Outalissi; a Tale of Dutch Guiana

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Chapter XI. The Rescue.

O, God! the Christians say that thine is vengeance.
Why, if it is so, sleeps thine arm parental
In a scene like this? - -
- -There is another world!
     Old Play.

I Must now request my readers to return with me for a short time to Mr. Cotton's plantation at Anne's Grove. On the arrest and removal of the proprietor, Outalissi and the rest of the negroes were left under the joint charge of Mr. Schwartz and Mr. Hogshead, a paradoxical arrangement; - the impressions from every word and action of the one directly colliding with the impressions from every word and action of the other, explosion ^* must be the result. If Christianity is true, the planters will be the authors and just victims of their infidel and obstinate interception of the sun of righteousness from the souls of their dependants; if

* See note F.

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Christianity is only a cunningly devised fable, its propagators are justly responsible for all consequences; but in the meantime, the pull-baker pull-devil sort of effect, to which the missionary efforts are exposed here, is at once destructive of the planters' authority, and derogatory of that of Christianity, its only and best substitute. Religion, in the present day, in order to afford any protection to the security and welfare of society by its moral controul over its members, ‘must not,’ as Burke says, ‘be banished to obscure corners, like something we are ashamed to show, but must exalt her mitred front in courts and parliaments; she must mix throughout the whole mass of life, and blend with all classes in society.’ On the contrary, what is the case in Surinam?

‘Come to church and save your souls,’ said Mr. Schwartz.

‘Souls, souls, d--n your souls - grow tobacco,’^* said Mr. Hogshead, ‘or woe betide your bodies.’

‘Renounce your lusts,’ said Mr. Schwartz.

‘O yes! cursed hypocrite, that you may have no rivalry in the indulgence of yours,’ said Mr. Hogshead.

‘Seek the Lord whilst he may be found of you,’ said Mr. Schwartz.

* See note G

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‘You may seek long enough before you'll find him here,’ said Mr. Hogshead.

‘Obey God rather than man,’ said Mr. Schwartz.

‘Fulfil your tasks, your daily tasks, or I'll soon show you that I am to be obey'd first here,’ said Mr. Hogshead.

‘O! spare her! spare her!’ said Mr. Schwartz to the director as he was superintending the flagellation of a pregnant negress; ‘remember that with the same measure that you mete to others it shall be meted unto you!’

‘Give her two dozen more for the parson's interference,’ said Mr. Hogshead.

‘As you would that men should do unto you, do you even so unto them,’ said Mr. Schwartz.

‘Kiss my --,’ said that horrible compound of lust and cruelty, Mr. Hogshead. ^*

On the apprehension and removal of Mr. Cotton and his daughter to the colonial capital, little Charles Cotton was left at Anne's Grove for the sake of his health, the temperature of the atmosphere on the coast being three or four degrees lower than at Paramaribo, and the bracing effect of the sea air making it to most Creoles, and in-

* See note H.

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deed to many Europeans, both an agreeable and salubrious climate. One of this child's attendants was a little girl of about fifteen, of the name of Charlotte Venture. She belonged to a tribe of negroes rather rare in Surinam, but not at all uncommon, as I have been informed, in the neighbouring colony of Demarara, distinguished for the symmetry of their forms, and the almost Grecian cast of their features, instead of the squab nose and thick lips which it is difficult for European prejudice to dissociate from a negro countenance. She had a fine strait nose, small mouth, thin lips, teeth that seemed to vie with the eyes in giving light and life to the expression of the whole countenance, a small slightly-prominent laughing chin in quick and intimate unison with the lines of the mouth; - eyes of a chastised intelligence and beaming benevolence, almost as much beyond the comparatively inanimate expression of a frigid zone beauty, in warmth, vivacity, and penetration, as her own never-sullen summer-lavishing sun beyond his captious wintry rival, set off too by long silken raven lashes; and corresponding hair (not wool), and a fine glossy jet black skin that looked like polished marble.

It was not likely that such a girl should escape the lascivious observation of Mr. Hogshead; but

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she was a remarkably good girl, well instructed in Christianity, and a great favourite of her young mistress, and for a long time, therefore, he was compelled to confine his persecution to his eyes. But poor Charlotte, from having frequently heard her mistress advert to it with expressions of sympathy, imbibed a very natural interest in the history of Outalissi, and undertook with great alacrity a commission from her on leaving home (in which the latter possibly had some speculation of temporal as well as spiritual benevolence in view, for which I have no doubt the saints in heaven will pardon her; although I am by no means equally confident of pardon from either their friends or enemies on earth,) to endeavour, if she had any opportunity, to remove some of the unhappy captive's prejudices against Christianity, and convince him that those from whose conduct he judged of the doctrines of Christianity were the opprobrium and disgrace of their profession, and no more really deserved the name of Christians from the accidental circumstance of their education in a Christian country, than a progeny of the wolves and tigers of his native forests would deserve that name, from a mere local removal. Charlotte, however, did not make much progress in the conversion of her royal pupil.

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‘She convinced him,’ he said, ‘that a soi-disant^* Christian might be both good and lovely, but he could not tell how much of her goodness to ascribe to Christianity, and how much to the kindly elements of her own natural disposition; that the proportion of good nominal Christians being so very small, was rather a presumption of their being good in spite of Christian influence than in subjection to it.’

‘But,’ said Charlotte, ‘if what your own heart confesses to be good in any body corresponds exactly with the directions of Christ, you must in consistency confess those directions to be good also.’

‘What are those directions?’ said Outalissi.

‘Mr. Schwartz will explain that to you,’ said Charlotte, ‘if you will listen to him with attention, which therefore Missy begs you to do,’ and which finally Charlotte obtained a promise from him that he would.

In the meantime, if Outalissi did not derive religious conviction from Charlotte's arguments, he imbibed the sentiment that ranks the next in its elevating and refining influence upon every human

* I have already said that I have taken the liberty occasionally of assisting the perspicuity of Outalissi's language a little, but never of altering the sentiment. - Note by the Author.

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bosom - a sentiment to which, when it comprises the association of mental purity as well as bodily worshipfulness (to use an expression of the Liturgy) in its object, and without both of which it is not the complete thing that God and nature intended it should be, philosophy itself must ascribe a very high degree of respectability, viz. a sentiment of strong personal affection for his instructress. Not that his manly principles ever betrayed such feelings to Charlotte either by look or gesture; ‘for never,’ said he to himself, ‘shall Outalissi be the father of a race of slaves;’ and his actual circumstances precluded all hope of any honourable result to such a passion; which, however, notwithstanding his perception of its utter hopelessness, and his conscientious concealment of it in consequence, did somehow or another (as perhaps had been anticipated by his mistress) considerably soothe his irritation, and gradually beguile him of his impatience of the indignity of his condition. Neither did Charlotte, who knew well from the frequent experience of her mistress's benevolence, that she could have handsomely and virtuously provided for them both, and probably had some such intention, remain long insensible to the very near connexion between pity and love, and instead of always waiting for an opportunity she would

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sometimes make one by walking with her little charge in the ground where Outalissi was employed (although frequently forbidden by Mr. Hogshead) for the pleasure of engaging him in conversation.

‘How often must I tell you not to interrupt that sulky fellow in his work,’ said Mr. Hogshead to her as he overtook her returning from one of these debates.

‘Sir,’ said Charlotte whose heart beat with apprehension at the approach of the white monster, ‘I was only trying as my mistress directed me to persuade him to become a Christian, and attend Mr. Schwartz, because my mistress says that his instruction in Christianity is the only compensation she can make him for the terrible injustice and injuries that have been done him.’

‘So your mistress means to compensate him with Christianity, and you with something better, eh! Charlotte! but come,’ said the director chucking her under the chin, ‘don't be such a fool as to throw yourself away upon a slave when you know very well that I have long designed you for myself, and I am not much accustomed to disappointment in the accomplishment of my purposes.’

‘I would rather remain as I am for ever, sir,’

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said Charlotte, ‘than be so ungrateful to my misstress as to dispose of myself without her consent, and I am sure she would not hear of my compliance with your proposals.’

‘Your mistress and you too are a couple of hypocritical puritans, I must have you without her consent then, that's all my dear,’ said the hideous reptile with a characteristic grin that made poor Charlotte tremble from head to foot, at the same time putting his arm round her waist. ‘You'd better consent to live with me quietly,’ continued he, ‘or if you compel me to have recourse to violence, I dare say I shall find an opportunity of taking some of that disdain out of you before you are again within the reach of your mistress's protection.’

‘Oh!’ said Charlotte, ‘pray release me sir, and let me speak to Mr. Schwartz.’

‘No! no! curse Mr. Schwartz,’ said Mr. Hogshead, ‘there's no time like the present after all, promise your consent now, or you shall not stir till I have indulged my desire.’

‘No! sir, I would sooner die,’ said Charlotte.

‘Then take the consequences of your own obstinacy,’ said the white savage throwing her upon the ground, but a scream from little Charles

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Cotton brought up Outalissi, the reach and quickness of whose eye and ear were about three times those of a European, and who had been watching every word and motion through some intervening foliage, and in a few seconds Mr. Hogshead felt himself in Outalissi's powerful grasp, as feeble as a child in the hands of a giant. ‘Now, sir,’ said Outalissi, ‘if you call for assistance, or utter a single word till that poor daughter of my unhappy race has reached the house, it shall be the last you will ever utter, for I will put my foot upon your neck till I press the breath out of your body, and you know it will not be in the feeble strength of your diseased and bloated carcase to disengage yourself, although all your limbs are loose.’ Mr. Hogshead knew too well the manly temper of the nerve that bound him, to doubt the instant execution of this threat if he betrayed the least resistance. His victim for the present therefore was soon out of his power, and when Outalissi saw that she had reached the house, ‘if now I let you go,’ said he to Mr. Hogshead, ‘before to-morrow my back will bear bloody evidence of your Christian gratitude, good faith, and promise keeping. Here we are at the edge of the sea, without the possibility of any detection, for there is no eye but that of the great spirit over us, and to rid the

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world of such a walking lazar house, such a pest of moral putridity as you, must be an agreeable service to Him, why should I not now discharge a part of my deep, deep debt of vengeance by giving you up to the mercy of that shark there, whose most Christian countenance of cold, watery, pitiless eyes, and blood guzzling snout, just shows itself above the gentle ripple of the shallowing waves, as if sent especially for the occasion.’

‘O, spare me! spare me! noble Outalissi,’ said the abject paltry tyrant, falling on his knees, and embracing those of him whose manly form in every line displayed the stamp of natural superiority, ‘and I will swear by my God, or by your God, or by any God, to be eternally grateful to you: and, far from punishing, to reward you in every way I can, and be of all the service to you in my power. O! remember, good Outalissi! that although the Christians' conduct to you has been outrageously wicked, their ill treatment is only co-extensive with your life, but if you now take mine, you will consign me to eternal damnation. O! give me some time to repent at least, good Outalissi!’

‘There's sense in that,’ said Outalissi, ‘I confess; for I do believe there's something in my

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breast which tells me that nothing but damnation in the next world can await such as you, Christian or heathen; but now I release you, don't suppose that you deceive me - you will neither repent, or forbear your vengeance; but still,’ said he thoughtfully, ‘for once at least I will show that I can practise what the Christians only preach about, viz. the duty of returning good for evil, and leaving vengeance to Him whose all-including eye can best dispense it. - Go.’

It may be easily supposed that Outalissi got nothing for his magnanimity but a most tremendous flogging that same evening, and poor Charlotte was so frightened that she prevailed on Mr. Schwartz to write to her mistress, acquainting her with what had happened, and intreating permission that she should come to her in town, which no doubt, under such circumstances, would have been arranged by her mistress, if she had not requested it; but before an answer could be received to Mr. Schwartz's letter an unfortunate accident threw her still more completely into the director's power. She was thanking Outalissi one morning for his generous rescue, and condoling with him on his punishment, and the misery of being subject to the despotism of such a monster, and saying,

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‘that she hoped on her mistress being acquainted with his conduct that she would prevail on her father to discharge him.’

‘O! they're all alike,’ said Outalissi. ‘As for me his lashes cannot reach my soul, and therefore on my account, Charlotte, don't you inflame either his vengeance or odious passion against yourself. I thank both you and that sweet Christian flower, your young mistress, for the interest you take in my misfortunes; and if poor Outalissi's life, which is all that is left him, can at any time be of service to either of you, I hope at least to be one evidence, by the cheerfulness with which I should expend it, that our dark bosoms, Charlotte, can harbour gratitude as well as vengeance.’

‘You have already shown that to me,’ said Charlotte.

‘O! that,’ said Outalissi, ‘was nothing more than I would have done for any other in similar danger; but you must not, Charlotte, come so much within the reach of this white atheist, for I may not be always near you. Keep near the house: he is already chafed to fury by your escape from him, and has forbidden the slaves to attend Mr. Schwartz any more of a Sunday, and punished several severely for disobeying him, on pretence that he, Mr. Schwartz, has taught you to deride

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his authority; but they declare they will persist at all hazards, and have invited me to join them, which I think I shall, for by the same light, and exactly in the same proportion that Mr. Schwartz shows them the duty of patience, gentleness, goodness, truth, temperance, justice, mercy, or in one word, which implies all goodness, charity towards each other, and the deepest feeling of self-abasement and humility towards God, he shows them also in colours deriving from the contrast a strength and depth of which many of them before had but very faint, inadequate, and undefined impressions, the full extent and number of the burning, burning wrongs which they have received from man, and in that light,’ said Outalissi, ‘although I am not yet a Christian, I see a hope of vengeance.’

‘What do you mean?’ said Charlotte. ‘O, do not listen to any scheme of violence, much less suggest one; believe me, the white people are both too strong and too cunning to make any effectual resistance of them possible; for, even, if, by surprise, you could master them for a moment, they have at all times indefinite supplies of force at their command from their countries across the sea.’

Before Outalissi could reply to the last observation, Charlotte screamed violently, and fainted, on

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seeing little Charles Cotton, who had been playing about, only a hundred yards from her, at Outalissi's back, in the mouth of a tremendous tiger, that by a sudden spring from the bush had caught him by the loose part of his trowsers, and throwing him diagonally across his back,^* was slyly slinking off with him. What was to be done? Outalissi had no fire-arms, and merely a short coarse cutlass, with which he had been cutting grass. To pursue the tiger, even if he could have overtaken him, and the child was not already dead, would infallibly occasion his being torn to pieces by increasing the speed of the animal's retreat through the bushes. There was but one chance, which would have occurred to no one that had not the heart of a lion, and been accustomed from his boyhood almost to rival one in exertions of muscular elasticity and power, and prepared if necessary personally to encounter one. It was to rush through the bush, which would conceal him from the tiger, and throw himself directly across his path, a near point of which, by the help of his cutlass, he was enabled to reach before the formidable felon; - where, as he expected, having laid himself down at his full length, and absolutely without motion, as if he were dead, in less than a minute the tiger trotted

* See Note I.

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slowly over him with his prey in his mouth; but without betraying the slightest inclination to run any risk of losing that, by examining another, apparently already dead. Accordingly, when Outalissi, laying across the length of the tiger, saw himself between his legs, by a violent spring at the exact moment, when it could alone have availed, he threw his body with tremendous force across the tiger's back, which compelled him to drop his prey, and brought him to the ground, when kneeling across his neck and shoulders, Outalissi soon dispatched him with his cutlass, but not without some severe lacerations from his hind claws.

Charles Cotton did not appear to be the least hurt, as the animal had merely held him by his clothes; he had probably fainted immediately after his seizure, and just began to awake from his change of position and cessation of movement, as, when Outalissi took him up, he looked wild and staring, and scarcely seemed to know what had happened to him; but shortly afterwards he fell into fits, and for a long time he never seemed easy out of his preserver's arms.

When Outalissi returned to Charlotte (who had but just begun to revive, for the whole transaction scarcely occupied ten minutes), himself all covered

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and streaming with blood, and her young master in his arms, looking as if he had been snatched out of a coffin, she fell back again into a state of insensibility. Outalissi, therefore, taking her up in one arm whilst he held the child in the other, with about the same ease that one could lift a fowling piece, carried them both into the house.

Mr. Hogshead did not fail to avail himself of the pretence afforded by this unfortunate occurrence for prosecuting his designs against his helpless victim; he wrote a full account of the matter to his master, Mr. Cotton, taking care to magnify as much as possible Charlotte's imprudence, and ascribed the accident entirely to her neglect and disregard of his repeated injunctions not to come upon that ground, (although, from the boldness of these animals, it might have happened just as well any where else,) and concluding that he had been obliged to send Outalissi to the hospital, and had thought it right to punish Charlotte till Mr. Cotton's pleasure should be known, by locking her up in a part of his own house;^* and that he had transferred Master Charles to the care of another slave.

The next morning, which happened to be Sun-

* The directors upon the plantation have generally a house detached from that of the proprietor. - Editor.

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day, Mr. Schwartz called as usual to pursue the Christian instruction of the negroes, who told him that the director had ordered them not to attend, because, he said, Charlotte Venture had referred to his instructions to justify her insolence to him; but that they were resolved to attend in spite of him or his master either, and asked Mr. Schwartz, if he did not think they were right?

‘I think,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘that it will very likely expose you to a gauntlet of persecution and punishment, and, perhaps, even death, if you do; but,’ continued he firmly, ‘I think you are right.’

‘Massa, if we die, we go to God; we loby (love) to die, massa. This life no more bettra as Hell, massa?’

‘But, perhaps,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘you may as well forbear to exasperate the director for the present, as I will write to Mr. Cotton, and he may possibly relieve us from his controul.’ After visiting Outalissi in the hospital, from the account which he received from him, Mr. Schwartz desired to see Charlotte Venture.

‘Why do you hesitate,’ said he to Mr. Hogshead; ‘you surely have no fear of her making any disclosure to your prejudice?’

‘Disclosure!’ said Mr. Hogshead, ‘O, no!

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she must be past disclosure of any sort by this time, as I left her dying an hour ago.’

‘There is the more reason that I should see her,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘in order to ascertain the cause of her death, that I may explain it to her kind mistress, as you know the value she sets upon her.’

‘You may see her, if you please,’ said Mr. Hogshead; ‘but it shall be only in my presence, as, if she is not already past articulation, you will make her say any thing you please.’

‘In your hearing, if you please; but not in your sight,’ said Mr. Schwartz; ‘nor must she know that you are near; as that might deter her from speaking freely; but why should you suppose she has any thing to say about you?’ said Mr. Schwartz, looking sternly into the villain's dropping eyes.

‘Well; here is the key,’ said the director, ‘if you will go into my house they will show you the room she is locked up in.’

On entering the room, Mr. Schwartz found Charlotte lying upon a small pallet, and apparently in articulo mortis; her features seemed distorted with the last struggle, and her eyes remained quite closed, till, approaching close to her head, he said,

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‘O, my poor girl, how came you in this dreadful condition?’ when, on recognizing the only tone of sympathy that she ever heard in the absence of her mistress, a gleam of vivacity for a few minutes lit up her ruined features.

‘I am murdered, sir,’ she said, ‘by Mr. Hogshead; he passed the last night with me in this room, and when he found that neither promise or entreaty could prevail on me to submit to his desires; he succeeded by the grossest violence in stifling my screams, and effecting his purpose, and this morning he endeavoured to strangle me, and left the room, I believe, under the impression that I was dead.’

‘I have already sent for a doctor,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘and I hope still that you may live; if not, I believe confidently, that you will go to the Christian's God, Charlotte, who can compensate you even for such an injury as this; but you must endeavour to forgive the author of it.’

‘O, sir, don't make me live,’ said Charlotte; ‘but don't ask me to forgive him. Must I say I forgive him, if I feel that I never can.’

‘No,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘it's useless to say any thing to God which is not true, as he sees through all disguises, even those by which we

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sometimes endeavour to deceive ourselves; pray then for his repentance and your own forgiveness,’ said Mr. Schwartz.

‘O, sir,’ said Charlotte, ‘I cannot think of him and pray. I have not told you half his cruelty --’

‘What are those lies you are telling against me?’ said Mr. Hogshead, who had been somewhere within hearing, and presented himself at that moment at the foot of the bed, in order to overawe her from disclosing more particulars of his brutality.’

The instant Charlotte saw him, she uttered a piercing shriek, threw her arms out at him, turned her face violently round into the pillow, fell into convulsions and expired.

‘I charge you,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘with the ruin and murder of that helpless girl; and if her countrymen themselves do not avenge her death, there is One above that will.’

‘Do you mean then,’ said the conscience-struck poltroon, ‘to invite the negroes to murder me?’

‘Whoso sheddeth man's blood,’ said Mr. Schwartz, ‘by man shall his blood be shed.’

Mr. Hogshead muttered something about the end of the d--d humbug of Christianity being that they should all get their throats cut, and

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‘that it would serve such fellows as you no more than right, if you were all flogged out of the colony; and I will do it off this plantation if you repeat such an accusation against me.’

‘You dare not,’ said Mr. Schwartz, coolly; which was the real fact, for the negroes loved him and would not have obeyed any direction to ill-treat him, or he would probably have been murdered himself long ago. But he happened to be a stronger man than the director, who, therefore, could only have got rid of him by the help of the slaves.

On leaving Mr. Hogshead's house, Mr. Schwartz went immediately and laid an information against him, both before the officer commanding the detachment at the outpost, and the police magistrate of the district, called the Heimrovad, and earnestly requested the immediate arrest of Mr. Hogshead, if it were only to appease the irritation and prevent the resentment of the negroes; but they both declined interfering, till they had an opportunity of communicating with Mr. Cotton.