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the southern sentinel
18 PUBLISHRI>
EVERY THURSDAY MORNING,
BY
T. LOMAX & CO.
TEXXKNT LOMAX, Principal Editor.
O Hre on Randolph street.
Citcvanj Department.
Conducted BY CAROLINE LEE IIENTZ.
[From the Southern Literary Messenger.!
Mobile, (Ala.) May 26, 1849.
My Dear Sir —Herewith I send you a poem, from
ihe pen of a friend, which he has consented to have
published at my instance. Were lat liberty to com
municate his name, you would find it one highly distin
guished at the South, in many departments, both of
Thought and Action. Like the young German, Kor
ner, the. author has twined the brightest laurels of the
Muses around the crimson splendors of the sword—
with the superadded di-tinction of the statesman. —
These verses will speak their own praise. They are
a touching tribute of paternal affection, and seem al
most the very tears ol love crystalized into poetry by
the spell ol genius. Since the monody of Mason, on
the death <>t his wife, 1 know nothing of the kind more
beautiful or pathetic. Thus much you can say from me.
Very truly your friend,
A B. MEEK.
J. K. Thompson, Esq., Editor So. Lit. Messenger.
I, INKS
To the Rev. Edward Fontaine, Pontotoc , Miss
IS REPLY TO Some RECEIVED FROM HIM.
A welcome to thy minstrel skill,
Dear friend of happier days ;
Thy notes are sweet, but sweeter still,
The love that prompts thy lays.
From sorrows deep and cherish’d long,
Thou fain woiildst free my heart, —
Thou wouidst, by thy enchanting song,
Thy own mild peace impart.
But vain it is iliy harp to strike ;
My woes thou eanst not drown,
Unless thy notes, Cecilia’s like,
Can draw an Angel down..
Until I meet my daughter fair,
Lost Pl- iad of my soul,
The burning tears of my despair
Must ever, ever roll.
Nor would I. if I could, revive
From my distraction wild :
1 love the grief that keeps alive,
The memory of my child ;
And if again by hope betray’d,
My soul should court repose,
How poorly would the guilt be paid
By all that earth bestows !
The morning star that fades from sight,
Still beams upon the mind ;
So doth her beauty leave the light
Os memory belt nd ;
Tho’ lost to earth —t o early gone—
By others seen no more,
She is to me still shining on
And brig ler than before.
The smile she wore when last we met,
The tear she shed at parting,
The kiss upon my eyelids set.
To keep my own from starting,
Like bright remember’d dtcainß of bliss,
Are lingering with me yet ;
That smile and tear and parting kiss,
O, how can I forget !
And you, my friend, who knew her worth,
And loved that worth to praise,
And bow amidst the ills of earth,
She walked in beauty’s ways,
M ill not condemn the grateful tears,
The ever flowing stream.
That keeps a loveiim ss like hers,
In memory fresh and green.
No! let me still in silence keep
My vigils o'er her tomb.
And with my tears forever steep
The flnw’rs that o’er it bloom,
Tho’ all the world should pass it by,
A place remember’d not,
*Tis meet that I should linger nigh,
And bless that hallowed spot.
The sacred love—the holy woes,
Awaken’d by the dead,
Are like the fragrance of the rose,
When all its hues are fled ;
And. as beside the grave we stand,
The mournful thoughts that rise,
Are whispers from the spirit land,
Sweet voices from the skies.
Then leave. O ! leave me to my grief,
Tim) wedded now to part ;
’Twill duly work its own relief,
By eating out the heart ;
But till my daughter pure and bright,
To me shall re-appear.
My life must be a sleepless night,
Without a star to cheer.
You Ml me that my grief is vain,
My child will not return,
No earthly tears can wake again,
The ashes of the urn ;
You tell me too that she is gone
To regions blest and fair,
And wrong it is her loss to mourn,
Since she's an angel there.
I know it all—l know it all;
Yet still with grief opprest,
Jv*y spirit sighs for her recall,
And will not be at rest.
i cannot, cannot give her up,
I am n"t reconciled ;
O, take away the bitter cup,
And bring nje back my child !
She was the last enchanting ray
That cheer'd me here below.
The only star that lit my way,
Thro’ this dark world of woe:
And now bereft of that sweet light,
0, ho v shall I sustain
The shadows of the awful night.
Which must with me remain !
Like him upon the rocky peak,
In wrath and vengeance doom’d
A victim to the vulture s beak,
To sufii r uneonsum and
So am I doom’d ia darkness deep,
All desolate and chill.
To bear a pang that will not sleep,
A death that will not kilt.
Then be it so—a! 1 silently
I’ll bear the adverse weight;
But He, I hope, in vouder sky,
Who dooms me to my fate,
Will, in His own good way and time,
My lovely one restore—
If not on earth, in that blest dime,
M here parting is no more.
I know ,will—far even now,
On faith's enraptur’d eye,
He breaketh 1 ke Ills own bright bow—
llis small, still *oiee is nigh.
Amidst iny deep despondency,
He whispers in mine ear—
Thy daughter may net come to thee,
l?nt thou eaust go to her.
VOL 111.
Enough, enough—l ask no more;
A light hath flash’d within ;
Mv child from earth He only bore,
To lure me on to Him.
Then let Him keep the jewel bright ;
O, let him wear the gem :
I would not snatch so pure a light
From Ilis bright diadem.
The only boon, O God, I crave,
Is soon thy face to see ;
I long to pass the dull, cold grave,
And wing my way to Thee—
To Thee, Lord, and those dear friends
In Thine eternal sphere,
Where I may make some poor amends,
For all rny errors here.
THE GREAT GOLDEN EAGLE.
Some people have u trick of describing in
cidents as having happened within their own
i observation, when in fact they were at the
time tying asleep in bed, and disturbing the
; w hole house with the snore of their dormito
; r.Y. Such is too often the character of the
eye-witnesses of the present age. Now, we
would not claim personal acquaintance with
an incident we had not seen—no, not for a
hundred guineas per sheet; and, therefore,
we wan the reader not to believe the follow
ing little story about an eagle and child (by
the way, that is the Derby crest, and a favor
ite sign of inns in the north of England) on
our authority. “1 tell the tale as ’twas told
to me,” by the schoolmaster of Naemaii
slaws, in the shire of Ayr; and if the inci
dent never occurred, then must he have been
one of the greatest liars that ever taught the
young idea how to shoot. For our single
selves, we are by nat: re credulous. Many
extraordinary things happen in this life, and
though “seeing is believing,” so likewise
“believing is seeing,” as every one must al
low who reads these oar recreations.
Almost all the people in the parish were
leading in their meadow-hay (there were not
in all its ten miles square twenty acres of
rye-grass) on the same day of midsummer,
so drying was the sunshine and the wind,—
and huge-heaped-up wains, that almost hid
from view the horses that drew them along
the sward, beginniug to get green with se
cond growth, were moving in all directions
towards the snug farmyards. Never had the
parish seemed before so populous. Jocund j
was the balmy air, with laughter, whistle, and 1
’ r s j
song. But the Treegnomans threw the sha
dow of “one o’clock” on the green dial-face
and the earth—the horses were unyoked, and
took instantly to grazing—groups of men.
women, lads, lasses, and children collected
under grove, and bush, and heldge-row—
graces were pronounced, some of them rather
too tedious in presence of the mantling milk
cans, bullion bars of butter, and crackling
cakes; and the great Being who gave them !
that day their daily bread, looked down from j
his Eternal Throne, well-pleased with the |
piety of his thankful creatures.
The great Cl olden Eagle, the pride and the I
pest of the parish, stooped down, and away j
with something in his talons. One single, j
sudden female shriek—and then shouts and
out-cries as if a church spire had tumbled
down on a congregation at a sacrament.
‘ Hannah Lamond’s bairn! Hannah Lamond’s
bairn!” was the loud fast-spreading cry.
“T he Eagle’s ta’en ass Hannah Lamond’s
bairn !*’ and many hundred feet were in ano
ther instant hurrying towards the mountain.
Two miles of hill and dale, and copse and
shingle, and many intersecting brooks, lay
between; but in an incredibly short time |
the foot of the mountain was alive with peo- j
pie - The eyrie was well known, and both
old birds were visible on the rock-ledge. But
who shall scale that dizzv cliff, which Mark
Steuart the sailor, who had been at the storm
ing of many a fort, once attempted in vain !
All kept gazing, or weeping, or wringing of
hands, rooted to the ground, or running back
and forwards, like so many ants essaying
their new wings, in discomfiture. “What’s
the use—what’s the use o’ ony puir human
means ? We h ave nae power but in prayer!”
And many knelt known—fathers and moth
ers thinking of their own babies—as if they
would force the deaf heavens to hear.
Hannah Lamond had all this while been
sitting on a stone, with a face perfectly white,
and eyes like those of a mad person, fixed
on the eyrie. Nobody noticed her; lor
strong as all sympathies with her had been
at the swoop of the Engle, they were now
swallowed up iu the agony of eyesight. “On
ly last Sabbath was my sweet wee wean bap
tized in the name o’ the Father, and the Son
and the Holy Ghost!” and on uttering these
words, she flew off through the brakes and
over the huge stones, up—up—up —faster than
ever huntsman ran in to the death—fearless as
| a goat playing among the precipices. No one
doubted, no one could doubt, that she would
soon be dashed to pieces. But have not peo
ple who walk in their sleep, obedient to the
mysterious guidance of dreams, elomb the
walls of old ruins, and found footing, even
in decrepitude, along the edge of unguarded
battlements, and down dilapidated stair-cases
I deep as draw wells or coal-pits, and returned
i with open, fixed, and unseeing eyes, unharm
ied to their beds at midnight! It is all the
, work of the soul, to whom the body is a
slave ; and shall not the agony of a mother’s
passion—who sees her baby, whose warm
mouth had just left her breast, hurried off bv
a demon to a hideous death—bear her limbs
aloft wherever there is dust to dust, till she
i reach that devouring den, and fiercer and
I more furious than any bird of prey that ever
i bathed its beak iu blood, throttle the fiends
> 0H t ll’
that with their heavy wing would fain flap
her down the cliffs, and hold up her child in
deliverance ?
No stop —no stay—she knew not that she
drew her breath Beneath her feet Provi
dence fastened every loose stone, and to her
hands strengthened every root. How was
she ever to descend ? That fear, then, but
once crossed her heart, as up—up —up —to
| the little image made of her own flesh and
| blood. “The God who holds me now from
perishing—will not the same God save me
when my chiid is at my breast ?” Down
; came the fierce rushing of the Eagle’s wings
—each savage bird dashing close to her head,
so that she saw the yellow of sheir wrathful
eyes. All at once they quailed, and were
cowed, \ oiling, they flew off to the stump
of an ash jutting out of a cliff’, a thousand
feet above the cataract; and the Christian
mother, falling across the eyrie, in the midst
bones and blood, clasped her child—dead—
dead—no doubt—but umnangled and uiitorn
—and swaddled up just as it was when she
laid it down asleep among the fresh hay in a
nook of the harvest-field. Oh ! what p ing
of perfect blessedness transfixed her heart
from that faint, feeble cry —“it lives! it lives!
it lives!” and baring her bosom, with loud
laughter, and eyes dry as stones, she felt the
lips of the unconscious innocent once more
murmuring at the fount of life and love. “O,
thou great and thou dreadful God! whither
hast thou brought me—one of the most sinful
ot thy creatures ! Oh ! save me lest 1 perish,
even for thy own name’s sake! O Thou,
who died to save sinners, have mercy upon
me!” Cliff’s, chasms, blocks of stone, and
the slu letons ol old trees —bar—far down—
and dwindled into specks a thousand crea
tures of her own kind, stationary or running
to and fro! Was that the sound of the water
fall, or the faint roar of vob es ? Is that her
native strath ?—and that tuft of trees, does it
contain the hut in which stands the cradle of
her child? Never more shall it be rocked by
lief foot! Here must she die—and when her
breast is exhausted—her baby too. And those
horrid beaks, and eyes, and tahms, and wings
will return, and her child w ill he devoured
at last, even within the dead arms that can
protect il no more.
M here all this while, was Mark Steuart,
the sailor ? Halfway up the dill’s. But his
eyes had got dim, and his head dizzy, and his
heart sick—and lie who had so often reefed
the top-gallant sail, when at midnight the
coming of the gale was heard afar, cov
eted his face w ith Ins hands, and dared look
no longer on the swimming heights. “And
who w ill take care of my poor bedridden
mother ?” thought Hannah, who, through ex
haustion of so many passions, could no more
retain in her grasp the hope she had clutched
in despair. A voice whispered “God.” .She ■
looked round expecting to see a spirit; but
nothing moved except a rotton branch, that,
under its own weight, broke off’ from the I
crumbling rock. Her eye —by some secret !
sympathy with the inanimate object—watch
ed its fall; and it seemed to stop, not far off,
on a small platform. Her child was bound
upon her shoulders—she knew’ not how or
when—but it was safe—and scarcely daring
to open her eyes, she slid down the shelving
rocks, and found herself on a small piece of j
firm root-hound soil, with the tops ol’ hushes
appearing below. With fingers suddenly
strengthened into the power of iron, she :
swung herself down bv brier, and broom,
and heather, and dwarf-birch. There, a loos
ened stone lept over a ledge, and no sound
was heard, so profound was its fall. There,
the shingle rattled down the screes, and she j
hesitated not to follow. Her feet hounded
against the huge stone that stopped them ;
but she felt no pain. Her body was callous j
as the cliff. Steep as the wall of a house was
now’ the wall of the precipice. But it was j
matted with ivy centuries old—long ago
dead, and without a single green leaf-—but
with thousands of arm-thick stems petrified
into the rock, and covering it as with a trcl
lice. She felt her baby on her neck, and
with hands and feet clung to that fearful lad
der- Turning round her head and looking
down, she saw’ the whole population of the
parish—so great was the multitude—on their
knees. She heard the voice of psalms—a
hymn breathing the spirit of one united
prayer. Sad and solemn was the strain—
but not dirge-like—sounding not of death, ;
but deliverance. Often had she sung that
tune—perhaps the very words—but them she
heard not—in her own hut, she and her moth
er—or in the kirk, along w ith all the congre
gation. An unseen hand seemed fastening
her fingers to tne ribs of ivy, and in sudden
inspiration, believing that her life was to he
saved, site became almost as fearless as if she
had been changed into a winged creature.
Again her feet touched stones and earth—
the psalm was hushed—but a tremulous sob
bing voi< e was close beside her, and a she
goat, with two litile kids, at her feet. “W ild
heights,” thought she, “do these creatures
climb—but the dam will lead dowm her kids
by the easiest paths; for in the brute crea
tures holy is the power of a mother’s love!”
and turning round her head, she kissed her
sleeping bahv, and for the first time she wept.
Overhead frowned the front of the preci
pice, never touched before by human hand or
foot. No one had ever dreamt of scaling it, and
the Golden Eagles knew that well in their
instinct, as, before they built their eyrie, they
had brushed it with their wings. But the
I downwards part of the mountain-side, though
| scared, and seamed, aud ehasmed, was yet
COLUMBUS, GEORGIA, THURSDAY MORNING. NOVEMBER 18,’ 1852.
accessible—and more than one person in the
j parish had reached the bottom of the Glead’s
j Cliff. Many were now attempting it—and
! ere the’ cautious mother had followed her
dumb guides a hundred yards, through among
dangers that, although enough to terrify the
, stoutest heart, were traversed by her without
a shudder, the head of one man appeared,
and then another, and she knew’ that God
had delivered her and her child into the care
of their fellow-creatures. Not a word was
spoken—she hushed her friends with her
hands—and with uplifted eyes pointed to the
j guides sent to her by Heaven. Small green
i plats, w here those creatures nibble the wild
flowers, became now'more frequent—trodden
lines, almost as plain as sheep-paths, showed
that the dam had not led her young into dan
ger ; and now the brushwood dwindled away
into straggling shrubs, and the party stood
on a little eminence above the stream, and
forming pa.it of the strath.
There had been trouble and agitation, much
sobbing and many tears, among the multitude,
while the mother was scaling the cliff—sub
lime was the shout that echoed afar the mo
ment she reached the eyrie—then had suc
ceeded a silence deep as death—in a little
while arose that hymning prayer, succeeded
by mute supplication—the w ildness of thank-,
ful and congratulatory joy had next its sway
and now that her salvation was sure, the
great erow'd rustled like a wind-swept wood.
And for whose sake wms all this alternation
of agony ? A poor humble creature, unknown
to many even by name—one who had had
but few friends, nor wished for more—con
tented to work all day, here—there—any
where—that she might be able to support
her aged mother and her child—and who on
Sabbath took her seat in an obscure pew, set
apart for paupers, in the kirk.
“Fall hack, and give her fresh air,” said
the old minister of the parish; and the ring
of close faces widened round her lying as in
death. “Gie me the bonny bit bairn into my
arms,” cried first one mother and then anoth
er, and it was tenderly handed round the cir
cle of kisses, many of the snooded maidens
bathing its face in tears. “There’s not a sin
gle scratch about the puir innocent, for the
Eagle, you see, maun hae struck its talons
into tho lang clues and the shawl. Bliti’,
biin’ maun they be who see not the finger o’
God in this thing !”
Hannah started up from her swoon—and,
looking wilely round cried, “Oh! the Bird
the Bird! —the Eagle—the Eagle has carried
off my bonny wee Walter—is there mine to
pursue?” A neighbor put her baby into her
breast; and shutting her eyes, and smiting
her forehead, the sorely bewildered creature
said in a low voice, “Am I wauken—oh!
tell me if I’m wauken—or if a’ this be but
the work o’ a fever.”
Hannah Lamond was not yet twenty years
old, and although she was a mother--and
you may guess what a mother—yet—frown
not, fair and gentle reaker—frown not, pure
and stainless as thou art—to her belonged not
the sacred name of wife—and that baby was
the child of sin and shame—yes—“the child
of misery, baptised in tears!” She had loved
—trusted—been betrayed—and deserted. In
sorrow and solitude—uncomforted and des
pised—she bore her burden. Dismal had
been the hour of travail—and she feared her
mother’s heart would have broken, even w hen
her own was cleft in twain. But how healing
is forgiveness—alike to the wounds of the
forgiving and the forgiven! And then Han
nah knew that, although guilty before God,
her guilt was not such as her fellow-creatures
deemed it—for there were dreadful secrets
which should never pass her lips against the
father of her child. So she bowed down
her young head, and soiled it with the ashes
of repentance—walking with her eyes on the
ground as she again entered the kirk—yet
not fearing to lift them up to heaven during
the prayer. Her sadness inspired a general
pity—she was excluded from no house she had
heart to visit—no coarse comment, no ribald
jest accompanied the notice people took of
her baby— no licentious rustic presumed on
her frailty; for the pale, melancholy face of
the mother, weeping as she sung the lullaby,
forbade all sucli approach—and an universal
sentiment of indignation drove from the par
ish the heartless and unprincipled s< ducer —
il all had been known, too weak a word for
bis crime—who left thus to pine in sorrow,
and in shame far worse than sorrow, one
who, till her unhappy fall, had been held up
by every mother as ati example to her
daughters.
Never had she striven to cease to love her
betrayer—but she had striven—and an ap
peased conscience had enabled her to do so
—to think not of him now that he had deser
ted her for ever. Sometimes his image, as
well in love as in wrath, passed before the
eye of her heart—but she closed it in tears
of blood, and the phantom disappeared.—
Thus all the love towards him that slept—
hut was not dead—arose in yearnings of still
more exceeding love towards her child.
Round its head was gathered all hope of
comfort—of peace—of reward of her repen
tance. One of its smiles was enough to
brighten up the darkness of a whole day. In
her breast—on her knee—in its cradle, she
regarded it with a perpetual prayer. And
this feeling it was, with all the overwhelming
tenderness of affection, ail the invigorating
power of passion, that, under the hand of
God, bore her up and down that fearful moun
| tain’s brow', and after the hour of rescue and
deliverance, stretched her on the greensward
like a corpse.
The rumor of the miracle circled the moun
tain’s base, and a strange story without names
had been told to the Wood-ranger of the
Cairn-Forest, by a wayfaring man. Anxious
to know what truth there was in it, he cross
ed the hill, and making his way through the
sullen crowd, went up to the eminence and
! beheld her whom he had so wickedly ruined,
and so basely deserted. Hisses, and groans,
and hootings, and fierce eyes, and clenched
hands, assailed and threatened him on every
I side.
His heart died within him, not in fear, but
in remorse. W hat a worm he felt himself to
be! And fain would he have become a
worm, that, to escape all that united human
scorn, he might have wriggled away in slime
into some hole of the earth. Hut the meek
eye of Hannah met his in forgiveness—an
un-upbraiding tear—a faint smile of love.
All his better nature rose within him, all bis
worse nature was quelled. “Yes, good peo
ple, you do right to cover me with your
scorn. Hut what is your scorn to the wrath
of God ? The Evil One has often been with
me in the woods; the same voice that once
whispered me to murder her—hut here 1 am
—not to offer retribution—for that may not
—will not—must not be—guilt must not
mate with innocence. But here I proclaim
that innocence. 1 deserve death, and I am
willing here, on this spot, to deliver myself
into the hands of justice. Allan Calder—l
call on you to seize your prisoner.”
‘Fhe moral sense of the people, when in
structed by knowledge and enlightened by
religion, what else is it hut the voice of God!
Their anger subsided into a stern satisfaction
—and that soon softened, in sight of li£*r who,
alone aggrieved, alone felt nothing but for
giveness, into a confused compassion for the
man who, hold and bad as he had been, had
undergone many solitary torments, and near
ly fallen in his unaccompanied misery into
the power of the Prince of Darkness. The
clergyman, whom all reverenced, put the con
trite man’s hand in hers, whom he swore to
love and cherish all his days® And, ere sum
mer was over, Hannah was the mistress of a
family, in a house not much inferior to a
Manse. Her mother, now that not only her
daughter’s reputation was freed from stain,
hut her innocence also proved, renewed her
youth. And although the worthy schoolmas
ter, who told us the tale so much better than
we have been able to repeat it, confessed that
the wood-ranger never became altogether a
saint—nor acquired the edifying habit of pull
ing down the corners of his mouth, and turn
ing up the whites'of his eyes—yet he assured
us, that he never afterwards heard any thing
very seriously to his prejudice—that he be
came in due time an elder of the kirk—gave
his children a religious education—erring on
ly in making rather too much of a pet of his
eldest horn, whom, even when grown up to
manhood, he never called by any other name
than the Eaglet.— Christopher North.
[From De Bow’s Review.]
LAFITTE-PROFESSOR INGRAHAM’S
LETTER.
The following note with which we have
been favored by Professor Ingraham, is an
amusing comment upon the controversy
which has sprung up in regard to this tradi
tional and historical personage, about whom
we suffered ourselves once to he put out of
temper, though, upon our word and honor,
we never cared a pinch of snuff whether his
reputation were that of pirate or pedlar. We
simply published in the first instance a graph
ic, though highly embellished sketch, which
was furnished us by a literary gentleman of
Louisiana, the correctness of which, we said,
was vouched for, using his own language,
upon a number of authorities, which were
set forth. Every one could weigh the value
of these authorities, and the paper was pub
lished, as every editor in the Union is accus
tomed to publish, upon its own merits. What
lias restored our good humor, however, is,
that we observed in the columns of the very
journal which called us so severely, and, as
we think, ungenerously, to task, in classing
ours among “other fictitious works,” and
italicising its claims to veracity, before even
the ink of the criticism had dried, a notice
under the editorial head most flattering in its
terms, and associating the Review, in rank
and “scientific” position, with Silliman’s
Journal—certainly one of the most veracious
journals in America. This opinion of our
labors corresponding with a great many oth
ers from the same source, for which we have
always entertained the most grateful feel
ings, we try to flatter ourselves, comes from
the heart; though the other is quite disagree
able enough, upon the old principle, to be
nearer the truth. ‘Fhe Delta has gained lau
rels enough in its own short career (and none
more than ourselves have rejoiced over them)
to leave a few for its neighbors. Even the
“pirate” Lafitte—we ask pardon of his mem
ory, whilst we dismiss him—cannot rob us of
these.
“Aberdeen, Miss., Sept. 1, 1852.
“That Lafitte was ever a ‘blacksmith’ I
cannot, in justice to my taste in the selection
of a hero, for a moment, entertain the idea.
The romantic young ladies who have fallen
in love with him, and the amateur juvenile
buccaneers, who have admired him as a dar
ling corsair, would never forgive me, should
it prove so. It is not to be questioned that
there have been very clever blacksmiths, cit-
izens good and true; and our own day has
produced a learned blacksmith. There is
Vulcan also, who has doubtless done much to
ennoble the profession; but as modern he
roes of romance do not usually
‘On thundering anvils ring their loud alarm,
And pufilng low the roaring bellows blow,’
I must beg leave to protest against Captain
Lafitte being biographized into a blacksmith!
To exchange his picturesque costume’into a
leathern apron ; ‘that Damascus blade’ for a
rusty iron hammer; those ‘jeweled fingers’
for sooty fists; that ‘darkly flowing, plume’
for unkempt locks,
‘With cinders thick besprent
his quarter-deck for the mud-floor of a forge ;
and the
‘Glad waters of the dark blue sea,’
for a cooling trough ; and all the buccaneer
ing splendor of his aristocratic person, for,
‘Sinewy arms and shoulders bare,
His ponderous hammer lilting high in air ;
While bathed in sweat from forge to forge he flies,
’Mid sulphurous smoke that blackens all the skies!’
—I must positively protest against smutting
the fair fame of the elegant ‘Pirate of the
Gulf,’ by admitting for a moment the possi
bility of such a thing. A blacksmith! ‘Fhe
hero of the Mexique seas a blacksmith! Two
duodecimo volumes of sentiment,* rose-col
ored at that, thrown away upon a shoer of
horses, and peradventure of asses! Not even
Vulcan’s fame, god though he were, nor Ve
nus’ ‘smile celestial,’ as she watches her soo
ty lord forging thunderbolts, not even die
fact that he was the son of Jupiter and broth
er of Neptune, the god of the Sea, on which
Lafitte achieved his romantic name, can in
duce me to consent for a moment that this
chivalrous and very gentlemanly pirate should
he hlncksmithed down to posterity! Wha
would become of all the romances that make
him the fighting Adonis of the seas! We
shall next learn that Ivanhoe was a tailor,
the Red Rover a cobbler; and that the ‘Last
of the Mohicans’ sold old clothes! We
should handle these t wo-vol umed-novel he
roes, especially nautical gentlemen, my dear
Mr. De How, with the softest doeskin-enca
sed fingers.
“But to reply more seriously to your in- j
quiry : 1 have every reason to believe Lafitte !
to have been, if not gentle-horn, well-born, !
and educated with some degree of refinement.
At this late day I cannot furnish you with
very authentic information that would serve
as data for a faithful biogophical memoir.
Seventeen years ago I gathered from various
sources, from persons who knew Lafitte well,
and from others, many fads which 1 wove
into the fabric of my romance. Since then
other facts have been related to me, all of
which have led me to the conclusion that he
was an intelligent man, brave and chivalrous,
with the bearing and amenities that distin
guish the courteous Creole—and a Creole
undoubtedly he was by birth and education.
He first prominently made himself known by
certain smuggling operations, by which he
introduced rich freights into New Orleans,
furtively conveyed from the Gulf through
bayous. In these enterprises he wag aim'd .
by the means of merchants, who, in a few
years, were enriched by this unlawful com
merce. AY hen at length Lafitte, who was in
their confidence, and had also made great
gains, learned that he was watched, and that
efforts were being made to entrap him into
the custody of the law, he abandoned this
perilous pursuit, and with his two or three
small vessels lent his aid to one of the strug
gling republics of the Spanish main. Success
in arms seems to have rendered him bolder
and more ambitious; for the following year
we hear of him actually buccaneering on the
coast of Texas, and carrying on a system of
spoliation—respecting no flag that came into
his power. Some depredations upon the
coastwise navigation of Louisiana, drew
down from Gen. Claiborne a proclamation
upon him, appended to which was a large re
ward offered for his head !
“Such, so far as I could ever obtain it, is
the outline of his career up to the beginning
of our war with Great Britain; and this out
line I filled out in the novel, with the usual
free creations of the romancer’s pen. Al
though authentic enough for fiction, it wants
the rigid verification which a biography
calls for.
“At the time the war broke out, (1812-15,)
Lafitte had his rendezvous at Barrataria, a
picturesque bay on the Gulf coast, less than j
fifteen leagues from New Orleans. His sym- j
pathies were enlisted on the side of the Amer
icans; and it is a matter of well authentiea
ted history that when the English comman
der would have bribed him to conduct them
by the secret avenues of the bayous to the
city, he refused their bribes of gold and na- !
val rank with disdain ; and in the face of the
proclamation for his head hanging over him,
he presented himself before Governor Clai
borne and volunteered his arms, vessels and ;
men, in the service of his native State.
“That he was at the battle of New Orleans,
as asserted by you, and served one or more
guns with his crews, there can be no ques
tion. 1 have had pointed out to me on the
field the very spot on which he was posted,
it having been close to the river on the ex
treme right of the American line. The ac
count in the novel was faithful to the narra
tive of his conduct there as told to me. If
you have at hand a copy of Marbois’ Histo
ry of Louisiana, or Latour’s, you will in one
or perhaps beta of them, find a correspon
*Lafitte—by Professor Ingraham- t vc!*.
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NO. 47.
deuce between Governor Claiborne and Pres
ident Madison, in which the fact of his pres
ence in the battle and his gallantry in sus
taining his position, is not only stated, but is,
1 think, advanced as good ground for the
clemency of the Executive. But it is so ma
ny years since 1 have thought of the subject,
that I have quite forgotten where I found
many of the tacts made use of in the novel;
and it is barely possible I may be incorrect
in referring you to Marbois, as I have no
copy by me by which to verify my reference.
| Col. Chotard, of Natchez, commanded, in
; the defence of New Orleans, a troop of Mis
i sissippi horse, the only cavalry, 1 believe in
1 the battle. A letter to him would no doubt
elicit what knowledge he possesses upon this
point. Governor Poindexter, of Louisville,
was also in the action as aid to General Jack
son. Either of these gentlemen could give
certain information touching Lafitte’s pres
ence at. the lines on that day.
“That there were two brothers is probable,
though questionable; yet, that there were
others of the name is quite likely, as it is by
no means an unusual name, either in the
South or in France. There is hut one La
fitte, however, who has any romantic or his
torical interest at all associated w ith his ea
ieer; and this personage is the veritable Bar
ritarian chief, known as the ‘Pirate of the
Gulf,’ the velvet-capped, sabre-armed, lofty
browed, glossy-locked, chisseled-lipped, ten
der, sentimental, courteous, throat-cutting
Lafitte! Whatsoever harmonizes not with the
chivalrous character of this Barritarian hero
and salt-sea gentleman, should he set down
to the credit of his obscure namesake to
whom you allude, and the events of whose
life you conjecture have crossed and mingled
with those of the true romance man. This
personage may have been his brother, for
aught that 1 know, and also have been a
‘learned’ or unlearned blacksmith, and, like
Old Vulcan, have forged his more war-like
brother’s cutlasses and cannon. A sword
has been presented to me by a gentleman of
New Orleans, Duncan Henrien, Esq., which
was taken from Lafitte at the time of his cap
ture; and if one might venture an opinion
. mi the rude, massive, cleaver-like fashion,
in which it is made, it was doubtless fabrica
| ted by his leather-aproned brother— a Jirst
effort, unquestionably, of the anvil-heating
brother’s smithy skiil. Moreover, a six
pounder, which once belonged to Lafitte, was
a few years since presented o me by a friend;
as a trilling souvenir of ‘my hero.’ It has
such a fierce, hull dog look'about the muzzle,
and so rough a coat, that l have set it down
as a first effort at rough casting of the hypo
thetical brother aforesaid. Mr. Tooke, who
ought to know, says in his ‘Pantheon,’ that
immortal English classic, how that Vulcan
wrought a trident for his brother Neptune.
Why, then, should not Lafitte, the junior,
cast a cannon or forge a two handed irotr
sword for his brother?
“Had I now at hand all the alledged facts
which l once collected in relation to Lafitte,
I could not offer them to you as authentic,*
not regarding them as sufficiently genuine”
material for a faithful memoir. 1 found, in
my researches, twenty years ago, romantic
legends so iußfiHyoven with facts that it was
extremely difficult to separate the historical
from the traditional. 1 atrT‘?s r y sure that the
same cause will make it impossible to arrive
at the truth of his life. His only
at last must he the romancer !
“There is to be found in Mr. Timothy
Flint’s ‘History of the A alley of the Missis--
sippi,’ a chapter, the perusal of which first
suggested to me the idea of writing the nov
el of‘Lafitte.’ I inclose a copy of the chap
ter. Mr. Flint was cotemporarv with Lnfltte,
was a keen hunter of testimonies, arid is to he
regarded as good authority touching him as
any one now to be found. He says, in brief
space, all that I believe can be said with cer<-
iainty respecting him ; and he asserts, as you
will perceive on reading this extract, that he
icas at the battle of New Orleans.
“ ‘A curious instance of the strange mix--
ture of magnanimity and ferocity often found
among the demi-savages of the borders, was
afforded by the Louisianan Lafitte. This
desperado had placed himself at the head of
a band of outlaws from all nations under
heaven, and fixed his abode upon the top of
an impregnable rock,* to the Southwest of
the mouth of the Mississippi. Under the col
ors of the South American patriots, they pi
rated at pleasure every vessel that came in
their way, and smuggled their booty up the
secret creeks of the Mississippi, with a dex
terity that baffled all the efforts of justice.
The depredations of these outlaws; or, as
they styled themselves, Barritarians, (from
Barritaria, their Island,) becoming at length
intolerable, the United States Government
dispatched an armed force against their little
Tripoli. The establishment was broken up,
and the pirates dispersed.; But Lafitte again
■ collected his outlaws, and took possession of
his rock. The attention of the Congress be
ing now diverted by the war, he scoured the
Gulf at his pleasure, and so tormented the
coasting traders, that Governor Claiborne, of
Louisiana, set a price on his head. This da
ring outlaw, thus confronted with the Amer
ican Government, appeared likely to promote
the designs of its enemies. He was known
to possess the clue to all the secret windings
♦Mr Flint is in error, as we are all liable to be, in re
| gard to the “rocs.” There is no rock on the Northern
i throes of the Mexican Gulf, in the neighborhood of the
1 Delta of the Mississippi. Lafitte had a fort in the inter
rior,“which uill remains in tolerable preservation.’*