Part 12

About six miles off the city, we got at last set fast; when, growing impatient of such close confinement, I requested the captain to set me on shore. The thing was voted impracticable; but I decided to make the attempt, and was accordingly rowed to the right bank of the river, when I took to the swamp, hungry and savage enough to have eaten any alligator fool-hardy enough to assail me. After a hard scramble, together with two or three plunges waist deep, I escaped suffocation, and gained one of the banks dividing and draining these vast fields: following this, unimpeded by other difficulty, I reached, after half an hour's march, the high land; and, attracted by the sounds of merriment, mounted the first bluff, where I found a large barn occupied by a couple of score laughing, noisy negroes employed thrashing out the crop: from one of these I received directions how to reach Savannah, whose spires were clearly to be seen.

At the end of about five miles, I found myself an exceeding dirty gentleman entering upon the long well-shaded mall which protects the river-front of the city. I was, by this, tolerably tired of my walk; for the light sandy soil was ankle-deep, and the sun broiling. After passing one block or range of counting-houses, I gladly read on the first of the next range the name of a friend from whom I felt certain of welcome.

A capital dinner, and a glass of the finest Madeira in the States, made light of past labour; and during the evening I was glad to learn that the Washington had arrived with her freight all safe and well. My friend Matthew now informed me he had given the boys in the boat directions to wait for me half an hour, which they did, fully anticipating that I should never clear the cane-brake and swamp lying between the river and the fields; and, in sooth, it required some perseverance.

SAVANNAH.

With this little city I was exceedingly pleased. The weather was remarkably mild, the sun shone brightly; and I took much pleasure in wandering along the quiet sandy streets, flanked by double rows of the Pride-of-India tree.

Except the range of buildings immediately facing the river, the dwellings are nearly all detached; each surrounded by its own offices, many by a garden filled with orange and other evergreens: they are mostly built on the true Southern plan, of two stories, with a broad gallery running entirely round; being of wood and painted white, with bright green jalousies, they give to the streets a gay and lively look, which is exceedingly cheerful and attractive.

Here are, however, several very ambitious-looking dwellings, built by a European architect for wealthy merchants during the palmy days of trade; these are of stone or some composition, showily designed, and very large, but ill-adapted, I should imagine, for summer residences in this climate. They are mostly deserted, or let for boarding-houses, and have that decayed look which is so melancholy, and which nowhere arrives sooner than in this climate.

Here is a very well designed and well-built theatre, but, like the houses I speak of, a good deal the worse in consequence of neglect: the materials and design were, I understood, all imported from England, at a prodigious cost when the smallness of the population is considered; but it is now, I fancy, rarely occupied.

On this occasion I had the pleasure of seeing it well filled for the four nights I acted, and had to regret my time was of necessity so limited, since my audience was as merry and intelligent as heart could wish.

My days were passed at the hospitable house of Mr. G----n, where I encountered many pleasant people; and was attended by the sleekest, merriest set of negroes imaginable, most of whom had grown old or were born in their master's house: his own good-humoured, active benevolence of spirit was reflected in the faces of his servants.

The trade of this port was at one period great; it offered at this time a cheerful prospect of well-lined quays, and I was glad to learn that the prospects of the community were again brightening; indeed, the high prices of produce this year are infusing additional life and spirit into the whole Southern community: the speculators in cotton are ardent, and the prices continually on the rise.

On the 15th, left this in a steamer called the George Washington, to proceed up the Savannah river to Augusta; a distance, by this route, of rather more than two hundred miles.

I got on board late at night, went immediately to bed, and, on coming on deck the next morning, found myself in the bosom of a dense forest, the trees growing as it were out of the very water, and all of them, with the exception of the gloomy cypress, still thickly covered with their gay autumnal foliage: numbers of the willow tribe were as fresh and green as in early springtime, at which season a sail up this river must be overpoweringly fragrant: even now, although offering little change of character for two hundred miles, it was not wholly devoid of interest; for it is constantly upon the wind, the longest reach limiting your view to a few hundred yards.

Our boat was small and very deeply laden, making hardly four miles an hour; but she had few passengers, was capitally provisioned, and possessed an indefatigable and most obliging commander, so that the tedium consequent upon such a progress had at least no nuisance superadded to make it more irksome.

Every few miles we brought up to take in a fresh supply of fuel; we were thus enabled constantly to stretch our legs in the forest; but throughout the whole distance so exactly similar were most of these landings that a light-hearted countryman of mine, whose company I was lucky enough to have, constantly used, on stopping, to say,

"I'd like to be sure we haven't gone back; and that this place is itself, and not the other."

We went ahead however, though but slowly; and after passing four nights and three days upon this miniature Mississippi,--for the characteristics are exactly similar, even to the owls and alligators,--we were safely landed at Augusta; perhaps, the most enterprising and most thriving community in Georgia.

By Mr. G----n's recommendation, I proceeded to the Planters' Hotel, kept by Judge Hales, a kind man and a worthy magistrate; and found that, in anticipation of my arrival, he had already secured me the earliest chance for a vacancy on the way-bill for Millidgeville.

Augusta consists of one very wide street, a couple of miles in length, and composed of a mixed description of building; many of the houses and stores being of wood, and exceedingly humble in appearance; others are built of brick, large, handsome, and well fitted up, in emulation of those in the northern cities; all, however, exhibited evidences of active and successful trade.

This was the high season for the arrival here of cotton from the plantations in the interior, whence it is forwarded by the railroad to Charleston, or down the river to Savannah. The streets were crowded with planters, and the suburbs with waggons either empty or laden; and these, together with their hardy drivers and assistants, who camp in all weathers amidst the forest, make a picture at once interesting in a commercial point of view, and in itself singularly striking.

As in the smallest American towns, I here met with an excellent bathing establishment; and found a hot bath, after being mewed up three days on board the steamer, a most joyous luxury.

The Planters' Hotel afforded an excellent dinner and a good bottle of sherry; and in the evening the mail-stage arrived, when to my great joy I was informed my place was safe, although there were many expectants necessarily left to abide the next stage. At this season of the year the current setting South is enormous: every stage from the North is laden; and, once thrown out, a man may have many days to wait before he gets a chance of proceeding.

19th.--At six P.M. quitted Augusta, with nine other victims, in a stage otherwise laden with mail-bags and luggage. About an hour before we started rain set in, and the weather-wise prognosticate that the fine season is now at an end for this year. I certainly have no right to complain, but could desire the rain might yet be postponed for a few days. The roads were from the start as bad as could be, and the heavy fall was not likely to improve that part of our route which was to come.

We passed in the course of this night several camps of emigrants, on the move from the Carolinas and Georgia: they managed to keep their fires blazing in the forest, in spite of the falling shower; occasionally might be seen a huge pine crackling and burning throughout as it lay on the ground, whilst, ranged to windward, stood the waggons and huts of the campers.

The rich alluvial lands of Alabama, recently belonging to the Indian reserves, and now on sale by government or through land-speculators, are attracting thousands of families from the washed-out and impoverished soil of the older Southern States; and, during this and the preceding season, the numbers moving along this and the other great lines towards the South-west are incredible, when viewed in reference to the amount of population given to the countries whence the emigrants are chiefly derived.

At a season like the present, the sufferings of these families must be considerable. The caravan usually consists of from two to four tilt waggons, long and low-roofed; each laden, first with the needful provisions and such household gear as may be considered indispensable; next, over this portion of the freight is stowed the family of the emigrant planter, his wife, and commonly a round squad of white-haired children, with their attendants: on the march these vehicles are preceded and surrounded by the field slaves, varying in numbers from half a dozen to fifty or sixty, according to the wealth of the proprietor; a couple of mounted travellers commonly complete the cavalcade, which moves over these roads at the rate of twelve or fifteen miles a day. At night, or when the team gives out, or the waggons are fairly stalled, or set fast, the party prepares to camp: the men cut down a tree for fire, and with its branches make such rude huts as their time and ingenuity may best contrive; the females prepare the evening meal, and perform such domestic duties as may be needful. On these occasions I have frequently passed amongst or halted by them, and have been surprised at the air of content and good-humour commonly prevailing in their rude camps, despite of the apparent discomfort and privation to which they were exposed.

Many of the negroes, however, I am informed, are exceedingly averse to a removal from the sites on which they have been bred, and where their connexions are formed: in these cases, planters who are uncertain of the personal attachment of their slaves, generally dispose of them amongst their neighbours: when they are really attached to their owners, however, there is little difficulty experienced in their removal.

In most of the parties I encountered, I should say, judging fairly by their deportment and loud merriment, despite the great fatigue and constant exposure, the affair was taken in a sort of holiday spirit, no way warranted by their half-naked miserable appearance.