The Life and Adventures of Jonathan Jefferson Whitlaw: Or, Scenes on the MississippiJonathan Jefferson Whitlaw was born to a Mississippi squatter family that got ahead and bought better land far from their squatter site. There the neighbors are a family German immigrants, who have worked their land in the Louisiana forest without using slaves. The Whitlaws promptly purchase two slaves and send Jonathan to school in Natchez where he gets the training he needs to work as a confidential clerk for Colonel Dart, owner of the largest plantation in the area. Whitlaw is soon in charge of punishment of the slaves. He is also scheming fo acquire some land of his own but after some frustration, concentrates on exposing the Blighs, who hide runaway slaves, in the hope of buying their land on the cheap after they've been ruined. |
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answer appeared Aunt Cli bamboo beautiful believe better bless brother Cæsar Clio Colonel Dart cried Croft dear Dido dollars door dreadful Edward Bligh exclaimed expect eyes fancy father fear feeling felt followed forest Frederick Steinmark gentle gentlemen give hand happy hear heard heart heaven Henrich Hogstown hope hour Jonathan Jefferson Whitlaw Jonathan Whitlaw Karl knew labour lady laughing leave listened look Lotte Lucy Bligh Master Edward mind Miss Lucy mistress mother Mount Etna Natchez negress negro never nigger night old Juno old woman once Orleans Orlines Paradise Plantation passed Peggy perhaps Phebe pretty quadroon Reichland seemed Selina Shepherd sight Sigismond sister slave slavery smile soul speak spirit spoke stood sure tell there's thing thought trembling truth turned uttered voice walked watch wish words young Whitlaw
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Page 116 - ... keep the word of promise to the ear, and break it to the hope" — we have presumed to court the assistance of the friends of the drama to strengthen our infant institution.
Page 334 - ... the antiquities of which she explored with unwearied zeal, and the historical dignity of which she has vindicated in her longest poem. From 1812 to 1815 inclusive, she passed much time at Windsor and its neighbourhood, and formed an intimate acquaintance with all the recesses of its forest. " She knew each lane, and every alley green, Dingle or bushy dell of those old woods, And every bosky bower from side to side.
Page 118 - ... launches into hyperbole about Juno's extraordinary command of human psychology: A metaphysician might have understood all this wonderfully well, and yet have been puzzled to work the machinery of such a mind as skilfully as Juno did. In truth, she knew to a nicety how far she might carry her tricks with every individual with whom she had to deal; and if all who undertook to rule their fellows studied the ins and outs of human feelings as patiently as old Juno, power as gigantic as Napoleon's...
Page 78 - The dogged quiescence of silent endurance which oflen gives to the negro an aspect of brutal insensibility, may originate from a temper whose firmness might have made a hero had the will been free ; and poor Peggy, when she hurried from the scene of her child's suffering, might have carried with her an anguish the bitterness of which no mother blessed with the power of protecting her offspring can conceive.
Page 66 - ... doubt that he is an admirable man of profound faith and integrity. Especially at the beginning of the book, she emphasizes his beauty and piety. An early paean to his sincerity, interestingly enough, explicitly disassociates him from the dangerously self-serving vocation of England's Evangelicals. Never did a hope more holy, an ambition more sublime, engross the soul of man. Remote as is good from evil, was the principle which sent him forth, thus self-elected and self-devoted, to raise the poor...
Page 91 - I'm positive certain that some of my black varment are being learned to read ; and if that spreads, we'll have an insurrection and be murdered in our beds before we're a year older, as sure as the sun's in heaven.
Page 97 - ... treated in her relationship to the business community. When Edward Bligh, the abolitionist, is driven to seek employment for his sister, he enters a store staffed by a beautiful young woman whose delicate complexion had a slight shade of that peculiar tinge which marks the quadroon in Louisiana. . . . Beautiful, graceful, elegant and gentle as she was, he dared not place his sister near her. Let her moral character be what it might, disgrace must of necessity be coupled with her name. Her remarkable...
Page 68 - Do you not know that the planters have sworn together to take vengeance on any one who should only be caught teaching a negro to read? And how much more dreadful vengeance would they take on any who should dare to say that the soul of a black man is like the soul of a white one ! — You must not think of it, Master Edward, — your life would pay for it.
Page 2 - But though one may fee] well disposed to linger for a moment to gaze on its strange and dismal vastness, it offers little to tempt a longer stay. The drowsy alligator, luxuriating on its slimy banks, or the unsocial bear, happy in the undisputed possession of its tangled thickets, alone seem formed to find prolonged enjoyment there.