Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence | Page 5

to the Cape at the head of 10,000 men and liberated
his benefactor. And, at the very moment of his liberation, a commission

arrived from France appointing General Laveaux Governor of the
Colony; his first official act was to proclaim Toussaint his lieutenant.
"This is the black," said Laveaux, "predicted by Raynal, and who is
destined to avenge the outrages committed against his whole race." A
remark soon verified, for on his attainment of the supreme power,
Toussaint avenged those injuries--by forgiveness!
As an acknowledgment for his eminent services against the British, and
against the mulattoes, who, inflamed with all the bitterness of caste,
had maintained a sanguinary war under their great leader Rigaud, in the
southern part of the colony, the Commissioners invested Toussaint with
the office and dignity of general-in-chief of Santo Domingo.
From that moment began the full development of the vast and versatile
genius of this extraordinary man. Standing amid the terrible, because
hostile, fragments of two revolutions, harassed by the rapacious greed
of commissioners upon commissioners, who, successively dispatched
from France, hid beneath a republican exterior a longing after the spoils;
with an army in the field accustomed by five years' experience to all the
license of civil war, Toussaint, with a giant hand, seized the reins of
government, reduced these conflicting elements to harmony and order,
and raised the colony to nearly its former prosperity, his lofty intellect
always delighting to effect its object rather by the tangled mazes of
diplomacy than by the strong arm of physical force, yet maintaining a
steadfast and unimpeached adherence to truth, his word, and his honor.
General Maitland, commander of the British forces, finding the
reduction of the island to be utterly hopeless, signed a treaty with
Toussaint for the evacuation of all the posts which he held. "Toussaint
then paid him a visit, and was received with military honors. After
partaking of a grand entertainment, he was presented by General
Maitland, in the name of His Majesty, with a splendid service of plate,
and put in possession of the government-house which had been built
and furnished by the English."
* * * * *
Buonaparte, on becoming First Consul, sent out the confirmation of

Toussaint as commander-in-chief, who, with views infinitely beyond
the short-sighted and selfish vision of the Commissioners, proclaimed a
general amnesty to the planters who had fled during the revolutions,
earnestly invited their return to the possession of their estates, and, with
a delicate regard to their feelings, decreed that the epithet "emigrant"
should not be applied to them. Many of the planters accepted the
invitation, and returned to the peaceful possession of their estates.
In regard to the army of Toussaint, General Lacroix, one of the planters
who returned, affirms "that never was a European army subjected to a
more rigid discipline than that which was observed by the troops of
Toussaint." Yet this army was converted by the commander-in-chief
into industrious laborers, by the simple expedient of paying them for
their labor. "When he restored many of the planters to their estates,
there was no restoration of their former property in human beings. No
human being was to be bought or sold. Severe tasks, flagellations, and
scanty food were no longer to be endured. The planters were obliged to
employ their laborers on the footing of hired servants." "And under this
system," says Lacroix, "the colony advanced, as if by enchantment
towards its ancient splendor; cultivation was extended with such
rapidity that every day made its progress more perceptible. All
appeared to be happy, and regarded Toussaint as their guardian angel.
In making a tour of the island, he was hailed by the blacks with
universal joy, nor was he less a favorite of the whites."
Toussaint, having effected a bloodless conquest of the Spanish territory,
had now become commander of the entire island. Performing all the
executive duties, he made laws to suit the exigency of the times. His
Egeria was temperance accompanied with a constant activity of body
and mind.
The best proof of the entire success of his government is contained in
the comparative views of the exports of the island, before the
revolutions, and during the administration of Toussaint. Bear in mind
that, "before the revolution there were 450,000 slave laborers working
with a capital in the shape of buildings, mills, fixtures, and implements,
which had been accumulating during a century. Under Toussaint there

were 290,000 free laborers, many of them just from the army or the
mountains, working on plantations that had undergone the devastation
of insurrection and a seven years' war."
* * * * *
In consequence of the almost entire cessation of official communication
with France, and for other reasons equally good, Toussaint thought it
necessary for the public welfare to frame a new constitution for