The Life of General Francis Marion [56]
eyes, is now the prey of devouring flames. Their slaves have all disappeared; their stock, part is taken away, part lies bleeding in the yard, stabbed by bayonets; their elegant furniture, tables, glasses, clocks, beds, all is swallowed up. An army of passing demons could have done no worse. But while with tearful eye they are looking round on the wide-spread ruin, undermined by the fire, down comes the tall building with thundering crash to the ground. The frightened mourners start aghast from the hideous squelch, and weep afresh to see all the hopes and glories of their state thus suddenly ended in smoke and ashes.
It was in this way exactly that the British treated my brother, major Hugh Horry, as brave a soldier as ever fought in America. They laid in ashes all his dwelling houses, his barns of clean rice, and even his rice stacks! Destroyed his cattle; carried off eighty negroes, which were all he had, not leaving him one to bake him a cake. Thus, in one hour, as the wild Arabs served Job, did the British serve my poor brother, breaking him up root and branch; and, from a state of affluence, reduced him to a dunghill.
These savage examples, first set by the British, and followed by the tories, soon produced the effect which Marion had all along predicted. They filled the hearts of the sufferers with the deadliest hate of the British; and brought them, in crowds, to join his standard, with muskets in their hands, and vows of revenge eternal in their mouths.
Hence it was that nothing so pleased Marion as to hear of British cruelty to his countrymen.
"'Tis a harsh medicine," he used to say, "but it is necessary; for there is nothing else that will work them. And unless they are well worked and scoured of their mother milk, or beastling partiality to the English, they are lost. Our country is like a man who has swallowed a mortal poison. Give him an anodyne to keep him easy, and he's a dead man. But if you can only knock him about, and so put the poison in motion as to make him deadly sick at the stomach, and heave like a dog with a bone in his throat, he is safe. Cornwallis has all this time been lulling them by his proclamations, and protections, and lies. But, thank God, that time is pretty well over now; for these unfeeling monsters, these children of the devil, have let out the cloven foot, and the thing is now beginning to work as I expected. Our long deluded people are opening their eyes, and beginning to see and smell the blood and burnings of that `Tophet', that political hell of slavery and ruin, to which the British army is now endeavoring, by murder and rapine, to reduce them."
This was truly the case: for, every day the whigs were coming into Marion's camp. Those who were too old to fight themselves, would call upon their sturdy boys to "turn out and join general Marion."
It was diverting to see how they would come staving upon their tackies; belted round with their powderhorns and shotbags, with rifles in hand, and their humble homespun streaming in the air. The finely curling smile brightened in the face of Marion; and his eye beamed that laughing joy, with which a father meets his thoughtless boy, returning dirty and beaten by blackguards, from whose dangerous company he had sought in vain a thousand times to wean him.
"Well, my son!" Marion would say, "and what good news do you bring us?"
"Why, why, why, sir general," replies the youth, half cocked with rage, and stammering for words, "as I was overlooking my father's negroes in the rice grounds, the British and tories came and took them and carried them all away; and I only am left alone to tell you."
Presently another comes and says: "As I was driving the horses and cattle down to the pasture, the British and tories fell upon them, and carried them all away; and I alone am left to tell you."
While he was yet speaking, another comes and says: "The British and tories came with fire and burnt our houses and goods, and have driven my mother and the children into the woods; and I only am left alone to tell you."
It was in this way exactly that the British treated my brother, major Hugh Horry, as brave a soldier as ever fought in America. They laid in ashes all his dwelling houses, his barns of clean rice, and even his rice stacks! Destroyed his cattle; carried off eighty negroes, which were all he had, not leaving him one to bake him a cake. Thus, in one hour, as the wild Arabs served Job, did the British serve my poor brother, breaking him up root and branch; and, from a state of affluence, reduced him to a dunghill.
These savage examples, first set by the British, and followed by the tories, soon produced the effect which Marion had all along predicted. They filled the hearts of the sufferers with the deadliest hate of the British; and brought them, in crowds, to join his standard, with muskets in their hands, and vows of revenge eternal in their mouths.
Hence it was that nothing so pleased Marion as to hear of British cruelty to his countrymen.
"'Tis a harsh medicine," he used to say, "but it is necessary; for there is nothing else that will work them. And unless they are well worked and scoured of their mother milk, or beastling partiality to the English, they are lost. Our country is like a man who has swallowed a mortal poison. Give him an anodyne to keep him easy, and he's a dead man. But if you can only knock him about, and so put the poison in motion as to make him deadly sick at the stomach, and heave like a dog with a bone in his throat, he is safe. Cornwallis has all this time been lulling them by his proclamations, and protections, and lies. But, thank God, that time is pretty well over now; for these unfeeling monsters, these children of the devil, have let out the cloven foot, and the thing is now beginning to work as I expected. Our long deluded people are opening their eyes, and beginning to see and smell the blood and burnings of that `Tophet', that political hell of slavery and ruin, to which the British army is now endeavoring, by murder and rapine, to reduce them."
This was truly the case: for, every day the whigs were coming into Marion's camp. Those who were too old to fight themselves, would call upon their sturdy boys to "turn out and join general Marion."
It was diverting to see how they would come staving upon their tackies; belted round with their powderhorns and shotbags, with rifles in hand, and their humble homespun streaming in the air. The finely curling smile brightened in the face of Marion; and his eye beamed that laughing joy, with which a father meets his thoughtless boy, returning dirty and beaten by blackguards, from whose dangerous company he had sought in vain a thousand times to wean him.
"Well, my son!" Marion would say, "and what good news do you bring us?"
"Why, why, why, sir general," replies the youth, half cocked with rage, and stammering for words, "as I was overlooking my father's negroes in the rice grounds, the British and tories came and took them and carried them all away; and I only am left alone to tell you."
Presently another comes and says: "As I was driving the horses and cattle down to the pasture, the British and tories fell upon them, and carried them all away; and I alone am left to tell you."
While he was yet speaking, another comes and says: "The British and tories came with fire and burnt our houses and goods, and have driven my mother and the children into the woods; and I only am left alone to tell you."