Dowager

“ When the landlady saw the unbroken food, she said to her daughter, "I know the poor ladies are sorely troubled by their losses in that shameful bank. There's one thing I can't make out about our corrupt nature. The people who are troubled by something wrong with their bodies eat and drink more than is good for them by way of trying to coax themselves to break their fast, and them that are troubled in their minds don't eat anything at all. The matter seems upside down somehow."
CHAPTER XXV.
TWO OF A RACE.
That day had not opened pleasantly or auspiciously for Mrs. Grace and her granddaughter. ”

“ Revivals of religion and revivals in the slave-trade go hand in hand together. The slave prison and the church stand near each other. The clanking of fetters and the rattling of chains in the prison, and the pious psalm and solemn prayer in the church, may be heard at the same time. The dealers in the bodies and souls of men erect their stand in the presence of the pulpit, and they mutually help each other. The dealer gives his blood-stained gold to support the pulpit, and the pulpit, in return, covers his infernal business with the garb of Christianity. ”

“ Gold commissioners, bankers, squatters, swells, come to see the rush; burly diggers just as they had left their work, shanty-keepers, bullies, loafers, and niggers, all pierced with cold and impelled by hunger, that great leveller of distinctions, jostled and pressed eagerly to satisfy the cravings of their appetites. ”

“ And oh, what prizes of the dump! Cracked plates, cups and saucers, tinware, bric-à-brac, footwear, clothing, nursing-bottles and nipples, bottles with the dregs of flavoring extracts, cod-liver oil, perfumes, emulsions, tonics, poisons, antiseptics, cordials, decayed fruit, and faded flowers! These were seized in triumph, taken home in glee, and no doubt used in faith. There is little philosophy in poverty, and questions of sanitation and prudence come in the stage beyond it. ”

“ Some were crowding with sharp, eager faces round a rag merchant, bargaining with the most absorbing passion for his wretched wares, and then separating to quarrel and fight over their purchases, or bartering their rags again as eagerly for a draught of the intoxicating drinks which had made so many of them the lost creatures they were. Not a rag or a burning drop was to be had except for money, and often for a price which to them was life itself. ”

“ But such a commerce means much more. Hundreds of thousands of hardy men risk their lives that we may have bread and butter, sugar with our tea, and all the necessaries and luxuries of modern civilised life. ”

“ One man always remained to mind the camp while the others were at work, and very often he used to do what was known as "weeding"—that was, taking a little out of each man's allowance of provisions, and then he had a little to sell and get money to buy himself some tea and sugar. ”

“ Ay, ay, 'tis the rich face that keeps us from poverty. If the tailor's countenance were in fashion now, and all that had fiery faces were counted comets, what a decay would there be amongst our houses of good fellowship. How our cans would rot and jugs grow musty for want of use! I would the whole city were jugs and cans, that they might never be in good case but when they're full of good liquor. ”

“ The dowries often comprised various kinds of property including gold and silver, slaves, furniture and apparel, and generally appear to have exceeded in value the marriage-price paid by the husband. If children born of the marriage survived the wife, her dowry was divided amongst them. ”

“ I have a supply of water and a cask of bread, but the poor wrecked mariners are [Pg 42] entirely destitute. Shall I keep my provisions for my own comfort, and leave these sufferers to pine away with hunger and thirst? But suppose I have not only bread and water, but many luxuries, while the men on the wreck are perishing for the want of a morsel of bread and a drop of water? And then, suppose I have casks of bread and other provisions to dispose of, and intend with the proceeds to furnish myself with certain of the conveniences and elegancies of life ”

“ The poor slave, on his hard pine plank, scantily covered with his thin blanket, slept more soundly than the feverish voluptuary who reclined upon his downy pillow. Food to the indolent is poison, not sustenance. Lurking beneath the rich and tempting viands were invisible spirits of evil, which filled the self-deluded gourmandizer with aches and pains, passions uncontrollable, fierce tempers, dyspepsia, rheumatism, lumbago, and gout, and of these the Lloyds had a full share.
Col. Lloyd Whipping Barney. ”

“ The necessary wearing apparel and bedding and bedsteads of the debtor and his family, and the tools and instruments of his trade or calling to the value of thirty dollars, one stove, and his last cow, cooking utensils, six each of knives, forks, plates, cups, saucers, spoons, chairs, one shovel, one table, teapot, jug, spinning-wheel, weaving loom, ten religious volumes, food and fuel for thirty days, two sheep, one hog, and food for same and cow for thirty days shall be exempt from execution. ”

“ Though the houses were full of riches, these would scarce suffice to buy bread for those who remained alive. The Doge and some of his Council passed laws to lighten the misery of the people, but soon few heeded these laws which none were left to enforce. The vagabonds and evil-minded men who began by robbing the deserted houses of jewels, money and plate, ended by searching them for food and casting aside their treasures as worthless dross. ”

“ We never took more than we could get away with. But we did take the cream of everything. For instance, if some philanthropic farmer had donated several dollars' worth of tobacco, we took it. So, also, we took butter and sugar, coffee and canned goods; but when the stores consisted of sacks of beans and flour, or two or three slaughtered steers, we resolutely refrained and went our way, leaving orders to turn such provisions over to the commissary boats whose business was to follow behind us. ”

“ Then he told him the whole story, adding, “Take this purse of a thousand dinars and give me the damsel, that I may carry her to my own land, for the money will profit thee more than keeping her in prison; moreover God will requite thee for us, and we will both offer up prayers for thy safety and prosperity.” When the warder heard this story, he marvelled exceedingly at this device and taking the money, delivered the girl to the goldsmith, on condition that he should not abide one hour with her in the city. ”

“ Young women of eighteen or twenty also work fifteen hours daily, for a mockery of remuneration. And that happens not only to my fellow countrymen, but to all the workers, who sweat the whole day long for a crust of bread, while their labor produces wealth in abundance. The workers are obliged to live under the most wretched conditions, and their food consists of a little bread, a few spoonfuls of rice, and water ”

“ And night by night the robbers came and carried off the wealth from house and barn, and drove away the choicest of the herds.
13. And when they knew that much of all the wealth that they were left to guard had been purloined, they said,
14. We cannot be to blame; if we had known the day and hour when our lord would come again we would have guarded well his wealth, and suffered not the thieves to carry it away ”

“ Those persons either could not maintain themselves on the goldfields, or were compelled by hunger to leave them in order to obtain employment, or they could not reconcile themselves to the privations and hazards which diggers have to undergo. ”

“ Here I recognized a large chest, a rum cask, and the grass hammock of my agent. I was rather exasperated to find my property thus neglected and exposed, and began venting my wrath in no seemly terms on the delinquent clerk, when my conductor laid his hand gently on my sleeve, and said there was no need to blame him. 'This,' continued he, 'is his house; here your property is sheltered from sun and rain; and, among the Bagers, whenever your goods arc protected from the elements, they are safe from every danger. Your man has gone across the plain to a neighboring town for oil ”

“ The small dowries and the very large ones may be useful to two different classes of men. The small dowries are often valuable to people in the struggling classes because they may enable the husband to advance his trade. ”

“ But if you had very little dinner, scarcely enough to satisfy your own hunger, you would buy more bread for your rat if you could. If your jailer asked you much more than the bread would be worth out of prison, you would give it him rather than your rat should not come and play with you. ”

“ And besides that, from your commerce in leather, jewels, grain, and pepper, you gain a fortune——"
"They are all losing concerns. All are injuring my property. I have made up my mind to give up commerce; perhaps—I have not quite decided yet—I may continue in that of pepper; but no more leather, no more grain; who deals in grain, will die on straw."
"You can do as you please; but will you give me forty thousand ducats?" ”

“ Are not much grosser Exorbitancies to be feared on the other Side, when the lowest Artificers, Husbandmen, and Labourers, are made Judges in their own Cause; and when it is left to their own Discretion, to exact what Price they please for their Labour, of the poor Farmer or Clothier; of whom if they cannot exact an extravagant Price, they will fly to that Alternative which Idleness often prefers, of Begging or Stealing? ”

“ And the prince told him.
“Then I beg your Highness to ask Lucky Luck this question: Why is it that though I have an excellent mill, with all its machinery complete, and get plenty of grain to grind, I am so poor that I hardly know how to live from one day to another?” ”

“ Articles of food, such as tea and sugar, or of convenience, like candles, starch, and soap, she never dreamed of being required at her hands. This method of living upon their neighbours is a most convenient one to unprincipled people, as it does not involve the penalty of stealing ”

“ Years went by and money and possessions began to change the farmer’s disposition. The more he accumulated, the more he wanted, until people were whispering behind his back that he was miserly and avaricious. ”

“ Then there would be some few purchases, mostly of coffee and tobacco, the money being wages received for farming for the few comparatively wealthy men who had a score or so of acres under cultivation and were too lazy to do the work themselves. ”

“ To show the force of habit, though it is a vicious one, we will give the reader a striking example. Some of the prisoners were so attached to chewing tobacco, that they sold all their day’s allowance of beef to the French at the gate, to purchase one chew. They sometimes sold this allowance to buy soap enough to wash one shirt, but this was only enduring one evil to remedy a worse. ”

“ In this apprehension, I lead a vagabond life, sometimes disguised as a priest or monk, sometimes as a gentleman or a peasant. Where is the benefit of knowing how to manufacture gold on such terms? Are not the goods of this world downright misery to those who cannot enjoy them in tranquillity? ”

“ The clerks have no conscience. In old days one could get off with half a rouble in copper and a sack of flour, but now you have to send them a whole cartload of grain, and add a red note too, they are such money-grubbers. ”

“ The new landowners were men who thought only of riches, and turned out the tenants of the old monks by the score, and by the hundred. A swarm of beggars was let loose over the country, beggars to whom the monks had given daily doles of bread and beer. Savage laws of whipping and forced labour had to be passed to keep these men in order. ”

“ Instead of spending the produce of your hunting in purchasing this pernicious drink, which produces poverty, broils and murders, it will now be employed in procuring food and clothing for your families, and increasing instead of diminishing your numbers. ”

“ We all are, we well-to-do people, as we think ourselves. Once my wife and I revolted by a common impulse against the ridiculous waste and slavery of the thing. We went to the storage warehouse and sent three or four vanloads of the rubbish to the auctioneer. Some of the pieces we had not seen for years, and as each was hauled out for us to inspect and decide upon, we condemned it to the auction-block with shouts of rejoicing. Tender and sacred associations! ”

“ The dead cattle, the ungarnered crops, the untilled lands—every spring of wealth had dried up at the same moment. Those who were rich became poor; but those who were poor already, and especially those who were poor with the burden of gentility upon their shoulders, found themselves in a perilous state. ”

“ So then, no body is injured by this condensation, and concentration of Ale, or Wine, but both the Buyer and Seller are Gainers, and this should of right, be in every Man’s heart, what condition soever he be of. It would be well done of Noble Men, Princes, Kings, Emperors, and other Magistrates and Common Wealths, if they would provide in their Store-houses for Warfare, such kind of condensed Liquors, and Juices, that so the poor may in a time of scarcity be made partakers of that plenty, and they will have no loss thereby, but rather benefit. ”