The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell Part 45

An' you've no idee how much bother it saves; 10 We aint none riled by their frettin' an' frothin', We're _used_ to layin' the string on our slaves,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- Sez Mister Foote, 'I should like to shoot The holl gang, by the gret horn spoon!' sez he.

'Freedom's Keystone is Slavery, thet ther's no doubt on, It's sutthin' thet's--wha' d' ye call it?--divine,-- An' the slaves thet we ollers _make_ the most out on Air them north o' Mason an' Dixon's line,' 20 Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Fer all that,' sez Mangum, ''Twould be better to hang 'em An' so git red on 'em soon,' sez he.

'The ma.s.s ough' to labor an' we lay on soffies, Thet's the reason I want to spread Freedom's aree; It puts all the cunninest on us in office, An' reelises our Maker's orig'nal idee,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Thet's ez plain,' sez Ca.s.s, 30 'Ez thet some one's an a.s.s, It's ez clear ez the sun is at noon,' sez he.

'Now don't go to say I'm the friend of oppression, But keep all your spare breath fer coolin' your broth, Fer I ollers hev strove (at least thet's my impression) To make cussed free with the rights o' the North,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Yes,' sez Davis o' Miss., 'The perfection o' bliss Is in skinnin' thet same old c.o.o.n,' sez he. 40

'Slavery's a thing thet depends on complexion, It's G.o.d's law thet fetters on black skins don't chafe; Ef brains wuz to settle it (horrid reflection!) Wich of our onnable body 'd be safe?'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- Sez Mister Hannegan, Afore he began agin, 'Thet exception is quite oppertoon,' sez he.

'Gennle Ca.s.s, Sir, you needn't be twitchin' your collar, _Your_ merit's quite clear by the dut on your knees, 50 At the North we don't make no distinctions o' color; You can all take a lick at our shoes wen you please,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- Sez Mister Jarnagin, 'They wun't hev to larn agin, They all on 'em know the old toon,' sez he.

'The slavery question aint no ways bewilderin,'

North an' South hev one int'rest, it's plain to a glance; No'thern men, like us patriarchs, don't sell their childrin, But they _du_ sell themselves, ef they git a good chance,' 60 Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- Sez Atherton here, 'This is gittin' severe, I wish I could dive like a loon,' sez he.

'It'll break up the Union, this talk about freedom, An' your fact'ry gals (soon ez we split) 'll make head, An' gittin' some Miss chief or other to lead 'em, 'll go to work raisin' permiscoous Ned,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Yes, the North,' sez Colquitt, 70 'Ef we Southeners all quit, Would go down like a busted balloon,' sez he.

'Jest look wut is doin', wut annyky's brewin'

In the beautiful clime o' the olive an' vine, All the wise aristoxy's atumblin' to ruin, An' the sankylots drorin' an' drinkin' their wine,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Yes,' sez Johnson, 'in France They're beginnin' to dance Beelzebub's own rigadoon,' sez he. 80

'The South's safe enough, it don't feel a mite skeery, Our slaves in their darkness an' dut air tu blest Not to welcome with proud hallylugers the ery Wen our eagle kicks yourn from the naytional nest,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Oh,' sez Westcott o' Florida, 'Wut treason is horrider Then our priv'leges tryin' to proon?' sez he.

'It's 'coz they're so happy, thet, wen crazy sarpints Stick their nose in our bizness, we git so darned riled; 90 We think it's our dooty to give pooty sharp hints, Thet the last crumb of Edin on airth sha'n't be spiled,'

Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he;-- 'Ah,' sez Dixon H. Lewis, 'It perfectly true is Thet slavery's airth's grettest boon,' sez he.

[It was said of old time, that riches have wings; and, though this be not applicable in a literal strictness to the wealth of our patriarchal brethren of the South, yet it is clear that their possessions have legs, and an unaccountable propensity for using them in a northerly direction.

I marvel that the grand jury of Was.h.i.+ngton did not find a true bill against the North Star for aiding and abetting Drayton and Sayres. It would have been quite of a piece with the intelligence displayed by the South on other questions connected with slavery. I think that no s.h.i.+p of state was ever freighted with a more veritable Jonah than this same domestic inst.i.tution of ours. Mephistopheles himself could not feign so bitterly, so satirically sad a sight as this of three millions of human beings crushed beyond help or hope by this one mighty argument,--_Our fathers knew no better!_ Nevertheless, it is the unavoidable destiny of Jonahs to be cast overboard sooner or later. Or shall we try the experiment of hiding our Jonah in a safe place, that none may lay hands on him to make jetsam of him? Let us, then, with equal forethought and wisdom, lash ourselves to the anchor, and await, in pious confidence, the certain result. Perhaps our suspicious pa.s.senger is no Jonah after all, being black. For it is well known that a superintending Providence made a kind of sandwich of Ham and his descendants, to be devoured by the Caucasian race.

In G.o.d's name, let all, who hear nearer and nearer the hungry moan of the storm and the growl of the breakers, speak out! But, alas! we have no right to interfere. If a man pluck an apple of mine, he shall be in danger of the justice; but if he steal my brother, I must be silent. Who says this? Our Const.i.tution, consecrated by the callous consuetude of sixty years, and grasped in triumphant argument by the left hand of him whose right hand clutches the clotted slave-whip. Justice, venerable with the undethronable majesty of countless aeons, says,--SPEAK! The Past, wise with the sorrows and desolations of ages, from amid her shattered fanes and wolf-housing palaces, echoes,--SPEAK! Nature, through her thousand trumpets of freedom, her stars, her sunrises, her seas, her winds, her cataracts, her mountains blue with cloudy pines, blows jubilant encouragement, and cries,--SPEAK! From the soul's trembling abysses the still, small voice not vaguely murmurs,--SPEAK!

But, alas! the Const.i.tution and the Honorable Mr. Bagowind, M.C., say--BE DUMB!

It occurs to me to suggest, as a topic of inquiry in this connection, whether, on that momentous occasion when the goats and the sheep shall be parted, the Const.i.tution and the Honorable Mr. Bagowind, M.C., will be expected to take their places on the left as our hircine vicars.

Quid sum miser tunc dicturus?

Quem patronum rogaturus?

There is a point where toleration sinks into sheer baseness and poltroonery. The toleration of the worst leads us to look on what is barely better as good enough, and to wors.h.i.+p what is only moderately good. Woe to that man, or that nation, to whom mediocrity has become an ideal!

Has our experiment of self-government succeeded, if it barely manage to _rub and go?_ Here, now, is a piece of barbarism which Christ and the nineteenth century say shall cease, and which Messrs. Smith, Brown, and others say shall _not_ cease. I would by no means deny the eminent respectability of these gentlemen, but I confess, that, in such a wrestling match, I cannot help having my fears for them.

_Discite just.i.tiam, moniti, et non temnere divos_.

H.W.]

No. VI

THE PIOUS EDITOR'S CREED

[At the special instance of Mr. Biglow, I preface the following satire with an extract from a sermon preached during the past summer, from Ezekiel x.x.xiv. 2: 'Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel.' Since the Sabbath on which this discourse was delivered, the editor of the 'Jaalam Independent Blunderbuss' has unaccountably absented himself from our house of wors.h.i.+p.

'I know of no so responsible position as that of the public journalist.

The editor of our day bears the same relation to his time that the clerk bore to the age before the invention of printing. Indeed, the position which he holds is that which the clergyman should hold even now. But the clergyman chooses to walk off to the extreme edge of the world, and to throw such seed as he has clear over into that darkness which he calls the Next Life. As if _next_ did not mean _nearest_, and as if any life were nearer than that immediately present one which boils and eddies all around him at the caucus, the ratification meeting, and the polls! Who taught him to exhort men to prepare for eternity, as for some future era of which the present forms no integral part? The furrow which Time is even now turning runs through the Everlasting, and in that must he plant, or nowhere. Yet he would fain believe and teach that we are _going_ to have more of eternity than we have now. This _going_ of his is like that of the auctioneer, on which _gone_ follows before we have made up our minds to bid,--in which manner, not three months back, I lost an excellent copy of Chappelow on Job. So it has come to pa.s.s that the preacher, instead of being a living force, has faded into an emblematic figure at christenings, weddings, and funerals. Or, if he exercise any other function, it is as keeper and feeder of certain theologic dogmas, which, when occasion offers, he unkennels with a _staboy!_ "to bark and bite as 'tis their nature to," whence that reproach of _odium theologic.u.m_ has arisen.

'Meanwhile, see what a pulpit the editor mounts daily, sometimes with a congregation of fifty thousand within reach of his voice, and never so much as a nodder, even, among them! And from what a Bible can he choose his text,--a Bible which needs no translation, and which no priestcraft can shut and clasp from the laity,--the open volume of the world, upon which, with a pen of suns.h.i.+ne or destroying fire, the inspired Present is even now writing the annals of G.o.d! Methinks the editor who should understand his calling, and be equal thereto, would truly deserve that t.i.tle of [Greek: poimaen laon], which Homer bestows upon princes. He would be the Moses of our nineteenth century; and whereas the old Sinai, silent now, is but a common mountain stared at by the elegant tourist and crawled over by the hammering geologist, he must find his tables of the new law here among factories and cities in this Wilderness of Sin (Numbers x.x.xiii. 12) called Progress of Civilization, and be the captain of our Exodus into the Canaan of a truer social order.

'Nevertheless, our editor will not come so far within even the shadow of Sinai as Mahomet did, but chooses rather to construe Moses by Joe Smith.

He takes up the crook, not that the sheep may be fed, but that he may never want a warm woollen suit and a joint of mutton.

_Immemor, O, fidei, pecorumque oblite tuorum!_

For which reason I would derive the name _editor_ not so much from _edo_, to publish, as from _edo_, to eat, that being the peculiar profession to which he esteems himself called. He blows up the flames of political discord for no other occasion than that he may thereby handily boil his own pot. I believe there are two thousand of these mutton-loving shepherds in the United States, and of these, how many have even the dimmest perception of their immense power, and the duties consequent thereon? Here and there, haply, one. Nine hundred and ninety-nine labor to impress upon the people the great principles of _Tweedledum_, and other nine hundred and ninety-nine preach with equal earnestness the gospel according to _Tweedledee_.'--H.W.]

I du believe in Freedom's cause, Ez fur away ez Payris is; I love to see her stick her claws In them infarnal Phayrisees; It's wal enough agin a king To dror resolves an' triggers,-- But libbaty's a kind o' thing Thet don't agree with n.i.g.g.e.rs.

I du believe the people want A tax on teas an' coffees, 10 Thet nothin' aint extravygunt,-- Purvidin' I'm in office; For I hev loved my country sence My eye-teeth filled their sockets, An' Uncle Sam I reverence, Partic'larly his pockets.

I du believe in _any_ plan O' levyin' the texes, Ez long ez, like a lumberman, I git jest wut I axes; 20 I go free-trade thru thick an' thin, Because it kind o' rouses The folks to vote,--an' keeps us in Our quiet custom-houses.

I du believe it's wise an' good To sen' out furrin missions, Thet is, on sartin understood An' orthydox conditions;-- I mean nine thousan' dolls. per ann., Nine thousan' more fer outfit, 30 An' me to recommend a man The place 'ould jest about fit.

I du believe in special ways O' prayin' an' convartin'; The bread comes back in many days, An' b.u.t.tered, tu, fer sartin; I mean in preyin' till one busts On wut the party chooses, An' in convartin' public trusts To very privit uses. 40

I du believe hard coin the stuff Fer 'lectioneers to spout on; The people's ollers soft enough To make hard money out on; Dear Uncle Sam pervides fer his, An' gives a good-sized junk to all,-- I don't care _how_ hard money is, Ez long ez mine's paid punctooal.

I du believe with all my soul In the gret Press's freedom, 50 To pint the people to the goal An' in the traces lead 'em; Palsied the arm thet forges yokes At my fat contracts squintin', An' withered be the nose thet pokes Inter the gov'ment printin'!

I du believe thet I should give Wut's his'n unto Caesar, Fer it's by him I move an' live, Frum him my bread an' cheese air; 60 I du believe thet all o' me Doth bear his superscription,-- Will, conscience, honor, honesty, An' things o' thet description.

I du believe in prayer an' praise To him that hez the grantin'

O' jobs,--in every thin' thet pays, But most of all in CANTIN'; This doth my cup with marcies fill, This lays all thought o' sin to rest,-- 70 I _don't_ believe in princerple, But oh, I _du_ in interest.

I du believe in bein' this Or thet, ez it may happen One way or t'other hendiest is To ketch the people nappln'; It aint by princerples nor men My preudunt course is steadied,-- I scent wich pays the best, an' then Go into it baldheaded. 80

I du believe thet holdin' slaves Comes nat'ral to a Presidunt, Let 'lone the rowdedow it saves To hev a wal-broke precedunt: Fer any office, small or gret, I couldn't ax with no face, 'uthout I'd ben, thru dry an' wet, Th' unrizzest kind o' doughface.

I du believe wutever trash 'll keep the people in blindness,-- 90 Thet we the Mexicuns can thrash Right inter brotherly kindness, Thet bombsh.e.l.ls, grape, an' powder 'n' ball Air good-will's strongest magnets, Thet peace, to make it stick at all, Must be druv in with bagnets.

In short, I firmly du believe In Humbug generally, Fer it's a thing thet I perceive To hev a solid vally; 100 This heth my faithful shepherd ben, In pasturs sweet heth led me, An' this'll keep the people green To feed ez they hev fed me.