Blake or The Huts of America

by Martin R. Delany

  Canst thou from thy great throne above

  Look down with an unpitying eye!

  See Africa’s sons and daughters toll,

  Day after day, year after year,

  Upon this blood bemoistened soil,

  And to their cries turn a deaf ear?

  Canst thou the white oppressor bless,

  With verdant hills and fruitful plains,

  Regardless of the slave’s distress–

  Unmindful of the blackman’s chains?

  How long, O Lord! ere thou wilt speak

  In thy Almighty thundering voice,

  To bid the oppressors fetters break,

  And Ethiopia’s sons rejoice?

  How long shall Slavery’s iron grip,

  And prejudices guilty hand,

  Send forth like bloodhounds from the slip

  Foul persecutions o’er the land?

  How long shall puny mortals dare

  To violate Thy just decree,

  And force Thy fellow men to wear

  The galling chains by land and sea?

  Hasten, Oh Lord! the glorious time

  When everywhere beneath the skies,

  From every land and every

  Peons to Liberty shall rise!

  When the bright sun of Liberty

  Shall shine o’er each despotic land;

  And all mankind from bondage free,

  Adore the wonders of thy hand.

  “Arm of the Lord, awake!” cried out Abyssa.

  “Amen!” replied Gondolier.

  “Ah ha! Dat’s de talk!” exclaimed an old domestic, whose head that moment had been thrust in from an adjoining room, where he sat in waiting on Montego.

  “I do not wish to be troublesome,” interrupted Madame Cordora, rising to her feet, “but I must here ask another explanation. Engaged as we all are in a common cause for liberty and equality, I would not have a difference to be made at the start. The poet in his prayer spoke of Ethiopia’s sons; are not some of us left out in the supplication, as I am sure, although identified together, we are not all Ethiopians.”

  “No,” rejoined Placido, “we are not; but necessarily implied in the term, and cannot exist without it.”

  “How so; I’m sure I cannot understand you!” replied the Madame with surprise.

  “I’ll explain,” said Placido. “I hold that colored persons, whatever the complexion, can only obtain an equality with whites by the descendants of Africa of unmixed blood.”

  “You surprise me, Señor Placido! I certainly cannot comprehend you. That is a positive admission that the mixed bloods are inferior to the pure-blooded descendants of Africa. 1 did not expect it to come to this, I think the acknowledgement of an equality of classes is sufficient for any purpose, without having to regard ourselves as inferiors–just what we are all contending against.”

  “I see you do not understand my position, Madame Cordora; let me make it plain to you,” further explained the poet. “The whites assert the natural inferiority of the African as a race: upon this they premise their objections, not only to the blacks, but all who have any affinity with them. You see this position taken by the high Court of America, which declares that persons having African blood in their veins have no rights that white men are bound to respect. Now how are the mixed bloods ever to rise? The thing is plain; it requires no explanation. The instant that an equality of the blacks with the whites is admitted, we being the descendants of the two, must be acknowledged the equals of both. Is not this clear?”

  “I certainly see it, Señor Placido, as I never saw it before, and you have given me a greater idea of the relation we sustain to the African race, than I ever had before; and the same certainly obtains in regard to Africa as a country, and her people as a nation or nations.”

  “Of course it does. Heretofore that country has been regarded as desolate–unadapted to useful cultivation or domestic animals, and consequently, the inhabitants savage, lazy, idle, and incapable of the higher civilization and only fit for bondmen, contributing nothing to the civilized world but that which is extorted from them as slaves. Instead of this, let us prove, not only that the African race is now the principal producer of the greater part of the luxuries of enlightened countries, as various fruits, rice, sugar, coffee, chocolate, cocoa, spices, and tobacco; but that in Africa their native land, they are among the most industrious people in the world, highly cultivating the lands, and that ere long they and their country must hold the balance of commercial power by supplying as they now do as foreign bondmen in strange lands, the greatest staple commodities in demand, as rice, coffee, sugar, and especially cotton, from their own native shores, the most extensive native territory, climate, soil, and greatest number of (almost the only natural producers) inhabitants in the universe; and that race and country will at once rise to the first magnitude of importance in the estimation of the greatest nations on earth, from their dependence upon them for the great staples from which is derived their national wealth.”

  “How surprising! What a different requisition this places us in to the whites. And are there really hopes of Africa becoming a great country, Colonel Montego?”

  “Nay, Madame, not only ‘hopes’ but undoubted probabilities, and that too at no distant day. The foundation of all great nationalities depends as a basis upon three elementary principles: first, territorial domain; second, population; third, staple commodities as a source of national wealth. The territory must be extensive, population numerous, and the staple such as the world requires and must have; and if the productions be not natural, they must be artificial. This will be seen in the case of Great Britain, which being but a small island, extended her dominions by conquest, thus adding an immense population, and taking advantage of her coal, established manufactories to supply the world with fabrics, in addition to her natural mineral productions, also made available by art. Africa, to the contrary, has five thousand miles of latitude, and four thousand longitude, with two hundred millions of homogenous population, all of whom readily assimilate themselves to civilized customs, and their continent, as shown before, producing the greatest staples of wealth to the world. Do you now understand it, Madame Cordora?”[36]

  “Indeed I do, Señor Placido; and although I thought I had no prejudices, I never before felt as proud of my black as I did of my white blood. I can readily see that the blacks compose an important element in the commercial and social relations of the world. Thank God for even this night’s demonstrations, if we do no more. How sensibly I feel, that a people never entertain proper opinions of themselves until they begin to act for themselves.”

  “This is true, Madame,” added Placido, “and I might call your attention further to the fact that by a comparison of the races, you may find the Africans in all parts of the world, readily and willingly mingling among and adopting all the usages of civilized life, attaining wherever practicable, every position in society, while those of the others, except the Caucasians, seldom acquire any but their own native usages.”

  “And these are really the people declared by American Laws, to ‘have no rights that a white is bound to respect’? Why have we so long submitted to them?” said the Madame with a burst of indignation, taking her seat amidst demonstrations of intense emotion.

  “It is indeed a sad reflection,” said Blake, “to contrast the difference between British and American jurisprudence. How sublime the spectacle of the colossal stature (compared with the puppet figure of the Judge of the American Supreme Court), of the Lord Chief Justice when standing up declaring to the effect: that by the force of British intelligence, the purity of their morals, the splendor of their magnanimity, and aegis of the Magna Charta, the moment the foot of a slave touched British soil, he stood erect, disenthralled in the dignity of a freeman, by the irresistable genius of universal emancipation.”[37]

  “Let us then,” said Placido, “make ourselves respected.”

  “So far as Cuba is concerned, we are here for that purpose,” replied Blake
.

  “And if we say it shall, it will be so!” added Madame Cordora.

  “Then it shall be so!” declared Blake.

  “Then,” concluded the Madame, “it will be so!” when the Council closed its grand and important session of several hours, to meet again at the residence of Carolus Blacus, father of Blake the leader of the great movement.

  CHAPTER 62

  Fearful Misgivings

  In the fullness of enjoyment at the Palace of the Queen’s nativity, the celebration continued the entire evening, only ceasing with the ushering in of a most delightful morning.

  It was not until sometime subsequent to supper in the servant’s hall during the fete, that the absence of a number of domestics employed about the palace was discovered, especially the head of the cuisine, Gofer Gondolier. This favorite servant on all previous occasions when others failed, was usually chosen to supply the place of some absent musician, in which his skill on the Spanish guitar, or African bango, especially the latter instrument, in which he had few, if any equals, was fully put to the test. He was a special favorite of the Lady Alcora, who preferred his execution to any other person. In consequence of the absence of nearly all of the amateur musicians, the presence of Gofer had been particularly desirable.

  As an outfit for the evening, an undress military suit from the wardrobe of the Captain General, selected by his own hands, was intended by the Countess to be presented to Gondolier.

  On commanding to the presence that evening the caterer of the palace, her ladyship was told that he was not to be found.

  “Are you certain of this?” asked the Countess.

  “I is, your ’adyship; case I looked-I hunted ’im good.”

  “Did you enquire of the butler?”

  “No ma’m you ladyship, I didn’t.”

  “Why, Hober, did you not do so?” enquired Lady Alcora.

  “Case twarnt no use.”

  “How do you know when you did not enquire?”

  “Case dare’s a big party at Madame Cordora’s in P——s street tonight, an’ Gofer’s gone at it.”

  “At Madame Cordora’s! Are you certain?”

  “Yes, ma’m, I is,” definitely replied he.

  “I see,” impatiently murmured the Countess to herself, having ordered the servant away, “this explains the whole matter. And even Gofer must be taken off to play for them! Indeed, things are fast changing, when not only are the blacks preferred to the whites, but even the civilities of the palace are slighted and its domestic offices neglected, and that too by a class wholly dependent upon and existing by the sufferance of the whites and clemency of the government. Tell me, Hober,” she further enquired as the servant re-entered the apartment, “did you hear Gofer say that he was going to the Cordora mansion?”

  “Yes ma’m you ladyship.”

  “What for; a party did he say?”

  “Yes ma’m you ladyship, but dat am not what ’im call ’im.”

  “What was it then?”

  “It am somethin like ‘sorry,’ or sich name like dat.”

  “Ah, soiree!” explained the lady.

  “Yes, you ladyship, dat am it.”

  “Ah, holding a domestic council, Lady Alcora?” playfully asked the Captain General, who had just entered.

  “No, your excellency; not holding a domestic council, though counseling with a domestic. But I very much fear, if all that’s told be true, that if not already so, ‘domestic councils’ may become a reality in the colony,” seriously replied the Countess.

  “Please explain, Lady Alcora, as I do not comprehend you!” anxiously asked the Count.

  “Why your lordship, it would seem that tonight, there is being held a great soiree at the fine mansion of Madame Cordora, the wealthy widow mulatress, where doubtless a grand scheme will be disclosed for a general rebellion of the Negroes.”

  “Can’t be possible!” exclaimed the Captain General. “Where in the world did you learn this?”

  “From our servant here, Hober.”

  “How could he know these things! I’m sure it would be very difficult for him to learn them,” replied the Count.

  “You are mistaken, Count Alcora, as he learned them among our servants, several of whom taking advantage of the fete tonight have gone there; among them our caterer, Gofer Gondolier, the chief of the cuisine,” explained the Countess.

  “Are you certain of this, Lady Alcora?”

  “I am.”

  “Probably he only went for a short time as caterer, or carried some little notion of his own preparation.”

  “No seh, ’e didn’; w’en ’e goed, ’e took wid ’im ’is big new carvin’ knife. I seed ’im and hearn ’im say ’e goin’ to use it on de wite folks, too,” interrupted Hober in explanation.

  “Say that over again, Hober; let the Count hear you!” said the Countess.

  “I distinctly understood him,” replied the Count; “but regard it as merely a freak of vanity to show himself by exhibiting among the Negroes evidence of his ingenuity by showing his invention; and an idle boast about using it on the whites would not be out of place to swell his importance.”

  “I am fearful that you attach too little importance to this matter, Count Alcora, and could I without committing myself to ridicule do so, I would like to reveal a singular dream to you.”

  “Well, my lady,” humorously said the Count, “as there are many revelations which I am incapable of comprehending, I shall make no objection to recording yours on the catalogue. Pray tell me, what is your revelation?”

  “It is the more singular, as I know of no external cause for it,” replied the Countess.

  “Do let me hear it quickly!” playfully continued the Count, “as you have excited my organ of wonder.”

  “I dreamed,” related the Countess, “of being in the interior of Africa surrounded entirely by Negroes, under the rule of a Negro prince, beset by the ambassadors of every enlightened nation, who brought him many presents of great value, whilst the envoy of Her Catholic Majesty sat quietly at the foot of the African Prince’s throne. I cannot get this impression from my mind, it seems so indelibly fixed.”

  “Having had the revelation,” with ludicrous seriousness said the Count, “now to a comprehensive interpretation of it. By your permission I will give it to you, Countess Alcora. It simply means that we shall have in Cuba several large cargoes of choice Negroes from Africa, out which your new plantation is to be stocked and when seated upon it in your new villa, very likely among them will be some Negro prince, catering to your orders. I take no fee for the interpretation.”

  “Count Alcora! I crave your clemency,” impatiently replied his lady, “when I say to you, that as the executive, you set too little estimate upon what seems to be important. I have had another presentiment: this is no dream but a wakeful reality.”

  “What is it my lady? I am anxious to hear.”

  “Why, that the Negroes of Cuba are maturing a scheme of general insurrection!”

  “How so? Why just now this conjecture, Countess Alcora? Will you let the idle vanity of an elated Negro cook frighten you out of your wits? I am really astonished at you, Countess. Tush!” rebuked the Count.

  “No, Count Alcora, it is not this but something antecedent from which I draw my conclusions,” replied the Countess.

  “Have you discovered anything? Pray do tell me if so, and let us be done with this unpleasant dreamy conversation,” said the Captain General.

  “I have, and I would that I could make the same influence on your mind concerning them, that the things which I saw made on mine.”

  “What were they, Lady Alcora?” now seriously enquired the Count. “I’m sure I shall fully appreciate any advice you may be pleased to communicate.”

  “I thank your excellency. I shall freely relate to you the facts. Today while at the amphitheatre exhibition, I observed on the part of the colored officers of the day–those in your confidence–a recognizance of the common Negroes and mulattoes in the pav
illion; and on the parade ground in the sports of the Negro chase, so soon as that part of the amusements were announced, I saw an immediate change not only in the countenances, but the conduct of all the Negroes and mulattoes present. And never before had I witnessed anything indicative of insubordination as their manner, when the chase was ordered and the hounds let loose in chase of the Negro prizes. Even Colonel Montego, one of your aids mounted on horseback near your side when the word was given, ‘let go the dogs!’ involuntarily started a pace forward, pressing his teeth upon his lip, and placing his hand on the hilt of his sword for a moment, looked a rage of vengeance at the whites.”

  “Do you tell me this,” exclaimed the Count with alarm.

  “This is not all, Count Alcora,” continued the lady. “Intensely watching with a steady countenance the chase of the dogs, when a Negro was caught and uttered a scream of agony; just as the shout of applause from the multitude rent the air-involuntarily drawing his sword partly from the scabbord, with a suppressed voice, though full in my hearing, exclaimed: ‘by the Holy Virgin, ’tis too bad!’ gritting his teeth till they chattered. Recollecting himself and adjusting his sword, turning to me he dissemblingly remarked–‘a well executed chase Lady Alcora; very well done! Fine animals, those dogs!’ But I had seen and heard all, and determined to advise you of it.”

  “Thank you, thank you, my dear Charlotte. I have found you in more than one instance a valuable adviser. I shall hereafter modify my actions by your counsels. Let us repair to the drawings rooms,” said the Captain General, supporting his lady on the left arm.

  Previous to returning to the drawing rooms, precaution was taken to dispatch a servant spy to the mansion of Madame Cordora, to reconnoiter the premises, and if possible discover the true state of affairs. On nearing he observed a universal stir and passing to and from the mansion into the beautiful enclosure and shrubbery. To facilitate his errand, the spy attempted an entrance by a narrow court back way, but found it obstructed by Negroes on guard some distance from the gate in among the shrubbery, who approaching, in a gruff manner, demanded his errand.

  “I is got a message from de Captin Genal an’ de Countess, for Madame Cordora, an’ I wants to see ’er,” replied the domestic.