Along the fences and by the woods I come upon their snares, dead-falls,
and rud box-traps. The freedman is a successful trapper and hunter, and
has by nature an insight into these things. I frequently see him in
market or on his way thither with a tame 'possum clinging timidly to
his shoulders, or a young coon or fox led by a chain. Indeed, the
colored man behaves precisely like the rude unsophisticated peasant
that he is, and there is fully as much virtue in him, using the word in
its true sense, as in the white peasant; indeed, much more than in the
poor whites who grew up by his side; while there is often a benignity
and a depth of human experience and sympathy about some of these dark
faces that comes home to one like the best one sees in art or reads in
books.
One touch of nature makes all the world akin, and there is certainly a
touch of nature about the colored man; indeed, I had almost said, of
Anglo-Saxon nature. They have the quaintness and homeliness of the
simple English stock. I seem to see my grandfather and grandmother in
the ways and doings of these old "uncles" and "aunties;" indeed, the
lesson comes nearer home than even that, for I seem to see myself in
them, and, what is more, I see that they see themselves in me, and that
neither party has much to boast of.
The negro is a plastic human creature, and is thoroughly domesticated
and thoroughly anglicized. The same cannot be said of the Indian, for
instance, between whom and us there can never exist any fellowship, any
community of feeling or interest; or is there any doubt but the
Chinaman will always remain to us the same impenetrable mystery he has
been from the first?
But there is no mystery about the negro, and he touches the Anglo-Saxon
at more points than the latter is always willing to own, taking as
kindly and naturally to all his customs and usages, yea, to all his
prejudices and superstitions, as if to the manner born. The colored
population in very many respects occupies the same position as that
occupied by our rural populations a generation or two ago, seeing signs
and wonders, haunted by the fear of ghosts and hobgoblins, believing in
witchcraft, charms, the evil eye, etc. In religious matters, also, they
are on the same level, and about the only genuine shouting Methodists
that remain are to be found in the colored churches. Indeed, I fear the
negro tries to ignore or forget himself as far as possible, and that he
would deem it felicity enough to play second fiddle to the white man
all his days. He liked his master, but he likes the Yankee better, not
because he regards him as his deliverer, but mainly because the
two-handed thrift of the Northerner, his varied and wonderful ability,
completely captivates the imagination of the black man, just learning
to shift for himself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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