The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 04, No. 25, November, 1859: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and PoliticsVarious
History
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 04, No. 25, November, 1859: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
you to the sugar-mill, where the crushing of the cane goes on in the
jolliest fashion. The building is octagonal and open. Its chief feature
is a very large horizontal wheel, which turns the smaller ones that
grind the cane. Upon this are mounted six horses, driven by as many
slaves, male and female, whose exertions send the wheel round with
sufficient rapidity. This is really a novel and picturesque sight. Each
negro is armed with a short whip, and their attitudes, as they stand,
well-balanced on the revolving wheel, are rather striking. They were
liberal of blows and of objurgations to the horses; but all their cries
and whipping produced scarcely a tenth of the labor so silently
performed by the invisible, noiseless slave that works the
steam-engine. From this we wandered about the avenues, planted with
palms, cocoas, and manifold fruit-trees,--visited the sugar-fields,
where many slaves were cutting the canes and piling them on enormous
ox-carts, and came at last to a great, open field, where many head of
cattle were quietly standing. Our negro guide had not been very lavish
or intelligible in his answers to our numerous questions. We asked him
about these cattle. "Dey cows," he replied. We asked if they gave milk,
and if butter was made on the plantation. He seemed quite puzzled and
confused, and finally exclaimed,--"Dat cows no got none wife." Coming
nearer, we found that the cows were draught oxen, employed in dragging
the canes and other produce of the plantation. Jenks his garden we
found in good order, and beautiful with many plants in full blossom;
but Jenks his house seemed dreary and desolate, with no books, a
wretched print or so, dilapidated furniture, and beds that looked like
the very essence of nightmare. Nothing suggested domestic life or
social enjoyment, or anything--; but as Jenks is perfectly unknown to
us, either by appearance or reputation, we give only a guess in the
dark, and would suggest, in case it may displease him, that he should
refurnish and repaint a little, and diffuse an air of cheerfulness over
his solitary villa, remembering that Americans have imaginations, and
that visitors will be very apt to construct an unknown host from his
surroundings.
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