"And behold, the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had nocomforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power, but theyhad no comforter."--ECCL. 4:1

It took but a short time to familiarize Tom with all that was to behoped or feared in his new way of life. He was an expert and efficientworkman in whatever he undertook; and was, both from habit andprinciple, prompt and faithful. Quiet and peaceable in his disposition,he hoped, by unremitting diligence, to avert from himself at least aportion of the evils of his condition. He saw enough of abuse and miseryto make him sick and weary; but he determined to toil on, with religiouspatience, committing himself to Him that judgeth righteously, notwithout hope that some way of escape might yet be opened to him.

Legree took a silent note of Tom's availability. He rated him as afirst-class hand; and yet he felt a secret dislike to him,--the nativeantipathy of bad to good. He saw, plainly, that when, as was often thecase, his violence and brutality fell on the helpless, Tom took noticeof it; for, so subtle is the atmosphere of opinion, that it will makeitself felt, without words; and the opinion even of a slave may annoya master. Tom in various ways manifested a tenderness of feeling, acommiseration for his fellow-sufferers, strange and new to them, whichwas watched with a jealous eye by Legree. He had purchased Tom with aview of eventually making him a sort of overseer, with whom he might,at times, intrust his affairs, in short absences; and, in his view,the first, second, and third requisite for that place, was _hardness_.Legree made up his mind, that, as Tom was not hard to his hand, hewould harden him forthwith; and some few weeks after Tom had been on theplace, he determined to commence the process.

One morning, when the hands were mustered for the field, Tom noticed,with surprise, a new comer among them, whose appearance excited hisattention. It was a woman, tall and slenderly formed, with remarkablydelicate hands and feet, and dressed in neat and respectable garments.By the appearance of her face, she might have been between thirty-fiveand forty; and it was a face that, once seen, could never beforgotten,--one of those that, at a glance, seem to convey to us an ideaof a wild, painful, and romantic history. Her forehead was high, andher eyebrows marked with beautiful clearness. Her straight, well-formednose, her finely-cut mouth, and the graceful contour of her head andneck, showed that she must once have been beautiful; but her face wasdeeply wrinkled with lines of pain, and of proud and bitter endurance.Her complexion was sallow and unhealthy, her cheeks thin, her featuressharp, and her whole form emaciated. But her eye was the most remarkablefeature,--so large, so heavily black, overshadowed by long lashes ofequal darkness, and so wildly, mournfully despairing. There was a fiercepride and defiance in every line of her face, in every curve of theflexible lip, in every motion of her body; but in her eye was a deep,settled night of anguish,--an expression so hopeless and unchanging asto contrast fearfully with the scorn and pride expressed by her wholedemeanor.

Where she came from, or who she was, Tom did not know. The first he didknow, she was walking by his side, erect and proud, in the dim grayof the dawn. To the gang, however, she was known; for there was muchlooking and turning of heads, and a smothered yet apparent exultationamong the miserable, ragged, half-starved creatures by whom she wassurrounded.

"Got to come to it, at last,--glad of it!" said one.

"He! he! he!" said another; "you'll know how good it is, Misse!"

"We'll see her work!"

"Wonder if she'll get a cutting up, at night, like the rest of us!"

"I'd be glad to see her down for a flogging, I'll bound!" said another.

The woman took no notice of these taunts, but walked on, with the sameexpression of angry scorn, as if she heard nothing. Tom had always livedamong refined, and cultivated people, and he felt intuitively, from herair and bearing, that she belonged to that class; but how or why shecould be fallen to those degrading circumstances, he could not tell. Thewomen neither looked at him nor spoke to him, though, all the way to thefield, she kept close at his side.

Tom was soon busy at his work; but, as the woman was at no greatdistance from him, he often glanced an eye to her, at her work. He saw,at a glance, that a native adroitness and handiness made the task toher an easier one than it proved to many. She picked very fast and veryclean, and with an air of scorn, as if she despised both the work andthe disgrace and humiliation of the circumstances in which she wasplaced.

In the course of the day, Tom was working near the mulatto woman whohad been bought in the same lot with himself. She was evidently in acondition of great suffering, and Tom often heard her praying, as shewavered and trembled, and seemed about to fall down. Tom silently as hecame near to her, transferred several handfuls of cotton from his ownsack to hers.

"O, don't, don't!" said the woman, looking surprised; "it'll get youinto trouble."

Just then Sambo came up. He seemed to have a special spite against thiswoman; and, flourishing his whip, said, in brutal, guttural tones, "Whatdis yer, Luce,--foolin' a'" and, with the word, kicking the woman withhis heavy cowhide shoe, he struck Tom across the face with his whip.

Tom silently resumed his task; but the woman, before at the last pointof exhaustion, fainted.

"I'll bring her to!" said the driver, with a brutal grin. "I'll give hersomething better than camphire!" and, taking a pin from his coat-sleeve,he buried it to the head in her flesh. The woman groaned, and half rose."Get up, you beast, and work, will yer, or I'll show yer a trick more!"

The woman seemed stimulated, for a few moments, to an unnaturalstrength, and worked with desperate eagerness.

"See that you keep to dat ar," said the man, "or yer'll wish yer's deadtonight, I reckin!"

"That I do now!" Tom heard her say; and again he heard her say, "O,Lord, how long! O, Lord, why don't you help us?"

At the risk of all that he might suffer, Tom came forward again, and putall the cotton in his sack into the woman's.

"O, you mustn't! you donno what they'll do to ye!" said the woman.

"I can bar it!" said Tom, "better 'n you;" and he was at his placeagain. It passed in a moment.

Suddenly, the stranger woman whom we have described, and who had, in thecourse of her work, come near enough to hear Tom's last words, raisedher heavy black eyes, and fixed them, for a second, on him; then, takinga quantity of cotton from her basket, she placed it in his.

"You know nothing about this place," she said, "or you wouldn't havedone that. When you've been here a month, you'll be done helpinganybody; you'll find it hard enough to take care of your own skin!"

"The Lord forbid, Missis!" said Tom, using instinctively to his fieldcompanion the respectful form proper to the high bred with whom he hadlived.

"The Lord never visits these parts," said the woman, bitterly, as shewent nimbly forward with her work; and again the scornful smile curledher lips.

But the action of the woman had been seen by the driver, across thefield; and, flourishing his whip, he came up to her.

"What! what!" he said to the woman, with an air of triumph, "You afoolin'? Go along! yer under me now,--mind yourself, or yer'll cotchit!"

A glance like sheet-lightning suddenly flashed from those black eyes;and, facing about, with quivering lip and dilated nostrils, she drewherself up, and fixed a glance, blazing with rage and scorn, on thedriver.

"Dog!" she said, "touch _me_, if you dare! I've power enough, yet, tohave you torn by the dogs, burnt alive, cut to inches! I've only to saythe word!"

"What de devil you here for, den?" said the man, evidently cowed, andsullenly retreating a step or two. "Didn't mean no harm, Misse Cassy!"

"Keep your distance, then!" said the woman. And, in truth, the manseemed greatly inclined to attend to something at the other end of thefield, and started off in quick time.

The woman suddenly turned to her work, and labored with a despatch thatwas perfectly astonishing to Tom. She seemed to work by magic. Beforethe day was through, her basket was filled, crowded down, and piled, andshe had several times put largely into Tom's. Long after dusk, thewhole weary train, with their baskets on their heads, defiled up to thebuilding appropriated to the storing and weighing the cotton. Legree wasthere, busily conversing with the two drivers.

"Dat ar Tom's gwine to make a powerful deal o' trouble; kept a puttin'into Lucy's basket.--One o' these yer dat will get all der niggers tofeelin' 'bused, if Masir don't watch him!" said Sambo.

"Hey-dey! The black cuss!" said Legree. "He'll have to get a breakin'in, won't he, boys?"

Both negroes grinned a horrid grin, at this intimation.

"Ay, ay! Let Mas'r Legree alone, for breakin' in! De debil heselfcouldn't beat Mas'r at dat!" said Quimbo.

"Wal, boys, the best way is to give him the flogging to do, till he getsover his notions. Break him in!"

"Lord, Mas'r'll have hard work to get dat out o' him!"

"It'll have to come out of him, though!" said Legree, as he rolled histobacco in his mouth.

"Now, dar's Lucy,--de aggravatinest, ugliest wench on de place!" pursuedSambo.

"Take care, Sam; I shall begin to think what's the reason for your spiteagin Lucy."

"Well, Mas'r knows she sot herself up agin Mas'r, and wouldn't have me,when he telled her to."

"I'd a flogged her into 't," said Legree, spitting, "only there's such apress o' work, it don't seem wuth a while to upset her jist now. She'sslender; but these yer slender gals will bear half killin' to get theirown way!"

"Wal, Lucy was real aggravatin' and lazy, sulkin' round; wouldn't donothin,--and Tom he stuck up for her."

"He did, eh! Wal, then, Tom shall have the pleasure of flogging her.It'll be a good practice for him, and he won't put it on to the gal likeyou devils, neither."

"Ho, ho! haw! haw! haw!" laughed both the sooty wretches; and thediabolical sounds seemed, in truth, a not unapt expression of thefiendish character which Legree gave them.

"Wal, but, Mas'r, Tom and Misse Cassy, and dey among 'em, filled Lucy'sbasket. I ruther guess der weight 's in it, Mas'r!"

"_I do the weighing!_" said Legree, emphatically.

Both the drivers again laughed their diabolical laugh.

"So!" he added, "Misse Cassy did her day's work."

"She picks like de debil and all his angels!"

"She's got 'em all in her, I believe!" said Legree; and, growling abrutal oath, he proceeded to the weighing-room.

Slowly the weary, dispirited creatures, wound their way into the room,and, with crouching reluctance, presented their baskets to be weighed.

Legree noted on a slate, on the side of which was pasted a list ofnames, the amount.

Tom's basket was weighed and approved; and he looked, with an anxiousglance, for the success of the woman he had befriended.

Tottering with weakness, she came forward, and delivered her basket. Itwas of full weight, as Legree well perceived; but, affecting anger, hesaid,

"What, you lazy beast! short again! stand aside, you'll catch it, prettysoon!"

The woman gave a groan of utter despair, and sat down on a board.

The person who had been called Misse Cassy now came forward, and, witha haughty, negligent air, delivered her basket. As she delivered it,Legree looked in her eyes with a sneering yet inquiring glance.

She fixed her black eyes steadily on him, her lips moved slightly, andshe said something in French. What it was, no one knew; but Legree'sface became perfectly demoniacal in its expression, as she spoke; hehalf raised his hand, as if to strike,--a gesture which she regardedwith fierce disdain, as she turned and walked away.

"And now," said Legree, "come here, you Tom. You see, I telled ye Ididn't buy ye jest for the common work; I mean to promote ye, and make adriver of ye; and tonight ye may jest as well begin to get yer hand in.Now, ye jest take this yer gal and flog her; ye've seen enough on't toknow how."

"I beg Mas'r's pardon," said Tom; "hopes Mas'r won't set me at that. It'swhat I an't used to,--never did,--and can't do, no way possible."

"Ye'll larn a pretty smart chance of things ye never did know, beforeI've done with ye!" said Legree, taking up a cowhide, and striking Tom aheavy blow cross the cheek, and following up the infliction by a showerof blows.

"There!" he said, as he stopped to rest; "now, will ye tell me ye can'tdo it?"

"Yes, Mas'r," said Tom, putting up his hand, to wipe the blood, thattrickled down his face. "I'm willin' to work, night and day, and workwhile there's life and breath in me; but this yer thing I can't feel itright to do;--and, Mas'r, I _never_ shall do it,--_never_!"

Tom had a remarkably smooth, soft voice, and a habitually respectfulmanner, that had given Legree an idea that he would be cowardly, andeasily subdued. When he spoke these last words, a thrill of amazementwent through every one; the poor woman clasped her hands, and said,"O Lord!" and every one involuntarily looked at each other and drew intheir breath, as if to prepare for the storm that was about to burst.

Legree looked stupefied and confounded; but at last burst forth,--"What!ye blasted black beast! tell _me_ ye don't think it _right_ to do whatI tell ye! What have any of you cussed cattle to do with thinking what'sright? I'll put a stop to it! Why, what do ye think ye are? May be yethink ye'r a gentleman master, Tom, to be a telling your master what'sright, and what ain't! So you pretend it's wrong to flog the gal!"

"I think so, Mas'r," said Tom; "the poor crittur's sick and feeble; 'twould be downright cruel, and it's what I never will do, nor begin to.Mas'r, if you mean to kill me, kill me; but, as to my raising my handagin any one here, I never shall,--I'll die first!"

Tom spoke in a mild voice, but with a decision that could not bemistaken. Legree shook with anger; his greenish eyes glared fiercely,and his very whiskers seemed to curl with passion; but, like someferocious beast, that plays with its victim before he devours it, hekept back his strong impulse to proceed to immediate violence, and brokeout into bitter raillery.

"Well, here's a pious dog, at last, let down among us sinners!--a saint,a gentleman, and no less, to talk to us sinners about our sins! Powerfulholy critter, he must be! Here, you rascal, you make believe to be sopious,--didn't you never hear, out of yer Bible, 'Servants, obey yermasters'? An't I yer master? Didn't I pay down twelve hundred dollars,cash, for all there is inside yer old cussed black shell? An't yer mine,now, body and soul?" he said, giving Tom a violent kick with his heavyboot; "tell me!"

In the very depth of physical suffering, bowed by brutal oppression,this question shot a gleam of joy and triumph through Tom's soul. Hesuddenly stretched himself up, and, looking earnestly to heaven, whilethe tears and blood that flowed down his face mingled, he exclaimed,

"No! no! no! my soul an't yours, Mas'r! You haven't bought it,--yecan't buy it! It's been bought and paid for, by one that is able to keepit;--no matter, no matter, you can't harm me!"

"I can't!" said Legree, with a sneer; "we'll see,--we'll see! Here,Sambo, Quimbo, give this dog such a breakin' in as he won't get over,this month!"

The two gigantic negroes that now laid hold of Tom, with fiendishexultation in their faces, might have formed no unapt personification ofpowers of darkness. The poor woman screamed with apprehension, and allrose, as by a general impulse, while they dragged him unresisting fromthe place.