William Gilmore Simms

“ God forbid, Master Davis," said he, with solemnity, "God forbid that I should assail it. I am your friend, your countryman, and I rejoice in what you have done. You have done well and nobly in destroying that evidence of your dishonour; for it is dishonour to barter one's country and its liberties for dastardly security—for one's miserable life. You have done well; but be not rash. Your movements must be in quiet. Nothing rash, nothing precipitate. Every step you now take must be one of caution, for your path is along the steeps of danger. ”

“ Why, man, thou quarrellest with kindness, when thou ravet at Huck for sending thee to the swamp. Thou wert feverish and impatient this morning until thou wert fairly in it, with its mud and water plashing around thee; and now thou art here, with the trees crowding upon us so thickly that the sun looks not under them once in the whole year, thou creepest like a terrapin upon thy journey, as if thou didst greatly fear thou wouldst too quickly get through it. A barren fear, this, for we see but the beginning: the bog deepens, and the day grows darker as we go. Thou art slow, Travis. ”

“ Fold upon fold, like so many variously shaded wreaths, the dim curtain of the night was drawn gradually up into heave, and once more the vast panorama of forest, river, and green valley came out upon the sight, rising, by little and little, into life, in the slowly illumined distance. The moment old Humphries saw the approach of daylight, he finished his tumbler of punch, and, with a sad heart, he set out for Proctor's quarters. Some little delay preceded his introduction to the commandant of the garrison, who received him graciously, and civilly desired to know his business. ”

“ Meanwhile, sir, let us not again speak of the subject until that period."
"A painful subject, sir, which I shall gladly forbear," said Proctor, rising; "and I will hope, at the same time, that Colonel Walton thinks not unkindly of the bearer of troublesome intelligence."
"God forbid, sir! I am no malignant. You have done your duty with all tenderness, and I thank you for it. Our enemies are not always so considerate."
"No enemies, I trust, sir. I am in hopes that, upon reflection, you will not find it so difficult to reconcile yourself to what, at the first blush, may seem so unpleasant." ”

“ Humphries proceeded with temper and coolness—
"It is time, Frampton, to be a man—to bear up against your losses, and think how to have revenge for them."
"I am ready. Speak not to me of revenge—speak not; I am thirsting—thirsting for blood!" was the reply.
"Yet, here you sit moping over your losses, while the red-coats are in the swamp—ay, hunting us out in our own grounds—Huck's dragoons, with Travis at their head." ”

“ His small person, slight but active, thrown back, every muscle in action and ready for contest; his broad-brimmed white hat dashed from his brow; his black, glossy hair dishevelled and flying in the wind; lips closely compressed, while his deep, dark eye shot forth fires of anger, fiercely enlivening the dusky sallow of his cheek—all gave to him a most imposing expression of animated life and courage in the eye of his companion.
"Take it—take the worthless life!" he cried, in low but emphatic accents. "It is worthless, but you will hev' to fight for it." ”

“ Believe me, dear Emily, I love not this strife; but defence of our country is war under God's own sanction, since it seeks to maintain free from blood and from injustice the home which he has given to the peaceful."
"You shall not persuade me of it, Robert," was the reply of the dying maiden. "You will have your arguments, I know, and they will seem wise on your lips, and I may not be able to answer them from mine. But shall I believe in any argument of man, however plausible, when the words of God are so positive? He has forbidden strife, forbidden life. ”

“ I know it—I know it, Bella! and God knows how glad I am to know it! Had I not heard all between you, and that old hag of hell, I'd ha' put this knife into you, just the same as if you were not my own flesh and blood. But go now—run to church, and pray to have some sense as well as innocence; for innocence without sense is like a creeping baby that has not yet got the use of its arms and legs. Go now—run all the way—and mind that you say nothing to the old man about it. ”

“ Few persons think more highly of British valour than the Carolinians. Father, you, I know, think extravagantly of it; and cousin Robert, too: I have heard you both speak in terms which fully sustain you, Major Proctor, in what might be called the self-complaisance which just now assigned the cause of your success."
Colouring somewhat, and with a grave tone of voice that was not his wont, Proctor replied—
"There is truth in what I have told you, Miss Walton; the British soldier fights with a perfect faith in his invincibility, and this faith enables him to realize it. ”

“ As a true patriot, and a lover of his country at every hazard, I prayed that the time might soon come, when the oppressor should put his foot, aye, and the foot of his menials, too—on the necks of those selfish or spiritless, those too little wise, or too little honourable, who have been so very ready to hug his knee, and yield up to a base love for security their manly character and honest independence. Verily, they meet with their reward. Let them feel the scourge and chain, until, beaten and degraded, the stern necessity shall stimulate them to the duties they have so neglected. ”

“ Singleton was impatient to present himself to his fair cousin, whose dialogue with Proctor had given him all the gratification which a lover must always feel, who hears from the lips of her whom he loves, not only those sentiments which his own sense approves, but the general language of regard for himself, even so slight and passing as that which had fallen from his cousin in reference to him. ”

“ No one who knew his usually bold character, his recklessness of speech and action, would deem him liable to any fear from such influences as were supposed to belong to the withered tenant of that isolated hovel. And yet, when he thought upon the cheerless life which she led and seemed to love—when he asked himself what might be its pleasures or its solace—he could not avoid feeling that in its anti-social evidences lurked the best proof of its evil nature. Wherefore should age, poverty, and feebleness, fly so far, and look so harshly upon, the whole world around it? ”

“ But still I wish to know the truth of this matter. It's for my pleasure. I like to know the truth; whether I mind it or not is another thing."
"Your pleasure, boy—your pleasure! and what if I tell you that Humphries spoke true—that you are—"
"A bastard! speak it out—I want to hear it; and it will give me pleasure—I love that which provokes me. I can smile when one does me an injury—smile all the time I bear it quietly, for I think of the time when I'm to take pay for it. ”

“ Oakenburg was in the company—under the guidance in fact—of a person whose appearance was in admirable contrast with his own. This was no other than the Lieutenant Porgy, of whom Humphries has already given us an account. If Oakenburg was as lean as the Knight of La Mancha, Porgy was quite as stout as Sancho—a shade stouter perhaps, as his own height was not inconsiderable, yet showed him corpulent still. At a glance you saw that he was a jovial philosopher—one who enjoyed his bottle with his humours, and did not suffer the one to be soured by the other. ”

“ He might give a man his choice," responded the other, gruffly. "It's but a small favour I ask, to be suffered to choose for myself whether I shall work for my master on hill or in hole—with a free bit, or hand to hand, close struggle with a hungry alligator in his wallow."
"And thou wouldst choose the very service he now puts thee to. What! do we not all know thee—and who knows thee better than Huck? He sees thou art the best man for the swamp; that thy scent is keen with the bloodhound, thine eye like the hawk's, and thou art quick for fight as the major's bull-pup. ”

“ Here, the rank matter of the swamp, its slime and rubbish, resolving themselves by a natural but rapid decomposition into one mass, yield the thick luxuriance of soil from which springs up the overgrown tree, which throws out a thousand branches, and seems to have existed as many years—in whose bulk we behold an emblem of majesty, and, in whose term of life, standing in utter defiance of the sweeping hurricane, we have an image of strength which compels our admiration, and sometimes the more elevated acknowledgment of our awe. ”

“ Lawfully!—and what care you, Ned Blonay, about the lawfulness or the unlawfulness of your birth—you who hourly fight against the laws—who rob, who burn, who murder, whenever a chance offers, and care not? Is it not your pleasure to break the laws—to live on the profits and the property of others? Whence came the purse you brought here last week, but from the red-coat who travelled with you as a friend, and you, all the time receiving pay from his people? Whence came this watch you just now put into my hands, but from your prisoner? ”

“ Confound the fellow, I don't care whether he has eyes or not; sure I am, I know the name which people give him without minding the blear. I only want you to say what you've done with him—where he is now?"
"You are too quick—too violent, Humphries, with the old woman," said Singleton in a whisper.
"Major, don't I know her? The old hag—I see through her now, jist as easy as I ever saw through any thing in my life. I'll lay now she knows all about the skunk." ”

“ Who should esteem the neutral, when his country is in danger, and when her people are writhing under oppression? True, though bitter—more bitter, as it is too true. Robert Singleton, thou hast given me a keen stroke, boy, but I have deserved it. Thou hast spoken nothing but the truth."
"Now, indeed, uncle, I rejoice to see you, and in this humour. You have felt the stroke at last, but it is not my speech that has done it, uncle of mine. It is the proclamation of Sir Henry Clinton." ”

“ The ladies had retired, but it was not easy for Singleton and his uncle to resume the topic which had previously engaged them. There was a visible damp upon their spirits—the elastic nephew, the hesitating colonel, the rough, honest, and direct Humphries, all felt the passionate force of Emily's exhortation, though its argument necessarily failed upon them. There had been quite too much that was awing in her speech and manner—as if death were speaking through the lips of life. ”

“ The heart of the youth had been so much warmed towards her by what he had heard in the previous dialogue, that his manner and language had in them much more of passionate warmth than was altogether customary even with him.
"Dear, dear Kate, how I rejoice to see you!"
"Bless me, cousin, how affectionate you have become all at once! There's no end to you—there—have done with your squeezing. Hold my hand quietly, as if you had no wish to carry off the fingers, and I will conduct you to Emily." ”

“ The duties of the rich man—the leading, influential man—are those chiefly of example. What is our safety, and where would be the safety of any nation—its freedom or its glory—if, when danger came, its rich citizens made terms with the invader which sacrificed the poor? Such is your case—such your proceeding exactly. There is now, thank Heaven, but one alternative that Clinton's proclamation has left you."
"That is the sword—I know it, I feel it, Robert."
"Touch it not, touch it not, dear uncle, I pray you. Forbear the sword—the bloody smiting sword. Submit rather to the oppression. ”

“ Life is holy. None should take life but him who gives it, since to take life takes away from man, not only the privilege to breathe, but the privilege to repent of sins, to repair injustice, to make himself fit for immortality. When you slay your enemy, you send him not merely from one world—you send him into another—and which? Oh, brother, dear brother, wherefore would you engage in this horrid war? What blessing so great will it bring you, as to take from you the thought of the butchery you must go through to secure it? Oh, turn not away, Robert, but hear me! ”

“ The contest of the Revolution, as far as it had gone, had confirmed and made tenacious this spirit of hostility and opposition, until, in the end, patriot and loyalist had drawn the sword against one another, and rebel and tory were the degrading epithets by which they severally distinguished the individual whose throat they strove to cut. When the metropolis fell into the hands of the British, and their arms extended through the State, the tories alone were active and formidable. ”