joker, sincere mourner; always an extremist, yielding to various excess; an April day, all smiles and tears; January and May met together; a many-sided fanatic; a universal enthusiast; a large-hearted sectarian; a hot-headed judge; a strong sketch full of color, with neutral tints nowhere, but fall of fiery lights and deep glooms; buoyant, irrepressible, fuming, rampant, with something of divine passion and electric fire; gentle, earnest, true; a wayward prodigal, loosely scattering abroad where he should bring together; great in things indifferent, and indifferent in many great ones; a man who would have been far greater, if he had been much less,—if he had been less catholic and more specific; immeasurably greater in his own personality than in any or all of his deeds either actual or possible;—such was the man Christopher North, a Hercules-Apollo, strong and immortally beautiful,—a man whom, with all his foibles, negligences, and ignorances, we stop to admire, and stay to love.

[Footnote A: One who met him many years ago in Edinburgh, at the conclusion of a lecture, tells us, as we write these closing sentences, of his splendid figure, as he saw him twirl an Irish shillalah and show off its wonderful properties as an instrument of fun at a fair.]

"CHOOSE YOU THIS DAY WHOM YE WILL SERVE."

  Yes, tyrants, you hate us, and fear while you hate
  The self-ruling, chain-breaking, throne-shaking State!
  The night-birds dread morning,—your instinct is true,—
  The day-star of Freedom brings midnight for you!

  Why plead with the deaf for the cause of mankind?
  The owl hoots at noon that the eagle is blind!
  "We ask not your reasons,—'t were wasting our time,—
  Our life is a menace, our welfare a crime!

  "We have battles to fight, we have foes to subdue,—
  Time waits not for us, and we wait not for you!
  The mower mows on, though the adder may writhe
  And the copper-head coil round the blade of his scythe!

  "No sides in this quarrel," your statesmen may urge,
  Of school-house and wages with slave-pen and scourge!—
  No sides in the quarrel! proclaim it as well
  To the angels that fight with the legions of hell!

  They kneel in God's temple, the North and the South,
  With blood on each weapon and prayers in each mouth.
  Whose cry shall be answered? Ye Heavens, attend
  The lords of the lash as their voices ascend!

  "O Lord, we are shaped in the image of Thee,—
  Smite down the base millions that claim to be free,
  And lend Thy strong arm to the soft-handed race
  Who eat not their bread in the sweat of their face!"

  So pleads the proud planter. What echoes are these?
  The bay of his bloodhound is borne on the breeze,
  And, lost in the shriek of his victim's despair,
  His voice dies unheard.—Hear the Puritan's prayer!

  "O Lord, that didst smother mankind in Thy flood,
  The sun is as sackcloth, the moon is as blood,
  The stars fall to earth as untimely are cast
  The figs from the fig-tree that shakes in the blast!

  "All nations, all tribes in whose nostrils is breath,
  Stand gazing at Sin as she travails with Death!
  Lord, strangle the monster that struggles to birth,
  Or mock us no more with Thy 'Kingdom on Earth'!

  "If Ammon and Moab must reign in the land
  Thou gavest Thine Israel, fresh from Thy hand,
  Call Baäl and Ashtaroth out of their graves
  To be the new gods for the empire of slaves!"

  Whose God will ye serve, O ye rulers of men?
  Will ye build you new shrines in the slave-breeder's den?
  Or bow with the children of light, as they call
  On the Judge of the Earth and the Father of All?

  Choose wisely, choose quickly, for time moves apace,—
  Each day is an age in the life of our race!
  Lord, lead them in love, ere they hasten in fear
  From the fast-rising flood that shall girdle the sphere!

* * * * *

THE HORRORS OF SAN DOMINGO.[A]

[Footnote A: See Numbers LVI., LVIII., and LIX. of this magazine.]

CHAPTER V.

INTRODUCTION OF SLAVERY—THE SLAVE-TRADE—AFRICAN TRIBES—THE CODE NOIR—THE MULATTOES.

It will be necessary for the present to omit the story of the settlement and growth of the French Colony, and of the pernicious commercial restrictions which swelled the unhappy heritage of the island, in order that we may reach, in this and a succeeding article, the great points of interest connected with the Negro, his relation to the Colony and complicity with its final overthrow.

The next task essential to our plan is to trace the entrance of Negro Slavery into the French part of the island, to describe the victims, and the legislation which their case inspired.

The first French Company which undertook a regular trade with the west coast of Africa was an association of merchants of Dieppe, without authority or privileges. They settled a little island in the Senegal, which was called St. Louis. This property soon passed into the hands of a more formal association of Rouen merchants, who carried on the trade till 1664, the date of the establishment of the West-India Company, to which they were obliged to sell their privileges for one hundred and fifty thousand livres. This great Company managed its African business so badly, that it was withdrawn from their hands in 1673, and made over as a special interest to a Senegal Company. The trade, in palm-oil, ivory, etc., was principally with France, and negro slaves for the colonies do not yet appear in numbers to attract attention.[B] But in 1679 this Company engaged with the Crown to deliver yearly, for a term of eight years, two thousand negroes, to be distributed among the French Antilles. This displaced a previous engagement, made in 1675, for the delivery of eight hundred negroes. The Company had also to furnish as many negroes for the galleys at Marseilles as His Majesty should find convenient. And the Crown offered a bounty of thirteen livres per head for every negro, to be paid in "pieces of India."

[Footnote B: Du Tertre, the missionary historian of the Antilles, proudly says, previously to this date, that the opinion of France in favor of personal liberty still shielded a French deck from the traffic: "Selon les lois de la France, qui abhorre la servitude sur toutes les nations du monde, et ou tous les esclaves recouvrent heureusement la liberté perdue, sitost qu'ils y abordent, et qu'ils en touchent la terre."]

This is a famous phrase in the early annals of the slave-trade. Reckoning by "pieces" was customary in the transaction of business upon the coast of Africa. Merchandise, provisions, and presents to the native princes had their value thus expressed, as well as slaves. If the negro merchant asked ten pieces for a slave, the European trader offered his wares divided into ten portions, each portion being regarded as a "piece," without counting the parts which made it up. Thus, ten coarse blankets made one piece, a musket one piece, a keg of powder weighing ten pounds was one, a piece of East-India blue calico four pieces, ten copper kettles one piece, one piece of chintz two pieces, which made the ten for which the slave was exchangeable: and at length he became commercially known as a