There, as the angelic armies crowd And there, as all the toils of earth, Whose snow-white temples, columns proud, All that our earliest years adored, Athena's pride, the World's despair;The page where deathless Genius spake, Or Learning poured her treasures rare ; The spot where patriot valor died, And triumphed 'neath the tyrant's stroke ;The halls, where waked in stern debate, Indignant Freedom's thunder broke,— When these, and all that earth adorns, Their silent prayer for others' wo,— Of inward sin;-submission meek, That smiled through tears, and kissed the rod ; Love's ardent gaze, attempered sweet As thus they stand, by Grace prepared These finished temples of the mind. Yes, and when Earth itself shall fade, TOUSSAINT L'OUVERTURE, THE PATRIOT OF HAYTI. TOUSSAINT was a slave, but an upright and strong-minded man, and his character, in connection with that of Citizen Boyer, from the same island, will go far to remove the stigma of incapacity and original degradation, so generally imputed to the race. Our readers will probably recollect the noble reply of Boyer to a white man, who had insulted him on account of his color, and who afterwards apologised: "I write A sentiment injuries upon the sand, favors upon marble." worthy of Socrates or Plato, or better still, worthy of the spirit of the blessed Saviour. When the Hatiens resolved to throw off the yoke of a foreign power, they elected Toussaint their chief, a proof of the estimation in which he was held by his countrymen. In 1802, Bonaparte sent over an immense army to St. Domingo, to subject the island to its former allegiance. But the natives stood firm and devoted to their newly awakened spirit of freedom. They gathered around the standard of Toussaint, and bade defiance to their invaders. Several years previous, Toussaint had sent his two sons, the one seven, and the other nine years old, to Paris to be educated. Bonaparte obtained possession of the boys, and sent them, together with their tutor,. to Hayti, with splendid offers of wealth and power to Toussaint, provided he would restore the country to its former situaCoisnon, the tion as an appendage to the French crown. tutor of the boys, with his young charge, arrived at the island, under the protection of Le Clerc, the commander of the armament. He immediately wrote to Toussaint, who was at his country seat, announcing their arrival, and stating that his children should be with him on the morrow, provided he would. pledge himself to restore them to the French power in case he did not comply with the proposals of Bonaparte. Toussaint gave his word, and on the morrow the children were with their parents. He had now the alternatives of forfeiting his pledge to Coisnon, of complying with the wishes of Bonaparte, or sending his sons back. He would not sell his country, would not act the traitor,--and it was a saying in St. Domingo, that Toussaint never broke his word. He had a father's heart, but a patriot's too. The boys were returned, and he never saw them again. Their fate is unknown. Bonaparte had anticipated an easy conquest of the negro chief. He imagined that every ear, like his own, was open to the syren voice of ambition, wealth, and power. He had too often found an easy access to the human heart through some one or other of these great passions, and he was unprepared to judge correctly of one, whose conduct was governed by the immutable laws of justice and piety. Toussaint returned the following dignified and christian-like rejection of the splendid bribes of Napoleon: "CITIZEN CONSUL,-Your letter, of the 27th Brumaire, has been transmitted to me by Citizen Le Clerc, your brother-inlaw, whom you have appointed Captain General of this island, a title not recognised by the constitution of St. Domingo. The same messenger has restored two innocent children to the fond embraces of a doting father. What a noble instance of European humanity! But, dear as those pledges are to me, and painful as our separation is, I will owe no obligations to my enemies, and I therefore return them to the custody of their jailers. "You ask me, do I desire consideration, honors, and fortune? Most certainly I do, but not of thy giving. My consideration is placed in the respect of my countrymen, my honors in their attachment, my fortune in their disinterested fidelity. Has this mean idea of personal aggrandizement been held out in the hope that I would be induced thereby to betray the cause I have undertaken? You should learn to estimate the moral principle in other men by your own. If the person who claims a right to that throne on which you are seated, were to call on you to descend from it, what would be your answer? The power I possess has been as legitimately acquired as your own, and nought but the decided voice of the people of St. Domingo shall compel me to relinquish it. "It is not cemented by blood, or maintained by the artifices of European policy. The ferocious men whose persecutions I put a stop to,' have confessed my clemency, and I have pardoned the wretch whose dagger has been aimed at my life. If I have removed from this island certain turbulent spirits, who strove to feed the flames of civil war, their guilt has been first established before a competent tribunal, and finally confessed by themselves. Is there one of them who can say that he has been condemned unheard or untried? And yet these monsters are to be brought back once more, and, aided by the bloodhounds of Cuba, are to be uncoupled and hallooed to hunt us down and devour us; and this by men who dare to call themselves Christians. Why should it excite your praise and surprise, that I have upheld the religion and worship of God, from whom all things come?' Alas! that all-bounteous Being, whose Holy Word has but lately found favor in your Republic, by me he has ever been honored and glorified. In his protecting care I have sought for safety and consolation amidst dangers and difficulties when encompassed by treachery and treason, and I was never disappointed. Before him and you I am,' as you say, 'to be the person principally responsible for the massacres and murders that are perpetrated in this devoted isle.' Be it so. In his all just and dread disposal be the issue of this contest. Let Him decide between me and my enemies; between those who have violated his precepts, abjured his holy name, and one who has never ceased to acknowledge and adore Him. (Signed) TOUSSAINT L'OUVERTURE." Le Clerc, with his hitherto victorious and disciplined troops, was unable to cope with a people stimulated by a burning thirst for freedom, and led on by a chief of so much valor and integrity. He resorted to the common artifice of tyrants and little minds, treachery. He proclaimed amnesty, liberty, and equal rights to all. Toussaint was deceived. How should a spirit so noble and generous, so delicate in its conceptions of honor, suspect baseness and treachery in others? He and his wife were loaded with chains and conveyed to France, where they were confined in separate dungeons. What were their sufferings, what their fate, will probably never be divulged, till that day when the secrets of all hearts are brought to light, and the oppressed and the oppressor are confronted face to face. In Wordsworth, we find the following beautiful tribute to his memory: "Toussaint, the most unhappy man of men! allies; "Lord Byron, on his first arrival at Newstead, in 1798, planted an oak in the garden, and nourished the fancy, that as the tree flourished, so should he. On revisiting the abbey, during Lord Gray de Ruthven's residence there, he found the oak choked up by weeds, and almost destroyed,—hence these lines. Shortly after Colonel Wildman, the present proprietor, took possession, he one day noticed it, and said to the servant who was with him, 'Here is a fine young oak; but it must be cut down, as it grows in an improper place.' 'I hope not, sir,' replied the man; ' for it's the one that my lord was so fond of, because he set it himself.' The Colonel has, of course, taken every possible care of it. It is already inquired after by strangers, as the 'Byron Oak;' and promises to share in aftertimes, the celebrity of Shakspeare's mulberry, and Pope's willow." Young oak! when I planted thee deep in the ground, Such, such was my hope, when, in infancy's years, On the land of my fathers I reared thee with pride: 1 left thee, my oak, and, since that fatal hour, Oh! hardy thou wert-even now little care Might revive thy young head, and thy wounds gently heal: But thou wert not fated affection to share, For who could suppose that a stranger would feel? Ah, droop not, my oak! lift thy head for a while; Oh, live then my oak! tower aloft from the weeds And still may thy branches their beauty display. |