The English praise the negro soldiers whom they have in Sierra Leone for good behavior, temperance, and discipline; and their Jolofs at the Gambia execute complicated manoeuvres in a striking way. West-Indian troops have performed many distinguished services, and English officers say that they are as brave as Europeans; but in the heat of a fight they are apt to grow intractable and to behave wildly. The troops which Napoleon used in Calabria, drawn from the French Colonies, emulated the French soldiers, and arrived at great distinction.
D'Escayrac says that the native negro has eminent qualities for the making of a good soldier,--dependence upon a superior, unquestioning confidence in his sagacity, an enthusiastic courage which mounts to great audacity, passiveness, and capacity for waiting.
From this the Congos must be excepted. Large numbers of them deserted General Dessalines in San Domingo, and fled to the mountains, frightened at the daring of the French. Here, if brave, they might have been armed and officered by Spaniards to effect dangerous movements in his rear. But he knew their timidity, and gave himself no trouble about them. There is a genealogy which derives Toussaint from a Congo grandfather, a native prince of renown; but it was probably manufactured for him at the suggestion of his own achievements. The sullen-looking Congo is really gay, rollicking, disposed to idleness, careless and sensual, fatigued by the smallest act of reflection; Toussaint was grave, reticent, forecasting, tenacious, secretive, full of endurance and concentration, rapid and brave in war.[30] What a confident and noble aspect he had, when he left his guard and walked alone to the head of a column of old troops of his who had deserted to Desfourneaux, and were about to deliver their fire! "My children, will you fire upon your father?"--and down went four regiments upon their knees. The white officers tried to bring them under the fire of cannon, but it was too late. Here was a greater risk than Napoleon ran, after landing at Fréjus, on his march upon Paris.
Contempt for death is a universal trait of the native African.[31] The slaveholder says it is in consequence of his affinity to the brute, which does not know how to estimate a danger, and whose nervous organization is too dull to be thrilled and daunted in its presence. It is really in consequence of his single-mindedness: the big necks lift the blood, which is two degrees warmer than a white man's, and drench the brain with an ecstasy of daring. If he can clearly see the probable manner of his death, the blood is up and not down at the sight.[32] The negro's nerves are very susceptible; in cool blood he is easily alarmed at anything unexpected or threatening. His fancy is peopled with odd fears; he shrinks at the prospect of a punishment more grotesque or refined than usual. And when he becomes a Creole negro, his fancy is always shooting timid glances beneath the yoke of Slavery. The negroes and mulattoes at San Domingo looked impassively at hanging, breaking upon the wheel, and quartering; but when the first guillotine was imported and set in action, they and the Creole whites shrank appalled to see the head disappear in the basket. It was too deft and sudden for their taste, and this mode of execution was abandoned for the more hearty and lacerating methods.