Pictures of Southern Life, Social, Political, and Military

Pictures of Southern Life, Social, Political, and Military.

SOCIAL, POLITICAL, AND MILITARY. WRITTEN FOR THE LONDON TIMES, BY WILLIAM HOWARD RUSSELL, LL. D., SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT. NEW YORK: J A M E S G. G R E G O R Y, (SUCCESSOR TO W. A. TOWNSEND & CO.,) 46 WALKER STREET. 1861. [A] Mr. Russell wrote one letter from Charleston previous to this, but it is occupied exclusively with a description of the appearance of Fort Sumter after the siege. His Pictures of Southern Life properly begin at the date above. NOTHING I could say can be worth one fact which has forced itself upon my mind in reference to the sentiments which prevail among the gentlemen of this state. I have been among them for several days. I have visited their plantations; I have conversed with them freely and fully, and I have enjoyed that frank, courteous, and graceful intercourse which constitutes an irresistible charm of their society. From all quarters have come to my ears the echoes of the same voice; it may be feigned, but there is no discord in the note, and it sounds in wonderful strength and monotony all over the country. Shades of George III., of North, of Johnson, of all who contended against the great rebellion which tore these colonies from England, can you hear the chorus which rings through the state of Marion, Sumter, and Pinckney, and not clap your ghostly hands in triumph? That voice says, If we could only get one of the royal race of England to rule over us, we should be content. Let there be no misconception on this point. That sentiment, varied in a hundred ways, has been repeated to me over and over again. There is a general admission that the means to such an end are wanting, and that the desire cannot be gratified. But the admiration for monarchical institutions on the English model, for privileged classes, and for a landed aristocracy and gentry, is undisguised and apparently genuine. With the pride of having achieved their independence is mingled in the South Carolinians hearts a strange regret at the result and consequences, and many are they who would go back to-morrow if we could. An intense affection for the British connection, a love of British habits and customs, a respect for British sentiment, law, authority, order, civilization, and literature, pre-eminently distinguish the inhabitants of this state, who, glorying in their descent from ancient families on the three islands, whose fortunes they still follow, and with whose members they maintain not unfrequently familiar relations, regard with an aversion of which it is impossible to give an idea to one who has not seen its manifestations, the people of New England and the populations of the Northern States, whom they regard as tainted beyond cure by the venom of Puritanism. Whatever may be the cause, this is the fact and the effect. The state of South Carolina was, I am told, founded by gentlemen. It was not established by witch-burning Puritans, by cruel persecuting fanatics, who implanted in the North the standard of Torquemada, and breathed into the nostrils of their newly-born colonies all the ferocity, bloodthirstiness, and rabid intolerance of the Inquisition. It is absolutely astounding to a stranger who aims at the preservation of a decent neutrality to mark the violence of these opinions. If that confounded ship had sunk with those Pilgrim Fathers on board, says one, we never should have been driven to these extremities! We could have got on with the fanatics if they had been either Christians or gentlemen, says another; for in the first case they would have acted with common charity, and in the second they would have fought when they insulted us; but there are neither Christians nor gentlemen among them! Any thing on the earth! exclaims a third, any form of government, any tyranny or despotism you will; butand here is an appeal more terrible than the adjuration of all the godsnothing on earth shall ever induce us to submit to any union with the brutal, bigoted blackguards of the New England States, who neither comprehend nor regard the feelings of gentlemen! Man, woman, and child, well die first. Imagine these and an infinite variety of similar sentiments uttered by courtly, well-educated men, who set great store on a nice observance of the usages of society, and who are only moved to extreme bitterness and anger when they speak of the North, and you will fail to conceive the intensity of the dislike of the South Carolinians for the free states. There are national antipathies on our side of the Atlantic which are tolerably strong, and have been unfortunately pertinacious and long-lived. The hatred of the Italian for the Tedesco, of the Greek for the Turk, of the Turk for the Russ, is warm and fierce enough to satisfy the Prince of Darkness, not to speak of a few little pet aversions among allied powers and the atoms of composite empires; but they are all mere indifference and neutrality of feeling compared to the animosity evinced the gentry of South Carolina for the rabble of the North. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 40727
Author: Russell, William Howard
Release Date: Sep 10, 2012
Format: eBook
Language: English