[Subsection]

St. Amelia Inhegno is a large sugar plantation, and I am now sitting in the smoke of the sugar-mill, which enters through the open window into my room--a large, excellent room, with a regular glass window, from which I obtain a fine view of the hills of Camerisca, and the palm-groves and plantations at their feet. I have every thing here which I can wish for, only too much of the sugar manufacture, which is just opposite my one window, and which is on a much larger scale than on the plantation of Ariadne. Is it not singular that the word Inhegno, which here signifies an inclosed and cultivated place, and which is always used to indicate a plantation, so much resembles, both in sound and meaning, our Swedish word Inhägnad?

My hostess, Mrs. De C., is an agreeable and well-bred American lady, a widow with four children, three of whom are in the United States, and only one, a pretty girl of sixteen, remaining with her at home. She lives here with her father, an old officer of cheerful temperament, although lame, and confined for the most part to his arm-chair. A young American Creole, Mr. W., whose plantation adjoins, is a daily visitor in the family, and a most agreeable companion he is. He, like my hostess, is possessed of the gift of gay and easy conversation, below which lies a foundation of earnest integrity. Another young man belongs to the social circle of the evening and the dinner-table, and he is, under the old gentleman, overseer of the plantation. This young man is of great value to me, from the candor and readiness with which he communicates any information which I may desire to possess.

This plantation is much larger than the one I visited in Limonar, and a considerable portion of the slaves two hundred in number--have lately been brought hither from   [p. 332]   Africa, and have a much wilder appearance than those I saw at Ariadne. They are worked also with much more severity, because here they are allowed only four and a half hours out of the four-and-twenty for rest; that is to say, for their meals and sleep, and that during six or seven months of the year! Through the remaining portion of the twelve months, the "dead season," as it is called, the slaves are allowed to sleep the whole night. It is true, nevertheless, that even now, upon this plantation, they have one night a week for sleep, and a few hours in the forenoon of each alternate Sunday for rest. It is extraordinary how any human beings can sustain existence under such circumstances; and yet I see here powerful negroes who have been on the plantations for twenty or thirty years. When the negroes have once become accustomed to the labor and the life of the plantation, it seems to agree with them; but during the first years, when they are brought here free and wild from Africa, it is very hard to them, and many seek to free themselves from slavery by suicide. This is frequently the case among the Luccomées, who appear to be among the noblest tribes of Africa, and it is not long since eleven Luccomées were found hanging from the branches of a guasima-tree--a tree which has long, horizontal branches. They had each one bound his breakfast in a girdle around him; for the African believes that such as die here immediately arise again to new life in their native land. Many female slaves, therefore, will lay upon the corpse of the self-murdered the kerchief, or the head-gear, which she most admires, in the belief that it will thus be conveyed to those who are dear to her in the mother-country, and will bear to them a salutation from her. The corpse of a suicide slave has been seen covered with hundreds of such tokens.

I am told here that nothing but severity will answer in the treatment of slaves; that they always must know that the whip is over them; that they are an ungrateful people;   [p. 333]   that in the disturbances of 1846 it was the kindest masters who were first massacred with their whole families, while, on the other hand, the severe, masters were carried off by their slaves into the woods, there to be concealed during the disturbances. I am told that, in order for a man to be loved by his slaves, he must be feared. I do not believe it; such is not human nature; but there is a difference between fear and fear. There is one fear which does not exclude love, and one which produces hatred and revolution.

The slaves have here, in a general way, a dark and brooding appearance. They go to their work in the sugar-fields sleepy and weary. As they drive the oxen to and fro, I frequently see them sucking sugar-cane, which they are very fond of, and of which they seem allowed here to have as much as they like. This is, at all events, a refreshment. They are not fed here on rice, but principally upon a species of root called malanga, which, it is said, they like, but which seemed to me insipid. It is yellow, and something like the potato, but has a poor and somewhat bitter taste; each slave receives a portion of such root boiled for dinner, and eats it with his salt meat. They have for breakfast boiled maize, which they bruise and mix with wild tomatoes, the fruit of the plantain, or vegetables; for they are allowed a little land on the plantation where they may sow and reap for themselves, and besides this, each family has a pig, which they kill yearly and sell.

Sunday, March 17. It is the Sabbath, and forenoon; but the sugar-mill is still grinding, and the whip-lash sounds commanding labor. The slaves will continue to work the whole day as if it were a week-day. Next Sunday, they say, is the one on which the slaves will rest for some hours, and dance if they are inclined; but--they look so worn out!

There are in Cuba plantations where the slaves work twenty-one out of the four-and-twenty hours; plantations   [p. 334]   where there are only men who are driven like oxen to work, but with less mercy than oxen. The planter calculates that he is a gainer by so driving his slaves, that they may die within seven years, within which time he again supplies his plantation with fresh slaves, which are brought hither from Africa, and which he can purchase for two hundred dollars a head. The continuance of the slave-trade in Cuba keeps down the price of slaves. I have heard of "gangs" of male slaves, six hundred in each gang, who are treated as prisoners, and at night locked up in a jail; but this is on the plantations in the southern part of the island.

It is amid circumstances such as these that one may become enamored of the ideal communities of socialism, and when men such as Alcott seem like the saviors and high-priests of the earth. How beautiful appear to me associated brotherhoods on the earth, with all their extravagance of love, when compared with a social state in which human powers are so awfully abused, and human rights trampled under foot! Here I feel myself more ardent than ever for those social doctrines which are laboring to advance themselves in the free states of America; and when I return thither, I shall endeavor to become better acquainted with them and their leaders, and to do more justice to both.

Yet even here I have derived some little comfort with regard to the condition of the slaves on this plantation, at least from the visit which I have paid to their bohea. This is a large, square, but low fortress-like wall, in which the slaves live as at Ariadne plantation, and in which they are secured by bolts and bars during the night. I have often visited them here during meal-times, and have always felt it a refreshment to witness their vigorous life and their cheerfulness; nevertheless, I have seen countenances here steeped in such gloom, that not all the tropical sunshine would illumine, so hopeless, so bitter, so   [p. 335]   speechless were they--it was dreadful! The countenance of one young woman, in particular, I shall never forget!

I can not but often admire the Herculean frames among the men, the energetic countenances in which a savage power seems united to a manly good-heartedness, which last shows itself especially in their treatment of the children, and by the very manner in which they look at them. The little ones are not here familiar and merry as they are on the plantations in America; they do not stretch out their little hands for a friendly salutation; they look at the white man with suspicious glances--they are shy; but the very little Bambinos, which are quite naked, fat, and plump, as shiny as black, or black-brown silk, dance upon their mother's knees, generally with a blue or red string of beads around the loins, and another round the neck; they are the very prettiest little things one ever saw; and the mothers, with their strings of beads round their necks, their showy kerchiefs fastened, turban-wise, around the head, look very well too, especially when, with delighted glances, and shining, pearly teeth, they are laughing and dancing with their fat little ones. Such a young mother, with her child beneath a banana-tree, is a picture worthy the pencil of a good painter.

I saw in those dark little rooms--very like those at Ariadne plantation-- more than one slave occupied during the short time allowed him for rest in weaving little baskets and hats of palm-leaves, and one of them had constructed a fine head-dress of showy patches and cock's feathers!

In other respects the slaves live in the bohea very much like cattle. Men and women live together, and part again according to fancy or whim. If a couple, after having lived together for some time, grow weary of each other, the one will give the other some cause of displeasure, and then they separate. In case of any noisy quarrel, the majoral is at hand with his whip to establish peace.

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"Are there here no couples who live constantly together as in proper marriage; no men and women who love one another sufficiently well to be faithful to each other as husband and wife?" inquired I from my young, candid conductor.

"Yes," replied he, "there are really such couples who have always remained together since they have been upon this plantation."

"Lead me to one of these couples," said I.

It was just dinner-time. My companion led me to one of the rooms in the wall. The door stood open, as is commonly the case, to admit light and air. The man was out; the woman sat alone in the room; she might be about fifty, and was busy at some work. She had a round face, without beauty, but with a good and peaceful expression.

I asked her, through my interpreter, whether she was fond of her husband?

She replied cheerfully and without hesitation, "Yes; he is a good husband."

I inquired whether she had been attached to him in Africa?

"Yes, in Africa," she replied.

I asked how long she had been united to her husband--how many years?

This question seemed to trouble or perplex her; she smiled, and replied at length that she had had him always!

Always! She did not know how vast and profound that word was on her lips. It went to my heart. Weeks, months, seasons, years, youth. strength, many changes had passed by unnoted, unobserved; hemisphere had been changed for hemisphere, freedom for slavery, the palm-tree hut for the bohea, a life of liberty for a life of labor-- every thing had changed; but one thing had remained steadfast, one thing had remained the same--her love--her fidelity! She had always had him, the husband whom she loved--   [p. 337]   he had always had her. Of that which was variable and evanescent she knew not, made no account--she knew merely of time as regarded that which was eternal. She had had her husband always; she should have him always. That was evidently written in her calm countenance and in her calm voice. It could not be otherwise.

"Love requires to be sustained by duty!" said Geijer to me, on one occasion when he spoke of marriage. So it does; but it is beautiful to see that the natural marriage between two kindred souls can remain firm and strong merely through the law of love, amid the wild license of the bohea, and that in the case of two black people, two of the wild offspring of the desert!

Poets and philosophers have spoken of souls predestined for each other. Here I found two such. They had always belonged to each other. In the profound consciousness of God they had belonged to each other, and would belong to each other through all time--that is, in--eternity.

The man entered while I was still in the room. He seemed to be about the same age as the woman, and had same good-hearted expression; but there was in his smile a sort of imprisoned sunshine, a cheerful beam of light, which, lit up from the heart itself, seemed as if it would gladly have free diffusion. I have often observed this imprisoned beam of light in the countenances of these children of bondage. They have brought it with them as an inheritance from their mother-country.

I went from this married pair to the prison cell, in which the slaves are placed after they have suffered punishment--women as well as men--and while the mind is still in a state of fermentation, after having endured bodily suffering. They are placed here in irons, made fast to a wooden frame, and here they sit, bound hands and feet--women as well as men--till their minds are again calm and their wounds healed, so that they can   [p. 338]   again go to their work. They are said to get fat while they remain here! The room was now empty, and inhabited merely by swarms of fleas.

I only wonder that suicide is not of more frequent occurrence among this people. How strong and tenacious the instinct of life must be!

The sugar-mill here affords, in its way, an interesting and picturesque scene. The athletic figures of those half-naked Africans who stand by the furnaces, or by the boiling sugar-pans, in those large, gloomy buildings, or who move about occupied in various ways, produce a singular effect. I can not behold without amazement and pleasure the savage but calm majesty of their bearing and movement, as well as the dark energy of their countenances. Sculptors ought to see and model from these African chests and shoulders. They seem made to sustain Atlas. And though the Atlas of slavery presses heavily upon them, they are still strong--terribly strong, if the hour of vengeance should ever come; now they are silent and gloomy. The Spanish majorals, in their white shirts and with their whips, or short, thin, square staves in their hands, stand or sit here and there on elevated platforms within the building, to overlook the work, and in the morning take the while their coffee and white bread. They seem to me, as far as form and appearance goes, to be much smaller and more insignificant than many of the black slaves. In the slave states of America no idea can be formed of the peculiar beauty of form of the African negro, especially those of certain tribes. The native slaves there are a weaker and gentler race. The wild raven has been tamed.

Many of the slaves, also, who are brought to Cuba have been princes and chiefs of their tribes, and such of their race as have accompanied them into slavery on the plantations always show them respect and obedience. A very young man, a prince of the Luccomäes, with several of   [p. 339]   his nation, was taken to a plantation on which, from some cause or other, he was condemned to be flogged, and the others, as is customary in such cases, to witness the punishment. When the young prince laid himself down on the ground to receive the lashes, his attendants did the same likewise, requesting to be allowed to share his punishment. This affecting instance of loyalty produced merely the coarse assurance "that they should not fail of their full share of the whip when opportunity offered !"'

This occurrence did not take place on this plantation.

There is more use made of machinery in this sugar-mill than in that at Ariadne. Instead of fixed troughs by which the sugar-cane is conveyed by human hands to and from the mill-stones, there are here carriages to convey the cane worked by machinery, and which run on many wheels in a long row, one after the other, from one door of the sugar-mill to the other, and it is merely at the entrance-gate that the cane is loaded by human hands.

And now you must have had enough of sugar-cane; but, before I leave the bohea, I must say a few words about the government of its population. This rests, after the master, upon an overseer, who is called the majoral, and below him is a contra-majoral, who sometimes is a negro. On large plantations, such as this, there are many white under-majorals. The condition of the slaves, and the prevailing state of feeling among them on a plantation, depends very much upon the ability, prudence, and humanity of the majorals. The savage murder of a majoral in Cuba not unfrequently bears witness to the despotism of their proceedings, and to the state of frenzied excitement into which cruel oppression may bring the naturally gentle and easily subjected negro-race.

However oppressive slavery may be to the inhabitants of the bohea, and though the planters quite naïvely ignore most of the Spanish laws for the emancipation of the slave, and though the justice of the law is also here nullified at   [p. 340]   pleasure, still the wafting breezes of the life of freedom can not be wholly excluded from the bohea. The slave knows, generally, that he can purchase his own freedom, and he knows also the means for the acquisition of money. The lottery is, in Cuba, one of the principal means for this purpose among the negro slaves, and they understand how to calculate their chances wisely. For instance, several individuals of a certain nation will unite for the purchase of a quantity of tickets, the numbers of which follow in close succession. Out of a total of consecutive numbers, one or two will commonly draw a prize, which, according to agreement, belongs to the nation, and is divided among all the members. In this way I have heard that the Luccomée nation lately obtained at Havana a prize of eleven thousand dollars, a portion of which, it is said, has been applied to purchase the freedom of slaves of their nation; and, if I mistake not, a Luccomée negro on this plantation has lately, with the consent of his owner, purchased his own freedom for two or three hundred dollars. Yes--some become free, but many, many never become so!

As far as concerns myself, my life here is as free and agreeable as I can desire. Mrs. De C. is a very charming and amiable person to associate with, and she allows me to have all the liberty I wish, and is infinitely agreeable to me. In the early mornings I go out alone; visit the slaves' bohea, or ramble about the plantation; I enjoy the air, and sketch trees and flowers. I have now become acquainted with that candelabra-like plant, which I have already mentioned. It is the flower-stalk of a plant of the aloe genus, called Peta, a shrub with stiff, thorny leaves, and this flower-stalk shoots up from the root every third year, and bears upon its branches bunches of yellowish flowers which produce fruit. It shoots up to a height of five or six ells, blossoms, and bears fruit all within the space of two months, after which it dies down. It has a singular but very ornamental appearance; I have made a   [p. 341]   drawing of it. Here, also, are a couple of remarkable ceiba-trees, the one on account of its beauty, the other for its deformity--its tragical combat with the parasite. The sugar-cane fields are inclosed with lofty, untrimmed hedges, in which grow wild orange and various tropical trees.

During the hottest part of the forenoon I sit quietly in my own light, excellent chamber, writing and drawing. Just before dinner I go out, look around me in the bohea, or seat myself under a mango-tree on a cross-road to catch a few breezes, if I can, in its shade. In the afternoon I generally drive out with Mrs. De C. in her volante, her daughter and Mr. W. accompanying us on horseback. To be rocked over the country in an open volante, in that heavenly, delicious air, is the most soothing, delightful enjoyment that any body can conceive.

The family assembles in the evening, and I then play American marches, "quick-steps"' and other lively pieces, with Yankee Doodle for the old gentleman, who, with these, recalls his youthful achievements, and feels new life in his stiffened limbs. At a later hour I go out on the pizza to see the stars shining in the darkness of night, and to inhale the zephyrs which, though not so full of life as at Matanzas, are yet always full of delicious influence.

Among my pleasures, I must not forget the lovely humming-birds in the little garden. In the mornings, and directly after mid-day, one may be sure to see them hovering around the flowers, and around the red ones by preference. There are in the garden a couple of shrubs, which are now covered with most splendid red flowers; the shrub is called La Coquette, and over these the little humming-birds are always hovering, they too of a splendid red, like little flames of fire. They are the most gorgeous little creatures any body can imagine, as fat as little bull-finches, and like them, having plump, brilliant breasts.

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They support themselves as if in the air, fluttering their wings for a considerable time about the red flowers, into which they then dip their bills, but how gracefully I can not describe. La Coquette and her winged wooers present the most lovely spectacle. I have here seen three kinds of humming-birds. The one with the crimson coloring of morning, of which I have just spoken; a little one of a smaragdus-green and more delicate form; and a third, green, with a crest of yellow rays on its head. They will sometimes all alight upon a bough, and as they fly away again, a soft, low twittering may be heard. They are quarrelsome, and pursue one another like little arrows through the air, while, as rivals, they approach the same flower.

Besides these most lovely little birds, I see here a black bird about as large as a jackdaw. It resembles the American blackbirds, and is called majitos or solibios (or soilvios, for here there is a great confusion between "v" and "b," and "b" and "v;" thus Havana is frequently both written and pronounced Habana). I see these blackbirds often sitting upon the branches of the candelabra-like peta. These queer birds are said to be a species of communists, to live in communities, to lay their eggs together, to hatch them in common, and to feed the young in the same manner, without any difference of mine or thine. The humming-bird is evidently of a very different temperament, and is a violent anti-communist.

The heat is now becoming excessive, and I feel it so enervating that I think I shall leave Cuba on the 8th of April instead of the 28th, as I had intended. From Cuba I shall proceed to Charleston and Savannah, visit two plantations on the coast of Georgia, and so on to Virginia --the Old Dominion--which I must see, and where I shall probably spend the month of May; thence to Philadelphia and New York--to my dear home at Rose Cottage; then to the White Mountains in New Hampshire, pay a visit to   [p. 343]   Maine and Vermont, and thence, in the month of July, to my first beautiful home on the banks of the Hudson; then to England, and then--home!

I am now going for a few days to Cardenas, a little city on the sea-coast; but I shall return hither. The kind Mrs. De C. will lend me her volante.