Our Nig
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The few words Wilson includes from this parable are therefore highly loaded. They refer to Frado’s humbly downcast eyes and so to the fact that “he that humbleth himself shall be exalted” (Luke 18:14), unlike the “professor of religion,” Mrs. B., or the disciples in the verses that follow in Luke: “And they brought unto him also infants, that he would touch them; but when his disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God” (Luke 18:15–16). This surely relates to Wilson’s later angry outburst concerning the refusal of whites to associate with African Americans (see note 85). Few Christian readers of Our Nig at that time would have failed to grasp these ironies.
CHAPTER 9
62 Epigraph: This is taken from Henry Kirke White, “Written in the Prospect of Death,” in The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White (London: Bell and Daldy, 1830), 79. In this edition the lines read:
—We have now
But a small portion of what men call time
To hold communion; for even now the knife,
The separating knife, I feel divides
The tender bond that binds my soul to earth.
63 Mrs. B. was too weak: This is perhaps the passage in Our Nig that best illustrates Wilson’s artistic restraint, as Mrs. B.’s hypocritical recovery of strength is economically described: one minute she is “too weak” to help lift her invalid son, the next she is thrashing Frado so vigorously that the sound of the beating can be clearly heard. This incident invites sensationalization. Yet the text resolutely declines to do this, to telling effect. The concision and matter-of-fact tone that prevail enable the cruel silencing of Frado to be represented all the more damningly.
64 If she minded her mistress, and did what she commanded, it was all that was required of her: See Colossians 3:22: “Servants, obey in all things your masters.” Mrs. B.’s words, as Foreman and Pitts point out, echo those used by proslavery advocates justifying slavery on the basis of this scriptural reference.
65 a black dress and a pink ribbon!: A well-established convention in sentimental novels depicts an impecunious protagonist’s struggles to secure appropriateness of dress, with bonnets not infrequently being a case in point. See, for example, Mary’s odd bonnet in Mary Jane Holmes’s English Orphans (New York: Appleton, 1855), 64.
CHAPTER 10
66 Epigraph: We have been so far unable to identify “G. W. Cook” with any conviction. Avery long shot could be George W. Cook, a maritime doctor, who signed himself Geo. W. Cook in his book The Mariner’s Physician and Surgeon; or a Guide to the Homeopathic Treatment of Those Diseases to Which Seamen Are Liable, Comprising the Treatment of Syphilitic Diseases, & c. (New York: J. T. S. Smith, 1848). Given the topic of the three lines of verse quoted by Wilson, this attribution has a shred of plausibility. Cook might just have written hymns with a nautical reference.
67 bruised reed: The phrase “bruised reed” appears three times in the Bible. In 2 Kings, the image figures, perhaps most pertinently, in the story of the fall of the Kingdom of Judah (18:21): “Now, behold, thou trustest upon the staff of this bruised reed, even upon Egypt, on which if a man lean, it will go into his hand, and pierce it: so is Pharaoh king of Egypt unto all that trust on him.” The image appears also in Isaiah 42:1–3: “Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my Spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench: he shall bring forth judgment unto truth.” These lines are reworked in Matthew 12:14–20:
Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against him, how they might destroy him. But when Jesus knew it, he withdrew himself from thence: and great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all; And charged them that they should not make him known: That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Behold my servant, whom I have chosen; my beloved, in whom my soul is well pleased: I will put my Spirit upon him, and he shall show judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive, nor cry; neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory.
68 he resolved to start on the narrow way: See Matthew 7:14; “Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” The “celestial city” (heaven) to which the gate leads is likely to be a reference to John Bunyan’s endlessly reprinted Pilgrim’s Progress (1678; 1684).
69 her mistress was a professor of religion: A second ironic reference to Mrs. B. as a “professor of religion.” See note 45.
70 stood like one who feels the stirring of free and independent thoughts: The phrasing here alludes to the Declaration of Independence, but Frado’s declaration as she makes her stand by the woodpile is only “like” its predecessor, for Frado remains in servitude. See our introduction, this page-this page.
71 She got into the river again: The way Frado greets the news of Mary’s death is complex and contradictory: it refers back to the dunking Mary inflicted upon herself when trying to bully Frado (“She got into the river again”), but also shows how Frado has internalized the abusive references to blacks made by many whites (by calling Mary a “nigger,” her body now blackened by hell-fires, as Frado imagines). The river Jordan is the divide between life and death in Christian eschatology, and its crossing a “big” event for everyone of whatever color bound for heaven or hell in the final judgment. No wonder then that her claim to know of Mary’s hell-fire destination is unacceptable to the “pious” Aunt Abby.
72 her period of service: The term “period” here suggests a fixed term was involved, which would appear to confirm Frado’s status was similar to that of an indentured farm servant, hired out by a typical New England town’s overseers of the poor. However, see note 60.
CHAPTER 11
73 Epigraph: The prolific religious poet Charlotte Elliott (1789–1871) is the probable author of these lines. She commonly signed herself C. E. What militates against this attribution is the fact that the lines lack the consolatory note usually found in Elliott. However, Elliott makes frequent use of anaphora (in this case, “love” is the recurrent word). Elliott also recurrently wove references to Christ’s sacrifice into her verse (see, for example, her Hours of Sorrow, 1836). Thus this quotation is reminiscent of her work in both style and content. Foreman and Pitts suggest another possible source: Charlotte Elizabeth Brown[e] Tonna (1790–1846), who published under the name Charlotte Elizabeth, and whose Collected Works (which does not include this verse) were edited by Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1849. Charlotte Elliott remains the more likely attribution, not least because her large, scattered poetic output has not been fully collected together.
74 Jenny [Bellmont]: Probably a composite fictionalization of Prudence S. Carmen and Sophia Nagel. See introduction, this page.
75 Mrs. B. and Henry had a long interview: The appearance of the name “Henry” here is at first surprising since it has not appeared since chapter 5. It may be an error, surviving from a redrafting. If this reading is embraced, the name “Lewis” would be the one intended. However, there may be a reason for bringing “Henry” back into the story in order to remind the reader how pervasively this New England family’s motives are dominated by pecuniary considerations. See for example how earlier Mrs. Bellmont championed the wealthy Henry over George Means as a suitable partner for Jane (55–61). Finding Henry plotting with Mrs. B. at this point therefore makes good sense, suggesting as it does, once again, that Mrs. B. always puts economic considerations first. See note 60.
76 Her school-books were her constant companions: Harriet E. Wilson’s frequent references to Frado’s industrious reading habits as a release from her social isolation may help to explain how Wilson’s own literary background and abilities developed.
77 we mustn’t put ourselves in the way of temptation: An allusion to the Lord’s prayer: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” (Matthew 6:13).
78 how should she, black, feeble and poor, find any one to teach her: Wilson well understands that not to be white is to be black in a racist society, which is why she depicts the light-skinned mulatta, Frado, as black at this point.
CHAPTER 12
79 Epigraph: Slightly misquoting, this is taken from Ecclesiastes 1:9: “The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.” The verses continue: “Is there anything whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us. There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.” (Ecclesiastes 1:10–11). These are disturbing reflections, given the themes of this novel. However, Wilson’s misquote also replicates that to be found in Sarah Josepha [Buell] Hale’s poem “Nothing New” in her poetry collection Three Hours (Philadelphia: Carey and Hart, 1848), 106–8, which takes as its epigraph “ ‘There is nothing new under the sun.’—Solomon.” The final lines of this poem read: “… who would be a slave and dwell / For ever in a dungeon cell, / Counting the links that form his chain? / —Such is the soul that would retain / The fetters forged by Time, to bend / To this poor world, th’ immortal Mind” (this page). This poem is possibly the more likely source for Wilson’s epigraph.
80 there appeared often in some of our New England villages, professed fugitives: The phrase “professed fugitives” ushers in a series of disconcerting reflections in Wilson’s final chapter that successively complicate the Manichean representation of good abolitionists/bad slavers dominating contemporary debates concerning slavery. The word “professed” signals that in Northern society, which had by 1859 largely come round to favoring gradual, if not immediate abolition, a potential now existed for a new set of hypocrisies and oppressions to take root, as individuals exploited the growing antislavery consensus by trading on the money to be gained by joining this good cause. Such incidents of “professed” abolitionism were common enough by this time to be causing concern in abolitionist circles. Several of the following notes explore these reverberations.
81 brother Pro: A reference to proslavery whites; the use of the term “brother” in the phrase is a disturbing reminder of the prominent role that many in the white Christian church still played in legitimizing the continuation of slavery. At this time church members still commonly called one another “brother” or “sister.”
82 She removed to Singleton … and there was married: Harriet Adams, of Milford, married Thomas Wilson, of “Virginia,” on October 6, 1851, according to the records of the Milford, New Hampshire, town clerk. See our chronology, this page.
83 his illiterate harangues were humbugs for hungry abolitionists: Samuel, now Frado’s husband, stands revealed as one of the “professed fugitives” referred to on this page. Plainly, Samuel is exploiting the dominant ideological climate in the North. A particular example in contemporary history would be the factitious narrative of James Wilson, which was “so compelling, so gripping, so useful” that “abolitionists decided to publish it and distribute it widely, sending copies to every state and to every congressman” before it was exposed as a fake and retractions were broadcast (see Henry Louis Gates, Jr., “From Wheatley to Douglass: The Politics of Displacement,” in Frederick Douglass: New Literary and Historical Essays, ed. Eric J. Sundquist [New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990], 59).
84 Then followed the birth of her child: That Harriet E. Wilson had a son and that her “birthplace” was Milford is confirmed by George Mason Wilson’s death record. See our chronology, this page-this page.
85 Watched by kidnappers, maltreated by professed abolitionists: This mention of “kidnappers” is most probably a further reference to the consequences of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which effectively gave license to unscrupulous slave hunters to try to lay hands on any African Americans they encountered, under the pretence that they believed them to be runaways. See our introduction, this page-this page. African Americans seized in this way had then to be taken before a magistrate, who was provided with a financial incentive if he found the African American to be a runaway. The danger of kidnap that this law therefore generated is here twinned with another danger: that of being “maltreated by professed abolitionists” (Frado already having been maltreated by a “professor of religion”). Perhaps the most damning phrase in the novel, “professed abolitionists” charges that racism is a deep-rooted problem in the North, even among abolitionists. Thus George’s earlier claim that “thousands upon thousands favored the elevation of her race, disapproving of oppression in all its forms” (75) is substantially undercut by Wilson’s quite different verdict upon abolitionists and their hypocrisy. As Wilson puts it, they “didn’t want slaves at the South, nor niggers in their own houses, North” (this page).
86 Faugh! … to sit next one; awful!: This bitter outburst by the otherwise largely implied concealed third-person narrator paradoxically mimics the viciousness of some Northern abolitionists’ racism and refers to the widespread practice in Northern churches of arranging their congregations in pews segregated by color.
87 Traps slyly laid by the vicious to ensnare her: By now the reader understands that “traps” is another reference to the consequences of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, or a comment on the dangers created by Northern hypocrisy and racism, or a signal about how vulnerable to abuse impoverished black females could be, or (most probably) all three at the same time.
88 a friend … provided her with a valuable recipe: In the first of three testimonials at the end of the book, “Allida” describes this as “a recipe … for restoring gray hair to its former color” (this page). In and around Milford, Wilson was to sell also “hair regenerator,” more dubiously. See Wilson, Our Nig, ed. Foreman and Pitts, 2009, 85.
89 Jane … has the early love of Henry still, and has never regretted her exchange of lovers: It is most likely that Wilson makes a slip here, as was possibly the case earlier (see note 75). Jane clearly chose George, and rejected Henry in chapter 5. However, it is possible that what is intended is the fleeting implication that even the least materialistic members of the Bellmont family, like Jane, at the last can reconcile themselves to the dictates of New England business acumen. Simply put, the alliance of Henry Reed and Jane Bellmont remains a desirable outcome, unifying as it would the wealth of two Singleton families, so Jane may have at the least held open the possibility of a relationship with Henry, by still retaining Henry’s love, despite his earlier villainy. Henry’s second surprise reappearance here can thus just possibly be read as one further signal of Singleton’s one main arena of single-mindedness (for all its other double values): the pursuit of profit. The word “exchange” might be held to point to this reading.
90 Frado has passed from their memories, as Joseph from the butler’s: The reference is to Genesis 40:23, in which the Pharaoh’s butler fails to remember his promise to Joseph to “shew kindness … unto” Joseph (Genesis 40:14). The Pharaoh has imprisoned his butler and baker, in the jail where Joseph already languishes. Both men have dreams, which Joseph interprets. Joseph tells the butler that his dream means the Pharaoh will release him in three days, and then continues, “But think on me when it shall be well with thee, and shew kindness, I pray thee, unto me, and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring me out of this house: For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews: and here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon” (Genesis 40:14–15). However, “Yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him” (Genesis 40:23). This biblical quotation reminds the reader of the way that those in servitude cannot be forgotten, since their services are omnipresent, but that they can be overlooked—not recognized as human or deserving of re
ciprocity of feeling. It is striking that the majority of the relatively scattered direct biblical sources in the body of Wilson’s novel are either to the Old Testament or, when (more rarely) to the New Testament, in references steeped in irony. This lends weight to our contention that Frado remains uneasy about Christianity (see note 39 and our introduction, this page-this page), particularly since the appendix is, by contrast, replete with biblical allusions, much more often referring to the New Testament (including Frado’s own “letter” quoted by “Allida”). See also note 91. If Wilson did indeed become a spiritualist medium in later life, as seems probable, then it is possible that in 1859, when these words were most likely to have been written, she was already beginning to embrace spiritualism, which may help explain how it is Frado feels some spiritual affinity with the Bellmonts, despite their treatment of her. See our introduction, pages xlix-1 and passim.
APPENDIX
91 Appendix: The appendix consists of three testimonials. None of the authors of these “testimonials” can be confidently identified; the attributions made by Foreman and Pitts are speculative. It is possible that all three were written by Wilson herself, as Elizabeth Breau has suggested in her article “Identifying Satire: Our Nig,” 455–65. There are some stylistic congruencies between each of the testimonials and the preface, which is initialed as her own by Wilson. For example, “Allida” ’s phrase in the first testimonial, “he left … and embarked for sea” closely echoes Wilson’s earlier words “he left her … embarked at sea” (this page). See also notes 110 and 115. Similarly, if one reads “Allida” ’s testimonial without reference to the fact it is presented as such, the common ground it shares with sensational sentimental writing becomes obvious. Such an affinity does not increase our confidence that the testimonial is genuine. Nor does the fact this first testimonial is signed by “Allida.” It is very unusual to find testimonial writers using pseudonyms. In this instance, if Wilson is the author of these testimonials, she may have chosen the name “Allida” because it conveys how “Allida” is allied to Wilson’s cause. If “Allida” did exist, then she was most likely to be a worthy citizen of W Massachusetts, or (less probably) Milford. The other two testimonial writers are named Margaretta Thorn and C.D.S. Nothing is known about either of them, but it is quite likely that if they ever existed they were also citizens of Milford or its environs. C.D.S. might be an abbreviation of “Colored Indentured Servant,” since this was then a common legal abbreviation in parts of the United States. Wilson, however, quite probably appended these testimonials in order to gain authority and suggest authenticity—and both are generic conventions of slave narratives of the time. See also note 114.