Chapter 7

But in the heart of Robertson there was a strange peace. Being human, he naturally resented the discernible thoughts in the minds of his comrades of many a hard-fought battle. But a calmness made him forgetful of all this for he knew that at last, in a moment of the supreme test, he had conquered that which had been his master throughout all of his life--his temper. All the slurs and coldness in the world could not rob him of the satisfaction of this.

THE DOG AND THE CLEVER RABBIT

A. O. STAFFORD

There were many days when the animals did not think about the kingship. They thought of their games and their tricks, and would play them from the rising to the setting of the sun.

Now, at that time, the little rabbit was known as a very clever fellow. His tricks, his schemes, and his funny little ways caused much mischief and at times much anger among his woodland cousins.

At last the wolf made up his mind to catch him and give him a severe punishment for the many tricks he had played upon him.

Knowing that the rabbit could run faster than he, the wolf called at the home of the dog to seek his aid. "Brother dog, frisky little rabbit must be caught and punished. For a nice bone will you help me?" asked the wolf.

"Certainly, my good friend," answered the dog, thinking of the promised bone.

"Be very careful, the rabbit is very clever," said the wolf as he left.

A day or so later while passing through the woods the dog saw the rabbit frisking in the tall grass. Quick as a flash the dog started after him. The little fellow ran and, to save himself, jumped into the hollow of an oak tree. The opening was too small for the other to follow and as he looked in he heard only the merry laugh of the frisky rabbit, "Hee, hee! hello, Mr. Dog, you can't see me."

"Never mind, boy, I will get you yet," barked the angry dog.

A short distance from the tree a goose was seen moving around looking for her dinner.

"Come, friend goose, watch the hollow of this tree while I go and get some moss and fire to smoke out this scamp of a rabbit," spoke the dog, remembering the advice of the wolf.

"Of course I'll watch, for he has played many of his schemes upon me," returned the bird.

When the dog left, the rabbit called out from his hiding place, "How can you watch, friend goose, when you can't see me?"

"Well, I will see you then," she replied. With these words she pushed her long neck into the hollow of the tree. As the neck of the goose went into the opening the rabbit threw the dust of some dry wood into her eyes.

"Oh, oh, you little scamp, you have made me blind," cried out the bird in pain.

Then while the goose was trying to get the dust from her eyes the rabbit jumped out and scampered away.

In a short while the dog returned with the moss and fire, filled the opening, and, as he watched the smoke arise, barked with glee, "Now I have you, my tricky friend, now I have you." But as no rabbit ran out the dog turned to the goose and saw from her red, streaming eyes that something was wrong.

"Where is the rabbit, friend goose?" he quickly asked.

"Why, he threw wood dust into my eyes when I peeped into the opening." At once the dog knew that the rabbit had escaped and became very angry.

"You silly goose, you foolish bird with web feet, I will kill you now for such folly." With these words the dog sprang for the goose, but only a small feather was caught in his mouth as the frightened bird rose high in the air and flew away.

THE BOY AND THE IDEAL

JOSEPH S. COTTER

Once upon a time a Mule, a Hog, a Snake, and a Boy met. Said the Mule: "I eat and labor that I may grow strong in the heels. It is fine to have heels so gifted. My heels make people cultivate distance."

Said the Hog: "I eat and labor that I may grow strong in the snout. It is fine to have a fine snout. I keep people watching for my snout."

"No exchanging heels for snouts," broke in the Mule.

"No," answered the Hog; "snouts are naturally above heels."

Said the Snake: "I eat to live, and live to cultivate my sting. The way people shun me shows my greatness. Beget stings, comrades, and stings will beget glory."

Said the Boy: "There is a star in my life like unto a star in the sky. I eat and labor that I may think aright and feel aright. These rounds will conduct me to my star. Oh, inviting star!"

"I am not so certain of that," said the Mule. "I have noticed your kind and ever see some of myself in them. Your star is in the distance."

The Boy answered by smelling a flower and listening to the song of a bird. The Mule looked at him and said: "He is all tenderness and care. The true and the beautiful have robbed me of a kinsman. His star is near."

Said the Boy: "I approach my star."

"I am not so certain of that," interrupted the Hog. "I have noticed your kind and I ever see some of myself in them. Your star is a delusion."

The Boy answered by painting the flower and setting the notes of the bird's song to music.

The Hog looked at the boy and said: "His soul is attuned by nature. The meddler in him is slain."

"I can all but touch my star," cried the Boy.

"I am not so certain of that," remarked the Snake. "I have watched your kind and ever see some of myself in them. Stings are nearer than stars."

The Boy answered by meditating upon the picture and music. The Snake departed, saying that stings and stars cannot keep company.

The Boy journeyed on, ever led by the star. Some distance away the Mule was bemoaning the presence of his heels and trying to rid himself of them by kicking a tree. The Hog was dividing his time between looking into a brook and rubbing his snout on a rock to shorten it. The Snake lay dead of its own bite. The Boy journeyed on, led by an ever inviting star.

CHILDREN AT EASTER

C. EMILY FRAZIER

That day in old Jerusalem when Christ our Lord was slain, I wonder if the children hid and wept in grief and pain; Dear little ones, on whose fair brows His tender touch had been, Whose infant forms had nestled close His loving arms within.

I think that very soberly went mournful little feet When Christ our Lord was laid away in Joseph's garden sweet,

And wistful eyes grew very sad and dimpled cheeks grew white, When He who suffered babes to come was prisoned from the light.

With beaming looks and eager words a glad surprise He gave To those who sought their buried Lord and found an empty grave; For truly Christ had conquered death, Himself the Prince of Life, And none of all His Followers shall fail in any strife.

O little ones, around the cross your Easter garlands twine, And bring your precious Easter gifts to many a sacred shrine, And, better still, let offerings of pure young hearts be given On Easter Day to Him who reigns the King of earth and heaven.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

WILLIAM PICKENS

He was the first President of the Republic who was American through and through. There was not one foreign element in his bringing up; he was an unmixed child of the Western plains, born in the South, reared in the North. Most of the Presidents before him, being reared nearer the Atlantic, had imbibed more or less of Eastern culture and had European airs. This man Lincoln was so thoroughly democratic as to astonish both Old and New England. He never acted "the President," and was always a man among men, the honored servant of the people.

From a five-dollar fee before a justice of the peace, he had risen to a five-thousand-dollar fee before the Supreme Court of Illinois. From a study of "Dilworth's Spelling Book" in his seventh year, he had risen to write, in his fifty-seventh year, his second Inaugural, which is the greatest utterance of man, and yet all of his days in school added together are less than one year. His pioneer life had given him a vein of humor which became his "Life-preserver" in times of stress; it had also given him a love for human liberty that was unaffected. He felt that the enslavement of some men was but the advance guard, the miner and sapper, of the enslavement of all men.

From a poor captain of volunteers in the scandalous little Black Hawk War, where he jokingly said he "bled, died, and came away," although he never had a skirmish nor saw an Indian, he had risen to the chief command in a war that numbered three thousand battles and skirmishes and cost three billion dollars. Having no ancestry himself, being able to trace his line by rumor and tradition only as far back as his grandfather, he became, like George Washington, the Father of his Country. Born of a father who could not write his name, he himself had written the Proclamation of Emancipation, the fourth great state paper in the history of the Anglo-Saxon race,--the others being Magna Charta, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. If we accept the statement of Cicero that the days on which we are saved should be as illustrious as the days on which we are born, then Lincoln the Savior must always remain coördinate with Washington, the Father of his country. Jackson was "Old Hickory," Taylor was "Old Rough," and there have been various names given to the other Presidents, but Washington and Lincoln were the only ones whom the American people styled "Father."

Child of the American soil, cradled and nursed in the very bosom of nature, he loved his country with the passion with which most men love their human mothers. He could not bear the thought of one iota of detraction from her honor, her dignity or her welfare. Against her dismemberment he was willing to fight to the end of his second administration or till the end of time. He might tolerate anything else except disunion,--even the right of some of his fellowmen to enslave others. Of every concession which he made during his administration, to friend or foe, the _sine qua non_ was Union. A house divided against itself cannot stand.

In this he left us a great heritage; it is a lesson for both sections, and all races of any section. White men of America, black men of America, by the eternal God of heaven, there can be no division of destiny on the same soil and in the bosom and in the lap of the same natural mother. Men may attempt and accomplish discrimination in a small way, but Almighty God and all-mothering nature are absolutely impartial. They have woven the fabric of life so that the thread of each man's existence is a part of the whole. He who sets fire to his neighbor's house, endangers the existence of his own; he who degrades his neighbor's children, undermines the future of his own. Together we rise and together we fall is the plan of God and the rule of nature. We must lean together in the common struggle of life: the syncline is stronger than the anticline.

In a great nation with an increasing fame, the lesson of Lincoln's life must grow in importance. As long as the human heart loves freedom his name will be a word on the tongues of men. His name will be a watchword wherever liberty in her struggles with tyranny lifts her embattled banners. No man of the ancient or the modern world has a securer place in the hearts and memories of men than this man Lincoln, who was born in obscurity, who died in a halo, and who now rests in an aureole of historic glory.

RONDEAU

JESSIE FAUSET

When April's here and meadows wide Once more with spring's sweet growths are pied, I close each book, drop each pursuit, And past the brook, no longer mute, I joyous roam the countryside.

Look, here the violets shy abide And there the mating robins hide-- How keen my senses, how acute, When April's here!

And list! down where the shimmering tide Hard by that farthest hill doth glide, Rise faint sweet strains from shepherd's flute, Pan's pipes and Berecynthian lute. Each sight, each sound fresh joys provide When April's here.

HOW I ESCAPED

FREDERICK DOUGLASS

Although slavery was a delicate subject, and very cautiously talked about among grown-up people in Maryland, I frequently talked about it, and that very freely, with the white boys. I would sometimes say to them, while seated on a curbstone or a cellar door, "I wish I could be free, as you will be when you get to be men. You will be free, you know, as soon as you are twenty-one, and can go where you like, but I am a slave for life. Have I not as good a right to be free as you have?"

Words like these, I observed, always troubled them; and I had no small satisfaction in drawing out from them, as I occasionally did, that fresh and bitter condemnation of slavery which ever springs from natures unseared and unperverted. Of all consciences, let me have those to deal with, which have not been seared and bewildered with the cares and perplexities of life.

I do not remember ever to have met with a boy while I was in slavery, who defended the system, but I do remember many times, when I was consoled by them, and by them encouraged to hope that something would yet occur by which I would be made free. Over and over again, they have told me that "they believed I had as good a right to be free as they had," and that "they did not believe God ever made any one to be a slave."

On Monday, the third day of September, 1838, in accordance with my resolution, I bade farewell to the city of Baltimore, and to slavery.

My success was due to address rather than courage; to good luck rather than bravery. My means of escape were provided for me by the very men who were making laws to hold and bind me more securely in slavery. It was the custom in the State of Maryland to require of the free colored people to have what were called free papers. This instrument they were required to renew very often, and by charging a fee for this writing, considerable sums from time to time were collected by the State. In these papers the name, age, color, height, and form of the free man were described, together with any scars or other marks upon his person.

Now more than one man could be found to answer the same general description. Hence many slaves could escape by impersonating the owner of one set of papers; and this was often done as follows: A slave nearly or sufficiently answering the description set forth in the papers, would borrow or hire them till he could by their means escape to a free state, and then, by mail or otherwise, return them to the owner. The operation was a hazardous one for the lender as well as the borrower.

A failure on the part of the fugitive to send back the papers would imperil his benefactor, and the discovery of the papers in possession of the wrong man would imperil both the fugitive and his friend. It was therefore an act of supreme trust on the part of a freeman of color thus to put in jeopardy his own liberty that another might be free. It was, however, not infrequently bravely done, and was seldom discovered. I was not so fortunate as to sufficiently resemble any of my free acquaintances to answer the description of their papers.

But I had one friend--a sailor--who owned a sailor's protection, which answered somewhat the purpose of free papers--describing his person, and certifying to the fact that he was a free American sailor. The instrument had at its head the American eagle, which gave it the appearance at once of an authorized document. This protection did not, when in my hands, describe its bearer very accurately. Indeed, it called for a man much darker than myself, and close examination of it would have caused my arrest at the start.

In order to avoid this fatal scrutiny I had arranged with a hackman to bring my baggage to the train just on the moment of starting, and jumped upon the car myself when the train was already in motion. Had I gone into the station and offered to purchase a ticket, I should have been instantly and carefully examined, and undoubtedly arrested.

In choosing this plan upon which to act, I considered the jostle of the train, and the natural haste of the conductor, in a train crowded with passengers, and relied upon my skill and address in playing the sailor as described in my protection, to do the rest. One element in my favor was the kind feeling which prevailed in Baltimore, and other seaports at the time, towards "those who go down to the sea in ships." "Free trade and sailors' rights" expressed the sentiment of the country just then.

In my clothing I was rigged out in sailor style. I had on a red shirt and a tarpaulin hat and black cravat, tied in sailor fashion, carelessly and loosely about my neck. My knowledge of ships and sailor's talk came much to my assistance, for I knew a ship from stem to stern, and from keelson to cross-trees, and could talk sailor like an "old salt."

On sped the train, and I was well on the way to Havre de Grace before the conductor came into the Negro car to collect tickets and examine the papers of his black passengers. This was a critical moment in the drama. My whole future depended upon the decision of this conductor. Agitated I was while this ceremony was proceeding, but still externally, at least, I was apparently calm and self-possessed. He went on with his duty--examining several colored passengers before reaching me. He was somewhat harsh in tone, and peremptory in manner until he reached me, when, strangely enough, and to my surprise and relief, his whole manner changed.

Seeing that I did not readily produce my free papers, as the other colored persons in the car had done, he said to me in a friendly contrast with that observed towards the others: "I suppose you have your free papers?" To which I answered: "No, sir; I never carry my free papers to sea with me." "But you have something to show that you are a free man, have you not?" "Yes, sir," I answered; "I have a paper with the American eagle on it, that will carry me around the world." With this I drew from my deep sailor's pocket my seaman's protection, as before described. The merest glance at the paper satisfied him, and he took my fare and went on about his business.

This moment of time was one of the most anxious I ever experienced. Had the conductor looked closely at the paper, he could not have failed to discover that it called for a very different looking person from myself, and in that case it would have been his duty to arrest me on the instant, and send me back to Baltimore from the first station.

When he left me with the assurance that I was all right, though much relieved, I realized that I was still in great danger: I was still in Maryland, and subject to arrest at any moment. I saw on the train several persons who would have known me in any other clothes, and I feared they might recognize me, even in my sailor "rig," and report me to the conductor, who would then subject me to a closer examination, which I knew well would be fatal to me.

Though I was not a murderer fleeing from justice, I felt, perhaps, quite miserable as such a criminal. The train was moving at a very high rate of speed for that time of railroad travel, but to my anxious mind, it was moving far too slowly. Minutes were hours, and hours were days during this part of my flight. After Maryland I was to pass through Delaware--another slave State. The border lines between slavery and freedom were the dangerous ones, for the fugitives. The heart of no fox or deer, with hungry hounds on his trail, in full chase, could have beaten more anxiously or noisily than did mine, from the time I left Baltimore till I reached Philadelphia.

The passage of the Susquehanna river at Havre de Grace was made by ferry-boat at that time, on board of which I met a young colored man by the name of Nichols, who came very near betraying me. He was a "hand" on the boat, but instead of minding his business, he insisted upon knowing me, and asking me dangerous questions as to where I was going, and when I was coming back, etc. I got away from my old and inconvenient acquaintance as soon as I could decently do so, and went to another part of the boat.

Once across the river I encountered a new danger. Only a few days before I had been at work on a revenue cutter, in Mr. Price's ship-yard, under the care of Captain McGowan. On the meeting at this point of the two trains, the one going south stopped on the track just opposite to the one going north, and it so happened that this Captain McGowan sat at a window where he could see me very distinctly, and would certainly have recognized me had he looked at me but for a second. Fortunately, in the hurry of the moment, he did not see me; and the trains soon passed each other on their respective ways.

But this was not the only hair-breadth escape. A German blacksmith, whom I knew well, was on the train with me, and looked at me very intently, as if he thought he had seen me somewhere before in his travels. I really believe he knew me, but had no heart to betray me. At any rate he saw me escaping and held his peace.

The last point of imminent danger, and the one I dreaded most, was Wilmington. Here we left the train and took the steamboat for Philadelphia. In making the change here I again apprehended arrest, but no one disturbed me, and I was soon on the broad and beautiful Delaware, speeding away to the Quaker City. On reaching Philadelphia in the afternoon I inquired of a colored man how I could get on to New York? He directed me to the Willow street depot, and thither I went, taking the train that night. I reached New York Tuesday morning, having completed the journey in less than twenty-four hours. Such is briefly the manner of my escape from slavery--and the end of my experience as a slave.

FREDERICK DOUGLASS

W. H. CROGMAN

Frederick Douglass is dead! How strange that sounds to those of us who from earliest boyhood have been accustomed to hear him spoken of as the living exponent of all that is noblest and best in the race. The mind reluctantly accepts the unwelcome truth. And yet it is a truth--a serious, a solemn truth. Frederick Douglass is no more. The grand old hero of a thousand battles has at last fallen before the shaft of the common destroyer, and upon his well-battered shield loving hands have tenderly borne that stalwart form to its last, long resting place. Earth to earth, dust to dust, ashes to ashes!

This country will never again see another Douglass; this world will never again see another Douglass, for in all probability there will never again exist that peculiar combination of circumstances to produce exactly such a type of manhood. Man is, in a measure, the product of environment. Yet it would be injustice to Frederick Douglass to say that he was great simply because of environment. He was great in spite of environment. Born a slave, subjected in his youth and early manhood to all the degrading, stultifying, demoralizing influences of slavery, he has left behind him, after a public life long and varied and stormy, a name as clean and spotless as driven snow. Take notice of this, young men, you who have ambitions, you who are aspiring to public place, position, and power. Take notice that a public life need not be separated from unsullied honor.

I said Frederick Douglass was great in spite of environment. Had there been no slavery to fight, no freedom to win, he would still have been a great man. Greatness was inherent in his being, and circumstances simply evoked it. He was one of those choice spirits whom the Almighty sends into this world with the stamp of a great mission on their very form and features. Said Sam Johnson with reference to Edmund Burke: "Burke, sir, is such a man that if you met him for the first time in the street, where you were stopped by a drove of oxen, and you and he stepped aside to take shelter but for five minutes, he'd talk to you in such a manner that when you parted you would say, 'This is an extraordinary man.'"