as a great favorite; and all
sorts of complaints and grievances were breathed in my ear; and I told
them to mother, and we, between us, formed a sort of committee for
a redress of grievances. We hindered and repressed a great deal of
cruelty, and congratulated ourselves on doing a vast deal of good, till,
as often happens, my zeal overacted. Stubbs complained to my father that
he couldn't manage the hands, and must resign his position. Father was
a fond, indulgent husband, but a man that never flinched from anything
that he thought necessary; and so he put down his foot, like a rock,
between us and the field-hands. He told my mother, in language
perfectly respectful and deferential, but quite explicit, that over
the house-servants she should be entire mistress, but that with the
field-hands he could allow no interference. He revered and respected her
above all living beings; but he would have said it all the same to the
virgin Mary herself, if she had come in the way of his system.

"I used sometimes to hear my mother reasoning cases with
him,--endeavoring to excite his sympathies. He would listen to the most
pathetic appeals with the most discouraging politeness and equanimity.
'It all resolves itself into this,' he would say; 'must I part with
Stubbs, or keep him? Stubbs is the soul of punctuality, honesty, and
efficiency,--a thorough business hand, and as humane as the general
run. We can't have perfection; and if I keep him, I must sustain his
administration as a _whole_, even if there are, now and then, things
that are exceptionable. All government includes some necessary hardness.
General rules will bear hard on particular cases.' This last maxim my
father seemed to consider a settler in most alleged cases of cruelty.
After he had said _that_, he commonly drew up his feet on the sofa, like
a man that has disposed of a business, and betook himself to a nap, or
the newspaper, as the case might be.

"The fact is my father showed the exact sort of talent for a statesman.
He could have divided Poland as easily as an orange, or trod on Ireland
as quietly and systematically as any man living. At last my mother gave
up, in despair. It never will be known, till the last account, what
noble and sensitive natures like hers have felt, cast, utterly helpless,
into what seems to them an abyss of injustice and cruelty, and which
seems so to nobody about them. It has been an age of long sorrow of such
natures, in such a hell-beg