.i.p.ation. But the abolition of Slavery in the West Indies, was a blow struck in the right direction, at that most inhuman of all traffics, the slave trade--a trade which would never cease so long as slavery existed, for where there was a market there would be merchandise; where there was demand there would be a supply; where there were carcases there would be vultures; and they might as well attempt to turn the water, and make it run up the Niagara river, as to change this law. It was often said by the Americans that England was responsible for the existence of slavery there, because it was introduced into that country while the colonies were under the British Crown. If that were the case, they must come to the conclusion that, as England abolished Slavery in the West Indies, she would have done the same for the American States if she had had the power to do it; and if that was so, they might safely say that the separation of the United States from the mother country was (to say the least) a great misfortune to one-sixth of the population of that land. England had set a n.o.ble example to America, and he would to heaven his countrymen would follow the example. The Americans boasted of their superior knowledge, but they needed not to boast of their superior guilt, for that was set upon a hill top, and that too, so high, that it required not the lantern of Diogenes to find it out. Every breeze from the western world brought upon its wings the groans and cries of the victims of this guilt. Nearly all countries had fixed the seal of disapprobation on slavery, and when, at some future age, this stain on the page of history shall be pointed at, posterity will blush at the discrepancy between American profession and American practice. What was to be thought of a people boasting of their liberty, their humanity, their Christianity, their love of justice, and at the same time keeping in slavery nearly four millions of G.o.d's children, and shutting out from them the light of the Gospel, by denying the Bible to the slave! (Hear, hear.) No education, no marriage, everything done to keep the mind of the slave in darkness. There was a wish on the part of the people of the northern States to s.h.i.+eld themselves from the charge of slave-holding, but as they shared in the guilt, he was not satisfied with letting them off without their share in the odium. And now a word about the Fugitive Slave Bill. That measure was in every respect an unconst.i.tutional measure. It set aside the right formerly enjoyed by the fugitive of trial by jury--it afforded to him no protection, no opportunity of proving his right to be free, and it placed every free coloured person at the mercy of any unprincipled individual who might wish to lay claim to him. (Hear.) That law is opposed to the principles of Christianity--foreign alike to the laws of G.o.d and man, it had converted the whole population of the free States into a band of slave-catchers, and every rood of territory is but so much hunting ground, over which they might chase the fugitive. But while they were speaking of slavery in the United States, they must not omit to mention that there was a strong feeling in that land, not only against the Fugitive Slave Law, but also against the existence of slavery in any form. There was a band of fearless men and women in the city of Boston, whose labours for the slave had resulted in good beyond calculation. This n.o.ble and heroic cla.s.s had created an agitation in the whole country, until their principles have taken root in almost every a.s.sociation in the land, and which, with G.o.d's blessing, will, in due time, cause the Americans to put into practice what they have so long professed. (Hear, hear.) He wished it to be continually held up before the country, that the northern States are as deeply implicated in the guilt of slavery as the South. The north had a population of 13,553,328 freemen; the south had a population of only 6,393,756 freemen; the north has 152 representatives in the house, the south only 81; and it would be seen by this, that the balance of power was with the free States.

Looking, therefore, at the question in all its aspects, he was sure that there was no one in this country but who would find out, that the slavery of the United States of America was a system the most abandoned and the most tyrannical. (Hear, hear.)"

At the close of this address, the Rev. Edward Matthews, last from Bristol, but who had recently returned from the United States, where he had been maltreated on account of his fidelity to the cause of freedom, was introduced, and made a most interesting speech. The next speaker was George Thompson, Esq., M.P.; and we need only say that his eloquence, which has seldom or ever been equalled, and never surpa.s.sed, exceeded, on this occasion, the most sanguine expectations of his friends. All who sat under the thundering anathemas which he hurled against slavery, seemed instructed, delighted, and animated. No one could scarcely have remained unmoved by the pensive sympathies that pervaded the entire a.s.sembly. There were many in the meeting who had never seen a fugitive slave before, and when any of the speakers would refer to those on the platform, the whole audience seemed moved to tears. No meeting of the kind held in London for years created a greater sensation than this gathering of refugees from the "Land of the free, and the home of the brave." The following appeal, which I had written for the occasion, was unanimously adopted at the close of the meeting, and thus ended the great Anti-Slavery demonstration of 1851.

AN APPEAL TO THE PEOPLE OF GREAT BRITAIN AND THE WORLD.

We consider it just, both to the people of the United States and to ourselves, in making an appeal to the inhabitants of other countries, against the laws which have exiled us from our native land, to state the ground upon which we make our appeal, and the causes which impel us to do so. There are in the United States of America, at the present time, between three and four millions of persons, who are held in a state of slavery which has no parallel in any other part of the world; and whose numbers have, within the last fifty years, increased to a fearful extent. These people are not only deprived of the rights to which the laws of Nature and Nature's G.o.d ent.i.tle them, but every avenue to knowledge is closed against them. The laws do not recognise the family relation of a slave, and extend to him protection in the enjoyment of domestic endearments. Brothers and sisters, parents and children, husbands and wives, are torn asunder, and permitted to see each other no more. The shrieks and agonies of the slave are heard in the markets at the seat of government, and within hearing of the American Congress, as well as on the cotton, sugar and rice plantations of the far South.

The history of the negroes in America is but a history of repeated injuries and acts of oppression committed upon them by the whites. It is not for ourselves that we make this appeal, but for those whom we have left behind.

In their Declaration of Independence, the Americans declare that "all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Yet one-sixth of the inhabitants of the great Republic are slaves. Thus they give the lie to their own professions. No one forfeits his or her character or standing in society by being engaged in holding, buying or selling a slave; the details of which, in all their horror, can scarcely be told.

Although the holding of slaves is confined to fifteen of the thirty-one States, yet we hold that the non-slave-holding States are equally guilty with the slave-holding. If any proof is needed on this point, it will be found in the pa.s.sage of the inhuman Fugitive Slave Law, by Congress; a law which could never have been enacted without the votes of a portion of the representatives from the free States, and which is now being enforced, in many of the States, with the utmost alacrity. It was the pa.s.sing of this law that exiled us from our native land, and it has driven thousands of our brothers and sisters from the free States, and compelled them to seek a refuge in the British possessions in North America. The Fugitive Slave Law has converted the entire country, North and South, into one vast hunting-ground. We would respectfully ask you to expostulate with the Americans, and let them know that you regard their treatment of the coloured people of that country as a violation of every principle of human brotherhood, of natural right, of justice, of humanity, of Christianity, of love to G.o.d and love to man.

It is needless that we should remind you that the religious sects of America, with but few exceptions, are connected with the sin of slavery--the churches North as well as South. We would have you tell the professed Christians of that land, that if they would be respected by you, they must separate themselves from the unholy alliance with men who are daily committing deeds which, if done in England, would cause the perpetrator to be sent to a felon's doom; that they must refuse the right hand of Christian fellows.h.i.+p, whether individually or collectively, to those implicated, in any way, in the guilt of slavery.

We do not ask for a forcible interference on your part, but only that you will use all lawful and peaceful means to restore to this much injured race their G.o.d-given rights. The moral and religious sentiment of mankind must be arrayed against slave-holding, to make it infamous, ere we can hope to see it abolished. We would ask you to set them the example, by excluding from your pulpits, and from religious communion, the slave-holding and pro-slavery ministers who may happen to visit this country. We would even go further, and ask you to shut your doors against either ministers or laymen, who are at all guilty of upholding and sustaining this monster sin. By the cries of the slave, which come from the fields and swamps of the far South, we ask you to do this! By that spirit of liberty and equality of which you all admire, we would ask you to do this. And by that still n.o.bler, higher, and holier spirit of our beloved Saviour, we would ask you to stamp upon the head of the slaveholder, with a brand deeper than that which marks the victim of his wrongs, the infamy of theft, adultery, man-stealing, piracy, and murder, and, by the force of public opinion, compel him to "unloose the heavy burden, and let the oppressed go free."

LETTER XXI.

_A Chapter on American Slavery._

The word Englishman is but another name for an American, and the word American is but another name for an Englishman--England is the father, America the son. They have a common origin and ident.i.ty of language; they hold the same religious and political opinions; they study the same histories, and have the same literature. Steam and mechanical ingenuity have brought the two countries within nine days sailing of each other.

The Englishman on landing at New-York finds his new neighbours speaking the same language which he last heard on leaving Liverpool, and he sees the American in the same dress that he had been accustomed to look upon at home, and soon forgets that he is three thousand miles from his native land, and in another country. The American on landing at Liverpool, and taking a walk through the great commercial city, finding no difficulty in understanding the people, supposes himself still in New-York; and if there seems any doubt in his own mind, growing out of the fact that the people have a more healthy look, seem more polite, and that the buildings have a more substantial appearance than those he had formerly looked upon, he has only to imagine, as did Rip Van Winkle, that he has been asleep these hundred years.

If the Englishman who has seen a Thompson silenced in Boston, or a Macready mobbed in New-York, upon the ground that they were foreigners, should sit in Exeter Hall and hear an American orator until he was hoa.r.s.e, and wonder why the American is better treated in England than the Englishman in America, he has only to attribute it to John Bull's superior knowledge of good manners, and his being a more law-abiding man than brother Jonathan. England and America has each its reforms and its reformers, and they have more or less sympathy with each other. It has been said that one generation commences a reform in England, and that another generation finishes it. I would that so much could be said with regard to the great object of reform in America--the system of slavery!

No evil was ever more deeply rooted in a country than is slavery in the United States. Spread over the largest and most fertile States in the Union, with decidedly the best climate, and interwoven, as it is, with the religious, political, commercial, and social inst.i.tutions of the country, it is scarcely possible to estimate its influence. This is the evil which claims the attention of American Reformers, over and above every other evil in the land, and thanks to a kind providence, the American slave is not without his advocates. The greatest enemy to the Anti-Slavery Society, and the most inveterate opposer of the men whose names stand at the head of the list as officers and agents of that a.s.sociation, will, we think, a.s.sign to William Lloyd Garrison, the first place in the ranks of the American Abolitionists. The first to proclaim the doctrine of immediate emanc.i.p.ation to the slaves of America, and on that account an object of hatred to the slave-holding interest of the country, and living for years with his life in danger, he is justly regarded by all, as the leader of the Anti-Slavery movement in the New World. Mr. Garrison is at the present time but little more than forty-five years of age, and of the middle size. He has a high and prominent forehead, well developed, with no hair on the top of the head, having lost it in early life; with a piercing eye, a pleasant, yet anxious countenance, and of a most loveable disposition; tender, and blameless in his family affections, devoted to his friends; simple and studious, upright, guileless, distinguished, and worthy, like the distinguished men of antiquity, to be immortalized by another Plutarch.

How many services never to be forgotten, has he not rendered to the cause of the slave, and the welfare of mankind! As a speaker, he is forcible, clear, and logical, yet he will not rank with the many who are less known. As a writer, he is regarded as one of the finest in the United States, and certainly the most prominent in the Anti-Slavery cause. Had Mr. Garrison wished to serve himself, he might, with his great talents, long since, have been at the head of either of the great political parties. Few men can withstand the allurements of office, and the prize-money that accompanies them. Many of those who were with him fifteen years ago, have been swept down with the current of popular favour, either in Church or State. He has seen a c.o.x on the one hand, and a Stanton on the other, swept away like so much floating wood before the tide. When the st.u.r.diest characters gave way, when the finest geniuses pa.s.sed one after another under the yoke of slavery, Garrison stood firm to his convictions, like a rock that stands stirless amid the conflicting agitation of the waves. He is not only the friend and advocate of freedom with his pen and his tongue, but to the oppressed of every clime he opens his purse, his house, and his heart: yet he is not a man of money. The fugitive slave, fresh from the whips and chains, who is turned off by the politician, and experiences the cold shoulder of the divine, finds a bed and a breakfast under the hospitable roof of Mr.

Lloyd Garrison.

The party of which he is the acknowledged head, is one of no inconsiderable influence in the United States. No man has more bitter enemies or stauncher friends than he. There are those among his friends who would stake their all upon his veracity and integrity; and we are sure that the coloured people throughout America, bond and free, in whose cause he has so long laboured, will, with one accord, a.s.sign the highest niche in their affection to the champion of universal emanc.i.p.ation. Every cause has its writers and its orators. We have drawn a hasty and imperfect sketch of the greatest writer in the Anti-Slavery field: we shall now call attention to the most distinguished public speaker. The name of Wendell Phillips is but another name for eloquence.

Born in the highest possible position in America, Mr. Phillips has all the advantages that birth can give to one in that country. Educated at the first University, graduating with all the honours which the College could bestow on him, and studying the law and becoming a member of the bar, he has all the accomplishments that these advantages can give to a man of a great mind. Nature has treated him as a favourite. His stature is not tall, but handsome; his expressive countenance paints and reflects every emotion of his soul. His gestures are wonderfully graceful, like his delivery. There is a fascination in the soft gaze of his eyes, which none can but admire. Being a great reader, and endowed by nature with a good memory, he supplies himself with the most complicated dates and historical events. Nothing can equal the variety of his matter. I have heard him more than twenty different times on the same subject, but never heard the same speech. He is personal, but there is nothing offensive in his personalities. He extracts from a subject all that it contains, and does it as none but Wendell Phillips can. His voice is beautifully musical, and it is calculated to attract wherever it is heard. He is a man of calm intrepidity, of a patriotic and warm heart, with manners the most affable, temper the most gentle, a rect.i.tude of principle entirely natural, a freedom from ambition, and a modesty quite singular. As Napoleon kept the Old Guard in reserve, to turn the tide in battle, so do the Abolitionists keep Mr. Phillips in reserve when opposition is expected in their great gatherings. We have seen the meetings turned into a bedlam, by the mobocratic slave-holding spirit, and when the speakers had one after another left the platform without a hearing, and the chairman had lost all control of the a.s.sembly, the appearance of this gentleman upon the platform would turn the tide of events. He would not beg for a hearing, but on the contrary, he would lash them as no preceding speaker had done. If, by their groans and yells, they stifled his voice, he would stand unmoved with his arms folded, and by the very eloquence of his looks put them to silence. His speeches against the Fugitive Slave Law, and his withering rebukes of Daniel Webster and other northern men who supported that measure, are of the most splendid character, and will compare in point of composition with anything ever uttered by Chatham or Sheridan in their palmiest days. As a public speaker, Mr. Phillips is, without doubt, the first in the United States. Considering his great talent, his high birth, and the prospects which lay before him, and the fact that he threw everything aside to plead the slave's cause, we must be convinced that no man has sacrificed more upon the altar of humanity than Wendell Phillips.

Within the past ten years, a great impetus has been given to the anti-slavery movement in America by coloured men who have escaped from slavery. Coming as they did from the very house of bondage, and being able to speak from sad experience, they could speak as none others could.

The gentleman to whom we shall now call attention is one of this cla.s.s, and doubtless the first of his race in America. The name of Frederick Dougla.s.s is well known throughout this country as well as America. Born and brought up as a slave, he was deprived of a mother's care and of early education. Escaping when he was little more than twenty years of age, he was thrown upon his own resources in the free states, where prejudice against colour is but another name for slavery. But during all this time he was educating himself as well as circ.u.mstances would admit.

Mr. Dougla.s.s commenced his career as a public speaker some ten years since, as an agent of the American or Ma.s.sachusetts Anti-Slavery Societies. He is tall and well made. His vast and well-developed forehead announces the power of his intellect. His voice is full and sonorous. His att.i.tude is dignified, and his gesticulation is full of n.o.ble simplicity. He is a man of lofty reason, natural, and without pretension, always master of himself, brilliant in the art of exposing and of abstracting. Few persons can handle a subject with which they are familiar better than Mr. Dougla.s.s. There is a kind of eloquence issuing from the depth of the soul, as from a spring, rolling along its copious floods, sweeping all before it, overwhelming by its very force, carrying, upsetting, engulphing its adversaries, and more dazzling and more thundering than the bolt which leaps from crag to crag. This is the eloquence of Frederick Dougla.s.s. He is one of the greatest mimics of the age. No man can put on a sweeter smile or a more sarcastic frown than he: you cannot put him off his guard. He is always in good humour. Mr.

Dougla.s.s possesses great dramatic powers; and had he taken up the sock and buskin, instead of becoming a lecturer, he would have made as fine a Coriola.n.u.s as ever trod the stage.

However, Mr. Dougla.s.s was not the first coloured man that became a lecturer, and thereby did service to the cause of his countrymen. The earliest and most effective speaker from among the coloured race in America, was Charles Lennox Remond. In point of eloquence, this gentleman is not inferior to either Wendell Phillips or Frederick Dougla.s.s. Mr. Remond is of small stature, and neat figure, with a head well developed, but a remarkably thin face. As an elocutionist, he is, without doubt, the first on the anti-slavery platform. He has a good voice, a pleasing countenance, a prompt intelligence, and when speaking, is calculated to captivate and carry away an audience by the very force of his eloquence. Born in the freest state of the Union, and of most respectable parents, he prides himself not a little on his birth and descent. One can scarcely find fault with this, for, in the United States, the coloured man is deprived of the advantages which parentage gives to the white man. Mr. Remond is a descendant of one of those coloured men who stood side by side with white men on the plains of Concord and Lexington, in the battles that achieved the independence of the colonies from the mother country, in the war of the Revolution. Mr.

Remond has felt deeply, (probably more so than any other coloured man), the odious prejudice against colour. On this point he is sensitive to a fault. If any one will sit for an hour and hear a lecture from him on this subject, if he is not converted, he will at least become convinced, that the boiling cauldron of anti-slavery discussion has never thrown upon its surface a more fiery spirit than Charles Lennox Remond.

There are some men who neither speak nor write, but whose lives place them in the foremost ranks in the cause which they espouse. One of these is Francis Jackson. He was one of the earliest to give countenance and support to the anti-slavery movement. In the year 1835, when a mob of more than 5000 merchants and others, in Boston, broke up an anti-slavery meeting of females, at which William Lloyd Garrison and George Thompson were to deliver addresses, and when the Society had no room in which to hold its meetings (having been driven from their own room by the mob), Francis Jackson, with a moral courage scarcely ever equalled, came forward and offered his private dwelling to the ladies, to hold their meeting in. The following interesting pa.s.sage occurs in a letter from him to the Secretary of the Society a short time after, on receiving a vote of thanks from its members:--

"If a large majority of this community choose to turn a deaf ear to the wrongs which are inflicted upon their countrymen in other portions of the land--if they are content to turn away from the sight of oppression, and 'pa.s.s by on the other side'--so it must be.

"But when they undertake in any way to impair or annul my right to speak, write, and publish upon any subject, and more especially upon enormities, which are the common concern of every lover of his country and his kind--so it must not be--so it shall not be, if I for one can prevent it. Upon this great right let us hold on at all hazards. And should we, in its exercise, be driven from public halls to private dwellings, one house at least shall be consecrated to its preservation.

And if, in defence of this sacred privilege, which man did not give me, and shall not (if I can help it) take from me, this roof and these walls shall be levelled to the earth, let them fall if they must; they cannot crumble in a better cause. They will appear of very little value to me after their owner shall have been whipt into silence."

There are among the contributors to the Anti-Slavery cause, a few who give with a liberality which has never been surpa.s.sed by the donors to any benevolent a.s.sociation in the world, according to their means--the chief of these is Francis Jackson.

In the month of May, 1844, while one evening strolling up Broadway, New York, I saw a crowd making its way into the Minerva Rooms, and, having no pressing engagement, I followed, and was soon in a splendid hall, where some twelve or fifteen hundred persons were seated, and listening to rather a strange-looking man. The speaker was tall and slim, with long arms, long legs, and a profusion of auburn or reddish hair hanging in ringlets down his shoulders; while a huge beard of the same colour fell upon his breast. His person was not at all improved by his dress.

The legs of his trousers were shorter than those worn by smaller men: the sleeves of his coat were small and short, the s.h.i.+rt collar turned down in Byronic style, beard and hair hid his countenance, so that no redeeming feature could be found there; yet there was one redeeming quality about the man--that was the stream of fervid eloquence which escaped from his lips. I inquired his name, and was informed that it was Charles C. Burleigh. Nature has been profuse in showering her gifts upon Mr. Burleigh, but all has been bestowed upon his head and heart. There is a kind of eloquence which weaves its thread around the hearer, and gradually draws him into its web, fascinating him with its gaze, entangling him as the spider does the fly, until he is fast: such is the eloquence of C.C. Burleigh. As a debater he is unquestionably the first on the Anti-slavery platform. If he did not speak so fast, he would equal Wendell Phillips; if he did not reason his subject out of existence, he would surpa.s.s him. However, one would have to travel over many miles, and look in the faces of many men, before he would find one who has made more personal sacrifices, or done more to bring about the Emanc.i.p.ation of the American Slaves, than Mr. Charles C. Burleigh.

Whoever the future historian of the Anti-Slavery movement may be, he will not be able to compile a correct history of this great struggle, without consulting the writings of Edmund Quincy, a member of one of the wealthiest, patriotic, and aristocratic families in New England: the prestige of his name is a pa.s.sport to all that the heart could wish.

Descended from a family, whose name is connected with all that was glorious in the great American Revolution, the son of one who has again and again represented his native State, in the National Congress, he too, like Wendell Phillips, threw away the pearl of political preferment, and devoted his distinguished talents to the cause of the Slave. Mr. Quincy is better known in this country as having filled the editorial chair of _The Liberator_, during the several visits of its Editor to Great Britain. As a speaker, he does not rank as high as some who are less known; as a writer, he has few equals. The "Annual Reports"

of the American and Ma.s.sachusetts Anti-Slavery Societies for the past fifteen or twenty years, have emanated from his pen. When posterity, in digging among the tombs of the friends of mankind, and of universal freedom, shall fail to find there the name of Edmund Quincy, it will be because the engraver failed to do his duty.

Were we sent out to find a man who should excel all others in collecting together new facts and anecdotes, and varnis.h.i.+ng up old ones so that they would appear new, and bringing them into a meeting and emptying out, good or bad, the whole contents of his sack, to the delight and admiration of the audience, we would unhesitatingly select James N. Buffum as the man. If Mr. Buffum is not a great speaker, he has what many accomplished orators have not--_i.e._, a n.o.ble and generous heart. If the fugitive slave, fresh from the cotton-field, should make his appearance in the town of Lynn, in Ma.s.sachusetts, and should need a night's lodging or refreshments, he need go no farther than the hospitable door of James N. Buffum.

Most men who inherit large fortunes, do little or nothing to benefit mankind. A few, however, spend their means in the best possible manner: one of the latter cla.s.s is Gerrit Smith. The name of this gentleman should have been brought forward among those who are first mentioned in this chapter. Some eight or ten years ago, Mr. Smith was the owner of large tracts of land, lying in twenty-nine counties in the State of New York, and came to the strange conclusion to give the most of it away.

Consequently, three thousand lots of land, containing from thirty to one hundred acres each, were given to coloured men residing in the State--the writer of this being one of the number.

Although universal suffrage is enjoyed by the whites in the State of New York, a property-qualification is imposed on coloured men; and this act of Mr. Smith's not only made three thousand men the owners of land, but created also three thousand voters. The ability to give, and the willingness to do so, is not by any means the greatest quality of this gentleman. As a public speaker, Mr. Smith has few equals; and certainly no man in his State has done more to forward the cause of Negro Emanc.i.p.ation than he.