The Hour and the Man Part 51

"Because I know that some--and the Ouvertures among them--were not born to live at ease--to pa.s.s their days in peace. I feel that some--and the Ouvertures among them--are born to suffer--to struggle and to die for their race. If you would know why, ask their Creator. I myself would fain know why. Meantime, the will of G.o.d is so clear, that I have devoted, not myself only, but my children. My sons, you know--"

"And not your children only, but your brother and his child."

"No. Moyse cast himself away. And, as for you, your hut still stands, as you say. Go to it, if you will; or make friends with the French, if you desire to be a slave again. You have suffered too much by me for me to ask you ever to serve me more. I shall never desire you to dedicate yourself anew to pain, in this crisis. Go and seek for ease. I shall incessantly pray that you may find it."

"I shall not seek what is not to be found, Toussaint. I have never dared wretchedness as you have: but since I am and must be wretched, I will be an Ouverture. Your eye and your voice make me an Ouverture again, even yet. Give me your commands."

"Read this proclamation, with the eye of an Ouverture. Well! Do you like it? How do you understand it?"

"You declare your allegiance to France, declaring, at the same time, its limits, and appealing to your soldiers, in the event of aggression. It is plain from this that you mean to defend yourself, and antic.i.p.ate war."

"It is well. That is what I intend to convey. You will publish this proclamation, in your city and district, under the date of this 18th of December, 1801. You will then concert with General Clerveaux the measures for the defence of this city, and report your decisions to me, on my return from Cap Samana. Shall it be so, brother?"

"Be it so."

"And we are friends?"

"We are fellow-citizens--we are Ouvertures--and therefore faithful. I shall not betray you."

"That is all I can ask, I know. We are old men, Paul. Fidelity for a while! Beyond the grave, perhaps more."

"You are going already?"

"To Cap Samana; and alone. Farewell!"

CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.

ALL EYE.

Day by day, in the internals of his occupation about the defence of the colony, did Toussaint repair to Cap Samana, to look eastwards over the sea. Day by day was he more sure, from the information that reached him, that the French could not be far-off. At length, he desired that his generals should be within call from Cotuy, a small town which stood on the banks of the Cotuy, near the western base of the mountainous promontory of Samana--promontory at low water, island at high tide.

All was yet dark on the eastern point of this mountain, on the morning of the 28th of December, when two watchmen, who had pa.s.sed the night under the ferns in a cleft of the steep, came out to look abroad. On their mountain all was yet dark, for the stars overhead, though still rolling clear and golden--visible orbs in the empty depths of the sky-- were so far dimmed by the dawn in the east as no longer to send down their shafts of light upon the earth. The point on which these watchmen stood was so high, that between them and the horizon the sea lay like half a world--an immeasurable expanse, spreading as if from a vast depth below up into the very sky. Dim and soundless lay the ma.s.s of waters-- breaking, no doubt, as for ages past, against the rocky precipice below; but not so as to be heard upon the steep. If might have appeared dead, but that a ray from some quarter of the heaven, capriciously touching its surface, showed that it was heaving as was its wont. Eastwards, at the point of junction of sea and sky, a dusky yellow light shone through the haze of morning, as behind a curtain, and told that the sun was on his way. As their eyes became accustomed to the dim light (which was darkness compared to that which had visited their dreams among the ferns), the watchmen alternately swept the expanse with their gla.s.s, and p.r.o.nounced that there was not a sail in sight.

"I believe, however, that this will be our day; the wind is fair for the fleet," said Toussaint to Henri. "Go and bathe while I watch."

"We have said for a week past that each would be the day," replied Henri. "If it be to-day, however, they can hardly have a fairer for the first sight of the paradise which poets and ladies praise at the French court. It promises to be the loveliest day of the year. I shall be here again before the sun has risen."

And Christophe retired to bathe in the waterfall which made itself heard from behind the ferns, and was hidden by them; springing, as they did, to a height of twenty feet and upwards. To the murmur and gush of this waterfall the friends had slept. An inhabitant of the tropics is so accustomed to sound, that he cannot sleep in the midst of silence: and on these heights there would have been everlasting silence but for the voice of waters, and the thunders and their echoes in the season of storms.

When both had refreshed themselves, they took their seat on some broken ground on the verge of the precipice, sometimes indulging their full minds with silence, but continually looking abroad over the now brightening sea. It was becoming of a deeper blue as the sky grew lighter, except at that point of the east where earth and heaven seemed to be kindling with a mighty fire. There the haze was glowing with purple and crimson; and there was Henri intently watching for the first golden spark of the sun, when Toussaint touched his shoulder, and pointed to the northwards. Shading his eyes with his hand, Christophe strove to penetrate the grey mists which had gathered there.

"What is it?" said he--"a sail? Yes: there is one--three--four!"

"There are seven," said Toussaint.

Long did he gaze through the gla.s.s at these seven sail; and then he reported an eighth. At this moment his arm was grasped.

"See! see!" cried Christophe, who was looking southwards.

From behind the distant south-eastern promontory Del Euganno, now appeared, sail after sail, to the number of twenty.

"All French," observed Christophe. "Lend me the gla.s.s."

"All French," replied his friend. "They are, no doubt, coming to rendezvous at this point."

While Henri explored those which were nearest, Toussaint leaned on his folded arms against the bank of broken ground before him, straining his eyes over the now-peopled sea.

"More! More!" he exclaimed, as the sun appeared, and the new gush of light showed sail upon sail, as small specks upon the horizon line. He s.n.a.t.c.hed the gla.s.s; and neither he nor Henri spoke for long.

The east wind served the purposes of the vast fleet, whose three detachments, once within each other's view, rapidly converged, showing that it was indeed their object to rendezvous at Cap Samana. Silent, swift, and most fair (as is the wont of evil) was this form of destruction in its approach.

Not a word was spoken as the great s.h.i.+ps-of-the-line bore majestically up towards their point, while the lighter vessels skimmed the sea, as in sport, and made haste in, as if racing with one another, or anxious to be in waiting, to welcome their superiors. Nearer and nearer they closed in, till the waters seemed to be covered with the foe. When Toussaint was a.s.sured that he had seen them all--when he had again and again silently counted over the fifty-four s.h.i.+ps-of-war--he turned to his friend with a countenance of anguish, such as even that friend of many years had never seen.

"Henri," said he, "we must all perish. All France has come to Saint Domingo!"

"Then we will perish," replied Henri.

"Undoubtedly: it is not much to perish, if that were all. But the world will be the worse for ever. Trance is deceived. She comes, in an error, to avenge herself, and to enslave the blacks. Trance has been deceived."

"If we were but all together," said Henri, "so that there were no moments of weakness to fear.--If your sons were but with us--"

"Fear no moments of weakness from me," said Toussaint, its wonted fire now glowing in his eye. "My colour imposes on me duties above nature; and while my boys are hostages, they shall be to me as if they no longer existed."

"They may possibly be on board the fleet," said Christophe. "If by caution we could obtain possession of them--"

"Speak no more of them now," said Toussaint.--Presently, as if thinking aloud, and with his eyes still bent on the moving s.h.i.+ps, he went on:

"No, those on board those s.h.i.+ps are not boys, with life before them, and eager alike for arts and arms. I see who they are that are there.

There are the troops of the Rhine--troops that have conquered a fairer river than our Artibonite, storming the castles on her steeps, and crowning themselves from her vineyards. There are the troops of the Alps--troops that have soared above the eagle, and stormed the clouds, and plucked the ice-king by the beard upon his throne. There are the troops of Italy--troops that have trodden the old Roman ways, and fought over again the old Roman wars--that have drunk of the Tiber, and once more conquered the armies of the Danube. There are the troops of Egypt--troops that have heard the war-cry of the desert tribes, and encamped in the shadow of the pyramids."

"Yet he is not afraid," said Henri to himself, as he watched the countenance of his friend.

"All these," continued Toussaint, "all these are brought hither against a poor, depressed, insulted, ignorant race--brought as conquerors, eager for the spoil before a blow is struck. They come to disembarra.s.s our paradise of us, as they would clear a fragrant and fruitful wood of apes and reptiles. And if they find that it takes longer than they suppose to crush and disperse us, France has more thousands ready to come and help. The labourer will leave his plough at a word, and the vine-dresser his harvest, and the artisan his shop--France will pour out the youth of all her villages, to seize upon the delights of the tropics, and the wealth of the savages, as they are represented by the emigrants who will not take me for a friend, but eat their own hearts far away, with hatred and jealousy. All France is coming to Saint Domingo!"

"But--" interposed Christophe.

"But, Henri," interrupted his friend, laying his hand on his shoulder, "not all France, with her troops of the Rhine, of the Alps, of the Nile, nor with all Europe to help her, can extinguish the soul of Africa.

That soul, when once the soul of a man, and no longer that of a slave, can overthrow the pyramids and the Alps themselves, sooner than be again crushed down into slavery."

"With G.o.d's help," said Christophe, crossing himself.

"With G.o.d's help," repeated Toussaint. "See here," he continued, taking up a handful of earth from the broken ground on which they stood, "see here what G.o.d has done! See, here are sh.e.l.ls from the depth of yonder ocean, lying on the mountain-top. Cannot He who thus uprears the dust of His ocean floor, and lifts it above the clouds, create the societies of men anew, and set their lowest order but a little below the stars?"

"He can," said Christophe, again crossing himself.

"Then let all France come to Saint Domingo! She may yet be undeceived-- What now?" he resumed, after a pause of observation. "What manoeuvre is this?"