Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. I.djvu/417

Rh strive, and then a new existence in a life of freedom, either in Africa, or here in their adopted country as the free servants or labourers of the whites. For I confess, that, according to my opinion, the Southern States would lose a great part of their charm and their peculiar character in losing their black population. Bananas, negroes, and negro-songs are the greatest refreshments of the mind, according to my experience, which I found in the United States. And to every one, whether in Old or New England, who is troubled by spleen or dyspepsia, or over-excitement of brain or nerves, would I recommend as a radical cure, a journey to the South to eat bananas, to see the negroes, and hear their songs. It will do them good to go through the primeval forest, with its flowers, and its odours, and to sail upon the red rivers! But the negroes are preferable to everything else. They are the life and the good humour of the South. The more I see of this people, their manners, their disposition, way of talking, of acting, of moving, the more am I convinced that they are a distinct stock in the great human family, and are intended to present a distinct physiognomy, a distinct form of the old type, man, and this physiognomy is the result of temperament.

Last evening I went with Mrs. W. H. to a place in the city, where the negroes, who come during the day to Charleston from the plantations to sell their small wares, baskets, woven mats, and such-like, as well as garden produce, lie-to with their boats. It was now evening, and the negroes were returning to their boats to row back up the river; they came with bundles in their hands, jugs on their heads, and all sorts of vessels filled with things which they had purchased with the product of their wares, wheaten bread and molasses being apparently the principal articles. Already were two boats filled with people, and baskets, and jugs, amidst the merriest chatter and laughter; but still they waited for more, and I heard