CHAPTER IV.

ALMOST A WATERY GRAVE.

Before proceeding further I would say that the standard of virtue among the negroes is very low, and that if any of their girls wander from the paths of virtue they are not cast off as is the case with the whites. It must be admitted, however, that there is an improvement among them along this line. When Octavia was a year old she came very near being drowned in the river. Elsie was fond of fishing, and carried Octavia and a little negro nurse to watch the child. The nurse got careless and let the child fall into the river, and would have drowned had not Simon happened to be near and heard his sister's screams, and getting there, jumped in just in time to rescue both mother and child, the former having leaped in to save the child. Simon gave his sister a good lecture and the nurse a switching for their carelessness. It seemed that Simon's nearness was providential.

Simon always said, after the child was a few months old, that she had a bright future before her; that, though a slave, the Lord would open up a way for her.

In Colonel R.'s absence Simon was required to make frequent visits to his mistress's home to report to her the progress he was making on the farm. The war had been over half fought, and while the Confederacy had gained many battles it suffered serious losses, and was daily getting weaker, and it was only a question of time when it would collapse. During his visits to his mistress Simon gained this intelligence in regard to the progress of the war, and while he was sure of his freedom, regardless of the way the war terminated, he could not but wish for the success of the Union armies on account of his sister and her child, who would thereby gain their freedom. He also had a broad, sympathetic feeling for his race and wanted them liberated.

He was also broad enough in his philosophy and intelligence to accord to his master and other Southern slaveholders the right to resort to arms to fight for property which they had bought or inherited, and which was recognized in the Constitution of the United States.

While he was legally a slave he enjoyed freedom as much so as his master or other white men. He had all the comforts of a country home, and while the large plantation over which he was foreman was not his, he was in one respect "lord of all he surveyed." He had a buggy, horse, saddle, whip, pack of hounds, and said to this, do so and so, and it was done; or go and they came or went. When one of the slaves transgressed he used the lash on him--in a word, he was as supreme in authority as the Nabob of Cawnpore or the Sultan of Turkey. Enjoying and having all these things at his command, why should he want them terminated? It must be remembered that he was three-fourths white, and one of the instincts of the Anglo-Saxon is freedom and liberty. Simon was attached to his master and mistress, who were humane, kind and thoughtful of their slaves. Still, with all this, there was a longing in his heart that would not be satisfied. It is admitted on all sides that had there not been cruel and heartless slaveholders, "Uncle Tom's Cabin" would never have been written, sympathy in Northern pulpits and Abolition societies would not have spread, and in all probability the negro would yet have been a slave. Simon's reasoning was that he nor his master were responsible for human slavery, which in some respects had been a benefit and in others an injury to the negro, and that there had been slavery in all ages of the world.

He knew that the mistake was made when slavery was recognized in the Constitution of the United States; also that the mistake had brought the negro from the wilds of Africa, and civilized, tamed and made a good laborer and citizen of him. That was the entering wedge which had caused all the contention, and finally precipitated the most gigantic war in history.

Let the consequences be what they may, Simon did his duty in successfully managing the affairs on his master's plantation.