CHAPTER XIII

THE BOND SLAVE

"And now," said my father, after he and Gregory had eaten well of what was on the table, such as most excellent fish from the river, one of our baked hams, potatoes, sweet potatoes, pones and wheaten bread, as well as puddings of papaw, or custard apples.

"And now we have a strange recital to make to you young ladies, the like of which is not often heard, or if heard--for the convict villains and bought servants are capable of any lies--not much believed in."

"What is it?" Mary Mills and I both asked in the same breath. "Tho'," she went on, "perhaps I can guess. Is't some young princess who has come out as a 'convict villain?'" and here she laughed. "Nay, 'twould not be so wonderful. From Bristol in my time there were many went forth who, when they reached here, or the Islands, told marvellous strange stories of their real position--sometimes imposing so much upon the planters that there would come letters home asking if such and such a woman could indeed be the Lady This, or if such and such a man could be the Lord That? Yet they never could procure proofs that such was the case."

My father and Gregory exchanged glances at her words, and then the former said:

"And such a letter I think I must send home. For I have bought to-day a young fellow--as much out of pity as for any use he is like to be, such a poor, starved radish of a young man is he--who protests and swears that 'tis all a mistake his being here, and that some dreadful villainy has been practised on him. For he says that, though not a lord himself, he is the son and heir of one, ay! and of a marquis, too, in the future."

I cried out at this, for my girl's curiosity was aroused, and Miss Mills exclaimed, "'Tis ever the old story. They have talents, these servants, tho' they apply them but ill. They should turn romancers when I warrant that they would outdo such stories as 'Polyxander,' or 'L'Illustre Bassa,' or 'Le Grand Cyrus,' or even the wanderings of Mendes Pinto."

"Yet," said Gregory, "there seems a strain of truth in his words. He speaks like a gentleman,"--Gregory had been educated at Harvard, so he was a fitting judge, independently of being a gentleman himself--"and, undoubtedly, no convict from home or rapscallion fleeing from justice would talk as assuredly as he does of his father's anger on those who kidnapped him, or of the certainty of his being sent for by the first ship from Ireland--whence he has come--if he had not some grounds to go upon."

"From whom did you purchase this youth, Mr. Bampfyld?" asked Mary, who herself seemed now to be impressed by what they said.

"From the most villainous-looking captain I ever set my eyes on," replied my father; "a fellow who could look no one straight in the face, but who sold off his cargo as quickly as he could, took the money, and, with a fine breeze, departed from the Bay last evening, having taken in some fresh water. His papers were for Newcastle, on the Delaware, but he said he could make as good a market in Virginia as there--if not better. I gave," went on my father, "a bond of twelve hundred pounds of tobacco for this fellow, which I borrowed of Roger Cliborne, and so miserable did he look that I gave it out of compassion. Whether he will ever be worth the money is doubtful, but Heaven send that he, at least, involves us in no trouble."

He spake meaning that he trusted the youth would involve us in no trouble with the Government at home, nor with the Lords of Trade and Plantations who, since many people had wrongfully been sent out to the colonies of late years--in spite of Mary Mills' banter---had caused much investigation to take place recently into such cases, and had, thereby, created much discomfort and annoyance as well as loss of money to those into whose hands such people had fallen. Alas! had this wretched young man caused us no worse trouble than this in the future we could have borne it well enough. What he did bring upon us was so terrible that, Christian tho' I trust I am, I cannot refrain from saying it would have been better that he should have been drowned from the vessel that brought him over than ever to have been able to curse Pomfret with his presence.

The sun was dipping towards the Alleghanies by now, so that, at the back of the house, it was getting cool and pleasant, and Gregory said that if the ladies so chose we might go down and see the young gentleman, who was, doubtless, by this time duly placed among the other convicts, bought-servants and redemptioners. Wherefore, putting on our sun-hoods, Mary and I went forth with them--who by now had finished not only their dinner but their beloved pipes and rum-sangaree--and down to where those poor creatures abode.

We had some eighty such, including negroes, at this moment on our plantation, an a motley collection they were, as I have already told. Those who came under the name of "redemptioners" were the best workers as well as the most trustworthy, because, having an object before them, namely, to establish themselves in the colonies when the service into which they had sold themselves for four years to pay their passage out, was over, they worked hard and lived orderly and respectably, and were generally promoted to be overseers above the others. Two or three of them were married, their wives having either come with them or been selected from among the female redemptioners, and all of them knew either a good trade or were skilful mechanics, so that they were doubly useful. Then there were the "bought" servants, as distinguished from the redemptioners, who consisted generally of the wretched creatures who had been made drunk at home and smuggled on board when in that state, or who, being beggars in the streets of Bristol, London, Leith, or Dublin, were but too glad to exchange their cold and hunger for the prospect of warmth and food in the colonies--the description of which latter places lost nothing in the telling by those who shipped them at, you may be sure, a profit. These were called the "kids," because of having been kidnapped, and also because most of them were very young. Next, there were the convicts, the worst of all as a rule to deal with, since many of them were hardened criminals at home who had been spared hanging and cast for transportation instead, and had become no better men or women under the colonial rule. Even in my short life we had had some dreadful beings amongst these servants, one having been a highwayman at home, another a coiner and clipper, a third a footpad and a cutthroat, a fourth a robber of drunken men, and so on, while there were women whose mode of life in England I may not name nor think of. All were not, however, equally bad, nor had all been such sinners in England. One had done no more than steal a loaf when starving, another had hoaxed a greenhorn with pinchbeck watches; one, when drunk, had shouted for James Sheppard, a poor lunatic, who had thought to assassinate the late King, another had been mixed up with Councillor Layer's silly attempt to bring in the Pretender. Yet all had stood their trials and had been sentenced to death, but had afterwards had that sentence commuted. And in every plantation in all the colonies much the same thing prevailed. The treatment of these bond servants varied not so much according to the laws of the different countries or states, as according to the tempers and feelings of their different owners for the time being. If a man was merciful he treated them well and fed them well; if he was cruel he beat them and starved them, whipped both white men and women, when they were naked, with hickory rods steeped in brine, and, when they were sick, let them die because, since they were his only for four years, their lives were not worth preserving. And, although he might not kill them by law, as he might a negro or a dog, if he did kill them it was unknown for notice to be taken of it. And sometimes, too, dissipated planters would gamble for their white men and women as they would for bales of tobacco or bags of Virginia shillings, so that those who had a hard master one day exchanged him for a good one on the next, or the case might be exactly reversed. My father, though firm, could not be considered aught else but a good master to both his black and white servants. Indian meal was allowed them in large quantities, while pork--though true it is that our swine were so numerous that they were accounted almost valueless--was served out to them regularly. Moreover, those who did well were given small rewards, even if only a Rosa Americana farthing now and again, while for floggings, none received them but those who stole, or ran away and were recaptured, or misbehaved themselves grossly. But each, on being purchased on to our estate, had read to him a dreadful list of punishments which he would surely receive if he did aught to merit them. It was thought well by my father that the fear of such punishments should be kept ever before their eyes, even if those punishments were but rarely dealt out.

We heard much laughing and many derisive shouts as we drew near the white servants' quarters, nor had we long to wait or far to go before we discovered the cause of it, which was our new purchase telling the others of his miseries and dreadful lot, as he termed it. Through the breaks in the trees we perceived him seated on a pork barrel--a miserable-looking figure, unkempt and dirty. His long straight hair, like a New England Puritan's or a Quaker's, was hanging down his shoulders; he had no shoes upon his feet, and thus he was holding forth to his new acquaintances.

"So consider," we heard him say, as we drew near, "consider what I, a gentleman, the Honourable Roderick St. Amande, have suffered. Near five months at sea, nearly drowned and shipwrecked, with our ship driven out of her course, then chased by pirates who knew the cargo there was on board; beaten, ill-used, cuffed and ill-treated by all--and all of it a mistake."

"Ay," exclaimed the man who had been, it was said, a housebreaker, and was a rough, coarse fellow, "and so was my affair all a mistake. 'Twas friend Jonathan--Jonathan Wild who hath now himself been hanged, as I have since heard--who pinched me falsely, but the Government, recognising my merits more than my lord on the bench, who was asleep when he tried me, sent me out here where I fell into the hands of old Nick."

Thus the wretch presumed to speak of my father, whose Christian name was Nicholas, and his remarks were received with laughter; upon which he went on, "Yet, take heart of grace, my young Irish cock-sparrow. Thou art in good hands. Nick is a good man and will not over-work thee; and he will feed thee, which is more than thy beggarly country could well do. Moreover, when thou hast done thy four years' service, thou canst palm off thy pretended lordship on some young colonial girl who will doubtless be glad enough to wed thee; if thou makest thy story plausible. Nay, there is one at hand; Nick hath a daughter fair as a lily, with lips like roses----"

"Silence, villain," said my father in a voice of thunder, as he strode forth from under the trees, his eyes flashing fiercely. "Thou hound!" he went on, addressing the man. "Is it thus you dare to speak of me and mine! Overseer," calling to one who was seated in his hut, and who came forth at once, "see this man has nought but Indian meal served out to him during the remainder of his service. How much longer is that service?"

"About four months, your honour," the overseer replied.

"So be it. Nothing but meal for him, and where there is any one labour harder than another, set him to it. And, hark ye," he said, turning to the convict. "If in those four months I find my daughter's name has been on your foul lips again, you shall be flogged till you are dead--even though I have to answer for it to the Lords of Trades and Plantations myself. Go."

The fellow slunk away cowed and followed by the overseer who drove him to the shed he inhabited with the other convicts, and, although it was their hour of relaxation previous to their last work in the evening, he ordered him to remain there under pain of flogging. Then my father, turning to his new purchase, bade him get off the barrel and come forth under the shade of the trees to where we were.

He did so, looking, as I thought, with some awe upon him who could speak so fiercely and have his orders at once obeyed. Also, we all observed that when he drew near to us and saw ladies, he took off the ragged, filthy cap he wore with a polite bow though an easy one, and with the air of one who is being presented to those with whom he is on a perfect equality. My father's face relaxed into a slight smile at this, while Mary whispered to me, "Faith! 'tis becoming vastly interesting. The creature is, I believe, in very truth, a gentleman."

"Now, young man," my father said, "you harp well upon this story of your being a nobleman's son---the Honourable Roderick St. Amande, you say you are? What proofs have you of this?"

The youth looked at him, frankly enough as we thought, and then he replied, "None here, because of the wicked scheme that has been practised on me instead of on--but no matter. Yet I have told you the truth of how I was kidnapped by two ruffians, a man and a youth--when I was dr--when I had been entertaining my friends in Dublin."

This part of his story he had, indeed, told my father and Gregory on the journey back from Norfolk where he was bought, and they had already repeated it to us, as you have heard.

"But," he continued, "'tis capable enough of proof, if you will prove it. Write to Dublin, write to the Viscount St. Amande, my father, or to the King-at-Arms, who hath enrolled him successor to my uncle, Gerald, the late Lord, or, if you will, write to the Marquis of Amesbury, whose kinsman and successor, after my father, I am."

"Humph!" said my father, "the name of the Marquis is known to me. 'Twas once thought he should have been sent Governor of Maryland, only he would not. He thought himself too great a man."

"Young man," said Mary Mills, "since you say you are heir to the Marquis of Amesbury, doubtless you can tell us his lordship's country seat?"

"Young lady," he replied, looking at her in so strange a way that, as she said later that night, she should dread him ever after, "'twere best to say his 'seats.' One he has near Richmond, in Surrey, a pretty place; another is in Essex, but the greatest of all is Amesbury Court, near Bristol--" Mary started at this, for she knew it to be true--"though in his town house, in Lincoln's Inn Fields, he has some choice curiosities, to say nothing of some most excellent wine. I would I had a draught of it now--your infernal American sun burns me to pieces, and the cruel voyage has nigh killed me."

"Young man," said Gregory, "remember that, whomsoever you be, you are here a slave, and not free to express your thoughts either on our climate or aught else."

"May be," replied the youth, "but it cannot be for long, if this--this--per--gentleman will but make enquiries. A letter may go from here to Ireland, if the vessel has not such cursed winds as the slave-ship had that brought me, and a reply come back, within three months. And if you neither beat nor kill me, but treat me fair, you shall be well rewarded----"

"Stay," said my father, "on this, my estate, it is best for you not to speak of reward to me. Where rewards are given in Virginia they are given by the masters, not by the slaves. But, since you keep to your story and do challenge me to make enquiries as to its veracity, I have determined to act as a Christian to you. You shall neither be beaten nor hurt on my plantations--none are who behave well--and, pending the time that an answer may come as to the letter I shall write, you shall be fairly treated. If your narrative is true, you shall be free to go by the next ship that sails for England. If it is false, or it appeareth that you have used your knowledge of the noble families you have mentioned to impose on us, you shall be whipped and kept to the hardest work on the plantations till your time is served."

"I am obliged to you," the other answered. "And you may be assured that you will receive confirmation of the truth of all I have told you. Meanwhile, what is to be my lot until that confirmation comes?"

"I will consider. Can you keep accounts and reckonings?"

The young man, perhaps because he felt that was assured of easy treatment for some space of time at least, gave a laugh at this and cut a kind of caper, so that we ourselves were almost forced to laugh outright; and then he said:

"The devil an account--saving the young women's pardon--have I ever kept except to try and check the swindling rogues at the taverns who were ever for adding on to the scores I owed them, and inserting in the list bowls of punch and flasks of sherris I had never drunk. And the fashioners would ever insert charges for hoods for the girls, or laces for Doll----"

"Your recollections are scarcely seemly before these ladies," my father again interrupted sternly. "My nephew and I have had already twice to bid you mind your expressions. Now, sir, hear me and remember what I say. If I treat you well you must behave yourself as becomes a gentleman, and use neither strong language nor introduce unseemly stories into your talk. For, if you do not conform to these orders of mine, you will be sent back to dwell among the bond-servants to whom doubtless your language and narratives will be acceptable."

"I ask pardon," the other said, though by no means graciously, and speaking rather as one who was forced by an inferior to do that which he disliked. "I will offend the ladies' delicacy no more."

Then, without hesitation, he changed the subject and said, "And when, sir, may I expect to get some proper food? I have neither eaten nor drunk since you brought me from the coast this morning."

"You shall have food," my father replied. "Come with us"; while, as we all went back to the house, he said to Gregory, "'Tis the coolest rascal that was ever sold as a slave into the colonies. It seems impossible to doubt but that his story must be true."