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On his tomb was placed a figure of Bacchus adorned with purple and gold; while on the spot where tradition pretended that Sophocles had received Esculapius, Athens raised a monument under the designation of Daxion.

Another decree ordered statues to be erected to Eschylus, to Sophocles and to Euripides, and deposited in the public archives; while it was enacted on the proposition of the orator Lycurgus, the contemporary of Demosthenes, that henceforward the tragedies of those great poets should cease to be represented by actors, and should only be read in public by the secretary of the Republic. Unfortunately this law entirely missed its aim, for by depriving such works of the advantages derived from the emulation of the actors, and the prestige of scenic representations, the ancients struck a fatal blow, which ultimately worked the downfall of the tragic art.

488

FEVER HEAT.

BY GEORGE MANVILLE FENN.

"AND we're not at all afraid of our negroes," said my hostess, for about the third time during one short evening. Why then should there be such evident anxiety to insist upon this fact? I had not asked whether the planters feared their slaves, or even alluded to the possibility of such an unpleasant state of affairs; and yet ever since my sojourn in the State of Louisiana, little things kept peeping out, to show that in connexion with this domestic institution there existed the same sort of feeling as one would experience in sleeping in a villa half way up Vesuvius, or occupying the post of keeper of a caravan full of uncomfortable snakes and snarling beasts. People pay and pay to look at such things, and the keeper lines his pocket well, but he never knows when it may enter into the brain of one of his amiable pets to pay him. And so with the domestic institution. Wonderful crops of sugar and rice are got out of those rich fat acres that border the Father of Waters. Year after year, by alternating the crops, riches are reaped, without recourse to manure proper or agricultural chemistry. Uncle Pomp's black back shines in the rays of the almost perpendicular sun as he steams away, ploughing or hoeing, between the tall green rows of the sugar-cane running far above his head, and beneath and amongst which hardly a breath of air is stirring; but £200 Pomp, with his stamina kept up by hominy and dried fish, almost returns his value to his owner year by year; and the same by Aunt Dido, whose parti-coloured handkerchief shelters her woolly head from the torrid beams. Hoeing away in gangs of Didos, the luxuriant weeds are kept down, riches pour into the planter's lap, and his house abounds with all the luxuries so much appreciated in a climate that enervates, and seems a foe to all active pursuits. But in the midst of his Eden of fruit and flowers, luxuriant tropical vegetation, humming birds—the fireflies of the day, and the insect scintillations of the darksome night, with every luxury that money can command to augment the beauties of nature, the planter feels that he may at any time be pierced by the thorn that is concealed amid his flowers; but for all this he takes pains to let you know, through the lady who presides over his household, that he is not at all afraid of his negroes.

As a traveller, of course, I am bound to listen with the greatest of politeness to all that I am told, but at the same time I do not feel that I am bound to believe it. I happened to have spent a week in New Orleans before ascending the Mississippi, and from what I saw there, I

came to the conclusion that at all events Creoledom is rather afraid of its slaves. Else why the armed nightly patrol to clear the streets, after the bell has sounded its warning to the descendants of Ham? why the guard-house for imprisoning the poor wretches who are captured? why the constant proneness to carry revolvers and bowie knives, and other uncivilized implements for boring, gashing, or otherwise letting out the human soul from its mansion of clay and lastly, why, when an incendiary fire takes place in the city, of which there were no less than three in the week I stayed, why should New Orleans say out loudly, and with plenty of the slang bluster-"All the result of accident," and then lay its heads together, and whisper with a shade more pallor in the pallid countenances-whisper low and soft as though fearing that the words might bear news that every one already knew-"the darned niggers."

So mused I upon leaving my host and hostess, and being shown to my bed-room. My advent seemed to have been looked upon as a favour, and no hospitality could have been more unbounded. I had ridden by the side of my host through acre upon acre of waving maize, and could almost have fancied myself some Oriental prince from the attendant slaves running by my side to brush away the insect nuisances of the climate. I had been shown the lagoons where those scaly abominations, the alligators, had their home, and where they thrashed the fish in the shallows with their flail-like tails, until they became an easy prey. I had been shown where there were snakes, and frogs as big as skittle balls, fit to be eaten (by those who liked the dish); walked upon the towering bank that confines the mighty waters-draining of a continent and heard stories of their wondrous volume, and the monsters that lived within their hidden depths; and, lastly, gazed upon the tangled cane brake which revived memories of Uncle Tom and Dred, and bloodhounds, and Legree, Maroons, Three Fingered Jack, massacres, and all sorts of horrors; and before going to bed had all set at rest by my hostess's assurance that "they were not at all afraid of their negroes."

Setting at defiance the sanitary precautions and warnings received, I sat at my open window watching the moon rising over the dark belt of forest, and flooding the misty fields with its silvery light, listening to the distant murmur from the woods, and almost awestricken with the silence around. The negroes' quarters lay to my right, within a hundred yards; and I could see the dark palisade that enclosed the huts; but all was silent as the night.

Nothing aids reflection better than a real Havanna, and with a large one alight I now took the slavery subject well into consideration. Down South, partly on business and partly on pleasure, I set myself to investigate all that appeared on the surface of that broad subject, abolitionists term the great black slough of slavery. My memory ran both ways. The owners said that the slaves were the happiest people on "the face of

the earth;" but if so, they have a very undemonstrative way of showing it; and casting on one side what I had read or heard, I tried to compare the state of the African African and the American African, and him in his turn with the British labourer. In his native state he is a savagesometimes cannibal—wild, war-like, ferocious, and diabolical in his worship; given to war-making and slaughter; and in his predatory excursions the weakest go to the wall, or more often to the compound of the slavedealer on the coast. In his American state he is hard-worked, but well fed; treated often with harshness, perhaps with the whip, but not overworked; doctored in sickness and taken care of; allowed to garden and keep poultry upon his own account and to sell it. But, on the other hand, he is kept in the same debasing state of ignorance of common things as of religion, and seems on the whole to be treated as if he were a black bullock, or to give him his proper name, a field hand. Comparing him with the British labourer, he is in some things far better off, but in many others far worse. The idea of buying and selling human beings is repugnant in the extreme, but how few farmers are there at home who value Bucolic John at the rate of £200; he gets but little help if he fall sick, and less tending; and far from having a good infirmary to go to, he trembles and thinks of the Union.

And so ran my musings, until I came to the conclusion that Mrs. Stowe had written her books to sell; that slavery was an evil undoubtedly, but a very old sore indeed, and one for which there seemed no present cure; that a slave under a good master had a very good time of it, and vice versa under a hard master; and that, taking men as we find them, masters and overseers, American Pompey in his condition, and African Cæsar in his, things were not so bad as they seemed. As my cigar was just out, I threw away the end, closed my window, and with thoughts that would have brought upon me the utter contempt of all men of Wilberforce tendencies, and the disgust of every Yankee abolitionist I threw myself upon my bed, mentally saying that " Pompey and Cæsar were very much alike, especially Pompey."

Weary with my exertions during the heat of the day, I had no occasion to summon sleep, she waited at my elbow, and in spite of the warning "wuz-yez" of ever active mosquitos, I was soon soundly asleep, with thoughts wandering far away, but tinged with the events of the past few days. Slavery was mixed up with all my wanderings, and I fancied myself engaged in the prohibited traffic, sailing the tropic waters between the Guinea Coast and the Spanish Main, and with my bark laden with the captive wretches. For a while all was well, but then they broke out into open rebellion, and I could hear them beating at the hatchways and doors to get on deck, and shrieking my name. Then a new change: they had set fire to the vessel, and the glare of the light was before my eyes, and I felt half suffocated with the heat and smoke. Then again they shrieked my name; but this time it seemed real, and with a wild ejaculation of terror I leapt from my bed, for a fearful glare shone through

the window, and the heat in the room was stifling. My first act was to hurl the great water carafe through the window; but though air came, it was heated and smoke-laden; and hurrying on a few things, I essayed to escape by the door, for it was but too evident that the place was in flames. I unlocked and opened the door, and a burst of flame and smoke nearly bereft me of what little reason I had left, the current aroused by the open window made the flames leap into the room, and it was with an effort that I managed to close the door again and rush to the window. It was too far to leap, but there was no time to lose, for the flaines were crackling outside and the heated floor to my bare feet warned me that the room beneath me was on fire. On making my appearance at the window a shout was raised by a crowd of blacks upon the lawn, but no one stirred to lend me any assistance. I shouted for a ladder, and a figure, which I recognized as that of my host, dashed into the crowd, which dispersed in different directions. I saw, however, that before they could bring the ladder I should be completely roasted; and in despair of aid I climbed outside the window. If I had possessed the sense that accompanies presence of mind I should have knotted my sheets together, secured one end to the bedstead, and have slid down, which would have been a much easier though less romantic proceeding; but I did not think of this. However, shouting to those below to bring a ladder or pole, I stood for a few minutes outside upon the window sill, but not for long, for there was a snapping and crackling noise, and then a rush of flame and sparks burst forth from the window directly beneath, writhing and forking up towards me, and licking my bare feet with its burning tongues. I dared not leap down, for the height was too great, but the yell that saluted my ears so unnerved me that I nearly fell and it was only by a strong effort that I commanded nerve enough to retain my hold of the wood spouting, that ran round the eaves of the house. There was nothing else for it, no means of escape; so leaning my whole weight upon the frail wood-work I began to travel slowly along hand over hand hanging with body motionless, for the gutter cracked and bent with my weight. I dared not look down for the height seemed fearful, and I mentally prayed for the arrival of the ladder. The flames seemed to follow me, and at last I arrived at the end of my tether. I was now at the north corner of the house, where the spouting had commenced, and I hung, nearly exhausted, waiting for the tardy succour. The moments

were like hours; my muscles seemed torn by the lengthened tension ́upon them, and I knew that I must soon drop. I felt that it would be a charity to force me to fall, for I could not be so seriously hurt, but nature whispered, "No! hang on till you drop ;" and hang on I did with the energy of life and death till one end of the spout was burned through, when it gave way and with a crash I fell.

The depth seemed interminable, and I could feel that I must be taken up in a crushed and mutilated state; but at last the shock came and I lay helpless, but only to be pounced upon by a crowd of black

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