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Show 122 THE GOLDEN HOUR. XIX. THE NEGRO . . MoNTESQUIEU said that it would not do to suppose that N cgroes were men, lest it should turn out that whites were not. The sarcasm falls ahnost exclusively upon thi. coun-try, where alone the indecent nonsense concerning the nature of the Negro survives. In 1781, in the caf-'e of the ship Zong, whose master had thro·wn one hundred and thirty-two slaves alive into the sea to cheat the underwriters, the first jury gave a verdict in favor of the mastc1' and owners : they had a right to do what they had done. Lord ~1:ansfield is reported to have said on the bench: " The 1natter left to the jury i , Was it from necessity? For they had no doubtthouo ·h it shocks one very much - that the case of b slaves was the same as if horses had been thrown overboard." Such was the Negro in the eye of the law when Sharpe and Clarkson began their efforts. The latter of these, early in his career, made a collection of African productions and manufactures, as indications of what the Negro, despite all disparagements, had attained. They were considered rmnarkable by some of the best judges in England. Mr. Pitt was especially interested in them. " On sight of these," says Clarkson, "many sublime thoughts seemed THE NEGRO. 123 to rush at once into his mind ·o1ne of 1 · 1 1 ' w uc 1 1e cx-pre~ sed." From this titne the project, which was always dear to hitn, of the ci viliza.tion of Africa arose in his n1ind. .A half-century of healthy dcvcloplnent bro1~ght England to its senses as rcgarclf) the N cgro. Stncc then the Negro has li vcd to prove that those who are counting upon perpetual d gradation and final cxtcrtnination a his destiny arc running against the grain of thing,'. Ilc has shown a vitality equal to that of the white race, where both arc out of their native clin1atcs ; and where the white man has been vindicating his claim to superiority only by enslaving hi1n, - empowered to do so by ha vi11 g arn1ed nations behind hitn,- the N cgro has shown hitnsclf ca ily superior to his n1astcr. This he luis always prove~ as soon as the outside pressure of law and force was removed, and a fair trial of strength between hitn and his master permitted. Ile has bcco1ne the dominant race in the West Indies ; he ha · superseded the white n1an in Ha'iti altogether ; and the unanirnous verdict of our soldiers now in the South is, that the N cgro is the superior race in that section of America. Of the eight millions of whites in the Slave States, six are "poor white trash," and no one who has seen them can compare them to the black laborers there. And when it comes to upper classes, it is not easy to decide that Jeff Davis' coaclunan is better fitted to be the slave than the 1na.stcr of J off, or that Robert Small is not equal to Pickens, Floyd, or any of their set. |