Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe

by Harriet Beecher Stowe

  “O, Uncle Tom! what funny things you are making, there!”

  “I’m trying to write to my poor old woman, Miss Eva, and my little chil’en,” said Tom, drawing the back of his hand over his eyes; “but, some how, I’m feard I shan’t make it out.”

  “I wish I could help you, Tom! I’ve learnt to write some. Last year I could make all the letters, but I’m afraid I’ve forgotten.”

  So Eva put her golden head close to his, and the two commenced a grave and anxious discussion, each one equally earnest, and about equally ignorant; and, with a deal of consulting and advising over every word, the composition began, as they both felt very sanguine, to look quite like writing.

  “Yes, Uncle Tom, it really begins to look beautiful,” said Eva, gazing delightedly on it. “How pleased your wife’ll be, and the poor little children! O, it’s a shame you ever had to go away from them! I mean to ask papa to let you go back, some time.”

  “Missis said that she would send down money for me, as soon as they could get it together,” said Tom. “I’m ‘spectin, she will. Young Mas’r George, he said he’d come for me; and he gave me this yer dollar as a sign;” and Tom drew from under his clothes the precious dollar.

  “O, he’ll certainly come, then!” said Eva. “I’m so glad!”

  “And I wanted to send a letter, you know, to let ’em know whar I was, and tell poor Chloe that I was well off, — cause she felt so drefful, poor soul!”

  “I say Tom!” said St. Clare’s voice, coming in the door at this moment.

  Tom and Eva both started.

  “What’s here?” said St. Clare, coming up and looking at the slate.

  “O, it’s Tom’s letter. I’m helping him to write it,” said Eva; “isn’t it nice?”

  “I wouldn’t discourage either of you,” said St. Clare, “but I rather think, Tom, you’d better get me to write your letter for you. I’ll do it, when I come home from my ride.”

  “It’s very important he should write,” said Eva, “because his mistress is going to send down money to redeem him, you know, papa; he told me they told him so.”

  St. Clare thought, in his heart, that this was probably only one of those things which good-natured owners say to their servants, to alleviate their horror of being sold, without any intention of fulfilling the expectation thus excited. But he did not make any audible comment upon it, — only ordered Tom to get the horses out for a ride.

  Tom’s letter was written in due form for him that evening, and safely lodged in the post-office.

  Miss Ophelia still persevered in her labors in the housekeeping line. It was universally agreed, among all the household, from Dinah down to the youngest urchin, that Miss Ophelia was decidedly “curis,” — a term by which a southern servant implies that his or her betters don’t exactly suit them.

  The higher circle in the family — to wit, Adolph, Jane and Rosa — agreed that she was no lady; ladies never keep working about as she did, — that she had no air at all; and they were surprised that she should be any relation of the St. Clares. Even Marie declared that it was absolutely fatiguing to see Cousin Ophelia always so busy. And, in fact, Miss Ophelia’s industry was so incessant as to lay some foundation for the complaint. She sewed and stitched away, from daylight till dark, with the energy of one who is pressed on by some immediate urgency; and then, when the light faded, and the work was folded away, with one turn out came the ever-ready knitting-work, and there she was again, going on as briskly as ever. It really was a labor to see her.

  CHAPTER XX

  Topsy

  One morning, while Miss Ophelia was busy in some of her domestic cares, St. Clare’s voice was heard, calling her at the foot of the stairs.

  “Come down here, Cousin, I’ve something to show you.”

  “What is it?” said Miss Ophelia, coming down, with her sewing in her hand.

  “I’ve made a purchase for your department, — see here,” said St. Clare; and, with the word, he pulled along a little negro girl, about eight or nine years of age.

  She was one of the blackest of her race; and her round shining eyes, glittering as glass beads, moved with quick and restless glances over everything in the room. Her mouth, half open with astonishment at the wonders of the new Mas’r’s parlor, displayed a white and brilliant set of teeth. Her woolly hair was braided in sundry little tails, which stuck out in every direction. The expression of her face was an odd mixture of shrewdness and cunning, over which was oddly drawn, like a kind of veil, an expression of the most doleful gravity and solemnity. She was dressed in a single filthy, ragged garment, made of bagging; and stood with her hands demurely folded before her. Altogether, there was something odd and goblin-like about her appearance, — something, as Miss Ophelia afterwards said, “so heathenish,” as to inspire that good lady with utter dismay; and turning to St. Clare, she said,

  “Augustine, what in the world have you brought that thing here for?”

  “For you to educate, to be sure, and train in the way she should go. I thought she was rather a funny specimen in the Jim Crow line. Here, Topsy,” he added, giving a whistle, as a man would to call the attention of a dog, “give us a song, now, and show us some of your dancing.”

  The black, glassy eyes glittered with a kind of wicked drollery, and the thing struck up, in a clear shrill voice, an odd negro melody, to which she kept time with her hands and feet, spinning round, clapping her hands, knocking her knees together, in a wild, fantastic sort of time, and producing in her throat all those odd guttural sounds which distinguish the native music of her race; and finally, turning a summerset or two, and giving a prolonged closing note, as odd and unearthly as that of a steam-whistle, she came suddenly down on the carpet, and stood with her hands folded, and a most sanctimonious expression of meekness and solemnity over her face, only broken by the cunning glances which she shot askance from the corners of her eyes.

  Miss Ophelia stood silent, perfectly paralyzed with amazement. St. Clare, like a mischievous fellow as he was, appeared to enjoy her astonishment; and, addressing the child again, said,

  “Topsy, this is your new mistress. I’m going to give you up to her; see now that you behave yourself.”

  “Yes, Mas’r,” said Topsy, with sanctimonious gravity, her wicked eyes twinkling as she spoke.

  “You’re going to be good, Topsy, you understand,” said St. Clare.

  “O yes, Mas’r,” said Topsy, with another twinkle, her hands still devoutly folded.

  “Now, Augustine, what upon earth is this for?” said Miss Ophelia. “Your house is so full of these little plagues, now, that a body can’t set down their foot without treading on ‘em. I get up in the morning, and find one asleep behind the door, and see one black head poking out from under the table, one lying on the door-mat, — and they are mopping and mowing and grinning between all the railings, and tumbling over the kitchen floor! What on earth did you want to bring this one for?”

  “For you to educate — didn’t I tell you? You’re always preaching about educating. I thought I would make you a present of a fresh-caught specimen, and let you try your hand on her, and bring her up in the way she should go.”

  “I don’t want her, I am sure; — I have more to do with ’em now than I want to.”

  “That’s you Christians, all over! — you’ll get up a society, and get some poor missionary to spend all his days among just such heathen. But let me see one of you that would take one into your house with you, and take the labor of their conversion on yourselves! No; when it comes to that, they are dirty and disagreeable, and it’s too much care, and so on.”

  “Augustine, you know I didn’t think of it in that light,” said Miss Ophelia, evidently softening. “Well, it might be a real missionary work,” said she, looking rather more favorably on the child.

  St. Clare had touched the right string. Miss Ophelia’s conscientiousness was ever on the alert. “But,” she added, “I really didn’t see the need of buying this one; — there are
enough now, in your house, to take all my time and skill.”

  “Well, then, Cousin,” said St. Clare, drawing her aside, “I ought to beg your pardon for my good-for-nothing speeches. You are so good, after all, that there’s no sense in them. Why, the fact is, this concern belonged to a couple of drunken creatures that keep a low restaurant that I have to pass by every day, and I was tired of hearing her screaming, and them beating and swearing at her. She looked bright and funny, too, as if something might be made of her; — so I bought her, and I’ll give her to you. Try, now, and give her a good orthodox New England bringing up, and see what it’ll make of her. You know I haven’t any gift that way; but I’d like you to try.”

  “Well, I’ll do what I can,” said Miss Ophelia; and she approached her new subject very much as a person might be supposed to approach a black spider, supposing them to have benevolent designs toward it.

  “She’s dreadfully dirty, and half naked,” she said.

  “Well, take her down stairs, and make some of them clean and clothe her up.”

  Miss Ophelia carried her to the kitchen regions.

  “Don’t see what Mas’r St. Clare wants of ‘nother nigger!” said Dinah, surveying the new arrival with no friendly air. “Won’t have her around under my feet, I know!”

  “Pah!” said Rosa and Jane, with supreme disgust; “let her keep out of our way! What in the world Mas’r wanted another of these low niggers for, I can’t see!”

  “You go long! No more nigger dan you be, Miss Rosa,” said Dinah, who felt this last remark a reflection on herself. “You seem to tink yourself white folks. You an’t nerry one, black nor white, I’d like to be one or turrer.”

  Miss Ophelia saw that there was nobody in the camp that would undertake to oversee the cleansing and dressing of the new arrival; and so she was forced to do it herself, with some very ungracious and reluctant assistance from Jane.

  It is not for ears polite to hear the particulars of the first toilet of a neglected, abused child. In fact, in this world, multitudes must live and die in a state that it would be too great a shock to the nerves of their fellow-mortals even to hear described. Miss Ophelia had a good, strong, practical deal of resolution; and she went through all the disgusting details with heroic thoroughness, though, it must be confessed, with no very gracious air, — for endurance was the utmost to which her principles could bring her. When she saw, on the back and shoulders of the child, great welts and calloused spots, ineffaceable marks of the system under which she had grown up thus far, her heart became pitiful within her.

  “See there!” said Jane, pointing to the marks, “don’t that show she’s a limb? We’ll have fine works with her, I reckon. I hate these nigger young uns! so disgusting! I wonder that Mas’r would buy her!”

  The “young un” alluded to heard all these comments with the subdued and doleful air which seemed habitual to her, only scanning, with a keen and furtive glance of her flickering eyes, the ornaments which Jane wore in her ears. When arrayed at last in a suit of decent and whole clothing, her hair cropped short to her head, Miss Ophelia, with some satisfaction, said she looked more Christian-like than she did, and in her own mind began to mature some plans for her instruction.

  Sitting down before her, she began to question her.

  “How old are you, Topsy?”

  “Dun no, Missis,” said the image, with a grin that showed all her teeth.

  “Don’t know how old you are? Didn’t anybody ever tell you? Who was your mother?”

  “Never had none!” said the child, with another grin.

  “Never had any mother? What do you mean? Where were you born?”

  “Never was born!” persisted Topsy, with another grin, that looked so goblin-like, that, if Miss Ophelia had been at all nervous, she might have fancied that she had got hold of some sooty gnome from the land of Diablerie; but Miss Ophelia was not nervous, but plain and business-like, and she said, with some sternness,

  “You mustn’t answer me in that way, child; I’m not playing with you. Tell me where you were born, and who your father and mother were.”

  “Never was born,” reiterated the creature, more emphatically; “never had no father nor mother, nor nothin’. I was raised by a speculator, with lots of others. Old Aunt Sue used to take car on us.”

  The child was evidently sincere, and Jane, breaking into a short laugh, said,

  “Laws, Missis, there’s heaps of ‘em. Speculators buys ’em up cheap, when they’s little, and gets ’em raised for market.”

  “How long have you lived with your master and mistress?”

  “Dun no, Missis.”

  “Is it a year, or more, or less?”

  “Dun no, Missis.”

  “Laws, Missis, those low negroes, — they can’t tell; they don’t know anything about time,” said Jane; “they don’t know what a year is; they don’t know their own ages.

  “Have you ever heard anything about God, Topsy?”

  The child looked bewildered, but grinned as usual.

  “Do you know who made you?”

  “Nobody, as I knows on,” said the child, with a short laugh.

  The idea appeared to amuse her considerably; for her eyes twinkled, and she added,

  “I spect I grow’d. Don’t think nobody never made me.”

  “Do you know how to sew?” said Miss Ophelia, who thought she would turn her inquiries to something more tangible.

  “No, Missis.”

  “What can you do? — what did you do for your master and mistress?”

  “Fetch water, and wash dishes, and rub knives, and wait on folks.”

  “Were they good to you?”

  “Spect they was,” said the child, scanning Miss Ophelia cunningly.

  Miss Ophelia rose from this encouraging colloquy; St. Clare was leaning over the back of her chair.

  “You find virgin soil there, Cousin; put in your own ideas, — you won’t find many to pull up.”

  Miss Ophelia’s ideas of education, like all her other ideas, were very set and definite; and of the kind that prevailed in New England a century ago, and which are still preserved in some very retired and unsophisticated parts, where there are no railroads. As nearly as could be expressed, they could be comprised in very few words: to teach them to mind when they were spoken to; to teach them the catechism, sewing, and reading; and to whip them if they told lies. And though, of course, in the flood of light that is now poured on education, these are left far away in the rear, yet it is an undisputed fact that our grandmothers raised some tolerably fair men and women under this regime, as many of us can remember and testify. At all events, Miss Ophelia knew of nothing else to do; and, therefore, applied her mind to her heathen with the best diligence she could command.

  The child was announced and considered in the family as Miss Ophelia’s girl; and, as she was looked upon with no gracious eye in the kitchen, Miss Ophelia resolved to confine her sphere of operation and instruction chiefly to her own chamber. With a self-sacrifice which some of our readers will appreciate, she resolved, instead of comfortably making her own bed, sweeping and dusting her own chamber, — which she had hitherto done, in utter scorn of all offers of help from the chambermaid of the establishment, — to condemn herself to the martyrdom of instructing Topsy to perform these operations, — ah, woe the day! Did any of our readers ever do the same, they will appreciate the amount of her self-sacrifice.

  Miss Ophelia began with Topsy by taking her into her chamber, the first morning, and solemnly commencing a course of instruction in the art and mystery of bed-making.

  Behold, then, Topsy, washed and shorn of all the little braided tails wherein her heart had delighted, arrayed in a clean gown, with well-starched apron, standing reverently before Miss Ophelia, with an expression of solemnity well befitting a funeral.

  “Now, Topsy, I’m going to show you just how my bed is to be made. I am very particular about my bed. You must learn exactly how to do it.”

  “Yes
, ma’am,” says Topsy, with a deep sigh, and a face of woful earnestness.

  “Now, Topsy, look here; — this is the hem of the sheet, — this is the right side of the sheet, and this is the wrong; — will you remember?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” says Topsy, with another sigh.

  “Well, now, the under sheet you must bring over the bolster, — so — and tuck it clear down under the mattress nice and smooth, — so, — do you see?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Topsy, with profound attention.

  “But the upper sheet,” said Miss Ophelia, “must be brought down in this way, and tucked under firm and smooth at the foot, — so, — the narrow hem at the foot.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Topsy, as before; — but we will add, what Miss Ophelia did not see, that, during the time when the good lady’s back was turned in the zeal of her manipulations, the young disciple had contrived to snatch a pair of gloves and a ribbon, which she had adroitly slipped into her sleeves, and stood with her hands dutifully folded, as before.

  “Now, Topsy, let’s see you do this,” said Miss Ophelia, pulling off the clothes, and seating herself.

  Topsy, with great gravity and adroitness, went through the exercise completely to Miss Ophelia’s satisfaction; smoothing the sheets, patting out every wrinkle, and exhibiting, through the whole process, a gravity and seriousness with which her instructress was greatly edified. By an unlucky slip, however, a fluttering fragment of the ribbon hung out of one of her sleeves, just as she was finishing, and caught Miss Ophelia’s attention. Instantly, she pounced upon it. “What’s this? You naughty, wicked child, — you’ve been stealing this!”

  The ribbon was pulled out of Topsy’s own sleeve, yet was she not in the least disconcerted; she only looked at it with an air of the most surprised and unconscious innocence.