Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348

The night was bright and starlight; the atmosphere perfectly clear, with the exception of a slight white mist that hung over the river. The hollow blows of the steam-engine seemed to be echoed in the far distance by the bellowing of the alligators; while the plaintive tones of the whip-poor-will were heard at intervals in the forest through which we were passing. There was no sign of life on the banks of the river; it was a desert; not a light to be seen, save that of millions of fireflies, which threw a magical kind of chiaroscuro over the trees and bushes. At times we passed so near the shore that the branches rattled and snapped against the side of the boat. Our motion was rapid. Twelve hours more, and I should be in my Tusculum. Just then the captain came up to me to say, that if I were disposed to retire to rest, the noisy smokers and drinkers had discontinued their revels, and I might now have some chance of sleeping. I had nothing better to do, so descended the stairs and installed myself in my berth.

When I rose the next morning, a breeze had sprung up, and we were proceeding merrily along under sail as well as steam. The first person I met was Monsieur Ménou, who wished me a bon-jour in, as I thought, a somewhat colder tone than he had hitherto used towards me, and looked me at the same time enquiringly in the face. It seemed as if he wished to read there whether his courtesy and kindness were likely to be requited by the same ungracious stiffness that I had shown him on the preceding day. Well, I will do my best to obliterate the bad impression I have apparently made. They are good people, these Creoles—not particularly bashful or discreet; but yet I like their forwardness and volatility better than the sly smartness of the Yankees, in spite of their ridiculous love of dancing, which even the first emigrants could not lay aside, amidst all the difficulties of their settlement in America. It must have been absurd enough to see them capering about, and dancing minuets and gavottes in blanket coats and moccasins.

Whilst I was talking to the Ménous, and doing my best to be amiable, the bell rang, the steam was let off, and we stopped to take in firing.

“Monsieur, voilà votre terre!” said the father pointing to the shore, upon which a large quantity of wood was stacked. I looked through the cabin window; the Creole was right. I had been chatting so diligently with the young ladies that the hours had flown like minutes, and it was already noon. During my absence, my overseer had established a depot of wood for the steamboats. So far so good. And yonder is the worthy Mr Bleaks   himself. The Creole seems inclined to accompany me to my house. I cannot hinder him certainly, but I sincerely hope he will not carry his politeness quite so far. Nothing I dread more than such a visit, when I have been for years away from house and home. A bachelor’s Lares and Penates are the most careless of all gods.

“Mr Bleaks,” said I, stepping up to the overseer, who, in his Guernsey shirt, calico inexpressibles, and straw hat, his hands in his pockets and a cigar in his mouth, was lounging about, and apparently troubling himself very little about his employer. “Mr Bleaks, will you be so good as to have the gig and my luggage brought on shore?”

“Ha! Mr Howard!” said the man, “is it you? Didn’t expect ye so soon.”

“I hope that, if unexpected, I am not unwelcome,” replied I, a little vexed at this specimen of genuine Pennsylvanian dryness.

“You ain’t come alone, are you?” continued Bleaks, examining me at the same time out of the corners of his eyes. “Thought you’d have brought us a dozen blackies. We want ’em bad enough.”

“Est-il permis, Monsieur?” now interposed the Creole, taking my hand, and pointing towards the house.

“And the steamer?” said I, in a tone as drawling as I could make it, and without moving a pace in the direction indicated.

“Oh! that will wait,” replied Ménou, smiling.

What could I do with such a persevering fellow? There was nothing for it but to walk up with him to the house, however unpleasant I found it so to do. And unpleasant to me it certainly was, in the then state of my habitation and domain. It was a melancholy sight—a perfect abomination of desolation. Every thing looked so ruined, decayed, and rotten, that I felt sick and disgusted at the prospect before me. I had not expected to find matters half so bad. Of the hedge round the garden only a few sticks were here and there standing; in the garden itself some unwholesome-looking pigs were rooting and grubbing. As to the house! Merciful heavens! Not a whole pane in the windows! all the frames stopped and crammed with old rags and bunches of Indian corn leaves! I could not expect groves of orange and citron trees—I had planted none; but this! no, it was really too bad. Every picture must have its shady side, but here there was no bright one; all was darkness and gloom. We did not meet a living creature as we walked up from the shore, winding our way amongst the prostrate and decaying tree-trunks that encumbered the ground. At last, near the house, we stumbled upon a trio of black little monsters, that were rolling in the mud with the dogs, half a shirt upon their bodies, and dirty as only the children of men possibly can be. The quadrupeds, for such they looked, jumped up on our approach, stared at us with their rolling eyes, and then scuttled away to hide themselves behind the house. Ha! Old Sybille! Is it you? She was standing before a caldron, suspended, gipsy-fashion, from a triangle of sticks—looking, for all the world, like a dingy parody of one of Macbeth’s witches. She, too, stared at us, but without moving. I must introduce myself, I suppose. Now she has recognised me, and comes towards us with her enormous spoon in her hand. I wonder that her shriveled old turkey’s neck—which cost me seventy-five dollars, by the by—has not got twisted before now. She runs up to me, screaming and crying for joy. There is one creature, then, glad to see me. It is amusing to observe the anxiety with which she looks at the caldron, and at three pans in which ham and dried buffalo are stewing and grizzling; she is evidently quite unable to decide whether she shall abandon me to my fate, or the fleshpots to theirs. She sets up her pipe and makes a most awful outcry, but nobody answers the call. “Et les chambres,” howls she, “et la maison, et tout, tout!” I could not make out what the deuce she would be at. She looked at my companion, evidently much embarrassed.

“Mais, mon Dieu!” croaked she, “pourrai-je seulement un moment? Tenez là, Massa!” she continued in an imploring tone, holding out the spoon to me, and making a movement   as if she were stirring something, and then again pointing to the house.

“Que diable as tu?” cried I, out of all patience at this unintelligible pantomime.

The rooms wanted airing and sweeping, she said; they were not fit to receive a stranger in. She only required a quarter of an hour to put every thing to rights; and mean time, if I would be so good, for the sake of the honour of the house, just to stir the soup, and keep an eye upon the ham and buffalo flesh.

Mentally consigning the old Guinea-fowl to the keeping of the infernal deities, I walked towards the house. My only consolation was, that probably my companion’s residence was not in a much better state than mine, if in so good a one; those Creoles above Alexandria still live half like Redskins. Monsieur Ménou did not appear at all astonished at my slovenly housekeeping. When we entered the parlour, we found, instead of sofas and chairs, a quantity of Mexican cotton-seed in heaps upon the floor; in one corner was a dirty tattered blanket, in another a washing-tub. The other rooms were in a still worse state: one of the negroes had taken up his quarters in my bed-chamber, from which the musquitto curtains had disappeared, having passed, probably, into the possession of the amiable Mrs Bleaks. I hastened to leave this scene of disorder, and walked out into the court, my indignation and disgust raised to the highest pitch.

“Mais tout cela est bien charmant!” exclaimed the Creole.

I looked at the man; he appeared in sober earnest, but I could not believe that he was so; and I shook my head, for I was in no jesting humour. The wearisome fellow again took my arm, and led me towards the huts of my negroes and the cotton-fields. The soil of the latter was of the richest and best description, and in spite of negligent cultivation, its natural fertility and fatness had caused the plants to spring up already nearly to the height of a man, though we were only in the month of June. The Creole looked around him with the air of a connoisseur, and in his turn shook his head. Just then, the bell on board the steamer rang out the signal for departure.

“Thank Heaven!” thought I.

“Monsieur,” said Ménou, “the plantation is très charmante, mais ce Mistère Bleak is nothing worth, and you—you are trop gentilhomme.”

I swallowed this equivocal compliment, nearly choking as I did so.

“Ecoutez,” continued my companion; “you shall go with me.”

“Go with you!” I repeated, in unbounded astonishment. “Is the man mad,” I thought, “to make me such a proposition within ten minutes after my return home?”

“Oui, oui, Monsieur, you shall go with me. I have some very important things to communicate to you.”

“Mais, Monsieur,” replied I, pretty stiffly, “I do not know what you can have to communicate to me. I am a good deal surprised at so strange a proposition”–

“From a stranger,” interrupted the Creole, smiling. “But I am serious, Mr Howard; you have come here without taking the necessary precautions. Your house is scarcely ready for your reception—the fever very dangerous—in short, you had better come with me.”

I looked at the man, astonished at his perseverance.

“Well,” said he, “yes or no?”

I stood hesitating and embarrassed.

“I accept your offer,” I exclaimed at last, scarcely knowing what I said, and starting off at a brisk pace in the direction of the steamer. Mr Bleaks looked on in astonishment. I bid him pay more attention to the plantation, and with that brief injunction was about to step on board, when my five-and-twenty negroes came howling from behind the house.

“Massa, Gor-a-mighty! Massa, Massa, stop with us!” cried the men.

“Massa, dear good Massa! Not go!—Mr Bleaks!” yelled the women.

I made sign to the captain to wait a moment.

“What do you want?” said I, a little moved.

One of the slaves stepped forward and bared his shoulders. Two others followed his example. They were hideously scarred and seamed by the whip.

I cast stern glance at Bleaks,   who grinned a cruel smile. It was a right fortunate thing for my honour and conscience that my poor negroes had thus appealed to me. In the thoughtlessness of my nature, I should have followed the Creole, without troubling myself in the least about the condition or treatment of the five-and-twenty human beings whom I had left in such evil hands. I excused myself hastily to Monsieur Ménou, promised an early visit, to hear whatever he might have to say to me, and bade him farewell. Without making me any answer, he hurried on board, whispered something to the captain, and disappeared down the cabin-stairs. I thought no more about him, and was walking towards the house, surrounded by my blacks, when I heard the splashing of the paddles, and the steamer resumed its voyage. At the same instant, somebody laid hold of my arm. I looked round—it was the Creole.

“This is insupportable!” thought I. “I wonder he did not bring his two daughters with him. That would have completed my annoyance.”

“You will want my assistance with that coquin,” said Ménou, quietly. “We will arrange every thing to-day; to-morrow my son will be here; and the day after you will go home with me.”

I said nothing. What would have been the use if I had? I was no longer my own master. This unaccountable Creole had evidently taken the direction of my affairs entirely into his own hands.

My poor negroes and negresses were crying and laughing for joy, and gazing at me with expectant looks. I bid then go to their huts; that I would have them called when I wanted them.

“D—n those blackies!” said Mr Bleaks as they walked away: “they want the whip; it’s too long since they’ve had it.”

Without replying to his remark, I told old Sybille to fetch Beppo and Mirza, and signed to the overseer to leave me. He showed no disposition to obey.

“This looks like an examination,” said he sneeringly, “and I shall take leave to be present at it.”

“None of your insolence, Mr Bleaks,” said I; “be so good as to take yourself off and wait my orders.”

“And none of your fine airs,” replied the Mister. “We’re in a free country, and you ain’t got a nigger afore ye.”

This was rather more than I could stomach.

“Mr Bleaks,” said I, “from this hour you are no longer in my employment. Your engagement is out on the 1st of July; you shall be paid up to that date.”

“I don’t set a foot over the threshold till I have received the amount of my salary and advances,” replied the man dryly.

“Bring me your account,” said I. My blood was beginning to boil at the fellow’s cool impudence.

Bleaks called to his wife, who presently came to the room door. They exchanged a few words, and she went away again. Meanwhile I opened my portmanteau, and ran my eye over some accounts, letters, and receipts. Before I had finished, Mrs Bleaks reappeared with the account-books, which she laid upon the table, and planting herself, with arms akimbo, in the middle of the room, seemed prepared to witness whatever passed. Her husband lounged into the next apartment and brought a couple of chairs, upon which he and his better half seated themselves. Truly, thought I, our much-cherished liberty and equality have sometimes their inconveniences and disagreeables.

“The 20th December, twenty-five bales cotton, four hogsheads tobacco in leaf, delivered to Mr Merton,” began the overseer; “the 24th January, twenty-five bales cotton and one hogshead tobacco-leaves.”

“Right,” said I.

“That was our whole crop,” said the man.

“A tolerable falling off from the former year,” I observed. “There were ninety-five bales and fifty hogsheads.”

“If it doesn’t please the gentleman, he ought to have stopped at home, and not gone wandering over half the world instead of minding his affairs,” retorted Mr Bleaks.

“And leaving us to rot in this fever hole, without money or any thing else,” added his moiety.

“And further?” said I to the man.

“That’s all. I’ve received from Mr Merton 600 dollars: 300 more are still comin’ to me.”

“Very good.”

“And moreover,” continued Bleaks, “for Indian corn, meal, and hams, and salt pork, and blankets, and cotton stuffs, I have laid out 400 dollars, making 700, and 4000 hedge-stakes for mending fences, makes a total of 740 dollars.”

I ran into the next room, found a pen and ink upon my dilapidated writing-table, wrote an order on my banker, and came back again. At any price I was resolved to get rid of this man.

“Allow me,” said the Creole, who had been a silent witness of all that had passed, but who now attempted to take the paper from my hand.

“Pardon me, sir,” said I, vexed at the man’s meddling; “on this occasion I wish to be my own counsellor and master.”

“Wait but one moment, and allow me to ask a few questions of your overseer,” continued the Creole, no way repulsed by my words or manner. “Will Mr Bleaks be so good as to read over his account once more?”

“Don’t know why I should. Mind your own business,” was the churlish answer.

“Then I will do it for you,” said Ménou. “The 20th December, twenty-five bales cotton, and four hogsheads tobacco-leaves, delivered to Mr Merton. Is it not so?”

Mr Bleaks made no answer.

“The 23d December, twenty bales cotton, and one hogshead tobacco, to Messrs Goring. Is it not so?”

The overseer cast a fierce but embarrassed look at the Creole. His wife changed colour.

“The 24th January, twenty-five bales and one hogshead to Mr Groves, and again, on the 10th February, twenty-two bales and seven hogsheads to Messrs Goring. Is not that the correct account?”

“D–d lies!” stammered the overseer.

“Which I shall soon prove to be truth,” said the other. “Mr Howard, you have a claim on this man for upwards of 2000 dollars, of which he has shamefully cheated you. I shall also be able to point out another fraud to the extent of 500 dollars.”

My faithless servants were pale with rage and confusion; I was struck dumb with surprise at this unexpected discovery, and at the way in which it was made.

“We must lose no time with these people,” whispered the Creole to me, “or they will be off before you can look round you. Send immediately to Justice T– for a warrant, and give the sheriff and constables a hint to be on the look-out. He cannot well escape if he goes down stream, but he will no doubt try to go up.”

I immediately took the needful measures, and sent off Bangor, one of my smartest negroes, to the justice of peace. “We must write immediately to Goring’s house,” said the Creole.

In an hour all was ready. At the end of that time the Montezuma steamer came smoking down the river. We got the captain to come on shore, told him briefly what had happened, gave him our letters, and were just accompanying him back to his vessel, when we saw a figure creep stealthily along behind the hedge and wood-stack, and go on board the steamer. It was Mr Bleaks, who had imagined that, under existing circumstances, a trip to New Orleans might be of service to his health. We found the worthy gentleman concealed amongst the crew, busily converting himself into a negro by the assistance of a handful of soot. His intended excursion was, of course, put an end to, and he was conveyed back to his dwelling. We took precautions against a second attempt at flight; and the following morning he was placed in safe custody of the authorities.

“But, my dear Monsieur Ménou,” said I to the Creole, as we sat after dinner discussing the second bottle of his Chambertin, of which the excellent man had not forgotten to bring a provision on shore with him—“whence comes it that you have shown me so much, and such undeserved sympathy and interest?”

“Ha, ha! You citizen aristocrats cannot understand that a man should take an interest in any one, or any thing, but himself,” replied Ménou, half laughing, half in earnest. “It is incomprehensible to your stiff, proud,   republican egotism, which makes you look down upon us Creoles, and upon all the rest of the world, as beings of an inferior order. We, on the other hand, take care of ourselves, but we also occasionally think of our neighbours. Your affairs are perfectly well known to me, and I hope you do not think I have made a bad use of my knowledge of them.”

I shook the worthy man heartily by the hand.

“We are not, in general, particularly fond of you northern gentlemen,” continued he; “but you form an exception. You have a good deal of our French étourderie in your blood, and a good deal also of our generosity.”

I could not help smiling at the naïve frankness with which this sketch of my character was placed before me.

“You have stopped too long away from your own house, and from people who would willingly be your friends; and if all that is said be true, you have no particular reason to congratulate yourself upon the result of your wanderings.”

I bit my lips. The allusion was pretty plainly to my misfortune at New York.

“Better as it is,” resumed the Creole, with a very slight and good-humoured smile. “A New York fine lady would be strangely out of her element on a Red River plantation. But to talk of something else. My son will be here to-morrow; your estate only wants attention, and a small capital of seven or eight thousand dollars, to become in a year or two as thriving a one as any in Louisiana. My son will put it all in order for you; and, meanwhile, you must come and stop a few months with me.”

“But, Monsieur Ménou”–

“No buts, Monsieur Howard! You have got the money, you must buy a score more negroes; we will pick out some good ones for you. To-morrow every thing shall be arranged.”

On the morrow came young Ménou, an active intelligent youth of twenty. The day was passed in visiting the plantation, and in a very few hours the young man had gained my full confidence. I recommended my interests and the negroes to his care; and the same evening his father and myself went on board the Ploughboy steamer, which was to convey us to the residence of the Ménous.