THE REMARKABLE MAN AT RICHMOND.
“Let me have men about me that are fat;
Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep o’ nights:
Yond’ Cassius has a lean and hungry look.”
_Shakespeare._
Yes, Ratcliff had escaped. His temper had not been sweetened by his
forced visit to the North. In Fort Lafayette he had for a while given
way to the sulks. Then he changed his tactics. Finding that Surgeon
Mooney, though a Northern man, had conservative notions on the subject
of the “nigger,” he addressed himself to the work of befooling that
functionary. Inasmuch as Nature had already half done it to his hands,
he did not find the task a difficult one.
In his imprisonment Ratcliff had ample time for indulging in day-dreams.
He grew almost maudlin over that photograph of Clara. Yes! By his
splendid generosity he would bind to him forever that beautiful young
girl.
He must transmit his proud name to legitimate children. He must be the
founder of a noble house; for the Confederacy, when triumphant, would
undoubtedly have its orders of nobility. A few years in Europe with such
a wife would suit him admirably. Slidell and Mason, having been released
from Fort Warren in Boston harbor, would be proud to take him by the
hand and introduce him and his to the best society.
These visions came to soften his chagrin and mitigate the tediousness of
imprisonment. But he now grew impatient for the fulfilment of his
schemes. Delay had its dangers. True, he confided much in the vigilance
of Semmes, but Semmes was an old man, and might drop off any day. A
beautiful white slave was a very hazardous piece of property.
It was not difficult for Ratcliff to persuade Surgeon Mooney that his
health required greater liberty of movement. At a time when, under the
Davis _régime_, sick and wounded United States soldiers, imprisoned at
Richmond in filthy tobacco-warehouses, were, in repeated instances,
brutally and against all civilized usages shot dead for going to the
windows to inhale a little fresh air, the National authorities were
tender to a degree, almost ludicrous in contrast, of the health and
rights of Rebel prisoners. If any of these were troubled with a bowel
complaint or a touch of lumbago, the “central despotism at Washington”
was denounced, by journals hostile to the war, as responsible for the
affliction, and the people were called on to rescue violated Freedom
from the clutches of an insidious tyrant, even from plain, scrupulous
“old Abe,” son of a poor Kentuckian who could show no pedigree, like
Colonel Delancy Hyde and Jefferson Davis.
A pathetic paragraph appeared in one of the newspapers, giving a piteous
story of a “loyal citizen of New Orleans,” who, for no namable offence,
was made to pine in a foul dungeon to satisfy the personal pique of Mr.
Secretary Stanton. Soon afterwards a remonstrance in behalf of this
victim of oppression was signed by Surgeon Mooney. Ratcliff, whom the
public sympathy had been led to picture as in the last stage of a mortal
malady, was forthwith admitted to extraordinary privileges. He was
enabled to communicate clandestinely with friends in New York. He soon
managed to get on board a Nova Scotia coasting schooner. A week
afterwards, he succeeded in running the blockade, and in disembarking
safely at Wilmington, N. C.
Anxious as he was to get home, he must first go to Richmond to pay his
respects to “President” Davis, of whom everybody at the South used to
say to Mr. W. H. Russell of the London Times, “Don’t you think our
President is a remarkable man?” Ratcliff was not unknown to Davis, and
sent up his card. It drew forth an immediate “Show him in.” The
“remarkable man” sat in his library at a small table strewn with letters
and manuscripts. A thin, Cassius-like, care-burdened figure, slightly
above the middle height. What some persons called dignity in his manner
was in truth merely ungracious stiffness; while his _hauteur_ was the
unquiet arrogance that fears it shall not get its due. His face was not
that of a man who could prudently afford to sneer (as he had publicly
done) at Abraham Lincoln’s homeliness. But before him lay letters on
which the postage-stamp was an absurdly flattered likeness of
himself,—as like him as the starved apothecary is like Jupiter Tonans.
In the original the cheeks were shrunken and sallow, leaving the bones
high and salient. The jaws were thin and hollow; the forehead wrinkled
and out of all proportion with the lower part of the face; the eyes
deep-set, and one of them dulled by a severe neuralgic affection. The
lips were too thin, and there was no sweetness in the mouth. The whole
expression was that of one whose besetting characteristic is an intense
self-consciousness.
This man could not be betrayed into the ease and _abandon_ of one of
nature’s noblemen, for he was never thinking so much of others as of
himself. The absence in him of all geniality of manner was not the
reserve of a gentleman, but the frigidity of an unsympathetic and
unassured heart. There was little in him of the Southern type of
manhood. It is not to be wondered that bluff General Taylor could not
overcome his repugnance to him as a son-in-law.
Although at the head of the Rebellion, this man had no vital faith in
it; no enthusiasm that could magnetize others by a noble contagion. He
was not a fanatic, like Stonewall Jackson. And yet, just previously to
Ratcliff’s call, he had been exercised in mind about joining the
church,—a step he finally took.
He had few of the qualities of a statesman. His petty malignities
overcame all sense of the proprieties becoming his station; for he would
give way, even in his public official addresses, to scurrilities which
had the meanness without the virility of the slang of George Sanderson,
and which showed a lack of the primary elements of a heroic nature.
A man greatly overrated as to abilities. A repudiator of the sacred
obligations assumed by his State, it was his added infelicity to be
defended by John Slidell. Never respected for truthfulness by those who
knew him best. Future historians will contrast him with President
Lincoln, and will show that, while the latter surpassed him immeasurably
in high moral attributes, he was also his superior in intellectual pith.
The interview between Ratcliff and Davis began with an interchange of
views on the subject of New Orleans. Each cheered the other with
assurances of the impracticability of the Federal attack. After public
affairs had been discussed, the so-called President said: “Excuse me for
not having asked after Mrs. Ratcliff. Is she well?”
“She died some time since,” replied Ratcliff.
“Indeed! In these times of general bereavement we find it impossible to
keep account of our friends.”
“It is my purpose, Mr. President, to marry soon again. You have yourself
set the example of second nuptials, and I believe the experiment has
been a happy one.”
“Yes; may yours be as fortunate! Who is the lady?”
“A young person not known in society, but highly respectable and well
educated. I shall have the pleasure to present her to you here in
Richmond in the course of the summer.”
“Mrs. Davis will be charmed to make her acquaintance. Come and help us
celebrate Lee’s next great victory.”
“Thank you. If I can get my affairs into position, I may wish to pass
the next year in Europe with my new wife. It would not be difficult, I
suppose, for you to give me some diplomatic stamp that would make me
pass current.”
“The government will be disposed, no doubt, to meet your views. We are
likely to want some accredited agent in Spain. A post that would enable
you to fluctuate between Madrid and Paris would be not an unpleasant
one.”
“It would suit me entirely, Mr. President.”
“You may rely on my friendly consideration.”
“Thank you. How about foreign recognition?”
“Slidell writes favorably as to the Emperor’s predispositions. In
England, the aristocracy and gentry, with most of the trading classes,
undoubtedly favor our cause. They desire to see the Union permanently
broken up, and will help us all they can. But they must do this
_indirectly_, seeing that the mass of the English people, the rabble
rout, even the artisans, thrown out of employment by this war,
sympathize with the plebeians of the North rather than with us, the true
master race of this continent, the patricians of the South.”
“I’m glad to see, Mr. President, you characterize the Northern scum as
they deserve,—descendants of the refuse sent over by Cromwell.”
“Yes, Mr. Ratcliff, you and I who are gentlemen by birth and
education,—and whose ancestors, further back than the Norman Conquest,
were all gentlemen,[41]—can poorly disguise our disgust at any
association with Yankees.”
“Gladstone says you’ve created a nation, Mr. President.”
“Yes; Gladstone is a high-toned gentleman. His ancestors made their
fortunes in the Liverpool slave-trade.”
“Have you any assurances yet from Mason?”
“Nothing decisive. But the eagerness of the Ministry to humble the North
in the Trent affair shows the real _animus_ of the ruling classes in
England. Lord John disappoints me occasionally. Bad blood there. But the
rest are all right.”
“A pity they couldn’t put their peasantry into the condition of our
slaves!”
“A thousand pities! But the new Confederacy must be a Missionary to the
Nations,[42] to teach the ruling classes throughout the world, that
slavery is the normal _status_ for the mechanic and the laborer.
Meanwhile the friends of monarchy in Europe must foresee that such a
triumph as republicanism would have in the restoration of the old Union,
with slavery no longer a power in the land, and with an army and navy
the first in the world, would be an appalling spectacle.”
“What do you hear from Washington, Mr. President?”
“The last I heard of the gorilla, he was investigating the so-called
spiritual phenomena. The letter-writers tell of a _medium_ having been
entertained at the White House.”
Here Mr. Memminger came in to talk over the state of the Rebel
exchequer,—a subject which Mr. Davis generally disposed of by ignoring;
his old experience in repudiation teaching him that the best mode of
fancy financiering was,—if we may descend to the vernacular,—to “go it
blind.”
“I’ll intrude no longer on your precious time,” said Ratcliff. “I go
home to send you word that the renegade Tennessean, Farragut, and that
peddling lawyer from Lowell, Picayune Butler, have been spued out of the
mouths of the Mississippi.”
The “President” rose, pressed Ratcliff’s proffered hand, and, with a
stiff, angular bow, parted from him at the door.
-----
Footnote 41:
Mr. Davis’s father was a “cavalier.” He dealt in horses.
Footnote 42:
“Reverently, we feel that our Confederacy is a God-sent missionary to
the nations, with great truths to preach.”—_Richmond Enquirer._